What Game/s are You Playing? Daily / Whenever Check :) (GAMEPLAY) [Archive]

Aussie2B

01-02-2017, 10:10 AM

I wanted to get Corpse Party on my Vita finished off in 2016, considering I started it in, what, summer, but that didn't happen. At least I got my first end in the final chapter, but it was a wrong end of course, so no actual beating of the game. I kinda don't know what I'm doing anymore, haha. It's not helping that I'm going long stretches between playing. I have no idea what I could've done differently outside of way back near the beginning of the chapter. Everything else felt pretty linear, unless I was supposed to avoid picking something up or switch who I was controlling at earlier points. But, yeah, I know that when Yuka is being chased, you can have her caught or successfully run away. Everything I did before that wrong end was after letting Yuka get caught, and I know if I have her run away, there's then an option in the long cutscene after that which results in a pretty significant diversion, or so it seems. That seems like the "right" thing to do, whereas with the course of events that led to the wrong end, everything seemed to be going to hell, haha. So I guess I'll start way back with my Yuka save and see where that takes me.

Videogamerdaryll

01-03-2017, 10:52 AM

Looking back I played Fallout 4 for over a year -forced to start over twice due to saving issues,now I am at nothing else to do in the game so I started Battlefield 1 ...
Having played nothing else but old school games and racing/arcade games my feel for a FPS is way off being so accustomed to Fallout 4.
I am enjoying Battlefield 1 playing the tank levels over and over"milking the game out for as long as I can.

Otherwise I'm playing ZOOKEEPER

Aussie2B

01-11-2017, 11:37 AM

I went to MAGFest last weekend, as I do most years, but I can't say I played much while there. Practically every machine in the arcade was occupied whenever I checked it out, and when I managed to get on a machine, it was half-broken more often than not. I did play a little Centipede. They had like 3 or 4 cabinets of it, but only one had a trackball that was working properly. I really wish the attendees would show more respect and not beat on the machines or play them with gross, sticky hands or whatever.

Back at home, I've been totally exhausted since (so far I'm not sick at least), and since I powered through all my work before MAGFest, I've had the luxury to be a lazy sack, haha. So I've been playing more Corpse Party on my Vita. I got another wrong end, and now I have the key to the principal's office. I don't know how close I'm getting to the end, but there are still something like 4 or 5 wrong ends I've yet to get in this chapter.

Aussie2B

01-13-2017, 11:29 PM

I got two more wrong ends in Corpse Party on my Vita, and I suspect that I'm reeeeaaally close to the end of the game. In fact, it seems like I'm up to the last scene, but who knows, maybe there's more. I did get a wrong end on it, and that seemingly leaves two more wrong ends that are either concurrent or follow. Then there's one other wrong end that seems to be close to the beginning of the chapter that I missed. I've found name tags for most of the corpses in Chapter 5 (the game especially dumped a bunch on me just a bit before where I'm currently at), though I think there's around 7 or so that I'm still lacking. No idea if I somehow missed them or if I haven't even gotten up to them yet. I have heard something about a corpse in the game being glitched, such that it'll never add itself to the list, but that wouldn't account for so many anyway. I also unlocked another extra chapter, which was just another short cutscene.

Aussie2B

01-16-2017, 12:12 AM

Now that I've beaten Corpse Party, I'm just working on getting the things I missed. I got the three wrong ends I missed in chapters 1 and 2, which weren't a big deal, even if if I did have to restart both chapters from scratch for two of them. What's really ticking me off is the single corpse name tag I missed in Chapter 3. I got all of the endings in Chapter 3, so that's the sole thing I missed in it. I totally forgot about it, but there was a corpse at the very end of the chapter that was blocked by victim's memoirs. Turns out you're forced to pick between getting either the corpse or the wrong end from reading all five of the chapter's memoirs. It'd be fine if I could just load up an old save, skip reading the earlier memoirs, and then get the corpse, but I loaded up all four frickin' Chapter 3 saves I had, starting from the one closest to the end of Chapter 3 to the oldest save, and EVERY damn one of them had all of the first four memoirs read, meaning that stupid fifth memoir would show up every damn time, blocking the corpse. So not only did I waste my time completing the chapter four times over with those saves, but now I realize I have to start from the very beginning of the damn chapter to get that corpse at the end. And unlike the previous chapters, Chapter 3 is more lengthy. My oldest save was like 2/3 of the way in the chapter. It's BS that they give you access to all of the first four memoirs that early in the chapter. It's like they really want to screw you out of getting that last corpse of the chapter. Really, this is what most of my missed stuff is like. Things where you have to deliberately avoid checking out a room or item, so the player is essentially punished for exploring and being thorough.

Aussie2B

01-19-2017, 11:28 PM

After I got the pain in the ass corpse I was missing in Chapter 3 of Corpse Party on my Vita, thankfully, the remaining stuff I was missing was all relatively quick and easy to get. It's annoying that the US release eliminates access to one corpse, leaving the list forever incomplete, but having acquired everything 100% as far as this release goes, I'm all done.

I started up Ozmafia on PC for the first time in about a month, where I was seemingly in the middle of Caramia's route, but playing a bit further, I think I actually stumbled onto how to get on Hamelin's route. I wasn't planning to do his just yet, but whatev, I'll roll with it.

Videogamerdaryll

01-20-2017, 09:54 AM

Two player King Of Fighter 2000 and Street Fighter II against my oldest Son,I can't beat him...

celerystalker

01-20-2017, 10:11 AM

One of my best friends came by for awhile yesterday to get lunch and visit. We played through the Punisher (arcade) co-op before lunch.

