Rockfish - An Unreleased Game Remake

Well, where do I start ..? I think I'd better let the game say it all by itself. It was a lot of work for me to do and redo the whole game of Daisuke, alone (It doesn't means that I'll remake all of his other unreleased games). I chose this unreleased game because I thought it would be cool see a game that put Cave Story and Ikachan together. And that's the result, and the download link:

• Demo Version
• Demo 2 Version
• 1.0 Version
• 1.1 Version

Spoiler: Screenshots

Spoiler: Changelog

First demo:
- First public release;

Second Demo changes:
- Reworked Orgs;
- New Rockfish Design;
- Some Rework Graphics;
- New Sound Effects;
- Some Bug Fixes;
- Mod now has Multisave (3 Profiles) Feature;
- Different Gameover Messages or cutscenes on Bosses.

v1.0 release changes.
- More Org changes;
- Full Animated Intro;
- New Start;
- More Bug Fixes;
- Added some Chests with Heart Jars on the start of each Stage.
- Changed MaPignon's damage rate to make the battle less impossible to win.
- Lots of message context changes.

Again, the credit won't go to me. All the credits go to Daisuke Amaya to his idea and Dev Logs information. The remake contains some custom graphics, music remixes and PiyoPiyoPlayer music remixes too. I hope the game has been fun and interesting for anyone who plays.
Edit: And I finished it! Screenshots were updated again to fit the update.

 

Hello, just played through your demo.

Spoiler: General review

I assume that this is a complete remake of an unfinished game, and you had only Pixel's Development Logs to base off. (If not, I apologise.)

This is well done, I'd say. It keeps the spirit of Pixel's other games, and really feels like there is a transition between Ikachan and Cave Story. Looking forward to playing the full version.

The level design is nice, but it's pretty spacious. That might have been based of Ikachan's wide open maps, but it's pretty slow to navigate though. The Ducts help to remedy this issue, though, and I like the statues hidden inbetween.

The graphics are nice, too. The Gray areas could have be done in a bit more interesting way (more decorations, or more different blocks, perhaps?), but otherwise it all looks pretty.

I do think that the Booster sound effect can be removed (possible with SeaTone), or replaced with something else, but if you plan to add something like Booster 2.0, then it can stay.

I have noted and recorded the grammatic mistakes in the script, you can see them below.

Observations are here. The text is in the ReadMe file.

 

Hello, just played through your demo.

Spoiler: General review

I assume that this is a complete remake of an unfinished game, and you had only Pixel's Development Logs to base off. (If not, I apologise.)

This is well done, I'd say. It keeps the spirit of Pixel's other games, and really feels like there is a transition between Ikachan and Cave Story. Looking forward to playing the full version.

The level design is nice, but it's pretty spacious. That might have been based of Ikachan's wide open maps, but it's pretty slow to navigate though. The Ducts help to remedy this issue, though, and I like the statues hidden inbetween.

The graphics are nice, too. The Gray areas could have be done in a bit more interesting way (more decorations, or more different blocks, perhaps?), but otherwise it all looks pretty.

I do think that the Booster sound effect can be removed (possible with SeaTone), or replaced with something else, but if you plan to add something like Booster 2.0, then it can stay.

I have noted and recorded the grammatic mistakes in the script, you can see them below.

Observations are here. The text is in the ReadMe file.

Oh, thank you for the reviews and told me the issues. All the grammar mistakes occur because English is not my native language. I'm still learning a lot but okay, I can fix these problems. I will fix the issues soon.
Edit: Changes done! Fixed everything and updated the post.

 

Bumping into certain objects and having them display tips over and over gets annoying at times.
Like the boss battle and the hatched egg shell, or the statues and going after the coins.

 

Bumping into certain objects and having them display tips over and over gets annoying at times.
Like the boss battle and the hatched egg shell, or the statues and going after the coins.

It's inspired by Ikachan's interactions, but okay. I'll fix it soon.
Edit: The issue is fixed and the link was updated!

 

This looks so cool; I'm definitely going to get around playing this!!! I love the new texture and tilesets you put into the mod judging by the screenshots.

 

This is really cool!. I don't know why pixel never released the actual Rock Fish.

