45 replies to this topic

[Bonegolem]

If you're unsatisfied with our performance, make a quest of your own that fulfills your need for that "110%" quest.

And what constitutes a "quality" quest? One with a lot of cutscenes, triggered events, layered screens, etc? Are you looking for eye candy, awesome gameplay, cool music, your favorite tileset? It's all your opinion, really (although some examples are completely obvious). For example, The Hero of Dreams and, say, Quest for Hyrule 3 ( ) are COMPLETELY different quests but both have good ratings and are generally "good" (I'm not saying equally good) quests based on the feedback their creators have received.

I don't think anyone should be discouraged from quest building. Ratings and criticism based on high expectations should not make quest building unenjoyable or "not fun". The reason I downloaded ZC in the first place back in 2001 was because I thought it was so totally awesome to create my own zelda game! And for anyone who has seen my previous 3 quests in the Quest DB at zeldaclassic.com, my beginning work sucked! It totally sucked! But I released Quest for Hyrule 3 because I'm not afraid of criticism and I wanted purezc.com to see my work. To heck with ratings and comments! In the end, the quality of the quest is in the eye of the quest maker. Quest making SHOULD be fun and I respect any fellow quest maker, regardless of the quality of their quest. Ok I'm done.

[Love For Fire]

If you're unsatisfied with our performance, make a quest of your own that fulfills your need for that "110%" quest.

And what constitutes a "quality" quest? One with a lot of cutscenes, triggered events, layered screens, etc? Are you looking for eye candy, awesome gameplay, cool music, your favorite tileset? It's all your opinion, really (although some examples are completely obvious). For example, The Hero of Dreams and, say, Quest for Hyrule 3 ( ) are COMPLETELY different quests but both have good ratings and are generally "good" (I'm not saying equally good) quests based on the feedback their creators have received.

I don't think anyone should be discouraged from quest building. Ratings and criticism based on high expectations should not make quest building unenjoyable or "not fun". The reason I downloaded ZC in the first place back in 2001 was because I thought it was so totally awesome to create my own zelda game! And for anyone who has seen my previous 3 quests in the Quest DB at zeldaclassic.com, my beginning work sucked! It totally sucked!  But I released Quest for Hyrule 3 because I'm not afraid of criticism and I wanted purezc.com to see my work. To heck with ratings and comments! In the end, the quality of the quest is in the eye of the quest maker.  Quest making SHOULD be fun and I respect any fellow quest maker, regardless of the quality of their quest. Ok I'm done. 

I actually liked the old Quest for Hyrules. They had a very classic feel. And Quest for Hyrule 3 IMO is a quality quest. Certainly one of the best of recent days, along with Freedoms (although his quests aren't really new, just new to Pure ZC)

[Skipper]

If you're unsatisfied with our performance, make a quest of your own that fulfills your need for that "110%" quest.

And what constitutes a "quality" quest? One with a lot of cutscenes, triggered events, layered screens, etc? Are you looking for eye candy, awesome gameplay, cool music, your favorite tileset? It's all your opinion, really (although some examples are completely obvious). For example, The Hero of Dreams and, say, Quest for Hyrule 3 ( ) are COMPLETELY different quests but both have good ratings and are generally "good" (I'm not saying equally good) quests based on the feedback their creators have received.

I don't think anyone should be discouraged from quest building. Ratings and criticism based on high expectations should not make quest building unenjoyable or "not fun". The reason I downloaded ZC in the first place back in 2001 was because I thought it was so totally awesome to create my own zelda game! And for anyone who has seen my previous 3 quests in the Quest DB at zeldaclassic.com, my beginning work sucked! It totally sucked!  But I released Quest for Hyrule 3 because I'm not afraid of criticism and I wanted purezc.com to see my work. To heck with ratings and comments! In the end, the quality of the quest is in the eye of the quest maker.  Quest making SHOULD be fun and I respect any fellow quest maker, regardless of the quality of their quest. Ok I'm done. 

Maybe you didn't read what I said before.

Also, Chiisaiko, you're no noob. I can see you are at least putting effort into YOUR quest, what with all the custom-made tiles, asking for help with certain stuff from your quest on the forums, ect. You see, quest like those are quests I must smile upon.If I see that the original author put a lot of effort into the quest, that makes me... happy. I just don't like it when someone releases a quest just for the reason "Well, I just made up a quick quest. I was bored out of my mind, and I know I might get a bad rating". I've SEEN some people who have said this before.

