Games Beaten 2014

[wclem]

# 12

Dead Space 2

More of the first game. They did change the controls a bit which pissed me off. Caused me to use a few health packs on accident. I did play them (part one) back to back so that is why I got screwed up with the controls. Otherwise the game was fun even though it did not really seem as much of a survival horror to me. The first one seemed darker and less shooter. I thought that part 2 was giving into becoming a shooter with horror elements.

If you liked one, then you will like part 2 just not as much LOL. I got about half way through 3 at this point and stopped. The game had way too many areas where you were in zero gravity and it was more annoying than fun. With my limited play time I was not gonna waste it on that game any longer.

[Ack]

1. Blood II: The Nightmare Levels (PC)(FPS)
2. Metal Slug (MVS)(Run and Gun)
3. Clive Barker's Undying (PC)(FPS)
4. Judge Dredd: Dredd Vs. Death (PC)(FPS)
5. Lagoon (SNES)(RPG)
6. Tin Star (SNES)(Light Gun)
7. Cacoma Knight in Bizyland (SNES)(Puzzle)
8. World Heroes (MVS)(Fighting)
9. Mario's Early Years: Preschool Fun (SNES)(Edutainment)
10. Rival Turf! (SNES)(Beat 'Em Up)
11. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (Genesis)(Fighting)
12. SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium (NGPC)(Fighting)
13. Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen (SNES)(RPG)
14. Super Turrican 2 (SNES)(Run and Gun)
15. Brain Lord (SNES)(RPG)
16. Live A Live (SNES)(RPG)
17. Treasure Adventure Game (PC)(Platformer)
18. Realms of the Haunting (PC)(FPS)
19. Pocket Tennis Color (NGPC)(Sports)
20. Unreal Gold (PC)(FPS)
21. Puzzle Bobble Mini (NGPC)(Puzzle)
22. John Romero's Daikatana (PC)(FPS)

Oh thank goodness that is done. Even on the best of levels, Daikatana feels like a slog. I was playing version 1.2, which removed a lot of the graphical bugs and made the game generally more stable, though not considerably so. A lot of folks have talked about how terrible Daikatana is on the PC, and yes, it is certainly not a good game. The audio and sound effects give away enemies and bleed through walls, the music can range from decent to grating, and occasionally the sound just bugs out. I experienced several crashes, particularly during the stage Wyndrax Tower part 2(which is famous as being the Dark Ages level that tends to crash), along with switches that just did not work. And while at times the AI partners were serviceable, they just as often flew into outright stupidity, shooting me in the back, running headlong into enemy fire, or getting stuck on just about everything. Getting Mikiko to ride an elevator was like pulling teeth!

There are also some serious design issues: the first chapter is horrible, with poorly-designed weapons, unintuitive layouts, enemies ranging from bland to terrible, both AI partners suddenly foisted upon you, etc. It's a real mess. Which is unfortunate, because it's the longest chapter and the game actually becomes noticeably better once you get through it. The chapters after that are actually a lot of fun, with some awesome weapons(I love the discs in Ancient Greece, and the ballista in Dark Ages Norway. 2030 San Francisco has a great chaingun), a variety of enemy types that are mostly fun to fight(though the game likes small critters like spiders, worms, and rats way more than it should), and the levels are far better designed, intricate but still sensible. In particular Mishima's Hideout in 2030 San Francisco is my favorite, as it features multiple branching and returning paths and offers some fun chances to play around if you have a high enough acrobatics skill.

Which is another thing that the game does reasonably well, though not without problems. I like being able to become more powerful personally over the game, moving faster, jumping higher, doing more damage, and getting more health. I maxed out acrobatics swiftly and had fun bounding around maps and discovering secrets. But I could find no way of measuring my progress to the next skill point. And the Daikatana partly ruins this system, as instead of boosting your stats, all kills with it go to power it up instead, and once it maxes out, any future kills with it are lost. Once I maxed it out, I really only used it for bosses, because it was actually detrimental to use it on regular foes.

The game is a mixed bag, and while it's certainly not unplayable, a lot of the worst elements of it appear in the opening stages. It's unfortunate, as the story is actually not too bad and serves as one of the highlights, considering the quality of most FPS stories at the time.

Eh, either way, I just made Daikatana my bitch.

Suck it down.

[BoneSnapDeez]

Well done Ack. From some reason I thought you were playing on the N64.

[Crynox]

@crynox how did you like the ending to that game? I played through it on my phone and that one definitely had some good twists when i played it all those months ago...

Twist city that's for sure! Yeah liked the ending although had to concentrate as playing during nightshift, (sneakily), and a lot goes on at the end.

