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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Jun 3, 2020 8:38:50 GMT -5
One shouldn't underestimate how clever and creative some fans can be. As long as there are well-made tutorials and (optional) semi-automated help-features, alongside the the option to choose from either a limited, beginner-friendly set or a complex, advanced set, I don't see a problem there. You would be able to find good dungeons, sure. But you'd probably have to wade through a bunch of terrible shit to get to it. Most people can't design a decent Mario stage, and I'd say designing a Zelda dungeon would have an even lower success rate. You need to take so much more into account to create a Zelda dungeon. I also see the potential inability for dungeon gimmicks to be a potential roadblock. I'm not sure it'd be terribly interesting to basically just have LoZ dungeons although if there was enough side scrolling for a Zelda II style, that is a little more interesting since there's just the one. I think that's pretty much the biggest problem too. Things like Mario or DOOM can have infinite permutations and still be just as fun, but I doubt Zelda has that in it, to be honest. It could work, but they wouldn't be able to stick so closely to the Zelda formula as they did to the Mario formula in Mario Maker.
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Post by windfisch on Jun 3, 2020 10:37:15 GMT -5
One shouldn't underestimate how clever and creative some fans can be. As long as there are well-made tutorials and (optional) semi-automated help-features, alongside the the option to choose from either a limited, beginner-friendly set or a complex, advanced set, I don't see a problem there. You would be able to find good dungeons, sure. But you'd probably have to wade through a bunch of terrible shit to get to it. Most people can't design a decent Mario stage, and I'd say designing a Zelda dungeon would have an even lower success rate. You need to take so much more into account to create a Zelda dungeon. I also see the potential inability for dungeon gimmicks to be a potential roadblock. I'm not sure it'd be terribly interesting to basically just have LoZ dungeons although if there was enough side scrolling for a Zelda II style, that is a little more interesting since there's just the one. I think that's pretty much the biggest problem too. Things like Mario or DOOM can have infinite permutations and still be just as fun, but I doubt Zelda has that in it, to be honest. It could work, but they wouldn't be able to stick so closely to the Zelda formula as they did to the Mario formula in Mario Maker. Granted, I've never played Mario Maker and I'm sure there are tons of terrible stages. But is there no rating system of sorts? And what about word of mouth? I'm sure if someone managed to create a good dungeon, people would take notice sooner or later. Personally, I find the thought of creating and experimenting with my own Zelda maps much more intriguing than creating ones for Mario. So that alone would make it worth my while.
I'm afraid I can't quite follow. If a potential Zelda Maker used a game like Link to the Past as basis, there'd be lots of gimmicks to play around with.
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Post by dsparil on Jun 3, 2020 12:54:31 GMT -5
You would be able to find good dungeons, sure. But you'd probably have to wade through a bunch of terrible shit to get to it. Most people can't design a decent Mario stage, and I'd say designing a Zelda dungeon would have an even lower success rate. You need to take so much more into account to create a Zelda dungeon. I think that's pretty much the biggest problem too. Things like Mario or DOOM can have infinite permutations and still be just as fun, but I doubt Zelda has that in it, to be honest. It could work, but they wouldn't be able to stick so closely to the Zelda formula as they did to the Mario formula in Mario Maker. Granted, I've never played Mario Maker and I'm sure there are tons of terrible stages. But is there no rating system of sorts? And what about word of mouth? I'm sure if someone managed to create a good dungeon, people would take notice sooner or later. Personally, I find the thought of creating and experimenting with my own Zelda maps much more intriguing than creating ones for Mario. So that alone would make it worth my while. I'm afraid I can't quite follow. If a potential Zelda Maker used a game like Link to the Past as basis, there'd be lots of gimmicks to play around with.
Super Mario Maker has multiple game styles with some elements being limited to to certain styles although that's somewhat of an articifical limitation. There isn't really a real rating system either. You can give a course a star and the number of plays and completions is visible, but that's it. One thing to keep in mind because you haven't used SMM is that one of it's appeals is the ability to combine existing elements in ways that don't show up in the games like a cloud that rains coins for a mild example. It has a tool kit of simple elements that can mixed and matched in various ways. The post-NES Zelda games are much more bespoke in a way that the Mario games aren't. Even if you take skill out of the equation, they're just a lot more work in general unless there's a greater emphasis on premade and lightly customizable components. The individual components also don't lend themselves to to being combined in new ways.