My brother and his family came by in the evening, and aside from some board games (Blockers, Sequence), I hooked up tge GI Joe pcb (whose sound issue is literally driving me nuts) so he could see how awesome the game is... because it is the shit.

I cannot find anyone who can do the work on that stupid hybrid sound chip to re-cap it for a reasonable price. One guy offered to do it for more than a new board costs. Fuck that. I know how to do the job, but I just don'r trust my hands to do tge tiny surface mount soldering while working overnights. Until sleeping last night, I had been awake for nearly 60 hours straight. I handle lack of sleep okay, but it does NOT facilitate steady hands.

I finally joined KLOV the other day in hopes of finding a reasonable tech there, and maybe some more arcade players.

celerystalker

01-21-2017, 12:22 AM

Tonight, after my grandma's wake, my sister came over with my oldest nephew. He and I played through the Punisher together, and he really got into it. He only had to continue about 3 times, which is pretty solid for a first time player! It got him more curious about my cabinets and PCB collection, so we pulled out all of my loose PCBs and talked through them. He tried out a little of GI Joe and Ninja Baseball Bat Man, which he dug, and then a little Devastators so we could laugh at how shitty it is compared to GI Joe. Pretty good night, and fun to see my 16 year old nephew get into the classics a bit.

Aussie2B

01-23-2017, 02:28 PM

I played a tiiiiny bit more of Ozmafia on PC, clearly on Hamelin's route now, but it was so little that it's barely worth mentioning.

With my Vita, I've been sitting on a brand new 32GB memory card for about half a year now, but I've been waiting to finish what I was in the middle of on my 4GB card before making the switch. I mean, it's not that I can't transfer the files and such, but I'm lazy, haha. And it's not that I'll never use the 4GB card again either, but I don't really feel like switching back and forth much. So anyway, I started up Norn9 for the first time in just a couple months shy of a year (not counting an attempt on a flight back in September; I couldn't hear the voice acting at all over the background noise of the plane so I just immediately turned it off). I left off in Chapter 4 of Heishi's route, and I played until Chapter 5 started.

MachineGex

01-24-2017, 12:14 AM

Got Rebooteroids for Jaguar a few months back and I am still playing it daily. Such a great take on Asteroids, but even better. The two player coop is a blast. Got some great high scores. I can not recommend this game enough. Instant classic!

Anyone else grab this little gem yet? Just another reason to buy a rotary controller for the Jaguar!

Videogamerdaryll

01-24-2017, 05:05 PM

Nintendo Double Dribble ..I am No good at this game..lol

FieryReign

01-24-2017, 08:24 PM

Messing around with Tail Concerto on ps1. Weird game.

jb143

01-26-2017, 02:12 PM

celerystalker

01-26-2017, 03:47 PM

I haven't been on the site much since having kids, but my oldest(5) has been getting into games recently. So I've been playing a lot of Goof Troop for the SNES, which is his favorite of "Daddy's games". It's got nice solid gameplay. Not too hard, not too easy.

Otherwise I've been slowly working through my DS library and just about to finish the first Ace Attorney game.

Goof Troop ended up far more interesting than it probably should have. I expected another licensed platformer when I saw it was a game in the early '90s, but its puzzles and co-op really felt pretty unique! Maybe not an all-time classic, but definitely something that stands on its own with or without a license.

Aussie2B

01-28-2017, 11:57 PM

Even though I feel like I put practically no time into it, I finished off Hamelin's route in Ozmafia on PC. Presumably not the good ending. Maybe the events leading into the good ending add a decent chunk of time to it. Or maybe it's just a short route in general, considering it is a "secret" route and all. Either way, I'm gonna get back to pursuing Caramia's good ending.

celerystalker

02-01-2017, 09:37 AM

I sat down last night wrapped up under a blanket recovering from sickness and playing Strider on PS3. I first started it about a year and a half ago, but had gotten sidetracked. I picked it back up last night, and wow, I'd forgotten how much I really like that game. I probably gave it a solid four hours during my quiet night alone, and it gets continually better as it goes on. Story-wise, it's just a re-telling of the same Strider vs Meio saga, but it controls like a champ, and that's coming from someone who doesn't care for analog control in 2D games.

The backgrounds can be a bit same-y, but variety is there, especially as you get deeper into the game. The boss fights are well designed, old school pattern-based affairs, and each is fought differently. The exploration is rewarding, with a good balance of secrets and progression. I like that not all functional upgrades are guarded by bosses, and the map function illuminating major items helps for completion, as do the menu tallies.

I'm at the tail end now for this play, and considering hunting all of the odds and ends down just to spend more time in it. It's a very good synthesis of Strider and Metroid, and I'm so glad it came out on disc in Japan (plays in english), or I probably never would have played it.

celerystalker

02-05-2017, 11:12 PM

Finished my playthrough of Strider on PS3. I have to say, it's becoming one of my favorite games in the Metroid style. The amount of secrets to find makes exploring fun and worthwhile, the boss fights offer a lot of variety, and the catapult mechanic is a really enjoyable gameplay element. The only real criticisms I'd level at it are that the backgrounds can be a bit on the dark side, which obscures the wonderful details, and there's no New Game+ or continuing to explore post game for completion. Saving after you beat it retains your unlocked extras, but wipes you progress otherwise, which sucks, leaving only a completion time and percentage to recall it. Still, the game was extremely satisfying, and any fan of Metroid or Strider ought to give it a whirl.

