Chiko's already developed a reputation as a rip-off artist, and the ROM hacking community is probably small enough that if he ever ripped off your own original work, it wouldn't go unnoticed for long (source: this thread). People would identify who had the originals and probably either be indifferent to him or hate him for it.

If you're feeling anxious about him ripping you off, just remember that this is a very good reason to be a well-rounded hacker; that is, if you put your hack out first AND it is a quality project, then more people will know how much work you put into yours and in the event that it's stolen from, the community may look down upon the thief because they will already be familiar with your superior work. Let's remember that there's nothing positive that puts Chiko's hacks on a level above other people's; his level design is straightforward and mediocre, he rips off graphics (and not very well, either), his custom music isn't all that great (Dood in Gate was good, though), and his sprite AI hacking is lackluster at best and generally cheap.

tl;dr: there's nothing to worry about, really. Thieves will be thieves, and if Chiko keeps riding on the coattails of other ROM hackers, his projects will never be as great as they could be.

Did that make any sense? I've got such a headache right now.

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Posted by "Keiya633"

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Competitive play was where the severe imbalance showed the most. If your opponent had a Mewtwo with Psychic, Amnesia, Recover, and say... Seismic Toss or Blizzard, it really doesn't matter. If you had no Chansey or a Mewtwo of your own, you have absolutely no chance of victory. Nothing could stand up to the embodiment of destruction that Mewtwo was in R/B/Y. All he needed to do was use Amnesia a couple of times and he'll effortlessly sweep your entire team in the blink of an eye.

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Not to rain on your parade, 'cause I know you're trying to stress how ridiculously imbalanced that Pokemon is, but I always had fun kicking his ass with rentals on Pokemon Stadium (R2 version has the exact move setup you mentioned, with Blizzard and Rest over Recover). I'd always open up with Thunder Wave, then I'd either have the rest of the team with Explosion usually kill him in two uses of the move or I'd have the other five team members use Horn Drill/Fissure/Guillotine to see how many turns would go before he got one-shot. Ah, good times, good times.

Mewtwo goes down pretty easily with that Thunder Wave + Explosion strategy I just mentioned, and no human player is gonna' give him Rest instead of Recover...so once you've cripped him with Thunder Wave, it's pretty much game over for Mr. Pwnage. Of course, having to use two or three Pokemon just to kick Mewtwo's ass really sucks, and if your opponent is actually using Mewtwo for competitive play, then odds are he's one of those brats that brought four more and a Mew or is a cheat abuser.

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Yeah, you're right. It would have been better if Mewtwo simply were unattainable; as you've likened him to "that one boss" from the typical RPG, I'm sure Gamefreak's intent was for him to simply overpower everything else in much the same way. There was no golden rule of balance back then.

And let's face it: the sucker is STILL damn powerful now. He may go down a lot easier, but he will tear a hole through almost any team that is unprepared to handle an uber.

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One underlying benefit of a thread like this is that it will teach people unfamiliar with HTML and CSS how to go about constructing a custom layout, too.

This is a good idea. Unfortunately, I've got nothin' at the moment.

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"Maze of Doom" is 1-3? I'd be kinda' scared to see what 6-3 would be titled, then.

It looks good, of course. I have to ponder, however...how difficult would graphics hacking for SMW2 be? Every hack of it I've seen so far is vanilla, and while vanilla is good...well, you know.

Keep it up!

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Is this a thread where anyone can post questions and suggestions? If so, I have a question...not an important one, but it'd be nice if someone could satiate my overly-curious self. Wall-o-text incoming:

On this forum as well as many others, bumping older threads is considered bad conduct or is against the rules. This confuses me. I've seen staff on various forums go so far as to suspend or ban users over this; personally, I am no fan of necrobumps and never do them if the content is more than a month old (or if the particular board is very very slow), but an explanation would be nice if at all possible concerning the general idea over this.

I'm mostly confused because there is another forum that I once frequented where this was the exact opposite; namely, if a new thread were created pertaining to a subject archived in the forum, then no matter how old, users and mods alike would tell the offender(s) to use the search function to find posts pertaining to the subject at hand instead of creating a whole new topic over it.

I guess my question is simply "why?"

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Okay. I can roll with that. That makes quite a bit more sense.

Thank you very much.

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Holy crap, Matrixz. That is awesome.

I wish I could do half the things you've put into your hack. xD Seriously. Awesome job.

I know it wasn't the focus of your video, but I really like your pause screen, as well (I'm a sucker for GUI edits). It looks completely professional, I like the color scheme, and it makes me happy to see the MMX subtanks successfully coded into a classic series entry. Keep it up!

