really fuckin hate bloom, truly awful
in retrospect that was the death knell for destiny
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Renegade multiplayer was so fun back in the day! I remember the single player being pretty bland.
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I am foolishly playing through Dragon Quest original. After 2.5 hours tonight all that happened is I gained two levels. So, slow going. On the other hand I got the Illumination spell and the first time I cast it I went “woah”.
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highly recommend revisit Japanese version with this guide
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I think you’ve highlighted one thing that they ruined in later Dragon Quest games.
In Dragon Quest 11 in particular, they constantly dump “progress” on you. No more saving up for a weapon or armor. You barely have a chance to try new equipment before you get more for the same character. And when you gain a level, it’s just a bunch of meaningless high numbers in every category instead of a small number of points that you actually pay attention to because they count.
19 Likes
there’s a really awesome boss fight late in the game. i just got to what i think is the final stage, and i guess the whole game’s length is like 4-5 hours for a first playthrough? but it’s definitely good enough that i’ll be playing it more times in the future. thanks inti creates~
3 Likes
Zombies Ate My Neighbors and Ghoul Patrol (PC/Gog, currently on sale–also on Steam)
Compilation of two LucasArts parodic/camp horror four-way-shooters: LucasArts developed Zombies, which was published by Konami (on SNES and Genesis–the compilation has the SNES version), and licensed the engine to “a small Malaysian studio called Motion Pixel,” according to Wikipedia, for the “Ghoul Patrol” sequel.
The compilation is by DotEmu which is usually a bad sign, and from the sounds of the reviews, they did their usual horrible emulation job–no button mapping and all sorts of nonsense.
Fortunately, thanks to the directions in this forum post, I was able to extract the ROMs and run them in a much better emulator, ie Mesen: ROM based GOG games compatible with third party emulators thread, page 11 - Forum - GOG.com
Zombies has immediately charming sprite work and music; the style sort of reminds me of the sci-fi campy Atari arcade game Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters.
Ghoul Patrol has more action-game controls beyond the four-way shooting of Zombies–you now have Jump and Slide. But conversely, character movement is REALLY sludgy, with a huge feeling of inertia from very slow start-up speed. Horrible feel! And the graphics and sound don’t seem as immediately charming, you have to click through loads of junk just to get into the game, and there’s a ton of stuff whizzing around and pop-up word bubbles constantly. But I don’t think I’m going to play this anyway because I’m crushing my fingers into the d-pad just trying to persuade the character to move. Bizarre.
People have made ROM editors for Zombies–or “ZAMN” as it seems to be abbreviated–and loads of rom hacks with new stages, etc Romhacking.net - Games - Zombies Ate My Neighbors . It comes with LOTS of stages to start with, and is apparently quite hard; the RGDS podcast says something about the game’s testers could only get to stage 25 or something out of 55. : P
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i’ve finally done it. i resubbed, made a new character, and i’m shooting magic at giant bugs all over again. and i’m a goth elf just like in pso.
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Ice Cap Zone, Launch Base Zone, Mushroom Hill Zone, and Flying Battery Zone Act 1 from Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles - Sonic Origins (PC/Steam)
Stuck for ten minutes or something on an icy cave jump. ; D
Man I don’t think I’m gonna use coins on continuing special stages anymore, don’t particularly enjoy the bonus games
and don’t really care about super emerald stuff (according to le FAQ https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/620568-sonic-3-and-knuckles/faqs/18497 , these get you super overpowered forms of the characters : P), would rather use coins to unlock the cool calendar art in the collection’s Museum!
^ From a '90s series of “SegaSonic the Hedgehog” calendars illustrated by Sonic and Dr. Eggman creator–and Sonic CD director–Naoto Ohshima.
Flying Battery Zone is my least favorite so far.
Still got half to go! : P Launch Base
was pretty epic though, and Mushroom Hill
is wild! ^ _^ Espio’s stage in Sonic the Fighters is based on it! ; D
8 Likes
Wow, didn’t expect anyone to hate Flying Battery
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Oh I don’t hate it, I just don’t like it as much as the others. ^ _^ The version in Mania I do kind of dislike, though.
that was a joke, it’s everyone’s least favourite zone
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FAERIE!!!
