Most of the landscape is engineered specifically to kill the player character. The game parodies many 8-bit and 16-bit era video games, such as the frequent use of references and sound effects from the Nintendo game Mario Paint. The final boss, The Kid's father, is unique to IWBTG.
Wily in the Koopa Klown Kar and a mix between the Mecha Dragon from Mega Man 2 and the Yellow Devil from Mega Man and Mega Man 3) are adapted from classic games, mostly platformers, but their behavior and appearance have been modified and enhanced for IWBTG.
The first seven bosses ( Mike Tyson Mecha Birdo Dracula Kraid gief, a parody of palette-hacked character glitches Mother Brain Bowser, Wart, and Dr. At the end of each stage, a boss must be defeated to progress. IWBTG is made up of several stages split into many screens, which are mostly pastiches of Nintendo Entertainment System games, such as Tetris, Ghosts 'n Goblins, The Legend of Zelda, Castlevania, Kirby, Mega Man, and Metroid. The controls are limited to left/right movement, jumping, double-jumping and shooting.
