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Post by dsparil on Dec 25, 2021 10:34:42 GMT -5
dsparil Quick question about Saints Row The Third. There's a Full Package version that includes all the DLC, including the mission packs Genkibowl VII, Gangstas in Space, and The Trouble with Clones. They aren't available from the menu but they do become available as soon as you're able to explore Steelport. Can they be counted separately? It has to be from a main menu and not in-game.
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Post by Null0x00 on Dec 26, 2021 5:26:39 GMT -5
Clear QP Shooting - Dangerous!! for Windows in 2.5 hours on the Normal difficulty in Conquest mode. Repeat playthrough with a final score of 14879617. 8/10. Still a great and highly underrated cute 'em up.
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Post by dsparil on Dec 26, 2021 6:26:14 GMT -5
GG Aleste (Game Gear, First Time)
I’m not going to complain about low difficulty in a portable game since the GG screen is so small. What is annoying though is the at times extreme slow down in some stages. The rippling water in stage 2 for example is nice but not so nice that it’s worth making the game hard to play from slow down. There’s two difficulties, although they are very similar. Special did feel a touch more difficult, but it’s hard to tell exactly.
I finished in 01:01:34 for the two play throughs.
Rating: 7
GG Aleste 2 (Game Gear, First Time)
This is a whole lot better! The graphics are nicer with very little slow down, and the special stages are simple rail shooters which is nice. I jumped straight to the hardest difficulty (Wild) this time around, and it’s a decent challenge. What’s interesting is that I played a little on Normal afterward, and it’s still barely different. I only played the first level on Normal, and the only thing I noticed was that the boss’s homing attack can actually be dodged whereas it’s nearly impossible on Wild.
I finished in 00:31:33.
Rating: 8
Power Strike II (Master System, First Time)
I’ve pretty much been going with the Japanese names for all these games for the simple reason that there’s two different games both called Power Strike II. Aleste came out as Power Strike outside Japan. GG Aleste was never localized so GG Aleste 2 was released as Power Strike II and was Europe exclusive. Very confusingly Europe and Brazil got this totally different Master System game of the same name in the same year. For reference, MUSHA was Musha Aleste, Robo Aleste kept the title, and Super Aleste is Space Megaforce in the US but kept the name in Europe.
The setting is very unique in being about sky pirates in 1930s Italy. The player character is a bounty hunter, and you get a picture of the pirate and the bounty amount before each stage. The graphics have a different flavor than you usually get in these types of games which is nice. Aside from the window dressing, it’s still the same basic formula as the others. The one tweak is that the recurring circling shot is a regular pick up in this game that complements your other weapons and provides bonuses depending on color.
As these three are collectively three of the four games in M2’s Aleste Collection, I have to ask, why hasn’t there been a western release yet? I’m very curious to see what M2 did witch GG Aleste 3. Also the new arcade game, but that hasn’t seen any console ports at all yet.
I finished in 00:43:46.
Rating: 8
Paper Mario (N64/Switch, First Time)
No question that it’s charming, but it’s also unsurprisingly basic compared to future games. It drags a little in the middle, and I almost ended up dropping it during Chapter 5 (of 8). I don’t think I even made it that far when I originally played this back when this was new. It was worth getting through, but I think it came off better when it was only the second Mario RPG. The focus on action commands and unique presentation compared to SMRPG made this feel much more special twenty years ago.
For emulation issues, I don’t think this actually has any aside from the general texture filtering difference. There’s a lot of things that look like they could be such the weird amount of unfiltered textures and some geometry seams, but those are all in original and the seams show up in videos of the game running in other HD emulators.
I finished in 20:44.
Rating: 7
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Post by ZenithianHero on Dec 26, 2021 20:26:23 GMT -5
Golden Force (Switch, First Time, about 3 hours)
A hack and slash platformer. This game has solid and tough boss fights. Although it and many enemies are damage sponges. I suppose they balanced the game for coop. The platforming stages are hit and miss. Some trap and enemy placement is annoying. The camera doesn't pan too well so you can get blind jumps or cannot react while swimming downward.
6/10
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Post by dsparil on Dec 27, 2021 10:00:39 GMT -5
Kemono Friends Picross (Switch, First Time)
Finally polished off the last Switch Picross game just in time for S7 to come out in two weeks. This one is obviously based on the Kemono Friends franchise which I had never heard of in any way, and seems to have been timed with the then upcoming second season of the anime. Nearly every puzzle is of a different animal girl across a fairly wide range of animals and you get a detailed image after the fact. As a Picross game, this came out between S2 and S3 so it lacks color puzzles. Judging by completion time, it's also easier than S2 as I spent two or three times longer on it despite having a similar amount of content. Overall, this feels inessential unless you're literally playing every Picross, are a fan of the franchise or are looking for an easier Picross to start with.
