Fall Hack Contest

[ReptileMonster]

Metroid Zero: Fall review.

I thought Metroid Zero: Fall was pretty good, but has issues.

Positives:
+: I love the atmosphere. That dark tone. The felling that something isn't right.
+: The fact that some enemies have set boundaries where they can't chase you was a nice touch.
Neutral
-: I like the graphics, but I feel like they need a little more. Maybe add a little blood to the textures (A little!), to add a sense of dread.

Negatives:
X: I thought it was a little short, even for a demo. I know it's a demo, and that life is being an issue, but I still feel like it could have been a little longer then under 10 minutes.
X: I didn't like the fact that you encounter enemies at the beginning, the moment where the station is "abandon". Maybe wait until the player gets the morphball, like in Super Metroid.

Final thoughts: I think it's a good start for a hack. Definitely has some issues, but it is still in alpha, so I'll let them pass. One to try out.

I'm looking forward to future versions! :wink:

[Alex S]

nice timing, me. learning metroid 2s tile format literally 2 hours after the contest ended... :mad:

Hey its alright. That means you will be able to take your time and make something really darn cool :3

[liamnajor]

nice timing, me. learning metroid 2s tile format literally 2 hours after the contest ended... :mad:

Hey its alright. That means you will be able to take your time and make something really darn cool :3

indeed. next contest, I'll be posting a real hack.

[TheAnonymousUser]

November 30th 2017 - FlyGuy: @everyone IT'S D-DAY FOR CONTEST ENTRIES! GET THEM IN BEFORE MIDNIGHT EST TONIGHT, OR FOREVER FEEL THE WRATH OF TAU!!!!

That's nothing compared to the wrath I'll bring to the SUBMITTED entries!
Sillyness aside:

So many entries. This is what I like to see in a contest (even if it takes longer to tear them all apart :colonrightv:)
Even better, we've got a good chunk of ZM hacks, too. And to top it off, we've got new hackers entering the scene, as well. As far as I'm concerned, this contest was a success just on that alone.

WITHOUT FURTHER ADO:
[spoiler=le review]
As always: Reviewed in submission order. Bullet points, because I'm trash with words. First point is always the theme. And a '/' represents a non-issue, but worth pointing out.

[spoiler=Volonus (v5) - Alex S]
tl;dr - 6th best hack. The hack is not entirely bad. It's just very unrefined. Plus it doesn't follow the contest theme very well (or at all). 'twas fun to play, though.

- I don't see how this relates to autumn or halloween

+ Intro automatically skipped (both the title intro, and samus' intro after landing)
- Whoops, jk beating the game gives the intro again
- Mis-aligned doors (most doors don't sit on the edge of the screen)
- Mis-aligned map on certain occasions
- Incorrect door transitions (this is only visual, but is prominent in a few places, not a one off)
- Nearly every chozo room is sealed with a red door. Any reason behind this?
^ This can also lead to a very possible, but very unlikely perma-stuck, should the player exhaust the chozo statue's refill, followed by all their missiles
- Room design is very choppy, and unrefined
- Background tiles sometimes acting as foreground tiles (One or the other, my friend. If they had a different pallete to differenciate if it's foreground or background, it'd have been a different story)
- Kraid fight is ez (the right-most tiles of the pillar kraid is supposed to destroy doesn't get destroyed)
- Speaking of kraid, elevator to kraid's lair that is completely useless
+ Boss death cutscenes are skipped (a bit jarring at first, but a welcome change)
- Get the map room at the very end of the area (although the map tries to explain the random room placements with morph tunnel tiles, it's still jarring without the map data)
- Those acid pits are just no
- Screw attack door leads to a point of no return door (personal gripe of mine when it comes to metroidvanias, points of no return)
- No zebs (iirc these were removed due to the authour believing there might not have been enough ammo to beat mother brain, and forgot that mst's spaghetti Os of death drop stuff in ZM. Correct me if I'm wrong)
+ Ship cuts to the credits

Final sentence: It's not winter mission levels of bad (this hack does demonstrate some of the progress gba-troid has made since mage. Points to it for that)

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=H A C K M E T R O I D 2 - liamnajor]
tl;dr - worst hack...if you can even call it that.

- This has jack shit to do with autumn/halloween

- You altered 1 room...1 room. And all you did to it was remove it's collision
- Secret worlds is not a feature
- There's no 'shit-load of luck' involved. You go 1 screen to the left, stay to the right side-ish of that room, and boom, you're at the omega nest. Hack over. Next. (I figured this out very quickly)
- The fact you thought this was a good idea for a contest entry, let alone a hack idea...

Final sentence: TAU.exe has stopped working

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Samus Aran in: Metroid Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO - mccad]
tl;dr - 2nd worst hack. This only gets 2nd worst thanks to H A C K M E T R O I D 2 not even really being a hack, or following the contest theme. This actually had some ""creativity"" to it.

