https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AA75OACyL78
Spelunky is a platformer where you play an interpid adventurer who enters a cave looking for treasure. The twist is that the game randomely generates the levels each time, and it's balls hard. Success in Spelunky comes not from the quick reflexes it takes to jump on spiders or whip bats but rather from foresight, resource management, and good decision making. Spelunky 2 is the same, except you play as the daughter of the adventurer, on the moon, and there are other new things.
Spelunky is awesome because you can play it basically forever. It has a ton of things to learn, like most roguelike-likes, so much of your time is spednt figuring out what various enemies or items do, how to navigate certain traps, and so forth. Then, as your skills improve, you realize the game is much deeper than you thought, and you begin to play differently. Finally, the game has all sorts of secrets which give you ways to beat the game more impressively or visit secret levels and so on. It's different each time you play and constantly evolving along with your skills. Spelunky 2 is also that.
Even better, all the various elements of the game, which are at their heart simple, combine in unexpected ways to add serious depth and unexpected hilarity. An errant rock pushed by your bomb rebounds off the wall, striking you in the head and causing you to fall, unconscious, onto an altar to Kali, so the dark goddess immediately accepts the sacrifice and ends your life, and your run. Or you throw an error from a dodged trap at a snake, only to miss and hit an exploding frog, whose death kills a pug and angers the shopkeeper that was selling licks from the pug. The shopkeeper chases after you with a shotgun until you die. Spelunky 2 has that sort of thing too.
Or, in other words, this is Spelunky:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lcy6RhoV8Is
Spelunky begas as
a free Windows game which is much like the game we have now, but with less stuff in it and pixel graphics. The next version, Spelunky HD (or just "Spelunky"), came out on consoles and PC. It costs money and it has updated hand-drawn graphics, along with a ton of new stuff. It's pretty dope. Spelunky 2 is also out on consoles and PC and also has hand-drawn graphics.
One cool thing about Spelunky is the Daily Challenge. Each day, every play can play it: you get one go on a randomly generated map which is the same for every player. Compete against your friends list to score the highest on the daily challenge! Ditto for Spelunky 2.
So let's play the Daily Challenge! Every day! Until we die! Or get bored!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zcS7SxfKUQ
Posts
Cool Stuff:
Bananasaurus Rex Solo Eggplant Run
Bananasaurus Rex kills the fucking ghost
My Progress
I just bought Spelunky today and aside from playing the free version a bit this is my first time playing it (although I've watched Idle Thumbs stream it so I know a fair amount about the game).
I'm terrible at the game. I recorded myself on my first daily challenge and I lasted about 3 minutes. It's uploading right now and I'll post it here. You should do the same! Let's get a feel for how people are doing. I can't talk much about today's challenge since, hey, 3 minutes, but it did give me the climby gloves and a web gun pretty fast, so maybe it was a good run for some people? I've heard some people don't like the climby gloves because they can make you grab a wall when you don't want to. And then die. Because this is Spelunky.
I was probably fatigued from my first regular run which got me to the UFO level, where I was killed by the exit when a turret somehow fell on me and exploded.
(Some mild spoilers in the video. Mostly on unlockable stuff)
Don't take naps on Kali's altar, ladies and gents.
After killing Yama and ghosting the rubies, instead of winning the game he decides to use the lava at the bottom of the room to kill the ghost just for kicks. In the attempt, he accidentally whiffs an input on a rope and ends up Climbing Gloved to the wall, where the ghost devours his soul.
I laughed so hard I cried
Of course, he still topped the leaderboard by a margin of $200,000 or so.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVphbnRvt4A
What time of the day does the daily challenge switch over? I accidentally did tomorrow's challenge about an hour ago.
Some quick tips I find useful
This game has gotten its hooks into me, deep. I bought it today and I already have 2.3 hours played. I've gotten much better! I definitely don't whip pots from point blank anymore (nor do I do that in the game). A discovery: this game is even better if you turn the music volume down to zero and instead play the Indiana Jones movie scores in the background.
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00
298,125 and #79 for the time being, which I guess isn't too terrible. I was sure I was in for an easy 4-4 clear when I hit the temple with a jetpack and a bajillion bombs, though.
I usually just place a rope nearby and climb it after grabbing the idol.
Spent a little time with it last night, and (among many, many other deaths) died the following unexpected ways:
* While figuring out how to avoid the arrows from arrow traps, jumped down past one far enough away from it to avoid the arrow... only to be killed when the arrow struck a wall and bounced back and downwards, skewering me in the head.
* The first idol I found, I somehow miraculously avoided both the boulder and the hordes of spiders that descended upon me. Made my way down to the end of the level, and lo and behold, a few short paces from the exit, there's the idol, wedged underneath the boulder at the end of its path of destruction. Overwhelmed by greed, I placed a bombo underneath the boulder, and retreated to a safe distance.
The bomb propelled the boulder back towards me, crushing me instantly.
* While this death wasn't mine... the 3rd or 4th damsel I found in the mines was separated from me by a short length of rock wall. That's no problem when you have bombs! Blasted my way through to her, even though the bomb was placed a little closer than I had intended. Picked her up off of the ground, and, after carrying her for a while, noticed that I didn't see the stars circling her head that I had seen on previous damsels. It wasn't until I saw my kill list on the summary screen that I realized that I had been carrying her severed head around like some sort of grisly trophy. What kind of madness have I been driven to down here in the caves?!?!
Well, let me take that back. I died many humiliating deaths. One of them happened to be on the Daily.
Let me say something about Spelunky: it is the only game I can ever remember playing that has made me furious to the point of verbally expressing my frustration at the computer. I got spelunk'd* in the temple after an amazing run down and I threw my controller down and swore loudly enough that someone came up from the other end of the house to make sure I hadn't somehow grievously injured myself.
and now I have to try going for a Hell Run
*spelunk'd, v. - to be killed in a manner that wasn't entirely the game's fault, but you didn't see coming
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVAxE04E6wQ
That'll teach you to throw rocks in a shopkeeper's direction!
The great thing about Spelunky is how it always feels like you're learning something. For example, today I learned not to use a mining pick on a floor tile within the bounds of a shopkeeper's store.
Pshh.
It took me a little over 1200 runs for my first Olmec kill.
I spend way too much time trying fancy stuff like speedruns...
It'd be great if I could get some people on my friends list that could eventually challenge my daily overall score.
I think the last run I posted about would have been the same one (it resets at...7:00 EST, I believe). There was a jetpack in either the shop you died in or the next one and loads of bombs in the black market. I don't recall anything else spectacular about the seed.
Once or twice would have been funny, three out of three times is just embarrassing. Stupid bats.
Except when it isn't.
The cape and the jetpack make ropes unnecessary in a lot of situations, but once in a while you might end up in a position where you're out of ropes and wish you had one.
Of course it also happens that you get ropes in five crates in a row and you're wondering where all the bombs are.
I was extremely relieved when my stunned spelunker managed to land on a piece of ground and not fall into the lava
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00
After dying, I must remember that I no longer have a jetpack.
[Tycho adds another hatch mark next to "do not accidentally jump on spikes"]
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00