Heavy Barrel ...
Nitro Ball..
An unusual Game I never heard of..
Heavy Barrel ...
Nitro Ball..
An unusual Game I never heard of..
I've barely had time for gaming this past month. I haven't touched Nightshade on PC since clearing Choujirou's route, not even to get his other ending (at least I assume there's an alternate ending). I'm squeezing in The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita when I can. I expected it to be a quick one, but with only sporadic short bursts of playing, it's getting stretched out. I've cleared all of the puzzle levels and two each of the action and RPG stages, but I've yet to touch the free mode. Sometimes I haven't had time for a stage, so I'd just turn it on for some servbot training. I very briefly tried out Punch Line on Vita, and I did the same with Wave Race and Densetsu no Starfy 2 on my Game Boy Advance SP. I think that about covers everything I've played since early September.
More 'Rolling Thunder' ...I am so terrible at this game....
Dreamcast : TNT Hardcore Heat..
Still little time for gaming, but I did clear a tiny bit more in The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita. I finished the third RPG stage, and with that, I also hit one million zenny and got a fairly lengthy cutscene (for this game, at least). I also tried out a handful of Limited Run Games releases that finally arrived: Super Hydorah, Va-11 Hall-A, Xenon Valkyrie+, and 2064: Read Only Memories. I still haven't tested most of the imports I've picked up recently, but I did pop in Phantasy Star Nova.
I hate to say it, but I'm starting to come to the conclusion that The Misadventures of Tron Bonne is pretty overrated. I don't think it would get nearly as much praise if it weren't rare and expensive on PS1 and if it weren't a part of the Mega Man Legends sub-series. I love both Mega Man Legends and Mega Man Legends 2, and I had been looking forward to this spin-off for a long time, saving it for when I really wanted to treat myself. I wasn't expecting it to play like the main games, but I was hoping to enjoy it on a similar level. One of the things I love about the MML games is the world and its characters, with Tron Bonne and her servbots being among my favorites. And I am enjoying the graphics, story, and voice acting of this game, but gameplay-wise, it's a jack of all trades, doing nothing that well. Some games can combines multiple modes that aren't exceptional and end up being greater than the sum of their parts, like ActRaiser, but it ain't working here.
I think the worst thing about the game is how it's so piss-poor at explaining anything. I've read the manual, cleared the opening tutorial, pressed O to see menu descriptions, appraised items, everything the game has to offer, and the whole game has still basically been a matter of doing things blindly, trying to figure out how and why I'm supposed to do things. Scouting still feels random, the first training game is basically impossible until you figure out you can take out two targets at a time, and the second training game is practically impossible on the highest difficulty level unless you repeatedly pause to "cheat". The action stages aren't clear about what can and can't be destroyed, and it's annoying how some enemies just keep regenerating endlessly, while also sometimes moving so fast and/or being so high up that you just have to tediously run and spin the camera wildly to avoid taking hits and hope you land a hit of your own now and then. The character interaction in the RPG stages was fun, but they were otherwise bland and plodding. And I hate how they're in first-person. And the puzzles stages, ugh. I've had enough of Sokoban-style gameplay in Boxxle, and at least Boxxle had the decency to save your progress after each level. You gotta clear three in a row here, with each getting harder than the last. When a new area opened up with more puzzles, I tried to tackle the first set, thinking it'd be quick at level 1, but after around an hour of playing, I had to just quit and go to bed, throwing away all the time I spent figuring out and solving the first two in the set. I didn't even know you could use the Beacon Bomb in the puzzle stages until I started this set. The servbot was basically useless in the first puzzle area. So I adjusted to using the forklift to take the crates of goods, but on the third puzzle of the set, I was just going nuts with it, saying "this is impossible" to myself as I tried over and over. And after I skimmed an FAQ, I think the way I was trying to do it was impossible. It turns out you can use the Beacon Bomb even while holding a crate yourself. I know some would just blame me for not experimenting more, but geez, is it too much to ask for this game to explain anything important? There's even a "hints" option in the puzzle stages, which would be the perfect time to point out stuff like that, but instead it gives completely worthless, obvious info (telling me to lift 4 steel crates and 1 wooden box when I already know I get only 5 lifts, and wooden boxes are always there for a reason). Anyway, given that I have precious little gaming time lately, it was a pretty damn frustrating experience. It felt like a total waste, between the lack of making any progress in the game and the repeated attempts very quickly becoming a chore that wasn't any fun. I don't mind a challenge, but I don't want challenge to come from bad design or inadequate teaching of a game's mechanics. I really expected better of this game, but the whole thing feels half-baked.
Still chipping away at The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita. I suspect I'm nearly at the end now. I've hit over two million zenny, so I can pay back the interest. A new option opened up in my menu on the ship, and the strategist Servbot is talking as if I've got the final battle ahead of me. I'm gonna hold off on that, since I still have one last set of puzzles to do, and I still haven't even touched the Free mode. Plus I still have more Servbot training to do, as tedious as it may be.
I started the Free stage in The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita, and this mission is pretty fun. It's like a combination of the RPG stages and action stages. It feels like one big Mega Man Legends dungeon, albeit with a bigger, clunkier player character. I'm finding a whole bunch of unique items, so I've been able to improve the robot. I suspect these ruins aren't going to last me very long, though. I explored everything accessible without the bazooka first, then went back in and explored as much as a I could before my Vita ran out of juice. It might only take one more trip in. I also trained all my Servbots such that the only ones whose attack meters aren't maxed are the ones with the longest meters. The training game difficulty levels basically go from easy, to moderately tough, to insane, so I don't look forward to trying to beat the games on the hardest difficulty. I'm trying to use Attack Cubes as much as possible to skip that.
I finished the Nakkai Ruins in The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita. Though, I ended up looking up how to beat the boss because I was fighting it forever without doing any damage and blowing through E. Tanks. Yet another instance where the game gives you no hints whatsoever about what to do, so you're expected to just play blindly and figure things out by chance. I had been targeting everywhere with the Beacon Bomb, but I hadn't tried spamming it toward the nostrils. Anyway, I made another trip in because I missed the Ancient Pistol, but now I think I'm done with that dungeon, outside of possibly going in and out to grind for items via Scouting. I also did speed training until only the Servbots with the largest bars aren't maxed out. Now all that's left before the final part is the last set of annoying puzzles and deciding on how I want to max out the remaining Servbots.
PS4
Castlevania Requiem
As I said in the Beaten in 2018 topic, I finished The Misadventures of Tron Bonne on my Vita, so now I'm not quite sure what to get into next, especially when I've got all these repair projects going on too. I considered Musynx on Vita, since I received that not long ago from Limited Run Games, and it's supposedly pretty short (to platinum, I guess). But I'd still consider myself a relative newbie to rhythm games, and this game's idea of "easy" is bonkers to me. I think I'm gonna need some more experience with this genre under my belt before I can get into this game seriously. So instead I just played a little more Code: Realize.
I'm still in between games, while I have my Colecovision's guts sprawled out all over the place, and I'm doing a lot of reorganizing of my game stuff too. I played some more Code: Realize on my Vita and cleared the sixth chapter. I'm admittedly a little lost, though, since I did the majority of my playing of this back in like 2015. I also tried out Death Mark. The prologue was intriguing, but I think I'll save it for a later day.
Basically everything from my prior post is still going on, so I'm still playing Code: Realize on my Vita too. I finished the seventh chapter, which I believe places me now in the final common route chapter. I'm not sure who the protagonist will get paired with, but I'm guessing it'll be Impey. I also hooked up my Wii so I could finally try out Wave Race: Blue Storm, which I received way back in August for my birthday. I think I'll keep the Wii hooked up for now. Maybe I'll play through one of our WiiWare games. I know once the Wii Shop Channel is gone, I'll permanently lose access to the manuals for those games.