- This has jack shit to do with autumn/halloween

- Spelling 'pls dont ban' via items isn't going to save you :/
- It's a Homenag-esque hack...what'd you expect...
- This hack is straight up shit: it's an example of what not to do for a metroid hack, or a contest entry for that matter (yet people keep encouraging this hacking mentality, via homenag)
- The fact this is trying to pay homage to Homenag, there's not a lot of spikes, or acid in this hack

Final sentence: Homenag is utterly disgusted that there's such half-assed competition for the title of 'True Homenag'

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Spooky Mission - CaptGlitch]
tl;dr - Best hack. Follows the contest theme. Very solid hack. Enjoyed every minute of it

+ Follows the theme of halloween

+ Intros automatically skipped
+ Custom music
- 'Press up to use doors'...after figuring it out
+ Boss death cutscenes skipped
+ Use of other bosses that are not kraid or ridley (the guardian, and mecha ridley aren't scripted anymore, and are just area bosses)
+ To be honest with you, this is actually a rather solid zero mission hack. People should do this more often
- Escape shaft wasn't really obvious in its path
- Only 1 set of title screen demos were altered (curious question: how hard is it to alter title screen demos in ZM?)

Final Sentence: Hack Zero Mission, people

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Substitute Turkey - Crystal Knight]
tl;dr - 3rd best hack. The hack stuck to the contest theme, looked visually impressive, and was fun to play. Albeit a few small problems, such as having way too much ammo for the size of the hack, and spazer almost obsoleting said ammo pool

+ Follows the theme of autumn

+ Very atmospheric
- Map inconsistencies (Morph's room, for instance isn't mapped. Neither is spazer)
+ Changed spazer fire rate
+ Removed beam flicker
- Large ammo pool that's barely tapped into (considering the size of the hack, too)
/ I'm struggling to see how phantoon fits into the hack, considering this hack focuses on autumn, than halloween
/ Rather short for a hack (Neither here nor there, considering I liked this hack)

Final Sentence: This is a good start to your hacking career. Keep at it

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Operation Save Thanksgiving - nodever2]
tl;dr - 4th best hack. Another solid hack, just didn't fit the theme well, until later on. Plus the route I took in the second half made me miss out on a lot of what brinstar had to offer, and I kind of felt robbed for that.

- A little weak on the autumn theme, visually (at least to start)

- Uh, by the time I entered brinstar, I ended up overlooking a lot of the place (didn't help that the route I chose took me straight to the boss. Speaking of...)
- Phantoon being the final boss, and not much of a hint toward it (again, didn't help I ended up skipping half of brinstar)
+ Phanturkey
+ Doesn't mean to say that the hack is bad. Visually, it's pretty solid. Brinstar is fucking gorgeous. Just progression was a slight problem for me, personally. Along with the weak start to the hack, in terms of following the contest theme
- Background for the landing site's escape state needs fixing

Final Sentence: See Crystal Knight's

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Metroid Zero: Fall - passarbye]
tl;dr - 5th best. The atmosphere is great, but this hack is way too short to get any feel for it (makes it hard for me to tell if its following the contest theme well, or not)

- Not really sure how (or if) it's following the theme of halloween

+ Intros skipped
+ Visuals/Atmosphere
/ Not sure why, but I feel like samus' movement in this hack is generally slower (I could be wrong)
- Really short hack

Final Sentence: Post bigger hack

[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Brew - cardweaver]
tl;dr - 2nd best hack. Was torn between this and Substitute Turkey. This made better use of the contest theme, as opposed to Substitute Turkey. Great use of visuals (and x-ray.) Solid little hack, and really enjoyed it.

+ Follows the theme of halloween

+ In typical cardweaver fashion, failed to take screenshot (I find this kind of ironic, considering this is a halloween hack, and the message is constantly haunting you)
+ When were blood thirsty ghosts so adorable?
/ Am I the only one here who found x-ray useful in this hack?
+ Phantoon was done in an...interesting way. Plus it's enrage from getting super'd was different
/ Did dropping a power bomb cause the message to read failed to save animals?
/ Rather short (though that's not really a bad thing, here)

Final Sentence: Gravity suit? In a card hack? What black magic is this?[/spoiler][/spoiler]

[spoiler=tl;dr ranking]
1st - Spooky Mission
2nd - Brew
3rd - Substitute Turkey
4th - Operation Save Thanksgiving
5th - Metroid Zero: Fall
6th - Volonus
7th - Samus Aran in: Metroid Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO
8th - H A C K M E T R O I D 2[/spoiler]

With that all said, see you next contest.

[OneOf99]

(His ratings)
[spoiler=Spooky Mission - CaptGlitch]
tl;dr - Best hack. Follows the contest theme. Very solid hack. Enjoyed every minute of it

+ Follows the theme of halloween

+ Intros automatically skipped
+ Custom music
- 'Press up to use doors'...after figuring it out
+ Boss death cutscenes skipped
+ Use of other bosses that are not kraid or ridley (the guardian, and mecha ridley aren't scripted anymore, and are just area bosses)
+ To be honest with you, this is actually a rather solid zero mission hack. People should do this more often
- Escape shaft wasn't really obvious in its path
- Only 1 set of title screen demos were altered (curious question: how hard is it to alter title screen demos in ZM?)