The S

02-06-2017, 03:39 AM

https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/439/31706303624_e197bc1331_b.jpg

I got this last month but didn't really have an opportunity to sit down with it. Giving each game a go, tonight.

celerystalker

02-06-2017, 05:39 PM

Just finished Silent Bomber on PS1. I've been wanting to see how long it was to possibly include it in the game completion challenge, and it took about 3 hours.

It's a pretty strong action game that in many ways feels like a successor to Trap Gunner with focus on a story campaign instead of versus battles. Pretty good, though a couple of the boss fights were infuriating. Overall, I liked it a lot, and feel like it's a pretty unique action game that combines a run 'n gun with Bomberman.

bb_hood

02-09-2017, 02:42 AM

So Ive been playing Skyrim on PS4 over the last few days, and this is my second time playing through it and its really fun.

Earlier today the game glitched, and I found 2 Dawnbreaker swords when the game should have only given me one. Its a unique Daedric artifact, and its pretty cool that the game gave me 2 for some reason (theres only supposed to be one in the game). Being a regular sword you can equip one in each hand. Time to kill some vampires!!

Mad-Mike

02-09-2017, 03:43 PM

aka....what's loaded in my machines ATM....

Atari 2600 - Pitfall II: The Lost Caverns

Intellivision - Tron Deadly Discs

NES - Dragon Warrior III, I've been poking at it since 2008 actually

Tandy 1000 - I've been playing a lot of Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny lately, reliving the one happy side of having Chicken Pox in high school

GEM 286 - Sim City for DOS....thing is so insanely fast for a 286 that if I put the right number of Residential, Commercial, and Industrial Zones on the property, set the game to fastest, auto budget, and turn off disasters, I can go to sleep and let it run while I'm at work, come back, and I've got a smorgasboard of cash to play with, enough to fill the whole map.

486 - DOS - I've been exploring Duke Nukem's series a bit lately, Windows For Workgroups 3.11 - Enjoying the prototype of Retro City Rampage, Windows 95 - Diablo runs surprisingly well on a 486 DX2-66

Modern PC - Still playing Five Nights at Freddy's once in awhile (all six games)

Wii - Random unknown NES stuff on emulator, mostly translations of Japanese stuff like those Kero Kero Keroppi games and that child-version of Castlevania (Castlevaina Dai Bouken or something like that).

Aussie2B

02-13-2017, 03:04 PM

I've been hopping back and forth pretty even between Norn9 on Vita and Ozmafia on PC. In the latter, I feel like every time I do a run of Caramia's route, I end up going off on a brand new branch. You really get the sense that the Oz routes are the main routes in the game, with the wealth of ways in which the routes divert. After I cleared Hamelin's route before, I started up another run of Caramia, sticking with Caramia at the confession, and this time, I got Axel as the love rival, unlike my first time through when I got Kyrie. Apparently, this affects the route earlier than the game immediately lets on, as I was getting brand new scenes and choices immediately after the confession. So I ran through that, stuck with Caramia, and got the same not-so-great ending I got my first time through. Started up Caramia again, got Axel as the rival again, but this time I picked the other options, causing me to switch routes for the first time. Now, I've already done a run with Axel, from beginning to end, so I figured switching to Axel would drop me off somewhere in the middle of what I had already seen, but nope, everything from the route switch clear to the ending was brand new. The part involving the switch itself was pretty soap opera-ish, haha. Now I'm wondering what'll happen if I, say, get on Kyrie's route and switch to Axel. Will I see the same stuff or will that be unique too?

Playing Norn9 alongside Ozmafia really highlights how straightforward the former is in comparison to Ozmafia. I finished Heishi's route, got the bad ending, ran through his route again, picking the options I didn't pick previously, got the bad ending again, then a third time picking all the right answers. I've got a save now right when the text leading to the good ending starts. While Ozmafia gives you zero indication of what the right answers are, Norn9 not only has an affection bar in the menu but you also get an animation when you pick a correct answer. It's super easy to get whatever you want to see on repeat runs.

For something completely different, I also started up Octodad: Dadliest Catch on Vita, if only because it's apparently one of the shortest Vita games I own, so why not clear it from the backlog. It's not that enjoyable, not as a single-player game at least. For me, the novelty of the silliness wears off fast, and then you'll just left with busy work with bad controls. Anyway, I'm at the Aquarium right now.

Videogamerdaryll

02-13-2017, 04:49 PM

Trying a multicart old fighting games.

1018510184

Tron 2.0

02-14-2017, 02:54 AM

PS4
Nioh

Retro Freak
Shinobi III

celerystalker

02-14-2017, 06:27 AM

This weekend has been busy, so not much play so far. Fixed my garage door opener, replaced the ballast on a light fixture in the basement, spent much of Monday with my son, as the wife had a meeting. Played a credit of Time Soldiers while the boy napped. Beat the game with a decent score of 1,606,800. I was happy with that, as I hadn't played it in a few months, and I got the toughest route for me (starting in the Primitive Age... yuck... give me the Age of Rome any day...). Should have some time to play a bit Tuesday.

celerystalker

02-18-2017, 10:29 PM

My Punisher pcb had the sound cutting out intermittently. Figured out it was a cold solder joint on a cap near the amp. Re-flowed it, and it's working great now, so I played a few credits. Have to keep that one up, as the wife likes it a lot.

Aussie2B

02-19-2017, 12:23 AM

Still playing everything mentioned in my previous post. In Ozmafia on PC, I started up Caramia's route yet again, specifically with the intention of getting Kyrie as the rival, and I picked the choices I skipped previously, which triggered the route switch. I had been avoiding switching to his route, thinking it would drop me off somewhere in the middle of doing his full route, which I've yet to attempt at all, but since I learned that the routes are totally different when doing a switch, I figured I may as well do Kyrie's now.

