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Sarge wrote:As for Mystical Ninja, I was liking it far more, but those last areas are garbage. They start trying to throw things at you that the engine really isn't ideal for. The game has some of the worst hit detection I've ever seen; Goemon (aka Kid Ying) has a pretty massive hitbox, and it's really egregious in the overhead stages. Even "flying" enemies can pop you, because the game doesn't really take height into consideration. So you basically just take a hit if you're lined up with them.

There's lots to do in the game, of course, and I'm sure that's part of the appeal. My advice is get as much money as you can and buy as many items as possible; you've got to have something to make up for the cheese. I'd say... 6.5, but could have been better.

Yeah, I like Goemon, but I've never been able to make myself actually finish the first game. It is SUCH a shame we never got the other ones here! They're SO much better! The later games make the overhead sections far, far better, more playable characters, more moves and better controls. It's great! Goemon 4, the one I've beaten, has most towns as just completely safe places, or the hit detection is just better. I honestly can't remember if that game has ANY overhead fighting sections, tbh Xp

Finished Earthbound on the SNES Classic on Sunday afternoon. Never had the cartridge back in the day, so was definitely interested in checking the game when I got the Classic. Glad I played through it and saw what the hype was about. One of the most unique games I've ever played for sure. Especially enjoyed the setting, music, and weird enemies.

May have to check out the other Earthbound/Mother games down the line. But, I've started FF3/6, so that's up next.

MrPopo wrote:8. Pools of Darkness - PC

Dang, Popo, it only took you three days to clear the last one. Is it considerably shorter than the previous entries in the series?

Ack wrote:

MrPopo wrote:8. Pools of Darkness - PC

Dang, Popo, it only took you three days to clear the last one. Is it considerably shorter than the previous entries in the series?

Well, don't forget there was a weekend involved. So here was my progression:

Started Pool on a Friday, finished it on a Sunday.
Started Curse on a Monday, finished it on a Tuesday (but the Tuesday I stayed home sick).
Started Secrets on a Wednesday, finished on a Saturday.
Started Pools on a Sunday, finished it on a Monday.

In terms of overall lengths, I'd say Pool of Radiance was the longest, because it's early game; you spend a lot more time heading back to town to rest and recuperate, and the fights are longer because you mostly solve them with low level melee. Curse and Pools of Darkness were of about equal length; in both cases you are doing a series of small dungeons with rests in between, and you have the firepower to make fights fairly quick in general. Secrets is the longest, because you have these long sprawling dungeon levels with a lot of useless areas. In Curse and Pools I could frequently figure out which parts of a dungeon were skippable side rooms if I was wanting to get a particular area over with. Secrets you have no such luck. If you started Pool of Radiance with a level three party I'd say it'd end up about equal length to Curse and Pools of Darkness.

PartridgeSenpai wrote:Yeah, I like Goemon, but I've never been able to make myself actually finish the first third game.

Check it:

pierrot wrote:

PartridgeSenpai wrote:Yeah, I like Goemon, but I've never been able to make myself actually finish the first third game.

Check it:

The first /SNES/ game

Games Beaten 2018

Darkwing Duck - NES (PS4)
DuckTales - NES (PS4)
DuckTales 2 - NES (PS4)
Talespin - NES (PS4)
Chip n' Dale Rescue Rangers - NES (PS4)
Chip n' Dale Rescue Rangers 2 - NES (PS4)
Scarecrow - PS1 (Vita)
The Heart of Dark - PS1 (Vita)
Justice - PS1 (Vita)
Caligo - PC
Tomb Raider (2013) - X1
Nephise Begins - PC
Diablo III: The Darkening of Tristam - PC
Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams - X1
Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest - SNES
Forza Horizon 3 - X1/ PC *new*

Total: 16

Previously: 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010

I have played Horizon 3 off and on on both my PC and X1 since launch (and actually have already beaten both the excellent expansions previously). I decided I'd try to finish it up this week and get through to the final showcase event. Forza Horizon 3 is probably the most beautiful racing game ever made and would serve as a compelling argument in any debate about the best open world title ever designed. It simply oozes jaw dropping visuals, has a mountain of content to move through, and gives you more cars to roam around in than any other game that I have ever played. I can't wait for a sequel.

1. Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse (Genesis)
2. Darkwing Duck (NES)
3. Batman* (NES)
4. Journey to Silius (NES)
5. Aladdin* (SNES)
6. Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse* (SNES)
7. Run Saber (SNES)
8. Batman: Return of the Joker (NES)
9. Ninja Warriors (SNES)
10. Thunder Spirits* (SNES)
11. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Switch)
11. Thunder Force III* (Genesis)
12. Donkey Kong Country* (SNES)
13. Skyblazer (SNES)
14. Super Turrican* (SNES)
15. Donkey Kong Country 2* (SNES)
16. Super Turrican 2* (SNES)
17. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (PS4)

* = replay



CoD games aren't too bad when you pick them up years later for $10 a pop. Last year I went through Modern Warfare 3 finally which I really enjoyed, then I suffered through Black Ops which was terrible. Black Ops 2 I jumped into as well and it seemed fine... but then I got a Switch and played other stuff. Consider Black Ops 2 dropped forever, I don't really care as it didn't seem like I'll be missing out on much.

