Cave Story

[quiet pond]

so yeah they aren't locked out of spur

[carmine ingot]

Thank you wiki

||Snake || is not bad either but it’s no ||spur||

[quiet pond]

i like them both over ||machine gun|| tbh

[slate hawk]

Oh shoot, I read that I needed || booster 2.0|| to reach where I needed to go. I'll try again and see if I can get to it.

[quiet pond]

it looks liek you can do it if you jump from ||the fence above the save room|| instead of the platform just nder the ceilling

[burnt finch]

This trash pit is some ||Getting Over it bullshit||.

[queen prawn]

Great game! I got the bad ending. Can you unlock new playable characters, weapons etc when completing with a certain ending?

[quiet pond]

no nothing like that. there's different weapons you can choose on a given playthrough tho

err i think some commercial versions have a mode where you ||play as curly brace|| that might be unlockable.

but the original freeware version has nothing u cant do on first playthrough

[fringe salmon]

all right for people who are struggling with this game

Mega Drive version's controls feel just a bit less slippery than versions like Cave Story+. Cave Story+ feels very slippery

also the save states

Cave Story+ feels like our robot has buttered shoes

[open dome]

Playing genesis version and loving it also

[quiet pond]

yeah the genesis version rules. only real downsides of it so far were slowdown during the bossfight in the waterway and ||whimsical star|| not being implemented yet

and a few false levelup sounds with ||spur|| but i forget if the original freeware versions did that or not

[fringe salmon]

I feel like the music is worse in the Genesis version

But the controls in Cave Story+ are so goddamn slippery. I lost count of how many times I butterfooted my way into the spikes in the Bushlands because it controls like ass

[quaint hound]

Started this up after star Ocean, Quote is a bit floatier than I remember

[deft salmon]

Should probably look up a walkthroughh as many of the items mentioned here are ones I missed. At the end. Beat and achieved the normal ending wondering || are there always 4 boss fights at the end without health recovery? ||

[quiet pond]

yes

[quiet pond]

man i have been doing a few attempts at the true ending every day or two and im still struggling lol. i did it legit when i was younger but i might have to save state a little

[carmine ingot]

It helped when I sat down and took it slower

[quiet pond]

yeah ive gotten really good at the first few rooms i just tend to take a bunch of damage in the last few sections just before ||heavy press||. and then i need to get better at ||ballos||

[burnt finch]

I frikking love the television character we fight every now and then.

[amber crypt]

I used to think he was a giant toaster

[carmine ingot]

Based off a bar of soap apparently

[quiet pond]

yeah i always thought he was a suitcase

[quaint hound]

I've gotten to the || plantation || with all the true ending requirements

I'll do the normal ending for the screenshot and at least try for the true ending

Playing on PC though, so no save states

[quiet pond]

true ending is definitely a difficulty spike lol.

[open dome]

For me it was always a cereal box.

[quaint hound]

Cleared the || hidden cave || had a much tougher time with that when I was younger

[orchid rain]

That was my experience! I hadn't played through the game since high school but I guess I've only gotten to be a better gamer since then. I had a very easy time with the true ending, although remembering how to do everything did play a part in it.

[quaint hound]

I have made a slight error and locked myself into the true ending

Cannot get the normal ending anymore

Hopefully I've gotten better

Wait, I can get the normal ending, nvm. Gonna screenshot that and then hopefully I can try the true ending

[quaint hound]

I have assessed how much time beating the true ending will take me, and I have concluded I have better uses of my time

[wanton granite]

you guys ever play Poacher?

[amber crypt]

I can see that!

[sudden marsh]

Wait, did balrog just disappear in the normal ending? He wasn't dead but I never saw him again

[quaint hound]

He || presumably dies on the island ||

[carmine ingot]

D:

Listed as Misery’s punching bag in credits so maybe there’s hope

[modest vapor]

I made a mistake and got the machine gun and had to struggle through last boss

But I did it

[open dome]

Wait why getting the machine gun is a mistake ???? I just traded my gun for it. Did I get fooled ??????

[carmine ingot]

Not a mistake but it’s not the “best” gun you can get for a trade

[modest vapor]

Sorry if that was spoilery. It's a good gun!

Anyway I really enjoyed my playthru. I did the genesis port and it was very solid. The jumping felt more floaty than I remembered?, But besides that was pretty spot on.

[open dome]

Well that’s what this thread is for! Thanks for sharing the info . It’s nice to know that I could have kept my gun longer to make a better trade .

[zenith widget]

Genesis port def feels floatier. I think the FPS is lower

[open dome]

Someone said the opposite , ie that genesis port is less floaty. That is my feeling also .

[hexed current]

Getting all the items to blow up the door is proving to be quite tricky, I guess it's the first point in the game where you really have to backtrack a lot?

[quiet pond]

yeah even then there's never that much. this game doesn't have a ton of mandatory backtracking to previous areas, just some backtracking within areas and some optional stuff between areas

[fringe salmon]

So, weapons and stuff after the Sand Zone

||That boss was a bitch. I'm feeling a bit more confident about my decision to forgo the machine gun, but||

slightly later weapon spoilers?

||I was going to save my Polar Star until I can talk to the gunsmith guy again, since I have played this game before. Don't think I got the good end tho||

||but I didn't know there are multiple things I can trade it for||

[carmine ingot]

||it’s worth ||

[quiet pond]

it's worth but i also like the other option too

[carmine ingot]

Nah ||spur|| makes you want to dress up as it for Halloween

[quiet pond]

but ||the second option is probably notably worse if you aren't doing the true ending cuz it's particularly useful for sacred ground||

[carmine ingot]

||snake|| just is the friend you take bowling

[fringe salmon]

Yeah I was thinking that ||I'd just suck it up and make use of the fact that I have an entire arsenal and should be able to get by with my other ones||

Yeah I was going to say

[quiet pond]

yeah honestly until i got ||spur|| i was barely using polar star. ||bubbler and fireball|| did a lot of my heavy lifting for levels and bosses respectively

