hello everyone!
doom is great and stuff, but mappist formats are very underrated on botb, even though a lot of cool old games can be modified and customized! (old games mostly, because we're following the 'bits'-aspect of botb, are we? ;D)

basically, i got the idea to open a thread for this, because of all the mario maker 2 gameplay i've watched in the past days and for me, "Mappist" formats (aka Doom/Boom) are nothing else than level design formats.

might be a good idea to collect some ideas and see how many people want a specific format c:

my idea is to add Super Mario World as a format, which could feature single level designs for ohbs and complete hacks for majors. lunarmagic is completely free and the allowed file format would be the ips-patch instead of a complete rom-file.

any more ideas for mappist formats?!

knytt stories/knytt stories+, knytt.bin file format

isnt mega maker a thing?
duck game maps? I love that game
terraria worlds lmao I second my previous statement

honestly you bring up a great point though. I love building things in games but im really not an fps person so trying to work with doom wasn't the most interesting with me. I personally love racing games to edit around but im sure that wouldn't be too fun.

now that I think about it, terraria/Minecraft(?) might make sense. I dont play Minecraft but I think you can share worlds just like terraria so...

yeah, that's my take. hope I could be of service!

anything that doesn't explicitly require a purchase to make maps on.

Any love for Quake? :O

SMW would be a fun one too! I think a good criteria to look at here is how big/active the mod/map communities are for any of the games here.

This is a good thread. Now's my chance to suggest something I've always wanted to see as a mappist format:

TrackMania Nations Forever!

This is a free-to-play racing game that features a custom track builder. Tracks are stored as .gbx files, which shall be the file format required. Any custom track you build is saved to a folder named "TrackMania" which is located in your documents directory. All your user data for the game is stored in there. For custom tracks, they are specifically stored in TrackMania\Tracks\Challenges\My Challenges.

You can put any custom track you download and save it to TrackMania\Tracks\Challenges and it'll be ready to play in solo mode.

I played the shit out of TrackMania growing up, and it would really cool to see it get some love here! It's free to download on Steam, and you can get started with track building right away. Hopefully there's other BotBrs who are familiar with this game as well.

Voting category ideas, based on track building concepts:
Flow - How natural it feels to progress through the track, and how easy it is to navigate. You want your track to maintain its flow so that a first-time driver can predict what is coming ahead.
Stunts - Crazy air jumps, wall rides, loop-de-loops, or anything else you can come up with.
Speed - How fast it feels like you're driving throughout the track, which adds challenge.
Scenery - How appealing the track is to drive through. There's all kinds of pieces the game offers to help make the track feel vibrant and alive. Good scenery feels natural and helps build atmosphere.
Mania in Pants - Obligatory "in pants" category.

TrackMania logo, which could be used for the badge:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d7/Logo_Trackmania.svg

rhythm game charting could be cool too! it'd be super cool to potentially play botb tracks in stepmania or maybe even clone hero

I'd be totally up to play BotBrs' custom made tracks for TrackMania, so I also wanted to add my voice for it

More about the game can be found on it's official site here:
http://trackmaniaforever.com/

And it's download link from the same site, here:
http://files.trackmaniaforever.com/tmnationsforever_setup.exe

TrackMania was literally the first thing that came to mind when i saw this topic on the homepage! A TMUnlimiter format would be really cool, you can do some really creative and detailed things with it that go beyond the base game's editor.

To expand on wvl post, TMUnlimiter is a unofficial custom track builder patch for the TrackMania Forever series, that enables more customization over their vanilla editor, including creating bigger maps, using custom 3D models on blocks for your tracks (Comes with a plugin for Blender), along custom rotation y placement for them, custom music for your track and other features!

More about TMUnlimiter can be found on it's official announcement thread, in this link:
https://tmnforever.tm-exchange.com/main.aspx?action=threadshow&id=6517627&page=auto

lunarmagic++

having charted a few botb songs for rock band 3, i totally second @petet's suggestion

edit: also, i think the formats should refer for the type of game (eg have a racing format, and the accepted file formats are the formats for accepted games, have a rhythm game format, and have the accepted format be simfile, chart/mid etc), this way we wont have a fuckton of new formats and most of them will still be acessible since most games are light and free

edit 2: i also second SMW/SMB

I've known Stepmania for a very long time myself, actually, going back to the G3 days (2005-2006 is a good estimate). However, if I even remotely test it, I would do only Stepmania 5 and earlier (with me not having actually used Stepmania in quite a while), since the system requirements gives me a version incompatibility with 6 and later.

Also, anything that requires pre-existing music to put beats to (which includes Stepmania)... I'd recommend just using the Battle of the Bits music collection.

On that note... Battle of the Bits announcer pack, anyone?

oh god i forgot about trackmania! hell yeahhhh
also uhhh osu? maybe

Stepmania official playstyle categories:
3 fingered

Everyone else is cheating
[edit:]
I'm curious now https://www.strawpoll.me/18271471

Full support for step-charts idea!! I've been working with them for a thing lately and it's fun as heck. It could also potentially open up the site to new users who wouldn't have gravitated here previously. I know some non-musicians and non-electronic musicians who make them who would love the music here for sure

clon/phase shift charts/maps would be killer on botb honestly. i've made a few so yeet

|дﾟ)… BMS?

i support SMW as a mappist format. Especially as a SMW music porter. it would be dope.

smw game jam

line rider

OOMG lovely idea ^

Oh Line Rider..... brings back memories :)

I don't know much (or anything) about most games suggested here.
As a guideline: the entries must be stored on BotB.
So the megaman mega maker won't work because they host all the levels on their server by an id number (unless its changed since it was released). I have no idea how easy it is to swap minecraft maps (or their filesize for that matter).
Basically, I am open to this but will have to vet each suggestion individually which could quickly get more bothersome than I want to deal with. :shrug:

okay let me try to sum up the most important stuff for the 5 most wanted formats:

LunarMagic / Super Mario World
file types - .bps .ips

Website

Using Lunar Magic to create custom rom hacks of Super Mario World. Lunar Magic is completely free and able to load the Super Mario World Rom File. Getting the SMW Rom itself is fairly easy... searching for "smwOrig.smc" on Google gives a lot of results.
Since uploading the Rom itself might not be completely legal, it is recommended to use the tool FLIPS

to create a patch file (.bps) and upload that. (patches are legal)
(Older patch-files uses .ips extension)
Everyone else can then use this patch file with the smw-rom to create the working and customized rom, which can be played on a snes-emulator like ZSNES or Snes9x or on real hardware if you have... things to make it work lol.



TrackMania Nations Forever
file types - .gbx

Galgox shared a lot of information about this here!
I'll copypaste the most relevant information:

This is a free-to-play racing game that features a custom track builder. Tracks are stored as .gbx files, which shall be the file format required. Any custom track you build is saved to a folder named "TrackMania" which is located in your documents directory. All your user data for the game is stored in there. For custom tracks, they are specifically stored in TrackMania\Tracks\Challenges\My Challenges.

You can put any custom track you download and save it to TrackMania\Tracks\Challenges and it'll be ready to play in solo mode.

Official Site!

It can be downloaded on Steam

or here

.
You need to create an account to play it though (or is there another way to get it working?)



Stepmania
file types - .zip

Stepmania

is a rythm game, where you can create "maps" for a music track. It's basically a rythm game, where you have to press buttons along with the music or beat to get a good score. As already mentioned by other users, the submissions should be limited to BotB entries only. The game itself is also completely free. I wasnt able to get it working correctly though, so if any of the information here is invalid, feel free to correct me :x
But from what i understand, you need to create a folder for your song (which will be submitted later as zip) and put the mp3 in it together with .pngs of wallpapers that will be used in the game while you're playing the map and a .sm-textfile, which contains the actual map-information. Setting up the file is explained here

, though it didnt work for me, maybe i did something wrong *shrug*
After you set up a raw-file, you have to open the game and select the blank song. You can now create your own level for it.
Would be good to not put the mp3 into the zip for the final submit, since its already on BotB.



Line Rider
file types - .json

Line Rider is a website for creating "movies" of a little person on a sleigh, which is riding over lines synced to a music track. The creation of those maps is done completely on the website

. Choose an mp3-file from your computer and start drawing lines. You're able to save your course into a json file, which can be loaded by the website. The mp3 isnt saved obviously, so for OHBs it would be required to set one specific botb entry to use or to link the entry in the description, if you're uploading it to a major.
Since you cant really "play" the map by yourself after its finished but only watch it like a movie, i dont know if its really fitting for a Mappist format though... maybe its more of a Grafxicist format? hmmmmm



Minetest
file types - .zip

Website

As Flaminglog said here, it's the open-source and free alternative of Minecraft. I tested it and it works good! Worlds are stored in different folders in the subdir /worlds. Submitting this world folder as a .zip would be required. The file size for a new created world is around ~2MB zipped, could be more if you create a lot of stuff, idk. But 10mb should be enough i guess.. same goes for every other suggested format!

BPS is the recommended format for snes patches now - use FLIPS

Oh, okay good to know! i will edit my comment!

minecraft build format

i am not joking and there is a free open-source alternative:
http://www.minetest.net/

let's BUILD THINGS in MINECRAFT TEST

Awesome! I added it to my comment!

since a few people named clone hero / phase shift (not many but still a few), i'll try to explain in a bit more detail what they are (most already know clone hero probably, but phase shift is underrated) and why they're viable imo

(quick edit: i'm not against those games being thrown in the same format/category as stepmania, i just want them available on botb)

Clone Hero

Free, cross-platform Guitar Hero clone for PC; only supports guitar, but has Gamepad Mode for oldschool dualshock players or keyboard players who don't want to strum.

charts can be created with Moonscraper

, Editor on Fire

or REAPER (with RBN Tools); all of these tools are free
the distributed file would be a .zip file containing a notes.chart/notes.mid file (format depends on the tool used, both are supported), song.ini and song.mp3 file (optional maybe since it can be gotten on BotB)

Phase Shift

Free Guitar Hero / Rock Band clone, supports more instrument than Clone Hero does (Drums, Pro Keys, Pro Guitar for instance). Also support MIDI controllers so if you want to play Drums with an electronic drumkit, or keys with a midi keyboard, you can.

charts can be created with Editor on Fire and Reaper (with RBN tools), and distributed in a similar way to clone hero charts (except .chart files aren't supported).

you can play phase shift customs on clone hero (if they have guitar, bass or keys track), but clone hero customs won't always work on phase shift (they probably will if it uses a .mid file instead of a .chart file; plus you can convert .chart to .mid using EoF).
however, since those games are mostly alike (and cross-compatible to an extent), i don't think they should be different formats, but a single one (if they were to become a format at all).

Chip's Challenge is a good candidate. It's fun and easy to make levels for, it's gotta a freeware clone (Tile World) that can load custom levels, you can upload the level files directly here, and the name of the game is extremely fitting. :P

Poor Chipchamp might have to come up with a new name for his winterchip gauntlet though. :P

found this lyceum article about something that might work as a mappist format. i dont really know why there's an article about it in the first place but since its already there, uhhhhh

It's very easy to make maps for Duke Nukem 3D (.map).

Dude wtf i never expected Super Mario War here
I loved that game on the Wii

dink smallwood -- it's freeware and cross-platform

bump, because i really wanna see new mappist formats. especially lunarmagic/super mario world and minecraft/minetest. detailed information in my previous comment here

...I never even considered a Mario Maker format with the entry being your level code, that could be amazing

the problem with mario maker would be, that people need to pay for the game in order to play the levels. you can, on the other hand, get a smw rom easily on the internet

Heightmaps for like OpenTTD and stuff would be cool.
.vxl maps maybe.

Hey
What if
AdvanceMap...?
Maybe?

BUILD engine stuff, Duke3D in particular plz

i approve all the new ideas in here, but would like to point out what puke7 already said. it would be good to provide further information about the format and game, since it would be too much work to search for all the required information for every suggestion made.
also more information about how the save files are stored and if its possible and legal to share them here on botb!

