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Post by JoeQ on Dec 20, 2022 14:23:41 GMT -5
Team Sonic Racing (PS4) - First playthrough, Time: quite a bit, Rating: 4/5 An all around solid kart racer by series veteran devs Sumo Digital. Good courses and tight controls. Feels a bit bland compared to the previous Sega All Stars racing games though and the story is the barest excuse for pitting Sonic characters against each other in races. I guess that's all you really need though. I beat all the Adventure mode races on the highest difficulty and unlocked everything the game had to offer. Beating the side challenges was hell. Got the platinum trophy too as usual. Alphabet Challenge: ABCDEFGH-JKLM-OPQRSTU-----
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Dec 20, 2022 17:44:14 GMT -5
I've never played a Portal game as they largely had unappealing bare looking visuals and environments. The game definitely was one of those which really surprised me. One I didn't expect to like at all, but ended up appreciating a lot due to it's smart puzzle design that included both players in every solution. I'm surprised to hear this. Even if the graphics look a bit bland (have any of Valve's games ever looked appealing?), I thought the game's concept and reputation would be enough to have high expectations of it. I have only played the first Portal FWIW, but I thought in that game the graphics served the game's readability and the atmosphere, so I was fine with the way it looked.
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Post by ZenithianHero on Dec 20, 2022 19:22:22 GMT -5
Sonic Frontiers (Xbox Series X, First time, 22 hours)
Whew, what a weird Sonic game. Its the most adventure-like experience where Sonic Team throws everything into the package. Does it work? For the most part. The game is set up in this huge sandbox open "zone" gameplay. You can freely explore and find items and fight enemies. Open Zone is freeform in progression. To progress you need memory tokens to interact with your NPC friends. You need gears from miniboss guardians. You need keys from cyberspace to unlock emeralds. Your new ability of cyloop is used in various puzzles. Its less DK64 tedious than it sound, you can find the items outside context of their intended challenge or fish for them in a minigame. The process of earning everything is busted you could cheese it totally but putting in the hard work the game is fun and gives me this comfort zone vibe. For a 3D "collectathon" platformer that is a good thing.
The level design is inconsistent. The shape of the world is alright, there's good sense of elevation and variation of landmarks. The problem Sonic doesn't always transverse it in a natural way. The game is filled with hundreds of micro platforming segments randomly placed on the field. They are made up of automated elements such as springs, dashpads, generic floating platforms, rails (so so many rails) those air dash rings, pulleys etc. There's very little difference throughout the game for gimmicks and world themes with them which is a missed opportunity. Some of this madness makes sense, doing a segment can steer you toward the nearest puzzle or a miniboss or cyberspace portal. I was surprised that I did these segments out of sequence (because you get dashpads everywhere telling you this was the correct pathing) and that Sonic's speed can allow launching yourself with ease.
Cyberspace has a mix of original layouts with past levels remixed "layout flipped" the game tries this nostalgic memory thing that already been used in other Sonic games lately, you get a redux of Green Hill and Chemical Plant visuals again. Some past stages are fun again so I don't mind that part. Later half of the game is loaded with original stages. What I do find annoying is the 2D in this game. Sonic's physics and control feel is off-putting. The 2D cyberspace levels aren't that interesting. What's worse is how much of it is in open zone there are some jarring camera lock that comes with it.
Sonic has to fight enemies like a beat em up. So basic combos and special attacks. Sonic can launch himself with kicks, counters and projectile moves that unlock with a skill tree. Not a deep system, you can complete the tree fairly quickly. Sonic's fighting style is a little mish-mash most of it makes sense to him although not sure if he needed the projectiles. Parrying is very lax it is more that your guarding comes with a build in parry. I still die from enemies, but the combat not too difficult when you realize that trait.
The minibosses are cool. There's quite a bit of variety to them. Some are straightforward fighters others require doing other actions to expose weakness. Take for example the Sumo that puts Sonic in a cage fight and you can bounce off walls to push the enemy. Squid generates a path to run on and chase. There's a lot of care put into this, I enjoy hunting them all down.