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Post by toei on Jun 3, 2020 13:32:04 GMT -5
dsparil You could combine the individual components indirectly. For example, you know those pillars that you hang onto with the chain to get past cliffs? Using one could also act as a switch, for example to close and open a door, so you would have to calculate a trajectory through a certain room filled with small platforms and pillars so that the door you need to get to is open at the end. Or you could have enemies that you can hang onto with the chain to cross - maybe they're invincible, but you can push them to the right spot by firing arrows at them, so you can then use the chain on them to get past a cliff. That sort of thing. There are many possibilities, maybe even some that haven't been used in previous Zeldas or other action RPGs.
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Post by windfisch on Jun 3, 2020 14:03:39 GMT -5
The lack of a proper rating system in Mario Maker is a shame, really. I agree that a proper Zelda dungeon requires a lot of thought put into it. And due to this it's possible that a Zelda Maker won't have quite the same mass appeal as Mario Maker has. But I'm positive it'd be popular enough. And not every dungeon needs to be perfect or highly complex to be fun. If you could only make a map in a specific style that would be fine by me, as long as the individual styles allowed for enough variety. Though I'm sure that some degree of overlap would be doable. Or they could make one unified style that combines adjusted elements from different games. I'm sure Nintendo would do their best to make it as beginner-friendly as possible ("premade and lightly customizable components" seems like a good start). I just hope it would be expert-friendly, too.
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Post by ResidentTsundere on Jun 4, 2020 21:49:00 GMT -5
Finished Train Valley 2 (Linux; First Time) which was a charming and (mostly?) chill puzzle/simulation game. 8/10.
I also finished The Gardens Between (Linux; First Time) which was ALSO a chill puzzle game. 8/10; Steam says 2.1 hours.
but there's a nagging feeling that the game is more quarter-munching than the others -- and I played with infinite continues. Just a friendly reminder: Arcade and Arcade Style Games- A maximum of 2 credits per stage may be used if the game allows for credit feeding i.e. you get revived exactly where you died after continuing. This does not mean that only 2 credits can be used total per stage. For example, a game with 7 stages has 14 credits available. - Games that use checkpoints or restart the level do not have a credit limit. - Games that loop infinitely do not count. Oh, I forgot that there were different rules for arcade/arcade style games. In that case, I can't claim Metal Slug 6 because I used way too many continues.
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Post by Digitalnametag on Jun 5, 2020 16:32:02 GMT -5
Trials of Mana PS4 FTP 21 hours
A nice breezy game. Plays more like a modern Ys with the jump and dodge inclusions but I prefer Ys to Mana anyway. My party was Angela, Riesz, and Hawkeye. Finished all the bonus dungeon stuff too. Good sound track. Not much of a story but this isn't that type of game anyway. Just kill some monsters and move to the next town. My biggest complaint is the party AI sucks. They just kinda swing at things now and then and die on bosses. There are settings you can tweak for them but they still didn't contribute much after playing with those. Pretty typical though. Still the game is fun. Might play through again sometime with the other three characters.
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Jun 6, 2020 10:06:07 GMT -5
One thing to keep in mind because you haven't used SMM is that one of it's appeals is the ability to combine existing elements in ways that don't show up in the games like a cloud that rains coins for a mild example. It has a tool kit of simple elements that can mixed and matched in various ways. This is pretty much the main reason SMM works so well, and also the main reason the formula can't just work for any game. Most things behave in a very simple way and everything can be combined to make essentially new elements. The lack of a proper rating system in Mario Maker is a shame, really. There is somewhat of a rating system in that you can leave a heart (I believe in SMM2 you can also leave the opposite of a heart, which seems a little cruel). But the most popular courses mostly are gimmicky or story-based or something like that, so it still needs some work. The way they've done it is basically you can look for recently uploaded courses, very popular courses or courses with certain elements/themes. But one of the other main modes of playing is just getting random stages from a queue in a mode where you get a certain amount of lifes to clear as many randomly selected stages. The problem in Mario Maker 2 is that if a stage isn't popular enough quickly, it gets removed from that queue, and it won't turn up again in that random mode. That means that stages that are a bit harder or more on the traditional, platformer-y side, will stand almost no chance, since the average player is more likely to either give up, or seek out something more gimmick-y. To compare, most of my Mario Maker 1 stages got tons of plays, likes/comments and clears, over a pretty long period of time. My Mario Maker 2 stages got a few plays at the beginning, but then just stop being played altogether. Even my unpopular Mario Maker 1 stages still got plays later on, but MM2 is just ruthless. It's recommended that after uploading a stage, you immediately get people you know to play them and like them. But I found that even stages that got some likes dissapeared very quickly. Anyway, this doesn't really have anything to do with a potential Zelda Maker, I suppose, but it is on my mind again now that I've been playing SMM2 again a lot lately. Basically, in SMM2, I'm mostly making stages for myself, which isn't as motivating as knowing a lot of others will play them.
