StanJr

I thought the game was coming to AA anyway, so I was looking for it to show up in the store soon. Glad that is now going to happen! Please allow for a non-boxed version as I am poor.

Some follow-up notes: When you have the Eagle Eye power you can spam the ground by holding down the button while you move. You don't have to wait for the MM to find the spot, the creature just pops out, before the tune can even play. This means any level where you have the EE power is super easy. You cannot spam the ground without the EE power. Also, spamming the tree is super easy when you position the tree in the center of the screen. I can reset all HP and time of day, and acquire the shield this way, no sweat. I am getting the right side of the first tree on the left side of the screen when the game starts. If I move left the tree "artifact" disappears and is replaced by the frozen lake. I also get tree "artifacts" appearing on screen when a tree scrolls off to the right. I figure this is a clean-up detail you already know, but in the interest of being complete... When going left, the yellow dog is almost impossible to catch when it runs away to the right (see picture). During the Flood Finch battle, the GW occasionally will get stuck in mid air when hit by the BF or the Vortex. Moving left or right corrects this, but if you do not move he hangs in the air. I had another oddball game wherein upon starting the second level I tried spamming the ground immediately and the tree turned into a ghost, which I captured. Once caught the tree returned. It may have just been a product of the ghost taking the place of the tree when being drawn, but I'm honestly not sure why the ghost appeared at all. Since the level just began, I obviously did not have EE. I have not been able to replicate this. Managed to get to the 5th level without spamming the tree!

Played a couple of hours today. Here are some notes from the snowfield: The blue bunipy can be very tricky to get in the hole. Is there a strategy I am not doing correctly? Occasionally he hops right in, but often he hops to the hole, but does not fall in. If this is just an aspect of the gameplay no worries, but if it's not executing correctly, I thought you'd want to know. Vortices during the Blood Finch battle are definitely increasing the difficulty of those battles. This isn't a bad thing, but maybe they should start after level 3 or so to ramp the difficulty a little better? I certainly got better after multiple games, but the first few were instant death unless I had full health. Does the number of creatures to be saved increase by 1 per level? It seems like that's what's happening, but I'm not sure. Could that be more randomized? Say level 1 you must save 3-5, level 2 4-6, and so on? Would add some variety. Not crucial, just a thought. Do additional packages re-up your shield's duration if you acquire them while in possession of the shield? The time reset twig is a great addition to the game! And it helps balance not getting the Eagle Eye as much. Trees are currently giving unlimited power-ups. You can dig the same tree forever and get as many power-ups as you want. This makes the game too easy. Going left creatures spawn in the center of the screen not from the hole you dig. (see picture) Going right they seem to spawn from the area near the hold, but not going left. I had something really odd happen in one game. Any time I picked up a present, the shield power and icon would disappear the minute I passed the tree I dug it up from. If I was traveling right and the present appeared on the left of the tree, I could pick it up and use the shield as long as I didn't pass the tree. But if I passed the tree, the shield and its icon would vanish. If I was traveling left, I could pick up the present from either side of the tree and continue going left, the shield and icon would remain. If I was traveling right and the present appeared on the right of the tree, the shield icon would appear very briefly and then vanish. This happened the entire game, but only this specific play through. Very odd. Shield does not work during the Blood Finch boss fight. This makes me sad. The star will occasionally still appear as a rainbow colored dash sometimes (see picture). I cannot determine what causes this. Occasionally the Moum Moum will land and get stuck behind the Gizzle Wap on the ground. The GW completely obscures the MM so it looks like he's alone. (see picture) I've had this happen when the MM is eating or when struck by vortices. After much consideration, I think I like the score best. Without spamming the trees I have not yet been past level 4, so just getting 4 icons at the bottom of the screen for my efforts isn't overly rewarding. If you can work out a way to keep the code as well and make it a special pay off for beating the game, all the better, but I think I prefer score. Hope this helps!

Oh I don't know. I like scores, but let's see how this plays with the code. The initial problem with a code instead of a score is that there is really only one goal: beat the game. So if you aren't very good at the game, you won't have much to show for playing it and not beating it. You can't say, "I only made it to level 4, but I saved a lot of animals and got 26,344 points." But that's all just theory at this point.

no score, eh?

I like the current size of the world. I don't think scrapping half for the sake of better graphics best serves the quality of the game play.