Final Sentence: Hack Zero Mission, people

[/spoiler]

To answer the question, demos are altered by literally telling the game what inputs should be pressed for each frame. Most of the demos are 500-800 frames long. We wanted to do more but ran out of time because of save-station ptsd and other problems.

And yeah, sorry about that first door :P That was shitty of us to do. All the streamers I've seen play have complained about it. Rip us.

(Oh, and by the way, the roast on winter mission is funny because Ing-Ing designed half the areas in Spooky Misison.)

[biospark]

We'll give a better indicator to enter the door in the next version.

Also, if you saw some demos that looked messed up, that was actually a glitch. It was supposed to only show the demos we completed. This will be fixed as well.

[Cpt.Glitch]

Time for my personal reviews of the hacks. I played them all on stream yesterday (in relation to this post), and will have those uploaded individually later. Let's start. (These are not labeled in a particular order)


[spoiler=Falling Simulator by Liam]
Pros:
-M2 Hack

Cons:
-Not autumn related
-Not entertaining
-Changed 1 room

Conclusion: Yeah this isn't an actual hack. Collision for room one was removed. That's it.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Brew by Cardweaver]
Pros:
-Spooky
-Level art and enemy graphics were well done
-The hack is based around X-Ray aka flashlight. Surprisingly does a good job utilizing it.
-Underwater physics were actually enjoyable
-Failed to take screenshot
-Phantoon and his noises

Cons:
-Sudden ending, even if it is amusing
-Sadly, having to stop to use X-ray to find where you need to go gets stale quickly

Conclusion: It's very interesting a neat hack that somehow makes X-Ray usable. The ending was a bit abrupt, but the laughter it provides makes up for it.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Substitute Turkey by Crystal Knight]
Pros:
-Fit the autumn part of the theme
-Level Design was nice, tileset was neat as well
-Lots of items
-Exploration factor was well done
-Great story and ending

Cons:
-Not much to do with the ammo
-Found a permastuck in a morph tunnel (pinged him on discord to let him know)
-A bit too easy. Never felt in trouble other than me taking damage for no reason
-Map broke after I reset (didn't save where I had been)

Conclusion: The hack was rather fun to play, the length and exploration required was decent as well, and had nice visuals. Not very exciting though.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Metroid Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO by Mccad]
Pros:
-Hail Homenag!
-Hail Shaktool
-Hail meme!

Cons:
-No adherence to theme
-The rest of the hack
-Has permastucks

Conclusion: It's a meme hack. It's good for that. Not good for anything else.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Zero Fall by Passarbye]
Pros:
-Very good level design
-Good visuals all around
-Perfect for what a demo should be

Cons:
-Music changes really often
-Slowed Samus movement...not a big deal though
-Minimap error made me think an item was somewhere that wasn't

Conclusion: A very good demo that showcases what Passar is all about. I'm eager to see the full hack.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Volonus by Alex S]
Pros:
-Lots of items
-Neat ideas
-Fast Paced

Cons:
-Lots of bugs and tiling errors
-Perhaps too many items
-Permastucks and insta-death pits

Conclusion: Needs lots of work, but it's a demo after all. Eager to see what Alex does with this.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Metroid: Operation Save Thanksgiving by Nodever2]
Pros:
-Fit autumn theme towards the second half
-Well designed in the latter half, first half wasn't bad
-Faster item grabs
-Escape sequence
-Great for a first hack

Cons:
-Map bugs
-First half didn't follow theme
-Last room's background is bugged
-Load times take ages, especially when grabbing an item and enetering a door before the fanfare ends. (side effect of his faster item grabs)

Conclusion: A really, really good hack for a first hack. It had a proper escape, design improved vastly towards the end, and there were minimal bugs. Good job! [/spoiler]
[spoiler=Spooky Mission by Magconst]
No, I will not rate a hack I took part in because bias. I will say I'm proud of what we accomplished though.[/spoiler]

[Xoneris]

Holy Moly.

So far i only played SpookyMission and Metroid Zero Fall, because im a huge sucker for GBAMetroid Hacks. 

Zero Fall:
[spoiler]A rather short Hack, but god is it good. If the finished ROMhack can keep up with this level of Atmosphere the ROMhack is going to turn out absolutly awesome![/spoiler]

SpookyMission:
[spoiler]This Hack is killer. I can't even describe how freaking cool this ROMhack is. The Ideas, the Sprites, the Music. They are all so cool. Absolutly Amazing.[/spoiler]
Oh yeah and about the NSFW thing in SpookyMission. Since you guys said its highly unlikly that somebody gets it without knowing how. Maybe wanna drop us some hints?

