Games Beaten 2015

[Sarge]

I think I'd take no voice acting in this case.

[Luke]

So what makes Lost Levels so hard? For one, it requires that you throw yourself into its levels at full tilt, but it also requires that you memorize the level layout to understand just when you need to jump, when to dodge, what blocks to go after, and what to avoid. You cannot take this cautiously and survive. You don't have time, and the game will penalize you in places for doing so. But more importantly, you have to learn to mesh and flow with the level design.

We talkin' 'bout practice.


What I love and loathe about games like SMB, Ninja Gaiden, and Castlevania is that you can get on a roll, and one death completely destroys your game.

I'm a sucker for playing games by the beat of it's own music, as these style of platformers certainly have a rhythm. Make the right move on the right beat and floating Medusa heads aren't that difficult to dodge.

And those are the games I like the most. Love Bioshock Infinite, but games like Bionic Commando on the nes "do it" for me. It has a pace to follow. And that's also what makes games like Bayou Billy so difficult for me, as it has no pace.

[prfsnl_gmr]

I'm a sucker for playing games by the beat of it's own music, as these style of platformers certainly have a rhythm.

I just played through Ninja Gaiden II again this weekend, and I agree with this completely. Once you get going, you are hard to stop. A random hawk knocking you into pit, however, and it feels like you are starting over from the beginning (even if yoou are just reset to the last checkpoint). R-Type gives me this same feeling, which is probably why it is my favorite shmup. (BTW...R-Type Dimensions is still on sale on PSN, and it is awesome.)

(Luke...If you haven't already, you really, really need to pick up Rayman Origins or Rayman Legends. They perfect rhythm-based platforming, and I think you would enjoy them immensely.)

[Luke]

(Luke...If you haven't already, you really, really need to pick up Rayman Origins or Rayman Legends. They perfect rhythm-based platforming, and I think you would enjoy them immensely.)

Thanks! Heard of the games, but have never played or even scene them.

To Google I go!

[fastbilly1]

This time I played the game using the Wii Fight Stick by Hori - and it completely changed the experience for me.

I am glad that I am not the only person who does this. It really makes you rethink how games are designed by playing them without the correct controls. A couple years ago I played through part of Half Life with the same arcade stick and it really made me appreciate how the world was built even more than before. Sadly I got to a point where I physically could not continue due to needing precision shooting while moving and had to give up the quest.

[Ack]

This time I played the game using the Wii Fight Stick by Hori - and it completely changed the experience for me.

I am glad that I am not the only person who does this. It really makes you rethink how games are designed by playing them without the correct controls. A couple years ago I played through part of Half Life with the same arcade stick and it really made me appreciate how the world was built even more than before. Sadly I got to a point where I physically could not continue due to needing precision shooting while moving and had to give up the quest.

You know our friend Zee once played through as much of Metal Gear Solid as he could with a DDR pad? He eventually had to give up because the pad lacked L and R buttons, but he said it completely changed his perception of the game.

[fastbilly1]

This time I played the game using the Wii Fight Stick by Hori - and it completely changed the experience for me.

I am glad that I am not the only person who does this. It really makes you rethink how games are designed by playing them without the correct controls. A couple years ago I played through part of Half Life with the same arcade stick and it really made me appreciate how the world was built even more than before. Sadly I got to a point where I physically could not continue due to needing precision shooting while moving and had to give up the quest.

You know our friend Zee once played through as much of Metal Gear Solid as he could with a DDR pad? He eventually had to give up because the pad lacked L and R buttons, but he said it completely changed his perception of the game.

Who do you think he got the idea from? I was running UT2k4 with a dance pad and a mouse at the time.

[Czernobog]

My preparations for Phantom Pain continue.

1. Lighting Returns

I had some problems with FFXIII, but liked it enough overall to beat the game and enjoyed myself. I thought XIII-2 improved massively and actually platinumed the game, which I rarely do, so I was excited to try Lightning Returns.

