2018 CYE Backlog Throwdown

[dschroll]

Jun 3, 2018 12:46:43 GMT -5 UsualNoise said:

Sounds a little like Elite Beat Agents, in that it is also a rhythm game with a weird alien back-story. (I *loved* EBA and completed everything in it. Wish that one had a sequel.)

Noticed the sequel is available on the PS store for PS3, I might pick it up.

I loved/still love Elite Beat Agents. Great rhythm game on a handheld. My biggest concern with that game is it wreaked havoc on your touch screen as you were tapping and swiping all over the place. I still have my copy of the game and will never sell it.

Not sure Space Channel 5 is similar, but definitely as kooky.

[dschroll]

It took a few years, but I finally completed Puzzle Swap on the 3DS. That is the Mii Plaza mini game where you streetpass with people and exchange puzzle pieces. I finally completed all of the various puzzles in that game. No cheating by creating a home Wi Fi setup to streetpuss, these are all legit street passes with people by taking my 3DS to various places. So glad to have this one done as I've been missing just one piece for a long time now.

[UsualNoise]

Congrats, I HomePassed my way to everything a long time ago and I don't regret it. Nice achievement!

[UsualNoise]

Finished Letter Quest: Remastered for Switch. As a Scrabble enthusiast this one was right up my alley, loved it. Ended up doing both normal and expert modes and hit all the available achievements. Took around 20 hours for each difficulty mode.

[dschroll]

Finished another PSVR game. This one is called Farpoint and I played it with the AIM controller. This is a first person shooter game where you crash on an alien world and are trying to survive and make your way to others that have also crashed. If I were playing this game without the VR, I would say it was maybe 6/10. Fairly mediocre. But, playing the same game in VR with the AIM controller...that gets bumped up to an 8/10. It's a great VR experience and the AIM controller really seals the deal. It has a nice weight to it, it rumbles when you're shooting and it has analog sticks built into it so you can move around like you would with a dual shock. I thought playing a VR FPS game would give me motion sickness, but you get used to it. And the developers really did a nice job of adding some elements that make it feel even more realistic. Like you can hold the gun sight up to your head/headset and actually look through it. When you want to change weapons, you bring the gun up to you shoulder as though you're grabbing the gun off your back and it automatically equips the alternate weapon. Really cool feeling the first time you do it. I could see this being the future of light gun games as playing in VR is a ton of fun.

The game itself isn't long coming in at 6-7 hours. But as a VR experience, it was worth every penny for me. 8/10.

[dschroll]

Recently finished playing Kirby Planet Robobot on the 3DS. I'm not a big Kirby guy, but Nintendo always releases a ton of games and this one was considered to be one of the better ones on 3DS. I will say, I did find this guy fairly enjoyable, but overall fairly easy. There were a couple of challenging moments if you want to collect all the items in each level as some were well hidden. But the game itself wasn't much of a challenge. The last boss though is a very long fight as it comes in the form of several stages. Still, this was a fun, colorful game that is not too intense and can be a nice relaxing play through. I enjoyed this game far more than I expected and have no problems recommending it to anyone here that enjoys a good Kirby or Nintendo game. It won't blow you away, but it's a solid game overall. 8/10.

[UsualNoise]

Finished Balloon World of Super Mario Odyssey. For anyone who has played it hopefully you'll understand that achieving a 50 star rank is an incredibly time-consuming process that I finally finished today. As such, I'm counting this as a separate game entirely.

[dschroll]

Finished an indie game on Switch called Yoku's Island Express. This one sounded odd to me at first, but I wanted to give it a try. It's a MetroidVania game that has pinball elements. You essentially play as a beetle that is attached to a giant ball the entire game and you traverse this world that has various bumpers all over. You get to new areas and effectively hit the ball (and beetle) with the bumpers, like pinball. As you do quests for various people, you gain new abilities, which lets you access new parts of the world. It sounds weird, but this game is an absolute blast and I highly recommend it if you enjoy video pinball games. The MetroidVania stuff works for the most part and the game is very light hearted and enjoyable. My biggest gripe with the game is that traversing the world can be a bit cumbersome at times. They do give you some ways to fast track but you'll still need to get to them before using them.

