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One of the things we'd like to do with v1.5 is support integrated highscores for ALL levels, including user-made maps. It would make our lives a lot easier if we could simply drop support for per-episode highscores, so that all highscores would be level-by-level. Is this okay with you?

We don't really know if anyone even bothers trying to get episode highscores.. hence this poll :)

People cheat anyways, so there's not much point anymore.

I would support dropping ep highscores, but some highscorers prefer episodes to levels. (Hendor, I believe).

I would rather see episode highscoring stay because I think it adds a different element to highscoring. I think is a key part of game too because of how the episode system is set up for when you play through the game for the first time.

I bother! =p I don't really care too much about them though, as long as you keep level highscores I'm happy. I'm just excited to hear something about v1.5 :D

I would much rather see episode highscores leave and see userlevels highscores integrated instead of how it is now. This opens up N to a much wider range of activity apart from just the 500 levels in the game.

Whatever makes it easiest for you guys, I'd say.

Personally, I've always liked episode highscores, and have always found them to be the most impressive. I can understand why you want to drop them, but at the same time something I've always hoped for is the ability for users to create episodes. Episodes are such an important part of the game, imo, and it always seemed like the users should be able to link their maps together into episodes, then you can really feel like your making the game, so to speak, and it would make episode highscoring that much more interesting, too, if you could highscore on user-made episodes, especially ones which have different levels challenging different highscoring maps, you could create cool tournaments, etc., etc (run-on sentence, much? :P). I'm trying not to go too off-topic here, but that's just something I've always wanted to see added to N, and I'm only bringing it up here to try and argue for leaving the episode highscores in. The 90 seconds is such an integral part of N, imo, and focusing too much on single levels, etc., results in the loss of a key gameplay aspect. I suppose I may have gone slightly off-topic, but I'm just quite pro-episodes, and highscoring them ;)
I know this would potentially make your lives that much more difficult, but I still feel as though it would be a cool addition that could allow for more focus and interest on episode highscoring and an important gameplay quality in general.
Oh, yeah, and I agree with TRO.

I'm a fan of the episode highscores and think they should be kept. If /user/ episode highscores were on the table, I'd be very much in favor of those too. What if the game recorded personal bests for an episode, but there was no server for them? Or maybe there's some other compromise that could be reached?

If there's some way to integrate user-made episodes, then i'd like to keep highscores for them. If there's no way in hell that's going to happen, then I'd suggest going ahead and dropping episode highscores.

on a related note, are you guys going to create new levels for the new game? i know you've already talked about small gameplay changes, so how are you going to integrate that into the preexisting game?

I don't really care, but for the love of God, implement an Overall Highscore/Speedrun/Overclock score for the entire game. This would of course not need you to complete the entire game to score better after one has completed the entire game, it would just be an overall score based on your accumulated level scores.

I like the episode high scores. It adds a dimension that would otherwise be lost as TRO and aerodynamic have said.

I myself would be really disappointed if the episode highscores got dropped. I've made it my goal to get an episode top-20 on every episode, and I'm not there yet (but I'm over halfway there :) ) While its impressive to get a level 0th/highscore, I think its that much more impressive to get an episode 0th/highscore because you need to be on the top of your game for 5 consecutive levels. The concentration and commitment to getting your best runs required for an episode score is much more than for a level score.

raigan wrote:One of the things we'd like to do with v1.5 is support integrated highscores for ALL levels, including user-made maps. It would make our lives a lot easier if we could simply drop support for per-episode highscores, so that all highscores would be level-by-level. Is this okay with you?

We don't really know if anyone even bothers trying to get episode highscores.. hence this poll :)

Legacy has been waiting for this for Five years, Raigan. Count that on your fingers. That is five more than ZERO.

Now, is that to say that episode highscores would be entirely gone, or could you throw in a simple string counting episode scores for the main game still?

