New hack page discussion

[Lunaria]

We are currently setting up (and making progress) in a motion to update the main site. Now, I'm the one sitting and designing the pages, this is an group effort, and that means all opinions are welcome and valid! Currently this update is planned to feature a, mostly, complete rewrite of the website as well as an much needed re-organization of how hacks are labelled, since let's be frank; The current state of the hack page is a mess, and really does not make itself for browsing!

This thread is specifically for what information we want about any individual hack on their hack page. (As well as what could be used to search for it when using the theoretical search function we want.)

This is what we have, currently, in regards to different things:

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*Title: Simple enough, the name of the given hack.

*Release date: This should be the original release date, not the upload date.

*Old size: This will probably be called something else, but it refers to whether a hack is: Overhaul (might be re-named?), full, half, mini, or one room (maybe rename to micro?).

*Trick: This would be a predetermined scale based on what tricks are required (from a feasible, not possible, perspective) to beat the hack. If a hack has a trick/skill/exploit that is required, then it will get a rating here based on that. Rating in this category will default to the hardest trick required, this is to prevent players from getting a nasty surprise! The current naming idea for the scales are: Vanilla (same stuff that is required to BEAT vanilla.), Average, Veteran, and Expert. (Maybe a TAS one too? Doubt there are many hacks out there that requires TAS tricks to beat though...)

*Difficulty: How hard the hack is. This is highly subjective for players, which means it's the hardest rating to place on a hack, but it's also one of the most important ones for outside people to get! The planned scale here is the same as above, except it leaves room for easier things too: Beginner, Vanilla, Average, Veteran, and Expert.

*Type: This will be a rather generic label for what the hacks focus is, as such, it can be a bit of everything, but it needs to be relevant information and it needs to be the main focus of the hack. Example types: Race, Exploration, Gimmick (Grapple only hacks and such goes here), Story, Action, Action/Exploration (This is what most hacks would get.), Boss rush, etc. (More type ideas are much appreciated!)

*Size: Measured in playable scroll areas. (We'll probably opt for "?" in many of the old hacks cases, since I doubt most would rather not start counting!) Some might argue that it's not a good way to measure size, and I'd agree, but this combined with the old size rating will give readers, who know nothing about the hack in advance, an general idea of how large the hack is, and how much of a time commitment it would be to play it!

*Rating: If we manage to put together an rating system then this might happen....

*Reviews: Will be listed at the bottom of the hacks page. These pieces will only be accepted if they are decently long and decently in-depth about their opinion in the hack.

*Forum link: (Name it "discussion thread"?) Also a maybe, but if we get this, we'll start generating forum threads (or use existing ones.) and have the hacks page link to them. It would be rather great since it would point people in the right direction for discussion! (And might get us more forum users!)

*Screenshots: I have not decided how many I want to display on the hacks pages, but I want more than the current, rather lacklustre, 2.

*Icon field: If people think it's a good idea. (I'm unsure myself.) I'll start pushing out icons for all types, old sizes, and difficulty. This is to provide a visual means to quickly acquire information, it's not there to replace text fields, just to supplement them! As so, they'd look something like this:

(Or maybe not? Someone else might have a better visual design if we decide to roll with this idea.)

*Description: An field for the author to write a short description of the hack.

*Download link: duh.

*Read-me: An separated download link that is just the read-me. Might be useful?(?)

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Keep in mind that nothing of this is final, and everything is up for discussion! (Which is why this thread was made!) Disagree with something here? Think that something is missing? Post right away and tell me why I'm wrong!


Also note: This is probably a long running thing, so don't start expecting the site to change overnight. At the earliest we'll probably roll out at new years~

[Quietus]

I'll tackle these in their respective order:

Title: Obviously.
Release Date: Yup.
Old Size: I can't see how this is relevant, nor how it would help any potential player to decide about playing.  Omit this.
Tricks: I'd save this sort of thing for the readme files.  Unless you're going to provide an explanation for every trick, players may not even know what they are.
Difficulty: I agree that five stages is about right, but I'd avoid labels.  A simple 1-5 stars alongside the rating would suffice.
Type: Not sure on this one.  It seems to me that the large majority of hacks follow the basic format of bosses > end game, so this may not help much.
Size: Again, I'm not sure this really helps with anything.  There can be massice hacks that are quick, and small hacks that take ages. :neutral:
Rating: Definitely, but I think it shouldn't appear until at least five ratings have been given to avoid any instant one- or five-star hacks after just one vote.
Reviews: I like the idea, but these should be at the bottom of whatever list there is.  While they'd likely vote anyway, make voting mandatory for any reviewer.
Forum Link: Yes, but call it "Discussion / Help", since that's what it'll likely be used for.
Screenshots: These need to be prominent, and not taken within the first five minutes of a hack.  These should be sourced by somebody actually playing a hack.  These will often sell a hack before a player even looks at / reads anything else.  I know from my time on SMWcentral that it was usually sort by rating > screenshots > download. :^_^:
Icon Field: I can't see this will help at all, so I'd skip it.  It sounds like there are going to be enough labels as it is.
Description: Definitely.
Download Link: Yup.
Readme: Yup.

I'd probably go with a slightly differrent order too.  The most important things for potential players are name, rating, difficulty, screenshots, and the download like, so make them first.  And, as I mentioned above, reviews at the bottom.

[Lunaria]

Yeah, order of how these things will show up is not decided at all, I just listed them as I recalled them when I made the thread, really! :p

Old Size: I can't see how this is relevant, nor how it would help any potential player to decide about playing.  Omit this.
Size: Again, I'm not sure this really helps with anything.  There can be massice hacks that are quick, and small hacks that take ages. :neutral:

I notice that you disagree with both of these, which will make it hard for people coming in to determine the size of the hack, which is something that I find very important. You said you have been on SMWC, on there they list amount of exits (IIRC, it's either that or levels.) there are in the hack. It really does nothing to tell how long said levels are, but it does give you an general idea of the size at least, which is the goal of this. Got any other ideas instead? Since I'd argue that there needs to be some information in regards to size.

Tricks: I'd save this sort of thing for the readme files.  Unless you're going to provide an explanation for every trick, players may not even know what they are.

I disagree with this, people should not have to download a hack in order to be able to tell if they could possibly beat it with their skill set. (And let's be frank, I have not seen an single hack that actually teaches these skills to players in a good manner.) If we do this, we'd obviously make an page that explain tricks and which category X trick is under. (We could even set up the name on the hack page to link to that page.)

Oh and, people have a tendency to disregard the read-me file. :sadface:

Difficulty: I agree that five stages is about right, but I'd avoid labels.  A simple 1-5 stars alongside the rating would suffice.

I think labels actually are better, as they give more accurate information. "Is three stars harder than vanilla or not?" etc. If you have to go and explain the most simplistic stuff about your rating system then perhaps it's better with names. Also, gamers in general are used to this sort of thing, heck, even metroid players are: MZM has Easy, Normal, and hard. The prime games have normal and hard, trilogy has even more difficulty settings. I don't think labels would be a problem, but clearly we don't agree. :P

#Opinions.

Screenshots: These need to be prominent, and not taken within the first five minutes of a hack.  These should be sourced by somebody actually playing a hack.

Generally we'll have hack authors submit whatever screenshots they want, but in the case for hacks that don't come with screenshots? Yeah, I agree, they need to relevant.

[RealRed]

Some of the information would be good if it were player generated. people could submit times, difficulties, reviews. I think knowing about what other players thought could be useful. That would kind of get rid of blind-playing hacks, which is kind of how I feel about the current hacks page. (little is told).
If too many people are submitting garbage/rage reviews, we could make it so user's reviews have to be reviewed first? But then that allows for bias, so I don't know.

Also, we could have a "media" section for each hack. screenshots, videos... maybe links to TASes or speedruns too?
This could also be player generated. maybe.
... How the crap would you sort a hack by screenshots though? What?

I like your icon. it's good for quick identification. Maybe use icons next to the hack on the full "hacks" page of the site, and then have all of the in-depth info on the actual page.
I guess as a whole, categorizing hacks would be fantastic. I mean, beyond just "overhaul, full, half, mini, one room"... because those all kind of imply diminishing quality as you scroll down. If we organize things into exploration, action, challenge, gimmick, mini-game, difficulty-booster, etc. and THEN have them in order of full, half, mini, unfinished... players could much more easily find the hacks that suit their interests, and therefore be less likely to miss out on anything they might like.

