Featured VVVVVV Level: “Decennial Hangout” by mothbeanie and Allison Fleischer

Terry Jan 12, 2021 6 Comments

“The crew throw a party for their famous mission’s 10th anniversary” – [Author’s Description]

10 years after their “famous mission”, the crew throw a reunion party to catch up and hang out and play some games together on Vitellary’s fancy new VR headset. It turns out the crew are all budding game designers, and the first thing we do is play through a space station inspired level created by Violet. Afterwards, Vermilion nervously shows the crew something he’s been working on, which comprises the rest of the game.

This thing is charming as all hell. As you play through the game, the various in-universe crewmates chime in, offering each other supportive feedback about their levels. It’s cute and funny and the whole thing is just really nicely constructed from start to finish – it reads to me as a loving tribute to the community of level creators over the last ten years, all hanging out and talking about levels they’ve made for each other.

It’s also a kind of remarkable showcase of tricks the VVVVVV level making community has learned in the past ten years – Decennial Hangout depends on a deep knowledge of forbidden “internal scripting” tricks, and uses custom graphics and sounds, and incredibly, an all new soundtrack created just for this level (available on bandcamp here). There’s some stuff here I didn’t even realise you could do with custom VVVVVV levels.

This is my favourite entry to the jam <3

Favourite part: This whole level is fantastic, and it’s hard to pick a favourite moment without spoiling it: but one trick it repeats, which never failed to be charming, is the level designers “fixing” issues on the fly – “whoops, I made this bit too hard, sorry”.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv. This level also requires you to install some custom music and graphics – see the included readme for instructions.

Featured VVVVVV Level: “Traps R.J.” by InfoTeddy

Terry Jan 12, 2021 3 Comments

“This is a troll level fashioned after Super Mario Maker and Super Mario Maker 2 troll levels, complete with misdirection, deception, and anti-softlocks. […] I recommend playing completely blind, i.e. not knowing anything about the level at all, no spoilers, no hints.” – [Author’s Description]

More than anything else, this level is just really, really funny. It knows VVVVVV well enough to know how to make it completely fall apart, and it uses that knowledge to tell some really solid mechanical jokes. Its description as a troll level made me worry that it would be impossibly hard, but turns out it’s the *other* sort of troll level, the prankster type. (Not that it doesn’t get, er, a bit hard in some places. There is one particular room I’m thinking of here which got a little too esoteric even for me, though it’s optional.)

It’s suggested that you play this level on camera, if you can. I didn’t, not my thing. But if it’s yours, you definitely should!

Favourite part: Skip this bit if you want to go in *completely* unspoiled – but I loved the joke right at the very first checkpoint, which parodies the bizarre sub-1 minute speedruns of the game that are possible.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV Level: “6×7 Planet” by ncrecc

Terry Jan 11, 2021 3 Comments

“Viridian and the gang (part of the gang) got stuck in some other dimension-type thing again! With spikes and whatnot. Ha ha ha how does this keep happening?” – [Author’s Description]

A simple, design-focused level in a 6×7 space, with four crewmates lost down four distinct paths.

This one’s great! It has some genuinely fantastic level design, including more than one section that features a mechanical “punchline”, which I always love. It’s pretty hard in places, but the hard bits can usually be solved by rethinking your approach – at which point you can bypass the challenge. All four crewmate paths are really well designed, and the trinkets are great too. In terms of level design, I think this is the best entry in the jam.

Favourite part: After finishing this one, I went through the level in the editor to pick out a highlight, and found it hard to narrow it down to just one room. But I think my favourite bit is the transition between “More of the same” and “Haha nope”, where the level plays with your expectation that it’s going to continue to use screen wrapping, and then… doesn’t.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV Levels: 10th anniversary jam roundup

Terry Jan 10, 2021 0 Comments

Happy new year! High hopes for 2021!

Today’s the 11 year anniversary of VVVVVV’s launch. Last year, I made a big splash for it, and released the game’s source code during an AGDQ speedrun. The source code got, uh, more attention than I was expecting, especially once people actually dug into it…

Good times, good times.

Some fun stuff has happened with VVVVVV since the source code release!