Now I'm getting to the more interesting CoD's that dip into sci-fi, starting with new developer Sledgehammer's Advanced Warfare. This game was headed by some of the creators of Dead Space, so that always perked my interest. Is this the best CoD I've played so far? I'm not totally sure, but I really liked a lot of it. From start to finish it had a pretty cool slick aesthetic and gold/white tint to it, that was kind of popular just a few years ago but visually I was really impressed. This CoD finally blesses us with ONE main character you play as from start to finish, which I wish would be the standard. It's pretty short and I ran through it casually over the weekend but yeah it was really good with a lot of great set pieces. It does still fall into several of the CoD pitfalls, with some bad trial and error QTE scenes, or having to constantly follow someones ass through a door and hallways... it really felt like with just a few small changes here and there this could have been an incredible game if it were under a different name and free from the CoD tropes. I can say that about the story too especially during some cool twisting moments near the middle, this was probably the most interesting story I've seen in CoD yet with an iconic villain (and in real world current events is even more evil now), but the story kind of folds back into cliche' material in the final stretch. That said, I was impressed, it was far more interesting than Infinity Ward's Saving Private Ryan scenarios, or the atrocious "edgy" try too hard vibe that I got from Black Ops. Nothing about this one annoyed me.

There was a Power Armor/Mecha level near the end that I think is the best vehicle/tech/gadget CoD level I've played, by far. Made me wish we could just get some insane huge budget mecha title from Sledgehammer.

I think the coolest way to put Advanced Warfare, is that through most of the campaign I found myself thinking... this is like if Titanfall 1 had a campaign. That's a big thumbs for me.

Now I've got Black Ops 3 and Infinite Warfare left. I'm happy to hear that Black Ops 3 doesn't bother to connect much with the first two, hopefully it doesn't try too hard to be edgy and annoying again, but I hear it does some crazy things that sounds fascinating. Jokes for Infinite Warfare aside, I've heard really good things about its campaign and that it tells a far better story about humanity than WW2, haha. I have no interest in WW2 at all. I'll stick to the modern/sci-fi games.

Thought Advanced Warfare was super fun as well.

Games Beaten in 2018 So Far - 23
* denotes a replay

January (16 Games Beaten)


February (7 Games Beaten)


23. X-COM: UFO Defense - Steam - February 14



X-COM: UFO Defense - or, as it was called in Europe with WAY better box art, UFO: Enemy Unknown - is the first game in the prolific XCOM strategy series. Release nearly a quarter century ago, the game has a lot of the quality of life issues that turn a lot of people off from MS-DOS games these days. Fortunately there's a fix for this in OpenXcom (and the further improved OpenXcom Enhanced +) that not only improves a lot of the quality of life issues that will turn off modern gamers but fixes a number of bugs and allows for relatively easy modding.



The core of X-COM involves maintaining a base and small military force with which you try to repel the alien invasion of Earth. While you're fighting off the alien menace, you have to investigate the aliens and where they're coming from and, ultimately, devise a way to stop them at the source. There are five difficulties in the game (and some of the mods tweak settings that make the game a little more approachable), and while the game still shows its age with the mechanics in a lot of ways, it's a very approachable game if you play it on the first or second difficulty and go into it with a little bit of patience. Even on easier difficulties, the game gets really tough at the end especially considering how heavily it relies on RNG mechanics, but it's extraordinarily addicting.



The visuals certain have the blocky MS-DOS look, but the pixels are pretty sharp when you set the resolution to a higher setting although I would advise not setting it to full screen; even setting is to 1920x1080, when it set it to full screen, it was mostly black with a TINY little box of the actual game screen. The sound effects and music can get repetitive, but they're generally pretty enjoyable. The biggest problem with the game is that it can be a little hard to tell what's environment and what's an alien in certain situations, but that's mostly remedied as the cursor turns from red to flashing red and yellow when you're over an alien or one of your soldiers.



Your soldiers do get more powerful as you play and gain stat points, but don't get too attached to any one soldier; whenever a shot actually hits its target, it does between 0% and 200% damage determined by RNG, so you'll end up with situations where a really strong weapon does nothing to an enemy but a weak enemy kills your strongest dude in one shot. Armor helps, but if that RNG comes up with 200% on a shot fired by an alien at one of your guys, it'll let you absorb one shot at most. There's a lot of frustration involved with this, but even at the most frustrating points, the fun always overpowers it.



X-COM: UFO Defense (or UFO: Enemy Unknown if you're in PALand) is definitely a game that shows its age, but if you have the patience to figure out the archaic menus and rough-around-the-edges presentation, there's an extremely fun and addicting game underneath. The story and lore, while fairly generic sci-fi in a lot of ways, are really interesting if you research various alien corpses that you get during your missions and find out about the different species and alien weapons. It's not a game for everyone, and its age makes it a lot less approachable than the more modern XCOM games, but if you like sci-fi and/or strategy games, I absolutely recommend it.