In this installment of Games From the Frog's Box, I'm finally taking a dip into the venerable abyss that is Super Mario World hacking, with one of my favorite short hacks. Don't worry- there's still a LOT to dig into with this one.
THE BRUTAL DREAM is a collaboration between five authors- Daizo Dee Von, EvilGuy0613, NopeContest, Big Brawler, and Wakana. It was made in tribute to the legendary, and sadly unfinished SMW hack Brutal Mario. Every level in here is a tribute to some franchise, to celebrate that hack's tendency to toss anything and everything into SMW's mechanics- but with all the polish and custom sheen that the SMW scene's learned over the past decades.
It's wonderful. So let's get into it.
STORY:
There is actually a story in this hack, not that it matters a whole lot. Basically, Mario's finally beaten Bowser once and for all, and decides to enforce his rule as King over the entire Mushroom Kingdom.
Sadly, the hack is too short to really take advantage of this, but the opening cutscene is still a great way to get hyped up for the gauntlet ahead.
STAGE 1: JOURNEY'S BEGINNING
Starting off rather subdued, with a Yoshi's island tileset and music from Legend of Valkyrie, Brutal Dream goes the route of easing you into its particular brand of wild creativity. What is apparent right off the bat, though, is that this hack looks gorgeous. Not a single vanilla tile to be found here.
The hazards here are fairly pedestrian- there are some mean Banzai Bill placements here and there, but nothing particularly absurd.
The second half of the stage is a glittery crystalline underwater cavern, menaced by Hot Heads, spiked balls, and fire-spewing Bowser statues. It's tricky, but nothing an experienced Mario player hasn't seen before.
The first phase of the boss, Tonpole from Visions of Mana, isn't too tough, since it just jumps around, occasionally slamming down to rain blue balls on your head. It does take an abnormally high amount of hits for a Mario boss, though.
Overall, a good beginning stage, but in terms of custom gimmickry and theming, it pales in comparison to the rest. It's only the "worst" stage in comparison to all the madness ahead.
STAGE 2: BOMBS FOR THROWING
This level introduces a custom ability- the ability to place bombs with the R button, that explode after a while. True to form, this stage has a lot of Bomberman assets in it, and uses them to great effect, with plenty of enemies that can only be killed with said bombs. Of course, there's also bombs laying around the stage, and if you touch THOSE, they explode in your face.
Or this part, where you have to go ahead and blow up blocks so a vine can grow. Just the right kind of puzzle in a platforming stage, easy to figure out, difficult to execute.
The second half of the level builds on the gimmick even more, giving you the ability to kick the bombs, and these blue blocks that the bombs can slide across (but not you). This is something that's really gonna get a lot of use later...
On the enemy front, these explosive enemies are introduced that slowly slide towards you and blow up- but you can turn the tables on them and explode THEM by kicking a bomb their way.
The puzzles only get more interesting with these green blocks- bombs can move through them, but they're solid to YOU. Naturally, both types of blocks get plenty of use throughout the level for some brainteasers. Thankfully, there's no time limit, so you can scope out each situation in advance and then execute.
It all caps off with an autoscroller at the end, with bombs raining down everywhere and barely any stable footing- there's a fair few parts where you either make split second reactions or die from an explosion, or because you won't have enough time to blow up the blocks in front of you. (I do wish there was a checkpoint or power-up before this section, but... that's what savestates are for, I suppose.)
After you get through THAT, you get the Glove, letting you throw bombs in any direction- and they explode on contact with blocks. You'd think this would make things easier... nope. They still hurt you, so you can't rest on your laurels. Plus, these invincible wheel enemies that you can't explode- only drop them in lava, and sometimes the stage won't even let you do that.
The red blocks stop objects like springs, but don't drop those springs into the lava, they do NOT respawn, and you'll have to kill yourself and restart.
At least you don't have to engage in any "spawn then grab bombs in the air" shenanigans- just move forward when you press the button, and you'll launch 'em automatically, which is really useful for blowing up large walls.
