Weekend Download
This edition of Weekend Download serves as a firm reminder that some video games used to be painfully difficult. None of this coddling, tutorialized hand-holding gameplay you find today. Back then you were tossed in a blocky four-color world and had to fend for yourself. Brutally difficult games may be a thorn in the side of modern-day casual gamers, but it will help you appreciate the experience programmers have collectively gained over the decades.
Diner Dash: Hometown Hero (Windows, 21MB, demo) - After returning from her adventures on a cruise ship, Flo finds her hometown is a bit run-down. What better way to spice things up than by serving good food? Diner Dash: Hometown Hero uses the familiar time management formula and tasks you with seating customers, taking orders, serving food, collecting tips and clearing tables as efficiently as you can. The twist comes when the power goes out, quirky customers demand special treatment, or when Flo hires an assistant and competes for tips. Upgrade your restaurant and customize its look as you progress, then upload it to the Diner Dash website for others to play. A brand new multiplayer mode lets you compete against friends to see who the best diner dasher is!
ToJam Thing (Windows/Mac/Linux, ~5MB, free) - An almost trance-like single screen shooter, ToJam Thing is all about inflating and popping floating red bubble things that meander about the screen. When they burst they release collectables that increase your score. They also let loose poppers that will cause other red bubbles to explode, causing chain reactions. The game ends when the song ends, but there's a nice boss fight to cap off the experience.
Untitled Story (Windows, 8.4MB, demo) - An exploration-based platform game with a charmingly childlike hand-drawn visual style. It gets pretty difficult, but the level design is excellent, and there's a lot of different things to do. If you've played Seiklus, it's a bit like that, but with a ton of boss fights. The download is a demo (a rather substantial one), but you can get the full game for as little as one dollar, if you want to support the author. (Thanks Psychotronic!)
I Wanna Be The Guy (Windows, 39MB, free) - Think you're good at video games? Let this one prove you wrong. Forged in the fires of old-school platforming, I Wanna Be The Guy is brutally difficult to the point of being unfair. To make through each stage you'll die no less than two dozen times, each the result of a cheap game mechanic you could never have predicted. Trial-and-error is your weapon, and with time you can whittle away at the levels by experimenting and hoping you don't get squished. Game is in pre-alpha stage, so expect glitches here and there, and we'll slap on a PG13 rating for lewd humor and gory pixelated death scenes.
Banana Nababa (Windows, 2.5MB, free) - Continuing the "you're not good enough to beat this game" theme, Banana Nababa is another old-school flavored platformer with a high level of difficulty. The difference is you only battle bosses, none of that stage stuff in-between, as you climb the tower. Each of the six foes are tougher than the last and you'll have to use a little experimentation to learn each one's attack patterns and find a weakness. If you're into challenge, Banana Nababa is definitely the way to go.
I'm baffled that you guys would post ridiculous hardcore stuff like Banana Nababa, but not An Untitled Story, even after I've submitted it twice. Well, I'll assume you get a lot of submissions and you can't check everything out. I'll just post it here for anybody who's interested. This game brought me a lot of happiness.
An Untitled Story is an exploration-based platform game with a charmingly childlike hand-drawn visual style. It gets pretty difficult, but the level design is excellent, and there's a lot of different things to do. If you've played Seiklus, it's a bit like that, but with a ton of boss fights.
The download is a demo (a rather substantial one), but you can get the full game for as little as one dollar, if you want to support the author. Download page.
I wanna be the guy is not really a game as much as an ultimate masochistic experiment in platform gaming. Think final level of Super Mario Bros 3 on steroids, but a little bit more gory and a whole lot more unfair.
I hate it so much I simply adore it.
Strange..I can beat the level you start on and the screen above it, but both screens after have spikes everywhere and impossible places to reach. Any tips?
Nevermind...
I apologize, Psychotronic. I did see the submission recently, and honestly haven't had a chance to check it out myself.
I've added your blurb to this post, and included a screenshot as well.
Thanks for the suggestion. :)
Mordecai,
I actually enjoyed trying to be The Guy, right until the screen with the giant brain. Up until then the game was excrutiantigly hard, but once you've found the (often quite devious) catch, the levels were passable and the next checkpoint was always near.
The brain room(s) aren't particularly clever - they are your typical a-gazillion-things-flying-at-you-at-once fare, and there is no checkpoint in sight. What's worse, you have to constantly break some doors which take about 20 hits. I still didn't give up, but the game evolved from frustrating-yet-clever to frustrating-and-dull.
That's okay. There's a lot of games out there, and you guys do a lot of work trying to keep track of them all. This just happened to be the perfect week to mention the game again, since the theme is super-hard platformers.
By the way, I didn't mean to say anything bad about Banana Nababa. I really respect the fellow who made that game, and it's a good one. Hard as nails, though.
I'm a little stuck on Untitled Story.
Any advice on the Guy? I can't get past the screen below the first one. Spikes!!!
Nevermind. That's sadistic.
Ok. Freaking apples. ARG!
Wow. Playing Banana Nababa, and it's freaking nuts. I beat the first two, and the third seems nigh impossible.
Basically
Blobs impede your movement, making it hard as dammit to get away from the guy.
Energy balls stop your attacks, which make it hard as dammit to get rid of the blobs on the ground, which makes it nigh impossible to get away from the guy.
Oh, and as far as I can tell, there's no health gain on this boss...
Then, when he reaches his second form...
For i wanna be the guy
Banana Nababa is fun! I beat the first two pretty easily; took down the first boss on my first try, and only had to use two tries on the second boss because I fell in the pit. The third boss, though... ouch.
For the first phase of the third stage, I usually stand next to the beetle and spam attack, and every time he jumps I jump between him and the purple bubble he fires. Takes a little to get use to but if you get it down right you could kill the first phase without taking any hits.
Having a bit of trouble on the third stage though -_-; don't live long enough to figure out the attack pattern.
so close 1 more hp on the first boss second on banana Nababa
Brandon:
You'll know when you reach an area that isn't in the demo. Since the game isn't very linear, I'm not sure what you have or haven't found, but there's at least one important thing you can use the ducking ability for. Big spoiler, though. You might want to try poking around a bit first.
Alice,
for the 1st phase of the beetle just stay on the ground. Let him jump over you, avoid the glittery thingie and spam the axes. It's actually quite easy once you get the hang of it - most of the time he's "dead" before he can even do a one falling block manoeuver.
Hm, I didn't quite get the hang of it. Lost about half my health by staying on the bottom. But, he did die pretty fast... and since I barely got hit on the second phase, and only lost a quarter health on the third... hey, good enough!
Trying the fourth boss, I lost most of my health before I realized what was going on. He requires a bit of patience... after a couple more tries (silly pits >.>) I managed his first phase, and started to get into the second; he'll fall soon enough!
As hard as Banana Nababa is.. it feels very fair. It's challenging without being frustrating. Not too many games manage that.
I'm not even trying the platform games considering that even Mario is challenging for me XD
However I got Diner Dash 4 a couple of weeks ago, but there aren't many differences from its predecessors. The so-called multiplayer mode is a time waster, since you don't even need to do combos or keep customers, just steal as many customers as you can from your opponent. The biggest change is that there are no longer comics to tell the story, instead there's a sort of half-comic, half-cartoon thingy. I liked the comics better.
But the untitled story has a name. If it stops working, it says: "You're an egg..." has stopped working.
Does anyone know what the difficulty setting actually does in I Wanna Be The Guy? In case anyone doesn't know, you can choose the difficulty of a new game by highlighting a save game slot, pressing Shift, highlighting New Game and pressing left or right to cycle through the difficulties, then pressing A to confirm your selection, or Z to cancel.
The difficulties I saw are Medium, Hard (default), Very Hard and Impossible. Though, for some reason, "Easy" flashes up for a brief moment when you first press Shift to access the difficulty menu. Anyone know anything about what these difficulties affect, or the significance of the concealed "Easy" setting?
Actually, I was mistaken. You don't press A to confirm your difficulty selection; you press Shift. Pressing A only loads the save you already have.
I also now notice some differences between difficulties.
So how do I get my full version of Untitled Story after I make a donation? Am I going to receive an e-mail link, or what?
Okay, forget I said anything. Pressing A doesn't load your game; it starts a new one. Pressing Shift to select things is the way to go. Blame this misunderstanding on not yet getting past the first save point!
I'm still curious about this "Easy" mode, though.
Neddo:
You will get an e-mail link. It was within 24 hours for me, but I think the author handles it personally, so the wait is variable.
Great, thanks. The game has really grown on me, but I think I've hit the limits of the demo. I can't wait to explore all the blocked areas!
Phew. Finally finished Banana Nababa.
I must say I've found the 3rd and 4th level the most difficult. 5th was a pushover and the last one is pretty easy, yet arduous - you can avoid all the attacks pretty easily but damn if that thing doesn't require a hundred hits...
All in all, a great game.
For those of you who have trouble, here's a small walkthrough:
There. Happy Nababing!
can some one please tell me how to get the ability to jump on yellows in untitled, or post a walkthrough or something!
fan:
Short answer, you get it at the end of FireCage. If you haven't found that zone yet, you're not expected to be able to use the yellows; you'll have to come back to them later. Make a note of where they are.
Re: I want to be the guy
fan:
By the way, for anyone else playing An Untitled Story, you DO NOT have to work to gather money in this game. There is a shop, but none of the expensive stuff is necessary to progress in the game until much, much later, and by that time you'll have plenty of money anyway. Unless you gamble it away. So don't gamble it away. ;-)
In i wanna be the guy if you play on medium it adds a bow tie to your hair, but more importantly adds a save point in most rooms.
Ah, finished Banana Nababa. You're right about the difficulty, Baba; it's all downhill after the fourth boss.
I didn't think the last boss was so arduous, considering
I wonder how score is determined...
A question regarding technique required to defeat one of the bosses in the superb Untitled Demo.
Thanks!
An Untitled Story is interesting and has fun aspects, but sometimes it's so extremely annoying... the balloon/ceiling part for example. Often, it's hard to tell if an area is doable with the abilities that you have, or if you need a new ability to tackle it. That's my main concern with this otherwise great game.
I'm going to buy the full version though, because it is a great game after all. ;)
Daedalus:
What do I do after
^ By that I mean for I Want To Be The Guy ^
Stuck on An Untitled Story, again...
A bit more guidance with regards to Untitled Story...
Where do I go after getting
Thanks!
Brandon:
Brandon & Psychotronic:
Pieter, Brandon:
Ah, my bad, I mixed up the names. :)
daedalus:
Get past
Nevermind about the last thing, but...
ok..so i tried "I wanna be the guy" After numerous tries, I just gave up. Jumping games just never seem like any fun to me. Would be fare more exciting to see a "challenging" game that didn't revolve around you fast button pushing abilities or something that has to deal with doing with a timer.
I would love to see a post follow-up of impossable puzzle games if you got em'
Daedalus: Refer to my hint for Brandon halfway back to the beginning of this thread. You may find your situation... transformed. ;)
I'm having some trouble on "Untitled Story" I'm in Farfall, up to the
Cory:
Cory, I think the problem in the demo version is you miss one crucial jump upgrade which would allow you to easily jump on the big blue bosses head.
However, he is still beatable. Just
As a sidenote, how can one get a full version if he is unfortunate enough to live in a Paypal-unfriendly country?
Does http://i213.photobucket.com/albums/cc276/mtheminja/Untitledstory.jpg
this much progress mean I am done the demo? I don't want to put it down until I've done all I can in it!
Erm, the link appears to have failed. I have:
23% progress
12/23 abilities:
1/10 (not counting the purchasable one) gold tokens
13/90 hearts (I also haven't bought some of them)
7/17 bosses
Does anybody know if the demo goes further than that?
Is there anything to do after the
Tayrin:
An earlier version of "I Wanna Be The Guy" had an easy mode. Selecting it just made your character explode instantly, as punishment for trying to take the game's difficulty down so much. :)
In "I want to be The Guy" how do i get past this room,
@mtheminja: I've reached 29% in the demo, which includes all items that you can buy from the merchant.
@Daedalus42: How high is your completion percentage?
Gahhh! i feel like such a loser! i can't even beat the second form of the first boss on banana nababa! is there some kind of trick to it or do i just suck?
digitalrushdude,
the trick is to approach methodically - this works for every form of every boss. For instance, instead of fighting the boss try staying alive as long as you can - learn different attacks and their order and try to think of ways to avoid them without taking ANY damage. Once you learn to evade incorporate attacks in your evasive strategy, it will have to work. Also, you can always google "banana nababa" on Youtube to see how the frea.. I mean the pros do it.
Alternatively, play a game that's a little bit less hardcore :).
Question for those who have the full version of Untitled Story:
How long do you have to wait to get it after donating, and how do you get it? A link in e-mail or what? On the page it says you'll get a game in e-mail but I really don't see such a large file going past my provider's spam filter...
@baba44713: my order was processed within a few hours, though I've heard it can take up to a day or such since he's processing it all by hand. Don't worry about the e-mail, you'll receive a link.
I'm currently stuck at 93% completion. I still need to find 8 hearts and 1 ability (no. 22). Anyone knows where that ability is located?
I got the full version, yay.
I'd like to cast a vote for the Untitled Story getting a separate review - it's simply too good to remain bundled up and get lost in the rubble. OK, it's not a free game, but for 1$ it's a terrific deal. And the free demo is quite longish, longer then plenty of other games reviewed here.
The only drawback of the game I can think of is it gets quite difficult after a while, and because of its sheer open-endness sometimes it's hard to figure out whether a certain part is difficult because you still lack abilities to traverse it or because you just plain suck. But this iss really a minor quibble, if one at all.
Pieter,
the 22nd ability is
I on the other hand am still missing 7 flowers and 15 hearts. I have deciphered only one clue from the crystal ball, the four that remain still stupefy me. Also, how the hell can you get that first heart at the bottom of the Rainbow Dive? My best score is 550 but it requires 615, sheesh...
I extremely enjoyed Banana Nababa. I liked how the graphics and music all felt truly 8-bit. Each of the boss's patterns were regular and once you figured them out it was all about not being an idiot. I'm on the final boss, and no matter how many times I die I know that it was because I did something dumb, and the game didn't do something unfair. If I were to make a suggestion, it would be to switch Gate Keeper and Giga Slith. SImply because I beat Gate keeper on my first try, but it took me 2 days to beat Giga Slith. Also, it has a great character name (Hairy Flowerpower). If it wasn't for the fact that the game is so short, I would ask for it to have a full review.
Hey I have a question. When ever I fight the dark grotto's boss (full version (the guy who breathes giant freballs)) on regular I defeat him his body flies away but another body appears and fights in the same way. Does that happed to anyone else.
for everyone who is stuck on the apple squash you part in the guy game,
ok, people playing i wanna be the guy...
for anyone who wanted a fairly impossible puzzle game, mr matt for windows 95 (it works on xp) is kinda fun! i don't know if you can get it somewhere these days, and don't expect anything too advanced graphics-wise but it's v.hard!
it's just occured to me for the iwbtg thingy
Elyma,
To all AnUntitledDemo players,
i have 33% with demo. I have:
13/23 Power-ups
2/10 Gold Orbs
25/90 Hearts
and 7/17 bosses defeated.
Make sure you buy a house and buy everything for it. Then get a high score on the game you buy. Those are missable.
An addition to my last post, ill tell you guys something i found out.
^ (Do at you own risk)
Or better yet, don't do this at all, because there's absolutely nothing to gain but quite a lot to lose.
wait, are you serious? i was just looking for a good game to download and waste my weekend with, so i was looking at the Weekend Download archives, and stumbled upon IWBTG! This game is so awesome! And horribly hard! but! it has been updated since way back half a year ago. with less glitchy-ness.
ahhh, i remember all of my great afternoons spent trying to get farther than my friend at this game... i managed to beat all the bosses up to the dragon, at the entrance to the mansion/castle thing. man that stuff all took me forever...
i think it deserves its own review! i mean, come on, i've spent like forever playing it! it's awesome! i couldn't stop EVEN THOUGH i died repeatedly... again and again and again and again and again and... yeah... you get the idea... just so addicting...
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