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Meh, I've always been a Nintendo whore, with only the occasional adventure on the side with Sega. XBox? What's that? The PlayStation? By Sony you say?



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

In a way, it's really cool that someone took the time to check your maps for accuracy. Otherwise, it's really just too much work to expect out of anyone to proof-check someone else's maps. Heck, in one map I did I found a secret that wasn't mentionned anywhere else on the entire net!



And of course, thanks for making the correction for everyone to see and wanting to give credit where it's due.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Out of curiosity, what's your favorite kind of desert? In fact, what are everyone else's?

(Did I write that right Revned?)



For me:



-Apple and sugar pie (doesn't feel as purely 'sugar' thanks to the apples yet is just as sweet if not more than regular sugar pie)



-3 colors Jello (you know, when you make one batch in a bowl, let it set, then add another color on top, repeat, and then the same with a third one)



-Fruit pies (the kind which is made of a flaky crust covered with a very sweet gelatine with fruits like kiwis, blueberries and strawberries on top)



-Tarte Tatin (a French variation on an appel pie which is served upside down, ending with the crust on top; my recipe is made with apples chunks and maple sirup)



-Blueberry pie



The one kind of desert I can't stand is the pure sugary kind, like brown sugar cubes (I don't know the real English name)



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

What!? There's no way in hell I'm ever mapping again with a guy who hates cheesecake, let me tell you that. It's almost, like, a crime against nature !



---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

In Inty's defense though, he might not have understood that he(she?) was actually talking about wanting to start a map without actually knowing how. I almost thought it was a semi-trolling post at first (although an unintentional one). Thanks for being on the lookout.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Nice to see you're able to play with the coordinates like that. I tried doing it with other games but since they weren't simple overhead games like RPGs, I couldn't find any manner of coordinates to work with.



As for the overworld, it's not surprising. The game developers wouldn't waste time finishing and polishing parts of a map that has no chance in hell of being seen. What you're talking about is probably either a tileset or just garbage data since there's nothing definite there.



I think the hard thing about mapping is balancing accuracy and aesthetism, and I've had to take hard decisions of this kind before.



For example, in my Zelda: Oracle Of Season overworld map, one screen had a tree tile that didn't fit with those of its neighboring screens, so I opted to correct it since it served to purpose to keep it accurate but looked better when changed.



On my Ufouria map which is comprised of several interconnecting sections like a Metroid map, all the sections fit together perfectly except one spot where there was the height of one tile between the floors of two sections (in short, by aligning all the other room transitions, I was throwing the last one out of alignment), so I actually added a single tile row to align everything, and nobody would notice while using the map unless they counted the number of tiles in the changed section.



So in short, I suggest to remove those tilesets unless they are of some significance (for example, in could be an in-joke and seen from far away, the tiles might form a message).



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Cheesecakes are good, but in moderation only. They're just too rich, but oh so tasty...



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

I knew, but couldn't edit it. Blame the board



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Regarding fixing animated tiles, you should ask Revned about his tile slicer program. It can break down a map in all it's various separate tiles with a file compiling which goes where. You can then view all the separate tiles and find any different one much easier (like say, you find 3 different water tiles despite being careful to always capture the same one; you can then make all three identical, and when the program will reassemble the map all the water will be the same).



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Well, despite restraining my computer use at home by a large amount, I still worked a bit on these maps yesterday evening. After encountering some severe difficulties in the way the game handles the various layers and how I was mapping it (namely, Sector 4 has a transparent water layer inserted *between* two layers I was putting together from the start), I've found that I have almost no choice but to switch to Paint Shop Pro for the final map assembly if I want to be able to play with the transparencies with ease.



It *is* a chore because I basically need to go back too all three maps I've done so far and re-map everything *again* but keeping what I call the back and middle layers separate, *plus* making a separate with only the various backgrounds. My hope is to come up with a simple file for each map that would include all the necessary info on separate layers, with the ability to turn on and off whatever I want.



So far, I'm hoping to do something like this:



-Layer 1: Background (parallax scrolling). It will make it easier to go back and realign any of it without having to recompose the whole thing.



-Layer 2: Back layer. It consists of the layer of stuff that is behind the sprites but doesn't use parallax scrolling.



