[Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction

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Offline Wibi

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[Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« on: April 04, 2022, 06:04:03 »
Post rewritten on April 20th now that April Fools is... well, over.


Reduction is an unusual production. Since January 2022, I had been working on a level far in advance for April Fools (creatively named The Machine April Fools Level 2022, or TMAFL2k22) where the joke would be you download it expecting just some crappy memes, and you get something twelve times larger and more polished. It would've been like an independent KS+ take on the idea behind Alternate Reality Machine: make a level with the same general structure and size as The Machine, but with each area having new screens and its own unique gimmick. Plus a new overarching plot and impromptu NPCs. Development started on January 25th, and come March 20th, it was barely halfway done, and still had a lot of cutscene work, area design, decoration, and scripting left, and I had lost all motivation to work on it. (There were also a lot of pretentious undertones that bothered me, and I'm normally pretentious to the max.)

So I decided: "Who cares if TMAFL2k22 is already a variant on The Machine? I want something in time for April Fools' and TMAFL2k22 is a lost cause, but I don't just want to copy and paste rooms from it and call it a day. What if I were to create a Medium-size level with assets, area themes, and gimmicks taken from the doomed level, but with all new rooms again - effectively a variant on a variant of The Machine?"

And that's Reduction! This level started development on March 20th, released on April 4th (just over 2 weeks!), and... turned out pretty well. At first I thought it would probably be dead in the water as well (prompting Reduction: Reduction?), and there were a few days I felt no motive to work on it, but I pressed onward, and somehow it actually turned into a full-sized level.

DonDoli's playthrough

Spoiler: Screenshots (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: Changelog (click to show/hide)

Download it HERE.



Spoiler: Original post (click to show/hide)

(Side note: The main joke behind TMAFL2k22's Nifforum post would've been that it had these fake low-quality grainy screenshots with a massive features list, and then quietly bait-and-switched you into playing something of much higher quality, where the features list is actually a bunch of half-truths. For Reduction, I went with a different joke that TMAFL2k22 had definitely been released and wasn't in limbo at all and you could compare Reduction and TMAFL2k22 side-by-side to see the similarities. It didn't occur to me until I started writing this that "I developed the awesomest biggest level ever but then I got burnt out so here's a smaller level inspired by it" could also be mistaken for an April Fools' joke... and would be a pretty good one. Will keep in mind.)
« Last Edit: April 21, 2022, 06:54:02 by canteven / ncrecc »

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Offline GrayFace

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #1 on: April 22, 2022, 08:00:42 »
Nice level!
Spoiler: (click to show/hide)

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Offline GrayFace

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #2 on: April 23, 2022, 09:46:11 »
Here's a fix I made to tilesets to make spikes shape visible. Had to leave 1 pixel of invisible border on one of the tiles of 101, because it's used on layer 3 (that can be fixed in the level editor though). Haven't fully tested the changes.
« Last Edit: April 23, 2022, 10:03:45 by GrayFace »

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Offline Lit Knob

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #3 on: May 30, 2022, 09:24:58 »
I just played this (actually, I also played all "canteven levels" but the Glorious Trainwrecks ones (I played the ncrecc ones months ago)) and wow...
This gotta be your best level (not counting GT and collabs. Tomatoes Gaiden is amazing).
Now that's what I call a Medium-sized level right there.
The tracks were bangers and made up for the more frustrating screens (and some even tell you to Git Gud X)).
Difficulty tag is right.
Nice job. :hiddenstar:
Spoiler: Spoilery stuff (click to show/hide)
« Last Edit: June 03, 2022, 17:36:19 by Lit Knob »
"The flaw expert" -egomassive

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Offline Wibi

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #4 on: May 31, 2022, 03:02:39 »
Thank you for playing!

Spoiler: (click to show/hide)

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Offline Lit Knob

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #5 on: June 01, 2022, 03:44:38 »
Spoiler: (click to show/hide)
« Last Edit: June 03, 2022, 17:53:41 by Lit Knob »
"The flaw expert" -egomassive

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Offline Lit Knob

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Re: [Challenge] [Hard/Very Hard] [Medium] [KS+] Reduction
« Reply #6 on: June 02, 2022, 17:08:10 »
I just posted the map:
https://nifflas.lp1.nl/index.php?topic=7319.0
Spoiler: (click to show/hide)
"The flaw expert" -egomassive