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Post by Apollo Chungus on Nov 18, 2021 11:17:46 GMT -5
I love that the HG101 forum has this little patch of people that will suddenly talk loads about the Yoshi games. No joke, I genuinely admire when there's something that gets a bunch of folks discussing it at great length. That said, I can't really join in on it (I've tried writing posts twice, but it never seems to come out in a way I'm satisfied with). So I'll have to make do with adding a pair of games I beat today: Sonic Robo Blast 2: Final Demo Zone (Windows; First Time; 17 minutes)
For some reason, there's a pair of SRB2 mods that have the exact same goal - take all the levels from an early version of the game and stick them into a single stage to show how much the engine can pull off these things. I tried playing Demo Quest Zone by Inferno, which is based on every major level featured in the beta versions of the game as found in the SRB2: The Past map pack, but the tight corridors that took up much of the map's latter half were insufferable to navigate so I gave that up. This other map pack by toaster is made up of every stage featured in the Final Demo/Version 1.0X-era, with entirely different stage layouts for Techno Hill and Castle Eggman Zones. It's fairly basic, and the stage layouts don't have convey enough information that I found myself getting lost or stuck for several minutes, but I kinda dug it. A neat way of checking out how things used to be in a more approachable way.
Spider-Man 2 (Xbox; Replay; 3 hours 55 minutes)
This one of my all-time favourite sixth gen games, and one I used to play loads during my teens. Whenever I got stressed out by my latest existential crisis, I'd boot up the post-game mode where you have nothing to do and just swing around New York, thinking about stuff or simply exhausting while I found Bruce Campbell hint tokens or rescued children's "BA-LOO-HOONS!" For whatever reason, I got the urge to play through the story mode, which I haven't done in well over a decade going by my save files. Something that really stood out to me was how streamlined things are: you're given the ability to skip every story cutscene immediately, every activity progresses you to the next part of the game by awarding you with hero points, and you can even skip the opening tutorial by climbing to the top of the building you start from. (I didn't even know that last one was possible until this playthrough!) It stands in such stark contrast to the PS4 Insomniac game, where some cutscenes can't be skipped, goals seem to be more segmented in the typical open world style of "here's the main stuff, and loads of busywork that doesn't really matter much", and you have to do the opening hour or so before the game really opens up. This isn't to say one's better than the other - they're both very different styles of game design that work quite well on their own terms, but I just happen to prefer Spider-Man 2's style. That said, the mandatory missions involving Doc Ock's reactor and the one fight with the mechs can go away into a black hole. Those stink, though everything else is still pretty great.
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Nov 18, 2021 15:16:30 GMT -5
Speaking of something that won't get loads of talk, here's some more DOOM wads I've beaten this summer but forgot to post about: Crumpets (Win10, first play, 3h) Going Down (Win10, first play, 13h)Both played on Hurt Me Plenty, save-less (except for Going Down map 19, which sucked). Crumpets is an 8-map wad made by Ribbiks, one of the two guys behind Sunlust, which I beat earlier this year. Sunlust is punishingly difficult, but Crumpets is easy (for Ribbiks standards as he states on his site). The last map is pretty challenging, actually, but it's mostly breezy. Could've fit in with the first 2 or 3 maps of Sunlust, difficulty-wise. Aesthetically very Ribbiks-y. Going Down is pretty brilliant. You start out on top of a UAC building, and each map is the next floor down from the last. You start and end each stage in the elevator (and some of the music sounds like twisted elevator muzak), though there are some exceptions later on, as you start going underground (the building is only about 8 floors and it's a full 32-map wad). The maps are mostly pretty small. The building isn't that big after all, and while later underground stages can be a bit bigger, they're still rather compact. So, there's lots of enemies in very little space. After playing so many DOOM mods, I can often tell when a trap will happen, but Going Down is rather unpredictable and often has a lot of traps in short succession. It's all very fun (except for map 19, but every megawad needs one stinker I guess), and it's super impressive considering it's all done with base DOOM (II) textures. All maps have a pretty strong theme as well, with the first few being set in the UAC building and being some of the better "realistic" DOOM maps, and later maps including an underground coloseum and evil church. Halfway through the game, in the secret stages, you go back up, through the stairwell this time, to go back to the roof of map 01 so you Doomguy's cellphone can get better reception so he can call his mom back. There's lots of original twists and interesting fights along the way. Too bad the guy who made this hasn't made that much else only seems to have been active for a couple years. Ratings: -Crumpets: 8/10, pretty good for something that's just supposed to be short and sweet -Going Down: 9/10I completely forgot about Kirby 64. A game that I've actually played and beaten. Shows how much an impression it left... It's not one of my favorites, but it has a lot of memorable things IMO, like the mixing of copy-abilities, the soundtrack, certain areas are pretty cool, that one world that's a frozen-over Earth... One kinda funny thing this talk about Kirby 64 makes me think about is just how often Yoshi's Story gets referenced in later games for such a middling game. Maybe that's just the impression I've gotten from being a lifelong Smash Bros. player, but if I didn't know any better I would think it's the definitive Yoshi game.
