Belated Weekly Report #3

By: Paul Eres

On: October 1st, 2010

1. Gigadeep. By Peposoft (Houkai Mura). Some resemblance to Mega Man X, but overall an amazing game. Japanese-only, but playable even if you don’t know the language. A bit of a lengthy download though (over 200 MB). [Windows]

2. Space Funeral. By thecatamites (Paul Moose in Space World, Ghost Voyage). A very different setting from most RPGs, with a unique style. Even if you hate jRPG-style games you should give this one a chance, it’s not a world I’d have liked to miss out on. It’s about two hours long, a manageable length. [Windows]

3. Sombreros. By Dustin Gunn (who runs the Indie Game Bingo site). Created for MrPodunkian’s Action52 OWNS contest (which yes is still ongoing). One of the better games made for it so far. The game is almost impossibly challenging when played straight up, but is made possible with the addition of the ability to stop time, target individual opponents, and then hit them all in very quick succession when time speeds up again. The boss battles are also fun & creative. [Windows]

4. Streemerz 2 and UnderPogo. Made by MrPodunkian (Streemerz, The Underside, Merry Gear Solid series) and GirlFlash (The Linear RPG) in a competition against each other for IndieKombat (Chevy had to drop out). They are now finished and you are now able to vote for which you like better, determining the winner. Arthur’s game is pretty challenging and polished, even if you played and beat the original Streemerz. Sophie’s game… has a nice outline effect. For those stymied by Streemerz 2’s extreme difficulty, you can enjoy Super Joe’s voice acting free of stress here. [Windows/Mac]

5. My First Quantum Translocator. By Cellar Door Games (Don’t Soil Your Pants). Platformer with a unique, fresh mechanic which is thoroughly explored: basically you create a point which you can warp back to at any time, but your momentum is preserved, leading to it having a large number of uses. There are a large variety of well-crafted levels, this game has some of the best level design I’ve seen in a while. It even has the ability to skip levels if they’re too tough (after you’ve tried and failed enough times), which is very welcome and a good trade-off between those who love challenge and those whose skills aren’t up to par with very demanding games. [Flash]

6. Give Up Robot 2. Made by YMM (Runman: Race Around the World, Jumper series, An Untitled Story). Grappling hook platformers seem to be the the fashion this week. Made for Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim games thing (and it’s great to see people from the community represented on that site). If you liked the original Give Up Robot, this one is even better. [Flash]

7. Inside Job. By Richard Perrin (The White Chamber, Critical Bypass). Starts out as a typical stealth game, but becomes something more the further you descend into the game. The ‘square head’ characters are cute. I can’t really write much else about it that isn’t a spoiler. [Windows/Mac]

8. Camelon. By sasakoge (Stringlink). Another indie game in Japanese, but can be played without knowing the language. This game is tricky to describe, the closest parallel may be the bonus stages in Sonic the Hedgehog, but even that isn’t a very good analogy. Extremely challenging. There’s a stage select system on the title screen (which you might miss if you’re not looking for it). [Windows]

9. Cascode. A “match-4” casual puzzle game by Increpare (Rara Racer, Opera Omnia, Mirror Stage). I think that combination speaks for itself. It’s probably the most challenging match-N game I’ve played, even though it’s very short. But as a proof of concept I imagine this could become a very engrossing game if extended. [Flash]

10. Ute. By Lea Schönfelder (Ulitsa Dimitrova). Contains cartoony, charming, animated sex, so don’t play if you don’t like that sort of thing. The game caused quite a controversy when posted on TimW’s blog, with a very mixed reaction; either people hated it or loved it. I loved it so I’m posting it here. [Flash]

Classic of the Week: Garden Gnome Carnage. By Ultimortal (Iji, Hero: Core). Now updated, with a Flash version. Move a building left and right, swing your gnome and prevent the elves from delivering presents to the people inside the building. Sounds like it wouldn’t be fun, but it’s extremely fun, and perhaps proof that you can make any wacky idea fun if you’re skilled enough. See if you can beat my score of 305k! [Flash]

