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[Loren Schmidt]

There's a huge bulk of iconic design elements in platformers. It's funny how they are echoed over and over, to the point where they lend games an air of legitimacy.

Player: I don't know about this new indie platformer...
Player: Squints eyes, looks at screenshot
Player: Ah, it has bright colors, giant mushrooms, and question mark blocks? Eh, maybe I'll give this a go then!

Examples of this include:

• the iconic question mark blocks in Mario
• cartoony cylindrical trees in the background with a rounded top
• giant mushrooms
• the metal strut / chain supported floating blocks in Cave Story
• jumping fish / fireballs
• floating, useless yet sparkly collectables (coins / stars / jewels)
  

There's nothing wrong with including these... many of them are great tools. But it's funny how I always find myself subconsciously tugged toward things like these...  :D

[Bree]

Mario games have a high concentration of recognizable iconography. It's quite interesting how distinct the games can look, especially when compared to the copycats that it spawned.

While I would love to see a sidescrolling RTS, there has been a sidescrolling racing game. Uni Racers, anyone?

[William Broom]

Pretty close to a sidescrolling RTS was a weird old game called The Tone Rebellion. It definitely scrolled sideways, and not in any other directions, but it didn't quite have the platform elements. You built your buildings on platforms, but your units could all fly wherever they liked.

It would be cool to see an RTS that really takes place in a platforming environment. Kind of like The Boomlands but not so automatic.

[Bob le Moche]

There's also this game:

[godsavant]

There's also this game:

That looks sweet. Narration harkens from Monty Python, though.

[laserghost]

I would take this with a grain of salt. Remember that Wikipedia is edited by nerds and pretty much every 'In Popular Culture' section features a lot of references to videogames, anime and Firefly.

Of course. Though for the sake of conversation, Wikipedia is an interesting collection of "knowledge" nonetheless.

[Problem Machine]

It would be cool to see an RTS that really takes place in a platforming environment.

I imagine this as basically being what Lemmings would be like if you gave them machine guns and flamethrowers.

[Cheater‽]

"...Lemmings [...] if you gave them machine guns and flamethrowers.

It must be done.

[Xion]

It would be cool to see an RTS that really takes place in a platforming environment.

I thought that's what Clonk was?

[nihilocrat]

Platform Shmup (You are forced to keep running in one direction, basically)

Eh?

One of the common elements in a scrolling shmup is the forced-scrolling part. Basically, it would be like any platformer but you are forced to move in a certain direction. You could move forward and back and jump and such, but you could not come to a complete stop. This is actually accomplished in a lot of platformers during a chase / vehicle section. Basically, it's a rail shooter.

Gunstar Heroes gets pretty close. There are vehicle sections and other bits where you're pushed through, but other bits where you can stop. It is probably more fun than pushing you around constantly, though.

Also, I'm just now realizing no one has made Warning Forever in a platformer. It would basically be Black's level over and over again, which would be pretty cool. 

Actually, has anyone heard of a game that takes pretty direct influence from Gunstar Heroes? I've heard of The Red Star for the PS2 but haven't tried it yet (but probably should).

[William Broom]

Platform Shmup (You are forced to keep running in one direction, basically)

Eh?

One of the common elements in a scrolling shmup is the forced-scrolling part. Basically, it would be like any platformer but you are forced to move in a certain direction. You could move forward and back and jump and such, but you could not come to a complete stop. This is actually accomplished in a lot of platformers during a chase / vehicle section. Basically, it's a rail shooter.

This would be really cool if it was in the style of Gunstar Heroes/Sin and Punishment.

[Reiss]

cave story didn't invented anything, there are a lot of games on the nes using a similar style

Actually, one of the things I associate cave story with is the scattered placement of square blocks within a slightly smoother landscape.  Are there nes precedents for this technique?

wait, did Cave Story have smooth landscapes?  i always thought that it was secretly just a bunch of blocks hidden under an outer, non-blocky layer.  although the non-hidden blocks (on second thought, this is what i think you were referencing.  uh.  oops.  and i guess they're not really "non-hidden," since they're being painted as much as everything else is - just made more obviously blocky.)  were pretty visually iconic - i don't remember any nes or snes games having a mostly-painted over landscape with a view "revealed" blocky shapes set into them.

Knytt Stories was also pretty iconic - a tiny sprite exploring what was a much larger nonscrolling landscape.  the main chapter was also pretty iconically minimalist - Juni's size meant that the sprite couldn't be too detailed, and the landscape was mostly made up mostly of beautifully arranged basic shapes.

[AuthenticKaizen]

Platform Shmup (You are forced to keep running in one direction, basically)

Eh?

One of the common elements in a scrolling shmup is the forced-scrolling part. Basically, it would be like any platformer but you are forced to move in a certain direction. You could move forward and back and jump and such, but you could not come to a complete stop. This is actually accomplished in a lot of platformers during a chase / vehicle section. Basically, it's a rail shooter.

Gunstar Heroes gets pretty close. There are vehicle sections and other bits where you're pushed through, but other bits where you can stop. It is probably more fun than pushing you around constantly, though.

Also, I'm just now realizing no one has made Warning Forever in a platformer. It would basically be Black's level over and over again, which would be pretty cool. 

Actually, has anyone heard of a game that takes pretty direct influence from Gunstar Heroes? I've heard of The Red Star for the PS2 but haven't tried it yet (but probably should).

viewtiful joe(ps2, gc) has also some similarities...




and silhouette mirage (psx, saturn)