#so i feel like I should put the 3ds rerelease there

[loopingpyre]

Here's the holy quartet of the best DS games that are the best on the platform and also irreparably changed my development as a person

Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors (2009) The World Ends With You (2007) Ghost Trick Phantom Detective (2010 DS, 2023 Switch/PC) Devil Survivor (2009) / Devil Survivor Overclocked (2011)

You should play them. All of them.

[zerochanges]

2020 Favorite Video Games

I don’t know if I am an outlier or if this is the same for everyone else but I really did not play a lot of games this year. 2020 was a very harsh year for all of us, especially for me for some personal reasons. So to get to the chase, I am just gonna say it left me not doing much in what little free time I did have, and I didn’t play much either. Usually I try to keep my lists for ‘favorite of the year’ to only titles released that year but since I played so little this year, screw it. I am gonna include any game I played this year regardless of release date.

Collection of SaGa

By far a flawed rerelease. It’s bare bones: there are no advance features you would usually expect out of these kinds of emulated rereleases like save states, fast forward, or rewind, and there was no real effort made to touch up almost 30 year old localizations that had to meet Nintendo of America’s then harsh standards. This really is just 3 roms slapped into a nice looking interface with an option to increase the game speed (which by the way you better use, the characters walk very slow in these old games). 

I am bit harsh here, but only because I thought the Romancing SaGa remasters and the upcoming SaGa Frontier remaster all looked like they got a great budget and a lot of love while this is just another Collection of Mana situation (moreso specifically talking about Seiken Densetsu 1/Final Fantasy Adventure/Adventures of Mana part of that collection). I would have loved to see Square Enix do a bit more for these older games. Or at least include the remakes. Seiken Densetsu 1 had two great remakes, both unused in Collection of Mana, and all three of these original SaGa titles have remakes that have never seen the light of day outside of Japan. How great would it have been to get the Wonderswan remake of SaGa 1, as well as the Nintendo DS remakes of Saga 2 and SaGa 3? 

But my gripes aside, these games are still fun as they ever were. Replaying SaGa 1 specifically during the holiday season really helped calm me down and made me feel at ease. It’s easy to forget but even in their Gameboy roots there are a lot of funky and weird experimental choices being made in these games. They aren’t your run-of-the-mil dragon quest (or considering the gameboy, maybe pokemon would be more apt) clones. 

Raging Loop

Perhaps my favorite game of the year, Raging Loop is one of the best visual novels I have ever played hands down. The level of creativity and splitting story paths that went into it is simply mind blowing. The basic premise is both a wonderful throwback to the old days of Chunsoft sound novels while still modern and somewhat reminiscent of both Higurashi and Danganronpa. Essentially you play as Haruaki, a poor slub that got lost in the mountains with no clue where to go until you stumble upon an old rural village with a strange history and even stranger superstitions. Before you know it there has been a murder and the Feast is now afoot.

The less said about Raging Loop the better, although I do want to say a lot about it one day if I ever can write a proper review of it. This is a gripping game that will take hold of you once you get into it though and never let go. I actually 100%-ed this and I very rarely do that. I got every ending, every bonus hidden ending, played the entire game twice to hear all the hidden details it purposely hides on your first play through, played all the bonus epilogue chapters, unlocked all the hidden voice actor interviews, collected all the art work, etc, etc. I was just obsessed with this game, it’s that damn good! And the main character is maybe the best troll in all of video games, god bless Haruaki. 

Root Double

From Takumi Nakazawa, long time contributor to Kotaro Uchikoshi’s work comes a game any fan of Zero Escape or Uchikoshi in general will probably enjoy. Root Double, like its name suggests is a visual novel with two different routes, hence Root Double. The first route stars Watase Kasasagi, the leader of an elite rescue team in the midst of their greatest crisis yet that could lead to nuclear devastation as they try to evacuate a nuclear research facility that has gone awry. 

The other route stars Natsuhiko Tenkawa, an everyday high schooler whose peaceful life is thrown into turmoil when he stumbles upon a terrorist plot to destroy the nuclear facility in the city and his attempts to stop them. Together the two separate plots weave into one and creates a really crazy ride. Part Chernobyl, part science fiction, any fan of the genre will easily enjoy it. And hey it’s kind of relevant to include on this list too since it just got a Switch port this year (I played it on steam though).  

Snack World

I was shocked upon starting Snack World as it is instantly incredibly charming, witty, and downright hilarious at times yet I heard almost zero people talk about it. EVER. This game is Dragon Quest levels of quirky though, and the localization is incredible. The game has such an oddball sense of humor that works really well with its presentation right down to the anime opening video that sings about the most bizarre things. Instead of the usual pump up song about the cool adventure ahead we get stuff like wanting to go out to a restaurant and eat pork chops. 

The self aware/fourth wall breaking humor is just enough to be really funny, but doesn't overstay its welcome and always makes it work right in the context of the dialogue. And finally, just everything; with the menus, the name of side quests and missions, and the character dialogue -- are all just so witty and full of quirky humor. This is one hell of a charming and funny game and addictive to boot.

Trials of Mana

Trials of Mana has gone from one of those legendary unlocalized games, to one of the first major breakthroughs in fan translation, to finally getting an official English release complete with a fully 3D remake. In a lot of ways from a western perspective this game has had an incredible journey. As for this remake itself, I really found myself having tons of fun with it. I loved the graphics, and the voice acting while a bit on the cheaper side almost kind of adds to the charm since both the graphics and acting really give it an old PS2 vibe. I know that is probably just more me being weird but yeah, I had to say it. 

I really hope Square Enix sticks to this style of remake more often, instead of just doing Final Fantasy VII Remakes that break the bank and involve extensive tweaking to both plot and game play. I’ll take smaller budget projects that play more like the original game any day personally. I wouldn’t mind if they also deliver a brand new Mana game all together in this engine either. 

Utawarerumono Trilogy

This year saw the release of the first entry in the series, Utawarerumono: Prelude to the Fallen--and thus finally after three years since the sequels Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception and Utawarerumono: Mask of Truth came out in 2017 the trilogy is now complete in English. I ended up binging through Prelude to the Fallen very fast shortly after it came out and immediately jumped on to the sequels. Perhaps the best part of 2020 was that I finally played all three of these fantastic games, and did so back-to-back-to-back. Playing the first Utawarerumono was an experience I will never forget, it was like visiting old friends again that I haven’t seen in ages, by and large thanks to the fact that I saw the anime adaption of the game when I was much younger, nearly a decade ago. Back then I would have never of dreamed that I would get to play the actual game and get the real experience. 

And it only got better from here, as all three games are such wonderful experiences from start to finish. The stories are all so deep, and by the time you get to the third entry, Mask of Truth, it’s crazy to see how they all connected over so many years and weaved together into a plot much bigger than they ever were. What carries it beyond all that though has to be the fun and addicting strategy role playing game aspect, which while a bit on the easy side, is still so much fun and helps make the game feel better paced since you get to play the conquests your characters go on and not just read about all the battles they fight. Beyond that the games are packed full of awesome characters, and I know I’ll never forget the amazing leads in all of them. Hakuowlo, Haku, and Oshtor will all go down as some of the greats to me. 

Ys: Memories of Celceta

Ys: Memories of Celceta is a full 3D remake of Ys IV, a rather infamous game in Falcom’s Ys series. Not to get bogged down too much into the history of Falcom but by this point they were facing a lot of hardship and had to outsource this entry to other developers, and thus passed it on to two particular developers they had a business relationship with, creating two unique versions of Ys IV. Tonkin House who had worked on Super Famicom port of Ys III with Falcom ended up creating their own YS IV entry, Mask of the Sun for the very same system, where Hudson soft who had produced the much beloved Ys Books I & II remakes for the Turbografix (PC Engine) CD add-on created their own Ys IV entry Dawn of Ys for that console. Both games followed guidelines and ideas outlined from Falcom themselves but both radically diverged from each other and turned into completely different games. 

Falcom finally putting an end to this debate on which version of Ys IV you should play have gone and created their own definitive Ys IV in 2012 for the Playstation Vita. I played the 2020 remastered version of this remake on my PS4. I even bought this on the Vita when it first came out but I am horrible and only horde games, never play them. So it was a lot of fun to finally play this. 

Memories of Celceta is probably one of the best starting points for anyone looking to get into Ys, especially if you only want to stay with the 3D titles as out of all the 3D entries this explains the most about the world and series protagonist Adol Christian. Beyond that it’s just another fantastic entry in a wonderful series that has a few good twists hidden behind it, especially for long time fans of the series. 

Random Video Game Console Stuff

Xbox Has Blue Dragon: I actually got an Xbox One this year for free from my brother. Because of that I started to play Blue Dragon again and there’s a lot I would love to say about this game. I don’t know if I am fully committed to replaying it all the way through however but I find myself putting in a couple hours every few days and enjoying myself again. Does anyone else remember Blue Dragon? I feel like it really missed its audience and had it come out nowadays and probably for the Switch it would have really resonated with the Dragon Quest fandom a lot more instead of being thrown out to die on Xbox and constantly compared to Final Fantasy VII and the like which it had nothing at all similar with. 

