It's the first weekend of August! That should be something special, but it probably isn't. One thing can help make it interesting, though: a game designed by Knytt creator Nifflas! And a fan-made Mario game! And a real-life postal service delivery simulator!!!
Shrug Song (Windows, free) - Created to showcase the larger game Shrug Worlds currently in development by Alina Constantin, Shrug Song is one of those games we really don't want to spoil by telling you all of the details. It plays somewhat like a point-and-click adventure game fused with a slight musical element. Move around the environment with a few clicks, enter your happy zen mode, then work with the runes floating above your head to change the environment. That's all we'll say. It's definitely a treat, especially with such beautiful artwork. (Note: Click the island marked "download mini game" to get Shrug Song.)
Sorry Mario Bros. (Windows/Mac, free) - Taking a break from the larger project titled The Wild Eternal, Scott and Casey Goodrow whipped up a little reverse Mario Bros. to keep us all entertained. Playing as Princess Toadstool, it's your job to free yourself and essentially play through portions of the original Super Mario Bros. game backwards. The basic mechanics are the same, only now you can float! And Mario's already done a lot of the fun stuff! A nice little diversion that manages to pay homage to the original series without copy/pasting original assets all over the place.
Sealed & Secure (Windows, free) - Ever wondered how tempting it is for postal service workers to be all sneaky and read the mail? Sealed & Secure from RhysD promises just that, allowing you to live through ten days in the life of a postman as you do exciting things such as deliver the mail, cook breakfast, and steam letters open to read their contents before carefully re-sealing them with your globby tongue. Or not, that last part's entirely up to you. Or is it?
"Sorry Mario Bros." was pretty cute. I liked all the reinterpretations of the characters, and the departure from the Nintendo-perfected face for the Princess.
Showing Mario's influence on the earlier level segments was a brilliant touch. The implication that he's taken the shortcut over the level and that caused him to miss the princess is executed briefly and cleverly without a word.
The game felt a little unbalanced in terms of exploration - the first two "Worlds" featured very small secret areas to explore for pink coins. By contrast, 1-1 had an absolutely huge secret area that contained the lion's share of the secret coins. The secret area in 1-1 was also really non-linear, and that made exploring the whole thing feel a bit like a chore. Splitting up the secrets to be a little more distinct and branching off the "Main" path back to the castle would have been a big improvement.
There are a couple bits that are annoying, like a penchant for making goombas fall on top of the player in the secret area, and places where you can put a bouncing shell between two blocks where it will make annoying sounds forever. The use of "Shift" to run is historically accurate, but kind of annoying since there's no time in this game where you don't actually want to be running.
This was cute and fun. I'd enjoy more games like this where you replay classic NES titles with slightly different roles and discover new places within familiar levels.
I like how Sorry Mario has all sprites remade instead of reusing the assets, it looks nice.
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