Penguin Canyon (Sealseal)

Penguin Canyon is my second custom course, made completely by myself. Patch to N64 Sherbert Land and replace Daisy Circuit. The current version of this course is RC5. A plan of a future RC6 may be released soon.

History of the Idea

Penguin Canyon first started as a very different idea that I came up with on a school trip. My friend and I were designing an outline for a custom track. At first, I wanted it to be Wario's Labyrinth. It would have consisted of a huge map with many turns and dead ends. When I got back from the trip, I tried designing it on Microsoft Paint. However, I tried importing the .png into the SZS Modifier, but the model was too complex. This required me to make many changes of the model. The edited .PNG design became the course as it is today. At that point, I thought Wario's Goldmine was not a good choice for it, and thought using penguins would be more interesting than mine carts, so I transferred all my ideas from Wario's Goldmine to N64 Sherbert Land. At that time, I did not know how to import different models into different courses via hex edit, so that is why this course was created off of N64 Sherbert Land. Due to school, it probably took me four weekends to complete the course for an ALPHA test. Many more changes were necessary for improvement. On a Sunday Night, I finished fixing more glitches and released a BETA to two different people. Of course, there were still many glitches I had to fix; Yeah, that's how all my courses turn out in the first stages. After many changes, I released Penguin Canyon RC1, my second custom course.

Versions

Penguin Canyon has had a big history. From ALPHA to the final release candidate, many changes have been made to this course.

RC5

RC5 was a minor update. All I did was change a few textures, fix up the walls, and tweak an enemy route in the KMP. However, this version has not yet made it into the official Custom Track Grand Prix. I think a problem was within the enemy route, so do not freak out if Baby Mario or Birdo commits suicide.

RC4

RC4 may have been the biggest update. In this update, I smoothed out the sides of the road and had a minor texture change to the start line. This version succesfully made it into the Custom Track Grand Prix.

RC3

RC3 fixed an item route glitch. At this point, I thought all items followed the path perfectly, and it was true. The problem, however, was at the point where the path splits and the walls border the path. Bullet Bill was having trouble on deciding which way to go, so after many attempts and lucky placements in the KMP, I successfully fixed this glitch.

RC2.5

This was a minor update, similar to RC3, only less complicated. Here, I noticed Bullet Bill looked a little crazy going up and down the hills, so I fixed this problem up in the KMP by adjusting the Y Values.

RC2

RC2 was an update fixing the download and the first Bullet Bill glitch. At this point in my custom track creating carreer, I mixed up the information on the creating a patch page on the SZS Modifier Patch Server. I mixed the original file (N64 Sherbert Land) and the edited file (Penguin Canyon) and put them in the wrong spots. This update is also the first of the many Bullet Bill problems. MrBean35000vr had a run through on this course when he stumbled upon the first Bullet Bill glitch. It was just a misplacement of an item dot in the KMP.

RC1

RC1 was the first release of this course. The walls were slightly improved, and the ramp was fixed as well. I didn't realize the download did not work, so that was fixed, as I said, in the RC2 update. Also, MrBean35000vr wanted me to shrink the penguin sizes a bunch. In RC1, they shrank over 50%.

BETA

Beta was only released to two people. They were MrBean35000vr and Matt Hanley. They thought the course was pretty cool. The penguin placements were fixed, and some item boxes were edited, like the Star/Mushroom only box.

ALPHA

Alpha was only shown to my friend. I had many versions of Alpha of this course, but I will sum up all the problems. Basically, I needed to fix penguin paths and placements, item box placement, and wall placement.

Future of Penguin Canyon

As I am typing up this article, I have thought of some future ideas for this course. One, I will fix the enemy route and the textures that everybody hate. Secondly, the SZS Modifier has advanced since the creation of this course, so now I am interested in importing different items into this course. An RC6 can be made, but if I create and release one, it will be in June, July, or August.

Credits

As I made this course, many people and programs helped me get through this project from the simple sketch to RC5. These guys were really nice to me, and I gladly appreciate them helping me.

Chadderz- for creating the SZS Modifier. None of this would have happened without him.

MrBean35000vr- giving me some tips along the way, and for Beta testing.

Matt Hanley- Beta testing

Ryuka/Chris- Beta testing

A bunch of really smart guys- creating Microsoft Paint.