The Turbografx 16 Mini: This was probably one of the best mini consoles that have come out and I feel like thanks to the whole 2020 pandemic thing it was largely forgotten about. That’s a shame, it has a wonderful variety of great games, especially if you count the Japanese ones (god I wish I could play the Japanese version of Snatcher included), and a wonderful interface with fantastic music. One of these days I would really like to be able to play around with the console more seriously than I have already. 

Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon Never Existed: So Nintendo localized the first ever Fire Emblem game on Nintendo Switch which is awesome to see them touching Famicom games again--I haven’t seen Nintendo of America rerelease old Famicom titles since Mysterious Murasame Castle on the 3DS, but their trailer hilariously made it seem like this is the first time ever they released Fire Emblem when in fact they had already localized the remake Shadow Dragon on the Nintendo DS nearly 10 or 11 years ago. I and many other fans I talked to all found this really hilarious, probably solely because of how much they kept repeating the fact that this is the first time you will ever be able to experience Marth’s story.

All that aside though I have to say the collector edition for this newly localized Famicom game is probably the most gorgeous retro reproduction I have seen in a long time, and I really spent many many hours just staring at the all clear glass mock cartridge. I have found myself really obsessing over retro reproductions during 2020, and obtained quite a few this year. I really hope this trend continues to go on in 2021 as recreating classic console packaging and cartridges is a lot of fun. 

[eat-the-richard]

Why Super Mario Sunshine is kind of bad (and how to fix it)

It’s safe to say that in our current hellscape that there are few games in the Mario franchise with as strong of a following online than Super Mario Sunshine. And how could it not? It’s so unique and fun that most people could probably have a good time with it. But it’s interesting to note just how much this perspective has changed over time. 

When Sunshine came out it was considered by some to be the black sheep of the series. Or at the very least a noticeable step down from 64. There’s quite a lot wrong with Mario Sunshine. While there’s a great game at the core of this thing, there’s certainly a few miles of paint-like goop to sift through.

What’s frustrating is that a lot of these problems could have been solved with just a bit more development time. Mario Sunshine was rushed. This can be observed even without prior knowledge, but it becomes plainly evident when you look at some of the prerelease videos. In some instances it doesn’t even resemble the final product. Even at E3 2002, just three months before launch, there are a lot of noticeable differences to the final product.

Because of this rushed development, a lot of corners needed to be cut to pad out the game’s relatively lacking amount of content. The result is a game that is fun and well designed in some instances but a complete and utter disaster in others. 

The issues plaguing Mario Sunshine were emblematic of a Nintendo-wide issue. At the start of the GameCube’s life, many prominent franchises were rushed along development to meet strict deadlines to fill out the console’s thinning library and boost sales. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker is a textbook example. A lot of people had issues with that one too when it came out. Despite some clearly dumb points about the game’s art style, there’s definitely a lot to say about how Wind Waker pads out limited content. Doesn’t that sound familiar?

Thankfully, in 2013, the Wind Waker received an HD rerelease for the Wii U. Alongside a hefty visual overhaul, there were many under the hood changes to make the game an overall smoother experience stemming directly from those 2003 critiques. Sailing is made way simpler and faster in this version and the Tingle-inspired back-half of the game is shortened significantly. These two changes alone make this version superior, at least to me.

In the years since, I believed that Sunshine could have benefited from a rerelease similar to Wind Waker. Not necessarily in terms of its visuals (which I think have held up rather well) but in terms of its structure. Some small changes to the way Sunshine progresses could really benefit it overall, and I believed, erroneously, that it was only a matter of time before it received this treatment.

But we live in a post-3D All Stars world, and Nintendo’s response is clear. They believe Mario Sunshine is perfectly fine as is. Just touch up some of the textures, give it a resolution increase, and you got yourself a solid product. And yeah, its still pretty fun like this. But its hard to look past the missed potential in refining some of Sunshine’s rougher edges.

Which is what I plan to outline in this video. If I were to be given the reigns to nosedive Nintendo’s current plans to revamp a 2002 GameCube game, what would I change? After a suitable amount of complaining, I’ll discuss a fan project that comes close to doing what I think Nintendo should do.

So sit back, relax and let me refresh your body and spirit.

The first changes I’d make have to do with the frame rate. It’s evident that Super Mario Sunshine was supposed to be a 60 frames-per-second game. Some prerelease footage even shows as much. But somewhere late in development, the framerate was capped at 30, making it the only 3D Mario Game post-64 to not reach 60. Using Gecko codes, it’s possible to unlock the framerate and play at a pretty consistent 60. It’s so consistent that it starts raising the question of why Nintendo didn’t implement this into the Switch rerelease. This code isn’t emulator exclusive either, it also works pretty well when used on Wii consoles. Also, a hypothetical rerelease using the source code wouldn’t even have to deal with this anyway. But it’s good that the game works so well like this even without more structural changes. I don’t really need to explain the benefit of an increased framerate, so strike that one down.

And with that out of the way, it’s time to outline the biggest change my hypothetical Mario Sunshine remaster would make. One seemingly small but with major ramifications towards the rest of the game. But first, some background.

Super Mario 64 took a pretty big risk back in 1996 by significantly changing the main objective of playing a platformer. It was no longer about clearing a level. You aren’t going through these areas to reach an end point. The objective is now to find certain major collectibles, in this case power stars. But the game doesn’t want you to collect all of them. I’ve heard a lot of discourse recently about the boot-out system, but even when I was a kid I realized that 64 kicked you out of every level not just to pad out game length but to keep you moving around the castle. 

64 is always inviting you to explore new areas with a constant trickle of new content the more total stars you collect. At first, the amount of stars needed to unlock a new level are small. The first area of the castle has every level besides Bob-omb’s Battlefield locked behind a small star total. And the amount needed to progress onto the next full area with five more major levels is only 8. But these star totals gradually increase over time, requiring 30, 50, and finally 70 stars to unlock new content. But what stars you got never mattered, just how many in total. This allows for free exploration where the player doesn’t have to think about where their next objective is. For instance, exploring pretty much every cardinal direction of Lethal Lava Land will lead you in the direction of a star. And because it doesn’t matter which star you get, it allows players to choose how long they invest in each level. Are the constant treks up Tall Tall Mountain or Rainbow Ride annoying you? Well all those stars are completely optional, you just have to compensate by completing more of the other levels. It’s an ingenious system that allows for a lower total amount of levels to feel more rewarding.

Super Mario Sunshine is practically begging to be like this. In fact, for the first few hours, that’s exactly how it works. New levels are unlocked progressively through getting Shines. But it doesn’t work in quite the same way. These shine totals are never outlined to the player. It shows you that you’ll eventually be able to use the Rocket Nozzle and has objects like the pineapple blocking Sirena Beach to make you yearn for a Yoshi. But you’re not told when these things are to be unlocked; it just sort of happens. Which is fine, it definitely makes the game feel more mysterious. But it lacks that forward momentum of 64 where your end goal is always simple and in the back of your mind. Oh, I need 30 stars to unlock this big door. Sunshine doesn’t have this despite literally operating in the same way. But it still maintains the ability to slowly unlock content to players through playing more of the game, which is good. And importantly, which stars you get for these gates aren’t important, just that you’re getting them at all. And if the game stuck to this principle, that would’ve been great.

Except it didn’t.

After the rocket nozzle is unlocked and Pianta Village becomes accessible, your total amount of Shines is never relevant again. Instead, game progression is contingent upon completing mission 7 of every level. Not every shine is valued the same according to the game. The progression is far more linear than in 64. You can no longer choose to avoid the Chuckster mission. Or the Sand Bird mission. Or the teeth cleaning mission. Or racing Il Piantissimo three times. Or fighting Gooper Blooper three times. Or fighting Petey Pirahna twice. Or defeating these same Piranha Plant Gatekeepers five times. Or even chasing down and squirting on Shadow Mario E L E V E N T I M E S. There’s a lot of repetition here which would’ve been eased simply by allowing the player to avoid doing these missions wherever possible. 64 had similar situations of reused content, but it’s not as egregious when there’s no incentive to collect stars you don’t want to. 

This structure is also weird because there’s a ton of extra missions in this game. Some of the game’s most, err, fun segments are hidden away in Delfino Plaza. These can be some pretty time-consuming tasks. You know what I’m talking about. But that’s not all. Every course also has some bonus shines. Every secret stage has an additional Red Coin challenge. There’s some “cleverly” hidden shines even within certain missions. There’s even a mission 8 to every level. Every level also has a 100 coin mission which, just to get it out of the way, should absolutely not spawn the shine somewhere 100 feet away from you AND boot you out of the level upon collection AND not be possible in every mission. Like c’mon, Mario 64 got this right on the first try. So Nintendo went out of their way to put all these extra shines in the game, and yet none of them matter towards game completion. Which makes me wonder what the point of completing them is supposed to be?

All this extra content, regardless of quality, would benefit from a system similar to Mario 64. In its current state, there’s not much of a reason to even bother with these extra missions, especially when some of them are of questionable quality. On that same token, there’s some pretty fun missions hidden in this extra content, and it’s a shame that they aren’t more important.

Well, with that...  

B L U E    C O I N S

I almost forgot about you!

