v1.0.2

This release bundles support for:

• Super Monkey Ball Invasion by scrap651
• Kaizo Monkey Ball - GDQ Edition by Eucalyptus (original pack by Twilight).

v1.0.1

This fixes a crash when using Marathon Mode on console.

This release is a hotfix for v1.0.0, see the v1.0.0 release notes for all of the new goodies.

v1.0.0

I'm happy to announce the release of SMB2 Practice Mod v1.0.0! This release includes a bunch of new features as well as a number of bug fixes. Hope that you enjoy!

Many of the new features were implemented by @Nambo0, thanks very much for the awesome contributions! Thanks also to Nambo, Callum, and Eddy for beta testing.

As a reminder, here's the installation instructions for Wii and Dolphin.

New Features

• Ball and Ape Color: You can now choose a custom ball color and monkey clothing color from the list of built-in game colors. Feature by @Nambo0.
• Freecam: Smooth and intuitive freecam for looking around levels. See the Help menu for controls.
• IL Battle Display: Track your best time and score on a level within a fixed amount of time (or unlimited time), similar to how it's done in the IL tournaments. Feature by @Nambo0.
• Raw Input Display: The input display now has an option to show stick input numbers, including raw stick inputs and filtered inputs actually seen by the game.
• IL Validation Mark: As the practice mod has increasingly been used for individual-level speedruns, there's been concern over making sure that no gameplay-altering features are used in ILs which are submitted to the official leaderboards. Starting in this release, by default a small version number will be shown in the bottom-right corner post-goal, colored green if no gameplay-altering mods were used and red otherwise. As I understand, you will be required to show this for IL leaderboard submissions for vanilla SMB2 if you are using the practice mod. Visual mods such as raw input display may also be disallowed for the IL leaderboards and aren't accounted for by the IL validation mark.
• Progress Unlock Control: Unlocking all progress (levels, lives, play points, etc.) is convenient but not always desired for the first playthrough of a romhack. Now, all progress will be unlocked for vanilla SMB2 but not for romhacks (by default). There's also a button to unlock progress temporarily for the current play session - save your game to make this persistent.
• Moon Gravity: It plays just like it sounds like. Feature by @Nambo0.
• Marathon Mode: Gameplay mod where your velocity entering the goal is carried over to the next level. Feature by @Nambo0.
• Menu: Mod settings have been reorganized into Tools, Displays, and Gameplay Mods submenus to reduce clutter. In addition, the Help submenu was expanded to cover new features.
• Default Preferences: In the menu, you can now press X on a preference to load its default value. You can now also reset all preferences to defaults under the new "Practice Mod Settings" submenu.
• Hide Elements: Preferences were added to hide game HUD, ball, stage, background, effects, and more.
• ApeSphere-Custom Compatibility: SMB2 Practice Mod can now be loaded in romhacks which use the latest master version of the ApeSphere-Custom modding framework. This includes the hot new release SMB: Launch!.

Bug Fixes

• Savestates: Fixed issue where saving a state within the first ~1s of gameplay on some levels could produce incorrect behavior when loaded. Please let me know if you still run into any similar issues.
• Savestates: Prevented sound effects from playing repeatedly when loading states on certain frames, including the timer ding.
• Savestates: Fix minimap not showing if a state is loaded during the first stage spin-in animation.
• Savestates: Prevent loading states during Exit Game sequences as this could produce buggy behavior.
• Preferences: Fixed issue where default values were not set for preferences introduced in new practice mod versions, if the default value was non-zero and a preferences file already existed.
• Menu: Prevented directional inputs from repeating immediately upon opening the menu if they were held down before doing so.
• UI: Prevented UI elements from being captured by the pause menu screenshot and effectively being shown twice.

Before:

After:

• Card I/O: Fixed bug which could cause savefiles and replays to be saved with a gamecode of all zeroes. This also revealed another bug in the REL loader Gecko code which could cause savefiles/replays to use the vanilla gamecode instead of correctly using a romhack's gamecode.
• Pause Menu: Fix issue where the pause menu would become dimmed if you used Go To Story Mode or started a Challenge Mode segment during an Exit Game sequence.
• Unlock: Unlocking progress now also unlocks Staff Credits Game as it should.

v0.5.1

New audio mods:

• Mute background audio (requires console reset)
• Mute timer dings

v0.5.0

New features:

• Automatic settings saving
• Freeze Timer mod
• D-pad controls mod

Thanks Namb0 for requesting the settings saving and freeze timer features, and Helix for requesting the d-pad controls feature!

v0.4.0

This release includes:

• New Challenge Mode individual segment practice feature! Find it in the menu (L+R)
• "Go To Story Mode" menu shortcut
• General menu redesign
• 9999 Banana Counter mod

Also check out the input display (originally released in v0.3.0) if you haven't yet.

Enjoy!

v0.3.0

This release adds an input display, toggle-able in the menu (L+R). Thanks to Nambo for the feature suggestion and helpful feedback on early prototypes!

v0.2.2

• Allow turning rumble on/off directly from the ApeSphere menu (L+R)
• Fix bug where rumble would stop working when loading a state during the post-goal replay

v0.2.1

• Fix bug where loading a state during fallout/post-goal replay blocked control stick inputs
• Allow loading states during the retry animation as well

v0.2.0

• You can now play Jump Mod directly within ApeSphere, no need to reinstall ApeSphere/Jump Mod to switch. Press L+R to open the new menu, then toggle Jump Mod and Practice Tools on/off as you please. I've changed the binding from R+Z to L+R as the latter is more comfortable IMO, and I expect the menu to have increasing utility.
• You can now save replays at all times, even with practice tools enabled. This also enables you to do full challenge mode runs, previously you could not progress because the mod prevented the replay view from being shown. If you use savestates however, the replay will not play as expected. This may also help prevent a very rare crashing issue, TBD.
• You can now play full Story Mode runs as usual without the IW practice feature interpreting World 1 as an IW.