-Layer 3: Middle layer. This is basically the stage layout, consisting mostly of the walls, floors and ceilings.



-Layer 4: Front layer. Will include special things like moving roots and door covers, and I will probably turn it on and off to show before/after conditions.



-Layer 5: Water layer (works best at 30% transparency)



-Layer 6: Lava / acid / cold layer (all at 50% transparency, so a single layer for them)



-Layer 7: Special blocks layer. I can thus have both the original map and all the information for the special blocks in the same file.



It's going slow of course, since I basically have to re-do everything *again*, but I'll make it somehow, one day.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

[My most recently played track]

Inty Said:

Internet > Crack

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My most recently played track

http://www.last.fm/user/inty6/?chartstyle=recenttracks1">http://imagegen.last.fm/recenttracks1/recenttracks/inty6.gif" border="0" />

And a lot less costly too.



But anyway, it's not like I won't be posting here anymore, just not from home. Life goes on, and all that jazz...



*nothing better to date yourself than to use expressions you've heard somewhere once that are probably -years- out of style *





---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Thanks for the tip, but church is right out for me, being agnostic and all.



As for the social circle thing, yeah I meant become part of one. I'm hoping to find some hobby or social activity that would let me meet people with whom I'd get along.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Exactly right. Aside from my family and a friend or two who don't live in my city, I've been pretty much alone for the last two years. I've always been afraid of personal contact, of letting people inside my personal space, yet at the same time I need it, which makes for a nice contradiction. You know the way we humans are, we don't always make much sense.



Yesterday I just had like a divine realization that spending time on my computer has been pretty much a reflex when I'm home alone ever since I've lived alone, for two years like I said. I went from living with my best friend to having no real friend except one that I only get to see once every 2 or 3 weeks. Talking on the phone or chating no the web are nothing compared to spending time, doing anything, with someone in real life.



What I need is to try and create my own social circle, something I should have done years ago but just was too afraid to do (there's a reason I've been seeing as psychologist for the last few years; I have a lot of fear issues despite there being no real trauma being it all)



I'll keep visiting here during the day at least, but I'm afraid I won't be contributing much in actual maps for a while, not until I've learned to be reasonable in the time I spend online.



But make no mistake, I'm glad to have this place to talk with people



---

"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

Long story short, I'm addicted to my computer; addicted to surfing, addicted to message boards, etc. For the last few years, I've probably spent about 80% of all my free time on my computer.



Well yesterday evening, I don't why exactly but all of a sudden I just got sick to death of my computer. I *had* to turn it off, as if it was some huge bug crawling over my body that I needed to slap off and crush with my foot. It was probably the first time in I don't know how long that my computer at home wasn't open from the moment I come back from work to when I'm ready to go to sleep.



The sudden silence was almost bliss. It also made me realize that spending all my time on the computer is why I have no social life at all. I already knew it, but I guess I didn't really *accept* it. I wish I had that realization long ago.



So from now on (hopefully), I'll limit time on my computer at home to a few hours *maximum*, and even then, that might be too much, what with a possible relapse and all.



I'll still come here in my free time at work, but I won't be active much in the evening, and mapping is definitely taking a break for a while. I'm pretty sure that mapping Metroid Fusion intensely for several weeks only hastened the crisis.



Sorry guys. I won't be gone completely, but I really need to take a serious break for a while.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me

No way that I know. I've heard of some mappers using Game Genie codes or memory hacks that stop the animation of moving tiles, but nothing automatic I'm afraid.



As for which frame to use like with water, the choice is up to you. Usually, I find that there's one frame that looks better so I use that one, but it's really your prerogative.



Sometimes it's hard to capture every animated tiles at the right time, so some of us will go back to a finished map to correct mistakes, which is often easy since tiles are almost always a round number of pixels like 8x8, 16x16 or even 32x32. For every map I work on, I always keep a folder with clean sprites files for items, enemies, bosses and animated tiles. That way I can be sure that the water, flowers, lava or anything else like that always looks consistent across all the maps.



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"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." [...] The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged. - Captain Jean-Luc Picard



B*tch, meet reality. Reality, meet b*tch. - Me