I fully polished off Heishi's route in Norn9 on Vita, so I decided to switch heroines and start up Senri's. I think it'll be interesting, since Senri barely shows up in the other routes (which makes sense of course, as he's a total shut-in). Also on Vita, in Octodad: Dadliest Catch, I'm still in the Aquarium, but I found each of the family members and completed their sections. I'm really having a hell of a time finding the tie collectibles in the game. I think I only have six so far. The trophies seem to be tough to unlock too. I think I've only got one of those.

Lastly, I played a little Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on Genesis, which doesn't sound like anything special, but it's actually pretty exciting for me. You see, our trusty old CRT TV (which we bought new back in 2003 or some such) bit the dust several months ago, and we only just recently found ourselves a replacement. I'm stubborn enough that I won't hook up classic systems to an HDTV and make the games look like ass, so I haven't been playing any retro home consoles in a while. Anyway, the new (old) TV is pretty nice. It's no fancy Trinitron or anything, but it's better than our previous set in that it not only accepts RF, composite, and s-video, but also component. It's also a bit smaller and considerably lighter than our old one, which is something we were looking for. We also wanted a set with a rounded screen, as we're not super crazy about totally flat screened CRTs. Anyway, all those positives aside, it's also been disheartening because, even though it looked perfectly fine when the Craigslist seller played a movie on it to demonstrate that it works, once we brought it home and waited a few days to buy a remote for it (since it didn't come with one), we discovered that it has vertical foldover. It seems that some colors and resolutions play nice with it better than others, such that sometimes you see nothing and sometimes you see horizontal bars across the top fifth or so of the screen. The picture is great otherwise, so it's really disappointing. So right now, I don't know what we're going to do with it. Maybe we'll try to get it fixed, or maybe we'll ultimately trash it and begin our search for a CRT TV anew. It wasn't terribly expensive, and getting rid of it is as easy as taking it outside and placing it at the curb (thank goodness we live in NYC and don't have to haul stuff like that to a dump ourselves), so that part of it doesn't bother me much. I'm just tired of having problems with this stuff and tired of being without a good CRT TV to play my old games on.

celerystalker

02-20-2017, 09:22 PM

Today, my brother and his kids came by for awhile. The kids played some Earth Defense Force 2017 on 360. We played through the Punisher (arcade), then plugged in the Master System 3D glasses to try Space Harrier 3D and Zaxxon 3D, which my wife gave me for Christmas. Zaxxon was particularly good. This led to some intense games of Missile Defense 3D, which in turn brought out a ton of light gun stuff including Gangster Town, Safari Hunt, Rambo III, Rescue Mission, and Shooting Gallery... which caused me to want to show him my 3DO gun I repaired last fall. We played Space Pirates and Drug Wars, then Space Harrier on 32X to round things out. Lots of good stuff!

Videogamerdaryll

02-26-2017, 02:13 PM

WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008 Featuring ECW (Sony PlayStation 2, 2007)

Testing old PS2 wrestling games..

Aussie2B

02-26-2017, 03:28 PM

I finished off Kyrie's route in Ozmafia on PC after switching from Caramia's route. Since then, I've been feeling a little burnt out on the game from starting up Caramia's route over and over. I haven't really been in the mood to start it yet again to finally pursue his good ending. Instead, I've just been progressing in Senri's route in Norn9 on Vita. I'm on Chapter 3, probably close to Chapter 4. Also on Vita, I completely polished off Octodad: Dadliest Catch, getting 100% of the trophies (no platinum, since the game doesn't have one). I couldn't be bothered to guess at how to unlock the trophies nor to hunt down every remaining tie myself, so I just checked some guides to know what to do.

I also very briefly played some Tokimeki Memorial: Taisen Puzzle-Dama on MAME and promptly got my ass handed to me, haha. It's been a while since I last played a Taisen Puzzle-Dama game, so I'm totally out of the groove.

Videogamerdaryll

03-03-2017, 02:37 PM

Neo Geo MVS Art Of Fighting 2
...
Zoo Keeper Addicted to this game..

Emperor Megas

03-03-2017, 10:33 PM

Emperor Megas

03-03-2017, 10:35 PM

Zoo Keeper Addicted to this game..The wife and I used to pass the DS back and forth for hours playing that back in the day. What an awesome game!

celerystalker

03-03-2017, 10:39 PM

I started Muramasa: The Demon Blade because of the GCC, and so far I'm really feeling it. Such a gorgeous game. I'm going to have to get more into the Vanilla Ware library.

I've also taken to bringing my PSP with me to work again thanks to the GCC. I haven't carried it in like 5 years or something. I didn't realize how much of an impact my lapse in gaming has played in the quality of my life. Mobile phone free to play stuff isn't the same.

Glad you're enjoying it! New games'll be up in the morning... or whenever I wake up. :)

Just finished Limbo on Xbox 360 since I got it on that triple pack disc they put out. Really fun little game; kind of quiet and thoughtful. On the other end of the spectrum, played some GI Joe for arcade, as I swapped it into my Sunset Riders cabinet this week. It is not quiet or contemplative. It is loud and explodey. I love it. Played a bit of Money Puzzle Exchanger on my MVS cabinet as well. One of my favorite puzzle games.