[fringe salmon]

||I don't know if I should take the Snake or save for the other gun. I'm a bit scared to give up the Fireball because it got me through the Sand Zone boss to begin with||

[carmine ingot]

You should at least experience ||spur supremacy || once

[fringe salmon]

I'm not gonna lie. I fear this game, including the bosses I'm going to face between now and later

But I feel like I should be most terrified of whatever comes at the end

[quiet pond]

||by the time you can get snake you'll have the blade, which if you keep it at level 2 is better than fireball at being a closerange boss shredder||

[fringe salmon]

Yeah I'm liking the ||blade|| but it seems very demanding to keep powered up

[quiet pond]

the secret is you don't really need to keep it powered up tbh. the gimmick of level 3 is usefull but its higher dps at level 2 and i think maybe even level 1

[fringe salmon]

I'm just wondering how hard I'm going to feel ||being limited to the Polar Star between now and then||

Also missiles are fucking disappointing tbh

[quiet pond]

did you get the ||bubbler||? it's bad dps for bosses but the gimmick of level 3 kinda carried levels for me in the early game, helps so much with crowd control

[fringe salmon]

I'd like to use them more except they kinda suck for how few I get

Yes I did

And yes it wrecks ||that fucking swarm of birds towards the end of the Sand Zone||

[quiet pond]

yeah its great for dealing with presses and hard-to-approach enemies in general too cuz ||the stars go in the direction you hold when you let go of fire. so you can shoot bubbles out left but make them pop up or down which really helps with hard to reach enemies||

[fringe salmon]

What I'm hearing is that I probably have the tools I need to hold out ||for getting the Polar Star back to the gunsmith||

[quiet pond]

this game in general does a good job of making every weapon useful tbh i think i used everything i had in at least a few situations. missiles are a little weak ||until you upgrade them|| but they're still worth unloading on bosses at least

[fringe salmon]

Honestly missiles feel kind of like a boondoggle

[quiet pond]

i feel like missiles would be a lot better if they had a dedicated button like some of the later metroid games

[fringe salmon]

against the ||Sand Zone boss, trying to make them hit feels like it was too much trouble to be worth it when I could cover the floor in fireballs instead||

[quiet pond]

weapon switching is a bit of a mess tbh and missiles would be better if you could just pop one off whenever

[fringe salmon]

They would

With missiles I have to fucking aim. ||not fireballs tho||

Granted that specific boss may be questionably representative

[quiet pond]

yeah ||fireball does kind off fall off late game tho. bosses are less grounded and faster moving. so giving up fireball to get snake doesnt really hurt extra||

[fringe salmon]

Except ||losing the Polar Star for it||

[quiet pond]

||it's a very direct upgrade over polar star, just that spur is probably a better upgrade. spur makes a lot of late game bosses really easy honestly. snake makes levels easier tho imo or at least faster, i think speedrunners usually take snake||

[fringe salmon]

Legit. ||I am kind of terrified of what I have to look forward to in the future||

[quiet pond]

if you aren't going for true ending i dont think its too crazy

[fringe salmon]

I don't know yet if I am or not

[quiet pond]

if you ||get booster 2.0|| then ||hidden last cave|| is somewhat hard

yeah true if you're still at sand zone you should be able to take yr pick

[fringe salmon]

I'm in ||the Labyrinth||

OK, spoiler shit

||last time I played, Curly ripped||

||if my priority is avoiding that, do I want to hold out for the best gun or get the best gun I can get now||

[quiet pond]

||i think either or? spur makes the final boss easier but if you level up missiles or keep nemesisis at low level u should be okay with snake, and snake makes the level leading up to it easier cuz u can shoot through walls to trigger the bombs that normally you would have to get closer to and stall||

just make sure ||you don't go down the pit after professor booster, make the tricky jump instead||

[fringe salmon]

Or, this is the Steam/Nicalis version, so let's say ||I want to unlock Curly if that's a thing||

[quiet pond]

and then ||grab the tow rope from the sparkly area in the core fight before the fight starts, then interact with curly after the fight at the escape bit||

not sure on that ive mostly just played freeware versions

[fringe salmon]

Fair 'nough

I'm going to hold out on reading some of those how-to spoilers and see what I can figure out myself

That said it'd be nice if I could copy my save

[quiet pond]

maybe read the spoilers lol its not super easy to figure out yrself

there are some gotcha moments

i would use a guide tbh there are definitely points where u could ||fail to save her|| and not realise u fucked up until u saved again

[fringe salmon]

I'm going to guess the good endings were intended for absolutely insane people willing to bang their heads against doing the game over and over again

[quiet pond]

yeah a little i think. you were meant to work for it lol. its not like, insanely hidden or anything but u have to do some pretty specific and unintuitive or failable things. there are things u can screw up and not realise u screwed up

[fringe salmon]

That is kind of annoying yeah

[quiet pond]

namely ||not saving professor booster|| and ||going into the specific door in the waterway||

[fringe salmon]

Anyway, I think ||I should probably try to get the normal ending first, because the good ending sounds very hard in general||

And I have shit to do this month

Though I'm squaring off work now

[quiet pond]

i think the nicalis versions let you back out of the final bit of the good ending? so u could try to do everything else (it's not that crazy imo) and then hold off on the final bit for later

the freeware version does not tho if you so if you ||save in the prefab house where the entrance to sacred gorund is|| you're locked in

[fringe salmon]

Got it

||Is saving Curly the thing that unlocks the good ending, or is it something else? You don't need to tell me what it is, I'm just checking this one thing||

[quiet pond]

yes ||saving curly|| but also ||getting booster 2.0||, which i forget if you can ||save curly without doing or not||

[fringe salmon]

OK got it

Weapon stuff again ||will I be able to backtrack to the Labyrinth shop for the Snake between now and getting access to the final gun if I'm getting stuck||

[carmine ingot]

@fringe salmon ||yeah there is a teleporter in the lab shop you can access||

[fringe salmon]

Nice

[subtle hamlet]

I'm about to start playing Cave Story tonight and still trying to decide on which version to play. My options are the two Portmaster ports or the Genesis, PSP, or WiiWare ports. Has anyone found any bugs or issues with any of those that would make me want to not choose one of them?