[Crynox]

@noise don't remind me of that, i already know(even though you were talking to him) that i need to play that one...especially because I've been watching the tech demo videos and a gameplay series for the first video. I need that game soon despite the fact it's strange and sad from what I saw...

it's truly amazing. It's really an emotional experience. One of my favorite games of the generation.

I did start it as soon as I finished Faranheit but only about an hour in. Need to restart for sure but trying to clear my backlog first, I've got lots to do before playing 7th gen stuff. Looking forward to it though.

[ExedExes]

Eh, either way, I just made Daikatana my bitch.

I'm sure glad someone did. I just had to read up on the development and all the stuff that went down with that. I would not ever want to play it.

Thank goodness the 2nd division of Ion Storm put out a way better FPS in 2000.

[alienjesus]

1. Kirby's Epic Yarn Wii
2. To The Moon Christmas Special PC
3. Super Mario 3D World Wii U
4. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD Wii U
5. Chiki Chiki Boys Mega Drive
6. World of Illusion starring Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck Mega Drive
7. Metal Gear PSVita
8. Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake PSVita
9. Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy 3DS
10. Akai Katana 360
11. Metal Gear Solid GBC
12. Atelier Totori Plus: The Adventurer of Arland PSN
13. Tearaway PSN
14. Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA ƒ PSN
15. Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA 2nd PSP
16. Final Fantasy VII PS1
17. Dead or Alive 5 Plus PSVita
18. The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds 3DS
19. NES Remix 2 Wii U eShop
20. Starfox Assault GC
21. Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney 3DS
22. Cybernator SNES
23. Gravity Rush PSVita *NEW*
24. Perfect Dark N64 *NEW*
25. Castlevania: Rondo of Blood PSP *NEW*

3 more games for the list. Spoilered for length:

Gravity Rush

Back in the early days of the Vita I remember people selling this as the reason to get a Vita. This was going to be the must-have game for the system. n open world game where you can shift gravity, it was going to be an epic. I thought it looked dull and brown, and I don't like open world games, so it held no sway for me.

Then the game actually came out, and everyone seemed disappointed with it. It's too short, too linear, too repetitive, too boring. I kinda figured, 'eh, so it's not even a good example of the genre. I'll ignore that one then'.

Then in January this year, I got a Vita with 7 games, one of which was Gravity Rush. I recently put it in to play as a quick game to play through, and hey, what do you know? I fucking love it.

The game is very brown, but it's also very charming. It comes across as nostalgic rather than grim. It amazes me people don't talk about the soundtrack here aswell - it's amazing. Epic orchestral pieces alongside jazzy numbers and it's all great.

The gameplay is very repetitive, but flying around (or rather, falling with style) is just endlessly fun, so that the repetitive mission goals I could forgive. Walking up walls, falling straight up, delivering a flying kick to an enemy 100 feet away and 50 feet off the ground, surfing alongside the top of the inside of a pipe - it just all felt pretty exhilirating and fun.The game isnt really open world imo either - it's always very clearly marked what to do next, and there's little to do outside of the storyline missions.

The story is a bit weird, and it's not properly concluded (definitely a push for a sequel here) but I enjoyed it, and it came across well in it's comic book cutscenes.

It definitely has flaws. Bigger mission variety would be MUCH appreciated, some camera troubles could be resolved and I encountered the odd glitch here and there, but the whole game just came across as pure fun, if Gravity Rush 2 comes out, I'd definitely pick it up.

Perfect Dark

I'd started Perfect Dark ages back, around Christmas. Me and friend went out for a joint birthday drinks, and spent the next day playing through half of the game in co-op.

Yesterday we were out for drinks again, so today we decided to plug through some more Perfect Dark and we finished it.

So, Perfect Dark. I can see why people love it so much. It definitely feels pretty fleshed out for it's time, it has some (quite quintisentially British) charm, and it's fast paced and fun. It;s not my kinda thing though. Unfortunately, FPS as a genre is just not that exciting to me. Perfect Dark is one of the one's I've enjoyed most though.

The weapon variety in the game is nice, even if you generally stick to one gun per mission. The missions mix stuff up quite a lot, and I like how you get more objectives on harder difficulties. However, I'm not a fan of the games erratic difficulty - some missions like the break into Area 51 are much harder than the missions that come later.

The story is basic, but fun enough. The graphics are honestly pretty ugly, but functional. They probably looked great back in the day. The music is pretty atmospheric and catchy in places though. Aiming was odd - the game really heavily adds auto aiming to your gun meaning you only have to point vaguely in the right direction to shoot enemies.

One issue I did encounter with the game was that it could be quite glitchy. In our run of the game, there was a surprisingly high number of occassion we had to restart levels because of a glitch - the last level in particular glitched out on us 3 times - a block we need to push got locked in place, meaning we couldnt progress (twice) and one time the final boss teleported (as he often does) and just never reappeared.

