Mushroomer by Jotapeh
Seeing the phrase “Just like a real video game!” immediately made me smile, but sadly the rest of the game couldn’t quite pull off enough to keep that smile on my face. A run and jump platformer made vaguely interesting with slidey controls and ninja rope goodness. Escape the cave before you lose all your lives or a ten minute timer expires. Competently done (nice backdrop!) and points for the rope, but a tad plain. 63%

Mushroom Stew by iarwain
Wahey, more mushrooms! You can never have enough mushrooms, folks. In this case you have to blast through a story of confusion and deception to find out why your mushroom buddies are suddenly trying to kill you. Use your crouching and time-bending skills to reach the end. Technically very good with several tricks used to enliven the graphics – sharp gameplay too, if a tad repetitive. Even has a level editor! 77%

Oh Crackers, Not Again! by The Greenest Banana
In a spicy, tangy twist to normality, here you have to protect a helpless little girl as she tries to get back home following a path which is infested with monsters. You take the part of her faithful and happily indestructible hound who can jump on enemies’ heads to stop them from being such a nuisance. A charming Flash effort but quite challenging even on the easiest difficulty. Needs more levels but still a great effort. 78%

One Pack by MrRoboman
Being a toned ace space pilot is all very well but it’s oh-so-easy to pile on the pounds in your retirement. Such is the problem Ace Fatman now faces in his quest for… okay, I have no idea what his quest is, since this game is one for the “unfinished” pile. But it’s enough to raise a guffaw at the creative use of assets. Multi-purpose flab, anyone? Throw a can or three of polish at this and it could have an entertaining future! 52%

Take a wander through some of yesteryear’s best games at www.hotud.org. And don’t forget to tell your friends!

Meantime, as some parting shots for the week, here’s the last of my mentions…

• chickhack [link, pictured left] – gets a mention for being a C64 game, of all things! Play it emulated on something like WinVice.
• Nyctos [link, pictured middle] – are you afraid of the dark? Lots of ‘orrible nasties are lurking where you can’t see them, that’s for sure!
• Expedition [link] – an ambitious exploration / settlement-building roguelike done in Java. See a video of it in action here.
• Cypress Tree Manor [link] – looks very good, but only available in Python source code for now. If you fancy some zombie escape survival, take a gander at it.
• The Favored [link, pictured right] – likened to Robotfindskitten [link] in reverse (whatever that means), this is actually one of the better entries and worth checking out if you don’t mind being cruel to helpless bunnies.

Hope you enjoyed this little bit of coverage of the roguelike world! Coming tomorrow: probably nothing at all. Oh, maybe a Dalyn’s Quill update, but then again, maybe not…

• Jacob’s Matrix [link, pictured left] – possibly the best 7DRL entrant yet and my pick o’ the day. Can you find your way out of an Escher-like series of twisty passages before the music stops playing? Comes complete with deviously fast gameplay and even an ASCII portal gun!
• Epic! Monster Quest: Hyper [link, pictured middle] – another contender in the realtime category. Hunt monsters, recruit mercenaries and generally become amazing. Like most realtime roguelikes, it’s very tricky and quite unforgiving.
• DDRogue [link, pictured right] – relatively plain-looking, but interesting use of story points and enhanced combat techniques make this one worth checking out.

That’s most of the “easy to try” entries covered – there are quite a few others that are available only as source code which makes them more difficult to cover. I’ll talk a bit more about those tomorrow, hopefully – but meanwhile, the full entry list on Rogue Temple is still there for your perusal. Happy adventuring!

• Fruits of the Forest [link, pictured left] – help feed your fellow villagers by foraging for food, but look out for bandits…
• TetRLs [link, pictured middle] – this is what happens when you mix Tetris and Rogue. And lots of rats
• Excitable Digger [link, pictured right] – dig your way to a huge fortune, selling what you find to extend your life. My pick of the day!

There’s still loads of entries to look through… stay tuned for part 3 tomorrow, or of course check out the full list over on Rogue Temple!

Yep, the annual 7DRL week has been and gone without a lot of hype, yet it’s been the most successful yet with a total of 45 entrants – 25 of which are actually complete enough to “win”. It’s possible that some of these will go on to be developed further and might even end up amongst the famous names of ADOM, Angband and Nethack.

