Frustration

[filkertom]

You will either find this beyond hilarious or merely WTF. The whole thing's just under twenty-four minutes, but you'll get the idea very quickly.

The video is just Super Mario Bros. The audio is SO NOT SAFE FOR WORK.

Comments

[kengr]

And now you know why I don't play that sort of game.

[per_solo]

I found it hilarious, after a bit...I don't remember the level, but man, I'm having bad flashbacks.

[vixyish.livejournal.com]

Oh. Heh. From the description I was expecting the audio to be "Closer to Mario".

[jenrose]

They were watching???????

[wormquartet.livejournal.com]

I saw this a while back WITHOUT the commentary track, so apparently somebody just recorded their voice over the original YouTube whatnot.

-=ShoEboX=-

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Indeed, that's what the poster says.

[louisadkins.livejournal.com]

That's not level 1-1 on the American release of the game. I would assume (Captain Obvious, here, I know) from the font usage that it is/was the Japanese release.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

It's not in either release -- it's a level hack. And a very well-designed one, considering that (at least up until the point where I stopped watching, having gotten the joke) it LOOKS impossible but an expert player can do it.

[hitchkitty.livejournal.com]

Okay, I got the joke, but nonetheless it's Soapbox Time:

By "expert", I can only assume you mean "possessed of a very, very good memory". That looks like a great design for a bonus stage, where you just try to accumulate extra points and your overall progress through the game doesn't depend on surviving that vicious little deathtrap.

It reminds me of the FoxTrot (http://www.foxtrot.com) sequence where Jason talks Paige into playing Generic Dungeon Crawl RPG, spends a week designing a dungeon for her, then has her plummet to Certain Death when she sets foot on the porch.

It's one thing to punish players for making mistakes. It's another when the "mistake" was playing at all. And last time I checked, the game was called Super Mario Bros, not WarGames (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086567/quotes).

Okay, sermonizing over.

[cktraveler.livejournal.com]

Some of the Lost Levels had similar nasty tricks, like the "blind huge running jump with a single-block platform target" -- and as can be seen, the player here also got some of these puzzles right on the first try. I would also say that the later levels of The Legend of Zelda's second quest were worse than this ... more forgiving in their choice of punishments but no less arbitrary and trial-and-error.

There is some unfairness, largely in the placement of the invisible blocks, but given that this is a level hack my expectations would be for a very hard level requiring multiple replays and, yes, probably some memorization.

I can also see your point for another reason ... the ZeldaClassic game Isle of the Winds was fantastic and kept me absolutely riveted until the final dungeon, which was crawling with Windrobes and Wall Masters and similar go-back-to-start monsters, not to mention large populations of extremely difficult monsters. After a long, intricate, beautifully constructed skill-based quest, the final dungeon was just utterly dreary and I never bothered finishing the game as a result.

Guess it's more that this specific example doesn't bother me too much because I've seen just as bad in published games. The fact that the level was obviously very well-tested and the creativity shown by some of the tricks make me admire the designer for that much.

[melaniedavidson.livejournal.com]

I'd agree with you if it were part of the game as it was released, but these things are more for experienced players looking for a new challenge.

And unavoidable-until-you-know-about-them deathtraps in ridiculous numbers can be fun, if you approach it in the right mindset (which I tend to think is, "Let's see if I can find all the deathtraps! :D" because then it's more about exploring and finding everything, and less about just getting to the end of the level). *cough*Sierra*cough*

[hitchkitty.livejournal.com]

Gah. Should have read "not Global Thermonuclear War". Ah, well. The point, I'm sure, is got.

[baphnedia.livejournal.com]

That is so, so very awesome.

[mg4h.livejournal.com]

*dies*

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt!