Line #13 YMMV/IWannaBeTheGuy


1	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic: Uses new arrangements of some of the best music of platform gaming. Too bad [[PlatformHell you rarely get to hear more than the first few measures]].
2	* BetterAsALetsPlay: The average player has close to zero chance of successfully completing the game, and it quickly becomes tedious trying and making next to no progress. Watching an expert's Let's Play thus offers two benefits: you actually get to see past the first few screens, and you get amusing {{Angrish}} over the soundtrack.
3	* BreatherBoss: The Dragon Devil is a very simple boss once you master the jumping at the beginning and ending. Of course, it's still difficult, but it's far from being the hardest boss.
4	* CrossesTheLineTwice: The game is so insanely over-the-top difficult that you ''will'' change your reaction to dying repeatedly in the same spot from annoyance to cursing to [[LaughingMad laughing]]. It's the only way to handle a game like this.[[note]] Of course, some people head back to cursing again after a while. It can get a little, well, messy.[[/note]]
5	* GatewaySeries:
6	** Its selection of SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic allows exposure for more obscure titles such as ''VideoGame/BionicCommando'', ''VideoGame/EVOSearchForEden'', and ''[[VideoGame/MontyMole Monty on the Run]]''.
7	** Alternatively, it's many players' introduction to PlatformHell games, particularly non-ROMHack games of the genre.
8	* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff: This game is much more popular in Japan than in its home country of the United States. In fact, there are ''many'' Japan-made fangames, such as ''I Wanna be the GB'', ''I Wanna Be the World'' and it's sequel ''I Wanna Be the Galaxy'', ''I Wanna Be the Love Trap'', and the ''VideoGame/IWannaKillTheKamilia'' trilogy. Videos of this game are popular on Website/NicoNicoDouga, the Japanese counterpart to Website/YouTube, and get much more views there than on Website/YouTube. Also, many Japanese players have recorded themselves playing the game on Impossible (no verified full clear run has been made without autofire, however, with the exception of two which are both hosted on Website/YouTube).
9	* GoddamnedBats: Most of the enemies. Strangely enough, the bats are probably the only things in the game that actually ''don't'' kill you upon touch.
10	* GoddamnedBoss: The [[VideoGame/SuperMarioWorld Koopa Clown Car]]. There are three different pilots (Bowser, [[VideoGame/SuperMarioBros2 Wart]] and [[VideoGame/MegaMan7 Dr. Wily]]), and you need to beat all three in a row. Bowser and Wart are long, yet incredibly easy, and the real fight is against Wily. However, every time you die to Wily, you need to do the whole thing all over.
11	* GoodBadBugs: Some bugs that benefit the player were actually kept in the game.
12	** Maybe not a bug, but during the second stage of the clown car fight with Wart it ends with him landing and you having to shoot a big bullet bill and blow it up before it kills you. However, if you're not that good at rapid fire you can go behind where the car lands and avoid it entirely. Wait around for about ten seconds, and the 3rd stage will begin.
13	** What may very well be the most game-breaking "bug" is the [[ChestMonster fake save point]] on Impossible. Killing it makes a perfectly usable save point appear for exactly one frame on the screen. Killing it while having a bullet exactly where the save point would appear allows you to save the game. In particular, this is the only way to save your game on Impossible mode, which otherwise subjects you to extreme CheckpointStarvation.
14	** Some bugs allow so much sequence breaking that people have completed the entire game in 18 minutes.
15	** In the Tetris room, it's actually possible to jump through some of the pieces. However, the jumps are quite difficult to time, so it's not really that useful.
16	** In the fight with Kraidgief, it's possible to avoid the entire fight by repeatedly pressing the 'K' key until he dies.
17	* HilariousInHindsight:
18	** [[spoiler:Dracula turning into a Waddle Doo]] is this as of ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBrosUltimate'', as Kirby can now fight Dracula.
19	** "[[Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda It's dangerous to go alone! Take this.]] ... [[TooDumbToLive You jumped into a sword. You retard!]]" In 2014, a man ended up in serious condition after being stabbed with a replica ''Legend of Zelda'' Master Sword... that he walked into to see whether or not it was a real blade.
20	*** The above part is made even funnier when in the HD Remaster of ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamSEED'' (released in 2012), when [[spoiler:Nicol Amalfi's]] death [[AdaptationalSelfDefense was changed]] by having him run into Kira Yamato's sword, as opposed to Kira killing [[spoiler:Nicol]] in self defense in the original.
21	* InferredHolocaust: The Kid's grandfather was killed by The Kid's father to be The Guy. The Kid's father was killed by The Kid to be The Guy. Take a guess what might happen to The Kid when he has a son. Doubles as BigScrewedUpFamily.
