Balrog Story.

There have been many mods of Cave Story. Some were simple story changes and map changes, but there have been many character changes. Character changes ranged from King (King Story AKA King: Strife and Sacrifice) to Curly (Curly Story, Curly's Past) to fan made character Abert (Mimiga Army) to Misery (Misery Story) and even to characters we thought couldn't be heroes but can, Ballos being one of them (Ballos Story) and even third-party characters like Sonic (Sonic's Story). But what puzzles me is, why didn't Balrog get his own mod where he's the hero? Why hasn't the most memorable character from Cave Story had his own mod yet? This is just an idea, but maybe someone could make Balrog Story?

 

While this is true that Balrog hasn't had his own story and it kinda sucks, I would recommend not asking people here to make a mod. I know you're just pitching an idea but people might interpret it otherwise. You could always learn how to mod and try to tackle it yourself though, though I'm not sure how hard that'll be since I don't partake in modding. But there's guides practically everywhere on this site, so...

 

the biggest obstacle with a balrog mod is that balrog does not fit in a 16x16 sprite

 

If a mod such as this were made, I would have but one thing to say:

Huzzah!

 

That sounds like a good idea, but what would it be like? I think it could be him as a kid, or how he got cursed to be the crown bearers servant.

 

I would also be interested in seeing how you'd handle combat. It would look kinda weird for him to be shooting polar star bullets, for example. Some assembly hacking would almost definitely be required to get him to properly behave, both in controls, and visually for the reason Noxid stated above. Which is probably the primary reason nobody has made a Balrog mod before.

 

Yeah, I wouldn't mind seeing a Balrog story mod but, like all the people above are saying, it's gonna take a lot of assembly in order to make everything work(I know nothing about assembly so what I'm saying might be irrelevent in my case but, you know, just saying).

 

He isn't the one who is going to make it he just giving the idea to better assembly hackers, that way we might see a mod out like this. But then again like some people above said not many people know how to do this hard of assembly hacking, or at least not that I know of.

 

He isn't the one who is going to make it he just giving the idea to better assembly hackers, that way we might see a mod out like this. But then again like some people above said not many people know how to do this hard of assembly hacking, or at least not that I know of.

SHUT UP WE WANT AS MUCH OPPORTUNITY TO INTIMIDATE AND RAGE AT NEW PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE

I think Balrog mods have been a redundant idea for quite some time. Seeing that there isn't a mod yet that means no one can do it yet.

 

Yeah your right... derp... Ok well It would still be cool to see someone you could do this.


...


Ballos Story... nuff' said

 

SHUT UP WE WANT AS MUCH OPPORTUNITY TO INTIMIDATE AND RAGE AT NEW PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE

Dude, if we bother you so much then just leave. Not to start any drama but the passive-aggressive bullshit isn't going to get you anywhere.

 

Dude, if we bother you so much then just leave. Not to start any drama but the passive-aggressive bullshit isn't going to get you anywhere.

I'm cool actually.
I'm just poking fun at you.
But well if you insist I'll stop.

 

Ah ok. Sorry.

 

While I recognize the inherent issues with making this, this is one of the mods I really, really, really want to see, outside of Noxid's mod being completed and someone picking up/restarting Misery Story.

The sad part is that I have the entire working script (cutscenes, item descriptions, object interaction) for a Balrog Story written out. I played the game in both translations several times to get the best feel for everyone's (but mostly his) sentence structures/train of thought/character composition. I started to write it out during the long breaks between some of my classes and it kind of escalated.

It actually would start from the point at which he was teleported into the labyrinth by Misery and run parallel to the actual Cave Story game, from that point to the end. So the cutscene where he lifts the boulder and the endgame cutscene would both be exactly as they are in Cave Story. So, in essence, it's half of Cave Story, but from Balrog's perspective. The running time would be about half of Cave Story's time as well.

But it was just for fun, I guess. I can write and sprite, but I cannot program or level design for the life of me.

Some additional, way-too-ambitious ideas I had while doing the script (feel free to ignore this, this is all pure wank):

- Altering his physics so that his jumps are not that high, making him feel like a heavy character. Initially he'd only be able to jump 1-2 "blocks" high (I don't know what actual units this uses).
- Later on, you'd be able to make jumps like the kind you see him do in-game. They would be like superjumps and be capable of breaking through some types of wall.
- Making it semi-mario-style where he could injure enemies by landing on top of them, since that actually seems to be his primary method of fighting things.
- Basing his "weapons" on the ones you see him use in-game. But that would result in a really small arsenal, so I don't know if it would be more prudent to be inventive and add a few we haven't seen for variety's sake.

But yeah. I don't actually see it happening because of what Noxid said.

 

One could always shrink every sprite in the game so that Balrog fits into MyChar

 

Well Carrotlord just released his physics editor, I can do TSC if you want programming, and I'm sure there is someone willing to do level design. This could become a thing.

 

I like your ideas, 43501. DT, your post brought another idea to my mind, even though it has very little (re: nothing) to do with 43501's.

In the beta builds of Cave Story, Balrog was a small, common enemy. I don't know if the sprite sheet for those minibalrogs is floating around anywhere, but if it were it could be useful. Maybe a Balrog-based mod could tell the story of how Balrog left the land of mini-balrogs and grew into the behemoth that we all know and love. Yes, I know that the mini-balrogs aren't "officially" part of the "cannon" or whatever since they never made it into the completed game, but it could still make for a fun story if it were executed well. That way MyChar would use a smaller Balrog sprite. Just a thought.

 

One could always shrink every sprite in the game so that Balrog fits into MyChar

My boyfriend jokingly suggested the same.

Well Carrotlord just released his physics editor, I can do TSC if you want programming, and I'm sure there is someone willing to do level design. This could become a thing.

Yeah, I was interested to note that a physics editor actually is in place now. It still doesn't erase some of the other hurdles, unfortunately.

I like your ideas, 43501. DT, your post brought another idea to my mind, even though it has very little (re: nothing) to do with 43501's.

In the beta builds of Cave Story, Balrog was a small, common enemy. I don't know if the sprite sheet for those minibalrogs is floating around anywhere, but if it were it could be useful. Maybe a Balrog-based mod could tell the story of how Balrog left the land of mini-balrogs and grew into the behemoth that we all know and love. Yes, I know that the mini-balrogs aren't "officially" part of the "cannon" or whatever since they never made it into the completed game, but it could still make for a fun story if it were executed well. That way MyChar would use a smaller Balrog sprite. Just a thought.

I would consider them semi-official. And I thought about them while writing the script/cutscenes/interactions.

Basically, I wrote out two versions of Balrog's "backstory".

In the first, I drew from that semi-canon and had ideas similar to your own. He's one member of a larger race. I depict them as robots/golems that are partially magical entities. You know how the labyrinth has robot scraps and junk and whatnot? I thought it would be interesting to include the vague outline of a smaller, broken "Balrog" as part of the background scenery, and if you'd interact with it, he'd reveal that he's seen other ones around before but none of them have been active.

 

this idea seems like mine except no PLAY AS Quote CURLY AND BALROG ALL AT SAME TIME. except after hearing what have to do to make this i backed out and started something new ... but i would love to see balrogs story someday

 

Editing both his hit rects and frame rects isn't difficult, but a bit time consuming/dull (changing oh so many hardcoded values). Same for the physics.

It would be a bit more difficult to make him jump on things though. Rewriting some serious code. But if you did it in the collision code itself, it might not be that hard....


This would all be near impossible though without proper hacking knowledge, but it's not the most insane hack.