Lightning Returns is strange. I've never played anything quite like it. Basically, the game starts with a few days left until the end of the world. It takes place 500 years after the end of XIII-2. Lightning has been awoken and apparently been designated as "savior" by Barthandelus, one of the various gods in the XIII lore. She has been giving the task of ferrying souls to a new world. Unfortunately, I found Lightning's constant way of talking about being the savior and brooding one of the most overly dramatic and annoying things ever. The other characters (most of which I didn't ever like to be honest) have made returns as well, because 500 years prior, the final events of XIII-2 caused everyone to stop aging. (They can still die though, and can no longer procreate). Snow has become king of his own party town, which is sort of hilarious. The others are spread around the world, each tending to their own issues. The story does get a little better, but is still often cringe-worthy. One of the saving graces is a little girl who keeps popping up to taunt Lightning and is enjoyably dark and vague to annoy her.

The gameplay is.....different, but addictive. There are encounters with on-screen enemies, but you do not level up by fighting them. Instead, you gain stat bonuses by completing quests throughout the four areas of the game. (Two cities, a desert, and a wildlands area.) Each quest also works to add time to the remaining days (you can get up to thirteen) and there is a clock constantly ticking down. You do have an ability to freeze the clock temporarily using ability points you get from killing monsters. There's no need to rush though, as you can fairly easily complete almost all the quests and still have days remaining. There are a few main quests which can be done in any order, as the game is completely open really early. Fortunately, the quests are fairly varied and some of them are interesting as the whole point is for people's souls to be "saved." There are some crappy fetch quests and tedious things thrown in though. Like finding clocks. Screw the clocks.

The battle system is actually surprisingly fun. It's sort of a mix between the garb system of X-2 and FFXIII's battle system. Most garbs have 1 or 2 unique abilities locked to them, but any open slots can be equipped with any abilities you have obtained throughout the game. You can have 3 garbs equipped at once and switch between them instantly with the shoulder buttons. I ended up having a physical fighter garb, a mage garb, and a buff garb, but also had additional ones for specific encounters. Basically, Lightning is extremely customizable. You can also create additional garb customizations and save them to equip when you want. The stagger bar also returns but has a color changing wavy line effect on the enemies hp bar which I didn't even notice until I had gotten a ways into the game.

Since it's the end of time and everything, you can actually drive nearly every monster in the game to extinction. After killing anywhere from 30 to 150ish(iirc) of a monster type, you get to fight their respective last one (basically a much stronger version of the enemy) and get a powerful accessory. I found playing the exterminator pretty fun. There are also two massively powerful extra bosses, which I attempted but did not beat. Would likely have to do so on a new-game plus.

Overall, an enjoyable game, and I was surprised by how much it was willing to differ from the other games.

2. Half-Life

Decided to play through the Half-Life games at long last. The first one was a lot of fun. Certainly dated at this point, but still enjoyable. I wish I had played this when it first came out as I probably wouldn't have played anything that managed to be quite as immersive at the time. It was noticeably more difficult than any modern fps I've played recently. I don't have a lot to say about it, other than the boss was annoying as hell, but Xen was neat. I tried playing through Opposing Force but ran into a glitch quite a ways into the game that would require a complete restart and decided to move onto the other games instead. Still may go back to that and run through Blue Shift as well.

3. Codename Gordon

This is a little 2D action platformer based on Half-Life that was taken off Steam, but you can still get if you Google how to get it in your Steam library. It's very short, but an alright little game. You hit things with a crowbar, then shoot things with the mouse when you pick up a couple guns. Then shoot down a helicopter and it's over. Manages to nail the half-life look with the headcrab zombies and things pretty well though. Even had some manhacks and vents. Good for a half-hour boredom cure.

