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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 27, 2018 12:19:48 GMT -5
It seems that for several series articles, the order of the articles (i.e. "This entry is part x of y in the series ABC") got a bit messed up in the transition. I noticed it on Ultima (wildly out of order), Wolfenstein (Beyond and 2009) and Prince of Persia (Harem Adventures should be after 3D, maybe after Sands of Time for context). Yeah, I gotta fix those. I'd lost track of which ones were messed up and which ones weren't, recently fixed up Mega Man since we posted Mega Man 11. The "series" widget produces some unpredictable results if you're not publishing them in order.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 25, 2018 19:41:09 GMT -5
You'd find more depth in Dragon Quest III/IV or Megami Tensei II, but as for something I'd want to play today? Easily Phantasy Star.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 25, 2018 19:39:33 GMT -5
That aside, exploratory platformer. This is my pick.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 20, 2018 11:18:21 GMT -5
There's the Grandia games! It fits 1 and 3 in that there are visible enemies on the field. It's turn-based but it has a very action-y feel due to the way that turns happen.
Shadow Hearts has timing elements but it also has copious random battles.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 19, 2018 10:22:35 GMT -5
So there's articles up for Command and Conquer: Red Alert recently but the thing is is this a re upload cause I remember reading these before in the past a year or so ago? You must be misremembering because these are brand new. We DID have articles on Command and Conquer 3 & 4 awhile back. We're kinda doing them out of order.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 16, 2018 19:28:33 GMT -5
The NES/FC Life Force definitely felt closer to Gradius. But, the original arcade Salamander is a much different feeling game from Gradius, despite borrowing some of its weapons.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 15, 2018 15:38:20 GMT -5
Instead of this just being a list thread, maybe it would be include to add some thoughts as to why some of these were changed? Some of these aren't really "sequel" either. For example:
Tower of Druaga > Return of Ishtar > Quest of Ki
Though these titles are all related, they play completely differently. Labeling them Druaga 2 and 3 (or even adding subtitles) would create different expectations.
Xevious > Solvalou
Completely different game. At least the Xevious 3D game kinda plays like Xevious.
Afterburner > G-LOC: Air Battle
These games play completely differently despite sharing many similarities. There's also little point in naming a sequel when this, at least in its arcade incarnation, was more of an amusement ride.
Rocket Knight Adventures > Sparkster (SNES)
Most of these mascot games had the character's name in the title and it was kind of unusual that Rocket Knight Adventures didn't, so it seems like they tried to standardize this for the sequels. Plus, the first game was Genesis only and the sequel was multi-platform.
Tail Concerto > Solatorobo
Isn't this more like a spiritual successor from a different company?
Joe & Mac > Congo's Caper (Tatakae Genshijin 2 in Japan)
A curious problem in the localization of the original title - since Joe & Mac aren't in this game, they couldn't use the name.
Commando > Mercs (though in Japan it's Senjo No Okami II)
I surmised that Capcom may have run into trouble since Commando the game came out around the same time as the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie and someone somewhere felt there could've been some confusion, just not enough to have any legal action filed. So I think they changed the name to avoid that for the sequel.
Gradius > Salamander
These are completely different games that share some commonalities (that became closer with each revision).
Parasite Eve > The 3rd Birthday
Square-Enix lost the license to the book/movie the original game was based on but still used the character Aya, since it was their original creation.
Fortified Zone > Operation Logic Bomb
The original game was Game Boy only so I think they wanted to avoid putting out a sequel to game on a portable platform.
Koudelka > Shadow Hearts
These are separate franchises that play completely differently, and are only connected by loose storyline reasons. Koudelka itself was not particularly popular or well-regarded.
Another World > Heart of the Alien
"Out of This World Parts I & II" are listed on the packaging. There are a few cases where what would otherwise be a subtitle is made the main title for the sake of marketing (you can see this with Day of the Tentacle too).