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Post by Snake on Jun 6, 2020 10:19:20 GMT -5
PC Genjin -Pithecanthropus Computerus/ Bonk's Adventure, PC-Engine (replay, approx. 1 hour 20 minutes)
Played this via the CoreGrafx Mini. It's only offered on the Japanese side of the Mini, rather than the English Turbografx side that instead has Bonk's Revenge and Aero Zonk in the library.
I think the graphical style holds up well. It was such eye candy when it came out, compared to the NES games at the time. It's very hard to get buy without putting the Turbopad controller to turbo. Being a floating, rotating head, makes all the difference. After replaying this in what has been... well, over 2 decades, I now get the feeling the 4th boss must've been inspired by Ashita no Joe. Strange game where the dinosaurs are given hair styles.
6/10.
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Post by halftheisland on Jun 6, 2020 19:17:07 GMT -5
Epistory - Typing Chronicles (PC / Windows 10, 1st time, HLTB completionist 9.5 hours)
This has proven a nice distraction over the last few evenings, and a useful break from my main gaming sessions (beginning to occur to me that going straight from Dragon Age: Inquisition into The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is a really good way to burn out on epic, narrative-heavy RPGs).
There's something I find quite compelling about typing games, so when this came up as Twitch Prime loot it seemed an obvious pick. In terms of mechanics this combines typing with a nice sort of isometric action-adventure / Metroidvania-lite - type words to defeat enemies and change/destroy/activate environmental elements, complete areas to unlock various elemental powers (fire, ice, electricity, wind) which allow you to progress and unlock other areas of the map.
The visual style and what I heard of the audio (mostly played on mute on my laptop while watching TV with my SO) were nice. In particular the visuals have a kind of nice low-fi polygonal aspect that worked really well. It's influenced by Bastion to the point of straight up ripping it off in places - particularly the elements of the levels falling or rising into place as you move - but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
The only major criticism I have is that there's a limited challenge to be had, particularly once you get the electric power which is seriously OP. I had maxed out the points needed to upgrade everything by maybe 2/3rds of the way through the game. There's a nice combo mechanic where you build up a multiplier by correctly typing words within an increasingly tight timeframe, but even in the later monster nests (enemy rush type areas) there are times where enemies simply don't spawn fast enough to allow you to keep building the combo. Other than that, the pseudo-isometric layout occasionally caused some issues with puzzles as it could be difficult to figure out exactly where on the screen you needed to align yourself which was a minor annoyance, but also the only actual difficulty to be found in the puzzles.
If you're looking for a relatively light action-adventure and you enjoy typing games, this is worth a shot. I probably wouldn't pay the ~ÂŁ11 it seems to go for on Steam, but at around a ÂŁ5 price point it would be worth picking up.
I feel like 6/10 is probably fair for this - it's a solid enough game, no major flaws, but nothing to particularly recommend it either.
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Post by Woody Alien on Jun 7, 2020 17:34:59 GMT -5
LAD - Local Area Dungeon (PC, replay, about 4 hours??)
Talk about a Blast from the Past! This obscure minimal roguelike from 1993 is one of those Windows 3.1 (!!) shareware games found in those compilations full of random games, utilities and .exe files that were everywhere at the time. I was just a little kid but I still spent (wasted) a lot of time in front of the screen playing random stuff and even if I didn't have the same knowledge of English language that I have now, I still managed to beat it! It's a simple game after all, but with all the variables expected from this kind of games.