I would say Hacks get their own database. I'd like to keep it as clean as possible. I'd also prefer either only listing games that got a physical cart release or at the very least a way to indicate games that were physically released. I'm very old, so to me a game isn't complete until there is a physical copy I can buy. I realize that these days young whipper snappers are all about the DLC and Harmony Carts and emulation and whatnot, but dang it, this is classic gaming!

Basic Instructions (for those just joining in) You control the combo of the Gizzle Wap (teardrop shaped guy) and Moum Moum (cute little bird). You must travel the forest digging up creatures buried by the blizzard. The Moum Moum tweets when it spots a creature and the Gizzle Wap digs them up. The Moum Moum cannot detect creatures at the top of the screen or while on the Gizzle Wap's head. You dig in the spot where the MM tweets. Find enough creatures and a map will appear. Pick it up and follow the arrow until it turns into an X. A star will fall from the sky and land on the X. Dig there and the boss enemy (Blood Finch) will appear. When he dives to attack, dig a hole for him to fall into. Repeat until he is defeated. At higher levels you must also watch out for a winter vortex that flies through the sky, it will drain HP. Things to know: Some creatures will pop up and sit or run about. To save them you must touch them, then the MM will carry them to safety. Some creatures will run about crazy like and sometimes ding you for HP. You must dig a hole for them to fall into, then touch them so the MM can carry them off. Some creatures do not want to be dug up and will attack. Dig a hole for them to fall into and they will go back to sleep and leave you alone. If you dig up a ghost, dig a hole for him to fall into and he will give you the power to detect creatures from the highest point in the sky. You can dig under trees to find HP refills for both the Gizzle Wap and the Moum Moum. You can also find a shield that can "stun" the winter vortices causing them to move straight across the screen. It has limited use. Time passes as you search. If you take too long the night will get too cold and you will freeze. If you take too much damage from creatures or winter vortices you will die. If one member of the duo dies, the game is over, so keep both characters HP up. That should get everyone up and going on gameplay so far. There are other nuances and details, but these are the basics to get you playing and you should play because this is a really good game.

A couple more notes from the field: I had one game where I defeated the Blood Finch (great boss villain) facing right and did not turn around when he turned into the campfire. Extremely minor, but maybe you want to know that. Also, I had a game where I was heading back to find the star drop point when I dug up a ghost. It got stuck on the left side of the screen and I could not reach him to dig a hole nor could I advance the screen. No action could get the ghost unstuck or advance the screen. This was a game killer.

I got a game with the new update wherein the X appeared right where I was standing when I got the map. The star would not fall until I left the area and the arrow appeared. Upon returning to the X area, the star fell. Not sure if this is problematic, but thought it worth reporting. Definitely noticing a difference in the day/night change in terms of difficulty.

Can you believe Codebreaker is the only game from my original collection I have not recovered. What an odd one.

I think the larger themes of avarice and oppression are expressed in the reductions you list. I think those are important because, as you point out the Empire did blow up Alderaan, but the Rebels were already fighting them at that point and we don't know much of why. It just fleshes out the conflict a little more and makes it less one-dimensional. I guess you don't need it, but I don't think it's out of place. We are definitely seeing different Poes. I think he's a great character. He's the up close action rebel pilot we all imagined Wedge Antilles to be, so he scratches that itch. He's also got that brash hotshot pilot thing that made Han so appealing. Honestly, he feels like this franchise's stab at a rogue type and I think it works. (I admit some bias because I'm also reading the Poe Dameron comic book and it's really good). I'll also argue that we have only lived with Poe for 3 years, but we've lived with Han for 40, so time may prove Poe to be better than you think at first blush. I really think if they had tightened that sequence up a bit, it's purpose would be more evident.

yeah, we used to do the "no cross" challenge after we got good enough to get perfect scores on regular runs. Theoretically, if you can do a perfect run you don't need the crosses anyway...