[DarkFlameWolf]

Internet cafe again: location Las Vegas, Nevada! Woohooo!
Well, I'm all for the new guy/gal. But they also must earn that respect of being a good quest maker. Just because you made the most amazing quest in the world does not entitle you to be an ass. Not to slam my partner, but even he admits that upon release of Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge, Petoe did get a bit full of himself and did happen to start fights with those who felt he was an ass and as a result didn't like his quest. Thankfully, he has since mellowed out since then and is really quite a decent guy and a great quest maker. (great enough to want me to make Lost Isle with him!) But making a great quest is only a first step a newbie must take to earn the respect a veteran quest maker has. They must also be courteous about topics regarding him/her and his quest and have a level head on their shoulders. The more agreeable you are with other people on the boards, the more respect you'll receive and the faster rumors will spread of your accomplishments among the community. So just keep at it, be nice to those around you and being modest at times really helps. Which is also why I (Petoe and I) haven't been hyping up Lost Isle any more than what you see in the Expo. Because we want expectations to be high, but not insanely high that we can't meet them and people view out hype as overbloated fluff. Thus the reason for limited information and less talk on 'features' and how 'awesome' the quest will be.
Just stick with it and you will be good. And for lord's sakes, don't start off your quest making career by saying and doing, "a quest that was made just for the mere fact that you wanted to make it as crappy as possible." That's definitely starting your quest career on a sour note. Because you're setting the standard by which the rest of your career will be judged.

Edited by DarkFlameWolf, 30 June 2006 - 06:59 PM.

[Darth Pikachu]

For me, I really like a hard quest, and personally, I've 'tinkered' around with Zelda Classic for quite some time. I've seen so many quests and one day thought maybe I can do the same. So I did a smart thing and got a pen and paper and started writing ideas and plot down, even through the end of my story. Then I started designing the quest out on paper, and then went into ZQuest and started making my quest. I'll be honest, there are some things and even some minor bugs in my first quest, but I know that they will get better with time and effort. I don't plan on stopping anytime soon, and my encouragement would be to keep going. The only other advice I have for people is that with all things in life, we do not start off as masters of it and you can make a darn good omelette without breaking a couple of eggs. So try and do, or do not.

BTW the reason I gave y'all my story is that I want you to see that I just didn't just sit down and make a quest in ZQuest. I followed the best adivce of others and what made them successful and tried to duplicate, and in the process learned a few new things. So there. Sorry I had to get this off my chest.

[Skipper]

For me, I really like a hard quest, and personally, I've 'tinkered' around with Zelda Classic for quite some time. I've seen so many quests and one day thought maybe I can do the same. So I did a smart thing and got a pen and paper and started writing ideas and plot down, even through the end of my story. Then I started designing the quest out on paper, and then went into ZQuest and started making my quest. I'll be honest, there are some things and even some minor bugs in my first quest, but I know that they will get better with time and effort. I don't plan on stopping anytime soon, and my encouragement would be to keep going. The only other advice I have for people is that with all things in life, we do not start off as masters of it and you can make a darn good omelette without breaking a couple of eggs.   So try and do, or do not.

BTW the reason I gave y'all my story is that I want you to see that I just didn't just sit down and make a quest in ZQuest. I followed the best adivce of others and what made them successful and tried to duplicate, and in the process learned a few new things. So there. Sorry I had to get this off my chest.

Heh. Good advice, I must say. Get ready before you make your quest. Plot out your story on a piece of paper, create diagrams of what you want some puzzles to be like... those are all certainly great ideas.

[skateboarder11]

Ah, where to start...

Some of the truly excellent quests out there haven't discouraged me and made me feel like a horrid questmaker at all. If anything... when I go through and play them, I feel like it awakens some potential in me.

...Now, QtT may seem like a thrown-together quest, with no effort at all put in, but believe me, I put my fair share of effort into it. Thing is... I wasn't totally sure what attributed to a good quest back then. If you see my work now, you can see just how much one can improve. (Billy Ronald is a good example too, as Revfan said...)

[Exate]

ZQ is meant to be for fun, for one to create something and share it with the community. Last I checked, being a badass with the engine wasn't mandatory.

