Games Beaten 2013

[Xeogred]

Sonic and Megaman games are the ones I like to replay the most and can blast through. I'd guess an hour for the Sonic's myself and 30 minutes on some of the Megaman games.

[dogman91]

Yeah the Genesis Sonic games are so easy to just play over and over again and never get that "I've done all this before" feeling. It's weird how that works. Never get sick of them and always have a blast each time. I often pop one in just to play the first stage or so and find myself playing through most of the game.

I'm actually playing Mega Man for the first time and I can see where all the praise comes from; it's pretty sweet to say the least. The power-ups you get from the bosses are great.

[Xeogred]

It's honestly to this day what makes me wonder if I'm a bigger Sonic fan over Mario. But... this is only looking back up through the 16bit era I guess. Otherwise, I thought Generations was just okay and hated what I played of the 3D Sonic's (though I enjoyed the demo for Lost World so I might check it out). On the other hand outside of Sunshine I've still enjoyed most of the Mario games a lot.

It's a shame, imagine if they just kept throwing out 2D Sonic's in the 32bit era or something with a style like the Megaman X4-6 games, would have been amazing.

[Original_Name]

My complete list:

Batsugun (MAME)
Panzer Dragoon Orta (Xbox)
D (Saturn)
Super Hang-On (Mega Drive)
Blue Stinger (Dreamcast)
Undercover Cops (MAME)
Night Slashers X (MAME)
The Stanley Parable (Steam)
Gone Home (Steam)
Skies of Arcadia (Dreamcast, ~100% - all discoveries, chams, treasure chests, special Pinta's Quest items)
Black Mesa (PC)
Portal (Steam)
Half-Life 2: Episode 2 (Steam)
Metroid: Zero Mission (Gameboy Advance)
Lack of Love (Dreamcast)

A pretty amazing year for me, even if I only completed about half of the titles I set out to, getting caught up in some pretty odd diversions (Super Hang-On, Blue Stinger, and D were unexpected additions considering I had Phantasy Star, Metal Gear Solid 3, and Child of Eden waiting for me). Skies of Arcadia was definitely the most significant accomplishment, ended up clocking in just above 60 hours in all after tracking down all of the extras (which was a great decision -- tracking down downloadable files and spending time with the VMU mini-game made it possibly the uniquely "Dreamcast" experience I've had) -- for all its clichés, it really is incredibly charming, and I felt myself caring about the characters and the world in ways I almost never feel.

After enjoying the hell out of the Black Mesa remake of Half-Life, I feel like I finally joined 21st Century gaming by playing through Portal. I know this is going to be an eye-roller as we're approaching 2014, but wow Portal is so good. All of the jokes were ruined for me -- most gamers sure love to meme the hell out of things, don't they? It inspired me to jump back into the storyline of the Half-Life series, which I left idle back when I plowed through Episode 1 on release day. I made Episode 2 another one-day completion, and got totally sucked back into the world, and found myself digging through the Half-Life wiki for hours afterward. Just unbelievable world-building. This leaves Blue Shift as the only title I've yet to complete (or even buy) in the series.

Metroid: Zero Mission is the second Nintendo game I've ever completed (Super Mario Galaxy was the first a couple years back). Despite the fact that it basically confirmed the fact that I really just don't appreciate the Nintendo school of game design all that much ("Why is there so much shit in the way, just let me juuuuump," combined with this general feeling of being very tightly controlled and directed at all times, even when the game encourages freedom), I deeply enjoyed the experience overall, and adored the art direction. Although I rarely complete Nintendo titles, I've played enough of them to know that Metroid and F-Zero series are by far the most appealing to me. I'll never be an outright Nintendo fan, but it's nice to have a growing affinity for at least a couple of their series... even if they're their most infamously neglected... if I could learn how to stomach watching Pikmin die, the list may expand even further.

Batsugun and Panzer Dragoon Orta were the most fun I had playing a game this year, but Lack of Love was just unbelievable. Simply one of the most endearing video games I've ever played, and thematically after my heart. Although it does not have the most incredible production values, never has a video game felt more like it was made with myself in mind.

Next year's to-do: Phantasy Star, Metal Gear Solid 3, Child of Eden, Portal 2, Half-Life: Blue Shift, Ocarina of Time, Final Fantasy VI, Ikaruga...

[BoneSnapDeez]

Skies of Arcadia is brilliant. When I completed it years ago I also wanted to play the VMU games but (shockingly) the VMU battery died.

And I must say I've enjoyed reading this thread. And I regret not tracking the games I've beaten. I plan to participate next year. I'd like to hit about 50 games in 2014, though that may be too ambitious given all the lengthy RPGs I plan on playing.

