Types of Screen

There are many recurring types of screen which appear across many PCGs, by many creators. This page shows some of them!

Inventory Screen

Main Article: Inventory Screen

A typical Inventory screen.

Amidsts your journey, you will invariably encouter several artifacts of use. These artifacts are called Items. This screen is a crucial part of your paper computer gaming adventure. Every experienced, and skilled paper computer game maker, will include the inventory screen.

This screen's sole purpose is to hold such "items" enabling you, the paper computer game player, to save them for later usage in such endeavours such as completing puzzles, solving mazes, and overcoming various plaques, etc. Though highly crucial and mostly important there have been some avant-guard paper computer game makers that do not include the inventory screen. Their games are designed in a fashion that requires you to use items immediately.

Common Features:

• All inventory screens are screens that store the character's items.
• The logo for the Inventory screen was traditionally a large E on the top of the screen. This was later modernized to be I, which is the correct first letter of the word Inventory. More recently, the E on the top has made a comeback, and has itself been modernized to be a sideways E in which the E is now a person, exclaiming 'Hey'. This is a reference to the origin of the letter E, which was originally a drawing of a guy saying 'hey'.
• Some inventory screens are hazardous, and must be dealt with, or else they eat your inventory. For example:
  • The Inventory Guy sometimes lives in one's inventory screen, and will eat any inventory items left in the wrong places. He can, however, be appeased.
  • Sometimes the inventory screen ITSELF eats the items; and they can only be placed in certain areas.
  • Sometimes the Inventory Screen is a physical thing, such as the inside of a creature, and is only available at certain times.

The Maze Screen

A Maze Screen, leading up to an airplane sequence.

Main article: Maze Screen

A screen with a top-down view which is a maze. The main character must not only fmd the correct path, but also solve puzzles to open pathways, get past enemies, etc.

COMMON FEATURES:

• Maze screens are almost always patrolled by 'Guys', some of which may be on motorcycles or have guns. These are sometimes substituted for other types of enemy, however. ,

Paths which lead to nowhere. Some paths within the maze lead off the screen, deceiving the player into thinking it's a way out, when in fact it leads to death in one form or another- Often they falloff the edge into a crocodile pit, or are sucked into the vacuum of space, etc.

A complex maze, this one found in a dream.

• Passage to an airport. It's tradition for a maze screen to come immediately before a 'Flight Screen', with perhaps a one- or tWo~screen interruption, which is usually a puzzle to get into the plane itself. In some games, there was an airplane or space ship in the maze screen itself, while in others one must leave the maze screen to go into an airport.

The Pre-flight Screen

Right before a flight screen, the player enters his or her vehicle of flight and often is faced with a challenge in getting to the controls. These screens, with one exception, always come after a maze screen and before a flight screen. .

COMMON FEATURES:

• These screens are often depicted from the side, and they often involve a climb from the bottom of the craft to the top. There are often many obstacles, as well as a few enemies.
• Laser guns often block the player's path, and must be disabled.
• There are often at least one or two armed enemies aboard the craft. One of which is at the top of the screen, at the controls. Knocking out this guy and getting to the controls are the goals of a Pre-flight screen.
• On one rare occasion, a pre-flight screen was also a Fat Guy screen, or rather, in this case, a Skinny Guy screen.

The Flight Screen

A screen in which the player has gotten into an aircraft or spacecraft and now must get past a multitude of enemy planes or space ships, etc. This almost always comes after a maze screen.

COMMON FEATURES:

• The standard flight screen depicts a top-down view of the character's aircraft, in the sky filled with clouds. Enemy planes circle the clouds, and the player is required to use guerilla warfare to defeat all the enemies. This is accomplished by ducking in and out of the clouds, hiding behind them, etc.
• Certain games have included a flight screen which was just a battle against one, giant, boss-like space-ship. Some of the same tactics can be used as in a standard flight screen.

The Fat Guy Screen

A screen in which the player's path is blocked by The Fat Guy. These can often be quite frustrating, and often disgusting.

COMMON FEATURES:

• The standard Fat Guy screen is a narrow passageway which is completely blocked off by the Fat Guy, who sits there gleefully.
• Slim fast. In a Fat Guy screen, there is often a can of SlimFast hidden somewhere, which can later be introduced to the Fat Guy. There is also often a hypodermic needle conveniently lying around. This is the most basic form of Fat Guy puzzle, and many games leave it out in exchange for a more original puzzle.
• The Fat Guy himself: Nuff said.

Game Over Screen

This is the screen you get for sucking.

• It often shows your character or characters, defeated.
• However, it may be an actual playable screen; so it's a fake-out, in that there may be a way to escape from it and get back out into the normal game. So, the game wasn't really over at all.

First Page Jail Screen

In almost all of Kurt Elfman's PCGs the first page is some sort of prison cell type thing, which the player has to escape.

• Sometimes, there's an ally which can be met on this screen, often becoming a sidekick throughout the game!

First Page Friend Screen

In almost all of Kurt Elfman's PCGs the first page is where you meet your first sidekick.

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