Why the heck are people complaining? You take the gamble of downloading a quest and playing it because it looks interesting. If it sucks to you, well, tough luck I say.

I don't like playing quests, PERIOD. The only fun I ever had with ZQ was making them, and that was that. I don't bash quests (I'll admit I did at some points in the past), if they're not that great. The only time I play quests are when people ask me to. If I don't like their game at some point, I stop and just tell the developer it didn't catch my interest.


Forgive me, but the community is just a thirsty batch of people wanting more and more from quests; They FAIL to REALIZE that ZQ is limited.

[Skipper]

ZQ is meant to be for fun, for one to create something and share it with the community. Last I checked, being a badass with the engine wasn't mandatory.

Why the heck are people complaining? You take the gamble of downloading a quest and playing it because it looks interesting. If it sucks to you, well, tough luck I say.

I don't like playing quests, PERIOD. The only fun I ever had with ZQ was making them, and that was that. I don't bash quests (I'll admit I did at some points in the past), if they're not that great. The only time I play quests are when people ask me to. If I don't like their game at some point, I stop and just tell the developer it didn't catch my interest.
Forgive me, but the community is just a thirsty batch of people wanting more and more from quests; They FAIL to REALIZE that ZQ is limited.

...
Look, I'm not trying to bash ANYONE, nor their quests. I just want everyone to give 100 percent effort into their quests, that is all. I'm not bashing ANY quests, whether you think I am or not.

End of discussion. Just let this topic die, will you?...

[Nathaniel]

I think this topic is fine as long as people can refrain from being rude.

If I think a quest is bad, I will be honest about it if I give it a review. Establishing that however, I try not to be rude about it. "This sucks!" would be an example of being rude, because it only expresses an opinion and it doesn't explain why the quest is not good. Short and rude comments with no explanations should not be taken seriously. Unfortunately, they still bring the average down. Also, if I don't like a quest, I dont get angry about it. After all, I am not paying one cent to play any of them. If I found it a waste of time, I still chose to play it.

I think the problem with some of the lowest quality of quests (0 to 2 star quality) is this (Keep in mind that this is coming from someone who doesn't touch ZQuest, so maybe I have no clue what I am talking about, although I play Zelda Classic a lot.): They were made simply to let others know you made a quest. Some may say this is obvious when there are a lot of bugs in the quest, but I say an even more obvious sign would be frequent spelling errors in dialogue and a large quantity of tiles that are simply a solid square of one color. If those are apparent, then don't expect to get a good rating. Simply making a quest for the sake of completing a quest is probably not going to turn out good. If that is your line of thinking and you are sensitive about how people would react to it, then maybe you should consider not releasing it to the database, but instead finding a file storage site to store it at, start a topic about it, and look for pointers on improvement, not necessarily on the quest itself, but for doing certain things in a quest in general.

[Revfan9]

I think the ultimate example of this is my only released quest, Clippy Chronicles.

A lot of you are probably thinking "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!", but I did make Clippy Chronicles for a reason. A very good reason at that. Why? Clippy Chronicles is the "Anti-Quest". It was not designed to be fun for the quest player, but to be fun for the quest maker. Making all 4 levels and the overworld of Clippy Chronicles was probably more fun for me than any other quest maker had fun making any other quest. I designed it to be as "not fun" as possible, and I had a blast with it, because I enjoy being mean to people. That's why the maze on the second screen of the unnamed temple has no hints to it, so the player would have to go under trial and error to get through it. It was an experiment, and a successful experiment at that. I would gladly do it again, but I probably wouldn't release it to the database due to it's incredible criticism, and I am going to make a topic soon to respond to this criticism.

The reason I am talking about Clippy Chronicles is because I put 120% effort into it! To make a purposely bad quest, you have to know what makes a good quest. To make the worst quest possible, you must know how to make the best quest possible. I did the exact opposite of everything I have ever learned about great quest making! There are 3 things I wish I had done differently in Clippy Chronicles:

1. Make the overworld worse. It had an overworld that was better structured than the ones of most 1st questers overworlds, as captain Magenta's comment explains.

2. Make it easier to get into level 2 dangit!

3. Make more spelling and grammar mistakes. If you look into the strings, I used proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation in all of them.

You see, I wanted comments like "This=****. That's about as nice as I can put it." Because of what my goals were with the quest, that is the equivilant of "Can I have your babies?" A 0 stars is like a 5 stars. I was even disappointed taht it's current store is a 1 star.

