Here's a first look at JBLP2! This is actually a real QR code that links to my photography website (which, at this time, is currently down, but that should be fixed in the days to come).

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For the lives all so wasted and gone

We feel the pain of a lifetime lost in a thousand days

Through the fire and the flames we carry on!

Just skyped you my TWS, Tom.

Guys, as I'm running out of web space, I'm going to have to remove a fair amount of CC Zone arcade games to clear up some more space for graphics and CC Zone downloads. I've decided to split these type of games into two categories.

• Broken
  
• Unpopular
  
  

• City Jumper
  
  
• Mini Golf
  
  
• Slot Machine
  
  
• Ten Pin Bowling
  
  
• Nyan Cat Fever
  
  
• Skee Ball
  
  
• Snake
  
  
• Classic Frogger
  
  
• Tetris Arcade
  
  
• Bloody Pingu
  
  
• Burger Time
  
  
• Marble Mayhem
  
  
• Ms. Pacman
  
  
• Tower Blocks
  
  
• Lemonade Tycoon
  
  
• Qbert
  
  

• Curveball - 2 votes
  
  
• Puzzle Bobble - 1 vote
  
  
• Mahjong - 1 vote
  
  
• Snake 360 - 1 vote
  
  
• Kitten Cannon
  - 1 vote
  
  
  
• Tower Defense - 1 vote
  
  
• Bush Royal Rampage - 1 vote
  
  
• Helicopter - 1 vote
  
  
• Minesweeper - 1 vote
  
  

• Minesweeper - 2 votes
  
  
• Multitask - 1 vote
  
  
• Mario Kart Extreme - 1 vote
  
  
• Snake 360 - 1 vote
  
  
• Crazy Pinball - 1 vote
  
  

I think the award requirement was like 50,000 or something. If so, I got almost 60,000 on my 1st attempt!

[img]<fileStore.core_Attachment>/monthly_2017_10/blog-0297139001362715969.jpg.8ee4de2a804e74ec589b394a5e966f38.jpg[/img]Welcome to J.B.'s Level Design Musings!

I've thought about starting this blog for quite some time, but I haven't really set out to commit to do so until tonight. So, here it is. Basically, I wanted to provide fellow Chipsters with a place where we could talk about the merits of quality level design, what level design preferences have looked like in this past in our community, and where things appear to be going in the future. I certainly don't consider myself to be the ultimate level design authority, but I'm happy to share my thoughts about what I've observed to work the most when designing levels, and at the same time, I'm ready and willing to learn from others as well.

So why don't we start from the very beginning?

Custom level design has almost always featured an overarching desire to explore new territory. When I discovered ChipEdit back in 1998, along with one of the first sets uploaded online (which is now much longer and called CatatonicP1.dat), I was intrigued by the use of invalid tile combinations. In fact, much of my time was spent playing around with invalid tile combinations, precisely because it was "that thing the original game just didn't have!" After a few years away from the game, I returned to the online CC world to discover many more sets had been uploaded, including an epic (then) 149-level challenge called EricS1 and an invalid tile lover's paradise: DaveB1 and DaveB2. From what I could tell, many of the seasoned designers were all about boldly going where no level had gone before. By the time CCLP2 was assembled and released, this same paradigm applied to many of its levels: sokobans, joyrides, a new type of puzzle called "Cloner's Maze," the use of random force floors, and other elements that had never been explored to much extent in years past took center stage. And at the same time, the interest in optimization started to reach a fever pitch.

The years that followed were largely spent dissecting the game and analyzing its various bugs and idiosyncracies. Some designers built entire levels that revolved around "insane" level behavior or the other strange workings of Microsoft CC. Much of the community at the time played the game for optimization, too. In fact, many levels were built specifically for optimization; the introduction of pieguy's custom scoreboard site was very instrumental in ushering in an era where custom scores could be reported on any set that was uploaded. Throughout this time, submissions for a new level set called CCLP3 were open - and for quite a very long time. With so much of the game's mystery taken away, the biggest satisfaction most people found was in optimizing it, and many of the levels submitted for CCLP3 consideration reflected this desire.