As you progress the story your friends may initiate minigames. I like them, good variety to it. This range of tasks such as herding Koco, sky diving, shmup stages, pinball. The sequence of events for the story is loaded with this stuff. Like typically Sonic is forced to go through set of levels with a story as reward. Here, the story events usually something like "here's a minigame" "this platforming pathway to the emerald is open to you". There's certainly a HUB-like direction to open zone I think fans of 2000s platformers can enjoy. If somebody wanted a no-BS Sonic experience yeah this game gonna drive you nuts. I cannot spoil the final "true" boss, which is only triggered in Hard mode, its another example of what I mean.
I hear there is mixed reception for the story. I personally enjoyed it? Like, its dreary but Sonic Frontiers is also peak anime there's crazy Super Sonic fighting and Sonic's conversations full of optimism. It is like if a Shonen Jump series and Evangelion had a mashup. It is a whirlwind of different tones that is for sure. Still don't know if it actually did work. I did like the dialogue, the cast sound like normal people. Definitely closer to IDW in execution (as should, Ian Flynn did write it). The main lore maybe could been better told. For how much the game strung you along with the mystery some details are still told with ambiguity in the end. I got the gist of the story but something is missing to wrap it all up in the end. One thing about the storytelling I was told was annoying was how much the game references things but I couldn't get Sonic to trigger a lot of it. What was mentioned in major cutscenes/NPC chat wasn't overly reference abuse to me I guess I will never know what the big deal was. It was fun to listen to Sonic comment as he explored when he can though.
So yeah, this is quite a game. I personally enjoyed myself with it. I wish Sonic Team would finally abandon their Boost-era tendencies toward level designing I think the followup to Frontiers has a ton of potential to grow as a sandbox platformer.
7/10
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Post by excelsior on Dec 20, 2022 23:41:42 GMT -5
I'm surprised to hear this. Even if the graphics look a bit bland (have any of Valve's games ever looked appealing?), I thought the game's concept and reputation would be enough to have high expectations of it. I have only played the first Portal FWIW, but I thought in that game the graphics served the game's readability and the atmosphere, so I was fine with the way it looked. It's just not very often that a game that falls outside of my own tastes positively surprises me, so I can usually trust my judgement from this perspective and happily ignore the reputation. I agree with you about Valve games looking unappealing in general though, which is why this is the first time I ever played one. On Half Life for instance, just looking at these covers drains any enthusiasm from me.
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Post by spanky on Dec 21, 2022 20:23:23 GMT -5
Family out of town for a couple of days, slow week at work...that's right, I'm gaming.
Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (Switch, First Time)
The original DKC being my selection for the SNES thread a couple of weeks ago got me realizing I had never beaten my copy of Tropical Freeze! I bought it when it came out, enjoyed it, then just kind of gave up at the final boss! I decided it was high time to finally beat the game. I started from the beginning and did not use Funky mode. I can beat the original trilogy in my sleep, I don't need an easy mode! This was a very casual playthrough, I found secret exits and collectibles when I could but I didn't take time to revisit levels that often.
Retro Studios revival of Donkey Kong Country back 2010 was and is well regarded and it's sequel is even better. I never played the WiiU version of this but I have played Returns. The devs wisely took out all the gimmick controls and the game is much better for it.
It's a gorgeous game - the characters are full of life with tons of going in the background. I also like the villains a lot more than the evil Tikis from Returns. The ritual banana sacrifice before the second boss gave me a good laugh. The environments aren't too crazy but there are some fun twists on the formula, with the jungle that has an enormous fruit processing plant in it. There was a some talk on the SNES thread about how DKC does a great job with atmosphere and this game keeps that going. And the music...David Wise returns to the series providing without a doubt the best soundtrack across the entire series.
The game hews pretty closely to the original DKC games with some minor changes. First of all, the partner system has been revamped. You always control Donkey Kong but you can pick up the other Kongs and they'll increase your health and give you access to some extra abilities while they ride your back. Diddy has a jetpack which lets you extend your horizontal jumping range, Dixie can twirl her hair to give you a short upward boost in the air and Cranky can use his cane to jump high and bounce off stuff (including spikes!) just like Scrooge McDuck. They also each have a special ability you can activate once you collect enough bananas. Dixie is by far the most useful, she gives you the most control over your jumps and her special move turns enemies into special heart pickups that let you overfill your health meter. There's other minor gameplay changes and you'll get used to them.