[open dome]

From what I read here all those versions are good choices .

Is it just me or the labyrinth is not a labyrinth lol

[quiet pond]

a labyrinth is not a maze!

[quiet pond]

genesis is a little buggy and doesn't have at least one (very) optional item implemented

but its still rock solid and has retroachievements and savestates if you want either of those

psp supports widescreen, not sure about wiiware but if you want widescreen those are probably better

[frank bane]

I came here to ask the same thing actually. Going to play on my RG351P so I think my options are the Portmaster libretro port or Genesis or PSP ports. Think I'll try the Postmaster version as it's just ready to run unless anyone has bad things to say about it. Excited though! First time trying it.

[open dome]

According to the dictionary it is ?

[quiet pond]

https://www.diffen.com/difference/Labyrinth_vs_Maze

[mint valley]

huh, TIL

[carmine ingot]

Well that just speaks to the intelligence of the Minotaur then

[open dome]

Pretty interesting! It still does not fit within this definition of labyrinth though since a labyrinth is supposed to be about going to the center and return?

[mint valley]

why did theseus need a thread to help him find his way out of the labyrinth if a labyrinth only has one path? was he stupid?

[quiet pond]

yes

[carmine ingot]

Moral of the story; don’t screw a bull or your intelligence in the kingdom drops significantly

[open dome]

lol yeah that kind of confirms that the difference that they are trying to make between a labyrinth and a maze doesn’t work . I am not saying that difference.com is not a reliable source but… yeah it probably isn’t .

I’ll go with the Webster dictionary which says literally that there is no difference between a labyrinth and a maze : https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/labyrinth

So calling this area a Labyrinth is total non-sense .

(So far it’s my only complaint about this great game)

[soft cosmos]

The wiki muddies the waters further

[quiet pond]

I think it's at least true in like, a garden/hedge context. Like a garden with multiple paths is a maze, with just one winding one is a labyrinth. That's consistent. But yeah by that definition the one from Greek mythology is actually a maze

I think in English mazes can be called labyrinths but not all labyrinths are mazes is where I'll settle on lol

This is a labyrinth but not a maze

[hexed current]

Whoeeeeee, this game is just sooo floaty, I'll get the quick ending but doubt I'll proceed with others

[open dome]

The floating mechanic works great though .

[proven lark]

I prefer my platformers less floaty, but you get used to it, I guess.

[frozen shard]

Got tossed in jail. Game still hasn't clicked

[quaint hound]

You are very far into the game, really not going to click now if it hasn't so far

[quiet pond]

yeah probably not

[wanton granite]

I'm with ya Zu, this is attempt #4 for my to like this game

[proven lark]

Same. I don't know, can't feel it.

[final cosmos]

The only part that clicked with me were the fetch quests and the underwater sequence.

[sacred geyser]

Got to the bit with the ||air tank||

JFC J effing C

I’m playing this without a guide and I’ll get the the ending I naturally get to, but if this wins GOTY (best story maybe?) I’ll deffo come back and get the best ending

[quiet pond]

Yeah I think it has a shot at best story or maybe art direction?

Depends what else we play, it's still early in the year

[frozen shard]

Does it count as an ending if I ||yeet with the doctor and let everything go to shit?||

[carmine ingot]

Ye it counts

There’s a few completion screenshots of the yeet that got credited

[quiet pond]

Yeah it counts but u are skipping like a third of the game

[carmine ingot]

The worse third

[frozen shard]

[open dome]

I’ll stop now then . I just love that ending

I don’t really understand why this ending counts and not the one where you beat richter in sotn

Maybe just a change in the guidelines since that time

[quiet pond]

Mostly comes down to rapid having played the game before or not I think?

[frozen shard]

I think that's because SOTN has 50% more game after that

previous multiple ending games let you pick whichever one you got

like the sleep 20 days Survival Kids move

or "okay I guess we're done" 999 BS

[quiet pond]

Idk rapid didn't let me get the starve to death on the raft ending in survival kids iirc

Even tho it took longer than the radio ending

[zenith widget]

I mean, this theme is multiple endings so I can see that being a factor

[haughty knoll]

I still say that ending doesn't count becasue it was said to get the end credits. If you get the 2/3 ending you get no end credits. But, whatever.

I also saw people get points for Gunbird with 50k points. Which I don't understand how that happens

[carmine ingot]

@hard dune

[haughty knoll]

I read those wrong they are 500k

[void otter]

I mean, I'll go back if and fix it if that's the case, my poor hands just can't hack it for the device I have to use

[void otter]

If you've fucked up that much to be offered that ending, like I did, there's really only 10% more game to be had honestly, it's mostly done. Really only making the best of a bad situation at that point

(For that playthrough at least)

[void otter]

There we go

[open dome]

Best ending ?

[void otter]

Normal ending

Just to say I at least got credits

[haughty knoll]

My faith is restored in you.

[sacred geyser]

Ok friends, I’ve got to the bit where there are skull flags with ||crushing blocks above you, just after you escape from jail|| and frankly I’m stuck.

I also don’t know what the password is but that might be something that comes later or that I’ve already missed.

Any hints?

[open dome]

If you are where I think you are there is a door to the far right that just doesn’t look like a door

[sacred geyser]

Perfect, thank you

[open dome]

I lost half an hour at that place lol

[sacred geyser]

Far right on the top level?

Like where you ||escape from the jail|| level?

[open dome]

Thé jail is the labyrinth right ?

After you escape it you go back to the incubators

I assumed that you were to the far right of the incubator with a wall blocking you. In the top level there is a bs invisible door . Looks like a black hole .

