I'm hitting 1000 soon-ish here, so I will give away an awesome game. I have talked about it before. My youngest brother did concept and incidental art for the project. I backed it on Kickstarter. The developer still supports the game with patches. The most recent one came out last week.

It is not on GOG (yet?). I will give the winner a choice of the game on or on [url=http://www.desura.com/games/elliot-quest]Desura.

The game is a scrolling platformer with lite rpg elements, reminiscent of zelda 2.

To enter, say you are in and tell me about your love for platformers or metroidvanias - 2 genres I am not heavily into. The recent glut of artistic indies has drawn me back in. I am enjoying the music and visuals. But I am still no good at platformers. and I'm not sure I even understand what exactly a metroidvania is.

Alternately, tell me about your love for Zelda 2 - the unloved Zelda. Why do you love it in spite of the disdain?

Rules:
1. In for yourself only, but the winner can do whatever he/she pleases with the prize.
2. Be human... or half-human. Thespian! Leonard! Sigh...
3. If in, say you're in and participate in the discussion.
4. If you win, tell me which platform.
5. I will let this run till next Friday night.

Cheers!

I'm not familiar with Elliot Quest, but I just looked it up on Desura - it looks pretty good, so I'm in! Congratulations on 1000 rep, that's a pretty impressive milestone.

I think my love of platformers is because that's where I started. We had a couple of game systems pre-NES, which I played games on. I was 10 when the NES came out, and we got one shortly after release. I played hours and hours of games like Super Mario Brothers, Blaster Master, Mega Man etc.

I'm not sure what a Metroidvania is either. I played lots and lots of Metroid on the NES (it's one of a select few NES games I finished multiple times), but I never really thought of it as its own genre.

Not in, but will gladly help push you over the edge with a +1.

i'm in one entry please

Not in, but congrats on 1000 and +1 for the giveaway!

I remember running into Elliot's Quest while it was in development. It was built using a fully javascript/html5 engine called ImpactJS -- it's very cool and encouraging to see it getting a lot of positive attention and press because I think "platform-free" native Javascript game development is pretty neat.

So my take on it: the term Metroidvania became a thing primarily because of Super Metroid & Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, which were two landmark, well-received, and highly beloved games released in a similar era that both offered exploratory non-linear "open-world" 2D platforming. The key difference here vs. other 2D platformers at the time is that the experience is "open-world" and non-linear, and that they also included some elements of RPG mechanics like item-gathering and leveling (in Castlevania: SOTN).

To be sure, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link was one of the first to do this, but it wasn't all that well received or understood at the time. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest was also one of the first to offer an open-world exploratory 2D platforming world and had items and RPG elements, also something cool which was the real-time passage of time and a day/night mechanic that influenced game interactions and progression. Casltevania II was also pretty misunderstood at the time, though I remember when I first played it when it came out I was hooked and thought it one of the most innovative/best games of the era.

Two other early games that I think heavily influenced non-linear open-world play are the original Metroid, which came before Zelda II and Castlevania II (but which lacked more of the RPG-type elements) and the original Metal Gear.

You are welcome to enter if you fulfill all the requirements.

Congrats, I'm in too. I saw a couple of videos for this game, and I loved it from the first moment. It seems a nice, good, old-looking platformers with no puzzles (because pretty much all platformers titles those days are PUZZLE platformers), so thanks for the chance :)

I'm in. (Just found out that people make giveaways in the forums)

I'll be in for the Steam version, thank you ^__^

It's no secret that I love platformers. I fondly remember the days of Super Mario Brothers, not being able to save, the system getting so hot that it shut down... and yet finally being able to win the game~! Woohoo~! haha

I've played through Donkey Kong 64 and the Donkey Kong Country games more times than I can count, and I'm always on the lookout for a new platformer to love ^__^

not in, but congrats!

I want to love platformers, but for whatever I suck at playing them, and I die a lot. Every few months I see a new one that I think will be the one, I buy it, and wind up rage quitting. It's a vicious cycle I can't get out of.

edit: this has been going on since Super Mario for NES

So what makes this game a metroidvania? I'm just ignorant looking for help with the term... Thanks, Hi! Welcome. Please read the rules again and join the discussion to qualify. Thanks!

that's pretty cool! Also congrats on the stars! :D

Not in & +1 :)

Well the object of the game is to level up your character, plus there is some back-tracking within the levels. But the story just makes it so good and the fighting mechanics work really well! It's about a character named Dust who lost his memory, but must gain it back. I really hope they make a sequel someday. I highly recommend Dust: An Elysian Tail! :)

Congrats on the 1000 points! I'm in for Elliot on Steam.

It actually was Super Metroid that did me in. I had played the original Nintendo game and was not interested. But, something happened while I was playing on a demo machine at the store which had the Super Metroid cart installed… That game was the one and only reason I HAD to buy a SNES!

Later a friend let me borrow a Final Fantasy cart for the SNES which moved me into the RPG genre, but that's another story.