Summer Games Challenge 2015

[pierrot]

The feeling of accomplishment isn't that much more grand than the joy in finishing ten different games. 5-9/10 is still a great thing.

[prfsnl_gmr]

Blaster Master (NES/PSP)
Earthbound (SNES/WIIU)
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (2600/7800)
Kaboom! (2600/7800)
Galactic Attack/RayForce (SATURN/XBOX)
Half-Life (PC/PS2)
R-Type Delta (PS1/PS3)
Samurai Shodown II (NEOGEO/PS2)
Shining Force II (GENESIS/PS3)
Virtua Racing (ARCADE/PS2)

I finished up Half-Life - and my summer gaming challenge - yesterday afternoon. I enjoyed Half-Life quite a bit. It had great atmosphere, and a compelling narrative. I also appreciate its approach to immersive storytelling, which would have been groundbreaking when it was released. Moreover, the game requires more than just shooting, and it rewards creative play. Accordingly, and while it is a bit aged now, it is still an enjoyable experience, and I recommend it to anyone interested in classic FPS games. I am also now looking forward to playing through Half-Life 2, and I may try to tackle it next summer. (I read that it was pretty good...)

.....

Six out of ten isn't too bad for this year's summer games challenge. I got through some genuinely challenging games, such as Blaster Master and R-Type Delta, and I am really glad that I finally beat them. Also, and while I didn't touch Earthboud or Galactic Attack/Rayforce, I made good progress on the other games. My high score in Kaboom! is approaching 2000 points, which is not high enough for the patch but still pretty good. I also have a gold medal in one of Virtua Racing's three races, and I may still try to win the other two sometime next month. Accordingly, I am pleased with my work this year, and I look forward to next year's challenge!

[alienjesus]

Quick pos as im on my Vita. I beat the 4th game on my summer list, which I'll post about later when im on a pc.

I also played some more MGS3 and accidentally started The End bkss fight. I want to beat him legit and not the old age trick, so Id best get stuck in now.

[prfsnl_gmr]

I also played some more MGS3 and accidentally started The End bkss fight. I want to beat him legit and not the old age trick, so Id best get stuck in now.

That is one of the best boss fights of all time. I spent just over an hour stalking him. I hope you enjoy it.

[alienjesus]

I quite enjoyed it after a slightly rough start. Ive been beating all the bosses with tranq weapons in order to get their camo, but i held upthe end too so i have his camo and his tranq sniper, which is proving incredibly useful. just learning how handy the shotgun is too. cant find much use for machine guns though.

I shot the ends parrot too. I meant to tranq it but I accidentally used the wrong gun

Im at the mountaintop outside groznyj grad now, I have a suspicion The Fury will be coming up soon! Anyone know how long i have left roughly? No spoilers please!

[laurenhiya21]

Finally got a chance to do this again

I was going to start up Super Mario Bros 2 again, but since I'm not sure where the Wii U is right now, I decided to try out Golden Axe III instead. I've already tried playing as the lady warrior (not sure if she had a name or I just forgot), but I got a game over so I might try again with a different character. I am liking it so far, just I'm terrible at pulling any of the moves off ><; Probably mixing the magic and jump buttons a lot doesn't help either though.

[BoneSnapDeez]

I'm not sure where the Wii U is right now

Canada.

Also, Golden Axe III is completely broken and the easiest of the original trilogy by far. Try jumping and slashing (just push the attack button a split second after you jump) - virtually every normal enemy can be taken down by doing this repeatedly, and some bosses as well. The enemy AI simply isn't very good.

[laurenhiya21]

lol It shouldn't be in Canada since I left it with my boyfriend!

But thanks, I'll try that. I'm probably going to have to start again though since I'm on my last continue whoops >_<;

[alienjesus]

I beat the 4th game on my summer list, which I'll post about later when I'm on a PC

1. Fire Emblem: Ankoku Ryuu To Hikari No Ken (FC)
2. Super Aleste (SNES)
3. Banjo-Tooie (N64)
4. Saturn Bomberman (Saturn)
5. Shenmue (DC)
6. Final Fantasy VIII (PS1)
7. Metroid: Zero Mission (GBA)
8. Shinobi (GG)
9. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (Vita)
10. The Curse of Monkey Island (PC)

As I said before, I took out my 4th summer game, which was Shinobi for the Game Gear. Despite the name, this game is probably more widely known as The G.G. Shinobi.

The GG Shinobi builds on the Shinobi formula set out by Revenge of Shinobi in terms of gameplay, but it feels a little more fluid - jumps aren't quite so stiff for example. It still has only one movement speed though, and none of the fancy moves of Shinobi 3.

The big twist of GG Shinobi is that it has a Megaman style progression where you unlock new abilities as you beat levels, in this case by rescuing other multicoloured garbed ninjas - like your own Super Sentai Shinobi team. The starting Red shinobi has a decently powerful but short range sword and earthquake magic to damage enemies and break blocks. He's also the only one who can damage the final boss. The other levels give you a Pink ninja who can walk on ceilings, attacks with powerful arced bombs and has magic to freeze enemies and light dark rooms, a Yellow ninja who has a long range charge shot, can walk on water and has invincibility magic, a blue ninja who has a grappling hook weapon, can swing on poles with the hook and has a tornado flight magic and finally a green ninja who has the series traditional shurikens (easily the best weapon, as they're fast and long range) who can also do the staple series double jump and has the series staple suicide magic.

You can choose which of the first 4 levels to play in any order, but the game seems set up with a certain order in mind - rescuring Pink, Yellow, Blue, Green in that order makes the game a lot easier than other orders. After that you unlock the final level which is a long and confusing labyrinth that requires use of all 5 ninja's skills to proceed. This level is very difficult, and full of lots of cheap deaths and very trick stage designs. It would have been better to have a Wily castle style set up in my opinion, where we could have had some more shorter levels rather than this big maze. Still, it's good at making you make the most of each ninjas powers, and tends to colour code rooms to let you know who you should use.

GG Shinobi is pretty short, but fairly challenging in it's last level. It's definitely the best game I've played on the Game Gear and a fine entry in the series. In the end I played it on 3DS out of ease of access - being strapped to the wll with my chunky game gear staring at the blurry screen is not an ideal way to play this, though it is managable. Pick it up on 3DS VC though and you won't regret it.

In other news, MGS3 and FFVIII are both about 3/4 through. FFVIII hasn't moved on in a while, will get back to it this weekend. I'm planning to play Curse of Monkey Island next, then jump into one of the longer two of the remaining games after that.

[laurenhiya21]

1. Super Mario Bros 2 (WiiU VC)
2. Super Mario World (SuFami)
3. Yoshi’s Island (SuFami)
4. Contra III (SuFami)
5. Klonoa: Door to Phantomile (PSN)

6. Golden Axe III (Steam)
7. Mega Man X (SuFami)
8. Wild Arms (PSN)
9. Gunstar Heroes (Steam)
10. Silent Hill (PS1)

After a few run thoughs with different characters and trying the jump & attacking strategy... I'm really bored of Golden Axe III. Every time I've gotten pretty close to the end, but then the game starts throwing tons of the super troublesome enemies at me, I lose a bunch of lives, then game over. My last try I did get to the final boss (at least I think it was) but I was on my last continue and quickly lost all my lives. I was quickly losing interest in the game anyway, so I just felt this was a good time to just stop.

For the next game, I've already started playing a bit of Gunstar Heroes. It's already proving to be very difficult but I'm enjoying it a lot more so I'll see how this goes...