Will there be support for user-made episodes for us purists? Because it'd be neat, and since so many people have made map-packs in the episodic format (Can't say I'm not biased here), it'd be cool. Not necessary, mind, but cool.

aerodynamic wrote:Personally, I've always liked episode highscores, and have always found them to be the most impressive. I can understand why you want to drop them, but at the same time something I've always hoped for is the ability for users to create episodes.

More than this, a lot of us have already created episodes, and took a lot of time to make episode score an important part of said episodes. If it's a lot of work / extremely obtrusive, then of course, I'd say no; I'd rather see v1.5 launch than have it stagnate due to something so small.

If we're trying to make user levels more "legit" as it were, then level based highscores would be a very good idea.

I don't think you should remove them, they are part of N and creates a nice addition to level highscores, because you have to do 5 levels perfectly in a row. Also it would be shame if the episode runs Mr_Lim and others did would be forgotten.

Also are you going to cooperate with Unreality somehow? Because i think that speedrun mode should definitely be a part of N.

vankusss wrote:I don't think you should remove them, they are part of N and creates a nice addition to level highscores, because you have to do 5 levels perfectly in a row. Also it would be shame if the episode runs Mr_Lim and others did would be forgotten.

I agree with this. It would be a shame to see them go.

I cannot emphasize enough that there needs to be strict anti-cheating measures that prevent cheated/hacked scores being submitted and prevent the game being slowed down or manipulated using similar methods employed by Unreality as well as a trusted highscores moderator - I'd like to nominate Unreality to take on this role if he would like, however, if he's too busy, I would happily assume this position. On behalf of the highscoring community, welcome to the new forums and best of luck for N 1.5!!! (Also, it'd be a horrific mistake to take episode highscoring out of the game :)

Ska's right, cheated runs annoy the hell out of everybody who actually plays the map properly and decently.

As for removing episode highscores/speedruns (I presume speedrun mode will be kept), no way Jose. I hold over 100 episode speed 0ths. :P

Just to be clear: we're not going to touch v1.4 stuff, all of those scores/etc will remain. The new version will be a completely separate thing.

I think there may be some confusion; what's currently implemented (episode highscores are completely separate from level highscores) has always seemed absurd to me, because really it's no different than 5 level highscores where you leave the game running in-between attempts..

We thought that we could just omit episode highscores as individual things and simply add the level highscores for those 5 levels to get the "episode" score. However we realized that maybe we were missing something, hence this poll :)

Also important to note: we want to support user-made episodes/packs (similar to e.g Legacy), the idea is that each level in the pack will have highscores, but the episodes wouldn't.

Basically we would like to understand the importance of ep highscores specifically -- how are they any different than "level highscores, with an absurd endurance element"? I feel like, if you're going to leave N running for several days just to get an ep highscore -- wouldn't it be easier if we allowed "resuming" from where you left off? And if we go that far, it's really no different than just level highscores..

I have never done episode highscores, so I don't care. I think that finally enabling mappacks/usermade-episodes/usermade-column-things is awesome. It would be cool if you could have "episodes" with a number of maps of the maker's choosing as well... For those who make story-packs or something...

raigan wrote:Basically we would like to understand the importance of ep highscores specifically -- how are they any different than "level highscores, with an absurd endurance element"? I feel like, if you're going to leave N running for several days just to get an ep highscore -- wouldn't it be easier if we allowed "resuming" from where you left off? And if we go that far, it's really no different than just level highscores..

From my point of view, episode highscores are different than level highscores because it takes a different mindset to do them. As a level highscore, you can finish the level as many times as you want, even if its not the best score (for example, missing a couple gold and finishing just to see how fast you did the route), and not be penalized for it. But in an episode highscore, if you finish a level with a mistake in it, that negatively affects the entire episode run and you don't have a chance to try again without doing the whole episode again. I am always more impressed with a large episode 0th-1st difference than a large level 0th-1st difference because it shows a quality of runs and skills through a variety of level types, and with a variety of techniques needed to get the good scores.