[sacred geyser]

So I’m in the plantation, got passed the ||bad ending|| then got || knocked unconscious and woke up in jail || then ||escaped||

Now I’m at this screen and can’t get up, but if I fall down, I can’t get back

[open dome]

Sorry I thought jail was the labyrinth . I stopped at the bad ending so I don’t know .

[sacred geyser]

Never mind just closed my eyes to go to bed and had an epiphany and worked it out

TBH that was 100% a mind skill issue

[junior adder]

Haven't been reading much of the chat here cause it's mostly spoilers, but I'm starting the game now, and wondering what difficulty should I choose

The game says easy is best choice for first time players...

I would be playing on PC so no emulator save states

[quiet pond]

not sure what changes easy makes tbh the freeware versions have no difficulty option. i dont think regular is super difficult as long as you aren't going for the best ending but there's a huge difficulty spike if you are

[carmine ingot]

Easy is just reduced damage taken

And the sprite change

Half damage

[junior adder]

Well, then I guess I'll stay on easy, since I'm working with a deadline

[carmine ingot]

Halfway through the month now, so what’s the general server consensus on Cave Story?

[orchid rain]

Most people did the bad ending which just proves the majority of people who do gotm is just for points and not to enjoy actually great video games 🫢

[soft herald]

Hot take: There's people here who just like playing with their emulation handhelds and aren't even that into retro games.

Which is fine. Makes perfect sense that GotX would have crossover between the two schools of thought. But it makes for some butting of heads during the voting process.

[open dome]

Why can’t I both enjoy this great game and get the bad ending?

[jovial sundial]

I figured the bad ending didn't count so I made sure to finish it properly. I don't care to go back and start a new playthrough and follow the crazy path it takes to get the best ending though, even if I did really enjoy the game.

[zenith widget]

I am super biased, cave story is one of my favorite games at all time. But along with getting a handheld, and the magic to get all your games in one place... The other part is playing the games themselves. My first handheld was the GP2X and that had a cave story port. Cave story is free, is a great game, and honestly not super difficult compared to say, some of the Castlevania or ghosts and goblins. I think the story sets you up to want to save curly... And that's what lead me to look up at my then dial up on how to save her. Being satisfied with the original ending seems so .. off lol

[quiet pond]

i think most people liked it, there's a few it didn't click with. consensus seems pretty positive tho and i havent seen too many outright complaints like u sometimes get

[sacred geyser]

I’ve liked it a lot more than I expected. I’m in on the story, but while I possibly missed the chance to get the best ended, I’m totally involved in avoiding the bad ending

[sudden marsh]

Loved it

Went for normal ending, will go back for best ending eventually

[final cosmos]

Hated it at first, but GoTM forced me to stick it out longer than usual (which is usually good). I got the hang of it, started to enjoy it, and then the difficulty spike at the end really soured the whole experience for me.

[slate hawk]

I'm a fan of faster-paced platformers (MMX, Katana Zero, gunvolt, etc.) so this wasn't my favorite. I liked it, and it's easy to see it's influence on other indie platformers, but I don't know if I'll go back and get the normal ending.

[quiet pond]

i like tight platformers too but i feel like the modern indie platformer scene is too homogenized in that way

so going back to stuff like Cave Story or N is kinda refreshing

[frank bane]

I'm actually not sure what difficulty level I'm playing on / is fixed for the Portmaster (lr) version of this. I'm not sure I was able to select anywhere? It's going to take me a lot longer than 8 hours to beat at current pace, but I'm really enjoying it so it's cool.

[quiet pond]

the freeware versions dont have a difficulty setting, it was added in commercial releases

[frank bane]

Yeah I didn't think I saw an option. Well if it takes me ages I'll assume it's automatically hard 😉 rather than anything to do with my ability.

[junior adder]

I'm 40 min into the game I don't know what to do already...

[open dome]

Don’t worry : knowing what to do is not really a problem in this game.

The world is small .

I am guessing that what you have to do right now is just opening every door .

It will be pretty much this throughout the game

[junior adder]

There is a shield, and it says I need to find a terminal to open it, but I can't find it, found some invisible secret, but no terminal

[open dome]

Are you in Arthur’s house ?

[mint valley]

hint if you'd like: ||go back to the last save point and look at every screen||

but yeah I'd agree the game doesn't give you much direction and assumes you'll just try everything sometimes

[open dome]

There is not so much to try though so it’s not bad

[mint valley]

huh, so turbo breaks the machine gun a little bit. bullet count doesn't go down.

[carmine ingot]

https://tenor.com/view/mgs2-solid-snake-metal-gear-solid2-metal-gear-solid-mgs-gif-27578347

[mint valley]

infinite hover too

[timber dew]

This game really shines on a second playthrough, I barreled through almost everything in one day. All the bosses and everything just made sense and I beat them all within 3 tries at most. Now I'm trying Hell for the first time though and beating my head against it. This will definitely take a lot more time, but the masocore elements of Hell trigger my brain into wanting to get better and finishing it like few other games do for me.

[pulsar narwhal]

There. I did the bad ending so I can end the month with less stress lol

How far am I from the normal ending?

1h? 2?

[carmine ingot]

3

https://tenor.com/view/days-months-years-spencer-icarly-elevator-days-gif-466734755836842920

[pulsar narwhal]

I see lol

[carmine ingot]

2 if you rush or are god at bosses

[pulsar narwhal]

Make it a week then

[fringe salmon]

Labyrinth stuff ||I think I just sequence broke the professor and the teleporter in his pit?||

||And now I'm just leaving him there?||

[quiet pond]

||yes you can do that that's one of the things you have to do to get the best ending||

[carmine ingot]

I hear leaving him ||to die in a pit is good for his health…||somehow

[quiet pond]

yeah somehow lmao

[pulsar narwhal]

One question. What's the deal with the numbers ||38-48-48||?

I found a computer with those numbers and something written ||first girl then ???|| (I don't remember the entire thing)

[quiet pond]

not sure honestly???

