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Block-Man

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namida:
Wondering if anyone else ever played or heard of this game?

It's another puzzle game from around the same time as Lemmings (maybe a bit later), which was on DOS. I recently felt like playing it, having never got past the 7th level back in the day when I played it, so picked it up - already doing much better, I'm up to level 11 now. :) I tried to obtain it, only to find not a single website that actually provided the full version for download; a bit of investigating turned up that the reason for this is that the publisher still sells the game. :O

Basic concept, it's tile-based, and levels consist of basically four elements on any given tile - either a red block (unmovable), a blue block (you can pick these up, upon which they'll be carried above your head, you can take them anywhere as long as you have an open tile above you, and you can put them down which will place them on the tile in front of you - if there's already one tile in front of you, you'll place the block on top of it, but you can't stack them higher than 2 tiles high without building a ramp), empty space, or the goal (one per level), and you have to figure out how to move the blue blocks to get to it. With or without a carried block, you can move one tile in either direction, and you can step up a height of one tile. Usually, you cannot turn around on the spot, but you can if there's a tile behind you that prevents you moving forward, even if it's low enough to step up onto (as "move left/right" and "step up" are different keys). Fairly simple concept (I probably made it sound more complicated than it is), but the puzzles can be quite clever - if a bit tedious at times.

One major source of frustration, unfortunately, is that the controls do not respond nicely to being held. If you hold Left for a while and let go, he won't stop moving as soon as you let go, but will keep walking left for quite some time. This can be avoided by, unless your move is impossible to overshoot (or at least, overshooting it won't be fatal), sticking to one tile movement at a time.

http://www.soleau.com/dosgame.html
You can download the trial version there. It doesn't play nicely with FreeDOS, but works fine in DosBox. You can also purchase the full game, if you're so inclined. Or, it is possible to find a registration code for it on the web. How to actually enter that code into the game though, is something that isn't explained anywhere.

There's also a sequel, but from what I've seen of it (haven't actually given it a go yet) it looks very much to be the "we tried to do too much and ended up killing the spirit of the game" type of sequel...

EDIT: I made an open-source clone for Windows, CubeGuy.

nin10doadict:
That sounds exactly like Blockdude, a game I and other students played on our graphing calculators in high school. I actually remade the engine in Game Maker and built some custom levels and boss fights for it, though I haven't worked on it in a while.

namida:
From a quick google, Blockdude indeed appears to have much the same gameplay. Block-Man doesn't have boss fights though, it's purely a puzzle game.

I just beat the 11th level. Honestly, I think it's harder than the previous 10 combined - not in a bad way though, my reaction upon finding the solution (and noticing all the ways the level hides the solution) was "wow, what a brilliant level". I took a quick look at the 12th (didn't make a serious attempt yet) and I don't think I'd even know where to start on that one, but we'll see when I try it.

Level 11 (K) spoilers (click to show/hide)One thing in particular that I thought was amazing, was the small area in the bottom-left. If you stop and think for a while, it becomes obvious what you have to do here - or at least, you can narrow it down to two possibilities, one of which will come back to haunt you right at the end of the level. The amazing part is that the level is set up to make you think you need to go here at the start of the level because you won't get another chance - the only way out will be sealed off by the time you get another chance to go there. In practice, one of the most amazing parts of the solution was the creative method used to get there at a later time, without sealing off the exit. :D I had wondered several times whether there might be a trick, only to exhaust every possibility I could think of on how to do it, until at one point I purely by accident (while trying something else) discovered a way to do it.

namida:
I beat Level 12 (L) yesterday. It was another pretty creative level, although not as amazing as the one before it - to be fair, Level 11 was downright amazing, and I'd be surprised if any level ends up topping it. I'd also say it was significantly easier than the previous one, although still harder than any other prior level.

Again, had a quick look at Level 13, but haven't made a serious attempt yet.

ccexplore:
Ok, your latest comments enticed me to check out the website at least.  Haven't downloaded Block Man yet, but I noticed the Bolo Adventures series was also listed there, and I'm pretty sure I played a few of those levels long time ago (like more than a decade).

I'm amazed and happy that they are still around and selling, will have to download and try them out one day. :thumbsup:

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