 

Sooo, after so long that probably no one else remembers this mod anymore, I finally finished the 2nd demo. I just don't have words to explain my great delay and procrastination that I had, but that's enough of talk. I just hope all this delay was worth it, just polishing and fixing some bugs.
Anyway, the 2nd Demo is done. Here's the download link, or just go to the first post that I'll update.

 

If you have time, rip tiles from the 3DS release of Ikachan, those were from Rockfish.

 

Pixel really like water.

 

If you have time, rip tiles from the 3DS release of Ikachan, those were from Rockfish.

Spoiler

I managed to rip that in some of the screenshots that I could find through the sites, but I kept hidden in the tileset.
But anyway thanks for the suggestion. (Thinking on where I could use this tileset, aside of Dark Cave...)

 

Very promising, I had a lot of fun with the demo! Though, after playing it I felt inclined to remake Naou's (I think that was its name, I'm referring to the blue fish) facepic. Feel free to use it as you please.

Spoiler

 

Very promising, I had a lot of fun with the demo! Though, after playing it I felt inclined to remake Naou's (I think that was its name, I'm referring to the blue fish) facepic. Feel free to use it as you please.

Spoiler

View attachment 5208

I'm glad you liked it, that project means a lot to me. And I loved the facepic you made of Naou. I liked some of details you put on him, made represent him better than before!

 

Hey everyone, I finally finished it!

 

That game is very awesome, the only problem that I had was the backtracking, but it's okay

 

Wow, there is alot to say about this game I completed this game to what I think is 100% and not once was there was a part I did not like I loved this game all the way through, this was my favorite mod and first one I've completed.

Spoiler: Full Review

Before I do a full Review I do want to metion a few minor glitches and problems with the game,when you first encounter the sea urchins when I killed some the coins they dropped would sometimes float in midair for some reason. The game in my opinion was too easy, I did not struggle at all in this game only dying 2 times in the entire game. The final boss is very easy to exploit if you know how balfrog work just keep him in one spot and fly around him to win and just hold bubbler if you find the upgrade. So Rockfish was very VERY fun the sorta complicated story was easy to understand unlike cave story where you have to make a lot inferences, The title screen was the most epic thing I have seen in a mod I just sat there and wondered how in the world did a full animation play, the Characters were pretty cool a yellow fish (interesting choice), the blue fish (way too many siblings), the octopuses (just want everyone to dead for their own benefit but become nice like balrog.)The ghost mermaid (hmmmmm... its a ghost that's for sure and she just wanted to hunt octopuses for some reason). The secrets and easter eggs were the coolest part, seeing the character you play as from Kero Blaster was cool, fighting ikachan was epic but was it supposed to be hard? The gaurdian pearl, whismiscal star but F I S H, the bubbler upgrade of inf ammo very overpowered. The maps connected ln a way that made me think of super metroid even the minimap in the folder looked like something straight out of Super Metroid, or Zero Mission (l like these games). The bosses were not very challenging if you have played cave story and beat several times and know the patterns of every boss. The final Boss, A big purple box was not expected just hold out bubbler and float a bit and you won't even get hit. The ending cave story true ending but F I S H.

My final thoughts overall 9.5/10, nice job remaking an unreleased game.

 

I wish there was a way I could download the soundtrack in an mp3 format

 

In light of the demo's release, I decided to knock this one off my bucket list too. It's not going be quite the same thing obviously, particularly with the story, but I think it's worth checking out for anyone who's still looking for a bit more to dig into. This thread got buried a bit too quickly anyway.

Spoiler

It definitely nails the atmosphere, I really like the sound design and integration of pre-beta instrument tracks, and as others have mentioned the game opening is fantastic. The movement usually feels pretty good, while the enemy models from the beta have had well-chosen similes, everything moves really cleanly. I managed to find everything on my own eventually I think, some of the upgrades and support items were a bit obscure but I enjoyed the minimalistic health system.
Some minor-ish nitpicks - Though the included game map and duct passages are very useful, there's still a fair amount of empty space (and backtracking if you want to do the subquests) and it can still be a bit hard to keep track of where you are. The bosses are mostly pretty easy, and a couple of times I found I couldn't break through the shootable block walls, I think triggering another event elsewhere on the map was blocking them somehow.
Still, very well put together, expansive, and finished too! In fact I'd say this probably fulfills the ideal of a fanwork reimagining of unfinished material as much as anything else we've ever put together here.

May your days be pleasant and your nights be internal