I’ve played but a scarce few of what’s on offer. Here’s a brief selection:

• Persist [link, pictured left] – how long can you stay alive? Watch out for the falling trees, unhealthy water and various other threats.
• Underbooks [link, pictured middle] – a realtime book-hunting adventure. Pretty, but needs a lot of luck to get started with.
• DungeonMinder [link, pictured right] – play a guardian spirit and help the hapless adventurer gain victory. My personal favourite so far – nicely polished and playable!

More to come tomorrow, but if you’re impatient, check out the full list of entries over on the Rogue Temple forums.

Many years ago I played an Amiga game similar to Atoms [link], a title that was itself based off a C64 game called Overload. The aim is to place atoms on the game grid and eventually make them kersplode into adjacent grids, capturing enemy atoms. If you do this enough and wipe out all opposition, you win. Simple, but addictive – and quite strategic, too. I’m a bit surprised that the concept hasn’t been picked up for a modern platform, and so I did a little happy dance when I unearthed this gem of a WIP.

This style of gameplay has a lot of potential, especially considering the “retro” versions are fairly plain. I’ll be keeping a close eye on this!

• Mystic Mine [link, pictured left] by Koonsolo is a frantic and really rather jolly shareware collect ‘em up where up to six players can fight over a single keyboard.
• Crazy Japanese idea ahoy! The name says it all, really: Pac-Man Physics [link], by imwill. Utterly nutterly, I tell thee…
• One to look forward to: it was announced that Jonathan Blow’s Braid [link] will be available through Steam for a paltry £9.99 from March the 31st.
• Get those brain cells moving with City Rain [link, pictured middle], another shareware title. Think SimCity mixed with Wetrix and you’ll be on the right track.
• To test your keyboard-wielding powers and have some fun at the same time, try Typomagia! [link], a smartly-done freeware type ‘em up from Sol Games.
• Rock Boshers [link, pictured right] by Dugan is an awesome Spectrum-like steampunk demake of Red Faction. Comes complete with scones and zombies!

The mix goes like this: basically, the gameplay is identical to Gauntlet; run around a selection of levels collecting keys and dodging monsters as you make your way to the exit. Collect treasure to boost your score, food to increase your energy and see if you can get in the hall of fame at the end of it all. Here, replacing the Wizard, Elf, Warrior and Valkyrie are… Bombermen. Don’t ask why, but somehow it just works – dashing around dropping bombs to kill the generators off seems perfectly natural after a minute or so.

Everything in the game was created from scratch and is authentic to certain 8-bit limitations, such as using a Sega Megadrive colour palette and a sound system similar to the SID chip from the Commodore 64. It’s undeniably retro, and what’s more, you can play it online in your browser without having to download a single thing! Well, as long as you have Java installed on your computer, I guess. If you don’t – you’re missing out on all the fun!

Interestingly there’s also a 4-way online multiplayer facility included, but for whatever reason it didn’t work when I tried it just now. Shame, really; I can imagine that’d be quite fun. Still, the single player is more than enough to keep you amused for a long time. Another strong contender for some RRC prizes!

Links: Markus Persson’s homepage :: Blast Passage homepage
Download: from its homepage :: from the Retro Remakes competition listing

EDIT: No, I don’t know why I categorised this as Commercial, either. I blame the evil Wordpress gnome.

FatSeagal has become quite well known for his miniaturised remakes and he’s executed the idea well. As you may be able to tell from the screenshots [below], the layout of the secret base you must infiltrate has stayed pretty much the same except that everything is in small-o-vision and, subsequently, you have a much wider view of your surroundings. The graphics are small but perfectly formed, and the sound effects are unremarkable.

A selection of difficulty levels allows everyone to jump in and the improved guard AI will probably give even seasoned veterans a run for their money. However, their intelligence isn’t flawless: at one point I ended up with about four or five guards trying to take down my ninja (who was minding his own business on some stairs at the time), and for all their kicking, punching and grunting, they didn’t make a single scratch on my black-suited hero – they seemed to be just outside melee attack range. Perhaps this particular ninja saboteur has enemy-deflecting forcefields?

Unfortunately I can’t say that I found Mini-Saboteur to be much fun, but I think that’s purely because of my apathy of the original game. There’s too much running about and getting lost and wondering where the hell you’re supposed to go for my taste. If you’re a fan of the original, give this a whirl; you’ll probably enjoy it. Otherwise… well, “meh” just about says it for me, I think

Links: No homepage available
Download: from the Retro Remakes competition listing