I have logged in a lot of hours into this game and I have not reached Olmec. But the sense of accomplishment when you beat a level is priceless. It made me happy and not many games do that to me.
If you played with another friend, it is much easier because if one dies, the other could resurrect the dead player in the next level. This is how both of my daughters are playing now.
Same here. That’s about as far as I ever made it too. It’s just one of the hardest games ever made, and as far as I can tell, there’s no real reason to pour hours into it to get better, since I don’t enjoy the core gameplay anyway. Why spend that long to get better? For what purpose?
Why not just play a game that’s less hard and more fun while you’re playing it?
It’s funny, because it’s not like I’m usually horrible at platformers, but this isn’t like a traditional platformer I guess. It’s more like I’m not observant enough.
It’s kinda funny… I was being careful because I was on the 4th mine level and I really wanted to make it. I got a shotgun, which I’ve never had, and shot a spitting snake. Well, the shotgun has kickback and I fell over the edge, got hit by an arrow shooting trap, which then landed me on a spike and I died.
This was the first rogue lite ever, so the reasoning probably applies to newer members of the genre, but the key for me is to enjoy the journey rather than the destination. Let each run tell its own story. I hate the repetition of hard platformers, but spelunky is sufficiently different in each run. Also, it’s not that hard. You can focus on small goals, like unlocking the shortcut to the next area. The shortcut will allow you to practice the dynamics of the new area, and often leads to more interesting situations than if you start the game from scratch. Also, it’s important to know that some items just suck and don’t help you.
I was so proud of myself. I triggered the arrow trap to shoot the shopkeeper and then threw a bomb to kill him. And then the next level he killed me. I didn’t realize dead shopkeepers had memories.
Heh. I bow to your leet skillz. And everyone else in this thread.
It’s certainly easier than most platformers that were so popular on old consoles, of which I am not a fan. Except for metal slug. That thing is sweet. But really, Spelunky is just pattern recognition, and slowly learning to master the patterns. Want a hard game? Necrodancer with the high level characters is hard. And you can’t see the ending unless you master them. I’m still salty.
Rob,
Some advice I gave you some time back might be helpful to refresh!
Once you kill a shopkeeper, all further shopkeepers are immediately hostile. In addition, every level (starting with the level after you killed one) exit will have a shopkeeper guarding it for the rest of the game. Until you are ‘good’ at the game, avoid killing them.
I made it to the second jungle level! …
But I didn’t have any bombs so I couldn’t build the shortcut. I rarely run out of bombs, but I did that time. I was definitely easier to make it to the exit when I didn’t worry about collecting stuff.
Because of this thread I re-downloaded the freeware. My first thought was why are the graphics so tiny. Then it was, oh yeah. 2009. what was my resolution then? 1024x768?
Buy the HD version on Steam! It’s so good and so worth it!
I found a gif I made from a recording I took while I played. I was sure I posted it when it happened (several years ago) but couldn’t find it, above. I’m pretty damned good at whipping those arrows out of the air - though honestly, it’s been a minute since I played a lot of Spelunky. I keep thinking I’ll wait for the sequel…
Man, this looks a lot like Rick Dangerous from the AMiGA.
More specifically, you cannot have the muscle memory both for the original and the HD version at the same time. They made slight changes to the behavior (like automatically clinging to cliffs) that makes them look similar but play quite differently.
It’s 180MB, and it should never leave your hard drive.
Aww man, I thought if I gave tunnel man a bomb I’d get my tunnel. I’ve got to give him more stuff. :-(
Yes, I know I’m spoiler tagging something most people know but you never know when someones going to pull this off the backlog.
My honest advice is to ignore the shortcuts - the early levels help you build up a stock pile of items and resources, once you are good enough to avoid taking damage in the mines for example, that’s four extra levels of goodies you can have for the tougher, later stages.
Though practicing in the new zones can be useful, I found I started to do a lot better when I worked my way to the later levels, such as the Jungle and Temple, because it became easier and easier to get to them, and then it became easier and easier to become adapt at those levels, too.
Also, I said this years ago and I still stand by it - turn off the music. It’s just adding stress, especially when the ghost comes out, while you are learning the game at least.
I agree with this. I never take the shortcuts.
But shortcuts are the only way I’ll ever get through :-)
Even if I don’t care about the score so much you think I should skip them?