In the terms of the anti-quest, Clippy Chronicles is the greatest quest, no, the greatest game of all time. I have created the greatest game of all time. See what I mean?

[Love For Fire]

Clippy Chronicles was a great idea, but I don't think it should've been submitted to the database. It could encourage people to make bad quests and send them in... thus causing the decrease in quest qulity skipper was talking about.

Don't get me wrong though, I'm not trying to say that you're responsible for the recent quest qulity.

[halper]

I just hope somebody doesn't make artistic expression a problem. I don't see what the real problem is.one can always view the ratings,and
how much the game is commented on. Heck, Why not?

[Lita]

I'm just a player, no attempted quest making here...lol. So it may not count for much...

But I think it's relative...to the individual. Thus, the rating system might be good to keep us from bothering with really poor attempts that offer no value to anyone... but I figure as long as there is at least a 3...it's worth taking a look see.

There's so many different tastes out there. Some like hard quests, some like easy flowing ones (like me, cause I 'hate' to have to ask questions..lol). Some like pretty ones, some like fighting ones, some like ones that make you think. I say... thank God that are enough creative minds out there to give us the choices in ALL these areas. And I tip my hat to anyone who has the ability and hootspah to even 'try' and make one.

You guys give of your time 'freely'. Ya'll aren't making any money off these things. So though I can see the frustration some might feel at looking for a quest they like personally...I don't see how you we can just wave away the rest. Someone might like them. And people wouldn't be making them if it wasn't fun. They learn as they go ofcourse, as DarkFlameWolf mentioned. So it teaches new things and give constructive goals to people. Even if they're not up to par for a hard loving quest player, or a pretty loving quest player... point 1: Someone else might like it; point 2: As long as the quest maker enjoyed it, learned something, used their time for something other than, like Freedom made mention, vegitating in front of the TV. Then whats the harm?

And as I was writing this... I thought of something that might help??? Instead of or in addition to the now rating system. Clue people in on.. Is it hard? As in.. Lots of fighting, or mind benders, short or long..etc etc. Is it easy flowing for those of us who don't have the major skills...lolol. Ya'll would know more about catorgorizing.. but that might be a help to people who are getting frustrated by continually trying games that aren't 'their' thing.

I never get frustrated with the creators for the bad games, or the bug filled games.. my ONLY beef would be not answering questions!!!! lolololoololololol If you're going to make it.. support it! If you don't have the time for that (cause I KNOW it's time consuming), give us a walkthrough after so many months or years! lol

Had to try and end on a lighter note there Main thing is I wanted to give a Shout Out to all the quest makers.. for even trying! Better to have tried and failed than not get involved right? IF you have the ability and time that is. Again, I never have created one... but I don't have the time to play and create. So I choose play! And I thank you ALL ... for giving me so many Free Choices!

[Schwa]

This is one of THE best threads ever. I can so relate...



When I submitted Molka, I was expecting a 5. I got a 4. I was quite discouraged, but about a week later or so, I got FAN MAIL. My God, there is no better feeling in the world for a creative Asperger than to get fan mail regarding his creations! So yeah, I daresay the rating system doesn't matter too much. The only reason it affects me is because I want as many people to at least *try* my Quest as possible, and I have a feeling most serious Quest players sort by Rating... in which Molka won't even appear on Page 1. That's why I put Molka in my siggy instead. ^,^



I KINDA make Quests for the respect and self-satisfaction... Basically it's this: ZC is a creative program, made to be used by creative people, and with that in mind I feel obligated, oathbound even, to use it in the best ways I can to create. It is in my blood to create. Some of you can relate.



So I'm not discouraged by a 4 rating... It's the comments that matter; what people actually think about your Quest. Someone gave me a 3 on Molka, so I looked at the comment and saw their feedback. They gave me an opinion on what needed work. Kudos! That's what the comments are there for! It allows designers to learn from their mistakes based on the diversity of the player community. Quest building is just that; a LEARNING experience. Each finished Quest is like a war medal for a soldier, marking that person's "experience in battle" so to speak. Molka took me a year to make... Granted, I took two long breaks (about a month or two at a time), but I finished it, submitted it, and sat back in satisfaction. I gave something to myself and the community.



Sorry for ranting, but I had to get that out...



But seriously! Fan mail! =D