4. Half Life 2 and the 2 Episodes

This is where I felt that Half-Life started to get interesting. I liked that the story wasn't spoon-fed to you, but you were dropped into the world and got to infer things through what was happening around you. I would have liked to see some more of the Xen enemies from the first game leaked into the world. The physics engine is certainly fun to play with, especially with the gravity gun, but some of the puzzles were a little too focused on it. Some very cool gameplay ideas, especially in episode 2. Every part of each game sort of feels like it's own set-piece. However, some areas do drag on and on. Especially the first boat section. Like the first game, I wish I had played this when it first came out. I imagine it was extremely impressive at the time. It still plays well, but I have a feeling some of it's more groundbreaking aspects are lost on me. I actually enjoyed the first Half-Life quite a bit more. I am a bit curious where they were trying to go with the story however. Maybe they're a bit curious as well.

5. The Last of Us

Let me preface this by saying I love horror games, but usually hate stealth segments. That being said, I found being stealthy the best part of The Last of Us' gameplay. I actually had a lot of fun sneaking around and landing the stealth kills. The gunfight segments mostly felt tedious. Still, this game was more about the story and atmosphere than the gameplay and it delivered. I really liked that the characters felt human. They were flawed and they had believable reasons for being flawed, especially Joel. Many of the environments were fun to explore and picking up the pieces left behind by other people who had once been there was often a highlight. This was especially true in the case of the boat captain who had made a life in the sewers. I know I'm not going into as much detail as I usually try to for my games beaten, but I am awfully tired at the moment.

6. Sleeping Dogs

Finally played through Sleeping Dogs since getting it on a Steam sale way back, and I wish I had tried it out sooner. I absolutely had a blast with this one. I'm really fond of these type of games when they know how to limit you're capabilities in the world. (I loved Saints Row III, but IV felt like you had way too much power way too early and felt like I had entered cheat codes). The story may have been cliche but the characters kept it from feeling stale, and I was always itching to do the story missions.

However, the best part of the game was the combat. It was just so damn fun. It's similar to the Batman games with the counter mechanic, but feels smoother. Once you get good at countering, you can feel like a total badass by countering every move and laying waste John Woo style. The driving was also fun with it's drifting mechanic and it was nice being able to lose cops easier than some of the GTA games. There's a ton of side mission things I haven't done much of, but I intend to play some more on my clear file and see what else there is to explore.

7. Fable: The Lost Chapters

Another enjoyable one. Fable had a lot of charm and quirkiness to it that I appreciated and being able to explore different elements of combat helped prevent it from becoming stale. I did a good playthrough, and thought about doing an evil playthrough down the line, but I'm not sure I'll want to invest the time. Fable sits at a strange place for me. There's an overall feeling of a game of that period but it's also refined enough that it doesn't quite feel the same. Anyway, I enjoyed the main quest quite a bit, and did some of the side quests, but there was tons more I could of unlocked and explored if I wanted. As for the Lost Chapters section, it felt a little tacked on. It offered some new enemies, a new location, and added to the story, but it was short and didn't have much of an impact. You did get a chance to use a powerful sword from the end of the game or a new one if you made different decisions which was nice, but the final boss was pretty disappointing. Overall, it took a while to get into, but once I did I was hooked all the way through.

8. Getsu Fuuma Den

I did a YouTube video on this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9MJ0mo8oJ8

Short version: I really loved it and consider it one of the Konami classics. It's got an overworld like zelda 2 but with the sidescrolling darkness of a Castlevania title and 3D dungeons. It was a bit short though.

9. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

I REALLY SHOULD HAVE PLAYED THIS BEFORE MGS4. Seriously, would have made that game much easier to understand. I had played all the MGS games with Solid as the main before this one, and enjoyed them all immensely. I love the convoluted plot and melodrama. I also suck at stealth games but have always found MG games approachable.

So far I'm really enjoying Big Boss as a character more than I enjoyed Solid. While Solid was virtuous and ended up being more of a hero through his journey, Kojima seems to have done a better job establishing Big Boss's emotions and changes, at least in MGS3. (I've made it a ways through Peace Walker before moving onto ground zeroes, and story/character depth seems to have taken a backseat to new gameplay mechanics.)

The gameplay in 3 is also just more enjoyable than it has been in the previous entries. I played the HD collection and also had the benefit of the free camera. Easy to control and maneuver and lots of possibilities for getting past areas.

