VIP 2 Revival; TRENTE-QUATRE: FINAL; the segment with infinity

[underFlo]

Mario bullet hell??? Let's hope Mechdragon isn't taking notes.

[LHB]

The good news is there are only 2 more levels that approach that amount of difficulty, but they are a couple worlds away.

One being Poison Gas, and the other one?

Bowser Castle 3 aka "Anikiti Power Hour", due to the sheer length.

[morsel/morceau]

I'd never played this 'hard' version of VIP 2 up to a couple of weeks ago, and this was one of the levels* I wondered if I would ever be able to beat. There are some people who say this is the hardest level in all of VIP, so very well done!

*The others? Bowser 2 (I kept dying at the obvious places near the end of either half) and the final level (you start to wonder if someone up there has it out for you if you run out of time on the final boss after six minutes of not enough shells).

[went]

Last time raocow played this level:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKSbtVc ... age#t=155s

I think it's 100% worth revisiting.

[Grounder]

For even further comparison, here's raocow playing this for the first time, when he spammed savestates. :o

[CM30]

It's a few posts back now, but I think carol made the homing Bullet Bills you see in a few of these games. They're the same ones used in the Demon Wall battle in Brutal Mario, and were likely either released by him years and years ago or decompiled somehow (since the Bumpty and Ptooie sprites found in early sprite packs were also taken from that game).

But they definitely suck.

That said, they suck less that most fan game wall jump mechanics, so I'll give them that. Most of those seem to have been made by people who got confused between Super Mario 64 esque wall jumps and Mega Man X style wall jumps.

On another note, guess the next world or so should be interesting to see again. Cause I remember quite a few levels in this game were basically taken from Brutal Mario without changes, and are honestly kind of boring because of it.

[Unaniem]

I miss raocow calling the homing bills "Missile Mike".

[DethBen]

Oh man... That was a level.

[Zephyr_DragonLord]

They were made in an age before homing was mastered by the Parakoopas and Paragoombas in SMBX, AND IT SHOWS.

Well the homing enemies in SMBX aren't exactly fun to deal with either. Actually, now that I think about it, it seems like in every Mario hack/fangame, the homing enemies are usually the worst to deal with. And every once in a while there's a level that has tons of them, and those levels always end up being really unfairly difficult. Fortunately, the homing bullet bills in Super Mario Maker are a lot more reasonable.

The problem with homing enemies in SMBX is that it's hard to predict their path. Contrast with the homing bills in SMB3 and YI (probably also SMM too), where they make wide turns, and their path is usually telegraphed

SMBX homing is slow by comparison to the wonky homing we're seeing here. They're also easier to react to, given enough space. 4 of those parakoopas would still be pretty rough to deal with at once.

Yeah, YI and SMM (and by extention, the 'New' Mario games) homing bullet bills were far more tame and predictable with their homing. SMB3 homing was just a simple turn around.

[alleightbits]

a platform level, touhou-style: Those despawning feathers must be because of sprite limits. And then you said it in the video. That accidental P-Switch throw offscreen was tense.

I enjoyed watching this video, and I hate myself for doing so. Breather episode tomorrow? Please?

[Jeran]

is it wrong to be proud of raocow for this accomplishment?

[Zephyr_DragonLord]

is it wrong to be proud of raocow for this accomplishment?

No, it is not. ....Also, I realized that I excluded the video for last time. It's there now, along with the newer one.

What a tame set of levels... They're also of pretty nice quality. The second one especially is what the level yesterday should have been like.

[Mata Hari]

#releasethegoose

[Grounder]

#ThatsWhatSheSaid

[raocow]

man, so, just because I'm done with one of the alleged hardest levels doesn't mean I won't randomly have weird difficulty elsewhere

[TaviTurnip]

"Afterwords"

[Zephyr_DragonLord]

man, so, just because I'm done with one of the alleged hardest levels doesn't mean I won't randomly have weird difficulty elsewhere

I know, raocow... I'm just waiting for that level where hitting that yellow switch actively hurts you (if there is one) and the postgame...

[went]

For even further comparison, here's raocow playing this for the first time, when he spammed savestates. :o

Dang I had forgotten about the foobar times. Those were the days.

[Zephyr_DragonLord]

Hm. It feels strange to have the Mario thread be something of a ghost town... I guess this speaks to VIP2 having lost its charm over the years.

It also feels strange to have a switch gate level, but nothing beyond it immediately. What gives? (unless raocow does this on purpose)
Also, that castle is nonsense. Harmful surfaces aren't clearly marked? Bridge building in autoscroll? Mole babysitting???? Bleh. That all doesn't leave much of a good tast in the mouth.

[Ryrir]

You can get 99 lives in two seconds in the butterfly level back in world 1.
Just play up to the midpoint and kick a shell in one of the water-pools.

[raocow]

You can get 99 lives in two seconds in the butterfly level back in world 1.
Just play up to the midpoint and kick a shell in one of the water-pools.

oh nice, alright I'll try to remember this

[pholtos]

You know, I think you could do block road without the red switch, potentially.

[Ivy]

You know, I think you could do block road without the red switch, potentially.

yeah but there's a pipe filter so rip

[pholtos]

You know, I think you could do block road without the red switch, potentially.

yeah but there's a pipe filter so rip

You mean that one you can skip if you go up top? :P

[Ivy]

also that castle gave me eye cancer