Invasion of the Blobs II: The Evolution Revolution

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Invasion of the Blobs II:
The Evolution Revolution
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Release type: Freeware
Release date: 1998
Levels: 26
Author: Mike Perrucci
Website: More Mazeguy
Related games: Invasion of the Blobs!, Luigi's Heroic Debut!

This sequel to Invasion of the Blobs! is a completely different game. In place of a top-down action adventure, Blobs II is mostly a side-scrolling platformer. The game is set ten years later. The player character is different; now you play as the girlfriend to the original protagonist. The game mechanics are different. The story is larger and more ambitious, as is the game design. Every level feels like a brand new experiment.

The resulting game uses just about every advanced technique demonstrated in a Game-Maker game, particularly in regard to advanced monster and background tile tricks, and makes about the best possible use of them. Some of these tricks would later be incorporated into the Super Mario Bros. tribute Luigi's Heroic Debut!, in a more subtle form. Other techniques, such as the faux-3D boss level and the word puzzles, do not seem to have been duplicated anywhere.

Design

Boss battle from Invasion of the Blobs II

There’s an element of world-building in Invasion of the Blobs II. As noted, it expands the timeframe, the active cast of characters, and their relationships. Another neat detail is that every stage seems to both lead logically to the next and from the previous stage. Often the previous stage is visible through an open doorway, and the tag leading to the next stage is hovering in the corner. For instance, after traversing a locker room you enter a behind-the-scenes area filled with leaky pipes. You plug the leaks with blob enemies, pass through, and climb to the roof. When you’ve reached the end of the roof, you leap off and grab the tongue of an enormous blob hovering in the sky. Startled, the blob begins to rocket backwards in space.

This leads to one of the most technically interesting stages in a Game-Maker game, a sort of Space Harrier tribute reminiscent of some of Eclypse Games' work. Other similarities include RSD’s Pipemare (in the custom intro screen) and Nebula (in the elegant mode selection menu), rounding up the demo game circuit.

Technique

Attacking in Invasion of the Blobs II

There’s a ton of neat stuff in here, from particle effects to background objects that you can kick around. Yet as with the first game, it’s the small things that stand out here. For instance, combat. The construction of Game-Maker makes melee attacks very difficult to realize. To harm a monster, a player sprite has to somehow birth a monster of a higher power level.

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Although it is technically possible to birth a monster that looks like an extension of the player sprite, it’s a pain in the neck to get right. Even when it’s almost perfect, it never quite works the way that it should. Through what must have been painstaking trial and error, though, this game gets it right. The protagonist attacks mostly through high and low kicks. Also notable is the amount of thought that went into the range and use of the attacks.

Somewhat uncommonly for a Game-Maker game, the visuals are imported from an external painting program, resulting in more flexibility and consistency in the backgrounds and sprites. Some would use the then-industry standard Deluxe Paint; Perrucci used Neopaint. Same thing.

Links

Downloads

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