Overall though, this game was very enjoyable. I finished at 99% as there is one treasure chest that is out of my reach and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get it. I've tried going on youtube and google and anything else to see if someone can help provide a hint on how to get the chest, and no one has posted anything about it. I will move on from this one for now and once an FAQ gets posted on the treasure chests I will go back and get that one last one that has been eluding me.

8/10

[UsualNoise]

Thanks for the review. This one is actually on my wish list already so I'll be getting it whenever there's a sale. Speaking of sales, I snagged Hollow Knight from the Mexican Switch eShop for like $8.10 or so. It was posted on slickdeals today.

Oh, and edited to add: I finished Metroid: Samus Returns for 3DS today. Some bosses were way harder than I expect in a Metroid game, but overall it was a pretty good experience. As a Metroid veteran I was surprised at the overall difficulty early in the game but it got easier as you gained abilities (although the bosses were still death-heavy). I started a new game in Fusion mode (via the Amiibo unlock) but I don't expect to finish that anytime soon (from what I read it is 8x the damage compared to normal mode).

[UsualNoise]

Not counting a new game, but I finished Metroid: Samus Returns on Fusion mode today at 100%. Surprisingly it wasn't as bad as I expected, probably because I had mastered the melee counter attack and was VERY careful for most of the beginning of the game. Once you get the screw attack things get simpler, but you still have to be careful as some harder regular enemies take down about 4-5 energy tanks per hit. The defensive aeon ability is essential to keep on all the time in fusion mode. It was pretty enjoyable overall, which is not what I expected.

[oldskoolboarder]

Figment on Switch. We played this at PAX last year and I was waiting for the Switch version. I like puzzle/adventure games and prefer to support the indies so this hit the spot.

Puzzles aren't too difficult and boss battles are manageable. Artwork is beautiful. My only complaints would be the load times from world to world, which always confuses me since this is on SD. Maybe the Unity engine is slow? Also, seems the developer is Danish so the English seemed forced, almost like it was a Moviefone voice. Nit picky yes, but would've been fine w/ heavy accented English vs a weird American one.

[dschroll]

Finished Panzer Dragoon on the Sega Saturn. This game has been on my 'want to play' list for a long time, so I am happy to finally have played through it. It's a rail shooter type game similar to Starfox, but your character is riding a dragon. I have absolutely no clue what the story is about as it felt very disjointed and didn't make much sense to me. Perhaps that is something better explained in the manual (which I don't have). One of the elements I don't care for the game is that it starts you out with 1 or 2 lives (credits) to play the game. As you complete each stage, depending on what percentage of enemies you shot down will determine if you qualify for any additional credits. This game can be pretty tough in terms of getting a high percentage of enemies destroyed, so you would think it would be fairly generous if you do ok. But I was getting 82% and such and didn't qualify for any credits. Other times I got over 90% and qualified for one. Suffice it to say, if you run out of credits, you start the entire game over again, so getting some early on helps with later stages that are a bit more challenging, especially the last boss.

There are 7 episodes total in this game and your hand will be super cramped by the time you are done because you have to repeatedly press the shoot button if you want to take shots at people. Holding down the shoot button will auto lock. My hand was sore the first few times I played the game, but then I wised up and busted out my Saturn arcade stick which has a turbo feature and that helped immensely. After that it was smooth sailing.

The game can be completed in about an hour, so it's not long. But nonetheless, it was a decent rail shooter game and I'm very happy I can cross this one off my list as it's been a long time coming.

[dschroll]

Picked up the Mega Man Legacy Collection on Switch and have already played through the first Mega Man game. I will say, that the main game isn't too bad until you go to the Dr. Wily level and then it just gets insane. You have to fight some yellow devil boss, where the only way I could beat it is to take advantage of a glitch in the game where you can make one shot hit him like 5 times. And then you have to fight through all of the other bosses from earlier in the game just to get to Dr. Wily, which confuses me because didn't I just have to fight all these bosses already to get the Dr. Wily stage and now some how they are back all in the same damn level? Come on!!!

Anyway, thank you for save states. I know games today are easy compared to old games, but Mega Man seems insane to me. That last level seems almost impossible to beat. I cannot imagine having to restart the entire game over again countless times due to dying on that level. So, save states FTW and I got to see the end credits of Mega Man 1. ;-)

[UsualNoise]

Nice. My brother just finished MM1 recently as well. I played through about 2/3 of it a year ago and never finished. It's one of those things hanging over my head since I know how insane the difficulty is ... but I'd like to get it done so I can move on to the 'easier' games in the series. My main gripe with MM1 was the slidiness, it's like you're Luigi all the time but with way less room for error than Mario Bros games.