I finished in about 7.5h.
Rating: 7
Sagaia (Game Boy, First Time)
Also for some reason I played through the GB "port" of Darius II / Sagaia which is an original game. It's recognizable as Darius and not awful by any means, but it's feel more cut down than something on Game Gear. If you want to see gigantic robotic fish in B&W totally go for this, but otherwise you're not missing a whole lot.
I finished in 00:40:12.
Rating: 6
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Post by Woody Alien on Dec 27, 2021 18:48:42 GMT -5
NOYO-! (PC Windows, first time, about 8 hrs and a half)
A short EarthBound clone made by a lone Japanese dude but not nearly as good as that game. At first it looks charming with its cute pixel graphics, wacky soundtrack and sound effects, comic book styled effects and goofy Engrish dialogues, but it quickly becomes tedious, boring and repetitive to the max. This is not the first ending but rather the New Game Plus (first ending took me about 6.5 hrs), there's also a NG++ and the "real" ending after that one, but I'm not going through it again for the moment just to see slightly different final dungeons and to complete the enemy guide (which is full of palette swapped sprites anyway).
Game is too easy but still there's no real incentive to complete it over and over again, what's funny each time you finish it an avatar of the dude who made it pops up and tells you that he allows video playthroughs to show the first "regular" ending but he'll ask videos of the other endings to be removed. Yeah sure, as if these are anything but short dialogues and anyone other than weirdos like me could care about your dumb little faux 8-bit game! Glad that I bought it during the Steam sales at a 90% discount for less than a dollar/Euro, I know that indie devs need to live too, but full price was just too much for what it has to offer. 5/10
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Post by personman on Dec 28, 2021 4:32:12 GMT -5
Just remembered that I was on the last episode of the Cube Escape Collection and decided to finish that up. Back in the day I remember the Crimson Room really fondly and enjoyed the eerie atmosphere it had. It had a sequel called the Viridian Room I think? It was pretty neat too. I remember the old forum thread I found those two games in also showed me Mysteries of Time and Space which was also an 'escape the room' type of thing if I remember right. I should see about checking that one out again sometime. Anyways, when the site released the articles for these it made me nostalgic for that sort of thing and I tried these out. Pretty good over all, I'll spout some little blurbs for them all though by now my memory may be a bit foggy since I started these in August I think?
Cube Escape: Seasons- Gave me a similar feeling to the Crimson Room just more obviously leaning toward horror. Even if it makes use of some jump scares here and there I wasn't too annoyed by them. Only thing that I didn't care for was the last puzzle being picky about where you put the fuel sources. Just seemed like being obtuse for its own sake. Rating- 7
Cube Escape: The Lake- Really just nothing to this one. It's over in the blink of an eye. Rating- 2
Cube Escape: Arles- This one gets back in the saddle. Took some doing to figure out the puzzles but they weren't annoying either. Wasn't too disturbing but definitely had a feeling of unease that keep me pulled in. I liked it. Rating- 7
Cube Escape: Case 23- This is when they hit their stride and seemed to figure out what they wanted to do with the series. Kinda feels like if there was a proper Twin Peaks game it would be kinda similar to this. It even did something with The Lake and made it better, if just for a short bit. Rating- 8
Cube Escape: Harvey's Box- Like The Lake again but with a couple annoying puzzles. Didn't care much for it. Rating- 3
Cube Escape: The Mill- Liked this one a bunch. Felt much more like a goofy dream which if I remember right channels that Time and Space game which I enjoyed. Hell, I've had dreams a lot like this in fact. It was neat how it was showing what was going on in the background of the first game too... somewhat. Maybe? Honestly I'm not too concerned for the story, I just enjoy the puzzles and the surreal nonsense. Plus I just found the mill it takes place in cozy. rating- 8
Cube Escape: Birthday- Pretty good, has a nice dark mood and nice puzzles and the solution offers some levity. Channels Twin Peaks, no complaints. Rating- 8
Cube Escape: Theatre- My favorite of the bunch. What can I say, I just love surreal dream like nonsense and that's here in abundance. I even liked the piano puzzle. Rating-9
Cube Escape: The Cave- I didn't mind the first half. Puzzles where fine. Then you have to operate a submarine of sorts and figuring out how to get it going was a damn slog. Once I got it hammered out though I didn't mind it too much but I came damn close to looking up a guide. Not the worst but not my favorite. Rating- 6
Enjoyed it over all. I may check out the stand alone games they've made sometime. Though I see they actually made a movie? That's kinda impressive and kinda... dunno. I like the series but I don't think I want it taking it's loose story too seriously. Knowing me though I'll get too morbidly curious and go look sometime.