Basically it randomly came to my mind one day so, after googling it, I found out that it was playable on Internet Archive with their WIN 3.1 emulator, so I played it and started several failed quests (I think I spent about 10 hours in total over several days) until I got lucky enough to reach the required item in the last dungeon floor and go back to the surface. It's all a matter of being lucky enough to find certain spells in the early phases, teleport to and from lower floors to find powerful loot and/or lots of gold and then turn almost invincible. For some reason however sometimes the Archive keeps the emulated save states and sometimes not, so I wasted a couple good runs that way...
As a game it is really simplistic (and somewhat annoying 25 years later) but well-developed with menus and mouse controls, no sound at all but only the PC beeper, but I still got pretty engaged with it like when I was a kid, so I'm giving it a 6/10.
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Post by dsparil on Jun 9, 2020 14:39:46 GMT -5
Game Center CX 2 / "Retro Game Challenge 2" (DS, First Time) It's hard to not see this sequel as a general disappointment although it is still fun in general. It would have been interesting for the focus to be on 16-bit games instead and maybe even progressing into the 32-bit era. I wouldn’t have minded some more sequels to games in the original plus 16-bit remakes. Instead, this largely feels like a rehash of the original. There’s occasionally other fictional systems, but they do little to differentiate themselves outside of the nod to the MSX in the bonus “MASA-X” version of Cosmic Fate. The big “addition” is a single 16-bit game, but I found that fairly disappointing. You at least don’t need to actually complete every game to get to the credits this time which is nice as I didn’t manage to finish Triotis and got stuck at the end of Guadia Quest Saga for so long that I gave up on it. I might have posted this in May if it wasn't for that! Wiz-Man - Sharing the release date of Devil World (10/05/84), Wiz-Man is basically just a Pac-Man clone with a few twists in requiring colored wands to pick up matching gems and being able to defeat the enemies prowling the maze. Not a whole lot to this one, but there are 32 levels. There is a level skip, but the directions on how to do it are inscrutable. I ended up playing 31 out of 32 as I somehow managed to do the skip by accident once. Mutekiken Kung Fu - This is just a straight clone of release date mate Spartan X (06/21/85). It’s supposed to be for the "GameCom" competitor "Enter M2000", but I can't tell what the hypothetical difference is supposed to be. The site's article notes the ficticious system as the MES-3000 so that seems to have been changed in the fan translation. I would say it’s a better version of its inspiration, but it’s still a fairly basic game. It would have been interesting if it had stayed a licensed game, but the title does allude to the US release which just dropped the movie title without having to change much else. Demon Returns - This gets Akumajō Dracula's release date (09/26/86), but it's pretty much a demon themed SMB clone with many specific similarities. Even the main "demon ride" mechanic is basically being able to use any enemy as a Kuribo's Shoe from SMB3 although the different enemies sometimes have quirks when ridden. It's kinda fun but slight. Arino: Ace Detective - An adventure in two parts, this seems to have the hate that Rally King got in the original, but I guess that has more to do with the total inscrutability without a translation although it still is the weakest game overall. The first part sees Arino and your character investigating the seven mysteries of cartridge maker CX Industries. A more serious larger story gradually unfolds and becomes the sole focus in Part 2. That one is not as fun or interesting and is a bit of a slog although someone actually familiar with the specifics from the show would get more out of it as there seem to be a fair number of references. As a floppy game, it is kinda cute that there's occasional disk read sounds. Part 1 (04/02/87) gets comedian inspired adventure Sanma no Meitantei's date while Part 2 (06/27/87) gets the sequel to Portopia's which are both weirdly fitting. GunDuel - The direct follow up to Star Prince, GunDuel is a fun little vertical shooter with a dual weapon mechanic. It seems to be an homage to the exact same games as Tyrian as they have some similarities. The seven weapons can be in primary or secondary configuration with swapping, and all the primary configurations and many of the secondary ones have direct equivalents in Tyrian. The ability for ships in two player to link up is in both although it requires a special pick up in this one and lacks some features that are in Tyrian. There are significant differences, but they're still close enough for it to feel a little eerie. This has Section Z's release date (05/25/87) to which it has zero relation outside of being some type of shooter. Triotis - For the handheld "GameCom Mini", this very unsurprisingly gets Tetris's release date on the GameBoy (06/14/89). It's a bit like a mix of Puyo-Puyo and Tetris, but with 3 block shapes. I don't think it would have entranced the world like Tetris, but the mechanics are solid. I didn't manage to beat