• We’ve accepted and merged more than 400 pull requests, which will form part of a new version that will probably come out a little later this year. Many of these pull requests are contributions from one particularly prolific contributor (shout out to InfoTeddy)! The changes are mostly fixes for a lot of long term bugs, but also include new features like 60fps support, and improvements to the editor.
• There’s a Dreamcast port now, as well as a port for the Haiku operating system, and you can play the Make and Play edition in web browsers thanks to a webassembly port.
• At some point in the future, it’s possible there’ll be a localisation update – there’s a branch on the github that I’m watching closely for the technical side of the task!

So, I guess for other game developers thinking about doing this, here’s a data point! Only good things have happened. This whole thing has been a really positive experience, and I’m really glad I did it.

One regret: in the blog post last year, I talked about the 10th birthday game jam independently organised on Glorious Trainwrecks, and said that I’d do a round up post of the entries when the jam was over… which I never did.

A lot of time has passed, but I’d like to make up for that right now. Over the course of next week, I’m going to be posting three of my favourite entries in classic featured level style. I haven’t done this for 10 years.

There was a lot of cool stuff entered in this jam, too much for me to usefully filter here. Still, here’s an attempt: a quick roundup of other entries that I wanna encourage you to check out, beyond my three favourites:

DROD: KVD / Level 1 by EpsilonTheDerg

“My favorite puzzle series’ first level recreated in one of my favorite platformer games! Happy birthday, VVVVVV!” – [Author’s Description]

Hah! I’m a huge fan of the DROD series of puzzle games, and, as this level points out, DROD: Architects Edition was a pretty major inspiration towards the Make and Play Edition of VVVVVV. That aside, though, the two games really don’t have much in common, so I was curious how this concept was going to work.

…ok, turns out, I don’t think you can say that this combination works, exactly. Mostly, it comes down to a lot of timing challenges. But as a big fan of the game it’s referencing, I found it interesting to see the layout reinterpreted, and there’s something I really like about the sheer unlikeliness of the concept in the first place.

Favourite part: It does feature one genuine puzzle, which is how to get back into the entrance tunnel in Quince North, Twice West. The author makes it very clear in the description that this is possible, and it is!

Steamed VVVVVVams by EpsilonTheDerg

“Viridian’s Luncheon doesn’t go as planned.” – [Author’s Description]

But what if Viridian were to purchase fast food, and pass it off as their own cooking? Delightfully devilish!

This *maybe* would have been stronger if it had just stuck to the one joke, but eh, what can you do? It’s still a great level.

Favourite part: Honestly, the second I saw that icon on the glorious trainwrecks page, I couldn’t wait to play this.

VVVVVV: Moonfall by Azure48

“As for the title, it’s from a dream I had a few months back, about a nonexistent sequel to VVVVVV called VVVVVV:Moonfall. The story would’ve tied into it, but I never got that far.” – [Author’s Description]

Rather than a .vvvvvv level, this one’s a pico-8 demake of VVVVVV. While it’s very unfinished, it’s worth checking out anyway for its charming atmosphere and wonderful demade version of the original soundtrack.

Favourite part: It really is super impressive that so much of the original soundtrack is remade in Pico-8’s synth, and it sounds fantastic. I happily stood around in empty rooms so I could hear everything.

The Groceries by Lollipop

“Viridian has to go buy the groceries, but of course, there are some small inconveniences along the way…” – [Author’s Description]

I’m not sure where to start! This very story-heavy level opens with a cutscene where Violet asks Viridian to go out and buy some groceries – which they don’t want to do because they’re sick (this hits a bit different after 2020). After Viridian says no a few times, Violet tricks them and locks them outside the ship, and off we go.

On the way, Viridian takes a train trip, and bumps into lots of random people who proceed to argue with them about morality, philosophy, and in one case just try to bully them into getting a drink from the dining cart for some reason. The whole thing has a kind of a strange, fanfic energy, in a good way? The final section when you actually get to the store is pretty strong in particular.

Favourite part: The store section is good, but so is the bizarre quiz section that occurs about halfway through, where an AI needs to check that you’re “not a robot” before it’ll let you continue by quizzing you on the events in the level so far.