Blue Coins are pretty despised. But in concept they’re pretty smart to put in a game like this. It’s kind of like the Red Coins but on a broader scale. They’re packed into every little tiny corner of the levels, giving players more of a reason to explore the pretty environments. And once you collect 10 of them, you get a Shine Sprite from the local beavers. If these Blue Coin shines counted towards a grand total for game completion, Blue Coins could give players a nice buffer to replace some of the games more questionable missions. But just like all of the extra content, Blue Coins matter not one iota towards finishing the game. So, the only reason to collect Blue Coins at all is if you wanted to collect them all.

And that’s precisely why people hate them. Because collecting all the Blue Coins is an absolute nightmare. Let’s not even talk about how cryptic some of these coins are because honestly I’ll be here all day. Let’s instead talk about how impossible it is to know how close you are to getting every Blue Coin in a level. You can intuit through previous levels that it caps out at 30 per level, but the game never tells you that. There’s obviously no Blue Coin tracker like there is for shrines in Breath of the Wild, so if you’re frantically darting around Noki Bay looking for the one coin you missed that's hidden inside a wall for some reason, you’ve only got GameFaqs and Jesus to help you at that point. 

To top it all off, just like the 100 coins missions, it’s impossible to get every Blue Coin in every mission in a level. Some blue coins are exclusive to certain missions. And it’s impossible to know how many are exclusive, which ones are exclusive, how many exclusives you’ve gotten, how many exclusives you need. Must I continue? This process is a disaster and gives Blue Coins a bad name. If they were put in a game like Mario 64, I feel like these things would have much more of a positive reputation. But as it stands these things are so toxic they’ve been reduced to POW switch fodder in later games. 

I think Blue Coins summarize the issue with the extra content pretty succinctly. In a game like Mario 64, they’re harmless. But in a game where none of it is tied to beating the final level, the only purpose they have is 100% completion. And 100% completion should never be the focus of 3D Platformers. Some players prefer playing to completion but there’s a reason why most don’t. Fully completing a game is a soul commitment as much as it is a time commitment. It’s saying to yourself that I am willing to go through all the unfinished, janky, and cryptic content Mario Sunshine has to offer all for the extensive reward of… a different end screen. So yeah, there is no reason to get 100% of Mario Sunshine’s content. Even completionists are going to be disappointed. Not only is this content useless towards Any%, it’s aggravating for 100%, since fully completing the game is so unrewarding. 

So, how do we fix this issue? Well to do that, let’s take a look at a mod that, in my opinion, does exactly that: Super Mario Sunburn, made by Epicwade.

The biggest change Sunburn makes is in its requirements for completion. Rather than Bowser being locked behind completing the seven Shadow Mario shines, the door to Corona Mountain is opened when the player attains 70 shines overall. If you recall, that’s the exact same amount 64 requires of the player to reach the final level. This change, by itself, adjusts Sunshine more towards what I would like it to be. But if you’re crazy enough to prefer the previous mode of completion, it’s still there as an option.

That’s not all, though. Now, when you collect a Shine, you’re no longer booted out of the level, and instead are simply asked to save and then you’re free to explore the rest of the level. My feelings on this essentially boil down to which mission I’m playing. I think the first two shines of Bianco Hills show this working pretty much perfectly. You squirt on the gatekeeper to get the first shine and then you’re immediately free to go forward and fight Petey Piranha. This feels far more natural than having to get booted out after the first shine and make the entire trip through the first half of Bianco Hills just to get back to where you just were. So in this case, it’s a positive.

However, Sunshine very often changes its course layout per mission. And when that happens, it feels a bit unnecessary to have to boot out of a level manually and boot back in just to get the next event to trigger. Sometimes you can chain getting a bunch of shines out in the open with a secret stage which resets the level upon entering the newly placed warp pipe at the end of it. But otherwise you’re stuck pausing and exiting. I feel this issue may be able to be streamlined by doing something like Mario Odyssey does, where collecting certain Moons boot you to the beginning of the level with the new mission unlocked. This might be outside of the reach of Sunshine modding at the moment, though.

This isn’t the only change set to make Sunshine more open. One of my favorite parts of the original game was that you could see other levels whenever you looked around. Turning at the start of Bianco Hills and being able to see not only Delfino Plaza but also the yet to be unlocked Ricco Harbor and Pinna Park was fascinating to me when I first played it. Sunburn takes this concept one step further by allowing players to travel from stage to stage. For instance, taking the river in Bianco Hills spits you out Ricco, and climbing a vine in Ricco allows you to travel back. This is a pretty novel idea and definitely makes replaying the game an entirely different experience, especially when combined with the lack of boot out. It does lose me a bit in how it necessitates for every level to be unlocked at the start. As I mentioned previously, slowly unlocking stages to the player by collecting whatever collectible they’re using allows for 3D Platformers to have constant forward momentum, which is lost here. But for those who’ve already played the game I think this is a fun option.

Other quality of life changes are strictly positives. In most instances, Blue Coins are now accessible from any mission in a level. I say most because it’s impossible for some of these coins to make the transition. But in the vast majority of cases, it’s been done. More coins have been added to each stage, along with Red Coins counting as collecting two coins just like in 64. This makes getting 100 coins a lot easier, especially when you’re doing multiple missions of a stage in a row. Two of the game’s weakest sections become far more manageable with these changes. There’s some smaller changes too, like being able to skip cutscenes, Blue Coins no longer bringing up a save screen, and Shadow Mario’s invisible health bar being restored. There’s also new content here, with additional secret stages being accessible from the main courses. Nothing mind-blowing, but it’s at least pretty neat to run around Outset Island as a FLUDD-strapped Mario.

Super Mario Sunburn addresses a lot of my issues with the original version, which was exactly the point. I’m not the first to bring up these issues, nor will I be the last. There’s so much potential within Super Mario Sunshine to be one of the best examples of its genre, so to see it fall short in such fundamental areas is undeniably frustrating. As usual with Nintendo, and even with other publishers, it’s often the community that sees itself to correct the issues with the games they feel deeply passionate about. Basically the only difference between Sunburn and an official Sunshine remake or remaster would be a significant layer of polish. That still might happen, but I’m not holding my breath at this point. So if you find yourself feeling similarly as I do about Sunshine, it might be worth it to check Super Mario Sunburn out. Here’s the download link again if you’re curious.

[badgersighted]

PS5 Game Reveal Thoughts

Below the cut I’m gonna write a brief paragraph or sentence or whatever about each of the 25ish games that were revealed last night at the PS5 thing.

Don’t have much to say about this one; I never played GTAV, the series has never really been my thing, but I think it came out in 2013ish? I think the time has been and gone for re-releases and they should be working on the next game. Too much more and this’ll quickly become the new Skyrim/Todd Howard meme.

Okay so I never played Spiderman, but I did watch the cutscenes because I never thought I’d go out and buy it (before I later got it free with a ps4 pro). This is one of those games where, like, I’m not invested but I can both see the appeal and am happy for those who were waiting on it.

I think there’s diminishing returns on realistic racing games. Stuff was coming out on current gen that looked near enough realistic, so it gets excessively hard to tell the difference.

The first one that caught my eye. Despite the last entry being a bastardized, hollow remake that encapsulated everything the original stood against while missing two thirds of the content, R&C has a place in my heart and I hope they can actually get back to standard now they don’t have to work around a terrible movie.

My hot take here is that Ratchet has a wrench and his name is Ratchet. Girl Ratchet has a hammer, ergo her name is Chisel or something. I just wonder if this is a look at the future and Ratchet’s kid, or if it’s an alternate, gender-flipped dimension. In which case Clank would probably be the same because he’s a robot, but I fear for the possibility of Captain Qwark.

Legitimately can’t remember a gosh darned thing about this one. 

I feel like the trailer proved that Stray works better as a short film than a game, but I guess we never saw any gameplay to prove that assumption. I like the art direction and you get to be a little kitty cat.

Ellen Degeneres goes to space and the mind fucky wucky happens. I got some Prometheus vibes for this, but the only thing that really left a mark was the aforementioned Ellen jokes we were making on discord.

Fuckin love me some Littlebigplanet, so this was a welcome surprise. Odd to see that they’re not implementing a create mode (as far as we know) but I can see how impossible it is to both make a fully 3d create mode (see: LittleBigPlanetKarting) and also go up against Dreams which was made by Sackboy’s original home studio.

I have a soft spot for LittleBigPlanet’s story modes, though, especially the second game’s - so this will be a welcome addition for me. I just hope they reference the previous stories and don’t act like a plot is something new to the series.

This game feels born out of the hangover of games like Fortnite and Apex Legends, leaving it feeling at least one year outdated. But if it’s your sort of thing, more power to you.

So Kena was another of the more subdued, new IPs that I think a lot of people will have forgotten but I actually quite liked the look of it, or at least some aspects. I’ll always have a soft spot for ‘young girl with bow and arrow’ games but I also liked the art direction and the little puff ball fellas, as well as the bad guy seeming like a legitimate threat in a world that tricks you into thinking it’s all cute. The contrast serves the narrative in that regard.

So following a game I’m interested in is a game I could not be less interested in. Horrendous character design, pseudo-deep narrative that are a dime a dozen for indie tumblr bait visual novels. The logo and the fact they’re [barely recognisable as] dinosaurs presumably suggests this will end in a meteor destroying everything and, frankly, I have never rooted for an inanimate rock more in my life.