[carmine ingot]

https://www.destructoid.com/why-cave-story-is-the-worst-videogame-ever/

Look ragebait way back in 2010

[quiet pond]

they dont make gaming journalism like this anymore

oh jim sterling of course its her lol

[fringe salmon]

second(?) Labyrinth boss ||this asshole feels like he's harder without the booster||

[carmine ingot]

It is

[pulsar narwhal]

Who's Jim Sterling?

And who hurt her? Lol

[fringe salmon]

It probably doesn't help that ||I still have the Polar Star||

[quiet pond]

i mean it's a shitpost lol. but yeah they have a sense of humour like that. used to be head editor of destructoid i think but she has her own site/channel called jimquisition now. fairly notable game critic/pundit

[fringe salmon]

OK, now I have a ||tow rope? that apparently I didn't already have the achievement for despite the fact that I'm pretty sure I played past this point in the past. hmm||

[quiet pond]

i would maybe look at a guide at this point if u want the best ending lol. at least before you save. cuz u have to do some pretty specific things

its easy to accidentally lock yrself out of it

[fringe salmon]

Eh I'm gonna do my best and if I don't ||save red hat boy I don't save red hat boy this time||

[quiet pond]

oh are u playing curly mode?

[pulsar narwhal]

What a strange sense of humour lol

[fringe salmon]

Yes because it is right up my alley

||OK, I'm hauling red hat boy through a waterway||

[pulsar narwhal]

I said this wrong. It's ||04-08-08|| and it says ||wife before child||

In cave story plus the computer says ||my child is born||

Is this a Easter egg?

[quiet pond]

idk maybe its pixel's kid's birthday or something

looks like a date

[pulsar narwhal]

Go to 2:09:25

https://youtu.be/b3Cl2PxX6Tc?si=2XJ8hYsEK0QOC3Gq

[fringe salmon]

After some issues adapting to the physics, this game somehow feels like less of a struggle than I remember it being. I'm still shit at a lot of games but maybe I got better at particular kinds of them idk

[pulsar narwhal]

I am stupid. It doesn't say ||wife before child||... It says ||wife BORE child||

It can be a Easter egg related to his personal life idk

[quiet pond]

yeah thats just an easter egg i think

[pulsar narwhal]

Into the rabbit hole I go

I figured it out. According to the Cavestory forum, if you ||do not save Curly|| you see this message on the computer. You have to bring something with you when ||curly dies after the boss fight|| to make the computer say how to ||drain the water and save curly||

Nobody knows why the computer says that, tho. Some people think that it is about pixel's personal life, others think that ||curly really is the mother of the mimigas||

[fringe salmon]

All right. ||I have two backed-up saves. One before fighting the Core, and one after getting red cap boy to the safehouse and draining the water from him but before deciding whether to take him with me on my way out||

||It's awkward because I feel like taking him with me would just drown him again, and I've tried it both ways and... one way he and I get separated after the boss fight, and the other I can't get back to the waterway where I left him||

As for what I do next, thinking through this logically, ||if I leave him there and can't get back to him at some point he's fucked; he's stuck and won't survive trying to escape without drowning and getting torn to shreds on the rocks. If I take him with me, I get him through that while he's rebooting and maybe he lands somewhere he doesn't die.||

I'm aware this is a video game and logic doesn't always apply but I'mma try it. Got my save backed up if it no worky

[fringe salmon]

...does the ||aborted ending|| qualify for GotM?

I'll grab a screenie of it just in case

[fringe salmon]

||I took him with me and sucked up getting separated from him after the fish boss, and now I just found him alive but un-chatty at the plantation||

[fringe salmon]

late game secret stuff? oh shit ||finally he speaks damn||

||Iron Bond get||

[frank bane]

I should have played a port of this that has the easy mode. And allows save states. I'm not sure I'll get this done by March 2025 let alone this month.

Also possible that I just suck at it.

[open dome]

Yep a lot of people used that ending .

That ending just feels so right I don’t really want to pursue another one lol

[final cosmos]

Lol "Eff all you people who ||think I'm a mindless killing machine||, I'm getting out of here on this dragon".

[mint valley]

I was a little annoyed that an npc basically tells you to do something and then when you do it, the game is like lul bad ending

[proven lark]

Maybe don't just listen to what random NPCs tell you to do.

[mint valley]

it's a video game?

[proven lark]

Correct.
And?

[zenith widget]

Oh boy

[jovial sundial]

Is this the good ending they speak of?

[fringe salmon]

||I don't know how you got up there with it the lady took it away from me before I went up||

All right, I think I might be just about at the end. Gonna review my stuff before I jump into what feels like it might be a point of no return

I've got ||45 life, the Spur, 30 Super Missiles, Fireball, Bubbline, Blade, map, Life Pot, Arms Barrier, Whimsical Star, Jellyfish Juice, some 290 Counter that I don't know what it does, Iron Bond, and Booster 2.0||

and the usual story items and ||Air Tank||

Part of me feels like I must be missing something but I don't know where it'd be at this point

[quiet pond]

you don't have ||nemesis|| but that's optional and you have to give up ||blade|| for it

other than that i think you have everything

aside from some useless joke stuff like a lipstick tube

[fringe salmon]

Huh. I have no idea where I'd find that

[quiet pond]

you have to ||reunite the little man with his family||. u might have ran into the ||very small family that lives at the bottom of the outer wall||

[fringe salmon]

nope

oh and I grabbed an extra pair of undies for the road

[quiet pond]

i think you'll be fine without it with your loadout lol. i prefer to get it when i don't ||have the spur||

oh of course

[fringe salmon]

I mean, as you do

[quiet pond]

and the lipstick tube is useless so dont worry about that lol

[fringe salmon]

yeah no I don't see shit ||at the bottom of the outer wall||

||oh wait I see it now. I'd need to get my booster back to get in there tho||

I've heard that in the Steam version, you can't accidentally lock yourself into the harder-to-get good ending? Because I think I currently meet the criteria for the good ending so far

incidentally, ||I won't lie, the Blade is very good, and I occasionally use it instead of the Spur still if I want to have King guard against a bunch of small flyers or projectiles or something with his flurry of slashes||

||if the Nemesis completely changes its role to something that the Spur already does then perhaps I should skip it. Currently, the Spur does almost all of my heavy lifting, though I don't recall for certain if I've fought a boss since getting it--the Super Missiles were definitely the upgrade the Missiles needed to make them worth using and absolutely carried me through the Core fight since my primary gun was goddamn useless||

[quiet pond]

yeah for the harder-to-get ending you want ||nemesis or spur|| because they both ||don't level up in the traditional way|| but i don't really think you need both

[fringe salmon]

oh, is ||Nemesis also a charge-up weapon||?

