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Not content with just images of the game's models, they went and recreated all of the levels with clay, paper, and various other media. Sure, they're not exactly to scale, but they're still amazing. Cool, Cool Mountain is just beautiful.

Someone recently contacted me with a request to map Wario Land II. I would love to do it myself and see all of the game's branching paths and secrets, but I already have my hands overflowing with the projects I have. I know this game has been requested and worked on before, but it's been quite a while (years?) since we've had any more maps from this game.

Anyone want to take a stab at it? I recall there being a level viewer for the game in progress, but I have no idea if it was ever finished or even released.

So, what do I do with my free time when I'm not mapping? Well, besides loafing about and occasionally drawing or playing games, I like to mess with 3D models. I've toyed around with the idea of making my own since the beginning, but only in the past year or two have I actually made them the "proper" way. Considering almost everything I model is based on old video games that weren't in 3D to begin with, I figure I would post some of my creations here. Enjoy!


Try for a hole in one!


I made all of Course 1. Sadly, I stopped before getting to Course 2 because of all the new custom pieces 2-1 needed.




I should do more with these.


How many Sonic fans do we actually have around here?


No, that's not my house in the bg.


These guys are some of my favorite MLPT enemies.


Messing around with "HD" stuff.





These are just some of the random one-off models I've made. But, since late 2011, I have been working on a very specific set of models. Introducing: my Brawl-style models!


Yaridovich, heavy spear-wielding fighter
Released: Dec. 23, 2011
Updated: Jan. 13, 2013
This was my first attempt at a Brawl-style model. Looking back at him, this was very evident, as he lacked a lot of detail. (Old Version) So, I recently updated him to the version you see here. I also made alternate colors for him. In case you don't recognize him, he's one of the big bosses from Super Mario RPG.


Axem Rangers, tag-team speedy fighters
Released: Jun. 25, 2012
These models took me several months to put together. For all the effort I put into designing and creating them, I am rather satisfied with how they came out. (Again, in case you don't recognize them, they are bosses from SMRPG.) I put a lot of thought into how they would work as actual Brawl fighters, even going so far as to plan their Final Smash. In fact, that's what the next one is...


The Blade, sentient fortified airship
Released: Oct. 14, 2012
I spent another two months making what amounts to a background prop. Since the game doesn't really give any good view on what the Blade looks like, I took the liberty of redesigning it. The model itself is about the size of the Halberd, and has about as many polygons as Delfino Plaza. Since a single picture doesn't really do the model justice, I made a couple of Youtube Videos to show off the details.


Vivian, timid shadowy helper
Released: Dec. 2, 2012
I bet you thought they were all going to be from SMRPG, huh? Due to Paper Mario's flat style and cutesy proportions on everything, making a competent 3D model of her was a challenge. In case you're wondering why she looks lower-poly than the others, it's because she's only meant to be an Assist Trophy. She isn't really cut out to be a full-fledged brawler.


Bowyer, arrow-flinging monster
Released: Jan. 5, 2013
Bowyer is probably one of the most well-remembered bosses in SMRPG, partially due to how frustrating his battle was, but mostly because his battle introduces Geno. Rather than try and shoe-horn him into the position of a fighter, I decided to leave him to what he does best: pelt you with arrows and disable your controls.


Drill Bit, kamikaze minion
Released: Jan. 13, 2013
I couldn't make Aero for Bowyer and not make Yaridovich's minion, now could I? And did you ever realize just how cute this guy is? It's all there in the sprite, albeit hard to make out.

Someone recently emailed me to ask if I would be tackling this Artoon-developed sequel. Unless I run out of games to map, I won't be, which is why I'm passing the request on to you guys in case anyone here is looking for a project.

I've already looked into it, and it looks perfectly feasible. It uses regular tiles and sprites, so grabbing map data and graphics are easy. The screen buffers aren't terribly large, so some effort will be required to rip backgrounds, but no more than what you'd normally expect. Those of you who have played this game before know that the level design is devious, so it will pay to be thorough. Also, I hope you either have cheats or are really dedicated, as otherwise you'll have a doozy of a time getting 100s to unlock the Extra levels. With five worlds of 10 levels each, plus some minigames, this project will be quite a handful.

If you take on this project, I wish you luck.

I thought the limit was 64x64, but it seems that it distorts it to 65x65 on everything that isn't the profile settings. Is it supposed to be 65x65 or is that an error?

[Anarchy in the Galaxy]

This is something I put together with the help of a tool called Anarchy in the Galaxy in order to celebrate Halloween. With it, I can read the coordinates of every object in every part of every galaxy, and used it to recreate almost all of Ghostly Galaxy, sans enemies. I have no plans on mapping SMG, but as you can see, it is theoretically possible with the right resources.

It took nine full hours to assemble the scene, and I didn't even go into enemies and collectibles. Instead of making one wallpaper like I planned, I went ahead and made six of them, at a whopping 1600x1200 each. Enjoy!

[complete!]

Since I'll inevitably be collecting models as time goes on, I figure I should make use of them. This gallery is inspired by the Wind Waker gallery of the same name, and new models will be added as I progress.

Find the rest of the Figures here!

Update: As of August 24, 2012, this gallery is complete!

Anybody else play this game? I tried it growing up, and the thing I remember most about it is that it was somewhat challenging and I that I had to start over at the beginning every time. I never got through world 2. Here's a video in case you didn't, or haven't even heard of it.

I haven't looked into it, so I don't know how difficult it would be to map. Anyone want to try? I'd pick it up myself, but I have more than enough on my plate already. I figure I'd toss up a seemingly-obscure SNES platformer for anyone who was looking for a project.

I'm currently trying to investigate a mystery, and I figured this would be the place to find people with a greatly varied gaming experience. Do any of you recognize these bugs?








I won't say where I got these models until I learn what game these are from.

Anyone else been getting this recently? Occasionally, on the first time I attempt to edit one of my posts, it has started giving me this error and telling me to try logging in again. Simply going back and trying again works, though, so it's not too much of a hassle.

[REGGIE!]

REGGIE!


That's right, the New Super Mario Bros. Wii level editor has finally been released. There's a slight issue in that not everything shows up rendered (3D models) so making maps with this might require some effort. This isn't really a request, per se, but I just thought I'd throw out this info in case anyone was interested in taking it up at some point.

[0. Programs Required]

Now that I've finished Paper Mario, I figure it's time for me to share with everyone how I did it. In this workshop, I'll be teaching techniques for ripping and preparing models, as well as answering questions. I will also keep a list of N64 games that people are interested in and whether or not it is possible to map them. And remember, this is for the community, so I want you all to get involved, not just sit around and watch. The more questions you ask and games you bring up, the better I can help you all learn. Now, to kick things off...

0. Programs Required
To rip a map on the N64, you'll need three things: an emulator, a rom, and a 3D modeling program. Obviously, I'm not going to show you where to get these, just which ones you'll need.

With the method I use, you'll actually be using two emulators. The main emulator you'll use to rip the models is 1964, in combination with the Nemu64 Combine Debugger plugin (LemD3D8.dll or later version, make sure you have both .dll files). While this graphics plugin isn't the prettiest thing to view games with, it gives you consistant and reliable VRML rips, which you'll be working with. The second emulator is Project64, v1.6 or later, with the TR64 OpenGL plugin. This will act as your backup for ripping textures, as it can export some textures that 1964 rips incorrectly, as well as ones that aren't used as textures (such as HUD elements). Supposedly, Project64 is able to rip VRML as well, but I can never get the rips it exports to work. You will be working both of these emulators together, ripping models in one and filling in the gaps with the other.

The 3D modeling program you'll be using is Cinema 4D, a very powerful modeling/animation program by Maxon. The version I use is Release 10.5, but anything 10 or later is fine. I know there is a Release 11 out there, which is supposedly much faster at rendering, but I don't know what other changes were made, so it's up to you which version you want to use. If you've used a 3D program before, great. If not, don't worry. Cinema 4D has a great and easy-to-use interface that will have you putting together maps in a couple of days. Feel free to play around in the program if you like, as you want to be as familiar with the controls as you can.