And then the level tops itself with THIS segment- gotta carefully blow up the blocks and hit P-switches as fast possible while rushing across, or you fall in the lava and die. (Another part I needed to savestate before...)
The boss is the culmination of everything the level's been building up to. Tossing bombs up to hit her while dodging her myriad attacks is spicy, but a brilliant bit of catharsis after the rest of the obstacles this level put you through...
Well, until she starts turning the switch blocks OFF, and you have to quickly toss one to disable them before hitting her again. A lot. I don't even KNOW how many hits this boss takes, but damn it's a lot to deal with... but oh so satisfying.
This level kicks ass (even if it kicked mine.) Seamless integration of Bomberman mechanics into SMW, fair yet brutal challenges, and an excellent boss fight. My only quibble is that there really should have been a checkpoint between the first and second halves... but that's what savestates are for.
STAGE 3: GARIBALDI TEMPLE
This is probably the most mechanically intensive stage in the game- the level of custom ASM is OFF THE CHARTS here.
Right off the bat, you'll notice some big things here. First is the strong Castlevania flavoring and music, that's the order of the day. Second is the giant HP meter in the corner of the screen- that's right, you can finally take more than one hit in a Mario game. Genius. These skeleton enemies have a bit of an awkward attack, leaping forward while swinging their swords, but a simple stomp on the head will take 'em out.
This level also has shades of nonlinearity, like any proper work of this style. Doors are scattered all around with things to find inside, and it's your job to find the objective.
Every so often you'll find one of these fountains, and get a huge upgrade from it. The big mechanic of this level is the Innocent Devil system from Castlevania: Curse of Darkness, and it functions GREAT, with them hovering around beside you and refilling their energy with hearts- or pink blocks will refill it, too.
The fairy, for example, can heal you and open sealed chests. Always useful to have more than one hit in a Mario game.
Another enemy rears its head in the green area of the castle- these green Dry Bones that toss three bones in an arc like Hammer Bros. Still just as weak to stomping, though! The new gimmick, though, is a real kicker. These ON/OFF blocks make platforms appear and disappear, but on a timer that only lasts a few seconds, so you have to rush and time your jumps properly.
The gimmicks don't stop- not with these platforms that move side to side and threaten to shove you into spikes!
After that, you'll find the second Innocent Devil, the Wood Rod- and it can STOP TIME (and moving platforms... and those timer platforms, too.) This feels like a Zelda puzzle- get an item, and immediately use it to remove a tailor-made obstacle in your path. Like these Thwomps that are too low to the ground, for instance... or throwing a key into the air, stopping time, and standing on it to reach a high ledge! It's SO cool.
I do have to complain about this part- it's one of the only things in the stage that has an instant-death pit, when everything else in the level is an HP loss, it feels lind of out of place. The timing puzzles with the Wood Rod and switch blocks are still very creative and fun, though. Especially when you have to time a rising and lowering ledge with a door.
Also, golden dry bones that boomerange their shots. Not much else to say about them.
At the end of this is a THIRD Innocent Devil, the Crow. It functions as a hang glider, which means you can get across that annoying pit with the tiny platforms that killed me more times than I'd like to admit. You can even carry items like a key across spikes with it! Very useful ability.
There is also this RED skeleton that fires giant sword beams at you, but with the timestop ability you can get an advantage.
And because this level still wasn't satisfied enough, it adds a FOURTH ability to the mix- Gale, which can meld you with the ground to get under narrow surfaces. Sadly, it shows up a bit too late to really get some use, but it's nifty the... two times you get to use it.
When you reach the end, after a slow pan up a mountain of corpses, you finally see the boss of the level- LEGION!
But he's not just going to fly down and attack you- you've gotta climb all the way up yourself, stomping on his minions as you go.
Then you have to repeatedly jump on the bastard while still dealing with all of his cronies- easier said than done with this awkward angle. Thankfully, he has a large hurtbox. The corpses, though, are really annoying to deal with, since they spawn constantly, are JUST tall enough to catch your feet when you're trying to jump over them, made worse by the slope. Once you get into a rhythm, though, it's not TOO tough...