Posted in Community, Features | Tags: WeeklyReport

eva

kool gams
http://www.derekyu.com Derek Yu

Space Funeral is really good.
mrpodunkian

seconding this; the strange dialog, messy ms-paint graphics, and sampled music give the game a real surreal feeling, but amazingly, everything seems to make sense in its own universe, and there are some genuinely funny things going on in the game. it has heavy shades of mother 1/earthbound, especially the magicant and moonside sections.

everyone should also check out sombreros, which has some really amazing setpieces, the likes of which you don't seen in indie games (or even many AAA games, for that matter). the boss battles, as the post says, are all really awesome and test both your reflexes and your brains. FULL DISCLOSURE: i contributed a little bit on dis gam;

lastly gigadeep is AMAZING. sure it has the same bugs that plagued peposoft's other game, hokaimura, but the exciting (and funny) setpieces and the ultra-fast-but-responsive feel of the game basically cements peposoft as one of my favorite MMF2 developers. add onto an already lengthy game a host of collectables that can be used to upgrade your character, and, you know, a bunch of different, playable characters, and, welp. indie game of the year right here. 200 mb download is def. worth it.
mrpodunkian

btw — i think the link to sombreros is technically wrong — the text in the thread you linked to says sombreros.exe (which is the correct url), but it links to sombrero.exe (which is the incorrect/old url), so a mod should go ahead and fix that if possible (i've also let dustin know about it)
Edmundito

UTE was actually made by the same person who made Ulitsa Dimitrova: http://www.ulitsa-dimitrova.com/
rinkuhero

thanks, will edit
rinkuhero

i just edited the blog post to link to the file directly for now
card

do any of them work on a mac/ without a mouse
rinkuhero

the flash ones and the ones that use unity, yes (the 3d ones use unity and the ones that look like flash games use flash, i'll add in some tags tomorrow or something)
http://twitter.com/newobject Brian Long

Love these weekly reports. Keep up the good work.
http://www.twitter.com/offalal offal

why do you refer to people by the screen names they used when they were twelve as opposed to their present and preferred aliases, paul?
http://twitter.com/FrogBawt Rhys Powell

Streemerz 2 has a mac version.
rinkuhero

hm? i'm not sure what you are asking
http://ortoslon.makgam.com ortoslon

iirc Matt Thorson and Danial Remar don't use YoMamasMama and Ultimortal anymore. and SophieH is just Sophie Houlden's name shortened for twitter.
http://s.hryx.net/ hyrx

Agreed, mostly. I tried Space Funeral after Cactus twittered about it. The atmosphere created by the mixture of crusty graphics, unconventional background music, and hideous characters is different and awesome.

But I feel like the author shirked on the ending. It was kind of an unoriginal non sequitur, and broke the feeling the rest of the game had established.

The Dracula segment didn't really fit in either, but it had me cracking up.

And now I must investigate these cube heads of Inside Job.
http://twitter.com/WaveringRadiant Giuseppe Navarria

Streemerz 2 is the best thing ever happened to indie gaming after Cave Story.

woops… Did I said that out loud?

– Eclipse
Kentdoggydog

I'm so mad that they changed the music for Garden Gnome Carnage. Angry. Grrr.
rinkuhero

ymm and ultimortal still use those names on forums, such as the gmc and eo forums, so that's not true. it's also the names they're far more well-known by.

sophieh is a better name than 'girlflash', but i guess girlflash is better-known, so i'll edit it to that
rinkuhero

i liked the old music better too, but that's the only negative change as far as i can see
http://ortoslon.makgam.com ortoslon

i beat sombreros using stop time twice and without dying, i'll try to record a video on monday.
Zerotau

Sombreros! It's hard, but amusing. Go play.
Julmust

I love GigaDeep, but it's not really playable beyond the first level. Can anyone translate the Item and Repair windows on level selection? :)
mrpodunkian

i spent about 30 minutes on the first level until i realized there was a dash button.

i'm thinking of asking peposoft if he wants the game translated, because i think it's amazing and deserves a wider audience.
LaserBeing

“[Camelon] is tricky to describe, the closest parallel may be the bonus stages in Sonic the Hedgehog, but even that isn’t a very good analogy.”