Simulation by nicholas

“Vitellary makes a simulation for adventure-seeking Viridian! Nothing wrong should happen, right?” – [Author’s Description]

Ok, so, I think I’m pretty good at VVVVVV? Maybe I’m a bit rusty, I guess? But I could get *absolutely* nowhere with this one. This is definitely one of the hardest VVVVVV levels I can remember seeing. I know that a lot of VVVVVV player levels skew hard, so I guess it shouldn’t be a huge surprise that there’d be at least one entry in this jam that was just beyond my skills.

Still, it was pretty clear from the first room (in the screenshot above) that this was a competently made thing, and I was curious about what the rest of the level was like – so I turned on invincibility mode, and went exploring.

What I found was frankly terrifying. Lots of really, really hard challenges, but all tightly tuned and carefully designed. Clearly a tonne of work went in this! If you like VVVVVV, but think that it’s just, like, way too easy, you’ll find this interesting. I, for one, would love to watch a successful playthrough.

Favourite part: If you view the map screen, the name of the level is written vertically along the side, which is cute.

Pointy Hazards by ureytw

“Phew, I made it! This is a song i made inspired by the Soundtrack. Enjoy, and happy VVVVVV 10th anniversary. :)” – [Author’s Description]

Not a .vvvvvv level this time, instead, just a really, really great tune inspired by the VVVVVV soundtrack.

Favourite part: That bit that starts at 33 seconds is *killer*. Uff, what a banger.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV Level: “Deja Verdigris” by Ciolf

Terry Nov 16, 2011 2 Comments

Here’s another short level I thought was cool. Ciolf’s Deja Verdigris is built around the idea of repeating the same rooms over and over again, adding some small thing to it with each iteration.

It’s tough, but not just for the sake of being tough – here the build up of difficulty across the loops is integral to the concept, setting you up for a final difficult challenge that you’ve been preparing for. Having multiple loops starting from scratch also results in the level having a really nice rollercoaster difficulty curve – something that can be hard to do well, and works great here.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV level: “CCCCCCCCCC Retold” by Whirligig

Terry Nov 7, 2011 3 Comments

Whirligig’s CCCCCCCCCC is an incredibly cool little game that you should definitely check out if you haven’t already played it – Whirligig bills it as a demake-slash-sequel to VVVVVV, but really, it’s very much its own thing with its own ideas.

CCCCCCCCCC Retold is a re-imagining of that game as a VVVVVV level. I was expecting a pretty straight conversion, but it’s actually very different – while lots of the basic structural ideas remain (the story, the zones), the content itself is all new. It’s huge too – probably the biggest player level since Dimension 333333.

In places it’s way too tough for it’s own good – one of its 10 stages is a mandatory Vini Vidi Vici style challenge – but on the whole, the difficulty is pretty reasonable – easier overall than some other levels I’ve featured.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV level: “Quantum Tunnel” by Martze

Terry Sep 29, 2011 9 Comments

“Quantum Tunnel” is a new level by Martze, creator of the previously featured level “Soul Searching“. While that level briefly touched on a room duality idea, this level explores the idea in much, much more detail, using a long 20×2 sized world to combine warp lines and world wrapping in a very clever way.

This is the sort of VVVVVV level I really love to see – succinctly designed, light hearted and imaginative, more interested in exploring cool ideas than presenting you with difficult challenges. Highly recommended.

To play a VVVVVV player level, extract the .vvvvvv file into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV Level: Bonus Roundup, Part 3

Terry Sep 21, 2011 3 Comments

Time for one last bonus round up! Five more little levels I liked lots:

“roomerBang” by DcTurner

This short level is lots of fun and extremely polished (which is no surprise considering it’s by the animator who made this). Loved the writing in this one too.

“LOVE V 2.0” by Ashley Gwinnell

Here’s another level that uses trinkets as keys! I really loved the structure of the main hub in this one, and the style of using the bright neon pink lab tileset for each room.

“Mineshaft” by Kadir

My favourite bit of this level is the second trinket, past the “Vent” room – Kadir set out to make a level that had a “strong sense of place”, and that’s where it comes across best. (The rest of level is great too!)