But it's not over yet- Nuculais comes as part of the package deal. He's got plenty of moves- a laser attack, a part where he darts into the ground and rises up in a burst of fire, extending his arms, and slapping you around repeatedly. His attacks are all deceptively fast for how slow he moves, especially that multi-slap move. Thankfully, he's nearly always vulnerable, so it's actually a bit easier than Legion itself. Apart, neither of these bosses would be that entertaining- but together, they elevate each half and cover the others' weaknesses.
As if it wasn't obvious, i LOVE this level. I love the creativity of the Innocent Devils- even if poor Gale got next to no time to shine. The boss is an exciting capoff, even if it's slightly jank in places. It's absolutely badass.
Onto the next level!
STAGE 4: BRIDGE AND BRIGADE
This level picked an absurdly obscure thing to reference, namely Magical Pop'N for the SNES. The penguin cannon and bomb enemies are absolutely adorable- and dangerous. Killing them makes their artillery explode after, so you can't sit still for a minute. And the tanks take three hits to kill, so it's easier to just run past them... but oftentimes, the level design won't give you that option.
Also menacing are these plants that pop out of pipes, VERY fast. They're very likely to catch you if you're not careful- worst when combined with normal piranhas that jump up and spit fireballs.
This level has some NASTY enemy placements, like this giant plant popping up from a pipe that blends in with the foreground. That gave me a heck of a shock when i first played this.
Or this part, where you have to bounce off the Parakoopa to dodge the cannonballs from the tank enemy right next to it...
The BOSS, however... is Princess from Magical Pop'N, and she brings the pain.
Her normal moves include stuff like a quick sword slash, firing a simple projectile, jumping across the screen, and tossing bombs all around. What's interesting about her, though, is that a lot of her attacks can be staggered. So if you're good at video games, you can easily prevent her from using a lot of her more dangerous stuff. Not that that's EASY, with her jittery movement patterns. She moves like a Melee player wavedashing- and this combined with her post-hit invincibility prevents any attempt to combo her to death.
Every so often, she'll float up in the air and turn invincible to unleash things like this snowflake barrage,
Or this GIANT LASER BEAM!! There's no second phase to this boss, so she goes down a lot quicker than the rest of the ones in this game. She's certainly a healthy challenge, though- if you're not careful, she will WRECK you.Really, you can say that about this level compared to the last two- it may not be as grandiose or custom-heavy as those, but it's a tight, well-designed gauntlet with a great finish, and it certainly pulls its weight in this hack. Excellent work.
STAGE 5: BOWSER'S DOMAIN
This stage starts simply, with a small room emulating the castles of SMB3. The lights are broken, it's dark, and there's nothing but the howling wind to welcome you in. Somehow, despite this hack being short, it feels climactic, like the end of a long journey.
Especially with this eyeless Bowser portrait looming over you...
Jump inside, and you end up in an autoscrolling lava nightmare, with buzzsaws, bowser statues, and absolutely banging music- a remix from Super Turrican 2. Plus- you get the cape, and you get to keep it thanks to the HP system just for this level. After SO MANY SMW hacks that restrict the cape heavily, and even if you do get it, you usually lose it quick... it's nice to be able to flex the power of this power-up.
Throughout the whole thing you're constantly being menaced by these fleshy robot things- which you WILL have to spinjump on to get over some of these lava pits.
Not that the platforming's any easier- especially THIS part with the single blocks, fireballs, and robots. It's like threading a sewing needle with a chainsaw, but it never feels unfair. This entire stage is like a sequence of death-defying jumps, but instead of being aggravating, it's so much fun. All thanks to the cape- it simultaneously increases the skill ceiling and makes such stunts MUCH more fun to perform. Even the lava doesn't kill you, merely bouncing you up with an HP loss.
When you reach the end, you get stopped by this guy on a jet bike. He spews fireballs, then charges at you- but doesn't often leave optimal time to land on his head. He's not TOO tough, aside from being very particular that you land directly in his center, lest you take damage while you're stomping.