[quiet pond]

no it ||levels down instead of up||

you have to ||avoid getting energy|| to use it well

[fringe salmon]

||Oh, so it's a weapon that rewards you for getting hurt and focusing on murder. The name fits||

[quiet pond]

yeah lol

[fringe salmon]

the real question then is whether ||it's better than the Blade even if I have the Spur, or if the Blade's flurry at level 3 and short-range rapid shotgun at level 2 is going to be more useful than whatever the Nemesis does if I already have the Spur as my bread and butter||

because I am absolutely willing to take a few extra minutes to run and grab it

[quiet pond]

i think ||blade is probably better||. that's what i stuck with at least for this playthrough

[fringe salmon]

fair 'nough

[snow shell]

||blade lv 2 is best for rapid tapping at close range, but missils are the best for that. nemesis has longer range than spur and pierces, which makes it one of the best traversal weapons as long as you dodge the doritoes||

[zenith widget]

No its like, the fourth ending lol

[snow shell]

thats the challenge mode normal ending

[zenith widget]

||Just ignore the mom and go up there. You get to finish the game without the booster pack 0.8 and get an Easter egg dialog & end art. However is just a variation of the normal ending while wearing the mask.|| I haven't seen anyone go for this ending so I'll try to clear it for funsies

Needless to say, ||the bosses change without a double jump, so it's harder, but easier than hell imo||

Also Ive never done it so GOTM gives me a good excuse to

[quiet pond]

i opted to just use save states to clear the best ending and gethis t this out of the way lol. i did it legit when i was younger and im sure id get it eventually but ive been putting it off. did hardcore mode up until now

ill probably try to redo the last bit legit before the month end

[fringe salmon]

Incidentally, is it possible to ||get back down from the top of the Plantation after getting rocketed up there|| in the Steam version? I've heard this seems to be affected by differences in physics between the engines of different versions

[carmine ingot]

Someone said it was but I never found out how

[quiet pond]

i was able to do it in the genesis version

[fringe salmon]

In my playthrough, ||they're called "Your Panties" but I know why that is||

[fringe salmon]

more just-before-the-end(?) stuff ||I'm glad I stopped and talked to the dog right before the top because turns out I was missing one life upgrade||

also, just-before-the-end(?) stuff speaking as a Steam version player, about the "point of no return" thing: ||with the Booster 2.0--dunno if this would work without it or with the 0.8--I was able to shoot myself downwards and escape the column of smashy blocks||

||You need to shoot exactly downwards; any diagonal deviation will kill you||

[fringe salmon]

so uh, actual question time, concerning endings

||how does getting potentially "locked into" the good ending work? I'm at the Hidden Cave now and oof it stings||

||I'm sure this part would be here regardless, but it's making me feel less than confident going forward||

[junior adder]

I'm too effing dumb for this game

hate the backtracking also

[frank bane]

I'm stuck on ||Frenzied Toroko||. I've tried like 15 times and just can't ||avoid the blocks enough times||. I think what's really tilting me also is having to skip through the longest cut scene in existence before I retry it each time as it's just continually taking me out of the zone.

[junior adder]

Just fought him, thank god for easy difficulty, at least I don't have to try hard the bosses. Would probably quit already with it stacking with all the backtracking and constantly being too dumb to figure out what to do next

[quiet pond]

i don't think you can get locked in on cave story+ (i might be wrong) but it's after the final boss of the main route. you go into a little house, and if you save there in the free versions, you can't get back out of the house

also you are playing the harder version of ||last cave|| because you ||got booster 2.0||. there's a regular version too

[orchid rain]

In Cave Story+, you can back out of the true ending once you're in ||the house by reading the bookshelf to rewind time to the escape sequence||

[fringe salmon]

😭

[fringe salmon]

Cave Story cleared with normal ending

I'm eligible to try for the hard ending but I'm not sure I'm brave enough

[frank bane]

I've run out of steam for this game now I think (really did need the easy difficulty level), but I've come too far not to claim my 1pt now. So I'm going to have to push on. At ||Monster X|| at the mo.

[fringe salmon]

Wait, there's an easy difficulty? How do you unlock that?

[sacred geyser]

Play the commercial release not the home brew

[fringe salmon]

I have the Steam version but didn't realize there was an Easy mode in it

I was playing ||Curly mode||

[burnt finch]

I think I'm almost at the end. Got the choice and climbed up to the plantation before my Vita announced that the battery is about to run out.

Possibly going to finish this tomorrow morning.

[quiet pond]

Yeah you're pretty close.

[magic bridge]

I don't think I can beat cave story

Still haven't been able to beat the mech boss with the cockroaches. I put it down for like two weeks to finish DQ5, just came back and keep dying to the boss still

[fringe salmon]

What weapons do you have?

[magic bridge]

Uhhh, machine gun, sword, missile, fireball. Might be forgetting one

[fringe salmon]

No bubbler?

But yeah if you have the machine gun and you're struggling, you're likely to have difficulty with the endboss gauntlet. Machine gun is ||the worst gun you can trade the Polar Star for, and one of the alternatives I think you can get before the Labyrinth tank boss thing||

That said, if you push through end get to ||Egg Corridor 2|| you could at least get the ||bad end|| for the completion point

That'd require you to get through at least a couple more bosses tho

[quiet pond]

I forget if ||snake|| is before that boss or not but it doesn't help that much for that boss. But sword is good for it

[magic bridge]

No I must have missed it

[quiet pond]

No it might not be until later

[burnt finch]

Man, this last cave isn't kidding around.

[burnt finch]

It's finished. Did the normal ending.

Apparently I lucked out at couple spots and managed to achieve some requirements for the true ending, but couldn't be arsed.

Good game.

[quiet pond]

Yeah the version of last cave you get if you have the requirements for the true ending is a difficulty spike

And then doing the true ending is another difficulty spike up from there lol

[sacred geyser]

Finished on a train in the way to see my folks.

That last boss rush was brutal. Took me way too long to realise I still had the life pot

So now done, I looked up what I needed to do for the perfect ending. Yeah, no way I’d have done that on my own

Does anyone know WTF the ||house with the tiny family who couldn’t find their husband|| was all about

Or ||the clock|| for that matter? Are they only for the perfect ending?

[burnt finch]

||IDK what the clock does, but the tiny husband can actually be found visiting the graveyard at the starting village. If you return him home, they'll exchange blade for nemesis which is a really good weapon for the final bosses.||

[sacred geyser]

Thank you

[zenith widget]

||the clock lets you time your last level attempts, timer will start when you first spawn and ends when you kill ballos.||

[sacred geyser]

Oh I could not work out how to trigger it

[zenith widget]

||i should correct this. by last level I mean the "Hell" part of the game||

it doesn't ||trigger with the normal ending||

[sacred geyser]

Ahhhhhhhh thank you very much

[magic bridge]

I fuckin did it, made it past the tank with 6 hp left

[magic bridge]

About to make two saves then do the bad ending to make sure I can finish it. Then maybe finish it later

[fringe salmon]

If you want to get a better ending, don't be afraid to start over ||and try to get a better main gun if the machine gun is just not doing it for you||. It's not a very long game, and once you've got the hang of the earlier parts and know what you're doing, they'll go fairly quickly.

[magic bridge]

||how much more is left between the bad ending and the first "good" ending? I also missed the tow rope so I didn't get curly in the underwater section. Does that mean I can't get the good ending?||

[fringe salmon]

||The Outer Wall (mostly platforming with enemies but no boss), the Plantation (not a very big area by itself), and the final boss gauntlet. The "bad ending" is missable, so don't refuse to run when you get the chance. And yes, if you fail to save Curly, you can't get the good ending. What version of the Booster do you have?||

||I will note, the biggest obstacle here is the final boss gauntlet, and it is a toughie, especially if you don't have the Spur. So definitely get the bad ending first if you want to be absolutely sure you can walk away with the point for this month. You can reload from your last save after getting the bad end||

[magic bridge]

||0.8, I just got back to the mimiga village, about to go to the egg chamber||

[fringe salmon]

||Right, you're two factors off from being able to get the good ending. Normal ending is the best you're going to be able to do. Grab the bad ending first as I said, and then it's up to you whether you want to press forward, retry, or play something else||

[magic bridge]

Sorry I meant normal, not the super tough one

[fringe salmon]

It's fine. Yes, you should be eligible for the normal ending no matter what

at least, IIRC

[quiet pond]

yeah the normal ending has no requirements beyond get to the end. you only have to do anything fancy for the best ending

[magic bridge]

Thanks both of you

[quiet pond]

the best ending is more like a "secret" ending tho it was meant to be a bit cryptic and is a lot more difficult than the rest of the game. its totally valid to just get the regular ending now and save the secret one for if you wanna try replaying later

[fringe salmon]

Also, what version are you playing?

If you're playing something like the Genesis or PSP port, you should hopefully have access to save states

though as I've mentioned before more than once, I like that one feature in the Steam version too much, even if all the goddamn cheevos are bugged for it :I

[magic bridge]

Portmaster Evo version I believe

[magic bridge]

On R36S

[junior adder]

Dropping this one, playing non emulated version was a mistake, I've no patience to play it without emulation save states, even on easy

[jovial sundial]

I used save states for sure, but maybe at a rate of 10 percent compared to some of the racing games we've played.

[junior adder]

I returned to the egg corridor, and there is no manual save before the dragons fight, so you have to replay entire level, carefully since it's leading to the boss, so you don't want to lose HP, and the big falling stalactites will one shot you, and I ain't wasting five minutes every time to have a boss attempt, and I was already on the verge cause this game is 90% backtracking anyways, so no thank you, I'm super glad I didn't buy it on switch

This would be non issue with emulation save states, so it is on me, but the game isn't good enough to warrant me replaying 3h of it

[sacred geyser]

name checks out

[quiet pond]

i did savestateless except for the ||sacred ground|| for true ending but this wasn't my first playthrough

[magic bridge]

The portmaster version doesn't have save states and it's been rough lol

[orchid rain]

I mean, the bad ending is literally at the end of the egg corridor, you're almost there. It's okay to take a break and try again in a few days

[magic bridge]

Kinda with you on this, that's such a long way to go to just get killed by the dragons

Maybe I'll try to run through it on psp with save states, but I was trying to do the bad ending to just get the point and be done with it. I need to finish at least 1 game this month

[junior adder]

I reccommend castlevania, short and fun, just pick easy cause they increased the difficulty for us release

[magic bridge]

About to start it on my RP3+

[fringe salmon]

alternative: JP version (titled Vampire Killer)

JP version is still preferable. It gives you a fresh load of lives and continues when resuming from a password

[summer skiff]

Finished the game. The last stage was whole load more difficult but overall super charming game

[fringe salmon]

oh yeah, there's a sharp difficulty spike at the end

To anyone who's having trouble doing it with the machine gun, ||it doesn't take that long to start over and hold onto your Polar Star until you can get a better weapon: the one you can get if you can squeeze past the Core relying on the Blade and Super Missiles is absolutely bonkers||

[carmine ingot]

https://tenor.com/view/boss-rush-fighterz-fighterz-boss-get-on-fighterz-ryan-gif-20855425

[idle acorn]

I....cannot get the true ending

It's too powerful

And I ruined my save by saving so I can't open the door and turn back

[quiet pond]

are you consistently getting to ||ballos|| at least? and do you have a life pot?

[idle acorn]

Life pot was used unknowingly

And I do not consistently make it, no

[quiet pond]

yeah kk. if you can get to the end consistently you can kind of cheese the final boss

[fringe salmon]

What version are you on? If you're on the Steam version, check the bookshelf

If you're not, it sucks, but this game goes way quicker on a second playthrough and it shouldn't take you nearly as long to rush through it a second time

[idle acorn]

Cave Story+ on Switch

[quiet pond]

yeah check the bookshelf, u should be fine

[frank bane]

It's taken me embarrassingly long to clock that you can level up whatever weapon is in your hand with the crystal things and not just the weapon that you used to actually get the crystal things. If that makes sense. I just assumed they'd be tied up that way.

[open dome]

It’s a nice twist to be honest

[timber dew]

Gave a good attempt at Hell, got to the first Boss of it a few times, but just decided I'd get the normal ending for GotM. I can go back to beat my head against Hell anytime I want with my save now.

[karmic lantern]

Oof this month got away from me. Time to see if I can beeline this, probably more likely than finishing Star Ocean by the deadline. || Just met Curly, || which I think is how far I got back in the day when I had this on an R4

[nova anchor]

I just started this one today as well, boy howdy is there a lot of "hang" in the jumping mechanic.

[karmic lantern]

Very floaty for a supposed robot 🤖

[quiet pond]

yeah u get used to it but it's jarring at first

[carmine ingot]

Maybe Qoute is made by Dr. Light

[fringe salmon]

Inertia be like that

Mass and weight are not the same thing and work differently, interestingly enough

I think it's actually why heavy objects and light objects fall at the exact same speed assuming the same size and shape: the effects of mass (inertia) and weight (gravity's pull strength) cancel out exactly

[magic bridge]

Can someone tell me how much more of the game is left until the bad ending ||after going back to the egg corridor and fighting those 2 dragons in the house? They keep killing me but I think I can beat them||

[fringe salmon]

Basically immediately after that

[magic bridge]

Fuck

I gotta do it now

[fringe salmon]

You'll want to save again first but there's just a bit more ||egg corridor|| after that

But the bad end is missable, so do not turn the opportunity to get a coward's ending down when it's given to you

Also ngl I thought the twins were easy, but I was also rolling with the ||Spur|| and hell's bells that gun does not fuck around

Do you have plenty of Super Missiles to unload, or are you using them up fighting regular enemies along the way?

I'd get them to 3 and then conserve them as much as possible for the Twins, because it sounds like you want to go in with a giant pile of level 3 super missiles

I didn't need them much but if you're using the machine gun you probably will

Fight as carefully and conservatively as you can on your way there. Most of the enemies have predictable patterns. Do not get greedy, do not expose yourself to the risk of getting counterattacked by overstaying your own counter window

Back up a few steps if you have to

[frank bane]

You can skip over the two dragons too if you want and just mosey on over to the exit door without picking up the upgrade.

(I just discovered, by doing just that myself. I only have time for the bad ending before the month is up)

[fringe salmon]

If you don't have other stuff to do, Cave Story is a short game and you could potentially clear it from start even starting now, though it'll be more challenging if you don't know what you're doing and get bodied by bosses and suffer from not knowing what guns to get and etc.

You'd really want to set aside tonight and tomorrow for it if that were the case tho

[magic bridge]

I believe I have the super missiles. I think that fight is mostly getting the timing right

[fringe salmon]

If they're orange, they're super

||you should've gotten the Super Missiles somewhere in the Labyrinth I think||

[frank bane]

I did really enjoy it, but I got stuck for a disproportionately large amount of time on a couple of bosses (namely ||Frenzied Toroko|| and ||Monster X||). It probably didn't help that I didn't really have big chunks of time. More like 20 mins here, 20 mins there.

[fringe salmon]

Yeah, really short chunks of time make it difficult to really get into a flow state

[karmic lantern]

Dang I went and caught whatever sickness the kids in the house have been passing around. I'll definitely be finishing this up at some point, really enjoying it

[weary helm]

Once I finish GotW, I’m starting this one. Hoping I can finish it in 4 days or so. We will see how it goes.

[weary helm]

Played another hour or so of this one. Finished up the egg corridor. Really enjoying it so far. I love the pacing of the story and the condensed levels. So far it’s been great.

[weary helm]

Made it sand zone and beat up curly brace. I have a dog now.

[weary helm]

Did all the dog stuff, but haven't played in the last little bit. This one is really fun though. I'm coming up against the clock, so I hope I beat it in time. Going to be cutting it close I think.

[weary helm]

Finished it up tonight. This was a lot of fun. May by my favorite of the month. I’m not sure. I really liked sweet home too.

[quaint hound]

I love Cave Story. I don't think it's objectively a masterpiece or anything, but it has so much charm

[weary helm]

It was very good. I was didn’t think I was going to enjoy it much. But it is really well done.

[quaint hound]

It set the tone and quality for the entire Advent of "indie games" it's that impressive

[weary helm]

I missed it when it came out. That's when I was living in Indonesia, so I missed a lot of things for that period. Really cool game though. I may go back and do some other endings. Just really well done.

[quaint hound]

I played it around the time of release? Maybe a bit after. I enjoyed it a ton at the time as well. Never did the true ending though

[fringe salmon]

@weary helm What ending did you get?

I got a couple myself, but I think I ended on basically the "normal" one. Not the extra good ending that's apparently very hard

[weary helm]

I think I got the worst one I just saw a possible option to finish befor the month was over and I took it 😆 . I ||flew away with kazuma and the wold was devastated, but I survived.||