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Post by dsparil on Dec 28, 2021 11:47:09 GMT -5
Aleste Gaiden (MSX, First Time)
First, I just want to say that it is supremely weird that seemingly the easiest way to emulate MSX games is to use WebMSX in a browser. It doesn’t even need to be served out of an actual web server if run locally because it’s all Javascript. Using a standalone emulator is fine if it’s a cartridge game as the open source BIOS every emulator is prepackaged with supports them, but it doesn’t support floppy games so it turns into a hassle to run them. I guess the author of WebMSX was willing to take the nearly infinitesimal chance the various rights holders are going to care and folded those in.
Anyway, Aleste Gaiden was a diskmag game for Compile’s own Disk Station magazine which had an actual printed component unlike the American ones like Big Blue Disk. It’s totally different from the other games in being a ground based shooter with a very underutilized jump button. There’s only five stages, but the graphics are nice. One of the bosses is very bad though and literally just moves a square occasionally sticking out some non-projectile spears. Not an awful game by the standards of the distribution format, but also a bit trifling. It does have a fuller ending than nearly every other game in the main series including which is surprising.
Rating: 7
Aleste 2 (MSX, First Time)
I find Aleste 2 very interesting. It’s much more in line with the difficulty I’d expect from most shooters and doesn’t have any obviously overpowering weapons that remove all the difficulty. Like I wrote before, I don’t necessarily mind an easy shooter, but so many of the other games are essentially completely broken with some weapons. Compare this to Psikyo’s Strikers games which bookends the other side of the year for me and how they dropped the very manageable lower difficulties with the third game. In that case, I’m assuming it’s because the company didn’t want to spare the resources to design easier settings that got almost no use in arcades. I don’t think Compile ever found a good middle ground outside of this game. I’d still say my favorite overall in the base Aleste series is Super since it has that nice SNES presentation.
Rating: 7
Golden Axe (Genesis/Switch, Replay*) * I honestly can’t remember ever beating this, but that seems incredibly unlikely to me.
Did a quick play of Golden Axe not intending to finish it, but somehow found myself doing just that. I used to play this a whole lot with a neighbor growing up, and we never managed to finish it even two player. We’d always get up to the last stage with only one of us still having any lives and then losing the rest without ever getting to Death Bringer. For whatever reason, I find myself better at action games as an adult and much worse at strategy games.
I finished in 00:34.
Rating: 8
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Post by Digitalnametag on Dec 28, 2021 14:02:30 GMT -5
Cris Tales PS5 FTP 18 hours
Squeak one more RPG in. This is a beautiful looking game with a decent soundtrack. The game theme centers around time travel and being able to three different time periods on one screen at the same time. Neat gimmick but underutilized. You can change time in battles too but it is rarely beneficial to do so outside of the early battles where they show off the gimmick. And that is the story of the entire game. The developers have all these cool ideas but don't make use of them. It feels like a rushed Kickstarter game just lacking that extra bit of polish. The difficulty of encounter is all over the place. One minute you are destroying enemies and then a boss comes along and curb stomps you. I played the most recent patched version too with the extra character. Apparently the balancing was worse before.
So indie developers. STOP SAYING YOUR GAME IS LIKE CHRONO TRIGGER! YOU WILL NEVER LIVE UP TO THAT! Several of the characters are analogues to the CT cast, but honestly the game plays more like Super Mario RPG with timed button presses with limited windows. In Cris Tales defense it is one of the better indie games RPG's making this claim (and better than S-E's Tokyo RPG Factory's attempts) but still.
That said Cris Tales is a decent game. I enjoyed my time with it. Every line of dialogue is well voiced. The game is pretty and sounds good. It could use a bit more polish but hopefully this sold well enough for the studio to have another shot. I'd rank this higher than say Blue Reflection Second Light...
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Post by dsparil on Dec 29, 2021 13:32:14 GMT -5
Spirit Warrior Spriggan (TurboGrafx-CD, First Time)
This is actually a pretty great shooter with some nice stage design and bosses. The multi-phase and slightly gross frog was a real highlight. I like the concept of the elemental mixing for weapons, but that aspect is a little confusing, and it was never clear to me exactly how it worked. You hold up to three orbs, and I could never tell if your weapon was based on two orbs or three orbs with some duplicate combos e.g. red-blue-red is the same as blue-red-blue. I basically just grabbed every orb until I found a combo I liked. Collected orbs double as your bombs and they should up frequently so you end up seeing a wide range of the weapons.