Of course, one of my favorite aspects of MGS games is the boss battles. Ever since Psycho Mantis, I've always been itching for creative ones. MGS3 delivered on that front for the most part. The really good ones made me indifferent to the forgettable ones. The End and The Sorrow were especially enjoyable. The End took me about 45 minutes of tracking and sneaking. Once I caught him a couple times I realized I could just chase him pumping the shotgun though. The Sorrow was just my cup of tea. Nice and twisted.
Anyways, now I finally get why most players seem to consider it the best MGS game to date.

10. Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker *NEW*

I had a love/hate relationship with Peace Walker for a lot of my playtime but the hatred wilted away towards the end of my time with the game. At first, the game was far too easy. As I've said before, I'm extremely impatient and bad with stealth games. During the majority of the missions, it was extremely easy to run through tranquilizing everyone with no issues whatsoever. Then the boss battles turned out to be rather difficult because you're almost guaranteed to run out of ammo and need to call in for extra supply drops multiple times.

Apparently, this game was designed for multiplayer but I did just fine on all of the story missions and tons of the extra missions playing solo. I did try to do a couple multiplayer sessions but the game was never able to find other players.

This was most certainly designed for handheld and in that regard I think the game excels. It's made up of a metric ton of very short missions and base management. Very well designed for pick up and play a few minutes.

Although the game was repetitive there was enough there for me to keep coming back and I really became attached to creating my own little Outer Heaven. Many of the missions were a lot of fun and it was cool grabbing soldiers to build up different facets of the base and unlock new weapons/items.

As for the story, it's a pretty average little affair that works on it's own, but it's certainly a bridge between mgs3 and ground zeroes. The events of portable ops are pretty much handwaved away at the beginning. It was annoying having to keep doing the same basic mission several times for the final chapter to see the "true" ending though.

Also, it seems Kojima went a little sadistic with the button pressing sequence in this one. I haven't played a game that wasn't on NES or Game Boy that I can remember having to use the tense your arm muscles until your hand spasms trick.

11. Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes *NEW*

I write this somewhat tentatively because I've only completed the main mission in Ground Zeroes. Still, it had me familiar with the new system and it covered the small bit of story Ground Zeroes actually had. I fully intend to play the other side missions during the next few days.

I liked a lot of what Ground Zeroes did. In terms of gameplay alone, things have become much more immersive. You no longer have the radar or a life bar. Instead, you have to carefully inspect your surroundings, then act and react appropriately. When I shot out lights, enemies would come inspect the damage. Enemies also seemed to have much better eyesight than previous games. The game also drops you into playing with almost no explanation of how to play. As a retro fan, I absolutely loved that decision.

The story is much darker than the previous games. They were not shying away from some of the terrible things that happen during wars/conflicts. While I respect that, there was a particularly hard to watch scene at the end, and some very difficult audio cassettes to listen to. If this is any indication that Phantom Pain will deal with some of the same things, I'll be very surprised if it doesn't ruffle some feathers.

I'm also very glad I played Peace Walker so much before this. It gave Ground Zeroes a much bigger impact, as it's events are tied directly to that game, whereas Peace Walker spent a lot of time recapping mgs3. All that being said, if I had paid full price for this when it came out, I would have most likely been peeved by the short length and one environment, even with the side missions.

[BoringSupreez]

[MGS3]
Of course, one of my favorite aspects of MGS games is the boss battles. Ever since Psycho Mantis, I've always been itching for creative ones. MGS3 delivered on that front for the most part. The really good ones made me indifferent to the forgettable ones. The End and The Sorrow were especially enjoyable. The End took me about 45 minutes of tracking and sneaking. Once I caught him a couple times I realized I could just chase him pumping the shotgun though.

I think MGS3 benefits more from a no-kills playthrough than any other MGS title, simply because of The End. When you chase him with a shotgun, it's not too bad. When you've got to tranquilize him, it's much more of a cat-and-mouse ordeal. I've heard of people taking 2 hours to beat him with a tranq gun.