[UsualNoise]

Revisiting handheld Mario games, completed Super Mario 3D Land; this time got the 5 shiny stars (can't die more than 5 times in a level prior to beating the game initially and must collect everything and beat all levels with both Mario and Luigi).

[dschroll]

I modded an original GBA and installed an AGS-101 GBA SP backlit screen. The GBA SP I bought cheap as it was crazy beat up, so I didn't feel bad dismantling it to salvage the screen. But I have to admit, this was a pretty easy mod and I love the feel of the original GBA more. Anyway, with that being said, I played through Wario Ware Twisted on my GBA. This is one of the few GBA games you cannot play on the overdrive since the game has a built in gyroscope and rumble feature. If you've never played this game, I definitely recommend it. This was a great Wario Ware game and you can tell it was a precursor of things to come for Nintendo with regards to motion controls in the Wii.

If you're a fan of the Wario Ware series and have a working GBA SP or Micro or something, go pick up this cartridge as you will enjoy it quite a bit.
9/10

[NoThru22]

Finished the Japanese versions of Persona 3 Dancing Moon Night and Persona 5 Dancing Star Night. Will probably wait for the English versions to go back and platinum them, because the menus are impregnable.

[fatty]

Jul 31, 2018 13:27:11 GMT -5 dschroll said:

Picked up the Mega Man Legacy Collection on Switch and have already played through the first Mega Man game. I will say, that the main game isn't too bad until you go to the Dr. Wily level and then it just gets insane. You have to fight some yellow devil boss, where the only way I could beat it is to take advantage of a glitch in the game where you can make one shot hit him like 5 times. And then you have to fight through all of the other bosses from earlier in the game just to get to Dr. Wily, which confuses me because didn't I just have to fight all these bosses already to get the Dr. Wily stage and now some how they are back all in the same damn level? Come on!!!

Anyway, thank you for save states. I know games today are easy compared to old games, but Mega Man seems insane to me. That last level seems almost impossible to beat. I cannot imagine having to restart the entire game over again countless times due to dying on that level. So, save states FTW and I got to see the end credits of Mega Man 1. ;-)

It's been years since I played Mega Man 1, can't remember if I had to use the pause trick or not to beat that boss. Reading this makes me want to go back and revisit these games, I love them. Especially the music.

Mega Man 2 - Metal Man
Mega Man 2 - Air Man
Mega Man 2 - Wood Man
Mega Man 2 - Dr. Wily Stage Acapella

[fatty]

Game that I beat about a month ago is Advance Wars - Days of Ruin. I really enjoy the Advance Wars games, wish they still made these like they do the Fire Emblem games.

As far as the story, I think I enjoyed this one the most. It is a much more serious tone, and it actually kept me engaged where I enjoyed reading the text, something that rarely happens in games like this as I usually just try to click through it most of the time to get back to the gameplay.

This one is also different from AW:Dual Strike as you don't rely on the CO abilities like you do on Dual Strike. Dual Strike could really turn the tide of a battle just from the CO abilities, Days of Ruin it relies just on the basic strategy of the core mechanics of the game itself. Not sure if I can say I prefer one way over the other, just a different experience.

But the game is really fun. I love Chess, this is one of my video game equivalents where I get that same kind of fix. I give it an 8.5/10. Great experience.

[dschroll]

I've been playing a 3DS game called Pocket Card Jockey and I'm about as far through the game as I will likely get.
I could write paragraphs on why I have a love/hate relationship with this game.
The game crosses horse back racing with timed games of solitaire. It sounds weird, but it really is well done and extremely addictive once you learn how to play the game.
You take a horse from infancy through fully grown and do various race circuits along the way. As your horse gets older, you qualify for more challenging circuits. Once your horse has lost too many races or is too old, you retire the horse on a farm where you can breed new horses. Then you select a new horse and run through various circuits again.

