Our family was pretty platform agnostic from what I can recall, there was no real logic or loyalty to what systems we ended up with. I do remember early on a lot of trading systems between households with other friends of my brothers, so it was probably more about what they could manage to get their hands on. I do think there was a bit of tenderness towards Nintendo eventually, but I think the first console we actually owned was a Mega Drive so… In general, at the time at least, videogames as a whole just felt like this great big novelty to explore. I only really remember becoming aware of the console wars stuff a bit later, probably once I started reading game magazines and looking stuff up online but I also remember friends of my own, when I was a bit older, having particular loyalties as well…
I think a big part of the willingness of my brothers to just get rid of their PS1 for an N64 was also just because there was a lot less information available about what different games and systems were like, so it was all very mysterious and enticing to try out a new system or game for the first time. You really didn’t know what to expect! Very different to how it is these days with endless coverage and gameplay and a billion different opinions on why a game should be considered universally shit or great and all this strange sorta canonisation going on around what games absolutely can’t be avoided because they’re classics… In some ways I miss those more mysterious days… Part of that is probably just nostalgia for the time I grew up, but I do genuinely miss that feeling of surprise from then. It’s been sorta deflating getting older and finding more and more games that just remind me of something else I’ve already played or seen before…
Not exactly sure where I’m going with this rant, I think Intelligent Qube just triggered a bunch of memories to flood back hahaha
a level that combines emissive and enlarged assets: a surreal, magical adventure. a poetic dreamscape. the crystals and street signs are glowing (emissive.) the big human head meshes and such on the horizon… a journey to the farthest reaches of imagination.
(makes a new landscape, drops in household object asset pack and resizes them all 20x) join me on the ultimate trip… recover your shattered memories in a strange land…
I started Super Mario 64 Plus. There’s a decent amount of options/toggles in the launcher, including camera stuff. I’m also seeing some interesting alternatives but I don’t think I’m ready for this rabbit hole.
i once played a game where the stock house assets were floating in some kind of void that you moved around to reenact a character’s memories… my hands were shaking. never again. game developers must realize that they have the power to raise potent dark visions as well as those of light…
You mean to tell me that everyone and their dog clocked Toby Fox as a Live A Live fan because the final song’s called Megalovania and not that the twilight of edo japan chapter has a literal pacifist and genocide route.
new computer + good experience with bloodborne emulation has lead me to re-exploring the current emulation frontiers
PS3 - wow, pretty good overall. a lot better than my last dip a few years ago; Demon’s Souls ran great and everything else was a struggle. still, some of the most important PS3-locked games (MGS4, Gran Turismo 6, God of War 3/Ascension, Motorstorm/Pacific Rift) have various issues and quibbles. definitely not anywhere close to a full replacement for real hardware yet; however, when it works, it’s often preferable to hardware due to how shit a lot of framerates are on PS3 proper. you wanna play Drakengard 3 without dipping to single-digit framerates? rcps3 is your only option. also - skate 3 works well. that shit ain’t on PC…
OG Xbox - goddamn, this is getting really good now. the games i tried ran fabulously. as above, though, some very important Xbox-locked titles don’t work: Project Gotham 2, Forza Motorspot, Otogi 1 & 2, Double S.T.E.A.L. 1 & 2 (first one was a.k.a. Wreckless and had a(n inferior) Gamecube port). however, JSRF and Ninja Gaiden Black both seem to run great, so… wins and losses.
Xbox 360 - not as far along as RCPS3 in terms of overall compatibility but seems to be quickly catching up. Red Dead Redemption runs really well here… better than on RCPS3? Forza Horizon (1) works. I’ve heard Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey work pretty well too, I’ll let y’all know once I get deeper into the woods. Ninja Gaiden II apparently got bleeding-edge audio fixes a few days ago and may be finally playable without major issues
TeknoParrot - Sega Rally 3 is really quite good, huh. maybe not as good as 1 or 2, but it’s pretty great. i’m not entirely sure if Revo actually does the arcade title justice… maybe it’s a presentation thing
this is where i’ve been so far, and i can say that i wouldn’t really classify these levels as falling completely into the usual platformer stereotypes, but maybe they aren’t as great as the original.