[Peace Walker]
Then the boss battles turned out to be rather difficult because you're almost guaranteed to run out of ammo and need to call in for extra supply drops multiple times.

Apparently, this game was designed for multiplayer but I did just fine on all of the story missions and tons of the extra missions playing solo. I did try to do a couple multiplayer sessions but the game was never able to find other players.

That's my biggest beef with Peace Walker too. You can't rely on getting multiplayer help, which leaves the boss fights overly difficult. It doesn't feel right using up all my ammo and killing so many people in a Metal Gear boss fight.

[alienjesus]

1. Star Fox 2 SNES
2. Sonic Advance 2 GBA
3. Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker Wii U
4. Advance Wars: Dark Conflict DS
5. Joy Mech Fight Famicom
6. Grandia PS1
7. Money Idol Exchanger Game Boy
8. The Battle of Olympus NES
9. Lost Kingdoms 2 GC
10. Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon DS
11. Code of Princess 3DS DL
12. Discworld Saturn
13. Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru [For the Frog the Bell Tolls] Game Boy
14. 3D Sonic the Hedgehog 3DS DL
15. 3D Streets of Rage 3DS DL
16. Pokémon Shuffle 3DS DL
17. 3D Altered Beast 3DS DL
18. 3D Super Hang-On 3DS DL
19. 3D Space Harrier 3DS DL
20. 3D Galaxy Force II 3DS DL
21. 3D Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master 3DS DL
22. Sonic 3 & Knuckles Mega Drive
23. Bayonetta Wii U
24. Fighting Vipers Saturn
25. Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan 3DS
26. Super Castlevania IV SNES
27. Shovel Knight Wii U eShop
28. Discworld II: Missing, Presumed...!? PC
29. Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo Saturn
30. Chameleon Twist N64
31. Live a Live SFC
32. Freshly-Picked Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland DS
33. Splatoon Wii U
34. Mega Man X Wii U VC
35. Game & Watch Gallery Advance GBA
36. Metroid: Zero Mission GBA
37. Saturn Bomberman Saturn *NEW*
38. Touch My Katamari PSN *NEW*
39. Banjo-Tooie N64 *NEW*
40. Transbot SMS *NEW*
41. Talmit's Adventure Mega Drive *NEW*
42. Alien 3 SMS *NEW*

Sigh, I've been very lazy in posting here. This is going to make me some time to type up...

Saturn Bomberman

Saturn Bomberman was one of the games on my Summer Games Challenge list, and is highly regarded as probably the best Bomberman game. This is pretty much entirely down to it's multiplayer mode which supports 10 player matches and adds lots of new features such as revenge bombing people to return to the arena and more. The multiplayer is a lot of fun, although I do think it has been surpassed in some ways since - The WiiWare Bomberman game for example has 8 player support, and allows you to completely customise how many of each item panel appear which is really cool. I do miss the dinosaurs/louies in that version though.

Multiplayer is definitely a selling point for the game then, and like most Bomberman games the single player is largely ignored and forgotten. Which is a shame, because like most Bomberman games I've played, it's pretty fun. In fact, it's probably the best single player campaign in the classic bomberman style.

It features a silly story about a gang of crooks stealing some stones and awakening a giant monster and taking over the world or something. It has some nicely animated cartoons to tell the story which look great and are reasonably amusing. The sound mixing in them is awful though - the music is muffled and the voices are hard to hear. The story campaign involves destroying mcguffins in each level (called zarfs, which is hilarious) whilst also defeating enemies and blowing up blocks to find items. You can also find dinosaur eggs to ride which work similar to the louie kangaroo guys from previous bomberman games but with a slight twist in how they can level up from a baby at level 1 to an adult at level 3, powering up in the process. This is done by gaining points without losing the dino to fill a guage. When full, the dino will evolve at the start of the next level.