[Lunaria]

The hacks page that list all hacks will get a major overhaul, most likely with sorting functionality. (And no, you can't sort hacks by screenshots, obviously.)

I think default sorting method would be from newest to oldest in regards to release date, but other ways of sorting would be available.

[personitis]

I haven't quite figured out how to concisely type my thoughts out yet and figured I might as well put up what I'm thinking on the matter rather than rattling my head with multiple thoughts at the same time then trying to make it all clear.

In regards to hack size, I don't think simply listing "small, medium, large" (or the sort will do). As such, I agree that total explorable screens is a step in the proper direction. This does leave out how often a player may spend moving around the hack, so it may be a good idea to factor in an expected time into the equation.

Using "Beginner, Vanilla, Average, Veteran, and Expert" to rate hack difficulty is a very good idea. Putting things on a star system seems not so efficient. What is 2 stars to the original? Easier or just like the original (since most hacks tend to often fall on the more difficult side of things)? If you'd go off and say "3 stars is the equivalent of the original game's difficulty," you're just using more words to say the same thing really.

Which also reminds me, I'd also side with the thought of cutting some of these organization categories. If you're browsing for a hack, I believe it'd make more sense to have all the information given out quickly and efficiently. If someone wanted an in-depth look at what they'll be getting into, that's what the "Discussion / Help" topic is for (which is also a good idea).

Screenshots: 5-8 should be sufficient.

That's everything immediately on my mind for now. I'll just echo this idea once again :eyeroll:: Being able to sort hacks on the page. E.g. List from smallest to largest, highest rated to lowest, etc.

[Quietus]

Old Size: I can't see how this is relevant, nor how it would help any potential player to decide about playing.  Omit this.
Size: Again, I'm not sure this really helps with anything.  There can be massive hacks that are quick, and small hacks that take ages. :neutral:

I notice that you disagree with both of these, which will make it hard for people coming in to determine the size of the hack, which is something that I find very important. You said you have been on SMWC, on there they list amount of exits (IIRC, it's either that or levels.) there are in the hack. It really does nothing to tell how long said levels are, but it does give you an general idea of the size at least, which is the goal of this. Got any other ideas instead?

Perhaps something more akin to SMWcentral, and just use number of rooms?  There's no ideal way to do size, which is why I originally said to leave it out, but rooms makes more sense than scrolls.  Players may not even know what scrolls are! :lol:

Tricks: I'd save this sort of thing for the readme files.  Unless you're going to provide an explanation for every trick, players may not even know what they are.

I disagree with this

...and I agree with you.  I didn't know you were planning to detail them elsewhere, so having a key and explanations elsewhere is fine.  I would, however, be tempted to simplify it to a basic skill level, alongside the difficulty.  Having 1 as those in the original game, 2 as basic tricks like wall-jumping, double bomb-jumping, and shinesparking, 3 as mockballing and shortcharging, 4 as super short charging and IBJing, and 5 for required glitches, such as jumping through floors or blue suiting.

Difficulty: I agree that five stages is about right, but I'd avoid labels.  A simple 1-5 stars alongside the rating would suffice.

I think labels actually are better, as they give more accurate information.

I was suggesting avoiding labels mainly because of the ones you'd listed, to be honest.  'Vanilla' means nothing, so having Easy, Original, Average, Hard, and Very Hard (or something like those) would work fine.

:^_^:

[Zero One]

Given I'm writing the database to contain all of this information, I should probably throw my opinion in here:

*Title: Of course.

*Release date: Duh.

*Old size: I'd call this "Category". We also need to properly define the categories as best we can, though no doubt, we'll encounter hacks that seems to straddle multiple types.

*Trick: Eh, I'd pass on this. Sounds like readme stuff. And if they don't read the readme, then that's their fault. OR, it could go in to the description of the hack.

*Difficulty: Given how subjective this is, I'd grab opinions from a bunch of people and average it out. Though I'd prefer to not have it at all, and possibly put it in the description.

*Type: Like "Old Size", we'd likely get hacks that encompass a lot of "types", making this a very difficult case.

*Size: I'd say "Old Size" accounts for this already. As long as we clearly define the categories, a player would be able to make a reasonable estimate as to the size of the hack.