Of course, .vxl maps are used in Voxlap engine games like Ace of Spades!; now hosted on BuildandShoot, they basically consist of Blocks of any color in a 512x512x64 map. There are many editors for .vxl maps but the original Voxed editor is pretty decent; it's saved and stored as a .vxl. Also there is a tool that can convert a heightmap and a colormap into a .vxl map, ask me if you need it. Here is a preview of what to expect from .vxl maps: https://twitter.com/dot_vxl
Here is the Voxlap page http://advsys.net/ken/voxlap.htm
Regarding legality I don't know, you might have to email kens@advsys.net

I second the osu maps and also clone hero

personally i'd like to see people utilize rock and roll
http://www.romhacking.net/utilities/246/

it's a comprehensive editor for making mega man levels that i've personally had a lot of ease of use with in the past

the only exception is that you'll also need a mega man (u) or rockman (j) rom to get it up and running but even so it's well worth it since you can actually upload the patch file with the level in it for ohbs as well as submit full patches for majors and not deal with mega man maker's id nonsense

that and megaman levels have less variables than smw so it's extra intuitive and easier for n00bz to get into than lunar magic

I'm not sure if there's an easy way to share the Mega Maker maps outside of navigating to them via the program, but that sounds like a fun one. Also, it's still be nice to do Doom maps for those of us that like Doom.

Finally, I have no interest in making Dink Smallwood stuff, but I haven't even thought of that game since it came out. Good times!

Just logged in to add a great suggestion of one more mappist format. It came when I was reminded by the time about 4-12 years ago I had fun playing with:

[All below updated 02/01-2021]
[update 14/07-2021: wrong to call ZC an emulator]

ZQuest
file type - .qst

Website

(It was a long time ago I've visited the site so I'm not sure if this is the right one, it has changed some but the background wallpaper is familiar)

Comes bundled with the LoZ PC-clone Zelda Classic. ZQuest.exe is a feature-rich quest-editor, with map-editor, texture-editor, advanced game-configuration and script-expandability . For the experienced user it's definitely possible to create custom games, especially through "bending" the game-engine with the script-expandabilty(have a look at this

). The quests are stored in .qst-files (Fun fact: they can even be locked for editing with a password LOL)

ZC.exe (or could be ZClassic.exe) is the LoZ emulator itself, that has the ability to load the .qst upon creating a new game in the menu ingame.

Oh did I mention that it has the ability to have s3xmodit, nsf, mid, etc. as ingame music? because it can!*

Notes about .qst embedding drawbacks 02/01-2021:
I noticed today that choosing the .qst-file as file-type for the format comes with some limits

*s3xmodit, nsf and streamed wavefile-formats are enhanced music, and it seems that enhanced music are NOT stored in the .qst file. Midi is the only music that gets embedded.

File-embedded scripts is an ambiguous matter (if that's the correct term). According to the info I've got over on PureZC-forums and ZCWiki, scripts can be embedded in the .qst in compiled form, in some cases. But then there's those who stores scripts in libraries, and the cases I've encountered are not stored compiled in the files.

So if .qst is used as the file-type for the format, usage of enhanced music and external scripts isn't possible.

kinda bumping this thread to show a format that would probably only work well in majors, but would still be fun.

BMS, a file format for charts in Beatmania IIDX simulators. BMS charts are usually more high-effort than in other rhythm games, as it involves a 2-3 person team creating an original song and chart, 'keysounding' the chart (separating sounds in the song so they can be assigned to keys in the chart), and optionally the creation of cover art (a BGI, or background image) or a music video (BGA, or background animation), all almost always submitted to demoscene-like compos. all this in mind, BMS would be a great botb format.

also seconding trackmania, stepmania and lr

adding on to the BMS stuff: the biggest BMS compo is an annual team-based compo called BOF (BMS of Fighters) and I think it might be cool to have a major held on BotB to select works -> registration of a BotB team for BOF

A-zu-ra made a thread to gauge interest for this back in 2016 but it only got like 2 entries and I don't think anyone's brought it up since

bms would be cool as hell even though im trash at iidx lolol

Surprised nobody mentioned Worms Armageddon. Levels are simply represented by single png images with some restrictions, so storage and viewing should be pretty easy.

closing this thread as soon as it reachs 56 posts.

okay.
there are a LOT of suggestions here, and if puke really wanna add more mappist formats, it will be a great resource. but its also an overwhelming amount already. to avoid even more noise, i'm gonna close the thread now.