Oh, and as far as the colors on the lava are concerned... I honestly think it looks fine as it is, but if you wanted to make it "hotter," then maybe you should increase the brightness of the lighter colors while leaving the red as it is. If the red isn't changed, then it shouldn't look too sandy, in my opinion.

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Oh, I was merely remarking on the fact that some SNES games use a strange compression method for their graphics. I know Super Mario World does this, which prevents straight editing of the tiles.

I just figured that since the original game does it, then SMW2 does as well...but maybe it doesn't. :o

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Posted by boingboingsplat

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FuSoYa made Ycompress which can decompress and recompress the graphics from YI.

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Thought so. The OP seemed to be suggesting that we could skip this step, though; hence my confusion.

Now we know!

As for the 1-up deal... No matter what the player's level design is, it's ridiculously easy to gain extra lives from the bonus games, so I don't see any real problem as long as the hack is made to be difficult.

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Hmm, I had no idea they did that... I thought most of the stuff changed was just censorship of sexual/religious things and needlessly changing characters' names in order to piss off a whole bunch of people.

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Posted by "DahrkDaiz"

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Plus, I kind of want to prove to the world you can make a great hack without extensive ASM hacking.

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NO! How dare you steal my idea!

I kid, I kid.

On a more serious note, it's nice to see one of the foremost authorities in SMB3 hacking jump back into the scene. It's uplifting and encouraging, seeing as yours is one of the very few Mario 3 hacks I've actually been able to play to completion without becoming disgusted by the second or third level. I have faith that, in time, you will deliver another masterpiece unto our humble little community. Good luck to you, Dahrk!

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Wow... Thanks, Matrixz! Visual data displays like this are pretty much a must in ROM hacking if one wishes to not be driven to insanity. I've been pretty up in the air about hacking a Megaman title, so a nice chart like this will certainly help if I ever go back to that corner of the ROM hacking world.

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Personally, Dahrk, I love your editor ideas. My only concern is an unshakable fear that it is so revolutionary or easy to use that people no longer have to think when hacking SMB3. *glares at Super Mario World*

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Posted by DahrkDaiz

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As for the editor making it super easy and it's no longer hacking anymore, hell yeah it will! But a good level editor can't make up for great ideas and level design

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Well, I'm actually more concerned about GOOD hacks getting lost in an ocean of terrible ones. There are already a lot of bad SMB3 hacks, though, so maybe my concern is misplaced.

Regardless, I look forward to seeing what you can really do with Mario 3. How old is Mario Adventure now? I'll bet you've learned a plethora of new tricks since then.

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Posted by copyRIGHThunter

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Yeah. I've done that, but I'm also horrible with the pointers (that why almost all the levels I made are only 1 room long) so It wound up screwing up rooms. My W1-1 and W1-5 were supposed to be 2 rooms, but I screwed up the rooms I needed. Also, that's why the fortress I made ends abruptly.

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If you're still interested in hacking the NES version, there are ways to get around all the problems you mentioned. Outlining this would take up far too much space here, though, so if you're interested, PM me or something.

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No problem, CRH. I completely understand.

So they updated goomba's shoe, huh? I wonder if they added swimming capabilities to it, too... The NES version lacks this (a common cause of death for me in Chaos Control and especially Mario Adventure, but an understandable one seeing as the original 5-3 has no water).

I wish I could code your editor, but unfortunately, it's out of my expertise. I'd like to pick up on a real programming language someday (I'm an expert with RPG Maker, but that's about it, sadly), but that could be a year or ten from now.

Random question: is there any way to port GBA save files to actual GBA cartridges? I'd love nothing more than to play the e-reader levels on my actual GBA/DS/Gamecube without having to sit in front of my PC.

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@Kawa: Hmm...what version of FFVI is that? The resolution seems...different.

@Insect: Wow, I like what you did to the menu. You even have your own icons, now. Good luck in programming all those new weapons. I look forward to more progress!

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Posted by Kiiro

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If you have a DS, can you launch DS homebrews ?
If yes, use GBA Backup Tool, it does what you want.

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Ah, no. I'd rather not mess with my DS like that. If I mod anything, it'll be my PSP...and only after games stop coming out for it.

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Posted by interdpth

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Megaman's Oddsey: The quest for emotions.

How's that?

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Sounds a bit too "human" to me, if you know what I mean. Personally, I think "Megaman Odyssey" is fine.

Since the game is being hacked so thoroughly, though, might I suggest taking the 3 out? I have a feeling it'll scarcely resemble the original by the time you're done with it.

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