[OneOf99]

Maybe wanna drop us some hints?

Show a proof of 100% under 2 hours and maybe. (But by DM)

[Charmander106]

Like with SpoOkyMagician I too wanted to submit something but just couldn't get it done. I do want to eventually complete the short hack and release it, but we will see. (likely not but whatever...)

Congrats on those that actually submited a hack!

[Cpt.Glitch]

Maybe wanna drop us some hints?

Think numbers that relate to NSFW related things.

[benox50]

So far I only played the SM hacks because I'm a SM guy.
I watched the other ones.

So personal reviews:

Metroid Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO
[spoiler]Idk if this will be the full name but what a name, already smelling the meme. Now I just have to taste the meme. And..... yes it is a joke hack.
It has red crateria, it has bad enemies placement, it has booring waiting, it has useless doors, it has wrong sounds, it even has an half hack section at the end just to show how lazy bad hacks can be and they dont bother editing vanilla rooms anymore or maybe he just lacked time. Its a shity hack, but a shity one by will, I know he can do way better  :wink:
Ofc this doesnt excuse him for being the worst hack of all I played.
It still make me smile at times which is already a good thing.[/spoiler]

Substitute Turkey
[spoiler]Have custom tiles and follow the theme quite well. It doesnt have major issues, I saw someone getting perma stuck, but I myself didnt encounter issues. I like the dark tone, but I think visually it could be better, it feeled empty visually and gameplay wise too. It was like walking from rooms to rooms with enemies inside them and thats it, not alot of exciting level design, well nothing to surprise me. There was good exploration tho.[/spoiler]

Operation Save Thanksgiving
[spoiler]Best SM hack of the bunch, the first part doesnt follow the theme of autumn, but I still liked it visually and level design wise even if simple. Level design in general was the best part : There was verticality, there was rythm : First part of calm exploration, then some action that lead to a boss even if it was vanilla, the placement was good. Then other calm exploration in a new place, really pwetty place too and then bam, a boss and a timer to end the thing. I liked the hiddy ninja pirates, there was also a neat use of scroll PLM where the screen move slowly to reveal a mysterious pit.
My issues were the lack of polish : Skrees hiting an invisible ground, map that borke, BG that borke...[/spoiler]

Brew
[spoiler]I wanted to like it but I cant. So I put it has the second worst and heres why.
The main gimmick is interesting on paper, but in the long run stopping every time to see with X-ray is bad. At the end I just removed layer 3 to see. Add on top of that this annoying ghost that you cannot kill exept with grapple later. The ghost was also a good idea but his AI makes it that you must take damage from him at some point and that is bad and there was too much of em. Add to this the multitude of samus eaters plants, all those things hard to see and you got something annoying to play. So I didnt even finished it. However the visuals were amazing, I loved the edited layer 3, I loved the destroyed look of everything like it was eaten by acid, it was gritty, rusty, dirty and dark. Also I saw the boss and that was also great, BG getting bloodier and red flashing screen, yea I love flashing things I'm weird. Oh and I also liked the entrance of the place, like you are outside but you dont know what contain the inside and you just enjoy the before the surprise[/spoiler]

[FelixWright]

Review Time. I helped with spooky mission, so I'm not reviewing it.

The winner in my book: Operation Save Thanksgiving by @nodever2

[spoiler=Operation Save Thanksgiving]Completion: 88%
Operation Save Thanksgiving is nodever2's first hack, and from what I have seen the hack is particularly enjoyable. Although there wasn't much fall theme stuff going on in the beginning of the hack, the edited brinstar stuff later on looked spectacular and was a really good choice for this contest's theme. Also lol phanturkey.

+ Phanturkey
+ More than one boss
+ Color Tweaked Tilesets. Particularly Brinstar where different colors made a cool LEAF FALL DOWN effect.
+ Careful use of BG tiles to not make hidden items leave an obnoxious big hole in rooms.
+ Use of other people's stuff like Scyzer's map fix made gameplay fluid.

- Escape background graphics were bad.
- The hack could have used more autumn-themed graphics in the beginning.
- The bomb secrets to Charge Beam and an energy tank could have been better graphically.
[/spoiler]

[spoiler=Brew]Completion: 90%
Runner up! Metroid: Brew is somewhat of a collab between Quote and cardweaver. Coming back to it, I have had a lot of fun, once I knew what to do.

+++ Phantoon fight was made into something not bad!
+ Fit contest theme.
+ Power Bombs are a neat way to end the hack.

- The hack felt a bit too short, IMO.
- Yeah, you get the ghost buster pretty much right away but I felt overwhelmed trying to find where to go while a ghost leeched at my EN. Perhaps introducing the ghosts in the second room of the warehouse rather than the first would have been a better idea.[/spoiler]

[spoiler=Substitute Turkey]Completion: 100%
Third place! While Brew and Spooky Mission were going for a Spooky theme, Substitute Turkey seemed to go for a general leafy autumn theme. Substitute Turkey is a swell reminder that you do not need to load your hacks with lodes of equipment to make them enjoyable. I particularly liked the item/chozo graphics in this hack.

