I have a JKHub project page set up for my level if anyone wants to check it out. There are four screenshots right now.

For what its worth, I'm pulling out of the contest.

Two reasons;

1) Not a fair contest. There is no way I can compete with editors that had a head start. (seems like some of these guys are using material that they've been working on for years...)

2) I just don't have the devotion I once had. I've gone a full week without touching my project. At the rate I'm going, I'll be done in about....2 years.

Just like that other, huge SP level you were working on and never finished?

Forget about other people - it's expected that we'll have a number of different types of levels with varying lengths. I suspect reason #2 is your main reason, and I hate to see you skip the contest. Remember, there will be multiple winners with forum badges, and I wish I could afford games for all of those people, but I can't.

Emon, those shots look awesome.

Mine's only 5 years old...

It's also for Jedi Outcast which I doubt anyone besides myself is working on for the contest.

Really, if someone has been working on the level for YEARS and hasn't finished, what are the chances they'll finish it now?

Yeah, that's why I dropped out at the first minute

My level's gonna rock all ya'lls socks from here to San Fransisco, unless you live near San Fransisco, in which case I'll rock them to Anchorage, Alaska. That seems to be pretty far away.

I just have to get right on hacking everyone's computer and compiling all the levels together, and I won't stand a chance at not winning.

My level was started back in late 2002 but I've lost almost all of it except for the .map file due to a hard drive crash in 2003. I had left the file to rot on my hard drive ever since until this SP contest was announced. I've been working on it quite a lot for the past 2 weeks, hoping that it'll eventually see a release on the internet.

I hope to see it soon!

Thanks. Check it again! Main character screenshot.

Wait... is that for JK or MotS?

JK.

And from that day forward, she would be known as "Slutty McNippers."

haha.... nipples? seriously??

i'm leaning towards dropping out. i don't think i'll have the time to finish my project. work is just too much right now.. i'm averaging 50+ hours a week. when i get home, the last thing i want to do is open up zed..

aw, but your new screenshots look so good!

Yeah, Asp, they look very promising!

I dunno, the timeline of the contest seems a bit too demanding, especially leaning into the start of the school/college year.

Brian, EXTEND THE DEADLINE!

Hmm, from the sound of it, with everyone dropping out, I could make a dflt.mat box with a key in the corner to unlock a door in the room and win.

Mission Objective Complete!

Wrongsauce. My level WILL BE DONE.

Grismath and I talked about this, and we think the best option would be to extend the deadline, if needed, near the end. This way people are still pressured to complete, but the community doesn't lose out if people need just a few more days.

Also, I just realized that this won't be able to be packaged as a single GOB. I replace several files, such as ky.3do, sabg.3do, ky.snd to name a few, which would interfere with other levels. Other authors probably do the same.

There could be n contest zip files, where n = the number of Massassi-sponsored games in which levels have been submitted (JK, MotS, JO, JA).

In each zip, if x > 1 (where x is the number of levels submitted for that game), then the file structure (at least for JK/MotS) could be like this:

Jedi Knight/MSPC/project_name/project.gob

or

MotS/MSPC/project_name/project.goo

Someone could write a very simple app that then displayed a list of the x projects for that game. Clicking on a project would execute JK.exe or JKM.exe with the path of that project, thereby loading all its resources.

I was thinking of just posting them all separately, with a note that they were contest entries/winners.

Or they could be released as separate levels.


When we were kicking ideas about for the hub SP contest, it was suggested having a startup splash screen after the level loaded that indicated its entry in the scontest, and could be altered for the winning entries to indicate they won. Not sure how nicely that would play with JO/JA.

[Edit: Curses. Now it looks like I'm rebutting Brian's post. I'll get you next time, Lozier!]

I'd really hate to have to recompile the levels or even repackage them.

Wouldn't be too hard to pull off for JO/JA. All ya have to do is alter the image file used for loading screen for the level (which is jpg/tga found in the levelshots folder using the level's name) to indicate that it's a contest winner.

well, ive some potentially bad news. usually when i do a level i save 3 or 4 different copies of every stage of the level. however for whatever reason i didnt do that this time. sooo.... this last time i went to save and test my sp contest level, it crashed on start up. usually when this happens i just delete what ever the last thing i added to the level was, however when i tried that this time, it still crashes so hopefully i can salvage most of the level, or else i may have to pull my submission.

This is probably a simple/minor error. Don't get so easily discouraged! You should go to #jkhub on irc.zirc.net and ask people for some realtime help.

Yeah, did you try the consistency checker?

Yeah, not to mention it wouldn't work for a variety of reasons. HOWEVER, you can put them all on one ZIP, for each game, as Grismath suggested. If you download them all at once, it's easier for users.

GENIUS!!!!!! i seriously forgot about the consistency checker. turns out one of the 3do's was not in a sector and the game didnt like it. all is back on track now though.

... at least you're back on track now

Unfortunately, I'm not sure I have the time anymore either. Mostly, it's my own fault though. I've been spending all my mapping time the last week and a half on a MP Duel project that's been fairly intensive.

After finishing Deception a couple years ago, I just haven't been able to get back into SP mapping again. And the fact that I'd have to overcome the (in some cases) years of head starts on top of that... I have to agree with a previous poster. If you are going to do a SP contest, it needs to be from the same start position. Theoretically, if this contest had been announced days before a major SP level was release, he could hold off, do absolutely nothing, and enter a highly polished product. For those who played it, what if I had been able to do this with SW: Deception in JA?

Perhaps, if there is a next time, you'll consider this aspect. As well as judging the base games seperately (JK/MoTS seperate from JO/JA), as the engines themselves are completely different. How can you objectively judge two SP mods against each other when thier engine capabilities are so differant?

I'm glad to see something like this being done, but between those two items, and my own time being burned elsewhere, it just isn't plausible for me to remain.

I'm sorry to hear this. However, the reason I chose to allow use of previously developed work is because I didn't want to force people to drop what they were working on and work on something new. I didn't figure anyone would have a problem with it, since the focus of the contest for new projects is short but sweet levels. I'm sad that people are discouraged by this, but seriously, if someone has been working on a map for 5 years, do you honestly think this will push them to finally release it? When someone has been working on a map "for 5 years" it usually means it's been collecting virtual dust most of the time and only been worked on in short spurts over the past 5 years. If you and others don't have enough time to finish your real vision of a map, we could always extend the deadline another month, but that decision will be made closer to the deadline (if a lot of people need more time, I will consider it, if only one person, probably not).

Get a grip, you complainers. This contest, and editing in general, is supposed to be fun. Stop taking it so seriously.

If you are lazy, then you're lazy. You can't cover up your laziness with there being better editors; none of us are going to buy that.

If you don't have enough time, fine. Just stop with the nonsense of saying, "It's not fair."

All of us want to see more (good) SP levels, not a bunch of whining. If you are only editing to win the grand prize, then I don't expect to see anything interesting come from you, anyway.

What Zeq said.

For instance, it's true that the episode I'm releasing has been "in the works" for years. But really, no work has been done on it since 2003... And I'm not doing this so much for the contest as I am to just finish the series and let the community play it. :]

The real prizes will be the levels that are released and that we get to play. This is supposed to be fun. If you really just want a new game, you could spend hours you would have spent editing and possibly make enough extra money to buy a game yourself and have money left over.

Easier said than done...

Wrong. Easier done than said; it is easier to not post than to post and complain.