Things like stamina and energy for your horse all depend on where your horse is located on the field. Different parts give better benefits, but then also force you to play more challenging games of solitaire. However, if you fail to have a perfect game of solitaire, then your horse will lose stamina. Keep in mind, these solitaire matches are timed, which can make it very challenging. Additionally, the more cards you leave on the field, whether it's because time ran out or you did not play them in the best order possible, causes your horse's mood to change. The worse mood your horse is in, the faster time ticks on future games of solitaire.

As I said before, the game is crazy addictive. It's one of those perfect portable games where you can pick it up, play a quick race and put it away. But the addiction comes when you start going through the circuit. There are various trophies you can win, puzzles you can unlock, and skills/upgrades your horse can get along the circuit. You can't really choose the upgrades or skills, you ultimately see cards on the field and if your horse touches them then it gets added to your game of solitaire. During the game if you manage to get the card in your pile, then you get the upgrade. Leave it on the field and you lose it.

But as much as I really enjoyed playing this game, I started what I would call hate playing it. I so wanted to go through all the various circuits and get all the trophies, but I've realized that the game is too random and is adding all sorts of padding to keep me playing far longer than I am willing to do so in order to go after such trophies. I've gone through this game multiple times with different horses, each time getting a bit better about going after all the level up cards on the field. But, once it's time to retire that horse, you have to pick a brand new horse and start the level up process all over again. Ideally you have some good horses to pick from with good attributes and whatnot, but you still have to start out with them racing all the same races you've already done. When you've played this game for as long as I have, the idea of having to play 20 games of solitaire to get you the one cup you haven't won starts to get old fast. And that's assuming you can get to that cup because if you lose a race, the circuit may change and they will route you to a different race instead. I wish I could just select the cup I want to go after and keep trying that rather than having to go through so many races prior.

The solitaire games are a lot of fun, but I do have issue with the game not giving you a lot of different paths to take to get that perfect game. It feels like there's one correct sequence to draw those cards to get that perfect game (assuming you're on the most challenging solitaire matches). While I expect a good amount of difficulty and skill needed to get that perfect game, in many situations it's purely based on a lucky guess. For example. You have a jack sitting in your hand and on the playing field there is a 10 and a Queen. Which one do you choose? I quickly scan to see if there are other cards that can be played after either of those cards and in this example there is not. So, I decide I will pick the 10. I draw the next card and it's a 9. D'oh! There goes my perfect game of solitaire because the remaining cards in the deck will make sure to not come up in the order you need, almost ALWAYS leaving me with just one unplayed card. That drives me nuts and it happened quite frequently to me.

Here's another frequent example of what was frustrating about this game for me. So, I've been playing the game a lot, exercising my brain so it's better at playing some of these fast paced card games and I finally get to a trophy I don't have. I go through the various solitaire matches and I have fantastic games, scoring perfect on almost all of them. After you complete the last solitaire match, the horses run in the home stretch where you can navigate your horse around other horses and hopefully be first across the finish line. So, I've played fantastically, my energy levels are at 100, my stamina is extremely high, and I even have a boost card I picked up from the field. Home stretch starts and these other horses start passing me left and right. I enable the boost card and catch some of them, but some are just too fast for me and ultimately I lose the game. The little horsey character that coaches you on how to play the game comes on screen (generally to tell you what you did wrong when you lose a match) tells me I was awesome and did a great job, but it's just the other horses were stronger. Ok, I get it. My horse was young and didn't have high experience levels when I first did that cup, so I do it again later when my horse has matured and the stats are maxed out. Same thing. I did great, but the other horses are just too strong. Seriously?!? This happened numerous times across several horses. My only takeaway is that the game just wants me to keep playing and breed more horses until finally one starts out strong so I can level him/her up enough to compete with the others. But that's the thing, I don't want to breed horses, play 40 more matches of solitaire to take another stab at it and find out my horse still isn't good enough.

So, I've reached a point now where I'm just going to consider this one completed. Ive sunk way more time into it than I probably should have but I just couldn't put it down. If you like card games and such, I cannot recommend this one enough. It is very well made, a ton of fun, and extremely addicting. But, you also need to know that there is a certain amount of randomness in this game that can be frustrating, even when you feel you've done everything right. If you're ok with that, then you will truly have a blast with this one. But if you get frustrated easily (as I do sometimes) then this game may not be a good pick for you. 8/10