22	* MemeticMutation:
23	** '''GAME OVER''' - PRESS 'R' TO TRY AGAIN [[note]]The game over message. Expect to see it. [[FakeDifficulty A lot.]][[/note]]
24	** Those are not apples. They're really more like giant cherries. [[spoiler:Canonically, they are known as "Delicious Fruit".]] [[note]]The creator's ComicallyMissingThePoint remark as to the "delicious fruit" falls up when you approach them from above.[[/note]]
25	** YOU JUMPED INTO A SWORD, YOU RETARD! [[note]][[spoiler: In the Zelda 1 segment, you can encounter the old man who gives you the wooden sword. [[SchmuckBait Trying to jump into the sword kills you]]]], resulting with the man remarking with this line.[[/note]]
26	** [[WebVideo/{{Retsupurae}} Please stop Let's Playing I Wanna Be The Guy.]][[note]]In the late 2000s and early 2010s, ''I Wanna Be The Guy'' was easily one of ''the'' most let's played games on Website/YouTube. It got to the point most people were starting to get tired of constant IWBTG [=LPs=]; ultimately accumulating with Slowbeef of Retsupurae making a video that repeatedly used this phrase whenever the player died. While not quite CondemnedByHistory, IWBTG was eventually considered an overdone 'rage LP', with very few managing to pull it off well. Now a DiscreditedMeme, with Slowbeef tweeting "I now think Let's Playing I Wanna Be The Guy is okay." when the remaster was released.[[/note]]
27	* MisaimedFandom: The game was intended as a parody of PlatformHell games and the [[NostalgiaFilter nostalgia for how hard older video games were]] (which was often a result of [[FakeDifficulty cheap difficulty tricks or archaic game design]]), not a genuine challenge--the creator didnt even intend for modes like Impossible to be completed. This didn't stop people from unapologetically loving the game in spite of hard it was (or even ''because'' of how hard it is) and [[PoesLaw see beating the game as a legitimate challenge]], including on [[HarderThanHard Impossible.]]
28	* NightmareFuel:
29	** When an apple hits you or fall on a spike, you turn into an explosion of blood.
30	** The Kraidgief is basically Zangief Meets Kraid, his skin is green like the Hulk and he makes some weird roar noises.
31	** [[https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/208909-i-wanna-be-the-guy This artwork.]]
32	* NintendoHard: Ironically, in order to make the game beatable, you have infinite lives and there are even save points. This is an almost unprecedented level of accommodation in the sidescrolling genre, but it's justified since, well, it really ''would'' be (almost) impossible without them (which is indeed exactly what Impossible mode does). To put this in perspective, [[spoiler:Mike Tyson, one of the most difficult final bosses in video game history, is probably the ''easiest'' boss in IWBTG.]]
33	* OnceOriginalNowCommon: While ''I Wanna Be The Guy'' firmly held as a classic of online PlatformHell games, it's a common joke among ''IWBTG'' fans that ''IWBTG'' is ironically not even the best ''IWBTG''. On top of being rather buggy and unreliable, [[VideoGame/IWBTGFangames many of its own fangames]] have been seen as eclipsing it in terms of quality (such modern favorites include ''VideoGame/IWannaBeTheBoshy'', ''VideoGame/IWannaKillTheKamilia'', ''I Wanna Run The Marathon'', and ''Not Another Needle Game''), usually by toning down the TrialAndErrorGameplay and [[FakeDifficulty arbitrarily exhausting design elements]], very rarely sacrificing the expected [[NintendoHard masochistic difficulty]].
34	* ParanoiaFuel: Like any good PlatformHell game, the game is built upon subverting your expectations of 2D platformer games, from fruits that are lethal upon contact and try to hit you to sections of ground that suddenly spring traps upon you. Be ready to assume that [[EverythingTryingToKillYou anything and everything you see will try to kill you]].
35	* PopCulturalOsmosis: Here's a little experiment. Look up [[VideoGame/GuiltyGear Guilty Gear Isuka]] tracks "Home Sweet Grave" and "Might Is Right But Tight" (''especially'' the latter one) on Website/YouTube, and count how many comments are IWBTG-related.
36	* SignatureSong: "Might is Right But Tight", for the [[GameOver extremely common context it plays in]].
37	* SoBadItsGood: The level design shoots for this, in all its FakeDifficulty glory.
38	* SpecialEffectFailure: The [[spoiler:fake error message]] in the Castle of the Guy is kind of hard to fall for if you aren't [[spoiler:running Windows XP in a default theme with your system language set to English]]. At the time of release, this wouldn't have been a particularly likely issue, but [[spoiler:with Windows XP being officially depreciated as of 2015, the probability of the error message blending as intended is now approximately zero.]]
39	* ThatOneBoss: While all of them are plenty hard, Dracula takes the cake as a result of being the only boss without a set pattern.
40	----
41	'''GAME OVER''' - CLICK [[VideoGame/IWannaBeTheGuy HERE]] TO TRY AGAIN

Context YMMV / IWannaBeTheGuy