It's a testament to the genius of Miyamoto and his crew that I can stare at this level editor -- a luxury they didn't even have back then -- and have
no fucking idea what to do with it...
I think the idea of a level editor is interesting, but a few things to think about. Will there be a way to inject new boards into a game similar to D2K? Could the editor change the level board structure (what boards set to appear in what level)? Could behaviors for things like springs be modified? Could new objects and behaviors be added similar to D2K?
Yes and no. Anything (well, almost anything) is possible by hacking the game's Z80 code. Unfortunately, hacking said code will be required for the forseeable future. That's something that's well within my abilities, but it's a monumental task for somebody who has no prior knowledge of Z80 assembly programming.
I will do my best to eventually make it relatively easy to add or change levels in the game, but I think any interesting levels will add or change behavior to some extent, and there's no getting around the fact that changing behavior will require a solid understanding of Z80.
The good news is that I will offer to implement any needed behavior for anyone's level
if I like the idea of the level
and the behavior would not be overly difficult to program. These are both very big if's, however.
D2K is an amazing technical achievement, but it's a bad game because the new boards are uninteresting and do not offer point pressing opportunities.
I think Miyamoto would agree that the D2K boards are uninteresting, but he'd probably be puzzled by the point pressing issue. While he certainly envisioned people going for the highest score they could manage, he didn't envision the myriad ways people actually go about it. The way joystick reads manipulate the barrels was intended to kill the player, not aid him! Moreover, DK has been played by millions of people and, from 1981 to this day, point pressing has been relevant for probably less than a hundred of them. Hell, the 100th score for the cabinet version of Donkey Kong on Twin Galaxies is a mere 42,400, which I could easily beat, and the 100th score for the MAME version is 141,300, which, while out of my range, is hardly kill screen material.
While I think anyone designing DK levels today should certainly consider point pressing opportunities, they're hardly a mark of the overall quality of the level.
My own issues with D2K are that the new levels are disproportionately difficult compared to the original four (which were hard enough), there is object placement that makes no sense (why get the hat in the Foundry when it will take more points off the timer than you'll get for collecting it?), and the gameplay tends to be dull (dealing with the moving platforms on the Foundry). The Refinery is a good start on a level design, but I think it could be greatly improved if the sparks were non-lethal and the elevators were controlled by jumping rather than timed. And I can't even make it to the first ladder in the Incinerator!
What I would REALLY enjoy in a DK hack is like a level like the bonus level in zoo keeper. Like a one platform level where Kong throws all kind of barrel combination (like he throws XX__X,X___XX__X_X__XXX_XXX___X_X_XX) on one single platform, and the goal is just to jump and survive until the timer runs out.
While I can't guarantee I'll implement any specific design for any level, I must admit the idea of a bonus round where you can earn extra points at no risk intrigues me.