Level designs are heavily gimmicked like you might expect, but that's OK, Like the other games, it does a very good job of easing you into each gimmick. I thought most were quite enjoyable with only a handful of levels not really landing for me. It starts to run out of steam towards the end game. It's quite difficult but each level has multiple checkpoints you can bring specials items into the levels to give you an edge. Even the dreaded mine cart and rocket barrel levels are surprisingly engaging.
Like the original games, the levels are full of secrets and bonus levels. In each level you have 4 KONG letters to collect which unlock an extra level if you collect all of them in a world. There's also a number of puzzle pieces which will unlock art and music. The KONG letters are pretty easy to find but many of the puzzles are pretty cleverly hidden. The bonus games all fall the same pattern - collect the bananas. While they're fun, they lack variety and there's not a ton of reason to do them unless you're just trying to collect the puzzle pieces. Extra lives are very common and there's a good chance you'll be maxed out on them by the time you hit midgame. There's plenty of secret paths, alternate routes and yes, a secret world too if you find everything.
Any complaints? Ehhhh I didn't really like the bosses. Most of them take way too long to beat and I find myself getting tired of the "dodge the boss's attacks for 30 seconds then he slips on a banana peel and you can bonk him on the head. Repeat this 9 times" design.
I've said a lot but I feel like if anything I am underselling how good this game is. The original trilogy puts me in a real time and place like few other games do and will continue to occupy a bigger place in my mind but on an objective level this is probably the best game in the series. 9.5/10.
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Post by spanky on Dec 22, 2022 21:08:56 GMT -5
Home Alone (Genesis, First Time)
Home Alone is probably my favorite Christmas movie. It's a very basic choice (at least it's not Die Hard I guess, though that's a great movie as well), but I saw the movie in the theaters when I was 6 years old and it's always stuck with me. It's a good blend of childhood fantasies and fears, slapstick humor and holiday schmaltz.
The Nintendo games were all handled by THQ have a reputation for being pretty bad. The NES game is probably the worst of the lot. It's a really underwhelming and shallow maze chase style game. The SNES and Game Boy games have you running around the house, collecting valuables and dumping them into the basement via a laundry chute and then locking them in a vault. It's marginally better but still not great.
The Genesis version, developed by Sega of America themselves actually has a bit of creative spark to it. Instead of just defending the McCallister household in this version, Kevin takes it upon himself to protect the entire neighborhood. There are 5 houses and they all have a theme and some unique obstacles. You have to stall the Wet Bandits for 20 minutes in the beginner game and 40 minutes in the Expert game. You navigate around the neighborhood on Kevin's sled, and you can demolish snowmen to pick up items. You can go into any house to set up traps or collect more items, or you can track the Wet Bandits van to see which house they are going to and follow them in.
Upon entering a house you can set up traps. These mainly serve as a way of letting you slow down the burglars. They don't cause enough damage or are numerous enough for them to make a huge difference. The main way of fighting the bandits is using weapons assembled with the game's crafting system. Using household objects you can make all sorts of wacky guns and launchers. A lot of the weapons fire in an arc, which is really annoying - you'll miss most of the time, so it's better to shoot the bandits at point blank range before your weapons arc over them. Once the bandits are in the house, they run around looking for safes to loot. Once they loot enough, they flood the house and move on to the next one. That is, unless you fill up their Pain Meter which at that point they'll retreat. Most of the bandits stun the bandits for quite a while, so a lot of the game is spent sitting there, waiting for them to come out of their cartoony stun animation and shooting them again.
Your main issue is going to be running out of ammo. So the key to the game is quickly getting to the houses, and collecting enough items to build up your arsenal and making it to whatever the house the bandits are currently looting before you flood it. It's pretty easy to win the game, you only really fail if the bandits loot all 5 houses.
Extremely low standards here ,but this is probably the best Home Alone game but even then it's not great. It's kind of fun, but if I were to redesign a game a bit, I'd put a slightly higher focus on the traps since that was the focus of the movie and maybe even let you build new traps via the crafting system. Sitting around and shooting the bandits over and over until you run out of ammo gets kind of repetitive. 5/10.