Also, if you change the episode score to being simply the sum of the level scores, there will be much less chance for competition on episode scores, in my opinion. I know that under that system I would have virtually no chance for taking any episode 0ths, while I have 6 or 7 under the current system. I don't think I'd have any of those episode 0ths under a "sum the level scores" system.

raigan wrote:Also important to note: we want to support user-made episodes/packs (similar to e.g Legacy), the idea is that each level in the pack will have highscores...

THAT is a great idea!!

golfkid wrote: From my point of view, episode highscores are different than level highscores because it takes a different mindset to do them. As a level highscore, you can finish the level as many times as you want, even if its not the best score (for example, missing a couple gold and finishing just to see how fast you did the route), and not be penalized for it. But in an episode highscore, if you finish a level with a mistake in it, that negatively affects the entire episode run and you don't have a chance to try again without doing the whole episode again. I am always more impressed with a large episode 0th-1st difference than a large level 0th-1st difference because it shows a quality of runs and skills through a variety of level types, and with a variety of techniques needed to get the good scores.

Also, if you change the episode score to being simply the sum of the level scores, there will be much less chance for competition on episode scores, in my opinion. I know that under that system I would have virtually no chance for taking any episode 0ths, while I have 6 or 7 under the current system. I don't think I'd have any of those episode 0ths under a "sum the level scores" system.

I don't think I've ever agreed with words on a screen as much as I agree with those. You can never be 100% sure with how well you did on a level until you reach the exit, and the confidence required for you to cross the finish line while episode highscoring creates a solid difference between it and level highscoring. Also, yes, episodes can test multiple skills, whereas some levels do not. They just need to stay.

raigan wrote:I feel like, if you're going to leave N running for several days just to get an ep highscore --

People do that? o_O

raigan wrote:Also important to note: we want to support user-made episodes/packs (similar to e.g Legacy), the idea is that each level in the pack will have highscores, but the episodes wouldn't.

Ecstatic to hear it, though being a supporter of episode highscoring I still can't help but feel disappointed that user-made/assembled episodes wouldn't have highscoring enabled for them. If they did, it would make them feel that much more authentic, but to be fair I have no idea how much extra work that would be and couldn't complain too much if it was left out... I'm not trying to make your lives hell, I promise :)

golfkid wrote:I've made it my goal to get an episode top-20 on every episode

Haha, I've just started that as well ;)

raigan wrote:Just to be clear: we're not going to touch v1.4 stuff, all of those scores/etc will remain. The new version will be a completely separate thing.

I think there may be some confusion; what's currently implemented (episode highscores are completely separate from level highscores) has always seemed absurd to me, because really it's no different than 5 level highscores where you leave the game running in-between attempts..

We thought that we could just omit episode highscores as individual things and simply add the level highscores for those 5 levels to get the "episode" score. However we realized that maybe we were missing something, hence this poll :)

Also important to note: we want to support user-made episodes/packs (similar to e.g Legacy), the idea is that each level in the pack will have highscores, but the episodes wouldn't.

Basically we would like to understand the importance of ep highscores specifically -- how are they any different than "level highscores, with an absurd endurance element"? I feel like, if you're going to leave N running for several days just to get an ep highscore -- wouldn't it be easier if we allowed "resuming" from where you left off? And if we go that far, it's really no different than just level highscores..

I think that if you were to allow people to make 5-lvl packs then there should be an overall score for that "episode." But the episode score should not be all the lvl scores added together because that's too hard for some people (I totally agree with golfkid). Also, being able to quit and continue where you left off is probably be on of the best innovations of Nv1.5. Maybe even be able to play other episodes while still in the middle of another episode because i currently have 3 n games downloaded just so that i can keep an episode open but if I'm stuck on it still play other levels. I also can't tell you ho many times I've beaten 4 really hard levels then given up on the fifth one and quit the episode i had to go back and play the whole episode over again. And finally one more idea: if you have beaten all 5 levels in an episode at different times from the highscore mode and not the "play game" mode then you should be able to move on to the next episode in that row but just not have an episode highscore for the episode with the levels that you didn't beat all at one time.