This 2d platformer took itself very seriously. I never understood Oddworld nor saw the appeal because its protagonist is very... not nice to look at. But more power to those who wanted a new Oddworld game.

I found this one kind of interesting, then the First Person gameplay kicked in and that very quickly faded. It’s a shame, really; the visuals were really good.

All I got from this is that it’s called Jeff, and it’s a low concept blend of the movie Gravity and Katamari. It’s one of those deep, arty games I’m just honestly too dumb to appreciate. Or maybe it’s false depth.

This is a weird one. I find it intriguing how a game can have so much going on on-screen, and yet none of it stand out. It really does feel like this game pulled inspiration from several places, but failed to embellish or add any value on top of it.

This is another one of those arty games I’m too thick to understand. I’d say it has slight hints of Journey in it, but I never played that so I can’t be certain.

Hitman reminds me of the Community Paul Rudd quote: “I see the appeal, and I wouldn’t take it away from anyone, but I’d also never stand in line for it.”

As much as a corporate Mario Odyssey knockoff as this game may seem, I’m honestly interested as I’m gagging for any Odyssey-adjacent content in my life. It looks like it could be mindless fun, at the very least.

Like JEFF and Solar Ash before it, I don’t know what this game is and I don’t think the trailer did enough to make me want to bother finding out. I liked the big cat dude, though.

Would the world suffer if it didn’t have the same set of games reskinned and rereleased each year, with a single number in the title changed? I never understood the appeal of sportsball games. Is it for the people too unhealthy or too lazy to actually play a sport? Why do they have to make one every year when there’s nothing new? It’s not like the sport has fundamentally changed in a year’s time.

So they had me in the first half expecting a Crash game reveal, I’ll be honest. 

But this is, oddly enough, the game I find most interesting of everything we saw here. I have no idea what the fuck it is, but I’m determined to believe there’s hidden meaning - that it’s a satire on Pokemon, that it’s a commentary on the phrase ‘you are what you eat’, that it’s a game that lulls you into a false sense of security and drops you in a horror game like Doki Doki Literature Club. Prove me right, Bugsnax.

I never played the original Demon’s Souls, so I can’t say much on the remake. I don’t even know if Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls are part of the same series.

Are we going to ignore that, fundamentally, this game’s unique selling point is that it has checkpoints?

Full transparency here, I had this game pegged as a Resident Evil game as soon as there was an old man in the trailer, and I’ve never played a Resident Evil game. I just associate old men in video games with horror, and Resident Evil is one of the first horror games that come to mind.

Looks like someone saw Death Stranding and thought “I can do that, too!” 

Yeah, well, you can’t.

Given the hype I saw surrounding this game, I feel like I should probably play the first one. I’m just concerned it might not be my sort of thing. It’s one of those things I want to like, but I’m not sure I want to put my money where my mouth is before being sure - so we’re stuck in stalemate. 

[crimsonlocks]

🎮 - What’s your favorite video game?

I have a few favourite video games. One of my all time favourites is the very unknown classic Terranigma for the SNES. It is an Action Adventure with RPG elements style of game which has an amazing lore hidden in its story as well as puts the world we play in as the planet we all live on.  It has a lot of deep philosophical question and that ending probably won’t let your eyes dry. It is fantastic and everyone should try out this game. Because it never released in the US though, it is pretty unknown. Most people knowing this game are german like me. Here it was heavily advertised. Another favourite of mine is Okami. I bought it for the Playstation 2, but waited a while before playing and boy, do I regret it. That is one of the best games I have ever played. It is an Action Adventure in the style of Zelda, but set in feudal japan. You play as Amaterasu, the sun goddess, who took the form of a wolf and uses paint brush techniques to solve riddles and fight battles. The graphic style also reflects this, the whole game looks like a japanese aquarell painting from that period and it is GORGEOUS. It also has one of the best OSTs I have ever heard in a game and the story is a complete reference to japanese fairy tales and sagas. The game got a HD rerelease on Steam, so if you don’t know it, go try it out. You won’t regret it. And because my muses are from FromSoft games, I have to include Dark Souls and Bloodborne.

I like the first Dark Souls the most, simply because the world feels the most complete to me. I played 2 and 3 and while they are fine, something feels lacking. When I think about 1, I can think about a route to take immediately and I just love how the world starts to interconnect itself, it is a Metroidvania in 3D and that is so good. Of course it has some problems, but I don’t mind them. Excuse me while I try out the next build and see in which ways I can take the route to the Lordvessel. Bloodborne is just brilliant. Lore, music, atmosphere, god, the atmosphere. It was so creepy that I sometimes had to stop playing the game because I felt so uneasy. The battles are fun, as hard as they are, the creature design is god like and that shift into Eldritch Horror was one of the best video game twists I have seen. I also absolutey adore the voice acting and all the screeches the beast like enemies make, or just the mutterings of the infected in Central Yharnam. “This town is finished...” “Away Away” “Vile Beast!” Yeah, I say it again, but Bloodborne is an 11/10 when it comes to atmosphere. Also, for a game that is so character driven, it is astounding how little we know about them, so that is my cue why this version of Laurence exists.

[katsuhikojinnai]

i preface this by saying that anyone who doesn’t agree with this opinion is flat out ignorant but

morrowind & oblivion are good games because of their locations & stories & the lore of the elder scrolls they bring with them, the mechanics of some aspects of the game are trash compared to what we’re capable of now.

i 100% think bethesda (or whoever even) should remake/ remaster these games, kind of in a sense how pokemon alpha sapphire & omega ruby & the 3ds versions of Zelda’s Ocarina of Time & Majora’s Mask as well as the remaster/ remake of Secret Of Mana. These are all very good examples of games that by today’s standards, had problems, but we got a revamp of the graphics & straightening out of buggy mechanics & even addition of new mechanics.

Also, bethesda themselves, if they are too busy, don’t even really need to put their whole time into the remaster/ remakes because perhaps we could have a splinter organization who gets the okay to move forward with the project on their time leaving bethesda to fuck around with whatever they want. (we are already getting something similar for Hammerfall)

i made a similar post on my facebook with the response of bethesda doesn’t have the time & won’t put in effort for something that won’t make as many sales as skyrim... but that opinion is totally false. I agree bethesda themselves probably consider themselves too busy to spend time on a project they assume won’t yield the greatest results, which is why i propose the concept of the splinter company. i really don’t believe getting together enough developers & programmers or whatever the fuck they need, to just put on those two projects alone, would be that difficult. You either hire more considering people are probably consistently graduating from game development/ program courses every year, or whatever positions it is they need, & then send over some pre existing people working for bethesda, like some from both skyrim & the other two games, maybe even just as overseers so their time can still be with bethesda if that’s what bethesda needs. There you go, that is the team, now the project can start & have little to no direct effect to the rest of bethesda.

Personally I was amazed that Secret Of Mana, out of all of the above mentioned games, would be remastered & rereleased, considering in the america it doesn’t have such a huge following, but it is my all time favorite series. But through the remaster & rerelease, the money isn’t just being wasted, because not only are the true fans of the games coming to buy the new one, but now you’re also exposing a whole new generation to the series. I fail to see how this would ever hurt bethesda financially. Plenty of people who started the series with Skyrim really do want to play Oblivion & Morrowind but feel like they have a film in their way when it comes to the difference in graphics & gameplay. This is similar to being someone who came into Pokemon at Diamond & Pearl but then wanted to play silver & gold, which mind you, those all got remastered & rereleased.

but finally, i think it’s important to preserve those games, their lore, & their stories for the future generations. I think if the proper changes are made then yes, people will always want to play them & buy them considering skyrim visually was very realistic, but the scenery so bland & Morrowind & Oblivion have such diverse locations, it is a shame not to bring them with us into the new age of pristine graphics. Not only the locations, but the monsters & equipment. There are so many strange creatures in both Morrowind & Oblivion that someone who only ever played Skyrim wouldn’t even be able to comprehend. The games were fantastic, they just need a bit of tweaking & an update for their graphics.

i’ll end this by saying not all games need to be remade & i’m not going to pull for everyone, like i don’t think we would ever need a remake of the original animal crossing, what’s been added in the games following has been enough, but obviously animal crossing isn’t surrounded by lore & stories. It would also be nice if it hasn’t already, but a remaster of Silent Hill 2 would be well loved. & Nintendo themselves have been quietly releasing remasters of their old games for the switch which is a great chance for people like me who couldn’t afford Twilight Princess or an n64 to play Majora’s Mask. People will still spend money on games they have been dying to play & games they have always truly loved, but if you leave barriers in their way, you may never know the amount of money you could make off of it, which is obviously what this is about i guess...

[leftwriteb]

LeftWriteB's Loot Box: Original Game Soundtrack Discs & Their Stories

“LeftWriteB’s Loot Box” is a series that highlights the stranger parts of our gaming collection. Whether it be collectables, merchandise, custom creations or more, we aim to bring you a look at some items you probably won’t see on the shelves of every retailer. Today’s focus: a collection of the more interesting original game soundtracks.

A soundtrack can make or break a game. Just as solid gameplay can help you gloss over the other issues a game may throw at you, a solid game soundtrack can stay with you for years after you finish it. While many special editions of games now include a soundtrack CD or a digital download for the music, physical discs for game soundtracks aren’t exactly a common occurrence. Over the years I’ve been able to acquire a good amount of them for games that have left a lasting impression on me. Sure, many of them were rewards from Club Nintendo, but the likes of The Sexy Brutale, Little Nightmares, Bioshock Infinite, Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle and The Witcher 3 don’t have as much of a backstory as the collected ones we are going to look at.

