BACK TO LEVEL SIX
BACK TO MAIN ADVENTURE DENNIS PAGE
The castle level was obviously necessary, a reference to many games but Super Mario Bros specifically. The priest outfit? I have no idea. Just for comedy I assume.
The post about this one being put on the site was the 29th of October, 2009.
Page 1: The knight in armour is probably not a specific reference, just the kind of guy who’d be in a castle.
Page 2: Similarly, I don’t know that the witch is a specific reference. But that tapestry shows the gem that Dennis will get at the end of the level!
Page 3: The biting monster is something. I don’t think it is a reference to anything from a game, at least not that I remember, but I do know that it was an attempt to do a one-colour demon in the style of the floating green one from the haunted house level and the yellow one from the forest level. I was making some kind of consistent appearance to King Demonevil’s army.
Page 4: The archer is not anything I know specifically, though certainly there are platform games with enemies that shoot arrows at you. I think I just thought an medieval-style archer made sense in a castle.
The bust is King Demonevil, though we won’t see him in person until Level X.
Page 5: The executioner is just another medieval castle kinda foe.
Page 6: The flowerman butler is Toad, but with a flower instead of a mushroom. I assume he’s actually not evil. If there are innocents around, it makes me wonder if this is a castle that King Demonevil’s forces have conquered. If so, why the bust?
But also, that tapestry on this page with six orange squares has to be something! It’s so specific. I have no idea what it was, though. Is it related to the orange gem? I wish I knew.
And then the jester is a reference to Malcolm from the Kyrandia games, though as a kid I only ever played one of those. I’m sure there ARE jesters in platform games (and the clown vehicle that Bowser uses in Super Mario World comes to my mind as well), but this was another adventure game reference for some reason.
Page 7: And the slime is a reference to RPG games, with the first Dragon Quest being something I played a lot as a kid (Wikipedia says it was called Dragon Warrior, which it must have been or I would have made a connection to my beloved adventure games and their use of the word Quest all the time). Anyway, I drew that little vent there assuming that was how the slime got in, as if that needed to be explained.
Page 8: The castle chef, presumably another innocent, is a reference to Burger Time.
Page 9: I think the wizard taking three panels to appear is a reference to having to wait through a cutscene for a boss.
Page 11: King Demonevil not being here is, of course, a reference to the “Your Princess is in another castle” from Super Mario Bros (and the fake-out of it from Super Mario Bros 3).
