Together Retro: Super Monkey Ball

[MrHealthy]

It definitely helps, you can lock yourself into a straight run much easier, which is extremely useful in speeding along narrow paths. But having spent enough time with both the gamecube and ps2 controllers (I never had an xbox, so I can't comment on that) its clear to me that the gamecube controller simply reads subtle movements with much more accuracy then the PS2 does.

[CRTGAMER]

PS2 Super Monkey Ball Deluxe

I'm on World 6, the Steam Pot levels!! Yes!!!

So, how many levels do you have to beat to get to the next world?

The Gamecube requires all ten. The Ps2 has double the levels at twenty per world. However, for the PS2 only Ten out of Twenty need to be completed. This puts it even or better since you can complete any ten levels. I'm glad of this, some of the levels are a real nightmare.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Monkey_Ball_Deluxe#Story_Mode

Story Mode is one player only, and features the same story mode featured in Super Monkey Ball 2. [3] The plot involves the games four protagonists Aiai, Meemee, Baby and Gongon who embark on a quest to stop the antagonist, Dr Bad-Boon, and his Assistant, from stealing all the bananas on Jungle Island. Story Mode consists of ten worlds, each of which contains of 20 levels, but only 10 levels are required to be completed in order to advance to the next world. Players are allowed to select and complete levels in a world in any order they wish. A story cut-scene is played upon completion of a world. Unlike in Challenge Mode, the player has infinite lives.

I put a tease earlier on PS2 Alternate Controls. I am happy to report back that some levels work very well going with a different controller. You know how the Mouse has the reputation as the best controller for a FPS on the computer? The same applies for Monkeyball roll the ball style games, but up to a point.

PS2 Accurate Control
I first tried a Mouse and found very precise control. As soon as I stopped moving, the landscape immediately jumps back to neutral and the Monkeyball slows down very quickly. Part of the reason is a mouse can never get the ball to roll very fast. I found even when using the couch cushion as a mouse pad, I still have to pick it up for another bite to drag. On the plus it is very easy to stay on a track, even one that is only one checker wide. Next I tried a Trakball, a perfect tight control! This worked even better then a Mouse!

When I spin the Trakball its almost like my hand is right on top of the Monkeyball, a very accurate precise control.

Slow Momentum
The bad part is the Trakball or Mouse does not "Hold" the landscape at an angle. As soon as you stop moving the Mouse or Trakball, the landscape instantly snaps back to neutral. This prevents any fast speed buildup in the Monkeyball roll, which kills any uphill climbs, tilting tracks or even hitting a sensor switch on the Playfield.

The Work Around
Luckily the game can be paused and the controller can be hot swapped. For tight levels with narrow tracks I switch to the Trakball. On uphill driving or tilting tracks I use the regular controller augmented with the SplitFish Tilt Controller. I can even pause and switch in the middle of a level to change controllers.

The game itself does not adjust for sensitvity of the Analog control. I think the SmartJoy Frag does though, I'll see if the Trakball can be tweaked.

[CRTGAMER]

Everyone give up on Monkeyball?
I have been busy playing Cubivore so have not been rolling the ball for a few days. I dread trying to balance the Kick the Hamsterball on tilting tracks, so decided to go back to another similar game I have not played for a while.



PS2 Mercury Meltdown Remix
Hey, this game is a lot more forgiving! Instead of a ball, a blob of Merury is controlled in the same fashion. What is nice is you have more time to recover since only part of the mercury glob drops off.

This adds a new type of gameplay. You can separate the Mercury into different blobs to get hit by different paint booths. For instance a Blue Mercury is needed to open a blue door. Then there is remixing of different painted mercury blobs to form a new color. All this is done while tilting the platform and trying to keep the colored blobs separated.

Note the Color Guide on the top right, mix the blobs to get new colors.



There is a Tutorial Level that gives a taste of the different things you encounter including ramps, sticky floors, splitters, paint booths, heat pads, ice pads and various enemies.

Damn this game is one of the better Marble Madness games! It should have been picked over the very difficult Monkeyball. I really have got to get the Wii version and see if it works with the Mayflash adaptor and PSX Twinstick.

Ride the chutes vertically!!

[RyaNtheSlayA]

I love MM.

[incominggame]

I'm still playing it. I just finished the story mode (of Super monkey ball 2 on gamecube). I must say that in general, I did not find the levels hard. Frustating, yes! But hard, ... not really. After a few tries (or more than a few depending on the stage), I could generally get the idea and go to the goal without much difficulties. Now, getting all the bananas is definitively harder, but attaining the goal was my main objective.

I'll now try to complete the challenge mode.

I feel the game lacks replay value. Since the game doesn't record score/banana/time for individual levels, the only thing I see increasing the replay value is to try to collect all bananas in each level. However, that's not something I would want to do.

Now that I think about it, another thing increasing the replay value would be to complete the levels using the hardest path when there are more than one way to the goal. I might try that eventually.

[d123456]

Gamefaqs reviews of the ps2 version says the controller are fuxured in the ps2 version as opposed to the GC version which has excellent control.
http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/924367-supe ... xe/reviews

[BoringSupreez]

Oops, forgot about this month's TG game! I'll have to get ahold of it ASAP.

[noiseredux]

I don't feel like this was our best TR.

[Flake]

I don't feel like this was our best TR.

As long as it wasn't the fault of the brave and virtuous article writer.

[noiseredux]

I don't feel like this was our best TR.

As long as it wasn't the fault of the brave and virtuous article writer.

I can't seem to trace back who's idea it was.