The Last of Us Original Score

The Last of Us is a game that many consider the best of the last decade, or one of them at the very least. Many aspects of the game were masterfully crafted; the story, the visuals, the voice-acting, the soundtrack. My lord, that score was something. The games main theme, which is retooled in various ways through the course of the game, is a haunting and beautiful piece of music that has stayed with me since the day I heard it but so too have other pieces. I didn’t own a PS3 at the time of the original launch, and instead went straight to a friends house on the day of the games release so I could simply sit and and watch him play. Months after, I watched the entire game via a YouTube playthrough and enjoyed it even more. The world captivated me even though I was yet to sit and play it properly myself.

It wasn’t until I bought a PS4 during the initial year of the consoles lifespan that I finally got to play it for myself and it remains one of the finest games I’ve ever had the joy to play. It is one of the most memorable experiences I will ever have and the lasting impression it left on me years after I’d concluded the story is certainly in large part because of the score. Thank you, Gustavo Santaolalla and those who helped make such compelling music.

Animal Crossing: Your Favourite Songs

A slightly more chipper soundtrack, this is actually an accidental favourite of mine. Animal Crossing is a series I’ve sunk literally hundreds of hours into over the years. I played plenty of Wild World on DS and, over the course of many years, had quite the time with New Leaf. I’d find myself glued to the latter solidly for months at a time before hitting a brick wall and putting it down. I’d tire of it and trade the game in. But, of course, 6 months later I’d want to play it again and would buy it yet again to eventually repeat this same cycle five times in the space of five years. Finally, I learnt that I should just keep it and not be such an idiot. One thing that remained pleasing through each binge I went through though was the ambient soundtrack that adjusted according to season, time of day and weather. Through countless hours playing, I always marvelled at how delightful the music was and how it always fit the mood.

When Club Nintendo were offering a whole CD of the ambient music, I jumped at the chance to grab myself a copy. Of course, I probably should have taken a second to think about it and read things properly. As it turns out, the CD was not a selection of the beautiful ambient soundtrack but instead a selection of K.K. Slider singing. Rest assured, his voice is not quite as soothing as tranquil tunes of a starry New Leaf midnight. Even still, the disc being covered in a cutesy Animal Crossing leaf pattern is a nice touch.

Super Smash Bros. Premium Sound Selection

Another item from Club Nintendo, the premium sound selection taken from Super Smash Bros. for WiiU and 3DS offered fans two discs of the finest pieces of music Smash Bros. had to offer. Having been introduced to the series so many years ago, Smash Bros. Melee was a cornerstone of the gaming time spent between me, my brother and our two cousins when we were kids. I stuck with the series for every iteration since and each one provided hours of friendship straining fun.

Not only was the artwork on this case great, but the two discs had a nice blue and red contrast with the Smash logo cutting through them. Given this was a selection from the WiiU and 3DS versions, these colours were undoubtedly chosen as they were the ones associated with the two console platforms. With Smash Bros. Ultimate having just been released, we’ve been treated to even more spectacular music and these two discs are just a small taste of what players get to listen to in the latest instalment in the series. More importantly though, Smash Bros. for WiiU and 3DS had the finest arrangements for Zelda and Luigi you’ll find.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D Soundtrack

Ocarina of Time is widely considered one of the best games ever created. It’s also one of my favourite games of all time and that might sound a little stereotypical but my reasons behind this are less typical. While I didn’t get to play it on the Nintendo 64 because of my age, the game still managed to take over a huge portion of my childhood. Having had a copy of the Zelda Collection thrown in to our bundle when we bought the Gamecube, I jumped into Ocarina after I’d replayed the Wind Waker demo roughly 700 times. The game completely hooked me but, as I was so about nine years old, it was a difficult game for me to conquer. In fact, it took me about 3 years to beat it. Every time I got stuck, I’d abandon the game for 6 months before eventually returning to it and miraculously solving what had stumped me for so long before. After a good few instances of this happening, I eventually defeated Ganon. Maybe I should’ve learned my lesson from this approach to games before picking up Animal Crossing: New Leaf years later - I should’ve just stuck with ‘em.

When the 3DS first launched and I was one of the few that bought them on day one and the news this was coming to the handheld in reimagined 3D made me just a smidge excited. To this day, the entire soundtrack holds a special place in my heart as the game was so present in my younger gaming years. This soundtrack came to Club Nintendo and was an instant acquisition. It was worth it just for the memories that the Hyrule Field theme can conjure, but the inclusion of everything else (and the Windmill Hut music) shows that the soundtrack is just as good now as it ever was.

The Legends of Zelda: Majora’s Mask Soundtrack (Japanese Import)

Also included on this Zelda Gamcube collection was the entirety of Majora’s Mask, the infamous Zelda release that followed Ocarina. I played this game in a very similar way, finding roadblocks that stumped me for what seemed like an eternity. I never actually got that far into Majora’s Mask and didn’t even manage to get past the first dungeon; the timing constraints were something I couldn’t overcome as a kid. What did baffle me though was how different Termina was to Hyrule. Everything was in a state of impending doom, people went about their days instead of standing still forever and the horrifying and mentally scarring image of the Moon hovered above you judging your life choices.

It was an experience, though small, that stayed with me. I’d never felt that kind of dread in a game as a kid, apart from perhaps seeing Ganon on horseback outside Hyrule Castle for the first time. Once again, when the game came to 3DS, I found myself eager to jump in and tackle the game with a brain that (as far as I could tell) was a little more well versed in puzzles, combat and gaming. But even having only scratched the surface years ago, the main title theme and clock tower theme still play in my head almost far too often. Having kept an eye on the soundtracks listed on eBay, I finally got to buying this Japanese import of the games soundtrack. While the music alone was a treat, the eerie artwork on the case and discs was so encapsulating of my feelings towards the game that it was a must-have when I saw it.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD Sound Selection

The thunderous success of the original Wii was what helped catapult the console into so many homes. While many, myself included, found themselves hooked on Wii Sports, the main reason I wanted a Wii was for Twilight Princess. As we’d already discussed, I had fallen in love with the series thanks to the collection I had on Gamecube and couldn’t wait to transition from wrapping up Wind Waker to a new adventure. I’d been nagging my parents to get me a copy for Gamecube before I owned a Wii but the scarcity and price made that a slightly unrealistic dream.

When we managed to get a Wii for my birthday (but opened it a month early because I couldn’t contain my excitement) I got a copy of Twilight Princess too. I only played through the game the once, but strolling through the shootout at the Hidden Village and taking part in the jousting match on the Bridge of Eldin were unforgettable in the most detailed Zelda game to date (at the time). When the pack rereleased in HD for WiiU and came with a soundtrack and awesome Wolf Link amiibo, I picked it up on day one. Sure, I didn’t own a WiiU at the time but the soundtrack and amiibo were worth it anyway.

The Legends of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds Original Soundtrack

Confession time: I’ve never played A Link Between Worlds. I bought a copy some time ago. I was and still am excited to play it. The thing is, my game library continues to expand as my time to play through it continues to shrink. Having enjoyed The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, a game that was a little controversial, I couldn’t wait to jump in to a new handheld Zelda game that was getting far more positive buzz. I actually lost track of how long I’ve had this game in my to-do list and with the Switch now having taken my 3DS’ place, I may never get around to playing it at all.

That said, I’ve had a great time with every Zelda game I’ve ever played and had confidence in Between Worlds. When Club Nintendo had the soundtrack available, I nabbed it before it was too late in preparation. At the very least, the artwork for the soundtrack was absolutely gorgeous and two whole discs worth of music is something no sensible person would turn down for what was effectively free. Like the Smash discs, it came with two of alternating colours though this time for to reflect the worlds of Hyrule and Lorule. With the Master Sword sitting peacefully in the Lost Woods adorning the cover, it’s just as great to look at as it is to listen to.

For more gaming oddities, stay tuned to “LeftWriteB’s Loot Box” for more gaming oddities.

[returnerofthesky]

tbh i never knew you were a fan of starfox since you like never post about it lmao

Sorry for taking so long to answer this. Again, trip, staying off of Tumblr, etc. :V

I’d say I’m a fan of Star Fox the same way I’m a fan of Sonic - they were both big influences on me when I was younger (and not just the whole furry angle either), but nowadays I’m only really a fan of... “part” of the series, despite still enjoying the franchise and wanting to see it keep going. Star Fox 2 is my favorite of them all, and the only one I’ve gone back to play more than just once or twice, which probably speaks for itself.

For me, Star Fox feels a lot like how Zelda did in that it feels like the series simply has not been allowed to evolve. It’s gotten so mired in a lot of old traditions (gameplay-wise or story-wise) that it doesn’t seem like a lot of people know really what to do with it, and this becomes a lot more glaring with how few games there actually are in the series. In a lot of ways I’d say that the series has been “suffering from success” for years, and I think it’s going to take a BotW-style shift in order for the series to truly survive.