Game List
A Bug's Life - **?
Aero Fighters Assault - X
Armorines - *
Army Men Sarges Heroes - ***?
Army Men Sarges Heroes 2 - **
Army Men Air Combat - X?
Aidyn Chronicles - ** good amount of UV damage to characters (Tropicon)
Banjo-Kazooie - **** heavy vertex shading use, room slides around but static angle/scale, complex textures
Banjo-Tooie - X, doesn't emulate well
Batman Beyond - ***?
Battle Tanx - ***?
Battle Tanx Global Assault - ****?
Bio F.R.E.A.K.S. - X
Blastcorps - **? (mikemc)
Bomberman 64 - ***** impossible to see but theoretically possible
Bomberman 64 2 - *** hard to see with culling issues
Bomberman 64 Arcade Edition - X
Bomberman Hero - X
Buck Bumble - X
Castlevania 64 - ??
Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness - ?? Needs looking into, presumed same as above
Chameleon Twist - X
Chameleon Twist 2 - X
Charlie's Blast Territory - *
Chopper Attack - ***?
Conker's Bad Fur Day - ** no problems it seems
Daikatana - X?
Diddy Kong Racing - **** very quirky, objects are misplaced
Donkey Kong 64 - X, can't emulate right now
Doom 64 - **?
Dual Heroes - ****?
Duke Nukem 64 - X
Duke Nukem Zero Hour - X?
Earthworm Jim 64 - ***?
Extreme G - X, way too much UV damage
Extreme G2 - X, same
Forsaken 64 - *** very small rip area, would take a while
Fushigi No Dungeon 2 - **
Flying Dragon - X
F-Zero X - ***** Heavy UV damage, need to be really close to part of track for it to appear right
Ganbare Goemon - Mononoke Sugoroku - X
Gex 64 - X
Gex 3 - X
Goemon's Great Adventure - X
Glover - X
GoldenEye 007 - X
Harvest Moon - X
Hey You, Pikachu! - X
Hybrid Heaven - **
Jet Force Gemini - **** characters/objects buggy, but terrain is fine
Killer Instinct Gold - X
Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards - ***** Very buggy in anything but Nemu, experts only
Knife Edge - X
Kuiki Uhabi Suigou - X
Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask - **** complex texture effects (Peardian)
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - **** complex texture effects, damaged textures, jpegs (Peardian)
Lode Runner 3D - X
Mace the Dark Age - ***?
Mario Golf - X, too much UV damage
Mario Kart 64 - ** complete (Peardian)
Mario Party - X
Mario Party 2 - X
Mario Party 3 - X
Mega Man 64 - X
Mischief Makers - ?? maybe possible?
Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon - ** some quirky textures that will require a bit of editing, but nothing too bad
Neon Genesis Evangelion - X
Nightmare Creatures - X
Ogre Battle 64 - * no problems, complete (Tropicon)
Onegai Monsters - X
Paper Mario - *** some UV issues, vertex shading use, complete (Peardian)
Perfect Dark - **?
Pokemon Snap - ***, possible only through cheats
Quake - X
Quake 2 - X
Quest 64 - *** hard to see with culling issues
Rakuga Kids - *?
Rampage - X
Rampage 2 - X
Rat Attack - X
Rayman 2 - X
Resident Evil 2 - X
Re-Volt - X
Road Rash 64 - X
Robotron 64 - X
Rocket - ****? UV damage
Rush 2 - *** same as first
San Francisco Rush - *** map slides around with camera but remains in proper orientation
San Francisco Rush 2049 - *** same as first
Shadow Man - **?
Space Station Silicon Valley - ***** heavy UV damage to terrain, many objects aren't models, trouble emulating, insane mappers only
Star Fox 64 - X
Super Mario 64 - X
Super Smash Bros. - ** some UV damage, complete (Peardian)
Tonic Trouble - ***? possible issues with emulation
Turok: Worlds - **?
Turok 2 - **** heavy UV damage
Turok 3 - ***? dumps a lot
War Gods - **?
Wonder Project J2 - X
Worms - X
Xena - **?
Yoshi's Story - X
Zool - **?

