[SM] Z-Factor Hack v1.3

[LReyomeXX]

I was able to secure Varia without needing ice via clever use of wall jumping and Super Missles to get to Brinstar's "back door"

[FullOfFail]

Meta, fix a few minor flaws and use us as your beta-testers and this could be one of the greats. We would've done it anyway, all you have to do is ask. You should've known we're going to break your game regardless. The foundation is here, it's just not solid yet.

[Digital_Mantra]

Meta, fix a few minor flaws and use us as your beta-testers and this could be one of the greats. We would've done it anyway, all you have to do is ask. You should've known we're going to break your game regardless. The foundation is here, it's just not solid yet.

Precisely what he said.
I'm in love with this hack and hate it at the same time due to all the backtracking and trying to find new upgrades.
Whatever your 'intended' path was, it's obvious now that none of us have found it and took our own paths.
Non-linearity is great, but to this extent, it really subtracts your player base due to rage quits and frustration.
You have what could be the funnest/greatest hack of 2012, it just needed the support of beta-testers.

[Yuki]

Tbh, this is more confusing than Ice Metal, which was designed to have almost no set path.

[Metaquarius]

Thanks for your comments.
I admit Norfair was designed to be hard especially. I did not hang on IRC often, so I can't tell for sure what could be improved. What do you mean by using you as beta-testers ?

So far, the main critizism is against the intended path which is not obvious for some people.
The fact is you don't need to perform any advanced tricks to progress, if you're going for an ibj or more than one wall-jump in a row, this is not the "intended" path. Zhz2 has mentionned the right path earlier. I'm aware this could be broken : varia before ice, wave before ice, and even more. I know this is quite tempting to sequence break when you're stuck somewhere, but if you do so, then don't expect the hack to magically get you back on roots. Don't forget to freeze enemies and use them as platforms, not only in the Brinstar shaft... Concerning walk-through walls, most of them are in Brinstar, I think I'll have to make some of them more obvious indeed.

Once you get the supers
[spoiler]you're supposed to go to Norfair to find 2 key items[/spoiler]

Once you get the wave beam
[spoiler]you're supposed to fight Crocomire[/spoiler]

Once you get the power bombs
[spoiler]you're supposed to enter into Kraid's lair[/spoiler]

Once you get the grapple beam
[spoiler]you're supposed to enter into the Wrecked ship[/spoiler]

[Odiumology]

So...

[spoiler] I found my way into Maridia with no Gravity, managed to get out of plenty perma-stuck instances by using a ton of save states, but at some point i just couldnt get anywhere w/o gravity or grappling, and finally got perma stuck. I kept a safe file before maridia, i found spazer beam too, but i dont have any damn idea on where to go now[/spoiler]

[Metaquarius]

Would you mind detail those perma-stuck, please ?  :^_^:

[spoiler]You must find the SpeedBooster down there, which will allow you to escape from Maridia, then fight Kraid.[/spoiler]

[Digital_Mantra]

What do you mean by using you as beta-testers ?

Seriously? After all this feedback, you're confused about beta-testing?
Dude, you have an amazing hack, which is full of flaws.
You've got people hardcore enough to cart this and play it on a super nintendo.
You've got everyone wondering how the hell to do this since you locked it.
This is 2012, we don't usually lock our hacks because we understand as a community, that we won't cheat that way.
We use it as a basis to convert to other platforms.
As for me, I'm a retired hacker, playing with tilesets is like night time therapy for me. 

Also: locking a hack is very outdated, 'I hack super metroid, therefore I'm an artist and this is my property.", that's pretty anal.
I won't go into the dozen examples, but for one, I didn't lock Eris, even though it had unique asm from jathys and others.
Making your hack inaccessible is understandable if you want to deter cheaters from changing things, but for the most part, they don't.
But in the long run, it just makes you seem like a self righteous dink.

[Metaquarius]

I locked the hack because I find it cool to see people arsing about. :twisted:

Ok, seriously, I've just talked to a few people on IRC, I think I'll make a new update soon, with easier difficulty, especially in Norfair, and with more obvious hints. This hack did not have a proper beta-testing, until then, don't hesistate to tell me what part of the hack you found insane...

[snibsnib]

I absolutely love this hack so far. It's got me in the 'bomb everything that looks slightly suspicious' mood. :^_^:

[LReyomeXX]

Why make Norfair easy, I love challenges, which is why I love Redesign so much. With just a few more tweaks, this hack can easily be on that level. Also

[spoiler]I found a Geemer that endlessly spins around a walled off area in Norfair. Is that a hint to the PB floor in that same room?[/spoiler]

[Zhs2]

It's not really challenging when a Desgeega kills you in three hits, and you can't kill it to save your life. That's just frustrating. Bringing them into balance would be very nice, though.