Dinosaurs come in 5 colours with different skills. Blue dinos can kick bombs over blocks. At level 2 and 3 they can kick them further and over hard blocks and the edges of the stage too (bombs kicked over the stage edge appear on the other side pac-man style). Pink dinos can jump over bombs, blocks and explosions and at higher levels can jump over unbreakable blocks and the stage edge too. Green dinos can run fast but can't turn or stop at level 1, colliding with walls and being stunned. Level 2 dinos are twice as fast and can stop at will and don't get stunned when hitting a wall. Level 3 dinos are even faster and can turn whilst running. Yellow dinos can stun enemies with a roar. Higher level roars cover more ground. It's always crap though, as it doesnt last long enough. Purple dinos have a sonar wave which detonates bombs and shows items in blocks. Useless in single player, though I bet it's good in multi.

The story mode takes place over 6 chapters in different eras of time. The level designs are nice and I love how each level joins to the next so it feels like you're progressing. The story mode is also very easy - much easier than Bomberman 93 and 94 for sure. You get remote bombs early and they reappear fairly often, dinos are more common than louies were in 94 and there are also extra hit hearts in fairly decent supply, compared to the maybe 2 that were in 94. It's still a lot of fun though.

Saturn Bomberman commands some surprising prices for a Bomberman game, though not that crazy as far as good Saturn games go. It's worth the money in my opinion - it's a definite highlight of the series. If you don't mind splashing out a bit, give it a go, it's great.

Touch My Katamari

Touch My Katamari is my first real introduction to the Katamari series. It was short and easy, but I had a lot of fun with it. I won't bore people by talking about the premise in detail (see stuff, roll stuff up, repeat) as I'm sure everyone knows how the series works. The series has appear on multiple consoles and hasn't really changed in any meaningful way.

It has a quirky sense of humour and a very distinct style that makes the premise work but I get the sense that people are suffering from franchise fatigue - if only because this was an entirely enjoyable experience that didn't review that well or get talked about much. It's short, it could do with a bunch more content and it doesn't innovate much, but it's still fun.

Touch My Katamari's new gimmick is that you can use the touch screen to pinch or streatch your katamari to make it thinner or wider. Thinner katamari's roll faster and can fith through narrow gaps but obviously pick up less, whilst wider katamaris are slower but pick up more at once. The gimmick is honestly a little annoying, and it can be a bit finnicky to do what you want sometimes.

Most missions involve rolling as much up as you can, aswell as rolling up certain types of objects (royal, money related, strong etc). A few offer more intersting twists such as the level where you must roll up as much low calories food as possible within your calorie count. There are two levels based around not rolling up certain kinds of objects though, and these suck - the controls are too awkward and the camera too badly placed to requiore such specific movements, as the items to avoid are bloody everywhere.

There are only 13 missions in the game, and that's it's biggest issue. The game would feel short with twice this amount of content, and probably with triple the amount too. For what content is there though, Touch My Katamari is a fun little game that was well worth the £3 or so I paid for it on sale. I can understand people's frustration that a series that was based on such an innovative concept fails to innovate further in every successive version, but as an introduction to the series there's nothing wrong here.

Banjo Tooie:

Banjo-Tooie is a game on my Summer Games Challenge list. A few summers ago I played through Banjo Kazooie for the first time for the summer challenge and I adored it. I prefer it over Super Mario 64 for sure. So I was very much looking forward to playing through this one too.

Banjo-Tooie feels like a different game to it's predecessor. It's cartoony whimsy is still present, but there's a much darker undertone and some classically British dark humour too. Within 10 minutes two characters have been killed off (in comical fashion), one of whom is a fairly well known character from the first game. There's a lot more double entendre, dark humour and slightly twisted scenarios here too, and it kind of feels like it's coming from a Rareware testing the waters to see what they could get away with in Conker. How the game got away with a 3+ rating in the UK I don't know Importantly though, it's still very charming overall, and it doesn't feel like it's changing what Banjo Kazooie is, but building on the original.