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Post by windfisch on Nov 18, 2021 17:12:27 GMT -5
One kinda funny thing this talk about Kirby 64 makes me think about is just how often Yoshi's Story gets referenced in later games for such a middling game. Maybe that's just the impression I've gotten from being a lifelong Smash Bros. player, but if I didn't know any better I would think it's the definitive Yoshi game. I have a couple of guesses, why that is the case:
1. Story was the first fully fledged Yoshi standalone game (no, Safari doesn't count and Island still had Mario for backup, even in its title) and for a while it remained the only one that held that distinction. So in a sense it could be called the "definitive" Yoshi game. 2. It was released around the same time the first Smash Bros. came out. And naturally the Smash designers chose it as a template, similarly to how they also took inspiration from Mario 64, instead of SMB3 or SM World. So Story is more important to the history of Smash than Island is.
3. Aesthetically it was pretty influental in how Yoshi would look and sound in games from then on. And the visual style is better suited for 3D (or 2,5D) games such as Smash than Island's. 4. It was a very well crafted game, whether one likes the actual result or not. I'm sure the makers of Smash recognise and respect that.
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Post by dsparil on Nov 19, 2021 8:25:21 GMT -5
Zelda II - End of Day (NES, First Time)
Another decent rom hack, but it gets a little BS towards after not being too bad for most of it.
I finished in 07:05:55.
Rating: 7
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Post by Digitalnametag on Nov 19, 2021 13:49:43 GMT -5
Digimon Adventure PSP FTP 25 hours
Remembered this had a fan translation and I have a jail broke PSP. It was pretty good! The translation anyways. The game is your average anime turn based RPG. It follows the plot of Adventure pretty much to a T with a few small added bits and some extra post game scenarios. The environments are bland but otherwise the character models and animations are excellent looking on the PSP. They even recreated all the digivolutions from the show and added the additional Mega forms for the cast with show-like animation. Cool! A shame you get the Mega's for the others so late you really don't get to use them unless you just want to trash new game plus...
All in all a fairly average RPG that rides on the Digimon license. Enjoyable if you are familiar with the anime. Which I do. Digimon Adventure was my favorite anime growing up so that kept me playing.
As an aside I had to repair my PSP before playing due to dark splotches on the screen. Turns out old LCD's can mold even when kept safe and cool. Easy enough to replace though and only ran me $20 for the parts.
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Post by ZenithianHero on Nov 20, 2021 19:32:10 GMT -5
Wario Ware: Get it Together! (Switch, First Time, 3 hours)
Finished this a while back but forgotten to report it here. A neat game design feature that uses the large cast in a fresh way. Each character has a gimmick to their controls to clear microgames. The difficulty for them changes up as result. One microgame is trivialized if you use a character who can shoot stuff, but is tricky to solve if the character can only ram into the objects. Some characters require a ring pulley to move around. Some can jump forever. Some cannot stop moving. It becomes too chaotic when the game makes you change characters at high speeds. The luck of the draw for what character is paired to the next minigame could leave you with cheap misses. That is, for when you experiment with the roster. The story mode eases you into the tougher to use characters. At least you can also practice and the game lets you know who is best suited for each microgame.
This entry features a bunch of multiplayer party modes. There isn't as much bonus single player ones. You can play a Mario-like platformer with the gang or do a battle royale fighting each other. I'll be revisiting this for multiplayer, but for single player its content options is lower than I thought. Aside from those modes you can spend coins on presents to give characters in exchange to leveling up and earn new color customization and gallery artwork. I still have to find every microgame too so there is a little life into this game for sessions by yourself.
7/10
Resident Evil 1 Remake (PS4, First Time, 16 hours)
Finally getting around to playing the Resident Evil games properly. I only ever played 4 extensively while owning bunch of random entries but never getting far. I have to say this is a brilliant game but I also learned that this sorta gameplay isn't always for me. Haven't played a Survival Horror in a while and I wouldn't say it is one of my regular game genres. I find it challenging enough even on easy. Juggling item space is a pain. I also would liked more melee options to conserve ammo, Silent Hill spoiled me with that. I was very worried about the crimson heads because the idea turned me off from playing the game but tedious two-item mechanic aside I got into the habit and rhythm of the game just fine. I shook off my worries and unease by the end because I conserved the good ammo and the lab wasn't freaking me out like the mansion did.