Most of that probably sounds vague, so let me put it another way - there’s two things that I think the developers really need to realize:

One, shmups are a really, extremely niche genre nowadays. Maybe back in the 80s and 90s shmups were all the rage, whether they were 2D or 3D, but nowadays shmups basically seem to be interchangeable with bullet hell. Linear corridor-esqe shooters really aren’t a thing anymore, even in indie circles; Star Fox Zero was the last space shooter game that I can remember coming out with a lot of fanfare in a long, long time.

The thing that made me realize this was Dan Ryckert’s review of Zero back when it came out, in which he stated that he liked the game alright aside from the motion controls issue and some minor stuff, and that it felt like the sequel to 64 that everyone always wanted... but nowadays, that still felt incredibly outdated. Like it would have been a really well-received sequel if it had been released back in the 2000s, but nowadays the industry had simply moved on after so many years.

Two, Star Fox 64 is... just kinda alright.

Like, it’s a good game. I’m not going to say something stupid (and untrue) by calling it bad, because it’s not bad by any stretch of the imagination. But there’s no denying that much of the game has aged, even with the 3DS rerelease. The bump in grahpics and sound quality was desperately needed (even if I think I prefer the older voice acting, as it sounds a bit more natural), but, as I said, shmups are a genre that’s fallen out of favor, and a large chunk of 64′s gameplay consists of rail shooter levels. And since the all-range mode, while good, mostly consists of fairly barebones maps with few obstacles or details...

I’m perfectly willing to admit that part of that is personal bias - I’ve talked before about how more arcade-y games and genres (like shmups) generally don’t grab me very well, as they’re usually much more stressful and frustrating for me to play. I find the all-range modes to be a lot more my style, even though they have their faults in 64. But the rail shooter sections in Star Fox have never bothered me as much as, say, Thunder Force (where I repeatedly lose track of everything happening at once and die on the first stage). That said, they’re still not that interesting, and as I mentioned last paragraph, all-range doesn’t fare much better in 64 either.

Of course, despite all that, SF64 is still a really iconic game that commands a lot of weight and respect - but despite being awed by the game when I was a tiny five year old tot, I think that most of what people remember about SF64 doesn’t stem from the gameplay itself. Instead, most of what’s kept the game so well-remembered comes from its presentation; the voice acting, the script full of memorable lines, the scenarios presented for each level, so on and so forth.

That’s not to say that the gameplay itself isn’t good, just that none of it feels like it really... “sticks”. Despite Sector X being about the robot boss destroying the base, I don’t really remember much of the level itself, just the boss fight. Despite Titania being about going to save Slippy, it’s mostly just a slog of fighting birds and other junk before actually reaching the interesting bit (it’s worth noting that Titania in Zero is much improved in this regard, with more variation in terrain and obstacles). All-range mode usually is a lot more memorable to me.

So of course, if 64 is more memorable for it’s presentation than most of the actual gameplay, and if half of its gameplay (shmup) has slowly turned into a niche genre, what happens? Well, as you might expect, I think the series needs to start putting more focus and care into the other half of its gameplay: all-range mode. And funnily enough, I think the developers(es), at least on some level, realize this as well.

If that sounds weird, let me point this out: after Star Fox on the SNES, the sequel immediately shifted gears from a rail shooter to an outright dogfight game, with some small strategy elements thrown in to add nuance to the space shooting. Star Fox 64, despite having shmup gameplay, also included a number of all-range levels and sequences. Star Fox Assault expanded on this with half-shmup, half-all-range, with on-foot sections and more detailed levels since you could go on foot. Star Fox Zero did the same, reintroducing the Walker instead of on-foot sections and making a lot of all-range sequences with impressive details and obstacles.

Do you see what I’m getting at here? The series has always, always, been drifting more and more towards emphasizing the all-range mode, expanding on it in many different ways and in a lot of ways improving and polishing it to the point where it easily could be a highlight. In fact, the reason it isn’t a highlight usually isn’t because of all-range mode itself, but because of other factors. Gyro controls, wonky cameras, iffy third-person-shooter gameplay, etc etc.

Take, for example, Zoness, in Zero. In it, you’re teleported to an enemy base on Zoness and have to infiltrate it without being detected, by sneaking through a main corridor, flying into power generator rooms and disabling the power shield so the place self-destructs (and then you have to escape while it crumbles, obviously). Unfortunately, you’re flying the Gyrowing, making the whole level this slow, annoying slog, and that doesn’t even take into account the aiming controls themselves.

However, there’s an alternate version of the level where you visit in the Arwing instead, and you have to do the same mission but on a seven minute time limit. Utilizing the Arwing/Walker in order to explore and escape the base is an incredible improvement on the level; it’s faster, smoother, and more fun to play - if they stripped out the time limit (keep it, just as a challenge level) and made it the default level instead of the Gyrowing, I bet the level would have been much more well received.

Another example of a really good all-range level from Zero is, of course, Sector Beta, and not just because it basically crams every named character from 64 into one giant love letter. It essentially consists of dogfighting between Andross and Cornerian forces (like Katina from 64), eventually getting through a giant battleship’s shield and infiltrating it in Walker form, and then battling Star Wolf while the rest of the battle keeps going on. There’s no frills or exploration like in Zoness, it’s just pure space shooting, and it’s an excellent level because of it.

For one that isn’t from Zero, anyone remember Sargasso Space Zone from Assault? It’s kind of a combination of both styles of all-range mission, where you have to get inside of the base and destroy some teleporter things while fighting enemies inside, but then after destroying them, Star Wolf pops up and you finish off by having a dogfight with them and other normal enemy fighters.

All of these are solid examples of how all-range mode works, and I feel like focusing more on these levels is where the series needs to head. I wouldn’t necessarily say that shmup gameplay should disappear forever, and I wouldn’t do away with absolutely all arcade-y aspects of the series, either (the high score counter is perfectly fine, for instance, and linear segments can work as small one-offs).

The games need a major shake up in order to survive, and I think making a game focused more around the dogfighting aspect rather than the corridor shooting would work quite well. That’s the reason I compare it to Zelda; it might not have nearly as many games under its belt and be quite as much of a staple, but Star Fox really needs its own Breath of the Wild to catch up with the times. Whether it goes the route of essentially becoming like a Rogue Squadron game, or if it takes Star Fox 2′s concept of light RTS elements and designs a game like it, something needs to give, and considering Nintendo’s recent habit of reviving their games with the right modern touches and the old, less-necessary traditions tweaked or changed, I think they could do it.

(Stick with the Zero aesthetic, though - the mixture of elements from SNES and 64 work juuuuuuuust right to me)

[placetobenation]

1994 was a big year for video games. Titles released that year on the SNES and Sega Genesis would be all time classics that are beloved to this very day. Sega had the Sega CD add on which had some hits and misses. Sega would release the short lived 32x in November of 1994 to try and keep the Genesis going just a little while long. But before I get into any of that, it is worth noting that the NES was still alive and kicking in 1994, although just barely. Most of my friends and myself has moved on to Super Nintendo by this point. My NES and the games got packed up, put in a closet, and forgotten about for a long time. Some friends of mine went so far as to throw their NES’s away, thinking it to be as antiquated as Atari and something they would never want to play again. That year, according to Wikipedia, there were 12 official releases in North America for the NES. I don’t have much to say about Mickey’s Adventures in Numberland or Mario’s Time Machine. They are both educational games for small children, focusing on math and history lessons. There is not much more to say than that. By this point, developers have figured out just what the limitations of the system were and learned how to make games for it. While not all the games I am covering today are gems, they aren’t the epicly shitty games you found earlier in the life of the NES. Many of these games could be a blind spot for some who, like myself, had moved on to other game systems and were unaware of these titles. Some of them are worth exploring if you are feeling in a retro gaming mood.

Wario’s Woods

I guess I will start at the end. Wario’s Woods was the last game released on the NES in North America. It is an addictive puzzle game with game play elements from Super Mario Bros. 2. In this game you play Toad. The story goes that Wario has taken over a portion of woods in the Mushroom Kingdom called the Peaceful Woods. Wario has cast a spell over the creatures of the woods and are making them do his bidding. It is up to Toad ,with help from a fairy named Wanda and Birdo from Super Mario 2, to defeat Wario and reclaim the Peaceful Woods. Why Toad and not Mario or Luigi or Princess Peach? I guess they were busy that day.

What happens is that Wanda makes bombs and drops them into the game area. As Toad, you lift the various creatures, matching the color of the creature to the bomb. Blow up all the creatures and move on to the next level. Birdo is in the corning doing….something. I think the official explanation is offering encouragement. You are up against a timer. If the timer runs out, Birdo runs off and Wario shows up. Wanda is also replaced by a pigeon which drops monsters into the game area. DON’T LET THE PIGEON DROP MONSTERS INTO THE GAME AREA. Wario also drops the ceiling lower on you to make matters more difficult. Eventually, Wario gets bored and goes away. Birdo comes back and now you can resume blowing up critters with bombs. Unlike many puzzle games of the time, this one has a proper ending. Get to the last level, defeat all of Wario’s critters, and win the game.