It looks like a riff on Cameltry, especially given the title.
http://twitter.com/HeroOfTheFSA Joseph Gibson

Hi, I'm Super Joe. Megaman is, was, and always will be stupid, bad and boring. Gigadeep, however, is cool. Peposoft is cool.
http://twitter.com/lachrob Robert

Yah, someone needs to translate this beast.
http://twitter.com/WaveringRadiant Giuseppe Navarria

@Paul Eres: Camelon is a clone of an old coin op called Cameltry (it's also for SNES)

– Eclipse
CIJolly

Sombreros was great. The mechanics are very simple, most of the fun comes from its many environmental puzzles. Clever boss fights, too.
http://ortoslon.makgam.com ortoslon

done http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONx3tcMA5l0
http://james.hamsterrepublic.com/ James Paige

Thank you, paul! In spite of your bold redefinition of the word “weekly” I find myself looking forward to these updates more and more ;)
guest

Sombreros is awesome
Adrahil

Definitely need an english patch for Gigadeep. I've beaten the main masters and the two sub bosses but I haven't figured out what everything in the shop does, what that giant needle I talked to wanted, and I don't know how to unlock the other chars.
http://ortoslon.makgam.com ortoslon

variable-interval reinforcement in action
CIJolly

Space Funeral seems like good multimedia…but not good enough to suffer through a terrible example of JRPG gameplay mechanics. If the gameplay is trying to be ironically bad, I guess…well done?
Hyper Emerson

When i tried to run Camelon, i got this error: caps.MaxVertexIndex < 0xFFFF

Does anyone know how i can fix this?
Asmodeus MacHorne

I'll find you and I'll tear your intestines out.
Snave

Translation isn't really needed, but it would be nice for some I guess. Anyhow, for those reading this needing a quick primer:

DEEP and PAPPY are the two main characters.

Stages are:
Seppashimal (Shinobi) — contains itemshop list
Masuraoman (Light) — ?????
Pizzaman (Water) — contains beer mug
Tajiiman (Inferno) — contains itemshop list
Otankoman (Ice) — contains beer mug
Passionman (Heaven) — contains beer can
Beatman (Sound) — contains itemshop list
Ouyaman (China) — contains itemshop list

Sub-bosses are:
Mecha Walido
Mr. Piiid (Mr Pead based off voice?)

Final boss is:
Maki-Wily

Items in the shop are:
-Set A-
[x] DEEP 1UP (increases max, but seemingly a tempoprary effect)
[x] Beer (glass is marked reusable, but I can't even figure out how to BUY this with the glass in hand)
[x] Can beer (restores life mid-game)
-Set B-
[x] Jump UP (increases jump height)
[x] Life UP 1.5 (increases life gains from balls to 150%)
[x] Fast Ladder Speed (greatly increases ladder climbing speed)
-Set C-
[x] Omake[Extra] Game A (tonnes of bonus stages, I can't seem to get past the purple scrolly one personally, it bugs out and the jump button freezes at the start)
[x] Needle Damage (take damage from needles instead of dying instantly)
[x] Big Life (things drop big life balls)
[x] Saber Plus (description says saber power increases, but to me this seems to sometimes make a saber appear when shooting in order to get a free attack in melee)
-Set D-
[x] ???
[x] ???
[x] ???
-Set E-
[x] ???
[x] ???
[x] ???
-Set F-
[x] Minigame A (more bonus stages)
[x] Needle Walk (can walk atop needles)
[x] Super DEEP
[x] Help Box (appear in a few places, especially the Light stage blocking spikes and generally making life easier)
-Set G-
[x] Minigame B (more bonus stages)
[x] Chaos A (weapons spool automatically)
[x] Life UP 2.0 (increases life gains from balls to 200%, if you have the previous powerup, combined they increase to 300%)
-Set H-
[x] Pado Spirit Mode (???)
[x] Chaos B (weapon button replaced with another life attack/vomit key)

NOTE: My item list is incomplete because I never found 2 of the itemshop lists, I've noted above what I found where if anyone wants to point me in the right direction. Note all items need to be turned ON in the setup menu on the stage select screen, this is also where to initiate bonus stages.

Controls are:
Shift: Dash
Z: jump
X: shoot
C: sacrifice life attack (vomit?)
2: suicide
P: in-stage menu
F2: return to stage select
Esc: quit game