What are you playing?

[Westane]

I just accidentally casually beat Ninja Turtles II on the NES last night...

http://600games.wordpress.com/2015/02/1 ... urtles-ii/

It was... okay... I guess. Wasn't expecting to be able to finish it so there's that. Tonight I'm starting up Chip 'n Dale which I remember playing a lot as a kid so that should be fun.

Still trying to get through Kid Icarus II on the Gameboy. Got passed the first boss and still not loving it. Looking forward to play Kid Dracula afterwards though!

[Erik_Twice]

It's taking me far less time to beat F-Zero (SNES) than I thought. It's actually not a very difficult game, its challenge mainly radicates on learning the courses and finding the right way to go through each curve.

Still, the last level is significantly harder than the previous ones, if only because it's the only one in which braking is actually necessary.

[marurun]

STILL playing a Tale of Two Wastelands. Almost done with the main story in the Fallout 3 half, though. Turns out if you avoid side-missions (which I haven't been very good at) you can breeze through the main story pretty quickly. I think I'll have to avoid the DLC and jump straight into New Vegas after victory over the Enclave to avoid hitting max level and skills before even beginning NV. Curious to see how they handle the whole shot in the head thing when you switch over.

[disrupture]

I'm playing Final Fantasy II on SNES. Now how the hell do I defeat 4 Cream with only Cecil In my party ?! I have also have the bard who has like 30 hp and Rydia at about 60 but they always end up dead and I'm wasting all my cures on them... Someone please help me !

[Michi]

I've been playing Fantasy Life for the last few days. What a fun little action RPG and simulation combo I'm about 7 hours in and having a blast so far. And I haven't even changed my profession yet. I've been middling around as a woodcutter the whole time. Not sure what I want to switch to first yet.

I'm about 20 hours into this. I advise going to miner and fisherman after woodcutter - the reason being that once you learn the woodcutting, mining and fishing skills you can always use them, so you can gather wood, ore and fish whilst training in one of the combat focused jobs, ready for one of the crafting jobs.

I wasn't even considering fishing. I was thinking I'd go into mining and then either carpenter or blacksmith, but you make a good point. Once those three are learned you can do them whilst out and about.

I actually think the combat jobs are the least useful in general, as they don't support the other jobs as well. I still have yet to try Paladin and Mercenary.

Yeah, these and Cook were at the bottom of the interest list for me, too.

[Soldier Blue]

I been having a lot of fun with Muramasa: the demon blade lately. The combat in the game is so fast paced and fun and the art style is incredible. I sat down and played the game for 4 straight hours. I think this type of game may be in my favorite genre. The action/brawler type of game with light RPG elements.

It also may be the most Japanese-y game I've ever played, and that is a plus in my book. I may just have to buckle down and buy a PS3 to see the HD version of this beautiful game.

[Ghudda]

I been having a lot of fun with Muramasa: the demon blade lately. The combat in the game is so fast paced and fun and the art style is incredible. I sat down and played the game for 4 straight hours. I think this type of game may be in my favorite genre. The action/brawler type of game with light RPG elements.

It also may be the most Japanese-y game I've ever played, and that is a plus in my book. I may just have to buckle down and buy a PS3 to see the HD version of this beautiful game.

I put a few hours into Muramasa when it first came out on the Vita and loved it. I just received a PS TV and am looking forward to being able to play it from my couch. The game is downright beautiful and the combat is fluid and enjoyable. The metroidvania layout/design suits it well since backtracking really enables you to appreciate the backdrop artwork. I'm a bit worried the quality difference between my TV and the OLED display of the Vita will be drastic, but I look forward to giving it a shot.

[Exhuminator]

I've got a lot of games going at once right now, which is unusual for me actually.

Army of Two - Playing this one co-op, we're at the last mission now. Fun game but it's all about shooting and that's it.

Endless Ocean - Blue World - I'm about 15% of the way through this I think. Very relaxing and a good way to wind down if you've had a stressful day.

Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles - Ring Of Fates - I've got 2.5 hours logged in so far. This is a dungeon crawler that kinda reminds me of Zelda at times, but a bit different. It's quite solid so far but some of the forced touch screen controls stuff annoys me. It's fun though, and gets more interesting the longer I play it.

Last night I spent a few hours messing around with a Sega Master System emulator for DS. It is this one: http://gamebrew.org/wiki/S8DS S8DS is an extremely good Master System emulator (also does Game Gear).

I put a bunch of Master System ROMs on the DS just to mess around and try playing some Master System games I'd never played. I actually had a Master System before I had a NES, when I was a kid. So I'm quite fond of the system, but there are lots of titles I never got to play back in the day. And I have already found a few that I plan to beat this year, and quite a few I did not enjoy at all. The thing that sticks out for me though is how crazy hard a lot of these games are. I guess I just haven't messed with 8-bit games enough in the past few years, but mannnn some of this stuff is just nutso tough right off the bat. A lot of it could be attributed to bad game design honestly, but there's also the fact the games are hard as hell to make beating them take longer so you actually keep the game around. Anyway, the Master System game I'm currently going through now is Psychic World. Very unique platformer with some cool features... and it is also crazy hard at times. I think I'm almost done with it now though, most of these games are quite short after all.

[BoneSnapDeez]

I dig Psychic World. I have it on Game Gear.

But yeah, lots of Master System games are tough as hell. Some have janky controls, and others are ports of difficult arcade games (with the credit-feeding option stripped away).

It's funny to watch YouTube longplays of these old SMS games because someone who's actually skilled at them can knock most of them off in <20 minutes each.

[Exhuminator]

I dig Psychic World. I have it on Game Gear.

Have you beat it yet? This game gets crazy hard at times! I do like the way you switch between psychic powers to solves puzzles though. That aspect has kept me going with it.

But yeah, lots of Master System games are tough as hell. Some have janky controls

I played a few random NES platformers shortly after messing with the Master System stuff, and it did seem the Master System games were harder indeed. I'm speaking in very broad general terms here of course. I do appreciate the power of the Master System, how nice its games looked without needing special mapper chips like the NES did. Not saying either system is better, just speaking on technical merits.

It's funny to watch YouTube longplays of these old SMS games because someone who's actually skilled at them can knock most of them off in <20 minutes each.

Exactly, that's the thing with these oldschool 8-bit games. Once you have all the patterns and timing memorized, the difficulty ceases to be an issue. There are some old Master System games I want to go back and beat that I couldn't handle as a kid, Aztec Adventure, Shinobi, and Alien Syndrome for example.

My biggest surprise has been how great the Master System version of Ninja Gaiden is. It's not at all the same game as the NES one. It seems very high quality though and very much its own beast.