VGS Christmas Contest 2022 [ENDED]

[darkchylde28 1,329]

Just now, Gloves said:

I've had layouts generated which were literally impossible to pass, which can be incredibly frustrating lol.

I ran into a few that seemed like it, but typically there are/were invisible blocks somewhere that made them passable ("too tall" pipes).  There were definitely a lot of random spots in the underworld that weren't passable if you weren't large Grinch/Mario and didn't have a serious hurry on.  The arguable glitch that did me in actually made me bust out laughing at the absurdity.  I died when Bowser, of all things, popped out of a question mark block, lol!

[Gloves 9,576]

2 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

I ran into a few that seemed like it, but typically there are/were invisible blocks somewhere that made them passable ("too tall" pipes).  There were definitely a lot of random spots in the underworld that weren't passable if you weren't large Grinch/Mario and didn't have a serious hurry on.  The arguable glitch that did me in actually made me bust out laughing at the absurdity.  I died when Bowser, of all things, popped out of a question mark block, lol!

The room following a Bowser had a literally unpassable wall of blocks with a single coin in it. I jumped around looking for invisible blocks or anything to help me get past it but it wasn't possible to progress.

[darkchylde28 1,329]

1 minute ago, Gloves said:

The room following a Bowser had a literally unpassable wall of blocks with a single coin in it. I jumped around looking for invisible blocks or anything to help me get past it but it wasn't possible to progress.

Weird, I didn't run into anything quite like that while playing it.  However, on the first or second try, as I was warming up to how it played, I did run into a situation where I encountered a Bowser on a bridge with an axe at the end, grabbed the axe, dropped Bowser, and then the game force-marched me into a pit as it did the required animation after defeating a boss, lol.  Some say these are glitches, I say it's all part of the charm of it being totally random.  And perhaps the cause of some pulled out and/or whitened hair. 

[Gloves 9,576]

9 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

Weird, I didn't run into anything quite like that while playing it.  However, on the first or second try, as I was warming up to how it played, I did run into a situation where I encountered a Bowser on a bridge with an axe at the end, grabbed the axe, dropped Bowser, and then the game force-marched me into a pit as it did the required animation after defeating a boss, lol.  Some say these are glitches, I say it's all part of the charm of it being totally random.  And perhaps the cause of some pulled out and/or whitened hair. 

Yeah I got the axe + forced walk animation into an impassable wall. Seems to be something up perhaps with the randomizer when doing that animation and picking the next phase. It LOOKED like there might be an invisible block to hit and let me over, but no luck:

[koifish 373]

well so much for me hoping to hold onto second. I can't keep the persistence up enough to get through things and not fudge it somewhere. Good on @Avgn Gamer and @darkchylde28 being able to run this game ragged.

[Gloves 9,576]

Just playing for fun before bed and I get yet another impossible to pass section.

[The Grinch 31]

Thank you all for playing
And now The Grinch must depart
But one final update
To declare WHO won the cart...

On 12/18/2022 at 6:16 PM, ZeldaFreak said:

• LEADERBOARD

1. Avgn Gamer - 1,031
2. darkchylde28 - 675
3. koifish - 196
4. CT - 191
5. BlackVega - 146
6. NESfiend - 133

• THE GRINCH'S FINAL DISTANCE:
• 118

 

Congratulations, @NESfiend
I'll send an IM to finish the deal
And once the gift has been received
The identity of The Grinch shall be revealed

[spacepup 1,945]

Ohh Mr. Ginch, take a look at that
Thought you were so clever,
that you'd win right off the bat
You thought you'd be the best
And beat all the rest
But boy did they clobber you in your sly little 'test'
Now the game is done
The others clearly won
It's time to reveal yourself,
And then you better run!
Boy this was a lot of fun!!

[NESfiend 1,287]

9 hours ago, The Grinch said:

Thank you all for playing
And now The Grinch must depart
But one final update
To declare WHO won the cart...

 

Congratulations, @NESfiend
I'll send an IM to finish the deal
And once the gift has been received
The identity of The Grinch shall be revealed

I cant believe it! I never win stuff like this, infamously bad luck. Thanks so much for the prize and everything that went into this contest. I had a lot of fun with this game and was considering buying one if I didnt win. 

The Grinch aspect of this contest was awesome. It really saved the contest too. I, nor anyone else probably, would have kept playing after AVGN broke the game. Kept it fun and interesting even knowing the top spot was locked up. Id certainly encourage contest organizers to do more stuff like that in the future. Thanks again! Cant wait to get my first 8-bit xmas cart!!

[NESfiend 1,287]

Sorry to double post, but I meant to ask if we will ever get to find out which user played the grinch?

[Jeevan 7,369]

1 hour ago, NESfiend said:

Congratulations, @NESfiend
I'll send an IM to finish the deal
And once the gift has been received
The identity of The Grinch shall be revealed

@NESfiend it shall be revealed when the Grinch wants to   

[spacepup 1,945]

We scared him off.  Good riddance!

[ZeldaFreak 2,889]

Alrighty! Sorry about the delay, BUT, with distances of 1,031, 675, & 196 respectively, @Avgn Gamer has won in 1st place, @darkchylde28 has won in 2nd place, @koifish has won in 3rd place, and thankfully @The Grinch has already taken care of selecting the winner of the 8-bit Xmas 2022 cart, which will go to @NESfiend with a distance of 133 over The Grinch's Final Distance of 118! Congrats, you all did super well, and you all will be PMed shortly!

As always, thank you all for participating!