[alienjesus]

1. Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions PSP
2. Pokémon: Dream Radar 3DS eShop
3. New Super Mario Bros. U Wii U
4. Paper Mario: Sticker Star 3DS
5. New Super Mario Bros. 2 3DS
6. Mario Tennis Open 3DS
7. Wario Land 3 GBC
8. Hana Samurai: Art of the Sword 3DS eShop
9. The "Denpa" Men: They Came By Wave 3DS eShop
10. Pokémon White Version 2 DS
11. Kirby Mass Attack DS
12. F-Zero Wii U VC
13. Jeanne d'Arc PSP
14. DoDonPachi Resurrection 360
15. Patapon PSP
16. F-Zero X N64
17. Cave Story WiiWare
18. Parodius GBC
19. Shock Troopers Wii VC
20. 1080: TenEighty Snowboarding N64
21. Donkey Kong Land III Game Boy
22. Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble GBC
23. Little Inferno Wii U eShop
24. HarmoKnight 3DS eShop
25. Liberation Maiden 3DS eShop
26. Fire Emblem: Awakening 3DS
27. Patchwork Heroes PSN
28. Crimson Shroud 3DS eShop
29. To The Moon PC
30. Wild Arms PS1 Classics
31. Fantastic Dizzy Mega Drive
32. Diddy Kong Racing N64
33. Pulseman Wii VC
34. Bubble Bobble Master System
35. Loco Roco PSP
36. StreetPass Squad 3DS eShop
37. Metroid Prime 3 Corruption Wii
38. StreetPass Battle 3DS eShop
39. Attack of the Friday Monsters: A Tokyo Tale 3DS eShop
40. Earthbound Wii U VC
41. Tomb Raider PS1
42. Streetpass Garden 3DS eShop
43. Super Princess Peach DS
44. Metal Gear Solid PS1
45. Pokémon Y 3DS
46. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies 3DS eShop
47. Deathsmiles 360
48. Pikmin 3 Wii U
49. Parappa the Rapper PSP
50. Crash Team Racing PS1
51. Power Stone PSP
52. Power Stone 2 PSP
53. Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles PSP
54. Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land GBA
55. Streetpass Mansion 3DS eShop
56. Botanicula PC
57. NES Remix Wii U eShop *NEW*

I normally don't update for a single game, but this close to the end of the year I'll make an exception - it could be the last update of 2013.

NES Remix is an interesting game. I've seen reviews of it that gave it very low scores - Jim Sterling for example called it an utterly pointless game. I completely disagree - this is an addictive, fun game perfect for quickly having a go at, but really hard to put down. Its a love letter to the early NES era, and I've loved every moment I;ve had with it.

It has its flaws - the controls for mario are mapped to the wrong buttons, the challenges are inconsistent in difficulty, and some of the games they've used are awful - challenges for Tennis, Baseball and Urban Champion are not what I wanted. Luckily, all of these games are tucked away in the bonus section, and only have a few missions each. Wrecking Crew and Golf unfortunately are a bit more prevalent. However, the rapid fire missions this game throws at you can often make even the lesser games represented quite enjoyable.

The main section of the game involves playing missions from one of 16 classic NES games. Examples include 'kill 14 enemies whilst invincible' in Super Mario Bros., 'Knock down 5 rivals' in Excitebike and 'Grab all the bonus vegetables' in Ice Climber. Some are more Warioware style affairs only a few seconds long, whereas others are a little more involved - but probably wont take more than a minute or two still. Each game scores you based on how quickly you accomplished the task, and some of them can be pretty tough to get the best ranking on - requiring literally perfect performances. More interesting, in my opinion, are the 50 'Remix' missions, which throw some sort of curveball into the mission - Mario levels where Mario can't stop running, Pinball where you can't fall onto the bottom half of the board, Luigi in Donkey Kong climibing up to the top of a mirrored 75M and then back down again, Link in Donkey Kong trying to clear 25M without being able to jump the barrels, Mario Brothers where you control 2 Marios simultaneously - theres lots of fun, and often very challenging missions in this section.

I'd definitely recommend this one to Wii U owners and NES fans. The game selection could've been better (it's all the very early NES stuff - Zelda or earlier), but the game is crazy addictive and kept me coming back over and over again for just one more go. And then another. And then just a quick attempt at the next level...

Up next: Christmas. I'll probably be playing some new stuff after that. Perfect Dark and Final Fantasy VII are still on the books for later though.

[ExedExes]

And I must say I've enjoyed reading this thread. And I regret not tracking the games I've beaten. I plan to participate next year. I'd like to hit about 50 games in 2014, though that may be too ambitious given all the lengthy RPGs I plan on playing.

This was a great thread, if only to remind me to give the Gamecube a rest between Together Retro picks and check out some classics on the NES that don't get a lot of love.

[emwearz]

alienjesus how did you go at collecting all stars? Some of those rainbow stars make me utterly rage like I was playing super meat boy.

[alienjesus]

alienjesus how did you go at collecting all stars? Some of those rainbow stars make me utterly rage like I was playing super meat boy.

I got 3 gold stars on all stages. I got about 60/204 rainbow star ratings, so I've not compelted everything yet.

I've found that some of the easiest and hardest stages are where I've got a lot of my rainbow ranks - the easy ones for obvious reasons, and the hard ones because I've had som much practice just trying to beat them! I've gone back to try for a rainbow rank on some of them and they're nuts. The Wrecking Crew level where you have to destory the ladders in particular I just can't comprehend how I could go faster

[emwearz]

It is the having to watch the instructions, then the GO! screen before being able to retry, which is throws me off and adds to frustration of losing. Wish it just did a instant restart.

If they released single or packs of games for DLC do you think you would pick them up?