I've been playing a good amount of stuff lately for feeling like I'm not really playing anything. I'm just not invested in anything at the moment, so my gaming has basically come in the form of briefly trying out new buys and multiplayer gaming with family. What I want to start really digging into is London Detective Mysteria on my Vita, but so far, I've only put like half an hour into it. I've popped in and out a bunch of other Vita games: Phantom Breaker: Battle Grounds, Soul Sacrifice, BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma, BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma Extend, Zero Escape: The Nonary Games, Gunhouse, Senran Kagura: Bon Appetit, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, Rayman Origins, Salt & Sanctuary, and probably some others. A number of my Limited Run Games orders going months back have been coming in recently. And I've been playing some Switch games with my family: Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and Super Mario Party.
I'm hoping I can squeeze in at least one more beaten game before the year is over. Ideally, I'd like to clear at least 15 a year, but I'd settle for 12, to have an average of one a month. But I'm sitting at 11 right now. I looked back at my lists from previous years and noticed that it's actually very common for me to not beat anything in December or to have few games finished in the last 2-3 months of the year. I guess I've been underestimating how busy this time of year tends to be and how it affects my gaming.
Well, it's the last day of the year, and it's not looking too hopeful that I'll beat another game before midnight. I did, however, start playing Castlevania: The Adventure Rebirth on my Wii today, so who knows. But I do have other things to do today, on top of New Years celebrations, so I'm not holding my breath. At the very least, maybe I can start 2019 with a game beaten shortly after the year begins. I'm up to the fourth stage so far, on the default settings. I'm not the only one who uses this Wii, so Classic mode is already unlocked in the game, which I was tempted to use, but I figure I should go for the standard experience my first time through. I wish the game had passwords or saves, but I guess lacking both is true to the original (not that much is; this is more a reimagining of the Game Boy game than a remake, similar to how Super Castlevania IV retells the story of the first Castlevania but is otherwise an entirely new game). The game does keep track of which stages you've cleared on each difficulty for its stage select option, but it's kind of a secret thing, so it feels a bit like a cheat. I also tried out A Boy and His Blob and Donkey Kong Country Returns, which were both fun, but I don't want to get invested in any more lengthy games right now.
I gotta say, it was a bit of an ordeal getting our Wii online again. I guess the last time we had it online was before we changed our internet setup, and the Wii's outdated technology just doesn't want to play nice with our wifi. But eventually I got the system updated and regained access to the Wii Shop Channel (as brief as this access will be before it's shut down). I checked to make sure all our VC and Wiiware games were downloaded and to see if we had any points to use up. I guess Nintendo's getting a couple bucks out of us for nothing, since I don't think there's anything cheap enough to use my last 200 points on. I also read the Castlevania manual on there. It was a real boneheaded move to store Wiiware manuals on the Wii Shop Channel. Soon, even if you've bought and installed Wiiware games, you won't be able to access the manuals for them anymore.
Beyond my Wii shenanigans, I've played a tiny bit more of London Detective Mysteria on my Vita, but I still haven't even cleared the prologue. I also tried out Tokyo Xanadu. I've heard it described as Persona with Ys gameplay, and it definitely does feel like a Falcom take on Persona.
The topic title only says 2017 and 2018, but I assume we're going to continue using this topic for 2019.
Since I couldn't get Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth on Wii beaten within 2018, I'm taking it slower now. I've gotten up to the fifth stage, but I've been repeating the earlier stages some to try alternate routes. I really wish this game was like Rondo of Blood and actually kept track of which areas you've visited.
As for London Detective Mysteria on Vita, I'm out of the prologue at least now.
And I'm still playing Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and Super Mario Party on Switch with family.
I JUst started playing Dragon's Crown on Vita. Got past the tutorial part during a break at work. It's got some potential as I was not a fan of the PS3 version.
On New Year's Eve I played Namco Museum DS, which was handed to me by my fifth oldest as we have a Galaga competition going on. He's, to put it as lovingly as possible, a "sore player". He thinks he's God's gift to video games as he can beat others at certain games and is VERY full of himself and condescending when you lose. "That's ok...it'll just take more practice for you," is a favorite phrase. However when he loses...he gets a little ugly and probably won't play that game for a while. He rage quit a game of checkers that day.
Anyway, his high score was in the 60k range, so I had my work cut out. On top of that, I was playing with a handicap with one of my step daughters curled up next to me in the recliner, my son on the other side playing with my ear and others huddled around behind me. As I played, the chair would start to rotate or recline thanks to the children. In the end, I racked up a score of 86K I think...(thought it was 82K but I remember I was only a few thousand away from wiping out the high score of 90-some-thousand). He was not thrilled, but quietly shut off his DS and walked away.
I traded in a Wii a friend gave me as they didn't want it, but I have 3 already including the Wii U. I picked up a DSi XL for an even swap at a local game store so I can see these games better. Should be interesting to see the scores I get now.
Nz17 (02-28-2019)
As I said in the other thread, just started Baldur's Gate part 2 on ps2 with my son. Pretty fun so far, and they definitely smoothed some things out from part 1.
I'm also playing The Last of Us on ps3. Having lots of fun. Trying real hard to just play, but I like to be perfect at stealth in games like this, so I sometimes restart encounters even though I don't need to. I've also run into strange behavior a couple times, most recently was the "fire up the generator and everything goes to shit" part. First time I wasn't ready for and died. Second time I had a plan, based on the first time, but ran smack into the bloater in a completely different place from the first time. Last time I just jogged out of the area without seeing a single baddie, same route as the second try. Go figure.
Crystal Caves by Apogee through Dos Box. I finished Secret Agent ages ago (very similair game) but only did the first episode for CC's. Im doing each level damageless and getting the bonus too.
The first episode was mostly a cake-walk and I just finished the second episode which had the difficulty ramped up quite a bit. Very satisfying to beat. Now i will be starting the 3rd and final episode
so it will be interesting to see how this one goes.
I finally made the time to clean and try out some of the imports I bought a while ago. I played a little Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon: Another Story on my modified SNES, and then I switched over to N64 to try Dance Dance Revolution: Disney Dancing Museum, SimCity 2000, Super Robot Spirits, and Tetris 64. I still don't have a Bio Sensor accessory, so I didn't touch those modes in Tetris 64, but I did try regular Tetris and Giga Tetris. I grew bored with regular Tetris (I've already played a lifetime's worth of regular Tetris on my Game Boy back in the day), but Giga Tetris, with its occasional massive pieces, was amusing enough. I don't think I saw a single lick of Japanese in the game from what I played, so it's easily one of the most English-friendly N64 imports I've played, if unremarkable. On that note, Super Robot Spirits seemed unremarkable too. Just your run of the mill clunky 3D fighter, except with licensed anime mecha. SimCity 2000 I've never been able to get into, not even in English or on any other platform. Disney Dancing Museum was good fun, though. I've never been great at rhythm games, even less so with ones that have dance pads, but this one seems on the easy side, so I wasn't doing half bad. The mat is surprisingly responsive, and the songs are catchier than I expected. They mostly sound like regular Japanese rhythm game music to me. With the Disney theme, I figured they'd be a lot more childish and grating.
I'm still playing Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth on Wii, and I'm steadily improving at the game. I can clear the first four stages without much difficulty now. Reaching Death at the end of the fifth stage isn't too bad either. I just need to learn his patterns more and hopefully I can tackle Dracula soon. I don't get why some series veterans talk like this game is so easy on the default difficulty. Maybe they're exaggerating for the sake of bragging, or maybe they're cranking up the number of lives per continue. Or I could just be rusty. I haven't played all the way through any Castlevania since 2012, when I beat the 3D Rondo of Blood remake on PSP. But I think the ReBirth game puts up a decent challenge on the default setting. Certainly harder than, say, Super Castlevania IV.
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