Tron 2.0

03-04-2017, 01:41 AM

Wii-U
Zelda Breath of the Wild

Sega-CD
Snatcher

ncman071

03-04-2017, 01:19 PM

I have been playing the Dreamcast lately...just got the dreampi few weeks ago and have been playing AFO and quake a lot...just got the Zelda on wiiu too will be playing that soon

otaku

03-04-2017, 11:39 PM

i keep meaning to do more with my dreamcast so far just playing a bit alone and some powerstone with friends
gonna do some modding/repairs and dreampi and dreamshell stuff eventually i swear

xboxone- tons of stuff forza horizon 3 forza 6 rock band 4 final fantasy xv metal slug aca

nintendo switch zelda breath of fire on a friends console

animal crossing welcome amiibo on my 2ds

celerystalker

03-05-2017, 12:36 AM

Played through GI Joe in my Sunset Riders cabinet with my brother. We also tried out co-op in 'Splosion Man. It was more fun than I'd have expected. Not bad. I feel something weird coming on... like it may be time to try something new on PC-FX or Jaguar CD or something...

ChasinTheTrane

03-07-2017, 12:26 PM

I've been playing through Super Metroid again. I forgot how incredible the level design is. Where to go feels natural and not like you're going through a maze, a common issue in a lot of games of that genre.

Montrealer

03-07-2017, 02:48 PM

I always keep a few games on rotation.

Currently playing:

Immercenary - 3DO
Phoenix 3 - 3DO
Star Fighter - 3DO
The Legend of Zelda : Phantom Hourglass - 3DS

FieryReign

03-08-2017, 12:29 AM

Messing around with the droid Saturn emulator uoYabause. Someone finally got Saturn games running full speed on android. A few games like Shining Force 3 don't work yet but alot do. Now I can see what the big deal is with Radiant Silvergun, PD Saga, and other games I never got to try when I had the system. Starting with Rayearth.

retro junkie

03-12-2017, 10:48 PM

Been playing Darius Twin on my Super Famicom all weekend.

Videogamerdaryll

03-16-2017, 12:26 PM

Metal Slug 6..on new type bartop machine with LCD screen

I'm obsessed with ZOO KEEPER..

Videogamerdaryll

03-26-2017, 01:33 PM

Robotron :
I never got into this game but now can't stop playing it...I SUCK at it..

Dreamcast Ready To Rumble

Neo Geo
Super Sidekicks 2
Metal Slug 6

celerystalker

03-28-2017, 01:28 AM

Played through the opening areas in Azure Striker Gunvolt and Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, both of which I picked up today for 3DS. Gunvolt looks like it'll be a fun little action game, though it's likely to be way too easy by the looks of it. Still, fun to get a physical release. I'll probably stick with Luigi's Mansion for awhile. I really had fun with the Gamecube original, and I can plop it in with my earbuds and play it in bed while my wife sleeps. I could always go play something downstairs, but sometimes it's nice to be with her, even if I'm not tired enough to sleep. Anyway, it'll be fun to play in English, as I played the first Luigi Mansion in Japanese, as that's the only way I own it.

FieryReign

04-06-2017, 09:02 AM

Messed around with Killzone Mercenary but got bored and bailed after the first mission. Started a Boy and His Blob again, I can probably make some progress now with a new memory card. Hopefully it won't get corrupted like the last piece of shit I had from Sony. Makers of overpriced, cheaply-made, junk.

The pstv is probably the most durable thing they ever manufactured. Maybe because there's no moving internal parts.

Aussie2B

04-10-2017, 11:05 AM

I've actually been having a slow work week for once, so I've been able to catch up on a lot of things I've been needing or wanting to do for a long time. How this translates to gaming is that I've had some stacks of games that I bought or received as long as a couple years ago that I still had yet to clean up and test out. I played some Pandora's Tower on Wii; Raw Danger, River King, and Tenshi no Present on PS2; and Akai Katana and Asura's Wrath on 360. I also played a bunch of random goofy Japanese PS1 demos. It felt kind of weird to do some console gaming, as it's been almost nothing but handhelds, with the occasional PC gaming, for me for years now. I also joined midway through on a game of Magic Sword via MAME.

As for what I'm putting some serious time into, I played through Thomas Was Alone on Vita, getting 100% of the trophies like I did with Octodad. I'm still chipping away at Norn9 on Vita. I cleared Senri's route, and then I moved on to Itsuki's route. I got his tragic ending (which kinda left me rekt haha), but I've yet to go back and get his happy ending. I don't want to get too invested in any visual novel right now because I'm waiting to start a few that are coming out over these next couple months. Time for my VN backlog to get even worse, haha.

celerystalker

04-10-2017, 12:10 PM

Haven't played much this week, as most of my efforts have been trying to rest. I'm having one of my worst bouts of insomnia in years, which is making me feel like doing nothing. I've spent what energy I have had on things like taking my family to the zoo and housework such as mowing the lawn, but the only gaming I've done has been working on Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, and I'm thinking of shelving it.

Initially, I was pretty into it. It plays great, looks great, and sounds great. What's not to like? Its mission-structured gameplay artificially slows the game to a crawl. Every time you complete a mission, you are forcibly recalled to a bunker, completely disrupting the flow of the game. Compounding this is a focus on collecting gems, money, and finding Boos. You end up having to redo the same puzzles over and over, which is a tedious decision that wastes my time. Hand in hand with that is that the fun of exploring a big mansion has been replaced with a segmented, linear approach full of unnecessary backtracking. Shame on you, Nintendo. It's a good game made to be more boring simply by stupid design choices.

