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[Farbs]

Glad you changed the ending!

Glad you told me the last one sucked!
Seriously, that was some high class feedbacking. Thanks dude.

[medieval]

All I can say is rofl.

[Steve Swink]

So good...

[Farmergnome]

Another sick entry, great job dude.

[ThetaGames]

I've never seen anything like this.  It was extremely funny, and really got across the atmosphere of 'broken NES.'  I like how the randomness 'flowed' from one game to another (keeping some elements while changing others).  It took me a bit to figure out what to do, but after that, I found it quite entertaining. 

I have only a few complaints:  First, the white noise sound between games was a little loud (though I guess it fit; it is supposed to take the player by surprise).  Second, the shooter (I think it is Space Invaders) is locked vertically, so it is sometimes impossible to shoot anything or escape.  Also, things can get stuck in walls when the generation happens.  I suppose such game glitches would fit the feel of the game, though.   

Excellent work!  By the way, was the name 'ROM CHECK FAIL' randomly generated?

~ Theta Games

[Farbs]

...things can get stuck in walls when the generation happens.
...was the name 'ROM CHECK FAIL' randomly generated?

Yeah, I ripped my collision code straight out of the less demanding Polychomatic Funk Monkey, and even there it glitched out a bit. I should do a rewrite some day.

"ROM CHECK FAIL" wasn't randomly generated, no. Basically I overlooked the N in VGNG and made a VGG. I don't mind if people penalize me for this in the voting, I just really wanted to make this game. Also I wanted to write "penalize", which I've done twice now. 

[Lim-Dul]

I don't know why but I really like this game - I didn't expect it to turn out to be THAT good - even though I'm not that much into retro gaming. =)

And no, I won't penalize you in any way should I decide to vote on this particular entry. ^^

Two notes I posted on the IndieGames Weblog:

"Could you turn "autofire" off every time jumping is required? That, is, make it so that e.g. Mario doesn't jump all the time the space bar remains pressed (a simple de-press check would do that)? It's really weird as it is now. ;-)"

You might want to alter the Space Invader "paddle-ship" to be able to move up and down since most levels can't be beaten by simply moving left and right. It wouldn't be accurate but at least add to the gameplay.

[Alec]

You might want to alter the Space Invader "paddle-ship" to be able to move up and down since most levels can't be beaten by simply moving left and right. It wouldn't be accurate but at least add to the gameplay.

This was discussed here already, right?

Sure to be a contentious point, but I like that you can get totally screwed over by that Space Invaders ship. Just seems to fit with the game. There are also brilliant moments when the random switch works out perfectly and you kill the last enemy right after switching etc.

Love the unexpectedness of it all.

[Eclipse]

it's awesome! very fun, but i think that it have nothing related to the compo, anyway it rules

[alphasmart]

Ah, I realised what the problem was: if you win the level during a transition, it stays mid-transition (i.e. crazy glitched) until another transition comes along.  I guess it adds to the effect but it can get annoying. Still, a fantastic original (and yet...unoriginal, if you know what I mean) game.

Also, with the space invaders thing, there are a number of combinations that screw you over - mario + space invaders for example, or the car and breakout blocks on the floor (can't shoot downwards).  While it's true that the space invaders ship is the most annoying one, it means you have to strategise for each level.

Finally, some questions. Pang balls but not the pang character?  Breakout blocks (I think) but not the paddle/ball?  And I don't know what the heck half of the things are from, could you provide a key?  Thanks!

[joshg]

Mario vs Space Invaders isn't totally impossible, it depends on whether you can get above them or not (or are already above them when a switch happens).

Anyway, seconded that the occasional impossible combo is fine, it adds to the glitch-tasticness of this game.  Also I think I've died more often as Pac-man than the space invaders ship anyway. 

[Farbs]

Also, with the space invaders thing, there are a number of combinations that screw you over - mario + space invaders for example, or the car and breakout blocks on the floor (can't shoot downwards).  While it's true that the space invaders ship is the most annoying one, it means you have to strategise for each level.

Finally, some questions. Pang balls but not the pang character?  Breakout blocks (I think) but not the paddle/ball?  And I don't know what the heck half of the things are from, could you provide a key?  Thanks!

Part of the reason that the game switches so quickly is that I didn't want people to be stuck in bad combos for too long. I find 5 seconds about right for the player to laugh at the broken game, then move their otherwise useless character to a more useful location. Also, strategy is a good thing right?

I thought about doing the Pang character, but sadly I ran out of time. Same goes for the arkanoid paddle. There are actually very few "complete" games at the moment. Most of the sprites have titles that show their heritage, so you can check out the res/sprites/ folder to see what everything is. Don't look in the res/endings folder unless you've finished the game though 

Oh, and if you're mucking about feel free to edit res/levels.lvl. It's just a text file so you can make whatever levels you like. Be sure to keep a backup though, and watch that every line is 16 characters wide (including whitespace) and that the number of lines is divisible by 14.

[Alec]

Yeah, I find that Pac Man is usually the hardest / most frustrating. It makes it all that much sweeter when you actually manage to get the pill... but on later levels it seems impossible to grab it with enough time to actually take out some enemies.

[Farbs]

Pacman + Gauntlet Ghosts is a total win though. Usually when I score this combo I blast through about half a dozen levels with it. Otherwise I probably would have tweaked the man of pac to be a little more powerful (eg: more power pellets)

[joshg]

Yeah, I hit a Pacman + gauntlet ghosts combo and got farther than I had with anything else, so it's definitely all about the matchup. 

[Jeferson R. Silva]

I really good game we have here, congratulations on finishing it Farbs!

I got through levels 14-20 using the Defender ship against the Gauntlet ghosts. Mario + Goombas in some stages is a great combination too (mainly on those stages with chambers full of enemies). As a final note, I really really really hate the last Space Invader ship. Got pwned by it so many times that now I wait until the ships change to something less dangerous like the Arkanoid blocks :D (though I think I'm the only one who got killed as Link by one of these).

[Pip]

^ That was a confusing post. But then, this is a confusing game!

Farbs, is there any chance you'll update this at some point with more games? Obviously, it's great as it is, but it's definitely the kind of game you could just keep adding more and more to if you wanted to.

[Farbs]

Maybe. I dunno. There's heaps I wanted to put in but couldn't due to time constraints. I could see this going in a bunch of different directions:

* Nowhere
* Sequel with RPG collection/unlocking mechanics
* Open source so people can add their own games
* Sequel with mod support so people can add their own stuff

Only the future knows what the future holds. I sure as hell don't.

[joshg]

One little thing I just noticed; if you start a new game after you lose, it picks up exactly as it left off in terms of tiles, avatar and enemies.  Which means if you died mid-texture-glitch, it starts off with the same glitched tiles.

Dunno if that was intentional or not, but if it wasn't it's probably an easy fix.

[Farbs]

Hahaha that's awesome!
I originally wrote the enemy/player/environment selection so that it ran independently from the game. It glitched every 5 seconds no matter what the game was doing, even if it was between levels or showing the startup sequence. That was kinda annoying though so I hacked in some controls to pause and restart it. I never thought about what would happen after you died.  :D