Posts from ‘Fan Games’ Category

Preview: Fighting is Magic

By: Derek Yu

On: July 25th, 2012

My Little Pony: Fighting is Magic is a fighting fan game that’s currently under development. Created using 2d Fighter Maker 2002, MLP:FIM will eventually feature 17 ponies from the popular animated show. Each character has its own unique movelist that includes launchers and special magic attacks. The developers have said the game, which uses four buttons, most closely resembles Marvel vs. Capcom in design.

No release date for the game has been set, nor is any demo currently available. However, you can watch a two-hour stream after the cut (taken from this year’s Evolution fighting game tournament):

Read the rest of this entry »

Zelda Classic Quests

By: Derek Yu

On: February 4th, 2012

[This is an overly enthusiastic guest article by vinheim that was originally posted to TIGForums. Zelda Classic is an enhanced remake of the original Legend of Zelda that runs custom quests built with ZC’s editors.]

Hey TIGers, prepare your anus for a waaaaall of text.

I bet some of you who’ve played the Legend of Zelda series and enjoyed it are probably thinking “Damn, these are incredible, it doesn’t get better than this!” or “There’s no way a LoZ fan game could compete with these.” Well I’m here to tell you that you are completely wrong and it gets better. Much, much better.

I’d like to introduce two types of LoZ fan games. For the rom hack games, I’ve made some short reviews on [a TIGForums] post. There’s one post near the top and another near the bottom. Don’t worry about the negatives, the gameplay makes up for it.

Second, for the Zelda Classic games, which may as well be the pinnacle of gameplay in the history of videogames since forever. These quests take the core engine of LoZ, add some additional functionality, graphics, and music through scripting and the level editor and let their creativity do the rest. One of the unique functionalities is how people have emulated side-scrolling screens.

Here’s some of the best I’ve played. Assume that graphics, gameplay, sound, and exploration is already awesome and the story is mediocre before reading the additional comments.

Read the rest of this entry »

Super Smash Land

By: Derek Yu

On: September 15th, 2011

Super Smash Land, by Dan Fornace

Super Smash Land is a cute Game Boy demake of the popular Super Smash Bros. series of games. It features six characters (Mario, Kirby, Link, Pikachu, and two unlockable characters), three game modes (Arcade, Endless, and Versus), and up to four human or CPU players. The control scheme has been simplified to one jump button and one action button.

Super Mario Bros. X

By: Derek Yu

On: January 6th, 2011

[This is a guest review by Paul Hubans. To submit a guest article for TIGSource, go here.]

When it comes to non-commercial games, fan tributes that recycle the same assets and themes from their commercial counterparts are probably the least appealing. Just when I thought that Super Mario Bros Crossover was the only exception to this rule, I discovered Super Mario Bros. X.

SMBX is a masterfully done mash-up of all of the core SMB titles up to Super Mario World with crossovers from other games like Zelda II, Metroid, and a few others that may surprise you. The game looks and plays just like the games it is based on, and it’s obvious that a lot of care and attention to detail went into making this game.

Perhaps the most compelling feature is the game’s two-player co-op mode that I blew an entire day playing with my roommate. This mode is akin to New Super Mario Bros Wii, but with a brilliant and innovative split screen feature that happens very seamlessly and never manages to feel jarring. When both players are in the same area the screen displays normally, but if they move far enough apart the screen will split either horizontally or vertically depending on the players’ relative locations.

In addition to the story campaign that features over 50 familiar and cleverly designed levels, there is also a battle mode where your objective is to kill your friend three times to win. In both the campaign and versus modes, players choose from five different characters, including the Mario brothers themselves, Toad and Peach from SMB 2, and Link as he appears in Zelda II. The mechanics of these characters behave as they would in their respective games, and there’s no greater feeling than taking down Wart with a few thrusts to the face from Link’s sword.

Packaged with the game is a very robust level editor that allows you to create and edit levels in real time; erase a path straight through levels that prove too difficult to pass or treat yourself to a gratuitous amounts of power-ups and 1-ups. While the game is missing a few obvious power-ups like the star or Mario’s cape, it does feature some very cool new and exclusive power-ups like the Billy Cannon, a portable cannon that your character carries like a turtle shell that fires a barrage of Bullet Bills.

Altogether, Super Mario Bros X is an excellent and highly-polished mash-up that fans will love and everyone can appreciate.

Mega man 2.5D

By: Xander

On: May 29th, 2009

Peter Sjostrand’s Mega Man 2.5D sadly doesn’t have a playable public build yet, but this video uploaded just recently was enough to get me excited enough to post it. It seems to reimagine Mega Man 2 as a Paper Mario style platforming adventure, with a number of interesting play twists on the original’s classic layout. A few of the pictured sequences involve a seamless transition between stages of the Mecha Dragon fight, and a usage of the conveyor belts in order to move Mega Man around between the foreground and background. It seems the Blue Bomber is only capable of movement in his regular dimensions so the only way to explore requires using the changing environment to his advantage.

(Update: According to commentors and some googling, this appears to not actually be a gameplay video but rather a concept video. Well… shit…)

The most interesting part of the video however is roughly halfway in where the game showcases a sequence from its Mega Man 3 mode, which actually appears to be a co-op adventure with a player controlling either Mega Man or Proto Man. Far from a simple side-scrolling slog with an extra gun, these levels incorporate a number of rather crafty looking puzzles where both characters really must work together to survivor. My favourite part is probably where Proto Man is being attacked from a flying enemy, but he must remain on a button until Mega Man jumps to safety. It looks like a suprisingly tense experience that simply isn’t present in any of the main Mega Man iterations. Suprisingly I’m pretty damn excited for this. A 2009 release? We can only hope.