Aussie2B

04-12-2017, 10:04 AM

I started up Densetsu no Starfy on GBA a few days ago, and I already have it beaten, but I still have a lot more to do. It's a fun game, if a tad easy. It's a little talky for a platformer too, but I could be saying that because I'm slow at reading Japanese, and my knowledge of the language is still so weak that I can't understand a lot of what's said (which is kinda sad, considering this is a game designed to be accessible for young Japanese children, haha). So between taking extra long on the dialogue and breezing through the action lightning fast, I felt a little impatient with the cutscenes.

I hear this series compared to Kirby a lot, if only because they're cute, easy platformers with a hero who's somewhat similar in appearance and shape, but having beaten this game, I now see that there are even more parallels. For one, there's the structure of the titles. You've got Hoshi no Kirby and Densetsu no Starfy. A possessive with the hero's name as the second word. On that note, that's one minor annoyance I have not with the game itself but with the "fandom" (if you can say there's such a thing as a Western Starfy fandom). All over the place, I see the title translated as "Legend of Stafy/Starfy". I don't care how people choose to spell the hero's name, but that's not how Japanese possessives work. For that translation to work, the title would have to be "Stafy/Starfy no Densetsu". Just as the Zelda games are "Zelda no Densetsu". When you translate a Japanese possessive as "something of something", the word after "no" comes first. A proper translation of this game's title would be "Starfy of Legend". Of course, that sounds pretty awkward, hence Nintendo going with the equivalent but more natural "The Legendary Starfy".

Anyway, that grammar/translation tangent aside, another obvious Kirby similarity is that, after you beat the game once, you're then encouraged to return to all the stages to go on a treasure hunt. As you find each item, a little picture appears on a grid-based menu, and I almost had to laugh at how reminiscent it is of The Great Cave Offensive in Kirby Super Star. It's nice that they give this longevity to the game with all the stuff you can collect after first clearing the game, to earn the true ending and such, but it's also kind of annoying how you can't even begin to work on this collection the first time through the stages. It kind of comes off as forced repetition. Like how you can't even collect all of a stage's treasures in one go, as grabbing a treasure counts as clearing the stage, forcing you to start from scratch when you go for the next treasure. You also need to do a ton of grinding for pearls to unlock the full group photo. Oh well, I complain, but I'm still doing it anyway, haha.

celerystalker

04-12-2017, 10:12 AM

Spent some time Monday afternoon getting to know Gunhed on Famicom a little better. It's a strategy game based on the giant robot movie of the same name, which has loose ties to Gunhed on PC Engine, better known as Blazing Lazers here.

It's pretty fun if a little repetitive as strategy games go, but for its time, offers a pretty robust set of actions as well as some solid real-time battles. I did a write up with some screenshots in the Import Mania sub-forum in the "Opinions on poorly documented imports" thread. It was pretty fun, and for some reason left me wanting to also play 10101 Will the Starship on PS1.

Videogamerdaryll

04-12-2017, 01:39 PM

Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus (Sony PlayStation 1, 1999)

Aussie2B

04-14-2017, 11:15 AM

I have one single treasure left to collect of the 45 in Densetsu no Starfy on GBA, and I'm assuming the final boss is holding it. Collecting the treasures was slow going at first, as I beat the game with only one of the power-ups/alternate forms unlocked, and a lot of the treasures require the use of those. Once I managed to find them all, though, everything started to fall into place. Another thing that kind of bugs me about the repetition in this game, though, is that, in the stages that end with a boss, the boss holds a treasure, but ONLY when you've collected all the others in the stage. If you fight the boss with others remaining, you get jack. And as far as I know, there's no way of knowing this until you get all but one in a stage (at least at that point, Kyorosuke the clam will tell you to fight the boss again). So, say you have 3 out of 5 treasures in a stage, and you know where one is but can't get it because you don't have the power-up yet. You could spend all eternity scouring the stage to find the other, not realizing that the boss will have it after you get the one you know about but can't get yet. Anyway, as for the other collectibles, I need about 2000 more pearls to finish off the group photo, and I need to encounter 5 more enemies for the picture book. I'm kind of at a loss as to where those enemies are. I mean, the game tells you which stages they're in, but I've already gotten every treasure in those and, as far as I know, beat every enemy along the way. I'm also pretty confident I beat the mini-games on hard in each stage to access the hidden areas to get the enemy in each of those, so what did I miss? I hope there's an FAQ out there with info on how to find every enemy.

Aussie2B

04-17-2017, 02:28 PM

I totally finished off Densetsu no Starfy, finding 100% of everything, so back to the container of GBA carts it goes.

I started up Nightshade on Steam, which I had been eagerly awaiting. It's another otome visual novel, with the same artist who did Norn9. I only just today cleared the prologue, though. My excitement to play it was kinda killed by all the issues it had at launch. First, the English text was all screwed up and overlapping, making it barely readable. Then they fixed the spacing, but the font was still wrong. They changed the font after that, but it's still not the one it was intended to be. It's perfectly playable now, but all these issues were a real turn off when I had wanted to crack into it immediately. Anyway, it seems interesting so far, but other VNs I'm even more excited about are coming soon. And maybe it's a little silly, but I don't want to get burnt out on this artist's style, having just been playing a bunch of Norn9. Period: Cube, with Kuroyuki's funky art style, should be a nice change of pace.

I was also "forced" into playing some Wayne's World on NES, haha. Man, what a turd. Also a little bit of Vigilante on TG-16, which I'm not particularly fond of either. These two were via emulation.

