It'sa me, Kaizo Mario!

[lincolnic]

I did get the Any% clear, I chose every level except the cape one. If you give me the option to skip a cape level, I'm gonna take it.

 

[MCBanjoMike]

You know what I meant 😐

where did all the TT custom smilies go, anyway

 

[lincolnic]

Listen, a hack may force me to do cape stuff, but that doesn't mean I'm ever gonna like doing cape stuff.

Speaking of not liking stuff, I'm giving up on Bunbun 3. After 18-19 exits, I'm just not having fun. Lush_50 has a new 20 exit hack out that I may check out next instead.

 

[lincolnic]

I did play Lush's new hack The Long Way Home this week, found it a bit of a mixed bag though. It's mostly single-section levels, and the tricks seem to vacillate between free and extremely technical. I'm pretty sure the second level has a required two-frame jump, and there are multiple spring drops required as well. Plus the usual amount of key nonsense. Not every level has stuff like that, but it was enough to be notable for me. I definitely had fun in some levels, but I also felt kinda frustrated a lot of the time. It might just be me, honestly. I also played another recent-ish Lush hack for the Kaizo Klub this week, Quest for Milk, and didn't love it either. Maybe anything I played right after Entropy was bound to feel a little disappointing since I enjoyed that one so much.

But hey, Saela and LightAligns' new hack Agnosthesia is in the waiting section now! Their trailer said it was coming in the fall, so this is a nice surprise. Looking forward to seeing what sweet levels they've come up with in between all the cursed ASM.

 

[MCBanjoMike]

Oh snap, between the two Halo Sides and Memento Mori, these two creators are currently among my very favorites in the community. I need to get back in kaizo shape, this might be a good way to do it. On a related note, what’s the best east hack you’ve played lately?

 

[lincolnic]

Super Insecure World by far. Fragaria was also good, but the extra boost of creativity in SIW puts it over the top for me.

Entropy is also a must (and maybe my hack of the year so far?), though there's a 1.02 update coming soon that smooths out a couple of the more confusing setups. It might be worth waiting for that if you don't feel like you're in great kaizo shape yet.

 

[lincolnic]

I pulled Agnosthesia out of the waiting section and I'm glad I did, this one's a hit. Lots of big brain setups and level design. Even the expected cursed ASM stuff has been pretty mild so far. I'm 17 exits in (out of 20) and had to stop myself from finishing the whole thing today. I'm not sorry I played Entropy all in one day, but I do wish I'd spread it out a bit so I could enjoy my first playthrough for longer. Trying to learn a lesson!

Anyway, just like Entropy felt like a step up for drkrdnk, Agnosthesia feels similarly for Saela and LightAligns. They've just really locked into their groove as creators now. Everything is so smart and fresh I keep wanting to go on to the next level just to see what they're gonna do. I'm really looking forward to finishing this one up tomorrow. It seems like there's some kind of puzzle involved in getting 100%, hopefully it'll be something a doofus like me can handle.

 

[lincolnic]

Finished Agnosthesia today, this hack was really great. I'm glad I spread it out over a couple of days! This is by far the best hack Saela and Light have made together. Everything flows so well and even when there's a chocolate gimmick, the setups are still very readable. Even the final gimmick, which is something I'd never seen before, was really clever and well done. I only have one complaint, but I'm gonna put it behind spoiler text because it's a gigantic spoiler: I wish the puzzle had been slightly easier to find. I've seen both Katun and shovda playing the hack (shovda was moderating) and they both missed it completely. I only found it by accident myself. I feel like most people aren't going to see it, and that's a shame, because the reward is extremely cool. At least it's completely optional and doesn't keep you from a 100% clear. Also: according to LightAligns, I'm the first person to successfully find all the hidden stuff, so that's kinda neat. (I was asking them and Saela some questions about it on Discord.)

Anyway, consider this another extremely enthusiastic recommendation from me. Between Entropy last weekend and this one now, August has been an amazing month for kaizo hacks already.

 

[lincolnic]

I recently played the new vanilla hack Super Fruits 'n Veggies World by JeepySol and it was great! It's their first hack, but they've clearly played a ton because so many of the setups are fresh and flow really well. You can tell they've really thought about all the interesting quirks and design possibilities inherent in vanilla. Every time you think "surely there's nothing new you can do in a vanilla hack", something like this comes along to prove you wrong.

My one criticism is that some sections felt a little too long (particularly in an early level where you have to do a couple of messed up Fugu things in a row), but the difficulty is pretty approachable and no level really took more than a few minutes. This one gets another big recommendation from me. These August hacks have really been making up for the slower times earlier in the year.

Speaking of exciting August hacks, our friend schema_tuna released his own hack Mycelium over the weekend! He spent something like a year and a half making it and it seems like people are really into it, so I'm super excited to play that next.