I finished in 00:50:40.
Rating: 9
Spriggan mark 2 — Re-Terraform Project (TurboGrafx-CD, First Time)
Why this is a “sequel” to Spriggan and not something else is odd since everything is different: horizontal instead of vertical, sci-fi instead of fantasy, no weapon pickups. I actually thought this was kinda bad for a while until you get the title Spriggan Mark 2, and it gets a whole lot better then. The site’s article mentions a Gundam influence which is very obvious, and it feels more like Assault Suits Valken if didn’t have any ground sections than a horizontal shooter.
The one drawback is that there’s way too much in-stage dialogue and it can start at the most inopportune times. That would be more annoying if you didn’t have a shield that recharges fairly quickly. Someone that actually understands Japanese would probably get a whole lot more out of this. I’d love to see a translation, but it seems like no one has ever attempted one.
I finished in 01:31:38.
Rating: 8
Spriggan Powered (SNES, First Time)
If this was some clickbaity YouTube video, it’s 100% be “A Micronics game that’s actually GOOD???” with some dumb faux-shocked face. I’m surprised there isn’t one already, but also the audience for something like that probably doesn’t even break four digits. Like all clickbait, that title wouldn’t be entirely true as Micronics didn’t actually design the game and they seem to have gone by Khaos at that point, but the programming is generally fine at least.
There’s a little bit of interesting design in giving you a power meter for your charged attacks and manually activated invincibility shield. It’s only replenished by defeating enemies so you need to be somewhat aggressive and can’t use power indiscriminately during bosses. There’s a “glancing bonus” for attacks that almost hit you, and I think having that also replenish the meter would have been better since using a charged attack is a full third of the meter and is better spent on the shield.
What is truly notable about this game is that it was semi-originally a Satellaview Soundlink game so there is actually supposed to be an audio broadcast that goes along with it. The physical version didn’t get released until a fews days after the initial run of broadcasts was done. There’s at least one video that includes the audio which I’ve embedded below. The site's article doesn't mention this fact which despite it saying the game isn't remarkable, this one aspect is quite remarkable.
I finished in 00:38:12.
Rating: 6 (but perhaps the full experience is better)
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Post by Deleted on Dec 29, 2021 13:49:05 GMT -5
dsparil - not sure if you were aware but you can turn the dialogue off in Spriggan Mark2 in the options. I find it a but jarring though since stuff hapoens onscreen without the contextual clues of dialogue, even as someone with little Japanese knowledge.
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Post by dsparil on Dec 29, 2021 15:15:56 GMT -5
dsparil - not sure if you were aware but you can turn the dialogue off in Spriggan Mark2 in the options. I find it a but jarring though since stuff hapoens onscreen without the contextual clues of dialogue, even as someone with little Japanese knowledge. I did not realize that! I wonder how the game ends up being with the dialogue or cutscenes since those seem to get cut out too. For some reason I did notice that you could switch between voiced and unvoiced, but the "off" setting eluded me.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 29, 2021 15:58:12 GMT -5
dsparil - not sure if you were aware but you can turn the dialogue off in Spriggan Mark2 in the options. I find it a but jarring though since stuff hapoens onscreen without the contextual clues of dialogue, even as someone with little Japanese knowledge. I did not realize that! I wonder how the game ends up being with the dialogue or cutscenes since those seem to get cut out too. For some reason I did notice that you could switch between voiced and unvoiced, but the "off" setting eluded me. The cutscenes and story dialogue seem on the surface to be the most interesting aspect to the game, so either way of playing isn't particularly satisfactory. Like you say, a translation would be welcome, but there's a lack of interest in the PC Engine as a whole on that front, so I don't expect one.
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Post by Null0x00 on Dec 30, 2021 6:45:56 GMT -5
Cleared all eight courses for Hang-On on the Sega Mark III in roughly one hour. Stopped playing once the game looped back to the starting courses with a final score of 1,002,530. First playthrough. 6/10. It's a perfectly serviceable line-scrolling racing game, and is comparable to both Mach Rider on NES or Pole Position II on Atari 7800 as an early launch game designed to show the capabilities of the system. Nothing more, nothing less.
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Post by dsparil on Dec 30, 2021 7:51:41 GMT -5
Cleared all eight courses for Hang-On on the Sega Mark III in roughly one hour. Stopped playing once the game looped back to the starting courses with a final score of 1,002,530. First playthrough. 6/10. It's a perfectly serviceable line-scrolling racing game, and is comparable to both Mach Rider on NES or Pole Position II on Atari 7800 as an early launch game designed to show the capabilities of the system. Nothing more, nothing less. I'm sorry but games that loop infinitely do not count for this.
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