Hey, remember this tweet? I remember this tweet.
I’m two years late, but hey! I did that thing!
The Super Win the Game Randomizer is now live on Steam, itch.io, and Humble!
Super Win the Game is also currently on sale for 90% off, so if you’ve never played it, now’s the perfect time to jump in!
Please note that this is a work in progress. I’ve taken care to try not to break existing saved games and to fix every bug I’ve found, but it is the nature of random games to fail in unexpected ways, so please help me by reporting any bugs you encounter.
So here’s how it works. When you start a new game in Super Win the Game, you’ll be presented with a new screen:
You can start the classic Original Game, but you can also start a new Randomized Game. Clicking the Random Seed button will generate a new seed, or you can click the seed and type in your own text.
In a Randomized Game, 160 of the game’s items are shuffled into different locations. This includes 128 gems, 15 keys, 6 pieces of the king’s heart, and 11 upgrades.
Excluded from the randomizer are the key you get during the tutorial at the very start of the game, keys sold by jewellers and lent by key lenders, the Pendant of the Sleepless, and everything in the speedrun courses.
Of these items, 152 are found in the world; the other 8 are given by or purchased from characters. These include four quests to find items or people, two freebies given away just for talking to someone, and two that can be purchased from jewellers.
The algorithm attempts to place items such that every Randomized Game is winnable. Only a small number of items are actually critical to completing the game, but those should never be placed in locations where reaching any two items is mutually dependent on having the other.
Some of the rules for where items can appear have been subtly altered for Randomized Games. For instance, in the Original Game, the second item sold by jewellers (the Underworld Ticket, labeled as “?????” in the menu) does not appear until after the first item has been purchased and the player has both the Springheel Boots and the Spider Gloves. In a Randomized Game, these rules have been decoupled. The jewellers’ second item appears as soon as the first has been purchased, while the Underworld Ticket should be placed in a location that depends on having the Springheel Boots and Spider Gloves to reach it.
The algorithm does not account for keys and locked doors. My assumption is that these are plentiful enough that no generation would ever be unwinnable due to critical items being placed behind locked doors, but I have not proven this.
I have eliminated all stuck bugs that I’ve found, but in the event that more arise, I have temporarily added an option to the pause menu to return to the overworld from anywhere in the game as a quick fix for being stuck. This option only appears in Randomized Games.
There is also an option to display the critical path, which is to say the locations of the 11 powerups and 6 pieces of the king’s heart. This is mostly for my own purposes in testing and debugging the algorithm, but I thought it might be useful or interesting to players, so I’ve left it in.
In the event that bugs are discovered which require tinkering with the algorithm, existing saved Randomized Games may be invalidated. I’ve added a warning message when this happens.
This update includes a small amount of new text, which is not yet reflected in the French or Spanish translations.
There is also a known bug in which the Blue and Red Auras and the Mask of the Arcadians do not take effect until entering another room. I don’t believe this could ever be a blocker; it’s just a little bit of missing polish. I might take a stab at fixing it in the future, but my priority will be on fixing bugs related to winnability.
For the curious (and given the circumstances and how much recent discussion has been given to, e.g., Shakespeare writing “King Lear” while under quarantine), I should note that this feature has been in development since the start of February and was largely wrapped up by the end of March. It was not a sudden flash of quarantine-induced creativity. It was about a seven-week development period — evenings and weekends only, as I’m not currently full-time indie — to get all the core functionality hammered out, followed by several weeks of periodic testing and bug fixing while I waited to align its release with our annual early May sale.
So, to reiterate:
The Super Win the Game Randomizer is now live on Steam, itch.io, and Humble!
Super Win the Game is also currently on sale for 90% off, so if you’ve never played it, now’s the perfect time to jump in!
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