But that's not the end of the level, oh no. You reach this segment, with pictures of Mario in the background, and music that sounds like it's punctuated by glass breaking. (Part 1 of 3 of Seiken Densetsu 3's final boss music... which the other two segments of the final battle use the rest of.) The sky is ominous and purple, with the curtains being parted to expose it- this is foreboding at its finest. And then, the boss of the level reveals itself... ROY KOOPA!
You can't actually hit him, so it's a chase sequence where you chase him down to the end of the hall while he throws a ton of stuff at you. The giant balls from the vanilla SMW fight, for one thing...
And most startlingly, DEAD BOWSER HEADS that pop into existence and zoom towards you like bats out of hell. It's badass and surprisingly creepy- and that's just the beginning.
Roy Koopa isn't too hard, since he just flies back and forth while spewing fire. But this is just a prelude to the REAL boss...
Romancing Bowser really pulls out all the stops, here. Breathing fire breath so long you have to hover over it, creating explosions beneath your feet... he doesn't let you up for a second before immediately getting in your face. You have to smack him with the cape spin, which conveniently turns off his hitbox. So it's a test of smacking him when you have a chance, or to get him out of your way if he's trying to jump on you.
And as if that wasn't enough, after you deal enough hits, he summons his Clown Car to toss the iron balls at you from the background!
I have to mention how Bowser looks here- the pink and darker red color palette just looks WRONG, along with those evil glowing eyes. It's a far cry from the orange and green of his vanilla appearance, to be sure. But, when you win, the Clown Car takes Bowser away. it's not over yet!
No, the final phase summons you to a passage with a large wall of fire behind it- if you're not running, you're going to get caught.
And you still have to fight Bowser and his new and improved clown car, the MACHINE DEVIL, like this!This boss reminds me of some Sonic bosses in that you can't stop moving, and you need to keep pace with him, while he's busy throwing out all sorts of dangerous attacks to deal with.
He'll scrape his chainsaw along the ground, gouge out hunks of falling metal from the ceiling, slam the ground with his drill repeatedly, and spew iron balls your way before rushing you. And he has a TRUCKLOAD of health to deal with, too...
But! This fight gives you the ability to shoot stars when spinning your cape, and aim them diagonally. When Bowser pops out of the Machine Devil to breathe fire at you, that's when he's vulnerable- running along and shooting stars up and to the right is the fastest way to grind him down.
Still, this is a tough boss- keeping up your momentum while dodging is REALLY difficult given how long it takes Mario to get up to a sprint, and the ever-present fire wall is waiting to punish any mistakes. Basically, this boss REQUIRES memorization of his attack pattern- which is good, because he always performs them in the same order. Scraping from the ceiling, chainsaw, drill, iron balls. It's an incredibly tough fight to deal with, but perfectly learnable if you can jive with it.
But Bowser's not done even when he kicks the bucket. Even after he dies, the damn clown car still bounces around for a little while afterwards! This? This is a bit of a cheap shot, given the momentum mechanic- it's REALLY hard to dodge fast enough for this given how fast the clown car moves. The battle would have been perfectly fine without it... or at the very least, slow down that part. I died right on the cusp of victory more than once to this, and it left a bad taste in my mouth.
Aside from that little hiccup, this stage and the boss therein is pure awesome. And I'm perfectly willing to chalk my minor quibbles to a skill issue. Phenomenal way to close out the hack.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
Aside from a few spikes of jank and unpleasantness, this hack's a shining showcase of what SMW can accomplish- and I have seen FAR more infuriating hacks out there than this. If my only major issue is "there's not enough of it", that's a high compliment to pay.
Not one of these levels feels like a throwaway. They're full of clever ideas, crazy gimmicks and ASM that works perfectly for the most part. The music is incredibly badass renditions of stuff from other sources, and the few custom graphics are AWESOME- the Machine Devil in particular. Add bosses that are absolutely sensational, and you have a masterpiece. If you have the skills, and have an hour or so to spare... play this. You'll be glad you did.
GAME LINK:
https://www.smwcentral.net/?p=viewthread&t=128541&page=1&pid=1642403#p1642403
SOUNDTRACK LINK:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YK4ITeAbYnM