The gameplay is very similar to the previous game - collect 10 jiggies in each level, plus numerous other things. It's described as a collectathon, but it's not so bad really. You can use a whole bunch of skills to help you proceed, including every skill from the first game being available righr from the start. You also gain a whole ton of new skills, a lot of which are much more situational before (only used when flying or swimming for example). You also gain the ability to split apart at special pads, and many of the new moves require Banjo or Kazooie to be alone.

Whilst the gameplay is the same, the levels are not. Most of them are huge, rivalling those in DK64, with loads to see. This makes things feel very epic and big, but it also makes it feel like everything is needlessly drawn out. A typical level would take me nearly an hour before I started gaining jiggies as I spent the time scouting the level and finding the new abilities first. Unlike DK64, there's not enough stuff in the levels to justify the size - DK64 had 25 mcguffins to find per level, Tooie has 10. This also tends to lead quests to have lots of tedious walking back and forward to get the things you need, especially if you need to make use of a transformation ability or one of Mumbos spells. It's still fun, but I would have preferred 16 levels at half the size over the 8 found here.

The levels often join together now and you can enter one level from another at multiple points. Earlier levels often require abilities acquired later in the game to get all the jiggies too, so the world feels like it progressively becomes more accessible, unlike Kazooie where each level was basically independent of each other (there's a single jiggy in Kazooie that requires backtracking iirc). It's impressive just how much they packed in one N64 game, and the draw distances and lack of fog is pretty impressive on the system, although the occassional slowdown and low framerate can annoy sometimes.

Banjo Tooie is a must own game for the N64 that successfully builds upon th first game. Of the two though, I much prefer Banjo Kazooie. I loved Tooie, don't get me wrong (I 100% completed it after all!) but one of the things I adored about the original was how fast paced it was. You could blast around the levels finding all 10 jiggies and it felt like you were always making significant progress. Tooie is much slower and more methodical, and whilst it's not a bad approach, its not as accessible or as consistently enjoyable as the first game.

Banjo Tooie is great, I love it. Banjo Kazooie is greater though.

Transbot

Transbot is a shoot em up for the Master System that I recieved as part of my My Retro Game Box subecription back in May, along with Shinobi for SMS and Wave Race and Game & Watch Gallery 2 for Game Boy.

Transbot was originally releaded on a card format (like Turbografx HuCards) that was compatible with the original model Master System, although it was also released on cartridge - perhaps when the Master System 2 came out and the card port was ditched? This card format seemingly had a low memory capacity, and all the games released on it are very simple. Transbot is no exception as it features a brain melting TWO levels.

Transbot involves you playing as a giant robot that flies through space in the form of a spaceship shooting stuff. Some weapons you acquire will make you switch into giant robot form, which serves absolutely no benefit whatsoever as it's only gameplay effect is to make you a much, much bigger target for bullets. Transbot moves slowly, and you can't have many bullets on screen at once. It's not terrible to control, but it's far from great.

Weapons are acquired from trucks that appear on the ground sporadically - shooting them releases a weapon icon which when collected starts cycling through the 6 weapons at high speed. Pressing A lets you stop the cycling, though timing it for the good weapons is hard. Most of the weapons suck - there's a few that are like the basic shot but worse because you can fire less often, a spread shot that's short range but decent, which is ruined by being a giant ass robot when you use it, and the infamous missile which I'll get to in a minute.

Seemingly to make up for Transbot only having 2 levels, the game's designers designed the first level to loop indefinitely unless you know the obscure trick to beating it. It's a dick move (although maybe it tells you in the manual? I don't have it) that isn't fun and doesn't make much sense. Near the end of the level, just before it loops, some satellite enemies appear. Shooting them does nothing other than make them shoot back. The trick to finishing the level is to keep hold of weapon D, the missiles, for when you get here, as these can destory the satellites. Destroy them all and you drop into a tunnel and begin level 2.

Level 2 is nothing special. They throw more enemies at you and lots of them come from behind, which I always feel is a dick move in shmups. There's a boss at the end which definitely isn't an ATST from Star Wars. Losing to the boss seems to make the level loop round again (and it takes FOREVER) but beating him sends you back to level 1 - this is an endlessly looping game.