@Avgn Gamer @darkchylde28 @koifish @CT @BlackVega @NESfiend  @TDIRunner @Gloves @JamesRobot @Gaia Gensouki @Deadeye @PII @Bearcat-Doug

That about does it! With all that said and done, the 2022 VGS Christmas Contest has come to a close! I hope you all had a good time with this one, and I'm glad you all seemed to enjoy The Grinch twist, I'm very glad that all seemed to work out very well

Hope to see you all again next event!

[The Grinch 31]

[NESfiend 1,287]

Well, it turns out @JamesRobotwas participating in disguise. He was the grinch all along. No wonder he was always "one step behind" the grinch - both scores were his own! I just put this thing in the NES and the xmas lights are dazzling. Seeing what all the hype has been about over the years of 8-bit xmas games. Thanks again for a tremendous competition, one of the coolest prizes I have ever won in any form or fashion, and a grade A acting job. Great way to close the holiday. Hope everyone had a great one. 

[a3quit4s 3,073]

I got a solid 28 distance when I finally got around to playing the new 8bit Xmas. I’m seriously dumbfounded at the scores. I only got like a half hour of play time but still. Damn. 

[darkchylde28 1,329]

46 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

I got a solid 28 distance when I finally got around to playing the new 8bit Xmas. I’m seriously dumbfounded at the scores. I only got like a half hour of play time but still. Damn. 

There's a huge factor of luck involved, but there's also large elements of recognition and repetition involved.  I haven't played it nearly long enough to be able to say for certain what's going on, but it becomes clear fairly quickly that something like your score at a certain part in one of the three sections of the game (underworld, overworld, and sky--yes, the big trees in the sky are up there, although vines tend to be rare) dictates what the next portion of that section is going to be, as there are a lot of repeating sections in each one.

There's a bit of skill in being able to recognize each next section you're going into quickly so you can speed through it as quickly and best as possible (as there are some sections that are bereft or nearly bereft of coins), as well as being able to go between the overworld and underworld as constantly as possible (since the beginnings/ends of those sections more or less repeat and are just free distance).  One thing that helped me do this most effectively was when I recognized that only those pipes that extend through the ground at the bottom of the screen will take you back and forth between the different sections (and only ones that stick up out of the ground, as there are sections with pipes whose tops are even with the ground and extend downward but don't go anywhere).  The luck kicks in with you receiving more areas that you recognize in a row than ones you don't, as well as the frequency that pipes that can be traveled appear; also, that the game doesn't randomly throw Cheep Cheeps up through the ground at you in places that it hasn't before, seemingly because you're doing too well, lol.

It's far from easy, but there is some method to the madness, and despite it seeming so, the game isn't truly random.  I truly think that what section you see next is directly affected by your score, and possibly whether you're small, big, or fire Mario/Grinch when you approach the end of one section of an area and the beginning of the next, so some truly ridiculous scores might be possible if that idea proves to be true and someone figures out the pattern.  Being able to predict or even control what you're walking into next would make the sky the limit as far as scores are concerned.

[JamesRobot 4,799]

2 hours ago, NESfiend said:

Well, it turns out @JamesRobotwas participating in disguise. He was the grinch all along. No wonder he was always "one step behind" the grinch - both scores were his own! I just put this thing in the NES and the xmas lights are dazzling. Seeing what all the hype has been about over the years of 8-bit xmas games. Thanks again for a tremendous competition, one of the coolest prizes I have ever won in any form or fashion, and a grade A acting job. Great way to close the holiday. Hope everyone had a great one. 

 

Congratulations!  I'm glad you are able to experience 8Bit Xmas in all it's glory for the first time.  The blinky lights really are cool and this is one of my favorite games from the 8Bit Xmas series.

I hope everyone enjoyed this as much as I did.  I conceived of a Grinch style contest the moment I played the demo and decided I wanted to do a giveaway where anybody who beat my score could win the cart.  

Thanks to the events team, mods and admins, particularly @ZeldaFreak, for letting me shoehorn my idea into the already planned 2022 Xmas contest.  And thanks to @Gloves; it was his idea to create The Grinch profile that allowed me to play the part.  Anybody who mentioned The Grinch by name got a reply, which is why I had such a good banter going with @Avgn Gamer.  So thanks to everyone who engaged and made this contest such a blast. 

And one last shout out to @Avgn Gamer and @darkchylde28 for putting up such monster scores.  I figured there would be some Super Mario pros in this contest and you guys did not disappoint. 

[Avgn Gamer 557]

50 minutes ago, JamesRobot said:

 

Congratulations!  I'm glad you are able to experience 8Bit Xmas in all it's glory for the first time.  The blinky lights really are cool and this is one of my favorite games from the 8Bit Xmas series.

I hope everyone enjoyed this as much as I did.  I conceived of a Grinch style contest the moment I played the demo and decided I wanted to do a giveaway where anybody who beat my score could win the cart.  

Thanks to the events team, mods and admins, particularly @ZeldaFreak, for letting me shoehorn my idea into the already planned 2022 Xmas contest.  And thanks to @Gloves; it was his idea to create The Grinch profile that allowed me to play the part.  Anybody who mentioned The Grinch by name got a reply, which is why I had such a good banter going with @Avgn Gamer.  So thanks to everyone who engaged and made this contest such a blast. 

And one last shout out to @Avgn Gamer and @darkchylde28 for putting up such monster scores.  I figured there would be some Super Mario pros in this contest and you guys did not disappoint. 

It was so fun playing along, always a treat to join events 

[CT 17]

I ended up buying a cartridge, cant wait to play it on my console.