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Well heck! ; D
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played thru several chapters of like a dragon 8 infinite wealth. if only it were tuned a bit harder… cant wait to play the ng+
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Played some more capcom arcade stadium and got the final achievement I needed to cap off Alan Wake 2. Perfect dodge is harder than I thought.
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Played through Silent Hill: The Short Message… As someone who never had an opportunity to give P.T. a shot, I guess I appreciated seeing those important bits of Japanese craft in a Silent Hill game again after all these years (Hexadrive developed it): well stylized character models, some concept work and a decent monster by Masahiro Ito, tasteful font selection. I can take the cloyingly earnest FMVs starring a teenage Japanese actress dubbed in English, I can accept a weird German setting with a lot of English writing scattered everywhere plus a Japanese witch backstory, I can forgive all the hammy dialogue about “my Internet followers” and bullying a HS girl by calling her a “crybaby” (the writer being mostly known for extra scenarios in 07th Expansion games makes a lot of sense), but what bums me out is how the artistic value is about the same as in a government PSA about teenage depression and suicide. The game even keeps flashing a screen full of (US-only) resources meant to help with thoughts about self-harm every 20 minutes or so.
Feels like the guiding principle here was to have middle aged men remake Silent Hill 2 for teenage girls, to do the James Sunderland thing while being respectful towards taboo subjects above all else, and what can horror even say if it’s being Respectful From The Distance, really, SH2’s entire artistic value comes from how it can unflinchingly delve into the ugliness of male psyche. The game has some Gone Home-lite walking around, some “we have Devotion at home” tricks, some Shattered Memories-style action segments that are absolutely terrible (all of them are about memorizing the one route that works, the last one suddenly has you look for a few key items scattered in a super dark labyrinth while being chased by the monster, as if it was designed to piss you off). Fundamentally decent, but will probably mostly be praised by people who really like to think of themselves as fundamentally decent. I wonder how many teenage girls it ostensibly targets it will actually reach, and I kind of dread what this direction says about the future games in the series.
15 Likes
I think there is a balance. Like sitting there just grinding outside of town for hours on in isn’t fun. Not like I am playing this version to have fun though. Finding out they boosted the numbers by 5 or 6 times in the remakes. Which yes good.
I got about another 90 minutes of grinding to get the 7700 gold needed for the magic armor. A guy in town told me the Golem can be put to sleep with the flute, which is not the same as the Goldman I found on the southern continent that can potentially kill me from full health and drop a mere 126 gold (over 600 in the remakes.)
I mean tweaking the math is like the only thing they changed in the remakes. So it’s a pretty solid game all told.
And I’ll he honest I did look into cheating but their are no codes for the famicom version. Just to like hurry up the math.
4 Likes
I hate to ask but… you bought the deluxe version, right? Only that gets NG+ apparently.
2 Likes
Beat Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, or as much of it as I’m going to (lotta loose ends, but these area maps are massive, and all I’m missing a handful of treasures and lore doodads - could comb over everything with a guide, but the internet being what it is now, even that’s a shit show).
Kinda disappointed one particularly creepy character never makes a reappearance - some suggest another boss you fight about midway is a time-altered version, but it feels more like maybe they just ran out of time/money to incorporate a fight with them.
Platforming and combat felt solid throughout, and I think the thing that finally dawned on me about this game is kind of a simple one - it’s just satisfying to play. Managing to beat these bosses, get through these hellish platforming gauntlets just feels good and rewarding to do, less for whatever is at the end and more just for the sake-of. Pretty rare thing with the games I play, and ironic I’m experiencing it with an Ubisoft game, which typically are the lawnmower task, brain-shut-off content slop trough I’ll play through and just sort of forget afterward.
Anyway! Good game! Hell, great game. Hope folks give it a chance.
10 Likes