[MetroidMst]

I locked the hack because I find it cool to see people arsing about. :twisted:

You will see plenty of that from me. I have just spent the last hour looking everywhere and coming up with a single Missile expansion... Seriously, you can give the player more items to find.

I have to say though, I am on the other end of locking ROMs. I say go for it, any and every time. If people get stuck, write a post and ask for help. Then the community can come in and help out. In some instances we can pool our knowledge of the hack together and get to the finish. If someone doesn't want to do that, then GTFO and find a game that will hold your little baby hands.

Also on the subject of locking ROMs, he explicitly said "You may not rip out any content from it and use for your own work unless the author approved of it." Therefor, you would have to PM about using it anyway, and if he allows you to use it, then guess what... It would require a PM anyway to send it your way. Locking the ROM effectively keeps people from using his custom work without his permission. Seems pretty straightforward to me, but because it is locked it turns into this huge deal because people can't just rip it anyway. So what?

Also Zeke... Missiles and Charge work pretty well on Desgeegas... FYI.

[Metaquarius]

So.... here is a new patch v1.1 for the hack, it should be compatible with 1.0 saves (thanks to Zhz2 for providing me a SRM to test with) : check out first post for patch & change log.
Not really useful for people who already got the Gravity Suit.

[Daltone]

Thanks bro.

But can I play it on my SNES yet?

[Metaquarius]

Dunno. The last data bank is not cropped anymore. You might need to add header however.

[Daltone]

cool, got it to work

dunno if i wrote the header in last time or inserted it lol,
i did write FF's into it until its 330200.

Yeah i know im retarded, this hack better not suck!

[Digital_Mantra]

perma-stuck:
[spoiler][/spoiler]

[Lunaria]

Thoughts so far: It's shit.
Okay, not really, but it needs a lot more work. Seems like beta testing was skipped over or something since player logic have not been explored at all in terms of design AFAIK.

Thoughts on finally reading the thread (And by that I mean OP, since I don't give a shit about the rest.): There are a few more things that this hack could have done, and also, should have been done that would not have been super time consuming but would have made for a better experience. But for the time frame put into it, I must say that I am indeed impressed, since it proves you work very fast and efficient. The problem here would in that case be lack in experience and skill towards making it enjoyable to play.

Regardless, I have made live stream of my first session (blind run even.) of this hack where I will go on and on about shit I think is terrible; You can find it over here: [Link]
And by that I mean all of it. I provide some insight in design choices I believe should have been taken, or indeed, should still be taken for future versions. Even if you don't give a shit about that (which is dumb if so.) then I certainly think you should watch it anyway to study how a player who is not you plays your hack. I will make another stream where I keep playing later some time in the future, hopefully some of the problems have been looked into!

[Digital_Mantra]

I'm not gonna bother updating the patch, a hack of this size isn't an overnight fix.
The enemies never bothered me, it was more just continuity and better hints.

So yeah, just got grapple! I'll do another planetary roundabout.
I'm thinking either lower maridia or ws.

Issues aside, this hack is definitely one of the tops.

[LReyomeXX]

Just got Ice, where to go next, I already got Varia

[Aerezoloh]

Just got Ice, where to go next, I already got Varia

[spoiler]Opposite of the door to the room with the crumble blocks and spikes, where you had to proceed to get to the following rooms to the Ice Beam, shoot at the wall on the left side.[/spoiler]

[Metaquarius]

Thoughts so far: It's shit.
Okay, not really, but it needs a lot more work. Seems like beta testing was skipped over or something since player logic have not been explored at all in terms of design AFAIK.

Thoughts on finally reading the thread (And by that I mean OP, since I don't give a shit about the rest.): There are a few more things that this hack could have done, and also, should have been done that would not have been super time consuming but would have made for a better experience. But for the time frame put into it, I must say that I am indeed impressed, since it proves you work very fast and efficient. The problem here would in that case be lack in experience and skill towards making it enjoyable to play.

Regardless, I have made live stream of my first session (blind run even.) of this hack where I will go on and on about shit I think is terrible; You can find it over here: [Link]
And by that I mean all of it. I provide some insight in design choices I believe should have been taken, or indeed, should still be taken for future versions. Even if you don't give a shit about that (which is dumb if so.) then I certainly think you should watch it anyway to study how a player who is not you plays your hack. I will make another stream where I keep playing later some time in the future, hopefully some of the problems have been looked into!

Thanks for your thoughts, Crys.

I've been watching part of your livestream too.
While I recognize several design flaws on my own (noticeably, not enough hints on secret paths in early game), I have the feel you're not a very patient player, you barely paid attention to region maps, and fast-forwarded as soon as you got bored (at least in the first part of the play).

The same goes for the invisible floor room in Brinstar, you absolutely want to cross that room for some reason, making lots of save states, while there's still a lot of unexplored rooms around. It clearly doesn't seem to be doable, but you try again and again which is *I think* dumb. Some other places reveal that kind of silly obsession.

