I was trying to come up with a list of my favorite levels, but realized that it's really hard to do because I like different levels for different reasons. There are levels I enjoy playing through quite casually, levels that are challenging to play through, levels that are great fun to optimize, and levels that take a lot of planning to solve. I'll try to explain each of these categories in more detail the reasons I enjoy those levels. I won't list examples because each category can still contain so many different types of levels, that I don't want to restrict myself to just calling out a few past favorites. And of course it would take a lot of time :-)

Levels I enjoy casually

These are levels that I can just play through when I have about an half hour of spare time. They don't require a lot of thinking to solve, but I still might encounter some puzzle elements. There usually is some dodging but not so many dangerous parts that I keep dying numerous times. These levels are elegant, to the point, and most often quite short. Playing these levels just makes me happy! If a set would only have this types of levels in it, I wouldn't mind at all, and it might even be one of my favorite sets. It would even have great replay value, because once I play through them once, I won't remember them completely but can go back and enjoy them again. I'm glad to see that quite a few of the new level sets have some of these levels. These are mainly the types of levels I'm hoping to find in CCLP1.

Levels I enjoy playing because of the challenge

These are the levels that might take several minutes to solve even when knowing the solution. They often multiple puzzles and areas, but don't get stuck in one task. To succeed in this category, the level also has to have some design elegance, and not just be a mess of convoluted tile arrangements. I need to see some design skills! Sometimes a level can have some overarching theme that tie several different puzzles together. These levels can incorporate difficult maneuvers, but they also give the player some respite from the action to think about what needs to be done next. Many of the last quarter of levels in CCLP3 fall into this category, but playing through several of them in succession is quite a task. However, for me, this doesn't take away from the fact that as individual levels they are enjoyable and well designed.

Levels I enjoy optimizing

The best levels to optimize are the ones where I know I've reached the maximum. Of course then someone comes along and beats the score by one second! But that's okay, because every once in a while, I get to be that person too! Finding that one nifty trick that others have missed is a great experience! Well anyway, I find that many of the levels that are enjoyable to optimize can summed up into one word: short. If a level takes longer than two minutes to play, it's very likely that optimizing it boarders on arduous. I like to work on one level for maybe an hour or two, and if by then there's still many avenues to explore, I lose interest. Even at this shorter end of the spectrum, routes can require cleverness and insight. I really like it when I understand how a level functions and why things work. I'd assume it's difficult to set out to design a level that would be great fun to optimize, but often enough this is a side product of an otherwise fun level.

Levels I enjoy solving

Then there are the levels that are super hard puzzles. I love these. I don't want these levels to be filled with tricky timing or extra knobs, but rather they should translate a logic puzzle into the language of Chip's Challenge. The epitome of a level in this category is one where I can print out a map of the level, stare at it for hours and then come back and complete it with one try. (Sadly enough, this has happened.) The level shouldn't be just about block pushing, but it seems to often be a major part of these levels just by the nature of the game. There's not too many of this types of levels around, but perhaps that's only a good thing, as long as there are some. It's great to find a couple of these every year, so if you can think of a tough puzzle that works nicely as a level, please share it with me!



In the end it's the levels that make up this game I spend a lot of my free time on, so I'm happy to notice that there are several types of levels that I like. I need all types to get my CC fix, but not all in the same quantity. Thanks to everyone out there who has managed to create enjoyable levels for me to play!

Next week I'm going talk about the things I've been up to since the new year with Chip's Challenge.

-Miika

Ok guys, TomP4 will be coming sometime this year. I've only got 20 more levels left to hit the big 149. Here's what to expect:

- TomP4 will continue on from TomP3.

- TomP4 will be split up into different worlds and follow a storyline like TomP2.

- 4 TomP levels so far have sequels: Chip Alone, Runaway Train, Solve The Pyramid, and Final Destination.

- TomP4 will be the last of my levelsets that follows Chip McCallahan.

- All TomP4 levels will be Lynx compatible.

- The difficulty of most TomP4 levels range from easy to medium.

Level screenshots will be coming soon, as well as a demo download of TomP4!

Since it came up in another topic, if someone was willing to make a new version of TileWorld with a "classic" mode for CC, and a new "advanced" mode -- what features would you like to see?

For example, it's been suggested that there be new tiles, more monsters, different shaped levels, etc. Even two-player mode has been suggested.

What are your ideas?

And, is anyone interested in working on this project?

Hello, CC community. I'm going to level with you here. I have a growing disinterest in Chip's Challenge. The conversations have stagnated. The drama that Chip's Portal brought exacerbated the disinterest, but it has been growing for about a year now. I have no interest in playing levels and I've exhausted my ability to make levels. I don't really like the new forums for a number of reasons that are out of anyone's control.


The first of the reasons is that I don't like the way that the portal is set up. It shouldn't be an "unread content" list, it should be a "most recent posts" thing.


The second is that there is so much chatter going on on it all the time and I don't have the ability to go on more than once a day or so.


The third reason is that I feel like a useless member of the administration team. I don't really do anything. I barely even read the posts.


The fourth reason I don
't like the forums is that it's a completely new start. I had a lot of programming put into both CCZone and Chip's Portal that's all lost now and I don't really want to bother to redo all of it.


The fifth reason is that I am going to be getting more involved with WebCC because PsuFan needs me now more than ever. Big updates are coming, all I can say.


For these reasons, I have asked Tom to remove me from the list of admin and staff of this site for the time being.

On Chip's Challenge, you know the teleporters? Well, I tried them out on the editor yesterday and noticed that they act different on both the Microsoft and Lynx versions of the games. I did a teleporter-1 ice tile-teleporter pattern in loads of rows, and the Microsoft version did the teleporters correctly by making a pink ball go through them one by one downwards facing east, but on the Lynx version it just kept going through the same row of teleporters over and over again! What's up with that?

Anyone remember this old time classic on the PC? RollerCoaster Tycoon was probably the game I spent most of the time playing on the PC. I loved how addicting this game was making rollercoasters, killing guests off by crashing rides, and making them suffer from not being able to go to the toilet. Both hilarious and awesome, and the 3D version was never as good but still an ok, but quite buggy game back then.

What's the best program or way to get a whole view of a level on Chip's Challenge? I really want to know so I can preview my levels on CC Zone. I don't have Mapmaker anymore and it wouldn't work on a 64 bit machine. How do you guys do the screenshots like the ones in the gallery?

What do you use to record your Chip's Challenge footage with? I usually just use Chipcap for level solutions, but for Let's Play videos I like to have the sound of the game in the background so I record with CamStudio or Hypercam for sound included. What is your preference on this?

Do you think there are some spirits or ghosts out there in our world? If so, have you ever seen a ghost or thought you saw one or couldn't explain the situation?

File category: CC1 Levelsets


JacquesS2, the levelset which I'm currently working on. Have fun,

About 30% of the levels are Lynx compatible. But don't worry, JacquesS3 will be fully Lynx compatible once I finish JacquesS2.

Yes, there are invalid tiles, but fear not. Nothing nasty here, like buried traps. The number of invalid tiles per level decreases as the set goes along. And there are only 4 hot blocks in the entire set (but for some, that's four too many! )

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