+ Custom chozo/item GFX
+ World design full of secret item hints that are easy to recognise.
+ Good execution of simplicity when it came to items.
+ The beams were changed to look less low-FPSish than vanilla SM. It's a nice touch.

- Riddled with bugs (map problems, OOB problems)
- Some item placement was a little lazy (The metal cubes you must missile into for expansions)
[/spoiler]

Disqualified Hacks:

[spoiler=Metroid: Zero Fall (Alpha)]Completion: 100%
+ Passar's out to get me with them graphics and palettes.  :yaynoes:
+ Passar is good at making rooms.

- Did not fit contest theme.
- Too Short! Enjoyable nonetheless.
[/spoiler]

[spoiler=Metroid Volonus]Completion: Almost 100% of what was in the hack.
I tested this hack before release and we've tried to get its creator to improve upon it, only to be told that he has already fixed said problems. (psst: he did not.) To be frank, I don't know if this hack will get very far.

+ Beatable

- "It's a feature"
- Lots of world design/tiling errors
- Some softlocks
- Bad use of scrolls, if any at all
- Does not fit contest theme
[/spoiler]

[spoiler=Metroid Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO] Completion: Enough%

+ Custom Samus GFX (Even though they were broken)
+ Beatable

- Did not have fall theme
- Felt like it was done in a few hours
- A compilation of metconst's boring, overused memes
- UNEDITED RAW GREEN BRINSTAR. [/spoiler]

[spoiler=H A C K   M E T R O I D   2]Completion: Nah Fam%
+ First RoS Contest Hack?
+ Beatable

- Just made it so samus could not get stuck because landing site has no collision.
[/spoiler]

[liamnajor]

@Cosmic H A C K M E T R O I D 2 does fit the theme. fall. get it?

[Quote58]

Oh man, you're so clever. Except that I specifically said the theme was 'autumn' instead of fall, because I knew someone would do that thinking they're being funny.

[liamnajor]

I wasn't trying to be clever. I was trying to be able to make the bare minimum hack.

[Quote58]

The results are in folks!

Congratulations go out to the team behind Spooky Mission, they are the winners of the 2017 Fall Hacking Contest!
So, first off we have a breakdown of all the points each hack got from the judges, and where they rank relative to each other:

Theme:
Judges:	Dessyreqt	Thedopefish	Begrimed	Kennon	Dmantra	-- Total Score --
Spooky Mission	5	8	10	10	10	43
Brew	10	6	8	8	6	38
Substitute Turkey	6	10	6	6	8	36
Zero Fall	8	4	5	4	5	26
Operation: Save thanksgiving	4	5	4	4	5	23
Volonus	3	3	3	3	3	15
Dread	2	2	2	2	2	10
Falling Simulator	1	1	1	1	1	5

Aesthetics:
Judges:	Dessyreqt	Thedopefish	Begrimed	Kennon	Dmantra	-- Total Score --
Spooky Mission	8	10	10	10	8	46
Substitute Turkey	5	8	8	5	10	36
Brew	6	5	5	8	6	30
Zero Fall	10	3	6	6	4	29
Operation: Save thanksgiving	4	6	3	4	4	21
Volonus	3	4	4	3	3	17
Dread	2	1	2	2	2	9
Falling Simulator	1	2	1	1	1	6

Gameplay:
Judges:	Dessyreqt	Thedopefish	Begrimed	Kennon	Dmantra	-- Total Score --
Spooky Mission	10	6	10	10	8	44
Substitute Turkey	5	8	8	8	10	39
Operation: Save thanksgiving	8	10	4	4	6	32
Zero Fall	6	3	5	6	4	24
Brew	4	5	6	5	3	23
Volonus	3	4	3	3	4	17
Dread	2	2	2	2	2	10
Falling Simulator	1	1	1	1	1	5

Final Scores:
Spooky Mission	43	+	46	+	44	=	133
Substitute Turkey	36	+	36	+	39	=	111
Brew	38	+	30	+	23	=	91
Zero Fall	26	+	29	+	24	=	79
Operation: Save thanksgiving	23	+	21	+	32	=	76
Volonus	15	+	17	+	17	=	49
Dread	10	+	9	+	10	=	29
Falling Simulator	5	+	6	+	5	=	16

Top 3 - Theme:
Spooky Mission	43
Brew	38
Substitute Turkey	36

Top 3 - Aesthetics:
Spooky Mission	46
Substitute Turkey	36
Brew	30

Top 3 - Gameplay:
Spooky Mission	44
Substitute Turkey	39
Operation: Save thanksgiving	32

Now, each judges individual thoughts on the hacks:

Dessyreqt:
[spoiler=GetDessyREQT]
Zero: Fall - 24 points
----
Zero Fall really built up a great atmosphere through the aesthetic design, sound, and the use of a spotlight focused on the player. I found the level design to be quite interesting, and very easy to follow as long as I was paying attention.
I really want more of this hack because it was fun to explore around the desolate area of the crashed ship.
My main critism is that I think the spooky atmosphere should have some element of danger, and it really wasn't there for me. The Deorem fight was also a bit telegraphed, what could have been a great surprise instead was "oh there's a fight here." Consider removing the falling debris and distracting the player prior to the to make it a better surprise.
--> Zero Fall playthrough twitch stream <--

Spooky Mission - 23 points
----
Spooky Mission clearly shows its development by a team of authors rather than a single person; its scope and content greatly exceed the other contest entries.
Its size isn't enough to earn it a top spot, but the level of polish that exists in the hack, along with the creative and on-theme skins for items and areas make for a very strong entry indeed.
All is not well, though. In the review copy there existed a number of camera glitches and inconsistencies that detract from the experience. Forutanely the authors have been quick to address issues noticed during streams of the hack. I think the best effort here would be to tighten up some of the level design, especially in the escape sequence.
--> Spooky Mission playthrough twitch stream P1 <--
--> Spooky Mission playthrough twitch stream P2 <--

Brew - 20 points
----
The theme for this hack is so on point. Not only is it handled visually and aurally, but via mechanics as well. A clear cut above the rest when it comes to theme.
The gameplay is also fairly well designed especially given that the screen is dark most of the time. Apparently a few people didn't realize you start equipped with X-Ray (it was noted in the description.) If you know it's there, it makes for a less frustrating experience.
That said, having such a strong theme, and having it so brilliantly executed unfortunately detracts from the playability of the hack, for me at least. I literally jumped into every Samus Eater, which was rather frustrating. My main complaint here would be address if that were changed into a different obstacle, something that doesn't revoke my control for five seconds.
--> Brew playthrough twitch stream <--

Operation: Save thanksgiving - 16 points
----
Phanturkey is phantastic! I thought the level design was quite nice. The Crateria portion features a nice chain of items to get and rooms to explore, and then the game funnels you toward the next area. It's not exactly typical in a Metroid game to segment areas like that but I think for a first area, this is a fine idea.
This hack really only features two areas though, and once you enter Brinstar area things start to feel a bit rushed. That feeling comes primarily from getting one item after another after another. The other part of the "rush" feeling comes from an obvious but apparently unintentional sequence break right at the end.
--> Operation: Save thanksgiving playthrough twitch stream <--

Substitute Turkey - 16 points
---
I think the fall theme as presented here is really well done! "Autumn" as a theme is a little harder to capture well since I don't think it's as evocative as scary things, but you did it beautifully.
Unfortunately the game was a little dark when played on console. It shows a little on your screenshot, but it seems more dramatic on a real SNES.
Some issues I had with this hack:
- there were some permastucks
- random map errors
- some of the items were not marked on the map
- I also thought it was a little odd to have just a bomb block leading to the final area, especially where it was. I'm not sure I would have found it on my own if someone else hadn't pointed it out.
A little more testing and attention to detail on the maps would have helped with the overall play experience a bit.
--> Substitute Turkey playthrough twitch stream <--

Volonus - 9 points
---
First off, congratulations on creating your very first hack! The items followed a logical flow and the areas to explore featured interesting obstacles. Please continue to learn more about hacking and level design; I'm sure your next hacks will be even better!
What to work on:
This hack was quite buggy. The rocks in particular made for some entertaining glitches. I also ran into a permastuck in the room after Kraid. The experience actually felt a little rushed, because I kept getting item after item after item with very little segue in between.
Finally I found the rooms that were basically mazes or covered up by foreground elements to just not be fun. Mazes in general are fairly lazy level design; they aren't a challenge in logic or skill, only persistence.
--> Volonus playthrough twitch stream <--

Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO - 6 points
---
You've given the player infinite health and supers, and barely edited a few rooms to have them run around in.
The peashooter being automatic was a strange choice.
The truly new rooms in this hack were not terribly interesting. Having unlimited everything also reduces the amount of fun in the hack, since there's no suspense. Of course I'm going to beat Ridley. I have all the health in the world and will never run out of ammo.
The only real suspense in this hack: when does it end?
--> Dread playthrough twitch stream <--

Falling Simulator - disqualified
---
You know this was a joke. I know this was a joke. Let's put a little more effort into the next joke, okay?
--> Falling Simulator playthrough twitch stream <--
[/spoiler]

Thedopefish:
[spoiler=SwimSwimHungry]

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Operation: Save Thanksgiving	00:16	68%

/ Didn't find high jump or charge
+ Looks nice, fits the theme
+ Pretty solid for a first hack
+ Phanturkey

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Substitute Turkey	00:13	16%

/ Didn't find supers
+ Very autumn-y, lots of colorful trees and pumpkins and such
+ Nice powerup resprites.