The NES was good for addictive little puzzle games, Tetris and Dr Mario being the most fondly remembered. Wario’s Woods fits right into that category. However, I feel like this game gets overlooked . Most likely because it came out so late in the life span of the system. Wario’s Woods has been released a few times and is currently on the Switch NES Online Library. If you have that service, I would encourage you to give this game a try. It’s easy to learn and hard to master. The gameplay is a lot of fun. Getting to the end was a rewarding experience for me. Wario’s Woods is a concept I think would work out quite well if they retooled it and put out a new version of the game in mobile devices. That is the home of puzzle games these days and I could see this catching on if they did it right.

Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers 2

Here is a game I didn’t know existed until I started this project. Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers 2 is a sequel to the 1990 game and is based on the Disney Afternoon cartoon. Developed by Capcom, it has all the elements one would expect from a Capcom side-scrolling platformer. You have a catchy 8-bit soundtrack, smooth gameplay and controls, , good looking graphics, and fun elements added to each stage. Capcom really mastered making this type of game and even with this being a late entry into the NES library, they still lived up to their reputation.

Fat Cat has escaped from prison. While that was happening, Chip, Dale, and their friends are all called away on a time bomb situation as a distraction. With Fat Cat safely on the loose, he steals the Urn of the Pharoh and plans to set the evil spirits loose. Chip, Dale, Monterrey, Gadget, and Zipper all track down Fat Cat to an amusement park to bring him to justice.

If I have any criticism of this game its that their isn’t a lot of challenge to it. It’s a lot of fun. They put some time and thought into the platforming and level design. I breezed through this game without much of an issue. You can find this game on PS4 and XBOX One in the Disney Afternoon Collection along with other fantastic games like Duck Tales, Tale Spin, and Darkwing Duck. Disney and Capcom were on a great run in the early 90’s. Watching these shows after school was a favorite part of my day back then. It is a concept that has been lost over time and that is just the way it is. After school programming was so much fun back then. Get home, catch the last part of GWF on ESPN, then it was Duck Tales, Rescue Rangers, then change the channel to PBS for Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, wrap it up with Tale Spin, finally it was time to go outside and play for a while before dinner and homework. Playing these games certainly is a part of those nostalgic feelings. I am curious how the younger people would feel about these games. To me, they hold up as some of the best from the NES library.

Mega Man 6

Speaking of Capcom, Mega Man would see it’s last entry on the NES in 1994, released in March of that year. Like the aforementioned Chip N Dale Rescue Rangers 2 , the game features a catchy soundtrack, fun platforming elements, smooth controls, and colorful graphics. If you liked the other Mega Man games, then you should like this one because they stayed fairly close to the formula. There are eight robot masters each with their own themed stages. Beat the robot master,gain a special ability move on to the next. Once all the robot masters are defeated, storm the castle. Complete each level of the castle, fight the last boss and win the game.

With the world at relative peace since Mega Man 5, the people decide to have an robot fighting tournament hosted by the mysterious Mr. X. During this episode of Robot Jox, Mr. X takes control of the top eight robots and attempts to take over the world. Mr. X explains he was behind Dr. Wily’s plots all along. Dr Light sends Mega Man into action to take down the rogue robot masters. The eight robot masters are Centaur Man, Blizzard Man, Flame Man, Knight Man, Plant Man, Tomahawk Man, Wind Man, and Yamato Man. Once they are defeated, Mega Man goes after Mr. X directly. You will never guess who Mr. X really is.

The focus of this game seems to lean heavily on the level design. Each of the robot masters levels have some unique challenges consistent with each of their powers. Wind Man’s level has you riding over pit traps and spikes with strategically placed fans. Flame Man’s level has rivers of oil that you don’t want to be in when they get set on fire. This time Rush combines with Mega Man to give him a Jet Pack and Power Punch. The robot masters aren’t terribly difficult this time around. In fact, they are painfully easy to beat. For as difficult as Mega Man 1 was, it’s kind of ridiculous how Mega Man 6 is so easy. The thing I will remember about this game is the contest in Nintendo Power where people could enter their ideas of Robot Master. I submitted an entry and got a pleasant form level in return. I was just happy to have had chance to enter my ideas.

It is fitting that the NES would go out with a Mega Man game in it’s last year. This style of game was defining for the system. The first six Mega Man games were so popular that the 8 bit style would be brought back years later for Mega Man 9 and Mega Man 10. Mega Man 6 has been rereleased in several compilations, such as the Mega Man Anniversary Collection on the original X Box and PS2 as well as the Mega Man Legacy Collection Vol. 1 on the Nintendo Switch, 3DS, PlayStation 4, and X Box One. Mega Man would have a rough transition going forward. The SNES I will always associate with the Mega Man X series. It was the home of Mega Man 7 but somehow it just didn’t feel right. The less said about Mega Man 8 on the PS1, the better. Mega Man 6 will probably be remembered as one of the best late entries into the NES library and a bit of a curiosity as most people had moved on to the 16 bit systems by the time it was released.

The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak.

If you happened to buy this game in a bargain bin at Blockbuster back in the day and kept it in your closet all these years, I have great news for you. The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak is one of the rarest games in the NES library. As of press time, a copy of this game sells for anywhere from $800 to $2000. There are apparently less than 10,000 copies of this game floating around. It is believed that Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak was an exclusive to Blockbuster in 1994 although there is some dispute to that. Chances are, the only way one played this game back then was to get it from a rental location.

The game is somewhat of a sequel to The Flintstones: The Rescue of Dino and Hoppy also developed by Taito. In Surprise at Dinosaur Peak, you switch back and forth between Fred and Barney. They each have different abilities that help one navigate through each stage. The idea is that Pebbles and Bam Bam are stuck on a lava flow from an erupting volcano. The only way to save them is to walk all the way around the volcano to the other side. In an odd scene at the beginning, The Great Gazoo appears to Fred to tell him that he can’t help because teleportation is behind his abilities. (?) No matter. You side-scroll and platform through the various levels and there are bonus stages with cave man hockey and basketball.

Overall, its a good looking game that plays pretty well. They put some thought into each level as well as the cut scenes. Given how few of these carts were made, it really is impressive just how much care and detail they put into the game. It’s not terribly difficult. You can breeze through it without too much of a hassle. I have to think this game would have done better if it had been released earlier in the life of the NES. Movie and TV show license games were notoriously bad. I had the misfortune of owning Back to the Future. A good friend in my neighborhood ended up with Fester’s Quest. The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak is a drastic improvement from those games. The graphics and game play are far superior to much of the early NES library. Fans of The Flintstones will appreciate the references that the game adds in. It is a genuine Flintstones experience. However, if you want to play this game as a curiosity, I can’t recommend paying up to $800 and beyond for a copy. This a fine game but not worth that much money unless you plan on becoming a serious collector of NES games.

Bonk’s Adventure

There is some similarity between Bonk’s Adventure and the game just discussed The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak. They are both fairly expensive games that were released late in the lifespan of the NES and have a prehistoric theme. Bonk is best remembered as the mascot for the short lived Turbo Grafx 16 consoul. While the NES version doesn’t look as good as the Turbo Grafx one, it is a really good looking game for an 8-bit system. The game play is very similar to other side-scrolling platformers. The goal is to go from level to level through this prehistoric world trying to save Princess Za from King Drool. A lot of video game plots back then were inspired by Super Mario Bros. Bonk walks through the world with nothing but a headbutt attack. You have a volcano level, water level, ice level,your typical affair for this type of game. Aside from the rarity, what makes this game remarkable is how faithfully they were able to port a 16-bit game onto an 8-bit console. Much like the last game we discussed, it would have been more fondly remembered if it had been released earlier in the NES’s life. Bonk’s Adventure is better than much of what we were stuck playing when the NES was at it’s peak. Bonk’s Adventure was rereleased on the WII and WIIU Virtual Console if you would like to play it without having to pay the obscene price for the actual cart. It is a must have for serious collectors though.

Alfred Chicken

Alfred is a chicken who flaps and pecks his way through five levels popping balloons along the way. I don’t know that there is a story to the game beyond that. Alfred Chicken is a platformer with puzzle elements added in for fun. In each level you have to find green balloons. Pop the balloons and float to the next level. The bulk of the game is climbing up platforms and reasoning out where balloons may be. Unlike many of the games previously discussed, the graphics aren’t all that good looking. It looks like a colorized version of a Gameboy game. The music is also quite annoying and very repetitive. What it lacks in visuals and sound, Alfred Chicken makes up for in gameplay. The levels are a lot of fun to work your way through if your a fan of platforming. The best I can describe it would be like a combination between Krusty’s Fun House and Kid Icarus. There are a few boss fights at the end of each level which resemble a shooter like Life Force or UN Squadrons. That kind of variety is appreciated. Alfred Chicken got a remake for the PS1 in 2002. That game looks a lot better and has more levels to it. I would probably recommend finding that game rather than this once, give how much some of these later years NES game cost. Alfred Chicken is a fun game to pick up and play but they could have done more with the concept and flushed it out better. My hope is that they did that with the remake and made a better gaming experience. The NES version feels like the playable Beta test for a much better game.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Tournament Fighters

At this point, I am understanding some of the complaints that the younger generation has about the NES. I have discussed a lot of platformers and puzzle games. If you cut your teeth on these games, then they are great but there isn’t a lot of variety on the system. The NES was a bit too late to cash in on the popularity of fighting games in the mid 90’s, lead by Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II. Neither of those games would be ported to the NES, although oddly they did make their way to the Sega Master System. If you have played those games or own them, then I tip my hat to you. There weren’t many games on the NES that could fit into the fighting game genre. So imagine my surprise when I found Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Tournament Fighters. If you have this one sitting in the back of your closet, I have great news for you. It is worth quite a bit of money.

