Summer Games Challenge 2014

[dsheinem]

1. Double Dragon (NES)
2. Super Aleste (SNES)
3. Perfect Dark (N64)
4. Wave Race 64 (N64)
5. Shantae (GBC via 3DS VC)
6. Ristar (MD via Wii VC)
7. Bangai-O (DC)
8. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PSP)
9. Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together (PSP)
10. Metal Gear Solid 2 (Vita)

Spent the afternoon playing Ristar today. It turns out that I wasn't very far from the end when I played through years ago - I was on the last world. Apparently the game only has 6 worlds, not 8 as I thought, and the map screen seemed to suggest.

I actually enjoyed the game a lot more than I have previously on this run through. The grabbing mechanics seemed much more reponsive then I remember, and the music and graphics were pretty damn good.

The game has some weak points - particularly the weird difficulty spikes around the stage 3 boss (the mole) and the stage 4 boss (the bird) considering how easy the bosses after them were (with the exception of the final boss who was nicely challenging without feeling cheap). I probably burned twice as many lives on these two bosses as I did on the rest of the game up to the final boss. The first level of stage 6 felt pretty unfair too, and stood out as the only stage that felt too tough.

However, some of the level designs were a lot of fun, the swimming sections managed to fall on the positive side of the usual hit or miss mechanic and it varied the level mechanics frequently enough to be interesting. It's no match for Sonic the Hedgehog, but I'm glad to have given Ristar another shot.

Something tells me you will be first to the finish

I really need to spend more time with Thief now that I have a PC up and running again.

[alienjesus]

Something tells me you will be first to the finish

We'll see. I may only have 3, but one is a shmup I expect to take a fair few attempts, and another is a 40-50 hour SRPG. I'm also away for two weeks at the start of August, so I'll lose a lot of time there. I should finish MGS2 no problem though.

Speaking of which, I spent a few hours on MGS2 again this evening. I met up with Iriquois Pliskin and Peter Stillman, learnt about some of the members of Dead Cell, ran into Olga (the first boss) again and defused 6 bombs set around the 1st half of the Big Shell.

I also levelled my grip up to level 3 using the drop and grab mechanic. I'm about 5 hours in, and I'm getting marginally better at this game once I realised that killing people is probably the easiest way to do things instead of just avoiding them as I did in the first game. I've snapped a lot of necks and thrown a couple of people over the ledges too...

I've still died a ton, and killed a lot of people. My ranking is going to be horrible!

[laurenhiya21]

Ys I beat!

I had a really good time with Ys. Really fun running into enemies I guess haha. Some bits of the story were interesting as well, and I really liked the art and music Only problems I had was getting lost (especially in the Darm Tower) and sometimes I would get really stumped on what to do next. Although once I figured it out I felt pretty dumb ><; Most of the time they were things that could easily be solved by paying attention to what people said, which sometimes I didn't haha.

It's funny though, after I beat the Bat Boss (who I like to call Bat Man because I'm so creative), the rest of the bosses were pretty easy. Even the final boss, Dark Fact, was easier than Bat Man (although what's with that name? Is it supposed to be opposite of White Lie or something?).

Now on to Ys II :3

[BoneSnapDeez]

Fact is actually one of the "Houses" of priests along with Hadal, Tovah, Dabbie, Messa, and Gemma. So yeah, Fact is like his last name. But he's a bad guy. So he's Dark Fact. There's a Hugo Fact in Ys Origin.

Anyway, have fun with Ys II.

[laurenhiya21]

Ohh ok. That makes a bit more sense. (I don't think they really explained that, unless I missed something) Fact is still an odd name though haha

[scarper]

1. Resident Evil 4 (PS2)
2. Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (N64)
3. Mega Man 2 (NES)
4. Panzer Dragoon Zwei (Saturn)
5. Wave Race 64 (N64)
6. F-Zero GX (GC)
7. Shantae (GBC via 3DS)
8. Virtual Boy Wario Land (VB)
9. Sonic and Knuckles (Genesis)
10. Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)

Just beat Resident Evil 4. Total play time was about 24 hours, including time spent leaving it on the pause screen. Died 25 times, mostly on bosses. I thoroughly enjoyed using the Killer7 as my mini rocket launcher. It just did so much damage! Perfect for boss fights and tougher enemies.

I really enjoyed this game. I loved how much it encourages being resourceful, and using absolutely everything to your advantage. This is the first survival horror that I've actually beaten, and it was a pretty satisfying experience. I didn't feel scared enough in the first half of the game, but that progressively got better. The sewers, and the blind wolverine lookin zombies really got me. Loved all the boss battles. My favorite ones were Salazar and the giant fish thingy. I was worried this game would turn into a long annoying escort mission after rescuing Ashley, but that part actually wasn't too bad at all. She usually does a pretty good job at staying behind Leon, letting him take the hits instead. Never really got in the way. She never died on me, ever. Very easy to tell her to wait in a corner before going off to fight something.

And of course, her getting re-kidnapped all the time helped out too.

I also played through Seperate Ways, and really enjoyed that. It was like free DLC, something we will never see again today, especially from Capcom. The crossbow that shot exploding arrows was quite nice. I tried the Mercenaries mode for a bit too, s'alright.

Right now, I'm halfway through Shantae, playing through the grand prix mode in F-Zero GX, and am about to start Shadow of the Colossus. I don't think I will have enough free time to actually get through my list before fall semester classes start up, but we'll see. Still chugging along.

[CFFJR]

Started playing RE2. Decided to use Leon first.

Its Resident Evil. What can I say? Good stuff.

Screwing around in the police station. I got the Diamond Key.

[darsparx]

I know it's not on my list but I've been playing some dkc1 on gba. Man i forgot how much fun that game is. Too bad I don't have the third anymore. Next year I'm going to have to give my list some more thought because I forgot I even had dkc(even if it is the ports to gba which imo are still fun to play mostly because I never owned a snes until now so I've never played the originals)

[alienjesus]

More MGS2. Obviously spoilers ahead.

I defused the last bomb in Shell 1, fought Fortune, accidently killed Vamp (and then didn't, somehow), fought and killed Fatman, met up with a ninja who the game clearly wants me to believe is Grey Fox but obviously isn't, found a disguise, infiltrated the hostage room and located Ames.

Now I'm fleeing from said room after being discovered by Revolver Ocelot. I have a key card for Shell 2.

[dsheinem]

I can't get over how amazing the level design is in Thief.