I used the Level Editor to make a level for the Mac Game DIAMONDS. It’s complicated to explain, but if you can throw Marble Madness and Arkanoid into a Blender, you come close to it.
I call the level “Suicide is Painless”
In the level, you have to commit to a choice early on in the level that you KNOW will kill your ball or force you to abandon it. [which is essentially the same thing, just with a smidge of dignity.] However, after you commit suicide, the board remembers how far you got. You come back into the board with the remembered state, but you no longer have to commit to the choice you had on your first ball. You can complete another part of the level with your second ball. After the first two parts are completed, you can move on to the third part.
The third part is nothing but an area filled with the highest scoring bricks in the game. You can collect these bricks without penalty. It doesn’t hurt that you are given more than enough of these bricks to grind out the points to earn an extra ball bonus.
Super Mario, We’re gonna do this, Ok. You and me Mario… Good thing I have W Blue Square Lives.
Still funny to watch. I cringe at the use of the F word, but, I think frankly, that port needed it, and then some.
Everything you can possibly walk on is moving. In different directions. And sometimes tips you off into the lava. Your enemies constantly respawn until you get to the end, but you are on a conveyor belt moving backwards. You can’t make forward progress and use your weapon at the same time. Reloading takes a looooong time.
You need to perform some repetitive task perfectly hundreds of times (like, say, dodging lightning bolts), and need to start over from the beginning if you make one mistake.
And yes, I did find the lightning dodging minigame in Final Fantasy X just a little aggravating.
Not really analogous, though, since you had a discrete choice of where to step onto ice, and if you found that one spot landed you in water or other hazards, then you just avoided stepping onto that spot in the future.
Damn. That’s going to be one tough level. I’m sure anyone who plays it would really like to have some sort of loud-mouth fairy helper who can [del]bug the hell out of them[/del] give useful advice at all times.
This level requires you to move pixel by pixel or risk falling off a curving path and starting all over. At the end, you have to make a jump, but to jump high you have to look upwards but to see when to jump you have to look downwards. Monsters that come at you can physically bump you off the path. The sound for this level is an annoying siren that you can’t silence or turn off because you need to hear the monsters coming. You need to hear the monsters because the entire level is pitch black. The path is a rat maze with multiple dead ends. If you reach a dead end, you can’t turn around. You have to walk backwards. The only way to tell where you are is that the screen is always centered on you. The entire level is roughly 10 miles across but the twists and turns make it actually 50 miles. It takes 40 hours to navigate the maze. There are no saves or waypoints. If you idle in the game to use the bathroom, monsters will come and knock you off the path. At the end of the maze is a key that you have to pick up and then bring all the way back to the entrance, but a whole series of walls shift and makes a new maze for the return trip. All mazes are randomized so you can’t get a map from the internet. This level is not required to pass the game, but you get 1 additional point for doing it. Otherwise, the maximum score is 99 out of 100. 3 guys in the whole world have scored 100 out of 100, you would be the 4th. If you do get 100 points, you get an additional 5 second splash screen (not a movie.)
Ha ha, I remember beating that minigame. A day well spent!
You know what would enhance the worst game level ever? Playing it many years later on a computer it can’t quite be correctly configured for, so it will freeze up at the most inopportune times. Yes, I am currently playing Final Fantasy 7…
Oh, I don’t think anyone’s mentioned the minigame I dread, tone-matching! Listen to the computer spew out a quick series of electronic notes and then fight your way to the crystal-whacking chamber and hit the dozen crystals with the right order and timing to recreate the notes. I have no musical ability so I just gaze at this one in despair. Of course since this is the worst game level ever you could do it backwards, while dodging enemies, in a room filled with hp-draining mist.
There needs to be a couple riddle-based puzzles in there somewhere. Ideally, these riddles should be based on information that is not available anywhere in game.
You forgot to include the phrase “poorly translated”, and possibly the word “misspelled”.
Also good would be choosing a font that is only readable on an HDTV. That’s not a big concern for most gamers, but before I upgraded, NCAA Football and Dead Rising were unplayable.