“Under Wraps” by Kurosen

Like “Devious Dimentions” in the previous post, this level is set in a very constrained world – but it takes the concept further than that level did, with lots of warping rooms and heavy use of screen edge warp lines.

“Space Station XCIV” by Danboe

This is actually one of the first custom levels posted to the forum, and the first level I saw to do the whole roomtext as roomnames thing. Although it’s a bit hard (impossible?) in places, it’s a dimension that’s a lot of fun to explore thanks to its attention to detail and very open structure.

Ok! Hope you enjoy these; I’ll be back to posting single featured levels next week. You can download this set from here:

To play a these VVVVVV player levels, extract the .vvvvvv files into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV level: Bonus roundup, Part 2

Terry Sep 17, 2011 3 Comments

Hope you’ve been enjoying the last set of levels from the roundup the other day! Continuing through my list, here are another five levels from my list of fifteen. Once again, these ones are a little rough compared to other levels I’ve featured, but they’re all awesome in their own way, and worth checking out.

“DSS Ideal X” by CHz

I almost featured this one on it’s own; it’s an extremely strong level – probably the best from this list of 15, if I’m honest. It’s bloody hard in places, but if that doesn’t put you off then I recommend it highly. It’s inventive, well designed, and has a pretty good story too.

“There and Back Again” by QualityJeverage

A level split in two paths, one easy, one hard. Both paths are good fun!

“The Sacred Grounds” by Requiem

This is a level inspired by the infamous secret hell level from Cave Story – but thankfully, not nearly as hard at the reference might lead you to believe! While it follows the structure of the Cave Story level pretty closely, it’s worth playing for its own spin on the level design. I particularly liked the interpretation of the Heavy Press miniboss!

“Jail Break” by YouKnow

A very short one next – Jail Break is a very neatly designed level with some cool ideas – including one section (in the screenshot above) that must have been a nightmare to script. This one’s not too hard either.

“Devious Dimentions” by Ferrety

This one’s set in a tiny, densely packed 5×3 world – there are a lot of little things I like about this one, but my favourite part is how it uses trinkets to encourage you to poke around in it’s various corners rather than as extra challenges.

You can get these five levels from the download below. I’ll post the final five soon!

To play a these VVVVVV player levels, extract the .vvvvvv files into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv

Featured VVVVVV level: Bonus roundup, Part 1

Terry Sep 11, 2011 1 Comments

Since the new version of VVVVVV launched, there have been a lot of amazing levels made for it – too many for me to cover, really. When I pick levels to feature, I try to stick to the best of the best – the ones that do something really special. Unfortunately, this means that a lot of great levels get overlooked…

So, I’ve decided to do a few roundup posts to highlight a few other levels I really liked, which you’ve probably missed unless you’ve been reading my forum!

These levels are a little rough around the edges compared to other levels that I’ve featured – some are glitchy, some are really hard, some are unpolished – but I think they’re all levels that fans of VVVVVV will enjoy a lot. There are 15 in all; here are the first five!

“Virtual V” by Vimol

This is a great little level that has a bit of a Manic Miner feel. It makes some pretty fantastic use of roomtext.

“Reactor Disaster” by Kris Asick (Gemini)

Reactor Disaster is a fairly large level with a lot of scripting. It’s quite hard, but very polished, and it has a lot of interesting challenges.

“Mirror rorriM” by PJBottomz

On the other end of the scale, PJBottom’z Mirror rorriM has no challenges at all; no spikes and no enemies. I liked it for its simplicity and singular focus.

“Castle Darkdeath” by Hatless

I found Castle Darkdeath utterly charming; it has some incredibly rough edges, but also some really imaginative challenges.

“The RYB maze” by S. Piqueras

The RYB maze I like because it’s so different from other VVVVVV levels – I found it really got interesting for me when I got as far as the room titled “The Bouncy, much much better edition”. I recommend sticking with it, even if you’re finding it a little confusing at the start!

You can get all five levels from the download below. I’ll post the other 10 over the next week!

To play a these VVVVVV player levels, extract the .vvvvvv files into your VVVVVV levels folder. On windows, that should be in My Documents/VVVVVV, on Mac it’s Documents/VVVVVV, on Linux it’s ~/.vvvvvv