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Dread - The Reawakening: Remastered Edition TURBO	00:09	520%

- Red crateria
- weird power beam
- a bunch of graphical glitches, a couple potential permastucks, and some questionable room design
- The shaktool room
+ I did like the crabs falling from the sky though.

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Brew	00:17	90%

+ Very spooky
+ Cool spiders and ghosts
- Pretty trolly, made way worse since you can't see anything
/ Did not expect gravity suit in a cardweaver hack
/ Final boss was a thing

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
H A C K M E T R O I D 2	DNF	DNF

+ Well, it's technically a Metroid 2 hack

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Metroid Volonus	29:37	81%

- Some funky door transitions
- A kraid elevator to a deadend, and a fun glitch with the purple rocks
+ Otherwise pretty solid
/ I'm bad at ZM

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Metroid Zero Fall Alpha	06:02	8%

Short and spooky.
Not too much to say about this one, a small but competent hack that fits the theme.

Hack name	Completion Time	Item Percentage
Spooky Mission	2:00:47	76%

The big collab entry.  Took me as long as the other 7 combined.
+ This one has it all--multiple areas with unique tilesets, custom music, custom graphics, custom ASM
+ Fits the theme very well
+ I love the dry bones sidehoppers
- I definitely struggled in this hack, both exploration wise and dying to enemies wise
Did I mention I'm bad at ZM?

--> Unedited Raw Footage twitch stream P1 <--
--> Unedited Raw Footage twitch stream P2 <--
[/spoiler]

Digital Mantra
[spoiler=DMANDMANDMAN]
SM Substitute Turkey
+ Nice autumn trees and pumpkins, good themes
+ Short and sweet
+ Dachora is best turkey
- Some boring crateria rocky rooms

SM Brew
+ Some interesting aesthetics
+ Spiders/ghosts n shit
+ Phantoon ghost really cool.
+ Failed to take screenshot was hilarious
- Often aggrivating, claustrophobic clusterfawk gameplay
- Annoying mouth vaginas

SM Operation Save Thanksgiving
+ Got me nostalgic for those 10+ year old hacks
+ Phanturkey
- No autumn concepts (except for phanturkey)
- Boring/bland

SM Metroid Dread - The Reawakening Remastered Edition TURBO
- Joke/troll entry? intentionally bad.
- An awful experience
- No hack contest themes

ZM spooky mission
+ Excellent contest themes
+ Very big (much bigger than the typical contest hack)

ZM volonus
- No hack contest themes
- Plays like broken garbage

ZM zero fall
+ Short and sweet
+ Gameplay wasnt annoying
- No themes

Metroid Falling Simulator
no
[/spoiler]

Begrimed:
[spoiler=BeTheGrimeYouWantToSeeInTheWorld]
SPOOKY MISSION
The creepy atmosphere was apparent throughout, and I really enjoyed the use of graphics from other games to set that point in even deeper (the lava raft skulls from Super Mario World being turned into sidehoppers was pretty dang creative). The Halloween theme wasn't too heavy-handed.
There was a lot of variety with how the areas and enemies looked, and which colors were used, which in my opinion is more difficult to pull off than perfecting one style for the whole hack.
I mean, Spooky is basically a full-length game, and the design and aesthetic are tight, so I'm in.

SUBSTITUTE TURKEY:
Had Spooky Mission not rolled through and impressed me across the board, SubTurkey would'a probably been the sweeper instead. I liked this hack a lot because it satisfied the theme, but kept a 'vanilla but with a bit extra' vibe throughout. One of the better new hacks I've played in a long while. The tree leaves are really repetitive at a glance and could have used a bit more variety, but the other graphics like mushrooms, grassy slopes, pumpkins, tree trunks and busted rock worked nicely. An update that fixes a few of the visible quirks with this hack would be nift.

BREW:
Spookyfun halloween theme is definitely apparent, but not too overtly so - nearly a perfect balance, really.
In classic cardweaver style, the color choices are fun, the tiling is adventurous and distinct, solidly put together, and unafraid of unnatural formations, with a dash of Cliffhanger-esque freakiness.
The custom graphics are nicely done and immediately noticeable. My initial reaction was a little iffy because of the low visibility and an unkillable enemy chasing you, but then I realized that everything does really low damage, so it doesn't matter.
My main complaint is how hard the fog was to see through, but it's easy to work around that.

OPERATION SAVE THANKSGIVING:
The fall theme didn't seem visually apparent throughout the hack at all, until near the very end... which I don't think was fall-themed either, but it was so good that it doesn't even matter. I had to smoke a cigarette after that fight.
Mostly vanilla aesthetic, with a few palette and graphical edits. The tiling in some spots was a bit rough, but nothing bad enough to really deserve being singled out. The rusted metal tiling for the rooms near ice beam is really well done.
It played a lot like many older SM hacks, but without the horrible game-breaking bugs. It was a fun little romp that should be straight-forward and easy enough entertain anyone who likes playing hacks.

