Create Console Game Levels

Extend the length of your game by creating new levels and sharing them with the world.

Some console games aren’t games as much as they are pure construction kits. Other titles are fun in their own right and just happen to include the ability to create new content that’s as much fun as the game itself. How can you exploit these console-creation kits to have more fun than actually playing the game you bought and trade your creations with other people online? Let’s pick a few of the best, most fun-to-use console-construction tools that came as game add-ons and discuss the communities around them and ways to add and contribute your own ideas.

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An honorable mention goes to the granddaddy of all construction kits, the track editor on Nintendo’s classic 1984 release, Excitebike. Unfortunately, after you painstakingly designed the track and played it, it would vanish as soon as you turned off the machine. There wasn’t even a password system to retrieve the design again! In those days, it was a one-time act, but if you use an emulator that supports snapshots, you’ll finally have the chance to save your work.

Tony Hawk Series

Spanning at least six titles over multiple hardware iterations, the Tony Hawk series from Neversoft and Activision, an addictive skateboarding games in its own right, has gradually improved its Create A Park feature. It debuted in Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 for PlayStation. The current iteration in Tony Hawk’s Underground allows uploads and downloads of custom skate vaults from the online Neversoft Vault if you have a PlayStation 2. This is an amazing way to try out new skate parks; all companies should aim toward this type of system when it comes to creating new content on consoles (imagine if you could do the same in RPG Maker!).

If you’re interested in making your own courses, start on GameFAQs with Nubermind’s superlative Create A Park guide to Tony Hawk’s Underground for the PlayStation 2 (http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/ps2/file/thug_cap.txt). Here are a few notable tips:

Beware of eye candy.
Although strange, random props such as cars and helicopters are cool-looking, it’s very difficult to integrate them into the flow of your park. You’re welcome to put them in, but they’re difficult to work around during complex, flowing trick runs. Remember, your course should be fun to skate.
Watch the Memory Meter.
You don’t have much actual memory on the PS2 for designing courses. If you decide to make the park a maximum eight-player course, Create A Park will have to reserve enough memory for eight instances of skaters and their animations, limiting the amount of pieces and size of the park. Nubermind suggests you set the number of players to two unless you intend to play online.
Save the finishing for the end.
Wait until you’ve otherwise completed the level before adding your gaps and goals. Nubermind advises that these finishing touches take a very small amount of memory, so you can design the shape and flow of the entire skate park and make sure everything is hunky-dory before committing to what people have to do to succeed in it.

Similarly, ThugXOnline’s Create A Review section (http://www.thugxonline.com/car/) is a lesser-known and super-helpful resource with ratings, details, and even descriptions of notable fan-created skate parks. Don’t be confused by the lack of download links; you’ll need to go online with your PS2 to grab them all.

If you can’t go online or want to hark back to the classic era of Tony Hawk Create A Park from earlier generations, you can use a DexDrive-style memory card device to grab fan-created skate parks for PlayStation 1 versions of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 from the smart Planet Tony Hawk site (http://www.planettonyhawk.com/downloads/parks/thps2/psx/). There are also PC downloads of skate parks for early versions of the game on this site, but later versions seem to lack a prominent central download location for third-party parks.

WWE Smackdown Series

Yukes’s popular WWF/WWE Smackdown wrestling game series for PlayStations 1 and 2 has always had a complex, well-designed Create A Wrestler option. This has led to all kinds of extremely cool designs for those who want to see their favorite comic character, wrestler, or even celebrity depicted in full wrestling glory. This is even fun for people who aren’t really wrestling fans!

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Yukes has released one new version every year in recent times, hence the different subtitles but upgraded gameplay.

To start your career, search for Smackdown on GameFAQs.com and visit each of the file areas and boards for the various Smackdown games. The file areas will allow Sharkport and other memory card saves to grab multiple new wrestlers at once (up to 30!). If you’re in the mood to check out a new wrestler without doing all that file transfer stuff, you can actually type in variables to create a new character. See messages such as http://boards.gamefaqs.com/gfaqs/genmessage.php?board=2000063&topic=13956737 that explain how to make Marvel villains. Beware, though: you may have to enter 100 different variables before you can replicate the character as described. Still, if you can end up with the Mexican Lucha Libre wrestlers perfectly depicted (http://www.vivalaluchalibre.net/smackdown3.htm), they must be doing something right.

TimeSplitters Series

At the time of writing, the excellent console FPS TimeSplitters series, from the ex-Rare developers at Free Radical, consisted of two games on PS2, Xbox, and GameCube, with a third in production. Apart from being an excellent multiplayer and fun single-player title, it has simple and intuitive FPS map-making software that works well with console controllers. Sure, it’s not as powerful or customizable as, say, Unreal Tournament 2004 ( [Hack #84] ), but if you just want to sit down and make a fun FPS level in front of your television with a minimum of technical knowledge, TimeSplitters and TimeSplitters 2 are very workable.

Unfortunately, some of the major TimeSplitters 2 map-making sites have closed down to prepare for the third in the series. Fortunately, Joel Barnett’s mapmaking FAQ (found at http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/gamecube/file/timesplitters_2_mapmaker.txt) is still on Gamefaqs. It’s a good guide to creating both deathmatch and story maps. Here are some of its best ideas:

You’re already advanced.
Although the game has Beginner and Advanced modes, pick Advanced every time. It’s really not that advanced, especially if you’re reading this book! Beginner mode has a very limited selection of objects and lighting.
Add doors and windows.
You can block off connected areas that are otherwise tedious run-and-shoot open areas by placing doors and windows inside the corridor sections. Join two sections of corridor together in the editor. Bring up the item tab, highlight where the sections connect, and then place doors and windows. You can even change the color of the door. This helps break things up and provides cover in an otherwise overly open level.
It’s a pre-Gothic world.
Don’t be confused by mentions of the Gothic tile set. It doesn’t exist in the released game, despite the documentation and even the strategy guide. You can still use the other four distinct tile sets, though.

As lamented earlier, the world of tradable TimeSplitters 2 map files is disappointingly bare. Hopefully, the third game will rectify this, perhaps even allowing online map trading. In the meantime, if you want to make new content, the map editor is easily one of the most fun add-ons to a console game.

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