Gargoyle's Quest > Demon's Crest
I think marketing just realized that "Demon's Crest" just sounded cooler. It's a little closer to the original Japanese title too.
Shinobi (PS2) > Nightshade
This has been one of the most baffling. Even the original Japanese title was different but some loose association can be made, but "kunoichi" is not a widely understood word in English, even though they probably could've used it. Nightshade is incredibly generic.
No One Lives Forever > Contract JACK
Spinoff starring a different character, totally different vibe.
Contra > Super C
Konami rode the headlines by associating with the Iran-Contra scandal for the first game but somehow got cold feet with the NES version of the sequel? No one is really clear.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 13, 2018 11:56:33 GMT -5
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 12, 2018 11:53:34 GMT -5
I agree with all of this above. I'd add that another element that I find relevant when discussing pre-Link to the Past Zelda clones (like Neutopia) is the field and dungeons being separated into square screens instead of freely scrolling through an area, simply because most '80s console RPGs don't do that. I don't know whether that was a technical limitation or design choice for the original Zelda, but it was definitely a choice in Neutopia. I think it's by design. The overworld is very open-ended, to the point where they stuck in a map on screen at all times, and it's much easier to determine your position when everything is mapped on a strict grid. Makes me wonder what Metroid would've been like if they stuck to similar design, but I feel like flip-screens work better from an overhead perspective than a side-scrolling one. There were issues in the early days of the NES with multi-directional scrolling, but it was mostly solved by the time the Famicom Disk System had been released.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 12, 2018 11:46:13 GMT -5
That's very interesting, hats off to you... however I wonder why making it so difficult to pull off the EXP trick in the actual game, to the point that nobody knows it. It's kind of a relic of 80s arcade games gameplay? I think so. There was definitely more of a culture that tricks of arcade games were documented in guides and magazines and such, whereas the same thing didn't really happen, at least in America, until fighting games like Street Fighter II. After all, it's not technically a huge influence on the game - it definitely helps level up a little faster, but the game is always tossing different types of enemies at you anyway so it's not like you can build up the chain too high, and all of the other tricks are just relatively minor bonuses. Still, I appreciate this kind of design. Reminds me of TMNT 3 on the NES, where different methods of killing bad guys gave you different amounts of points. So the "stab and toss" move killed most enemies instantly but gave the least amount of points, compared to other methods, and that was important to build up extra lives for the last levels.
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Post by Discoalucard on Nov 7, 2018 22:13:49 GMT -5
I had actually written this game off for a long time since I found the Arthurian thing kinda played out. But since it was on one of the PSP collections (my writing these series predated the Beat-Em-Up collection that just came out), I gave it a shot, and found myself really liking it once I understood the mechanics and the little extra things you can do to boost your experience. None of the other reviews I've read out there document this, since I was translating off some Japanese sites, so I hope it will help some people find more depth to the game.
As for King of Dragons...I like I mentioned in the review, I like it, but it's also at that weird midway point between Magic Sword and the Dungeons and Dragons arcade games, and I think both of those are superior.
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Post by Discoalucard on Oct 30, 2018 9:51:27 GMT -5
Somehow we've missed Beyond the Beyond > Golden Sun. Given the generally hostile reception that game got, I'd say that's more like "willfully abandoned" rather than losing it. (Though I've never actually played Beyond the Beyond so I dunno how similar they are...they do look very close.)
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Post by Discoalucard on Oct 25, 2018 8:01:37 GMT -5
A direct disc ➡ iso would have been preferable but thanks nonetheless I tried to make an ISO but it keeps coming up with unreadable blocks.
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Post by Discoalucard on Oct 24, 2018 11:28:10 GMT -5
Their apology was stunningly awful. What the hell is going on at that company?
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Post by Discoalucard on Oct 24, 2018 8:58:27 GMT -5
no Halloween Special this year? We're posting stuff from the Retro Horror book (Youkai Yashiki should be up today), and The Suffering is due on Halloween day.
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