VOLONUS:
I forgot it was even a fall/Halloween entry because of the lack of theme, but still the hack was fun to play. There were some difficulty issues, but that likely is just my lack of experience with the GBA Metroids, and I still made it through.
A lot of doors seemed to have buggy looking transitions. Nevertheless, a nice window into what GBA hacking can produce.

DREAD:
The level of quality and care that has gone into this hack is such that it cannot be commented on.
It scores lowest for all three categories simply to keep other hackers from becoming discouraged.
[/spoiler]

GFKennon
[spoiler=DragonOverlordKennon]
SM Substitute Turkey
pros:
- Good Autumn themes with a dash of Pumpkins
- Using the Dachoras as the replacement Turkey was pretty clever
cons:
- I dont have much bad to say about this, some rooms may have been a little bland but it was a nice play

SM Brew
pros:
- Aesthetics wise this was pretty cool. Very gritty unsettling place to explore.
- The spiders and ghosts were a nice touch.
- Phantoon was pretty great too
- "Failed to take screenshot"
cons:
- Sadly for how good it looked it was miserable to play. (I ended up turning off layer 3)

SM Metroid_Operation_Save_Thanksgiving
pros:
- Phanturkey was a pretty amusing thing to find
cons:
- Other than Phanturkey there wasnt any Adherence to the theme of Fall/Autumn/Halloween
- A lot of early rooms were bland to me

SM Metroid Dread - The Reawakening Remastered Edition TURBO
pros:
- 10/10 will ban
cons:
- 10/10 will ban

ZM spooky mission
pros:
- Oh boy where do I even start? This one surprised me with how big the hack was, much more content than the typical contest hack here.
- Graphics are nice, themes are nice, everything is nice.
- Will sell soul again

ZM volonus
cons:
- Kind of no real theme here either
- Tiles looked incorrectly placed, too many tile errors (I could be wrong but it looked like a lot of them)
- I didn't finish this one, I'm not great with ZM and the lava around the worm boss was very unfun

ZM zero fall
pros:
- It was short and sweet, nothing jumping out at me but not being dull ether.
cons:
- No theme here again.
[/spoiler]

Before wrapping up, I need to mention the less fun news, which is that Metroid: Falling Simulator is disqualified from the contest for not following the rules.
Specifically:
- It is not beatable, you can get all the way to the queen metroid's room, but it does not trigger an ending with credits as far as I am aware
- It does not have 10 unique rooms made by the author

It also does a couple of things that aren't technically against the rules, but are still problematic:
- It does not follow the theme for the contest at all. The theme was Autumn or Halloween, the act of falling does not fit either
- It's more of a hex tweak rather than an actual hack

One last thing:
Unfortunately, no hack fufilled the requirements for getting the special Homenag role, although notably both Dread and Spooky Mission came quite close to doing so. Good to see some love for the Homenag in both of those.


Alright Metconst, it's been a fun contest. We had way more entries than usual, totaling 8 before DQ. That's a great thing, and it's good to see more people getting into hacking.
We also saw a huge collaboration, and not only that but it was of Zero Mission, not Super Metroid. This contest even saw the addition of the first Metroid 2 hack to be entered in a metconst contest, even if it ended up being DQ'd.
I know not everyone was happy with the choice of theme and structure for the contest, but in the end there were some great ideas, and we have a few new hacks to play that tried new things.

Congrats to everyone who entered, and Congrats to Metconst for a contest that got all sorts of great ideas flowing, and people talking.

I also want to say thanks to all the judges (Dessy, Dopey, Dman, Grime, and James) for taking time out of their busy schedules to play the hacks, I know there were a lot of them and it was tough to get it done in time, but I appreciate you guys making the effort.

See you next mission everyone!

PS: Feel free to use this thread to discuss the contest as a whole, especially in terms of what you would like to see done differently in future contests, and ideas for how to make contests here better overall, thanks!

Edit: Missed a thing in grime's stuff, fixed.

[Cardweaver]

Congratulations to Team Spooky Mission! Thanks to all the judges and everyone who participated in the contest. It was a lot of fun!

[nodever2]

Congrats to Spooky Mission! The victory was definitely well deserved. I'm very happy with this contest, it was really cool to participate. I accomplished what I set out to do: I learned a lot. Thank you to everyone who played my hack and/or gave feedback, it is much appreciated :)
I will be releasing a new version of my hack soon btw - it won't be a huge overhaul or anything, but it will polish the hack and fix the minor issues sprinkled about everywhere, and change progression near the end (this is mostly just for smoothing out the experience for anyone who hasn't played my hack but would like to, this would be a better version for them)

Looking forward to moving on to new projects!

[OneOf99]

Congrats to everyone who participated! (Also how tf did Brew not win aesthetic wow weak)

[jamablues]

I like this hack so far.... just shinesparked into varia suit to attempt blue suit glitch......and craaaaaaaaaaaash hhahha :lol: :lol: