MFGG - Mario Fan Games Galaxy

Review Information

Game Reviewed	Fencing, by Roo
Review Author	Cap'n Coconuts
Created	Aug 9 2014, 4:02 PM

General Commentary and Game Overview

It took me a while to come up with a good opinion of this game, as I couldn't make up my mind about it. Was it extremely brilliant or hardly worth a mention to others? Or is it somewhere in the middle?

Well, after giving it some thought and carefully analyzing the gameplay, I decided it was hardly worth a mention to others (inherent weirdness notwithstanding). Unless you feel compelled to play weird games (particularly Roo's flavor of weird), there is just about nothing for you here. May I suggest you play something else instead?

Pros	+ Is certainly original (not to mention weird)
Cons	- Apparently no music - Some sounds may not be authentic Game Boy sounds - Checkpoint starvation - No apparent way to heal, even in-between levels - Difficulty spike in level 3 - Trial and error gameplay - Checkpoint starvation + difficulty spike = screw this, I'm playing something else

Impressions

Gameplay 4 / 10	You're given the two Mario Bros. to play as. Mario has 3 hitpoints. Luigi has 2 hitpoints but can jump higher. In all other aspects save their sprites, they seem to be exactly the same. Unfortunately you have no healing whatsoever, so those hitpoints are all you get. You are unable to stomp enemies in this game. People familiar with Mario games will try to stomp the first spikeless enemy they see, and will feel cheated when suddenly they find they have one heart less than they did one second ago. Nowhere is it mentioned that you cannot stomp enemies (not even in the manual) so I have to file that under "bad game design". In level 2, you encounter cyclops Goombas which are not knocked back when struck. Once again, the game and the manual fail to tell us a thing. It would seem that Roo expects everyone to learn how to play the game through trial and error, to the annoyance of almost everyone. This game does not seem to have any checkpoints--or at least, not any before finishing level 3. This is unfortunate because level 3 features a difficulty spike in the form of a bulky hammer brother. Somehow this hammer brother is able to throw hammers in a straight horizontal line when his official cousins threw them in an arc. Due to the floaty jump physics this game has, it's difficult to get even close to him. And let me repeat--there are no checkpoints. If you die, you get to start right from the beginning! Move on little ones, nothing to see here.
Graphics 3 / 10	The thing I don't like about the graphics is that they feel... crude. The backgrounds for levels 1 and 2 look like they were made in a minute at most with the spray can and fill tools. The sprites for the Mario Brothers and the princess are no better. There are some people who dislike the SMB3 Mario sprites because he looks like a crude Play-Doh sculpture. Now take that Play-Doh sculpture and exaggerate its flaws, removing apparently unnecessary features like eyes and overalls, and you wind up with Roo's sprites. Not to mention that their animation leaves much to be desired. Despite having legs, they WADDLE through the levels (and their noses wiggle for some odd reason). They also lack arms and their swords have no hilts. Or maybe their swords ARE their arms. It wouldn't be surprising, seeing as they are both freaks of nature to start with. Come to think of it, just about everything in this game has stiff, weak animation. The cyclops Goombas, the Koopas, the princess, the boss at the end of level 3, the flames... just about everything. The strange humanoid creatures that do nothing have the most interesting animation despite not even moving (are these the "Shy Guys" mentioned in this game's manual? They look nothing like Shy Guys, but then, nothing looks like it ought to in this game). Actually, that last parenthetical sentence is an excellent summary of this section. Just about nothing looks like it ought to in this game, and that is not a compliment. The sprites are crude and their stiff animation is depressing, in a bad way.
Sound 3 / 10	There is virtually no music. For Redemption, one of Roo's other games, this worked out nicely (and that game at least had music in some situations) but this game seems to lack it entirely. Maybe there's some after the third level, but who knows? I'm not going to bother thanks to that difficulty spike + checkpoint starvation combination. There are a few sound effects. Some of them sound unlike anything I've heard before on the Game Boy, which is not a good thing as this game was submitted to the second minigame competition where the whole point was to make a Game Boy game with one of those enhanced SGB or GBC palettes. Now it's entirely possible Roo managed to generate those with the GB's waveform channel, but given the lack of effort in other departments I doubt he bothered to do that.
Replay 1 / 10	This game does not encourage me to play it again in any way, thanks to the aforementioned lack of checkpoints and the difficulty spike in level 3. To my knowledge there are no unlockables and if there are any secret areas (the manual implies there are), I am not motivated in any way to look for them.

Final Words

It has this air of weirdness Roo is known for, but take that away and you wind up with an unremarkable and forgettable game. Nothing to see here, folks.

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