The idea of the game is that you pick from one of six characters. Included are the four Turtles, Casey Jones, and Hothead, apparently a character from the comics. You fight each of the Ninja Turtles then go on to face Casey Jones, Hothead, and a final battle with Shredder to beat the game. Shredder is absurdly difficult so there is a great sense of accomplishment when you manage to beat this one. Sadly, in this version of the game, the Ninja Turtles aren’t given their weapons. There is a little bit of move variety from Turtle to Turtle, mostly inspired by Street Fighter II. Leo does a Tornado Kick similar to Ryu and Raph does a Torpedo Launch similar to E.Honda, you get the idea. In the context of the game, there seems to be no reason the Turtles are fighting each other. The pregame cut scene only tells us that Shredder has challenged the Turtles to a fight in the streets of Manhattan. It doesn’t explain why you have to fight all your friends before facing Shredder. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Tournament Fighter is your run of the mill fighting game. Win the best two out of three and move on to the next fight. The game can get a bit glitchy. Graphically, they are really pushing the limits of what the NES could do. The NES controller really wasn’t made for this type of game. The controls don’t feel smooth at all. If you force yourself to get used to it, the game is playable but it feels awkward. By 1994, The Ninja Turtles and the NES were waning in popularity. There are such better examples of fighting games on the SNES and Genesis, including superior versions of this game. It’s no surprise that this was overlooked. Still, Konomi put a lot of work into a game that few people played. The music is excellent and it looks pretty good. The NES just wasn’t made for this type of game.

Zoda’s Revenge: Star Tropics II.

Star Tropics II can be best summed up as more of Star Tropics. This time though your main character Mike Jones (Who?) and his uncle, Dr. J, are flung through history to collect blocks called Tetrads. You play through nine chapters, each one a different point in time of human history. You meet characters like Cleopatra and Sherlock Holmes, who help you along the way. Like the first one, they combine RPG elements with dungeon crawling, puzzle solving, and adventure aspects. Play through the dungeon, collect the Tetrad, go back and talk to the villagers, proceed to the next chapter. I am making it sound simple but this is an incredibly fun and satisfying game. They improved the controls from the first one, now letting you jump and move in a few different directions and not just hopscotching along. Other than that, they didn’t change much from the first. The game still has a quirky sense of humor. The graphics, enemy design, level design, and gameplay all mirror the first one. I don’t mean to be disparaging when I say it’s more of the same because it’s more of a really great game. This has been rereleased a few different times over the years. Although it is not yet on the Switches NES Library, I expect it to appear before too long. Of all the NES games to come out in 1994, this is the one I recommend most.

So that is the NES in 1994. I hope that I have given you some ideas for different games to play that you may have missed when they were first released. Many of these games are worth checking out. Nostalgia for the NES is alive and well today. For many of us, this was our first game console. When you are out and about, you see t-shirts with the classic characters on them in all their 8-bit glory. I have a pair of socks with NES controllers on them. Merchandising the warm feelings for this system to Gen Xer’s and Millinials is going strong and can be found at just about any retail outlet. Something about the NES will always be special to us.The warm, fuzzy, 8-bit memories never really go away although by 1994, we had mostly moved on to bigger and better things. As will I as I continue to celebrate all that was 1994 as we approach the New Year.

[geek-gem]

Friday The 13th Part 3

So a few minutes ago I finished Friday The 13th Part 3 IN 3D! But not in this case. Before this I wanted to check Amazon.com of when I had my mom ordered Part 2 and 1. Because tonight was my first time watching part 2 on DVD. But three years ago this is why I tried looking up when she ordered it. I first finally watched part 2 on tv in 2015 probably. Especially seeing that film for the first time in three years basically.

For part 3 and I have a lot to say about part 3 and it's not necessary negative. But it's a film I think about a lot. Including I think it's a film I watched a hell'va a lot. So prepare for spoilers and this isn't gonna be as short as the others.

Part 3 I feel is a weird case or just seeing it as I'm older now. Along with the critics making me go crazy and that stupid site Rotten Tomatos.

Honestly I feel stupid if I think part 2 felt humorous to me but it seriously was funny. Part 3 to me felt different. Especially remember the whole thing I read they wanted the story to be more sinister or some shit like that.

Why do I feel weird about part 3? Well let me talk about part 3 and some of the big things with it. The first appearance of the hockey mask in the series and the whole thing with 3D. I watched the 2D version because I don't know where the glasses are anymore. But I've watched the movie before in 3D and I did like seeing it in 3D.

But back to why I guess I feel weird about part 3. It's because of how I feel it compares to probably the last two films and even other films after it.

Especially over time I tried to figure out of what was with part 3. Was it one of the worst if the series or maybe it's secretly good.

It's the idea the entire movie of part 3 just seems so simple. Especially compared to the last two. Including it feels like it's own thing in some ways while still connected to the franchise.

So it's Decker Shado I didn't watch the review but a comment by Shaderaygun mentioning of just the simplicity being the movie's strength. Especially the person mentioning the movie being a great intro for slasher movies.

While I feel the original Halloween is a better introduction to slashers I can understand this. But back to the idea.

It's the idea that part 3 just feels so simple. Especially the idea that it feels I guess random. The characters while yeah their not supposed to know Jason is there. But it feels like Jason appeared in a different movie or something. A bunch of random people. While not random for one person who he met.

Basically it makes me glad the final showdown of part 2 is there as a introduction. Showing Jason after getting a machete to the shoulder and surviving.

Also on the whole idea of Jason being bald now. I'm gonna go with the idea once in a while Jason basically shaves. Which is why he's bald and that's my theory. The face is another story but I feel it's not important.

But yeah basically the idea the legend of Crystal Lake and whatever else is very absent in this and it feels like a random slasher flick. But we should talk more about the film.

This film honestly to me feels more serious then part 2. While the movie is simple. The film feels a bit more like the original film in some ways. It's mainly the ending that feels more creepy to me despite a part of it doesn't make sense even if it's a dream yet I'm sounding hypocritical.

It basically while I've heard this is a more fun film in the series and I could get that. But to me the film feels more like a serious slasher in some parts. While theirs humorous it's like a balance of seriousness and some humor.

Especially the presence Jason has now let's talk about him.

I've talked about it before Richard Brooker is one of my favorite Jason's. Had to click here again and looked under Drumdrums review and that's a nice review. Theirs a comment I agree with by the user name of Mike Joseph of how Brooker is Jason to them just like how Nick Castle is Michael Myers. I agree with that.

Mostly in the third act of the film but overall I liked Richard's performance as Jason. It's just his movement and other stuff I just really dig it. Especially the look of Jason that simple look with the hockey mask. While I'm a Derek Mears guy I freakin love Richard Brooker as Jason. He's basically a classic.

Now the characters are another story. While I feel Dana Kimmel's character Chris and Larry Zerner's character Shelly are the best characters in the film. While their is some humor the characters feel simple and not the best kind of simple. Especially as a guy who liked Shelly as a character I feel remembering these films from long ago they change as you see them.

But yeah Shelly who other fans will agree some like him because of the situation he's in. It's basically tragic of what happens to him. Especially I am a person who wanted him to survive but watching the movie I didn't mind but it was still tragic.

Chris while not as great as Ginny is a nice character. She's a character I like. The whole back story of she met Jason before part 2 is alright. Honestly remember on the wiki it explains what actually happens. Yet I feel like they should of explained more some how of what actually happened. Yet I mentioned their is something explaining what happened but I don't know where the wiki got the info from.

It's better then what I'm hearing the original script she was raped by Jason which makes no sense and seems unneeded or whatever. Especially I'm sounding like a hypocrite there.

The other characters like I said the Wild Bunch, the biker gang, and others are very simple. While not bad their are nice moments with them but nothing grand or anything.

I also wanna talk about the ending. So I get they wanted to do stuff like dreams or whatever. But also their were two different endings not used. But I'm guessing the ending they went with was quick.

How would Chris know what Pamela might look like or as some sort of a corpse? Especially I'm had this weird theory did Pamela come out of hell for a bit as a spirit to fuck with Chris in her mind and scar her for life being like, "You fucking put an ax to my son's head now I'm gonna scar you for life bitch!" Which is something I'm gonna go with even if it might not make sense. Even though dreams aren't supposed to make sense.

Gonna say that main theme....it's just so interesting. It's not a bad theme it's classic but it's so weird comparing it to other themes. Including I now feel like it may not suit the movie well but over time and I feel it will fit like originally. It's just that funky groove man.

You know it's just interesting I'm stopping the marathon at three it's 12:40 am it turned to that. It feels interesting because this was originally gonna be the last of the series. Until this film made so much money that it got a sequel but it was rereleased the next year.

Seriously I was looking on Google but nothing to give me a simple answer. It's just I remember reading that on Wikipedia if I remember correctly. Especially the film is the 4th highest grossing Friday The 13th film. So make that of what you will.

Tags dealt with anyway those are my updated opinions of the first three films. I like all three of them but I feel the 2nd is my fave of the three.