Videogamerdaryll

04-20-2017, 02:43 PM

NFL Sports Talk Football '93 Starring Joe Montana (Sega Genesis, 1992)

Sometimes I just like to play the old sports games and this one Talks..

kainemaxwell

04-20-2017, 10:42 PM

castlevania harmony of dissonance on my gba android. trying to get back to a little secret of mana before firing up lego star wars 2: original trilogy.

Aussie2B

04-21-2017, 04:54 PM

I wanted a decent stopping point in Norn9 on Vita, so I got both endings in Itsuki's route (though I'm strangely missing more CGs than expected), and I'll leave it at that. Next time I play the game, I plan to start up Akito's route, but that'll probably be a while with all the new visual novels that'll keep me occupied.

I've played a little more of Nightshade on Steam, but I'm still super early in the game, so not much to say there. Another otome VN release caught me by surprise when I suddenly got an e-mail saying The Charming Empire was out on Steam. I snapped that up immediately too. I don't normally buy VNs that were originally developed for mobile platforms, as they tend to be a lot shallower than full-fledged PC and handheld/console VNs, but considering The Charming Empire is getting ported to Vita in Japan and has full voice acting, I figured it was a step above most. It's not bad so far, though it definitely shows its mobile roots, and it seems like a light affair. I hear it's pretty short, but that's no problem for me, since I'm already drowning in long VNs that I've yet to complete (or even start, in many cases). I breezed through the prologue and chose to start Tanba's route, if only because he's the first listed. The chapters/episodes of each route seem to fly by too. I'm on the 4th or 5th in Tanba's route, and I've barely played so far.

It's kinda funny how I can't escape similarities to Norn9 lately. First with Nightshade, having the same artist, then with The Charming Empire, having the same Taisho Roman setting.

Besides all those otome visual novels, I also played a little Super Castlevania IV via SNES emulation.

Aussie2B

05-03-2017, 11:10 AM

I've been playing a whole bunch of random stuff lately. The most exciting thing is that our CRT TV is fixed. :D So we've been trying it out with a lot of different stuff, adjusting the picture and what have you. On MAME, I played Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Tokimeki Memorial: Taisen Puzzle-Dama, and Mega Twins. Via SNES emulation, I played Miracle Girls, Super Loopz, and Cameltry. Almost beat Cameltry, so I'd like to get back to that and finish it off. On the Ball was one of the earliest SNES games I ever owned, so it's always fun to return to it.

We also busted out Mario Kart: Double Dash, which we played on our Wii, for some 3-player racing and battling. Good times. :)

On the visual novel front, I'm still playing The Charming Empire on Steam, and I've cleared Toki Tanba and Kei Yoshimine's routes. Right now, I'm on the second chapter of Koichiro Sera's route. I also got Period Cube on Vita as soon as it came out, and I'm on the second chapter of that too. Apparently I've ended up on Hiroya's route.

Aussie2B

05-08-2017, 11:31 AM

We're still doing a lot of setting up over here with the fixed CRT. Both physically setting things up and setting up emulators and such. Oh, and after having it kick around since... I wanna say 2005, our broken spare PC Engine Duo-RX is finally fixed. :D

Via MAME, I played through Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time, which I had already posted about in the Beaten in 2017 topic. Also played some Super Mario World and Akumajou Dracula XX via SNES emulation. Man, am I rusty at Dracula XX. I used to be pretty damn good at that game. Though I wasn't really playing seriously.

I played a tiny bit of Puyo Pop on Neo Geo Pocket Color, thinking I'd maybe play through that for the Game Completion Challenge, but I'm not really feeling Puyo Puyo right now for whatever reason. So I think I'll just put it back on the shelf.

In The Charming Empire on Steam, I'm now up to chapter 7 or 8 in Koichiro Sera's route. I like how this route has some chapters that flow from one to another. Kei's route mostly felt like a series of disjointed vignettes.

celerystalker

05-08-2017, 02:34 PM

Been playing some Tempest 2000 on Jaguar the last couple of nights. That game looks so good in S-video. About once a year I go through a love affair with that game for a few days. I love the heck out of it, but I'm pretty mediocre at it. I usually clear about 40 webs on a credit, but I start really getting killed on the yellow frame webs. I'm getting better at them, though.

The thing that always pulls me back is that a single credit often lasts upwards of an hour, which really can be exhausting to play more than one or two games when it starts getting intense. Still, like many other people, it's easily my favorite game on the console, and my personal favorite version of Tempest.

Niku-Sama

05-09-2017, 01:58 AM

Donkey kong arcade. no emulation

celerystalker

05-09-2017, 04:23 AM

Earlier today, I played two credits of Tempest 2000 on Jaguar. Set a new personal high score at around 780,000, but each credit lasted a good hour, which is a little exhausting for such a chaotic game.

Tonight, I decided to take a break and played through Duck Tales Remastered on PS3. I enjoyed it quite a bit. It's a very easy game, but fun to play all the same, and definity captures a Duck Tales feel. Much better than last week when I needed to be up late and played Wario Ware.

Videogamerdaryll

05-09-2017, 01:38 PM

Videogamerdaryll

05-18-2017, 01:44 PM

Playing a bunch of Sega Master System Games,none working so I had to open them up and clean them..

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Sega Game Gear, 1992

Aussie2B

05-18-2017, 02:30 PM

shadowman

05-21-2017, 03:58 PM

Hakuoki: Kyoto Winds on Vita has completely consumed my gaming attention. Which works out fine because I ran into some PC issues, which required a format, and I still haven't set everything back up, which means no Steam for now. I download my Steam games to a portable drive, but I hate how some games store their saves elsewhere.