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Post by Woody Alien on Dec 23, 2022 12:21:35 GMT -5
Another day, another round. They're all games on Steam yet again:
Deep the Game (PC, first time, about 2h 15)
More like Shallow the Game am I right? I knew it was going to be bad when it started and one of the ugliest developer logos ever appeared on my screen. It's a free precision platformer set in a series of caves, four chapters with 20 levels each where the final one has a different challenge (bosses, rising flames, rotating screen etc.). You have to jump around, climb, avoid spikes, kill enemies, collect coins and eventually survive, prizes are randomly unlocked different skins for your character and that's it. It's not badly made per se, it's just that is a basic porting of a completely unoriginal mobile phone game (plus a level editor, but I didn't care for that). Everything is generic and done a million times before, from the blocky pixel art to the challenges to the two kinds of enemies (slimes and bats), there's no real point in getting the best times or trying to complete levels with less deaths, I just downloaded it for a few easy achievements and tried to complete it as quickly as possible to get it over with. There's also a paid DLC for more levels but I don't see anything that would convince me to play it again. 4/10
Max, An Autistic Journey (PC, first time, about 4 hrs)
I am not on the spectrum and do not personally know people who are, but I wanted to learn more about the condition in a somewhat entertaining way, so I added this title to my Steam wishlist because it seemed interesting. And bought it during a sale.
Though I know edutainment titles aren't usually good, well, this one is not a great game either, but it's still miles better than crap like, say, Captain Novolin. The game has been made by a man who based the main characters on his family and especially his young autistic son who is the playable character. He wanted to represent a day in his son's life as a video game, made with RPG Maker, since he argues that every moment in his day from waking up, eating, going to school etc. has to be controlled by a series of pictograms to show him what he has to do and in what order, so it is not too much different from a series of mini-games where you have to follow instructions and complete a clear goal. It kind of makes sense, and there are some cute ideas here and there.
RPG battles are justified by Max's hyperactive imagination where he sees people or things he doesn't like as fantasy monsters. And completing the day's tasks gives him more powers during the battle sequences, for example learning to breathe deeply to calm his anger turns into a technique that makes him focus and regain HP, the ear muffles he wears to avoid sensory overload become a protection from enemy magic, or the flashlight he uses when it's dark turns into a magic that hurts and blinds monsters, and so on. Plus there's several other mini-games representing what he does, from writing compositions in school to playing an instrument, taking a shower, drawing etc. Every "chapter" is also preceded by a description on how Max deals with everyday interactions in the "real world". Max's inner voice that also acts as save point is represented by a Godzilla stand-in, who is also his ultimate summon and attack, since as a pre-teen Max has a passion for dinos and monster movies.
All well and good, but the game can't avoid the usual problems inherent in the RPG Maker engine, plus the fight sequences are insultingly easy and repetitive, so that they become more of a chore than anything and you don't feel that Max is really putting what he learned during the day to the test.
I don't want to be harsh on the game because it is clearly a labor of love and as I said there are some nice ideas and sequences, and it does explain fairly well how the mind of a person who isn't neurotypical works, but 1. the engine is a bit too primitive to clearly depict some of these features and 2. as far as I know the author is not a game designer by trade so some things come off as clumsy or cheesy. But in the end it's fairly enjoyable and well-meaning. I played much shittier games inspired by personal situations, so there's that. And profits also go to charity! 6.5/10
In the Rural Village of Nagoro (PC, first time, 16 minutes)
This can be barely considered a game so I have a hard time giving it a score, but there is some interactivity since you can move a character and press a button to do stuff (game's page even proudly states "interaction button exists"!). Stupidly I spoiled myself what the game was about, but since it lasts a quarter of a hour I can say it here: it's a sort-of promotional infotainment game about the almost abandoned Japanese tiny village of Nagoro which is a real place and has been populated by scarecrows, all made by one woman, Tsukimi Ayano (you can learn about it here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2TSTOy0fus&t=206s ) Sounds like something out of a horror movie but it's a cute, peaceful and melancholic. You start by controlling a little girl who goes from home to school and then her as an old woman who makes the trip back but this time everyone has been replaced by dolls... again, I made it sound like some bad creepypasta but it's anything but. It has a cute hand-drawn pastel art style, almost no words, relaxing soundtrack and even a vocal song provided by a Japanese singer (her Youtube channel is here www.youtube.com/@lizu0110/videos and she also covers some video game songs!). Minimalistic "walking simulator", the idea is interesting and I don't remember seeing what is essentially a tourism ad (but with some undertones about Japan's dwindling rural areas) done in this way.
