Snickerd00dle's Summer Game Challenge 2011

[Flake]

Final fight with Sigma:

He has three forms: The sentry form that shoots the laser.

The three heads that attack you with electricty, fire, or ice.

And the massive head in the bottom left corner.

Strategy:

Sentry form is easy. He telegraphs his shots and gives you an awesome platform to stand on. Stand on the middle head at all times and dodge from there. If you here him say "The End" don't bother to attack - just dodge that round.

From here he cycles through the three heads: When the blue head is attacking, rush to the left. Jump off the wall and destroy the blue head with a massive buster attack (use the full charge buster, not the stock pile buster).

When the red one attacks be ready to jump and take it out the same way.

The yellow one is the hardest to dodge. Don't worry about destroying it and just try to survive.

The moment the heads vanish stand about 60% of the way towards the right wall. Sigma's head will appear to the left and he will either suck you in or blow you away. Whatever he does, the moment his little spiky pillars appear rush to the left so that you are standing on the safe side of the pillar closest to him. This way no matter what he does you have a good three seconds to react before he hurts you.

If he sucks just stand there and wait for that to end. Then destroy the pillar and continue firing into Sigma. If he exhales, keep dashing towards the left pillar. When he stops destroy the pillar and fire into Sigma.

Rinse. Wash. Repeat.

[Crabmaster2000]

I cant believe how many of you guys are "pro" cheating. It sickens me .

I would rather not finish the game than cheat my way through it. I'll give it a break for now and maybe come back when its the last one left on my list.

Beat Gex in one sitting tonight. If I had to describe it in one word that word would be "meh". Wasnt horrible and wasnt fantastic. Kind of forgettable. Ended it with like 50 extra lives. Some of the later levels were kind of challenging, but having so many extra lives on stock didnt make it very frustrating.

The save system was fairly sucky (only saved when you found tapes hidden in specific levels), but since the game was so short it wasnt to bad.

Onto Battletoads/Double Dragon next!!

[noiseredux]

hey man, I've never beat Contra without the Konami Code. And I sleep just fine at night.

[Crabmaster2000]

hey man, I've never beat Contra without the Konami Code. And I sleep just fine at night.

Contra is not that bad, no need for the code. I enjoy a good challenge in my games. Once beat Mega Man without dying for an informal contest over at Nintendoage.com and I've beaten other games like Ninja Gaiden, Yo! Noid and Battletoads without to much trouble.

If I spent more time early on in FFVIII actually learning the basics (I didnt bother learning how to actually junction my characters until halfway through disc 3) I probably wouldnt be in the mess I got myself into. Its not that I'd lose sleep over cheating (how do you cheat in a RPG anyway?), I just wouldnt consider it beaten, which was kind of the point of the challenge was it not? If I just wanted to see how it played out I could watch a youtube video of someone playing the game (which would essentially be what I would be doing if I used a gameshark). There is a small sense of pride that comes along with figuring out how to overcome annoying parts like this in games. I never use guides on my first playthroughs of any game either because it feels like cheating to me.

[Flake]

I cant believe how many of you guys are "pro" cheating. It sickens me :P.

I actually have tackled with this very dilemma a few times myself - a game is defined by the conditions set by the developers so what is the point of playing the game if you break those conditions?

Yet at the same time, games are meant to be a pleasurable diversion. If a game is pissing me off am I not wasting my time and money on the hobby?

Eventually I realized that with some games cheating is okay as long as I don't change the rules so that any and all challenge is removed. I'm essentially just adjusting the settings so that it is as if the developers had geared the game specifically towards my level of play.

Sometimes I'll find a game that I enjoy so much that I am willing to invest the time it takes to improve my skill - but with a library of nearly 100 unfinished games, it is a rare game that commands such devotion from me.

Of course this is all in regards to single player games. I cannot abide cheating when others are involved.

[Flake]

- Super Mario Land (GB)
- Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land (GB)
- Burning Rangers (SAT)
- Super Mario Kart Super Circuit (GBA)
- Tales of Symphonia (GCN)
- Metroid Prime 2 (GCN)
- Sin and Punishment: Star Successor (Wii)
- Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (GBA)
- Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (GBA)

Sin and Punishment - holy shit, that was amazing. From this point forward, this game will be my response to anyone who asserts that there are no 'hardcore' (golly, I hate that term) games on the Wii. I haven't played a game that pushed me to my limits like this since Ikaruga.

This game did a lot of things very right: The art direction was fantastic. Your characters movement being independent of your aiming was splendid - in many ways this game felt like a natural evolution to the Smash TV gaming method.

I especially enjoyed the creativity the developers showed in boss design. And speaking of bosses, the boss medley at the end blew my mind. Treasure could easily have just put in a quick boss rush leading up to the final enemy - instead they designed a completely new experience for each boss. That is a kind of devotion to creating a breathtaking experience that you do not often see. Treasure took no short cuts on this game.

I do not know what will be next. Probably either Castlevania: HoD or Burning Rangers.

[lisalover1]

I just had THE most fucking annoying random encounter battle in FFVII. I was going through the ShinRa mansion, and this weird two-headed zombie-like thing called a YingYang showed up in a random encounter. It was just one, so I figured I could handle it. But, I didn't realize that the thing had a health bar bigger than mine, could use spells that were practically one-hit kills, and took almost 30 SECONDS to do any attack, and could attack twice per turn. Oh, also, he is almost completely immune to physical attacks and completely immune to some spells. I managed to do the necessary 1,200 damage to him that was supposed to kill him, only to realize that his other head had his own 1,200 HP! In total, it took me around 20 MINUTES to kill one freaking random encounter enemy! BULL...FUCKING...SHIT. Why can't this game at least grant me the luxury of an "Escape" battle menu option?

[Xeogred]

Hold L1/R1.

[KillerJuan77]

hey man, I've never beat Contra without the Konami Code. And I sleep just fine at night.

Same here, some games just beg to use cheats.

[Flake]

Let's get a status update from everyone!

I have 4 games down, 5 to go. I just started Metroid Prime 2 this morning. I have opted for the Wii version as I find the GCN controls difficult to return to after playing Corruption.

Is everyone else still plugging away?