Played through Castlevania Bloodlines as Eric. Such a great game, I love running through it every few months.
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Such a great game! Secret best 16-bit castlevania.
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It really is. Two playable characters with different gameplay styles, a completely different setting, not to mention expert mode, which also adds more enemies and some different attack patterns for them. Highly repayable.
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My wife and I played through In the Hunt tonight. Shots are original hardware on a Sony BVM/PVM. I really love this game. Feels like an underdog. Hard as nails though. I think we would have spent about $100. Definitely no 1cc run.
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Some of the best sprite work and animation in any game ever. Nazca were true masters of their craft.
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I finished Opoona this evening after obsessively playing it whenever I could over the past week. This is the very definition of a hidden gem - it’s a highly unique game with a mesmerising world filled with little details such that you can just tell the developers poured their heart and soul into making it.
It’s a shame it was overlooked - including by myself, but not entirely surprising. Most of its unique qualities are unmarketable, and certainly aren’t easy to communicate unless you sit down and commit to playing the game.
If you love exploring worlds which feel alive in the same way Shenmue’s does, or if you’re looking for a relaxed RPG with a great sense of individuality check it out - I adore it.
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Pro Rally (GC)
After the obnoxiously difficult driving school it’s a pretty good rally game. Perhaps a little easy after all that! Until you unlock and use Pro cars.
Collisions between cars are quite broken, particularly in Arcade mode which I guess is why they keep that locked for a good while?
Stage design is very good. Varied and no repeating patterns of track I could see. Locations are very different and have nice attention to detail with villages, train yards, harbours etc. Roadside objects are nice and varied enough, roadside cars and people are limited and do repeat. No water splash effects. Minimal destructive scenery. Would benefit from more environmental sounds. And more rumble. Looks good in 480p, 60fps, quite low resolution textures and polygons.
Driving School is a lot easier after extended play. But still way too strict. When I hit a cone give me a time penalty rather than instant fail.
There’s a bug where sometimes the menu doesn’t load after a race. Save often and don’t mute music (just have it low volume) seemed to help for me.
I got to 100% and it was thoroughly enjoyable, particularly the later half of Championship mode using a Pro car. Some of the most fun rallying I’ve had on any console.
Returning to diving school after completing championship was a lot more fun. I managed to get 10s and pass the target times in all events. Rain and Ice were a real challenge. But it was actually fun.
Somehow I have one unlocked car, Citroen II, and no idea how to unlock it. Probably multiplayer mode?
Anyway, I really enjoyed this game.
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Never heard of this one, I will give it a go.
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I finished Dead Rising on Xbox 360 this evening, and as posted on the other thread it really blew me away.
It’s both easy and hard to believe that this game was released in the mid 2000s, in the sense that it still feels very ambitious, unique and ahead of its time conceptually, but I couldn’t see today’s Capcom, or any other big publisher, taking a risk on an idea like this. The back of the box using the game’s stressful and strict 72 hour time limit as a selling point really does paint it as a product of its time, these days publishers are all too keen to avoid game mechanics that invoke frustration in players - like time management, which has been stripped out of quite a few series that used to do it really well.
The best thing about Dead Rising is how well considered and economical it is in its design. I was really impressed by how it tied together all its elements: the RPG-like character stat progression, the very strict time management, resource management, action, and survival horror.
At first I thought it would be impossible to solve the mystery on my first playthrough because of how difficult bosses were, and how slow and inept Frank was at fighting, but the more time you spend playing - and reloading after failure - the more familiar you become with the mall’s layout and the better Frank’s abilities become, which in turn helps you considerably at taking on the game’s challenges while also managing your time better.
Not to say it was easy by any means, it was one of the most stressful games I’ve played, but I say that in the best way possible.
Clearing ending A unlocked Overtime mode, which appears to be a direct continuation of the story’s events but with a bigger focus on resource management. I look forward to tackling it in the future…
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I one-lifed Gradius III SNES on hard mode! (My thumbs aren’t good enough to unlock arcade, sorry!)
This was the game that got me into shmups so…
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I just finished up Sonic 1. I’m making my way through the series (albeit in a strange order 3, 1, 2) and getting all of the Chaos emeralds in each run.
I had a blast with this - it’s a much more difficult game than 2 or 3 with some instant kills in later stages that punish careless play. I have cleared it before but that would have been 15 years ago or so, meaning I had forgotten most of the experience which meant that the aforementioned traps came as a complete surprise.
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I finished Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter today. I’m relieved to have finished it with just one SOL Restore (like Dead Rising after it, you can choose to carry over stats and restart after dying).
It’s a very intriguing, unique, smartly crafted game, I’m really glad the team had the guts to make something so unconventional in a series that was, in the past, rather pedestrian (yet still well made) for its genre.
Dragon Quarter is to the RPG what Majora’s Mask is to action adventure, and I mean that rather literally since like MM, DQ features heavy use of resource and time management mechanics where every action has real consequences as a result.
One-lifed Darius Force! (ACFIL route). While the deliberate deviations from the Darius formula are cute enough, this game is full of stupid, sloppy shit
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I 1cc’ed Sagaia!
Sagaia is a western rearrangement of Darius II that turns it into a crazy byte-sized version of itself. The branching path map is dumbed down, bosses have 1/10th of their health but are much more aggressive, levels have section cuts to remove prolongated mid-boss battles. The final levels are brand new and batshit insane. It’s a fun way to play a great game
(I also managed to place 10th on the Switch version leaderboards /notsohumblebrag)
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Three Dariuses in a row, woo-hoo!
Weird thing tho is that I got the standard “oh noez we have to escape” ending despite not losing any life and fighting great thing. Does the best thing require a very specific path, or is it because i didn’t destroy everything on super alloy lantern?
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Operation Logic Bomb:
Vice: Project Doom:
Vs Excitebike doesn’t have credits after you clear the seventh race, instead repeating itself for more high score opportunities until you lack consistency to rank in place and continue…so here’s some amazing skillz instead:
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I was playing Operation Logic Bomb on Saturday! That’s a game that has held up really well. It was more impressive now in 2020 than when I first played it new way back when it was released. I can’t think of that many games remotely like it either, which I think makes it that much more special.
It was my first time playing it, and I came away really impressed, the laser weapon and clone hologram in particular were used to great effect, and I like how the narrative is told without a single word of dialogue. It’s the perfect length, too. I ran out of credits a couple of times but it never felt like a chore to get back in there and start it again and do better.
I felt pretty similarly about the last Jaleco action game I played - Avenging Spirit on the Game Boy. I can’t think of many games like that one, either, and it offered enough variety such that you can experiment in different ways whenever you replay the game.
Finally polished off DKC2 - I had a great time with this game - I never owned it as a kid (I had the GB version) so it was great to experience the real deal.
It’s a great platformer with some amazing music. It’s a shame the following generation Rare’s music quality falls of a cliff.
Anyway I don’t think I’ll start DKC3 up right away - I think I’ll give Actraiser 2 a go next.
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