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Post by dsparil on Dec 24, 2022 5:54:48 GMT -5
9 Clues: The Secret of Serpent Creek (Switch, First Time) 9 Clues 2: The Ward
Two hidden object adventure games from Artifex Mundi, the Kemco of the genre at least on Switch. Not really sure why I snagged these, but I've been on a little bit of a mystery kick and these were on sale. The first one was actually pretty good and is a nice thriller about a creepy town. The sequel is not as good and is pretty much just a parade of decrepit asylum stereotypes.
Rating: 7, 5
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Post by Mr. Saturn on Dec 24, 2022 12:12:09 GMT -5
Team Sonic Racing (PS4) - First playthrough, Time: quite a bit, Rating: 4/5 An all around solid kart racer by series veteran devs Sumo Digital. Good courses and tight controls. Feels a bit bland compared to the previous Sega All Stars racing games though and the story is the barest excuse for pitting Sonic characters against each other in races. I guess that's all you really need though. It was such a bizarre game in that it was such a step-down from the 2nd one. Hell, it doesn't even really compete with the first one on any significant level. Wonder why it was so bare-bones compared to first two.
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Post by ZenithianHero on Dec 24, 2022 20:17:46 GMT -5
Team Sonic Racing (PS4) - First playthrough, Time: quite a bit, Rating: 4/5 An all around solid kart racer by series veteran devs Sumo Digital. Good courses and tight controls. Feels a bit bland compared to the previous Sega All Stars racing games though and the story is the barest excuse for pitting Sonic characters against each other in races. I guess that's all you really need though. It was such a bizarre game in that it was such a step-down from the 2nd one. Hell, it doesn't even really compete with the first one on any significant level. Wonder why it was so bare-bones compared to first two. It was a filler game, so got that shoestring budget. A shame, I found the co-op idea creative. Never had a chance, its marketing went down the toilet as it was competing with Crash Team Racing Remake and barely won over an audience due to pivoting away from Sega crossover concept.
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Post by personman on Dec 25, 2022 1:55:49 GMT -5
Lunistice (Steam, played on Steam Deck; first time; 8 hours)
Didn't think I would have another entry this year but lo and behold one of my friends got this for me for Christmas and I immediately got hooked and finished the thing in a couple days. I saw the thing on Twitter and just thought it looked nifty with the faux PS1 aesthetic you see so often today (I'm not complaining). I probably would have grabbed it half way soon just because its so cheap (only 6 bucks) but I'm really glad I didn't get the chance to sleep on it any longer. So its actually a 3D Sonic game, really. But its one that feels like what a Sonic game would in the Saturn days, like maybe Sonic Xtreme could have been like this before it got twisted and messed up by so many unfortunate events. It's abstract dream theme even calls back to the trippy bonus stages of Sonic 1 even. Level design wise it even feels a bit like a 2D Sonic stage in 3D just with less of an emphasis on multiple paths, there will be like four little off shoots you need to spot in order to grab all the stuff in a stage but other wise its all about precision platforming with the opportunity for speed but not a requirement for it.
I think that's what I like about it so much: it's a fast game but doesn't fall into the trap Sonic games as a whole do where they try to make going as fast as possible the entire point when it's clearly not since they force you to slow down anyways or other bullshit the Adventure games and such forced you through ("buy a fishing controller now!"). And even when you do reach that crazy speed you're often not doing much but going forward. Here the fastest you can go is like Sonic's walk and to me that's a good thing because its manageable and allows the stage to actually be something you have to engage with; you can go fast as you can to get that short time but you can just take your time if you wish and it doesn't feel bad. 3D Sonic on the other hand you get so frustrated with because you control to just move in a straight line as fast a possible but the stage wants you to act more like Mario and take tiny steps and it just doesn't work. Its this whiplash in that series, 2D and 3D that has always bothered me. I never really knew the solution but I think just toning down the actual velocity may have been the key based on what I see here. Of course I haven't played a 3D Sonic in years so I dunno, I won't claim any of that as gospel.
Point is this game is a really fun, simple and adorable platformer. It's got plenty of challenge but isn't face punchingly difficult. It is a touch lean and I wouldn't have minded if they could try to experiment with the levels a bit more; only one of them really switches things up. There are nothing like boss fights either which I am okay with but I wouldn't have minded if they at least tried one for the finale. The camera can be a slight bit bothersome getting stuck by some objects but that rarely happened. Again though the thing is 6 bucks, of course its lean and even if they stages don't branch out much they do such a good job I really didn't care. Not to mention the awesome music which even reminds me a little of Sonic music before it went the uh... way it did lol. This is my favorite track of them all but the whole thing has a fun feel good vibe to it:
Its just a nice time all around. I usually have a hard time going out of my way and collecting everything or getting top ranks in stuff with some exceptions. I've got too much to play and all but I stuck with this one and did it all without a second thought. There are two more characters to unlock afterwards too which has their own quirks not sure I'm too worried about doing the same thing with them but who knows. For now though I really recommend this to everyone. It's a fun little time that the only real criticism I can make of it is I wish there was a little bit more and maybe it could have taken a couple risks. Otherwise no complaints it nails what it was going for damn near perfectly. Really put a smile on my face.
Rating- 9
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Post by Apollo Chungus on Dec 25, 2022 6:07:05 GMT -5
Saints Row: Gat Out of Hell (Xbox 360; Replay; 1 hour 47 minutes)
I had a couple of games on the go that I ended up dropping due to technical issues and chicanery that I couldn't overcome (which I'll eventually write about in the Game Fail thread), so I decided for the heck of it to replay a game I know I could beat in a couple of hours due to how it's structured. Gat Out of Hell is the last Saints Row made during the series' original run and an expansion based on the mechanics to Saints Row IV, in which you play as either Johnny Gat or Kinzie and cause havoc in Hell itself to try and rescue the Boss from being married to Satan's daughter. It's got the same basic rhythms of IV, engaging in the usual mix of activities and collecting super powers to get stronger (with only one new power - summoning demons).
The big difference here is that there's only one mandatory mission; the final mission where you bust down the doors on Satan and kick his ass; but you only unlock it by completing enough activities and side missions to fill up a meter. In a sense, it brings back the respect meter mechanic from the first two games, locking off progression by asking you to take part in the side stuff first. It's an interesting way of framing the entire game like this, since it means that everything between the opening tutorial and final boss is totally optional. That said, a good chunk of side activities don't open up until you do the "recruit a new ally and get a new power" mission for each of the game's four regions, which is kinda odd. I get that it encourages a kind of order by having you do the big things to unlock the little things, but it also takes away from the ability to do as you please for no real reason.
Otherwise, it's a fairly good game, though I admit that's largely because it inherits the strengths of Saints Row IV - plenty of combat options that makes thrashing enemies a load of fun, goofy fun side activities, and charismatic banter between you and your mates. Sadly, there isn't a whole lot of story, unless you dig around for audio logs in the overworld and take part in the loyalty missions. While those were in IV as well, that was alongside the main missions where you got a lot of time with the various characters and they worked together in fleshing them out. Here, and especially in the manner that I replayed the game, it's easy to ignore those logs/missions and find characters don't have that much of a presence. It's a shame because the stuff I love about IV's vibe is still in there, but in a comparatively microscopic sense.
In a way, I think I feel about this game the way others feel about shorter expansions that concluded their respective games such as Duke 3D: Nuclear Winter or Half-Life: Blue Shift - one last romp that feels too truncated and ends things on a middling note. I enjoyed Nuclear Winter and Blue Shift as concise adventures capping off much grander experiences, and maybe I'd feel the same about Gat Out of Hell if I'd experienced it as an epilogue to my time with IV rather than as a self-contained game played a few years later. Ah well.
Super Mario Land (Game Boy; First Time; 35 minutes)
I've never been much of a 2D Mario fan. I find it hard to wrap my head around how the games control and frequently found them a bit too harsh in proportion to how crap I am at playing them. Apart from Mario Land 2 (which had me using save states on the regular) and the original New Super Mario Bros, I never got very far into any of them. Then last night I was chatting with some online acquaintances and we somehow got onto the original Mario Land, and I faintly recalled that game could be beaten very quickly. When said acquaintances backed this up from experience, I decided to download it and give it a bash. This is the first 2D Mario from the olden days that I've beaten without save states, and I'm quite proud of that.
It's also a cool little game. For once, I was able to figure out the controls and managed to control with a bit of precision, though some things took a while to get used to like how you fall like a lead weight if you just walk off platforms. There's plenty of neat level designs - I'm particularly fond of how stages will sometimes include two routes that you use if you're Big Mario but only one you can use if you're Smol Mario. I really appreciate some of the ways things are made easier, such as rewarding you with lives if you reach the bonus exit and removing nearby enemies if you die and respawn.
Hirokazu Tanaka's one of my favourite composers of this era and he puts together a very good soundtrack that fits the Mario bill of jaunty tunes while doing its own thing. On that note, I appreciate how strange Mario Land is compared to your average Mario. Stages are inspired by real world locales like Egypt and China, there's various oddball enemies inspired by said locales such as the flying Eastern Island heads in World 3 or the hopping Jiangshi in World 4, and a couple worlds even end with a side-scrolling shooter level. It's an oddball title, and that's why I find it so endearing (as well as just being a nice romp that can be cleared in half an hour).
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Dec 26, 2022 11:24:34 GMT -5
Not much time left in 2022, so I guess I better get some of the various games I forgot this year for various reasons (mostly because I was still doing post-game stuff or gathering my thoughts). I'm quarantined with covid anyway, so it's not like I have anything better to do this christmas than writing this stuff up now. Boxlife (DS (played on 3DS), first time, ??h??m) PiCOPiCT (DS (played on 3DS), replay, ??h??m)Two Art Style games I've owned since the DSi days. In Boxlife, you cut shapes of 6 tiles you can fold boxes out of. There's the R&D mode where you have to use entire sheets, basically a puzzle mode. Beating those stages unlocks Factory mode stages, which are basically score attacks. As it turns out, there's a lot of shapes you can use to fold a box, and as the game goes on the R&D it becomes increasingly trial-and-error-y (or rote memorization of the various random shapes you can get per shape). It's honestly more than a bit frustrating, but the idea of the game is quite unique and can be pretty satisfying. PiCOPiCT is probably the most popular Art Style game due the the NES (or Famicom, more like) stylings, but it deserves it regardless. Gameplay is a unique take on the falling block genre. It gets hectic and mostly depends on reaction time as you'd expect of a game of this type, but the touch screen controls and way you have to shuffle the blocks around to keep things neat means its a unique type of chaos. Especially in the hard modes of each stage it gets crazy (though it never feels too unfair). The great music and 80's nostalgia is the cherry on top. Ratings: 7.5 (Boxlife), 9 (PiCOPiCT).
New Super Mario Bros. 2 (3DS, replay, 12h00m (est.))I'm sure we all celebrated the 10th anniversary of this classic this summer. No? Just me? Actually, it was just a coincidence I played this exactly when it turned 10. This is probably the least impactful Mario game of all time, but it's a good time. It's both very traditional (and derivative aesthetically), and a bit weird (a lot of typical elements and enemies are used sparingly or in weird ways. The main story mode is fun enough I think. It's hard to mess up Mario honestly, and I kind of prefer the smaller stages of NSMB1+2 over Wii+U. There's a lot of coins around, and in this mode it doesn't really amount of much apart from just the intrinsic fun of picking up lots of coins. The main event here is the Coin Rush mode, and it's both brilliant and very flawed. It makes it fun to remember stages, speedrun through them and think of strategies (not to mention thinking of when to use your Golden Flower). But there's also a huge difference in the amount of coins between stages, so playing with random stages means you're largely dependent on RNG. The DLC coin packs fix this issue, and have their own high scores to try to reach. Getting that high score and picking up all 9 star coins along the way is a fun challenge (depending on the pack and I haven't played them all yet). I really wish they'd implement something like this in future games, though they'd have to balance it better if they were to include the stages from the main game. Rating: 8/10
Overboard (Win10, first time, 1h45m)No, it's not the Psygnosis game Overboard!, though I do own that, coincidentally, It's a DOOM II wad. It's made by DOOM mapping legend Cyriak (Mouldy), who made the excellent Going Down a couple years back and surprisingly returned to DOOM mapping this year with this short but sweet wad. There's also a new game+ which remixes stages slightly (and adds even more demons to kill of course), which I've never seen done in a DOOM wad. It's a nice breather while I'm slaving away at a really big/difficult wad, and I had to play it as soon I heard of it. It's about Doomguy getting shipwrecked and visiting various locales in a small boat which you need to find fuel for in order to beat the maps. There's various islands but also a cruiseship and a rather creative submarine map. Like Going Down, the music is zany, there's a lot of impressive tricks and cool worldbuilding (again mostly done with vanilla textures), and gameplay is both pretty challenging and with lots of original fights. Played on Ultra-Violence with Pistol Starts. Rating: 8.5/10
Hexcells (Win10, replay, 1h50m) Hexcells Plus (Win10, replay, 6h10m)windfisch gave me the Hexcells trilogy christmas 2016 and they remain some of my favorite puzzlers ever. Hexcells Infinite is also great but I got stuck in the last stage. Well, stuck is a big word, but it's a huge stage and I prefer to play without making a single mistake so one instance of mixing up the left and right mouse buttons and it's all over. Anyway, if you haven't played these, it's like Picross meets Minesweeper, but it's better than both. Picross' "level design" is entirely dependent on the shape of the picture, and minesweeper is random, but Hexcells has actual hand-crafted levels, and I think it strengthens the game. If you even remotely like Picross, Minesweeper, Sudoku or whatever, play it! Rating: 10/10
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Post by ZenithianHero on Dec 26, 2022 20:14:33 GMT -5
Doom classic (XBOX One, first time, 5 hours 30 minutes)
Why did it take this long to play Doom? I'm quite impressed the game is like arcade bliss with its action running around in mazes just shoot stuff. Quite hard too, the game does not let up with amount of enemies. Plus, you lose your weapons on death and you keep your previous health and ammo so its little frustrating in that regard.
8/10
Doom II (XBOX One, first time, 6 hours)
Its like Doom 1 but with new enemies and larger levels. Said level design have bit more trickery and puzzle-like and was confusing to me.
6/10
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Post by dsparil on Dec 27, 2022 12:39:33 GMT -5
Sports Story (Switch, First Time)
I gave up on this yesterday, posted about it and then deleted it since I decided to power through. This is without a doubt this most disappointing game I have ever played, and it's easily one of the absolute worst. For one thing, this is an early beta maybe even an alpha that got pushed out the door. It's mind boggling how buggy this is on every level. Some challenges can't be completed due to bugs, and it's easy to put yourself into situations where the game can't be completed due to scripting errors. Loading can even cause these problems. Literally none of the sports actually work properly 100% of the time, and some work correctly 0% of the time. Calling most of them sports is generous since they're mostly small mini-games that get minimal appearance. It's mostly just golf which behaves worse than the original and tennis which is very buggy. The poor quality of the tennis is especially galling because its expansion was stated as a reason for delays. Even if all the bugs were squashed, there's nothing redeemable here. The plot is threadbare, poorly written and nonsensical with a finale that's completely tacked on. The game is also mostly poorly defined fetch quests giving this only a fraction of the content in the original which was mostly golf or at least golf related.
This game is a complete unmitigated disaster. Stay, far, far away. Don't even get it on sale or if someone pays you play it. I could go on for pages and pages of all the problems this has on a design and technical level.
I finished in 15:30:38.
Rating: 0. Originally I went with 2, but that's overly generous after it also ate my final save.
Edit: I forgot to mention that it seems like there's a lot of cut content too. There are entire areas shown in the trailer last month that aren't in the game. You can even sort of see one of them on the world map.
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