 

[lincolnic]

Tore through Mycelium between Thursday and Friday. No less than Barb himself called it a contender for hack of the year, and I'd put this one on the "must play" list too. It's so inventive and polished that I wouldn't even guess it was schema_tuna's first hack if I didn't know. Having a playable hub area instead of an overworld is really cool, and the amount of care that went into the levels themselves is palpable. The obstacles and setups are really well thought-out, and they feel very intentionally placed -- there's no filler in this hack. You can tell that tuna had a clear idea of what he wanted from each section/level, but made sure not to pad anything unnecessarily. In service of that, the section lengths are all pretty friendly. Even the levels I didn't love went by quickly enough for me to appreciate the design without getting frustrated. It's even got a 100% custom boss that tuna coded from scratch! You guys know I'm not typically a Boss Enjoyer, but it was refreshing to see something brand new in a hack. I have to salute the incredible amount of effort that takes.

Also (big spoiler, Mike don't read this until after you finish the game) I'm in the credits! We're both in the credits! No one's ever given me a shoutout before, and it made my day a little bit. I guess you never really know who's thinking about you. In any event, another fantastic hack to add to the list of fantastic hacks that came out in August. Kinda feels like January 2021 all over again.

 

[lincolnic]

Played Super Foo World 0 today, which I saw the creator describe as "Super Foo World 2 DLC". And it was pretty much that, though they kind of go out of their way from the intro screen to tell you that everything is unpolished and not good. And, like, sure, honesty is nice, but it feels like you're just telling people not to play a thing you made. Didn't exactly inspire confidence, even though I really liked Foo 2 and the creator makes really cool stuff. And this was totally fine, there certainly was more of the stuff we all liked about Foo 2, but even a little playtesting and revising could've made it really good. Tl;dr play it if you liked Foo 2 and wished it were 7 exits longer.

 

[MCBanjoMike]

I finished a kaizo hack! Super Insecure World is complete, and it really was excellent almost the whole way through. I didn't really enjoy the late-game level that featured item-spawning cannons, and the final fight against the big "boo" was pretty frustrating thanks to the weird-ass "auto-scroller" physics that made it feel like you were always sliding around on ice. But for the most part, the game made exceptionally creative use of SMW's physics, along with a few well-placed bits of ASM, to keep you moving in ways that were really fun and inventive. Good sense of humor, too, for the most part. Thanks for the recommendation!

I also briefly dipped my toes into Mycelium, although I only wound up playing maybe 15-20 minutes of it before stopping for the night. I'll have to give that one a proper go next time. I'm looking forward to playing more kaizo hacks in general in the near future, there are 3 or 4 recent releases that I'm pretty interested in.

 

[lincolnic]

I didn't really enjoy the late-game level that featured item-spawning cannons

Aw, I thought that level was silly and fun. But I'm really glad you enjoyed the hack as much as I did! I think it's gone under the radar for a lot of people, so I've been trying to recommend it where I can.

I'm really excited for you to get into Mycelium. After I finished it I told schema_tuna that you were going to play it next, and he said he'd come hang and watch, so I think you're obligated to stream it now? That's how streaming works, right?

I haven't played any kaizo since my last post (I've been deeply ensnared by Baldur's Gate 3), but MorrieTheMagpie is about to release a new hack called Fresh Hops that looks awesome.

I really liked their previous hack (Get On Up!), so I'm definitely going to be playing this when it comes out.

 

[MCBanjoMike]

I'm really excited for you to get into Mycelium. After I finished it I told schema_tuna that you were going to play it next, and he said he'd come hang and watch, so I think you're obligated to stream it now? That's how streaming works, right?

He actually stopped in during the brief period when I was playing it! I had to stop not long after, though, because I've had a bad cough for a while and it was making it pretty hard to talk. I'll try to pick it up again on Friday or Saturday, might even start from the beginning, since I barely made it anywhere.

I haven't played any kaizo since my last post (I've been deeply ensnared by Baldur's Gate 3), but MorrieTheMagpie is about to release a new hack called Fresh Hops that looks awesome.

That trailer looks good! I kind of like the idea of premiering a hack on somebody's stream, makes it feel like an event.

Oh no I just got the pun

 

[lincolnic]

He actually stopped in during the brief period when I was playing it! I had to stop not long after, though, because I've had a bad cough for a while and it was making it pretty hard to talk. I'll try to pick it up again on Friday or Saturday, might even start from the beginning, since I barely made it anywhere.

Ah dang, sorry I missed a stream then. I'll keep an eye out Friday or Saturday!

 

[lincolnic]

Hey Mike, you're in luck, schema_tuna put the Mycelium soundtrack up on Youtube.

 

[MCBanjoMike]

Ooh, that's gonna make for some good listening at work!

 

[lincolnic]

I managed to tear myself away from Baldur's Gate 3 long enough to play Fresh Hops. It was a very fun hack, would recommend! Lots of clever setups that were still readable enough for me to sight read significant chunks of sections, even though I haven't played kaizo in a month. If I had one complaint, it's that the difficulty is sometimes uneven within a section -- a bunch of them would randomly have That One Obstacle (you know, the obstacle that's randomly much tougher than everything around it) which held me up for a couple of minutes. Even so, the whole hack took me around 2.5 hours. Not too bad for feeling very rusty!

Edited to add: the hack's also got one of the most unique Wendy fights I've ever seen, which I liked a lot. Good work Morrie!

 

[MCBanjoMike]

Dang, they’re coming out faster than I can play them! Hoping to start Entropy tonight, maybe I’ll be caught up one day.

 

[lincolnic]

Nice! I will make sure to check if you're streaming tonight then.