Table of Contents
0. Programs Required
1. Ripping VRML Data with 1964
-Q: other programs?
-setting up the VRML folder
-working Lemmy's plugin
-resource organization
-ripping process
2. Problems in Ripping VRML
-unmappable games
-damaged UV data
-vertex shading
3. Ripping Images with Project 64
-types of images in the N64
-working TR64
-transferring save files from 1964 to PJ64
4. Getting Started in Cinema 4D
-basic C4D layout
-rescaling models with Coordinates panel
-correcting the lighting
-saving
5. Basic Scene Correction
-catching missing scene elements
-basics of Materials
-Color Channel
-Alpha Channel
-handling unneeded objects & materials
6. Axis Control and Optimization
-object axis
-Center Axis To
-Optimize
7. Tiling Textures
-Seamless tiling
-material tag attributes
-controlling Offset, Length & Tiles
-dealing with x-only/y-only seamless tiling
-dealing with edge smearing
8. Model Modification and Scene Setup
-model editing modes
-Camera objects
-Perspective and Parallel view
-picking a viewing angle
-handling backface culling
9. Rendering To File
-Render view
-Render settings
-Reference Spheres
-organizing your renders
10. Shadows and Overlapping Objects
-overlapping horizontal planes
-overlapping vertical planes
11. Cheat Codes
-using cheat codes
-codes for different game versions
Q: Only some models show up?
12. UV Editing
-BP UV Edit Layout
-UV Mesh basics
-UV Commands
-Transform
-repairing UV damage
13. Advanced Texture Techniques
-compound textures
-Fusion shader
-Projector shader
-gradients
-setting up a 3D linear gradient
-gradient + fusion
-mask gradients
-Texture Axis Mode
14. Dealing with Backfaces
-coloring backsides black
-Create Polygon tool
-Connect function
-covering areas outside the walls
-Extrude tool
-objects sticking through walls
-Visibility tag
15. Artistic Renders
-Light types
-Floor object
-Shadow types
-Phong shading
-Global Illumination
-Sky object
-Ambient Occlusion
-Compositing tag
16. Shadow Catcher
-Installing plugins
-Shadow Catcher
17. Connect Object
-phong across multiple objects
-Connect Object
-Quick Shading
18. Reflective Objects
-fake reflections on the N64
-Environment Channel
-Reflection Channel
Tip: Infinite Lighting, Infinite Angle
19. Vertex Weight Maps and Vertex Shading
-Vertex Maps
-Colorizer shader
-Layer shader
-Coloring with vertex maps
Tip: Snapping Settings

That's the end of the planned lessons. However, I will continue to maintain this thread as long as necessary, answering questions and helping with maps.

For the past three weeks, my laptop has been infected with a nasty virus. The school stuck me with a Mac because of my major, so I run a Virtual Machine of Windows XP on it so that it itsn't completely useless to me. The virus only affects the Windows VM, and I've been using Mac's Safari to access the internet. The Saturday night before the school semester started, we checked into a hotel offcampus so I could spend time with my family. I used Windows only a little bit, just to check email and Fraxy and chat, but it was still enough to catch the virus. The symptoms are as follows:

• Prevents almost all internet access, with the notable exceptions of Windows Live Messenger and Steam (only chat)
• Causes computer to slow to a crawl when trying to open big programs (Fireworks, Flash, etc.); Task Manager shows that taskmgr.exe is using up 100% of the CPU, and IceSword shows no hidden processes at work
• has caused it to bluescreen once due to using up all the memory
• slow shutdown/startup times
• No malware was found by AVG, Avast, Spybot S&D, or Panda Rootkit Scanner

As I mentioned in my other thread, this makes SNES emulation very slow and tedious, so I can't work on Yoshi's Island until this is solved. I'm thinking I got it from a malicious ad, as I found I also had a Trojan (AVG took care of it). Amusingly, it was one of those phony "you have a virus, download our program!" viruses, but it never had a chance to show it's face because the bigger virus was completely blocking it.


The guy at the campus computer store said that his friend recently had the same problem, that it's some kind of new virus that doesn't have a cure yet, and that a fresh reinstall might be the only solution right now. I'm hoping it doesn't have to come to that, but I will do it if completely necessary. I don't know if many people here are very savvy with this kind of thing, but I'm posting this here in hopes that someone can help me.


Edit: And don't worry, it doesn't infect files I have or people I talk to, so don't worry about catching it through my map submissions.

Edit: In case you stumble on this topic and are worried, this issue has already been resolved.

Now, I myself have never really played Mario Party Advance until just today. I've mapped out all of "Shroom City" which seems to be the only board in the game. Also, from what little I've seen of the "mini-games", they seem to be all little story-based things or random little things that use only one screen and don't really seem like they'd even be considered "maps".



So, to anyone who has played this game fully, is there anything left to map?

---

YTT (34%) - WL4 (60%) - PM (34%)

A few days ago, (the 28th) I got a hold of the N64 Super Smash Bros. and started ripping various things, mostly the stages, just for kicks. After ripping half the stages, I remembered that this site doesn't have maps of all of them and that I could maybe make some maps and submit them. Yesterday, I checked the site only to find that the very next day, someone had submitted three excellent maps of the three 1-Player-exclusive maps. Though lacking backgrounds, his maps are more accurate since the 3D program I use doesn't seem to support the kind of shaders that the N64 uses (for things like the rainbow gradient on the center of Final Destination). However, I still might make maps of all the Break the Targets/Board the Platforms stages and the Race to the Finish stage. Unless someone beats me to those too.





Of course, this sorta thing happens to me all the time, so I'm used to it. Once again, good job to Perfect for making those maps.

---

YTT (34%) - WL4 (60%) - PM (34%)

After finishing my latest Paper Mario map, Raccoon Sam put to me the suggestion of using .JPG for my Paper Mario maps (and at the same time, maps of all 3D games). Obviously, small rips like PM's 320x320 map screen would remain .PNG, since they're tiny enough.



PNG

+Lossless compression, and thus perfect quality of map and text.

+Format used for very many maps already.

-File size increases significantly with complexity and size. Most of the Paper Mario maps are several megabytes in size.



JPG

+Compresses to a much smaller size than PNG. Estimated to reduce the size of the mapset by 90%.

-Lossy compression would dull the text and finer details of the map, taking away all crispness.



I'm sure you all already knew the pros and cons of the filetypes already, but I just wanted to list them as a reminder. What do you guys think? Should I keep my maps of 3D games in .PNG, or switch over to .JPG? Right now I'm leaning towards staying .PNG, but I want to get your opinions first.



---

YTT (34%) - WL4 (60%) - PM (34%)

[Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3 - Secret Levels]

Looks like I forgot to register here after it switched over to this new board.



Anyway, for future reference, I'm going to list here the mapping projects I have in progress (and a few that I have planned). Feel free to comment or whatever.


Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3 - Secret Levels
Currently at: Secret 3
This game would take a lot longer to map if I couldn't turn into a helicopter at will. Currently being neglected.

The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
Currently at: Southern Swamp
Finally, the first real quarter of the game! I don't quite know what to expect, since the layout of the swamp has always confused me.

Densetsu no Stafy
Currently at: World 1
It's the first game to feature Starfy! Since it's in Japanese, I'll just refer to the worlds as World 1, 2, 3, etc. Currently being neglected.




Next mapping projects:
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Mini-Land Mayhem
- Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again (do they even have DSiWare emulators?)


Misc. games that I have considered maybe mapping if I feel like it:
- Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time (unless someone else gets to it)
- Kirby's Dream Land 3 (leaning towards no right now)
- Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards (would be original maps)
- Super Mario Sunshine (might have to be original maps)
- Quest 64