You've admittedly realized you got the Varia early and blame the hack for not giving you clues on where to go after Ice. The fact is Varia suit is only useful in Norfair, no matter you got it before or after Ice, I think it is just plain obvious to this regard, just saying.

You just throw yourself in a ocean of spikes, expecting something cool to happen, where's the logic there ? :lol:
Anyway, that vid is priceless. Thanks again. I'm gonna make even more things easier and obvious of course.  :^_^:

[Lunaria]

While I recognize several design flaws on my own (noticeably, not enough hints on secret paths in early game), I have the feel you're not a very patient player, you barely paid attention to region maps, and fast-forwarded as soon as you got bored (at least in the first part of the play).

I give you that, I am impatient; But possibly not in the way you think. For example: I hate waiting for slow door translations from room to room, so I speed them up. I don't like things to go slow since it breaks the flow for me. That being said, when I have been clueless on where to go, I have actually studied the map to see if I could figure something out from it! :colonrightv:

The most obvious show case of this was early on before I found bombs, where I was looking around to see if the map provided any sort of hint on where to go. Which pretty much lead to me trying to even damage boost to get up to the last area that the map scan gave me. :P
(Since at the time I had indeed not read the thread and had no idea where the skill level was supposed to be set at.)

The same goes for the invisible floor room in Brinstar, you absolutely want to cross that room for some reason, making lots of save states, while there's still a lot of unexplored rooms around. It clearly doesn't seem to be doable, but you try again and again which is *I think* dumb. Some other places reveal that kind of silly obsession.

This may have something to do with me messing with prime 2 recently too. It might seem rather obsessive, but if you want to do stuff that I do you have to take quite a few tries to establish if something is possible or not. I am, of course, speaking about sequence breaking here.

For example, I managed to jump up the shaft to Varia where you needed ice beam(?). But I most certainly did not manage it on my first try! :P
I don't want to stop trying too soon risking that it might be possible but it was just a lack or experience/skill that prevented me from achieving the goal.

But regarding the invisible floor room in Brinstar, I'm pretty sure you placed BTS down in it, otherwise I would have gained hight from the wall jump to get back up. The reason I kept at it was that the pit seemed small enough that one could be able to pull it off with one crumble jump or a wall jump if you managed to get a running start. Crumble jumping is, well, not the easiest thing though. :P

I should also note that in other situations (such as the lava room in norfair (the one with a bunch of red flying skulls and spikes in the celling.) I only do it for shit and giggles even though I know there is no possible way I could do it. :P

You've admittedly realized you got the Varia early and blame the hack for not giving you clues on where to go after Ice. The fact is Varia suit is only useful in Norfair, no matter you got it before or after Ice, I think it is just plain obvious to this regard, just saying.

Yes, but you also have to realise that I have no idea of knowing exactly what I sequence broke. Since I don't know the intended route or even the map structure; This being a blind run and all that good stuff.

I could have (by skipping ice beam.) skipped a bunch of other shit too that you would need to get ice beam. Evidently, there is also a possibility that even if Ice beam unlocks varia suit (which is indeed only useful for heated rooms.) Ice beam might also open up paths in other areas of the game for other upgrades that you also need to progress. The fact that you're calling me out on this thinking it's silly that I did not realise something like this only serves to further establish that you have not check up with any other players logic. :P

People play differently, as such, there are many different ways in which players will tackle the goal!

For example, say if my earlier example was true and you needed another item beside varia suit after ice beam that was placed in another area such a crateria, would you also have found it dumb if a player runs around thinking they have to progress in norfair?

Anyway, that vid is priceless. Thanks again. I'm gonna make even more things easier and obvious of course.  :^_^:

Glad you're enjoy it, but most of all; I am glad that you're taking in what I say to heart and at least try to see what I'm saying! People can complain as much as they want how rude I am, but I do provide feedback. :P

[LReyomeXX]

Yes, but you also have to realise that I have no idea of knowing exactly what I sequence broke. Since I don't know the intended route or even the map structure; This being a blind run and all that good stuff.

I could have (by skipping ice beam.) skipped a bunch of other shit too that you would need to get ice beam. Evidently, there is also a possibility that even if Ice beam unlocks varia suit (which is indeed only useful for heated rooms.) Ice beam might also open up paths in other areas of the game for other upgrades that you also need to progress. The fact that you're calling me out on this thinking it's silly that I did not realise something like this only serves to further establish that you have not check up with any other players logic. :P

People play differently, as such, there are many different ways in which players will tackle the goal!

For example, say if my earlier example was true and you needed another item beside varia suit after ice beam that was placed in another area such a crateria, would you also have found it dumb if a player runs around thinking they have to progress in norfair?

Well said Crys...I am the hardcore explorer, so I always disregard "item order" and "item sequence" and if I break it, I break it. I am fully prepared to pay whatever consequences come up because I get into an area or section too early.