How is Hakuoki? I've got it coming this week but I've not read an awful lot about it (good or bad).

Anyway, I've taken a week break from Persona 5 (which I've been loving) to play some more Vita games:
I managed to platinum PixelJunk Shooter Ultimate (it was good despite some annoying stages that slowed my progress at times)

I've restarted Guacamelee, which I have finished before on the PS4, but I wanted to get back and 100% the Vita version as I loved it so much. And its still so good. The exploration is satisfying, the visuals are lovely and the combat is brilliant (your moves combo together so well). Just heading toward Jaguar at the moment, so I'm getting closer to the end of the game. Absolutely worth playing for fans of action/platformer games or someone just looking for a good "Metroidvania" game.

I've also started F1 2011. I'm not a Formula 1 fan, but I do enjoy different racing games, and I'm working on clearing every Vita launch game so it seemed like a decent choice. I'm really liking it so far. It feels like a more arcadey feeling racing game which is good, I dislike sim based racers. Plenty of modes to work through as well so I can see it lasting me a very long time.

Lastly, I finished Army Corps of Hell this week - another launch Vita title. Its a strange game, basically using a Pikmin style combat system but the game is nowhere near the quality of Nintendo's title. Its a game that kind of forces you to grind after a while, as otherwise the game becomes insanely unfair/difficult. That said, when you hit the point where the Magi class has the best weapon, and is basically the only class you want to use for the late game stuff it actually gets better. The later levels even off difficulty wise, as its more about fighting bosses and huge waves of enemies and less about annoying trap rooms. I actually ended up enjoying the last 25% of the game while the middle part was a mix of frustration and boredom. Definitely glad I persevered though.

Aussie2B

05-22-2017, 10:23 AM

I'm a newbie to Hakuoki too. Despite that I love otome visual novels, I never bothered to pick it up on PSP or 3DS (I did get the action spin-off on PSP, but that's in my backlog), and while I did get the PS3 version when it launched, I still don't have a PS3 to play it on. I'm really liking it so far. Lots of interesting historical drama and political intrigue, plus some supernatural elements, with a localization that reads nicely, and lovely art and music. The one thing that's kind of disappointing is that it doesn't have the full story in the previous releases. Since they doubled the number of routes and also incorporated fandisc content, the cost for all that added content is that it's split into two releases, and right now, there isn't even a release date for localization of the second part. This first part is almost nothing but common route, so there's barely any romance at all. I guess the second part will be totally focused on the relationships.

Videogamerdaryll

05-28-2017, 10:48 AM

The Punisher (1990) (Nintendo, 1990)

NBA Jam SNES...

celerystalker

05-28-2017, 12:00 PM

Last weekend played some Rough Ranger (Arcade). Pretty fun Rolling Thunder clone I've been going on about in Arcade Alley.

Played Tekken 2 (Arcade) yesterday. It's the first version of Tekken I've ever owned, as I won it for $10 with a power supply, JAMMA harness, and Namco kick harness. I was never into Tekken, but wanted the kick harness, and can use the other stuff to build someone a supergun. Anyway, it's playable, and I'm sure some friends will dig it, but I far prefer Sega's 3D fighters, and any 2D to boot.

Finally playing through Zelda: Link's Awakening on original Game Boy. It's pretty okay so far. I like that the dungeons are small.

celerystalker

05-29-2017, 01:32 AM

I played through Noah's Ark on Bible Adventures for NES for the thousandth or so time. I genuinely don't care that it's an objectively bad game; I've always found it somewhat calming and therapeutic to play, just quietly collecting animals with minimal resistance. It's silly, but as a game I grew up with, it's just one that suits me at times.

Aussie2B

06-03-2017, 07:46 PM

Though I was very much enjoying Hakuoki: Kyoto Winds on Vita, I hate to leave Period Cube barely touched, so I switched back to that. I'm now on Chapter/Quest 4 in Hiroya's route. I also briefly tried out some new Vita acquisitions. I popped in both Mutants Mudds Deluxe and Mutant Mudds: Super Challenge. Neither impressed me much. Even though, generally speaking, I like straightforward platformers more than Metroid-style games, I'd say Xeodrifter is the better game from that developer. Though maybe my mind would change after more time with the Mutant Mudds games. Similarly, Earth Defense Force 2 didn't really grab me. I know that franchise has a cult following, but I wasn't seeing what all the hype was about.

I decided recently to pick up a couple GBA games I've been putting off buying for years and years, and the first to show up was Donkey Kong Country 3. I love the SNES original and have played that tons, so the main draw here was to hear the brand new soundtrack. I played till I cleared the first boss (that dumb belching barrel). The new music isn't bad, nor was I ever that crazy about the SNES soundtrack, but man, does it throw me off. I'm just so accustomed to how the game sounds on SNES. The graphical changes don't do much for me (I miss Wrinkly's N64), and the added mini-games are pretty lousy. But nitpicks aside, it's a fun game in any form.

celerystalker

06-04-2017, 02:39 AM

It's been kind of a crummy week for me in a lot of ways, but I finally squeezed in a little time today and finished Link's Awakening for Game Boy. Overall, I like it. The later dungeons are very tedious with gimmicks that require a lot of backtracking, and there's little to no challenge in the game. The jumping mechanic and boomerang are totally broken, allowing early access to a lot of stuff to a decent player, making dodging enemies a breeze, and the boomerang mauls everything. That said, it's still a pleasant overall experience, with useful items, piles of secrets, and quick pacing. It's the first Zelda I've enjoyed in years.