When CCLP3 voting was finally completed, most of the levels that the community had favored were the most difficult ones out of all that were submitted. But ironically, though the set was built mainly for the veteran players who enjoyed complexity and puzzling brain-teasers, what followed in the community was an unexpected but quite welcome shift. New players began to join the fold, and many of them weren't interested in optimizing the game, analyzing its intricacies to meticulous detail, or spending hours solving giant puzzles. They just wanted a game they could pick up for a brief period of time and enjoy playing in manageable chunks. The rise of Let's Plays on YouTube also proved to be conducive to casual gameplay, and once again, CC felt new again for a brand-new generation. Design was no longer about finding something new; it was now about presenting the familiar in innovative ways. It also wasn't long before the idea to create an official set specifically for new players that served as a replacement for the original CC1 was brought forth, and from that, the CCLP1 project has since launched and is currently in production.

Since CCLP1 submissions have closed, I've tested thousands of levels in the running, and I can safely say that the future is looking bright for level design. The objective of creating a level set that's beginner-friendly has sparked a revolution in level design where casual gameplay is being considered, and I believe that can only be a good thing, particularly for the next generation of CC players who will likely search for more challenges after completing CCLP1. In the days to come, I'll be sharing my thoughts on level design, how I believe the best levels consider all styles of gameplay, and some difficult lessons I've learned as a designer. Where will community preferences with respect to level design go in the future? The answer is anyone's guess, but I can only hope that it's a place where players of all skill levels can feel welcome.

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Well, the CC Zone arcade is almost half a month old already, and it's pretty fascinating to have that included in CC Zone. More people are signing up just for the arcade alone, and that's a good thing, There is a problem though. These arcade games are pretty big in size. One of the staff on my board provider Invision warned me that the reason the upgrade failed the first time was because I ran out of space! The solution was to upgrade my hosting packaging but the trouble is the costs will go up and I'm barely getting through monthly on this due to current unemployment. Nevertheless, I also have trouble with games that don't install the first time like Pac-Man for example. I currently have the most arcade awards out of everyone, but my high scores are getting beaten every day, which is a bummer.

Overall, I've been wanting to have the arcade since the beginning of CC Zone, but thanks to newer technology implementation, it's now all possible to do.

Oh geez, that kinda sounded wrong. But yeah, somehow I can't give awards anymore, you might want to fix that, Tom

So, the new award system brings achievements to the table, but some may prefer the old system where it was just awards and they only appeared if you had them. The achievements permanently stay there, so everyone can see them and only light up when you get them. What do you guys think? Should we go back to the old system or keep the new achievement system up? I personally like the achievements to stay, and I made them smaller so they didn't take up too much room. Also, to let you guys know now there won't be anymore achievement icons popping up. What you see now is the maximum there will be on CC Zone.

Also, the idea I had for the achievement system (Inspired by the video game TimeSplitters 2) was to give you a specialised title when you hit a certain amount:

Bronze Chipster
- 8 achievements lit

Silver Chipster
- 12 achievements lit

Gold Chipster
- 16 achievements lit

This is a comic of my reaction of BigOto2's final episode of Let's Play JoshL2. Not too special but still funny to me

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I have to admit, the old awards system was getting a little dated. One of the things I disliked were the square borders around the images. They looked kind of ugly so in the last two days I changed every award with a smooth corner edge and boy did it make a difference!

Shortly afterwards, I had to list every single member's award in notepad to get working on converting them to the new system. This took about 6-8 hours to do. After uninstalling the old system and installing the new one, I wrote down all the awards again one by one and then implemented the new achievements system in. I figured the ones most people would be able to get should be the ones that appear, as anyone including the guests could view them and all they'd have to do is highlight the locked image to see how to get it. The hard awards are still there, but appear in the standard awards column, meaning they don't show up until you get them.

Overall, the new award system was worth it, but at the price of having to upgrade the entire board, most of the whole process went pretty smooth I think. Also, the auto awards don't appear to be working yet as the blog award isn't being triggered for some reason, but a future update will probably fix that.