The first Resident Evil has a solid campaign and sense of dread. The game did a good job of refreshing old areas with a twist and also set a good pacing for gameplay everything is so compact with content. I can see why this game is listed as a masterpiece. The remaster aged the game a bit though, the FMV scenes don't look good here. Capcom probably should remake those scenes next time they release this game. The rest of it looks incredible, and to think developers abandoned pre-rendered backgrounds.
8/10
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Post by personman on Nov 22, 2021 14:09:23 GMT -5
Warlock (SNES, emulated on 3DS; first time; 4 hours
There was a video rental store chain called Hollywood Video over here in the states that I frequented a lot growing up. They always had two demo station set up for the SNES and Genesis right in front of a little tiny day care room for the young'uns (seriously people used to frequent things like this so much they thought that was necessary. How times have changed eh?) The Genesis one had The Jungle Book in it all the time so that garnered as much interest as you can imagine. The SNES one had this game in it for a good while before it got swapped out to Earthworm Jim 2. This one stuck out in my mind as the first stage has a normal dog just milling about innocently till you move forward making it turn into a monster. It kinda freaked me out a bit at that young age.
So got to trying it out last week to sate my curiosity of it. It's got some things going for it with its foreboding tone and for the time decent graphics. In addition to your typical projectile attacks you get this little golden snitch thing that follows you around you can use to grab items just out of reach and defend against little flying popcorn enemies. I like the idea, and some of the items you can pick can be a little interesting like how lives work for instance: if you're taken out you'll start over at a check point as usual but you can also spend a life to completely heal yourself as well to potentially get past a checkpoint threshold and stuff. It's not amazing but I just found it to be an interesting quirk.
The big problem though are the controls. Movement is extremely stiff and sluggish but the stages, particularly the enemies; were all made with a fast pace in mind like its a typical action platformer while you are stuck thinking your in something like Out of This World or what have you. It's tolerable at the start as health items are coming out of the walls and you can tank a ton of hits before going down. It's pretty generous with passwords as well so if you do game over you likely won't be set back too far. As the game goes though it just starts to get really cheap and the stages just go on forever. Or at least it feels like they do. You have to get six stones and it seemed like after each one you obtain they add on another gauntlet you have to get through before reaching the stage you'll actually find it. Once you get to the castle the environments, decent as they look repeat over and over and over. You'll be running over what feels like the same hills in a graveyard forever as you go after the fifth stone. Complete with obnoxious enemies that constantly block attacks and little flying enemies that commit the worst sin in my book: near impossible to hit bastards that just stick to you and keep draining your health. It feels like eurojank once you get that far.
I was thinking the game was just okay until I got to the fifth area. After that though things just turn into a huge slog and I got pretty sick of it. It was already something I wouldn't recommend but thanks to the final stretch I'd warn against it completely. You can do worse, sure but it's already rather unremarkable and theres no room for all the mistakes it makes at the end. Also when researching to try and find out more about who made the game (not LJN, they just published it) I found out this is based off of the second in a trilogy of movies by the same name staring Julian Sands as the villian. Hm, no idea but now I'm kinda morbidly curious as everyone says they are campy and dumb as hell. Might be worth a laugh to look at one.
Rating: 3
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Nov 22, 2021 17:28:18 GMT -5
I have a couple of guesses, why that is the case:
1. Story was the first fully fledged Yoshi standalone game (no, Safari doesn't count and Island still had Mario for backup, even in its title) and for a while it remained the only one that held that distinction. So in a sense it could be called the "definitive" Yoshi game. 2. It was released around the same time the first Smash Bros. came out. And naturally the Smash designers chose it as a template, similarly to how they also took inspiration from Mario 64, instead of SMB3 or SM World. So Story is more important to the history of Smash than Island is.
3. Aesthetically it was pretty influental in how Yoshi would look and sound in games from then on. And the visual style is better suited for 3D (or 2,5D) games such as Smash than Island's. 4. It was a very well crafted game, whether one likes the actual result or not. I'm sure the makers of Smash recognise and respect that. Now that I've looked into it a bit more, it's definitely the fact I play so much Smash that has colored by impression so much. Island gets as many, if not more, references than Story. N64 games are a bit overrepresented in general in SSB games, since Smash 64 came out in the N64 era and Melee so early in the GCN era that there pretty much wasn't anything out for the GCN yet, so the N64 era was still pretty much the most recent thing to happen in Nintendo land.
