Have been playing the NES and SNES channels as part of Nintendo’s online service. I never really had much experience with the SNES and I’ve yet to find a game I really enjoyed on it (apart from Chrono Trigger). Eventually I defaulted to the NES stuff because I think its limitations make it more strange and interesting.
I eventually settled on and have decided to finally complete Super Mario Bros. since I was never able to beat it. I’m using save states but only using them at the beginning of a level. I am also going to play every level. I’m actually really enjoying it. I think it still handles super well as a 2D platformer and its age makes it feel more pure over time. I even prefer it aesthetically to the version in the SNES all-stars collection with different graphics/sound. Hitting a block in SMB just feels fucking good.
hitting blocks really does feel physically different between nes smb1 and allstars but I’ve never managed to pinpoint why. sometimes I suspect I’m just experiencing placebo, but the difference feels too real
I think it’s the ‘budge’ they have and the sound is a much lower frequency which gives it some heft. It’s really hard to articulate without getting into a millisecond comparison of the feedback.
Whenever I play smb1 I try to run into pipes so he slides down while doing the walk animation. All stars is missing this because he gives you the peace sign while going down a pipe. It also doesn’t occur in Mario Maker unsurprisingly despite me occasionally expecting it too.
I’ve also been playing the switch’s NES library. I’ve only played the gba version of smb2 so I did a few playthroughs. Now I’m playing through Zelda 2 and decided to only level up my attack while still collecting the heart and magic containers. I still need to get through that cave maze.
I’m also trying to finally overcome SMB 8-4 but in the All-Stars version. I’ve played a lot of both this and the NES version throughout my life, and I still prefer the look and feel of All-Stars. 16-bit is 2x better than 8-bit, as I already stated earlier in this thread.
I’m trying to get through the game only with start-of-world saves. I managed to get to 8-3 last night, but I’d had a few beers and couldn’t perform any further.
No judgment on preferences, original SMB is certainly rough around the edges. I’m at 4-1 atm and the pace is pretty easygoing but I’m expecting some shit once I hit world 8.
I’ve been playing both Descenders and Lonely Mountains: Downhill and really enjoying both. On the downhill biking tip for whatever reason.
Lonely Mountains is the more charming of the two, with dynamic camera angles that might throw you off if you don’t pick the “Steer in the direction you’re pressing” controls. There are four mountains with four trails each and all have their own challenges, including unlockable night modes. The trails are very well designed with lots of shortcuts and room for creativity, basically made for speedrunners. You can also just Explore the trails, find Rest Points where your character just sits and chills while you enjoy the view (at night, you even have a campfire). Really digging it quite a bit.
Descenders goes the more proc gen end, in a more traditional 3D realistic behind the biker view. You start at the top of an easier mountain, go down a trail of varying steepness/curvature/number of jumps. The faster you go and the more tricks you do, the higher your score which unlocks members for your crew that do various things like reduce curves, make you a little more stable, let you see further ahead on the map. It’s very roguelikey. After each little trail you go to a map where you choose between connected points, with the goal of reaching the “Boss” trail of each mountain that ends in a spectacular jump over a speeding train and the like. You have health that you lose each time you wipeout and that you can gain by doing bonus objectives in each area. There’s four mountains in total although I haven’t made it past the third one in one go yet, it’s really brutal. I haven’t really figured out how to safely land from really high jumps. It’s got a nice soundtrack with electronic artists that pop up in the corner. I haven’t heard of them but it’s all professionally done.
Both are on gamepass so if you have that I def recommend trying them out. They both capture the feeling of going really fast on a bike while chilling in nature quite well.
it’s actually kind of astonishing to me how often small mechanical differences between games can slip my notice, other than that overall something “feels” off. and since knowing how a game plays infects the way i look at screenshots, it’s often led me to blame some aspect of the graphics instead
earlier this week, i played through trine with two friends. i can’t imagine playing it with less than a full trio of players.
someone lent me nioh. it’s a good game, very atmospheric and satisfying, just like bloodborne. i can only play it for like 30 minutes at a time though.
Made it to 8-1 in SMB. I haven’t screamed and laughed while dying like this in quite a while. This game is excellent at generating skin of your teeth moments in the later levels. They either got very lucky or properly tuned the distances of obstacles and max speed jumps.
SMB1’s balancing is funny in that worlds 2-7 are more or less the same difficulty level and suddenly world 8 is much harder. I remember as a kid, I routinely made it to world 8 (warp zones help obviously), but never beat the game until I returned to it as an adult.
Zelda 1 and 2 have a vicious spike in the final palace too, so I guess that was the Nintendo design philosophy in those days.
8-1 is kind of a slog too compared to previous levels. It’s gotta be the longest by far up to that point, right? And then 8-2 seems quick in comparison.
