Screenshots For The NES Version Of “The Secret World Of Arrietty” (借りぐらしのアリエッティ).

Apple Quest Monsters!

Over 50 lovingly crafted sprites and descriptions of monsters from a non existant RPG, inspired by my childhood love of reading strategy guides for games I never played.

4 of the monsters here previously appeared in my Guide to Ghosts.

I spent a lot of time on each monster, so I hope you enjoy reading them!

Buy on itch.io here!

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Nightmare Busters Prototype Tracks, by Gonkaka

13 track album

Today, 103 Records presents a special treat: the long lost soundtrack to Nincom’s first ever game, Nightmare Busters!

More well known as an arcade-style 3D action game for Zony’s original FunCentre console, the game’s true origins date back to the mid-to-late 80s; Nincom, newly founded and hungry to prove themselves, set out to make a cutting edge, horror themed title centred around two brave toys named Copper and Little Red Hood, who had to save their owners from far more malevolent playthings still bitter about being abandoned many years ago. Unfortunately, the project’s scope far outweighed what technology was able to replicate at the time; the graphics and animations were too process intensive, for one thing, and the idea to have fully unique enemies in every level proved to be a strain on the memory. Even the music was somewhat hamstrung by ambition; this was the first time the various members of what would become Nincom’s in house band and sound team, Gonkaka, had worked with the Yomeha FY5212 sound chip- or any sound chip for that matter- and it showed in both the roughness of the sound programming, as well as the fact that almost every song used entirely different soundbanks and waveforms. The collapse of the project threatened to destroy the company before it even got off the ground, but thanks to a last minute developer partnership with Gesa North, the company was able to prove their worth (and learn some valuable technical insight) by aiding with the development of their surreal, existentially horrific space shooter “Schadenbergiana”. But you all know that story, surely?

Through our continued publishing partnership and working relationship with both Nincom and Gonkaka, we are able to secure the original sound files for the unproduced arcade version of Nightmare Busters, and are happy to present them for your listening pleasure; devout old timer or fresh face newbie alike, the origins of Gonkaka’s long career are an essential listen for any fan of the band!

Forever Nightmare (Nincom Logo)

We Loved, Once (Attract Mode)

The Busters (How to Play/Continue)

The Beatthings (Stage Introduction)

Nightmares Don’t Shuffle (Copper In-Game BGM)

Nightmares Can’t Disco (Little Red Hood In-Game BGM)

Bitter Beatthings (Regular Boss Battle)

Spiteful Beatthing (Final Boss Battle)

Nightmare Beatthing (True Final Boss Battle)

Tears for the Brave (Bad Ending/Name Entry)

Sweet Dreams, Old Friends (Good Ending)

Against the Dark (Stage Clear)

Perish Greatly (Game Over)

released August 21, 2017

project directed and concept art created by Decon Theed

music composed by Shinji Namiki, Fumie Saso, Takayuki Mitsuyoshi, and Denji Koshiro

cover designed and produced by Dio Maxwelle

DOWNLOAD INCLUDES: FULL RES SCANS OF THE SKETCH AND FINAL VERSIONS OF THE COVER, AN EARLY PIECE OF NIGHTMARE BUSTERS PROMO ART, AND 12 PIECES OF NIGHTMARE BUSTERS CONCEPT ART

Suzanne Treister 1991-1992 Fictional Videogame Stills

In the late 1980s I was making paintings about computer games. In January 1991 I bought an Amiga computer and made a series of fictional videogame stills using Deluxe Paint II. I photographed them straight from the screen as there was no other way to output them that I knew of apart from through a very primitive daisy wheel printer where they appeared as washed out dots.

The effect of the photographs perfectly reproduced the highly pixellated, raised needlepoint effect of the Amiga screen image. Conceptually this means of presentation was also appropriate in that it made it seem like I had gone into a videogame arcade and photographed the games there, lending authenticity to the fiction.

The first seven works on this page form a series titled, ‘Q. Would you recognise a Virtual Paradise?’

Many of these works were shown in London at the Edward Totah Gallery in March 1992 (view installation) and later that year at the Exeter Hotel in Adelaide, Australia. In 1995 the ‘Q. Would you recognise a Virtual Paradise?’ series was shown in London at the Royal Festival Hall in the exhibition It’s a Pleasure, curated by Leah Kharibian.

Recent venues: Somerset House, London, 2018 view installation ; Akron Art Museum, Ohio, USA 2019 and tour; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden, 2019/20 view installation

The original Amiga floppy disks which stored the image files are corrupt, but the photographic art works remain.

Adventure game fact: The Secret Library Archive Project includes Night of the Tentacle, an AU version of Day of the Tentacle starring Razor, Chester, and Moonglow, the three other kids from the original design document.

itch.io

Oblique Strategies GB by Nicky Flowers

A port of Brian Eno & Peter Schmidt's Oblique Strategies cards for Game Boy and Analogue Pocket, made with GB Studio.

Oblique Strategies GB

Oblique Strategies is a deck of cards designed to help artists break up an art block. Each of the 100+ cards contain a possible action to take or a new way of thinking about a creative problem. They were created by artists Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in the 70s and have been updated with various new editions over the years.

This is a port of that deck of cards for Game Boy, for some reason.

It was made by me, Nicky Flowers, as a way to learn how GB Studio works. Turns out it works pretty well! I boot up the ROM on my DMG when I get stuck working on music or coding or really anything where I'm creating stuff. I hope you might find it useful too!

Raz - PS1 (1998)

This poor clone of Cherryman Generations had little impact on the beloved series

Promo art for a game that doesnt exist.

Devil Summoner: Lost Memories This album is an original set of compositions for the Megami Tensei fan project "Lost Memories", which is based on old JRPG music, specifically the PS1-era games.

You can also find the album on Bandcamp

Yet another game idea I want to make.