this, and I'm not sure exactly how anyone is supposed to. The final rival is so much more difficult than the one just before. It also doesn't help that you can't seen what the rival is doing if they even have some kind of virtual screen and isn't just the game throwing hazards at you and randomly deciding when you win. Guadia Quest Saga - The third game in the Guadia Quest series (the second is unseen), it also unsurprisingly gets the release date of SaGa III (12/13/91). The difference being that this is for a GBC equivalent. The naming and close releases is very similar to the NGP and NGPC though not that it looks anything like a game for it as it’s basically identical to the first Guadia Quest with significant enemy sprite reuse. There are some tweaks to gameplay and some UI enhancements, but there’s nothing particularly earth shattering although the dungeons are quite large. Like I put up top, I got stuck and gave up at the end. If anyone knows what I’m supposed to do, that’d be a great help! I got the Demon Key in Sendark Castle, but I’m not sure how to proceed. I think I still have to rescue the king. The guy at the bottom of the well mentions a secret passage which I assume would be down there, but I can’t find it. The duck in Twilight Town mentions secret stairs behind the castle, but I don’t think there’s a way behind the castle. I also tried Looking on the top two tiles on the world map, but that doesn’t do anything. Super Demon Returns - Pretty disappointing for what's supposed to be SNES equivalent game. It feels less like a direct SMB clone, but it also isn't interesting at all. It obviously looks better, but that's about it. You get one additional charge move which uses a separate button for no reason, and can attack up and down. Neither of those add much of anything, and it just feels like a somewhat competent platformer. GQS should have been a gorgeous 16-bit title with a retitled SDR as an exploration of the resolution limitations of the GB/GBC. That would have at least given this some real conceptual substance. For some reason this has DQV’s date (09/27/92), but it does fit in the sense of a series moving from 8-bit to 16. Rating: 7
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Post by Snake on Jun 10, 2020 10:49:38 GMT -5
Ginga Fukei Densetsu Sapphire, PC-Engine CD-ROM (1st time, approx. 30 minutes)
I'm starting to realize that PC-Engine had a ton of shooter games. Didn't know what to expect, beyond the all-female cutesy anime cast of a jet pilot squadron. Immediately I get the sense that this came out later towards the end of PC-Engine's life. It's visually quite impressive for a PC-Engine game. It feels like a lot of the enemy sprite and effects are pre-rendered, a la Donkey Kong Country and Killer Instinct. Very much a danmaku bullet hell game, through and through. But your side option power-ups luckily are indestructible and can block bullets and take down enemy planes.
7/10
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Post by dsparil on Jun 11, 2020 13:44:28 GMT -5
The White Door (macOS, First Time)
I wasn't sure what to expect based on the GOG description, but this ended up being a pretty good adventure although it is a bit short. This is about a man named Robert Hill who is in some kind of mental institution unsurprisingly called The White Door. The gameplay alternates between his daily routine in the institution and his dreams/memories over the course of a week. The gameplay is pretty simple with lightly interactive narrative portions and mechanical puzzles. You can tell that this was originally a mobile game as some of the interactions make more sense in that context, but it's nothing too awkward. There's some interesting underpinnings to the story although those don't seem to get as much focus as I would have liked. There's also a fairly involved ARG tied into this that I didn't explore much. That technically is kick started by calling a Dutch phone number which initially leads to the fake website for the institution. I wonder if that actually does go into the odder elements presented and that they're simply not in the game proper. This is also technically part of the Rusty Lake series of games or at least ties into them so I do think some elements were lost on me. I did snatch those up now since they're on sale on GOG for the next few days.
I finished in about two and half hours.
Rating: 8
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Post by dsparil on Jun 12, 2020 6:39:10 GMT -5
Tiny Dangerous Dungeons (macOS, Replay?)
Tiny is right, dangerous is questionable and dungeons is a total misnomer as there's only one. This is an okay GB-styled Metroidvania, but it feels very slight to the point that I'm not sure if I actually finished it in the past. I noticed that I got the iOS version when it came out and do remember playing it but little else. The major problem I have is that it doesn't work at all on Retina/HiDPI displays (any Mac starting from 2012 to 2018 depending on line) at all and displays at double the intended size with a non-working windowed mode even if the scaling is turned off. I did play it on my older laptop, but that's such a sloppy issue.
I finished in 44 minutes by my own timing.
Rating: 5 (Really a 6, but the resolution issue is a major problem)
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