*Rating: Of course. Probably an average of all ratings, out of 5 stars.

*Reviews: Yeah, why not.

*Forum link: Yup.

*Screenshots: Sounds good.

*Icon field: I'd pass on this. The user will most likely figure out what kind of hack it is quite quickly.

*Description: yep

*Download link: duh.

*Read-me: Maybe. It's not difficult to do, and saves the person from actually downloading the hack.

[Quietus]

I think size should be restricted to number of rooms.  The old labels mean nothing.  I've been around for years, and even I don't know the difference between Overhaul and Full, nor between Half and Mini.  I take Overhaul to mean that everything was changed, but does that mean that I could create a hack with two rooms (so it's not a one-room hack), change the physics, graphics, map, enemies, and music, and it's considered an overhaul despite being just two rooms?

There's also no need for two labels of size, regardless of how we end up doing it.  We have to create this list while aiming at newcomers, and two sizes is just going to complicate things.  Somebody coming to the site for a hack is not going to have any knowledge of our strange, old labels, and with something simple like 'Number of Rooms", they can immediately compare hacks, and know that one must be quite small while another is clearly bigger.

[Retroo]

i like the icon idea not really that it would help but its cool and would like to see that

[Mon732]

Something I should mention about the number of rooms. What about multiple rooms inside one room header?
Would the number of rooms be counted based on the number of room headers or the number of "rooms" that you see ingame?

[Quietus]

Keeping it simple is key, so it'd be one room, regardless of how many sections fall within it.  While some 'rooms' do have multiple explorable areas within them, most hacks don't do it much (if at all), so it should be fairly easy to manage.

[Jordan5]

I can see where you're coming from Quietus, but I think measuring scrolls would be a better measure as it's more easily comparable with the other hacks (and it would have the number of scrolls in the original at the top of the page or something so newbies can relate easily, too) and people tend to use rooms within rooms more and more nowadays. I know Drew needed something like 17 room headers for Tourian but 195 doors (it was something around this, i think) as he had many rooms per room header, which just shows that the number of SMILE rooms isn't as good an indicator as the number of in-game rooms. Just what i think anyway :^_^:

[Quietus]

Yeah, I understand the arguments for and against both, but the point is that neither of them are going to be perfect, much like some of the other labels, but I still feel that any newcomer to the site is going to instantly understand what a room is, but scrolls is open to interpretation.  Rooms including multiple areas is as awkward to count as scrolls in rooms, so they're on par.  Do we include scrolls that the player can actually enter or all of them?  Exclude those that cannot be reached, or are full of solid tiles?  If you include all scrolls, it's still got its problems, since you could have a fifty-scroll room, but it's only used for a 1x1 save room (unlikely, I know, but it's just an example).  That's my reasoning behind suggesting that we keep it as simple as possible. :^_^:

[Jordan5]

I meant all explorable scrolls (ie. those that aren't red all the time and filled with solid tiles etc.) but yes, no way is perfect. :heheh:

[Lunaria]

You guys do realise, that if we use scrolls we'll call it "screens", right? Since a scroll area is pretty much the size of a screen. And I doubt players will have an hard time understanding what screens mean... (And it should really go without say that you only count screens the player can be on Quietus, a la the map.)

The main problem I see with using rooms is that, well, it does nothing to tell how big the rooms are. Redesign, for example, would probably get a relative small number that does not do it justice, since Redesign uses a lot of really large rooms.

[Quietus]

[spoiler][/spoiler]

Get to it, hackers! :yay:

[Lunaria]

I don't think any sane person would do that though, and in the edge cases where something similar to this shows up, I'd just count it after the map tiles used in the hack, ain't that hard m8.

[Quietus]

I'm just kidding - don't panic.  However, I can see somebody doing this, and making the map to match, just to inflate their listing. :neutral:

[Lunaria]

Perhaps, but it seems unlikely to me that it would have any large effect. Making a complete fullsized SM hack takes years (for most people,) should their hack perhaps utilise tricks to inflate their rating to seem, at a glance, larger than other hacks? I don't see a big problem with that. It's not an e-penis contest, if the hack is good or shit will be judged based on all its merits. (And is also why reviews are there too! ^o^)

I think that, if you're serious enough to have the commitment to make an good SM hack, then you're probably more interest in portraying your world as close to your vision, not trying to abuse specification in order to appear larger on the websites rating. :v

* Crys shrug

It might become a thing for smaller hack projects but...