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Post by spanky on Nov 24, 2021 9:25:06 GMT -5
Panzer Dragoon Remake (Switch, First Time)
The only time I ever played the original was at a local pizza place that acquired a bunch of (newly released) Sega Saturns for their party room. They pretty much had all the launch games. I was immediately overwhelmed by the concept of a rail shooter in full 3D and didn't play it too long. I spent more time playing Astal, Daytona and even Street Fighter The Movie (the home versions aren't bad in all honesty).
Some 26 years later I notice the remake is on sale. I've heard mixed reviews about the remake itself, but you know what? I enjoyed this. It's pretty simple all things considered, but I found the core gameplay engaging, I thought it looked fairly nice and I love the world and setting. The game is very short and in 1995 you could definitely tell this was supposed to be a brief rollercoaster ride of a game. And that's fine with me, as a matter of fact I might find myself playing it again.
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Post by alexmate on Nov 24, 2021 11:00:56 GMT -5
F.E.A.R. First Encounter Assault Recon (Windows, 1st time, Est Time: 8 hours) Great game, much better than the expansion pack I completed earlier this year.
Rating: 8
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Post by dsparil on Nov 24, 2021 11:22:58 GMT -5
Panzer Dragoon Remake (Switch, First Time)
I've heard mixed reviews about the remake itself, but you know what? I enjoyed this. The original release had some really embarrassing bugs and performance issues, but those got cleared up. Did you try the motion controls? When I played it, they were basically unusable, but there was a new patch last month.
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Post by spanky on Nov 24, 2021 11:31:12 GMT -5
Panzer Dragoon Remake (Switch, First Time)
I've heard mixed reviews about the remake itself, but you know what? I enjoyed this. The original release had some really embarrassing bugs and performance issues, but those got cleared up. Did you try the motion controls? When I played it, they were basically unusable, but there was a new patch last month. I did not, I used the classic controls, which the game defaulted to. I found it a bit difficult to dodge obstacles and shots with the controls but the game gives you a really generous life bar so it was never much of an issue.
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Post by dsparil on Nov 26, 2021 9:16:15 GMT -5
Gumby vs. The Astrobots (Game Boy Advance, First Time)
After the official Gumby Instagram account posted a box shot of this recently, I became slightly curious after seeing that it's the only licensed Gumby game. I can't say I'm a huge fan of Gumby in general, but I did watch it as a kid. This is actually not too bad, but it's really short and there's a lot of mechanics that don't get enough use. You get some new abilities over the course of the game as if it were a Metroidvania, but there's no reason to revisit old levels and the collectable ice cream cones don't seem to unlock anything. Maybe there were plans for a full exploration focused game which were dashed as this came out towards the end of the GBA's life.
I finished in 00:58:38.
Rating: 6
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Post by Apollo Chungus on Nov 27, 2021 16:42:41 GMT -5
Daze Before Christmas (Mega Drive; First Time; 1 hour 6 minutes) I pitched a bunch of European-developed games to cover for the website, and one of them was this Christmas-themed platformer by Norwegian developer Funcom Oslo (who later made The Longest Journey and the Age of Conan MMO). If you never heard of this, that's because it only came out in Australia, though it later got a SNES port that also released in Europe. I've even heard some people say this game was cancelled while doing research, that's how obscure it is. I decided to start grabbing screenshots yesterday and managed to beat it in a couple of sessions. I won't say any more right now, but I'm happy so far that I chose to cover this game.
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Post by JoeQ on Nov 29, 2021 6:43:16 GMT -5
Final Fantasy X-2 HD (PS4) - Replay, Time: a metric ton, Rating: 4/5 Final Fantasy X-2 HD: Last Mission (PS4) - First playthrough, Time: a lot, Rating: 3/5 Went back and did a NG+ playthrough of FFX-2 to get that platinum trophy I missed last year, this time with a guide since this game has roughly million missable things. Got 100% Story Completion, did all the extra dungeons and got the best ending. I didn't bother with the Creature Creator mode added in the HD release, since it wasn't required for anything and completing it would have easily added another hundred hours. I'm counting Last Mission as a separate entry, since it is a completely separate and lengthy roguelike game with it's own gameplay mechanics and story taking place after the main game. Not particularly deep or good, but decent enough for what it is. Alphabet Challenge: A--D-FGH---LM-OP--ST--W--- Number Challenge: 0-234---8-
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