there is like grass land, uh….foresty-sort-of-swampy land, a level that is ice up high and lava down low, and now am in a fishing town/Fishy Factory
was facing down the last month of metaphor when it expects you to grind to unlock the best classes and I was like OK no way am I doing this anymore, but then I had a “what about… the old ways…” revelation and sure enough someone made a trainer for it (remember those) and I gave myself infinite job XP so I could unlock all the rest of the classes and now I’m having fun again strategizing around my moveset for the endgame, probably gonna wrap this up tidily in the next few hours now and have a lot more fun than I would have
Tried some NES and GB Mario platformers and decided the only one I really like the look/sound/feel of right now is SMB1.
I’ve been resisting getting it for like the past year and a half but I guess I’ll just get it.
… Spent additional time trying to work out if there were ROM revisions and if so which would work with most romhacks (is Romhacking.net being updated again or am I missing something?). There are multiple cartridge revisions to the stand-alone U SMB but as far as I can tell they’re entirely cosmetic and ROM-wise all just “SMB (World).” (?) So I ordered a beat-up $15-incl-shipping 3-screw.
unlike crypt, it is NOT a roguelike and it’s just a DDR/guitar hero style rhythm game except all the notes are monsters and thus a lot of the skill is in just reading/reacting to the board state. slimes need to be hit multiple times on consecutive beats. skeletons run away UNLESS they have shields and then you have to hit them double time first. armadillos are varying sorts of triplets. swordsmen attack from afar. harpies are fast but move every other beat. there are traps that can shift or teleport or speed up monsters. etc etc
lots of variety and new situations! feels pretty fresh mechanically for a rhythm game.
there’s a story mode which ok but kind of slight – it has some cute rhythm-heaven-style minigames sprinkled in but the songs are definitely the meat of the game.
there’s also a remix mode (and daily challenges) that will vary the monsters used in a song so the emphasis is more on sight reading instead of memorizing.
if you’re at all interested in rhythm games there’s a pretty generous demo i played like 13 hours of pre-release so i would recommend checking that out!!
edit: thought i should note i had pretty severe Danny Baranowsky fatigue from playing so much crypt but this game has much better variety imo. lots of other composers that aren’t just remixing danny songs.
playing the ds remake of metal max 2. yeah this game is cool. my character is a flamboyant dude with green hair and a cowboy hat, and i just recruited an incredibly sexual nurse to my party and gave her a motorcycle i bought with some bounty money, because what is a video game without being able to indulge in at least several of your fetishes? is this a viable team composition? probably not, but i do not care.
I’ve seen too many poorly scaled ones or the scanlines are too pronounced, or they don’t account for the loss of brightness because it is a filter not electrons, etc etc. Which one exactly are you praising?
Been enjoying Mai in SF6. In World Tour it’s very funny that low-detail Andy shows up, initially only seen from behind and then later as an NPC in Mai’s little hangout spot. He even teaches you a move that doesn’t exist in any other fighter’s moveset, it’s his ninja elbow. Kinda nice they go to the effort with this stuff. You then do a sidequest where you fight people cosplaying obscure SNK characters.
Also started playing fighting games with a friend on a more regular basis. I convinced them to try Dojo Masters and we may be the only people in the world playing it atm. It’s really good, and figuring out matchups together kept us busy for a while. The most notable thing is that despite it being a very simple game the speed is really high and it does kinda resemble the short explosive rounds of the martial arts they target. Boxing seems the best at just overwhelming the opponent but I still find Tae Kwon Do the most fun. We’re gonna do a historical run through of fighting games using the Capcom Fighting Collections and I’m also going to [try and] return to the game partially responsible for by hand injuries — Melee! Gonna try mapping keyboard and seeing if it’s feasible to play. I had ordered a Boxx controller variant months ago but the seller, I’m pretty sure, is giving me the runaround and has no idea where my order is. I think I need to email them and demand a refund. Anyway yeah, fighting games!