It's a good game. I feel like I'm probably issing it's historical context and significance due to my ambivalence towards the genre though.

Castlevania: Rondo of Blood

I've sort of beaten this game before (I played through the remake - Dracula X Chronicles - last year), but this is my first trip through the PC Engine CD version (although via the aforementioned PSP game). There are really two key differences between this game and it's remake - 1. this game is way prettier - the 2D spritework is gorgeous, and everything flows much smoother than the fugly 2.5D remake. 2. The remake has better music. This one might be a bit controversial, but whilst the original music is good and charming, the PSP versions music was just epic and really got you going.

Anyhow, having pretty much played this before, I played through as Maria for the sake of brevity and ease (although I replayed the final boss fight as Richter to see both endings). Maria is an unlockable character. Whereas Richter plays in the classic Castlevania style - can only whip straight forward, uses axes, knives and crosses as subweapons, commits to jumps and cant adjust them in midair etc, Maria completely turns the mechanics on their head by having a slide manouvre - great for dodging and running at speed, plus a double jump, and full midair controls more akin to Megaman than Castlevania. She also is an 8 year old girl in a pink dress who attaclks with kitties and birds. She's awesome.

Maria kinda feels to me like a first step towards the Metroidvania movement mechanics - she's capable of moving about the battlefield in a realloy satisfying and fluid way that feels similar to what they aimed for in the later Castlevanias.

Anyhow, the level design in this game is great, the horror inspiration seems more obvious here than in some others - all the usual monster are here, but some of the stages and bosses seem generally creepy, and things are a little more bloody and grim than the NES games.

I can't compare the gameplay to other classicvanias unfortunately, as this is the only one I've played. As an introduction to the series though, I think it works great. It's a gem.

Now I've played through this one, I can move on to it's sequel, and one of my summer marathon games - Symphony of the Night

[wclem]

#13 Wolfenstein PS3

Wanted to play through in anticipation of the new game coming out. It was pretty much Wolfenstein with a lite story sprinkled in it. Though, I will give it credit some of the boss battles were more than shoot it as many times as you can. Had "some" solving to do to beat them. It was a fun, mindless diversion. Hoping the new one offers a little more in story and gameplay.

[REPO Man]

Recently beat the Sonic hack "Sonic Classic Heroes" (version 0.10.008a, the most recent one), which combines the "Sonic 1+2" hack (which joins the levels from the first two Sonic games) and "Sonic 2 Heroes" (which brings a "Sonic Heroes"-style of gameplay to Sonic 2), while also adding a save feature and (as of recently) the ability to swap out the Sonic/Tails/Knuckles team with Team Chaotix (with Vector, Espio and Charmy). You can also add Chaotix's Combi-Ring feature IIRC and even nix the whole three-characters-at-a-time thing in favor of two or (as I did) one.

When I beat it, I did so as Vector the Crocodile (Solo) and with all the Chaos Emeralds (the S1 Emeralds, of which there are now 7) and the Sol Emeralds (what they call the S2 Chaos Emeralds). Now I could also play through as any of the other two Team Chaotix characters without worrying about the Special Stages, though I can't change which team so on that save file Sonic, Tails and Knuckles are off the table. I'll probably just do a new save for each character, though.

[ExedExes]

1. Metal Gear - NES (February 27)
2. Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault - PC (March 4)
3. Thunderbirds - NES (March 9)
4. Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon 2 - Gamecube (March 22)
5. Army Men: Sarge's War -Gamecube (March 22)
6. Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas - PC (April 5)
7. Army Men Advance - GBA (April 16)
8. Judge Dredd: Dredd vs. Death - PC (April 27)
9. *NEW* Contra Advance: The Alien Wars EX - GBA (May 17)

Fastest game completion I had in a long time. Took me only about an hour.

I was going in thinking this game would be just as good as Contra III on the SNES. It tried, but it fell short.

Cheap deaths, poor hit detection, only one gun can be used at a time and no bombs. Plus, the overhead levels were scrapped for 2 levels from Contra Hard Corps (Genesis). Also, the small screen size made those gigantic SNES boss battles seem real tiny (and the actual battle areas have to compensate for them). Only 2 difficulty levels (and only 1 will let you play the entire game)

Good points? It's Contra III lite. REAL lite. Impressive graphics and large bosses even in the Hard Corps stages have been preserved pretty accurately. Plus, passwords after each stage to help you clear it faster

It's not a hard game to find, but it is uncommon. Would I recommend it? Perhaps at a good price (around $10), otherwise, not really. Stick with Contra III on the SNES.