You're not going to get away from a minority abusing such things in the first place, and it will probably happen for other things too, such as people submitting screenshots that don't accurately represent their hack.

[Quietus]

There's no need for such analysis - I was just pulling your leg.  I don't honestly expect anybody to do it.

[RealRed]

For real guys. Who is honestly going to sit down and count every explorable scroll?
1. Favoritism. Nobody is gonna want to tediously count each scroll in a hack they think is garbage.

2. Map style. Super metroid Revolution EX and Super Metroid SAC don't have maps. Super metroid limit has large crateria rooms that aren't shown on the map. Counting may easily become incorrect anyway.

3. Making a program that suits all hacks. Imagine you wrote a program to do it for you. How would you tell what is and isn't a scroll? Hidden areas are placed in red scrolls all the time. You can't make it determine what's explorable based on tile variation because tile variation is largely different between hacks... say a program determines a scroll as "not explorable" if it uses two tiles or less. Okay, but often times hackers will have corner scrolls with details so you don't see it for a moment and see all of the tiles cut off.  Really basic hacks could have scrolls cut out because they just suck.
If you have a program look through the whole rom, often times hacks will have unused or added rooms anyway, so you can't make it that easy. You'd have to manually figure out which rooms are used and which aren't, which nobody will want to do.

4. What do screens even mean? What the actual fuck, guys? You can't determine the length or size of a hack at all through a statistical number. Lets say super metroid is 1000 scrolls, and redesign is 2000 scrolls. Wow, twice the size! Now, let's say redesign is 2000 scrolls, and phazon hack is 2500 scrolls. That's strange, playing redesign took a lot longer than phazon hack did. But why is that? well, phazon hack has boatloads of massive crateria-landing site style skyline rooms that don't necessarily add length to the gameplay, only size to maps. Now, lets say super metroid is 1000 scrolls and super metroid wet dream is 1000 scrolls. Wet dream, despite being the same size half hack, is a much longer hack despite being the same size, thanks to water filled rooms.

So in the end, what would the amount of scrolls really honestly tell you about the size, quality, and or length of a hack? Chances are, not as much as you guys are making it seem.

The size and length of a hack should be a consensus generated by players, not by a machine that spits out numbers (or a player that does the machine's job and spits out a number).

EDIT:

Counting the amount of rooms is also relatively useless. See these two rooms.

[spoiler=One Room. (Massive image)][/spoiler]

[spoiler=One Room. (Small image)][/spoiler]

What if both of these rooms' respective hacks featured 50 rooms? Which is larger? The data isn't actually helping.
Numbers and statistics aren't useful. Do we play hacks because they have the biggest playable area, or because they're fun? Hopefully the latter. Now, which measurement of a hack will help you determine if a hack is fun? a really big number, or a user review?

[JAM]

*Release date: This should be the original release date, not the upload date.

I'd use 2 dates: release date and last modified date as at romhacking.net to avoid any problems.

And I'd add new category named "Micro". Mini-hack that can be cleared in 5 minutes or so. I can count about 7-8 of them already.

Also, I'd split Half hacks to "Skill hack", "Hard mode", "Boss rush" and... just half.
A lot of existing half hacks will be in each category.

Also, how about "April's day" category? =)
To see what I mean, go to hack page and look for a hack n@mÊÐ LÏkÊ T#!$

EDIT:
As for the size, we can use 5 types: from extra small (XS) to extra large (XL).
Evacuation, Green Peace, Vacation are XS.
Most of mini hacks are S. (general rule: size of 1 or 2 areas of original game)
Original game is M.
Redesign is L.
What is XL? Really big hack. 8 full areas filled by the rooms almost completly.

[MetroidMst]

Size is pretty useless to include. If a hack is fun, people will play it/keep playing it. If it isn't, they'll stop. Size has nothing to do with that.

[Quietus]

At the moment it sounds like most of us think size is pointless, and others want to categorise everything to death. :^_^:

I'll stand by my original point, which is that this list isn't just for us, it's for anybody visiting, and I think size information would mean nothing to people outside of experienced hackers.  That's edging toward elitism, and that never helps.