I disagree that the Finn/Rose side story was unnecessary. I do think the llama race through the forest was too much. I think you could trim the whole trip down by about half and still get what you need from it. I feel that storyline was there to help strike at the core of why we have to fight the First Order/Empire and really get what the Resistance is about. One of the contemporary gripes about the OT is that we never see why the Empire is so bad, we are just told it's bad. I think this scene helps remedy that a little bit. It also sets up one of the most poignant moments at the end of the film. I'm ok with both of those things. I think a lot of people are upset that their plan didn't work. But I'm ok with that too because sometimes plans don't work and thus far Star Wars has lived on the back of harebrained schemes by rogue agents that need everything to happen perfectly to save the galaxy, and do. If it happened again here, what's new? What's interesting? But what happens if the crazy plan fails and everything goes totally tits-up? Finally we get to see that and our characters get to deal with it. It also is a character moment for Poe Dameron. It's his idea to send them on this plan. Many times in this film Poe is so sure he is right and I think it's important that sometimes he's not. People are wringing their hands because Rey "has no faults" (which isn't true), so here we have a moment where Poe puts everything at risk on the back of an unlikely plan that blows up (literally) in his face (not literally), and now he has to look his mentor in the face and accept a whole humble pie. That, my friends, is how you build a character. We don't love Han Solo because he's always right, we love him because he's usually wrong and Leia has to save his hash. It's how he recovers from that, that makes us love him. "you do have your moments, not many of them, but you do have them." So I don't think we can throw away the Monte Carlo trip entirely. While it doesn't pan out as a plan it pays off in bigger ways for the film and its characters.

More notes (sorry, it looks like I'm going to be playing this all day today...) I've noticed some star oddities: Sometimes the star appears in the sky before I get the map. Is that intentional? Sometimes after getting the map the star appears as 3 stars and sometimes it appears as a long dash instead of a dot. This will persist intermittently until I reach the impact point and sometimes 3 stars or the dash will fall in place of the proper dot star (see pictures) Also, I am still finding creatures buried after I get the map and are seeking the star impact point. Is that intentional and is it just for points or are they necessary to save? Made it to level 5, but man, those vortices get really tough. After playing more and more, I think the Eagle Eye should come from the ghost OR the broccoli, but not both. Makes it too easy to get. Also, if I find a ghost after I already have the EE power, does saving it count as saving a creature toward solving the level? Should the EE power have a usage limit like the shield? If that were the case then maybe keeping two ways to regain it may not be a bad idea. Finally, would it be ok if I made a short little "quick start guide" for this game to help people who are just getting into the game? I know a bestiary and a short summary of game play would have helped me. Thanks

Ok. I must have missed the note about the Eagle Eyes or just failed to understand what it did. Now that I understand that better, I take back the note about Moum Moum flying up. it works just fine as is and I don't think you need to up the frequency of the power-up appearance either. This is also helped by 4. in the latest update. I was getting constant vortices in an early build and that combined with trying to keep the MM in the middle of the sky was frustrating. Now with no vortices in the first level and then occasional ones in the later levels, scaling, there is plenty of time to get your MM technique worked out before you have to contend with enemies. Likewise with the vortices in the later levels, you don't notice the stop and go aspect of keeping the MM up because you are already stopping to dodge the vortices. This creates a much better balance. I managed to get to Level 4 this time around. I need to get the hang of using the shield. Having so much fun!

You people make me SICK. Just SICK. How dare you? How dare you make this game so freaking incredibly awesome it defies belief. I have to question all reality now. Thanks. Absolutely incredible. Doesn't even seem real. Wow.

Ok. I love this game. I really really love this game. It's got tons of polish and attention to detail and is a lot of fun to play. The amount of growth since Strange Red Tree is impressive. I can't wait to own this on a cart. Wow. One question, and please don't hate me, but is it critical to the game play that the bird cannot detect the buried creatures when it is at the top of the screen? My game is a whole lot of go-stop-go-stop as I wait for him to sink back down to near the GW's head. Does that lend significant difficulty or challenge to the game play that would not be there if he could detect creatures the whole time?

And "Mr. Activision." High scores or not, he's a tool.

It's a little picky and you can't fall to a lower platform, but I still really enjoy this game. The bouncing dot makes the higher levels brutal.

Yeah, gotta be limited to those that make it to physical form in one way or another. I think games like Defend Your Castle and Ature qualify, but not sure exactly what the criteria could be. Would love to have such a resource.

Yeah, I was trying to track homebrews in development, but I didn't realize how many people put out quick games to test a concept or just because they can as opposed to completely developing a game for physical release. Turns out I didn't have the hutzpah to keep chasing down every time someone announced a new game about running up and down avoiding footballs or whatever. It would be nice to have a searchable index to keep track of such things.

Were you asking if a quidditch game for the Atari 2600 was passé?