Transbot is not a bad game. But Transbot is not a good game either. Not by a long shot. I wouldn't bother to track this one down, but I guess it's worth a punt if you run across it for cheap.

Talmit's Adventure

Whilst Transbot was a game I recieved in my May My Retro Game Box, Talmit's Adventure was a game I recieved in the June box, alongside Splatterhouse 2 (MD), Spy Hunter (GBA) and Bomberman Tournament (GBA). It's better known under it's American name (?) Marvel Land.

Talmit's Adventure is an early release for the Mega Drive, and is a port of a Namco arcade game. It is a platformer where you play as the Dragon prince (basically a human boy with a tail) to rescue the fairies who protect a magical theme park from the evil mole king. It's kinda dumb, but also kinda awesome.

First impressions of Talmit's Adventure aren't great. The game looks great for such an early Mega Drive release sure, but it still looks like an early Mega Drive release, and it doesn't hold up to the graphical fidelity of post-Sonic MD games by along shot. The music is nice but kinda twee and repeats too often. Like many old arcade games music is often used for multiple levels. The controls of Talmit's Adventure feel kinda slippery, and enemy hitboxes are too small and it's very easy to miss the hitbox and fall into and enemy and die.

Play a little longer though, and you start to realise that Talmit's Adventure is kinda quirky and fun and very impressive for it's time. It has cool power ups like the dragon wings to glide with and the incredibly cool clone power up which gives you a whip of mirror image Talmit's to swing around and hit enemies with, and even to swing gaps like a rope. The stages are filled with interestin hazards such as tilting pirate ships and steam ships whose paddle wheels you can ride across. The physics on tilting platformers and swinging across gaps feel accurate and awesome - very impressive for a mega drive game.There are also hidden doors everywhere which allow you to warp about the levels and finding them is a lot of fun too. The enemy designs are weird and quirky. Talmit's Adventure quickly goes from feeling a bit uninspired to being a lot of fun!

It gets better too. There are awesome roller coaster stages which shoot you round a level at a fast pace, jumping and ducking over obstacles. The level end is a giant target you ahve to jump through at the right height to get more points. The 'bosses' are silly mini games of musical chairs and rock paper scissors, but without the random bullshit like in alex kidd (you can defend yourself when you lose). When you beat a boss you get to enjoy a bonus level which is full of parade floats based on other Namco arcade titles like Valkyrie, Sky Kid, Mappy, Pac-Man and loads more I only half recognised. The last level is and incredibly easy but very fun escape through a collapsing cave and out of the park on a roller coaster which just adds to the fun.

The hit detection and control issues of Talmit's Adventure aren't easy to ignore. They'll annoy you throughout the entire game and you will die a lot to things you feel weren't fair. The pain is lessened somewhat by the fact that the game has infinite continues and the fact that you'll be having a lot of simple arcade platforming fun. Talmit's Adventure isn't amazing, but it is fun, and sometimes that's all a game needs. Pick it up for sure!

Alien 3

Coincidentally enough, much like Transbot was a My Retro Game Box game from May and Talmit's Adventure a MRGB game from June, this was a game I got from my Retro Game Box subscription in June, alongside Pilotwings 64 (N64), Sim City 2000 (Saturn) and Sonic Pinball Party (GBA). It was ctually totally unplanned to play them in this order

Alien 3 was 'the dud' game I pulled out of last months Retro Box. A licensed game for the Master System by Acclaim wasn't something that set my heart racing with excitement. But I stuck it in the console to give it a go, and...what do you know, this is actually pretty cool. The game looks stunning for an SMS game - better than many games I've played on the Mega Drive even. Ripley animates nicely and the Alien's look pretty awesome, even in 8 bit. The music is good, if not especially memorable and it controls nicely other than some odd jumping physics. This might be worth a go!

And indeed it was. If any of you are familar with the SNES or Mega Drive versions of this game, this plays similarly - run around slightly maze like levels killing aliens and rescuing prisoners before escaping. Aliens attack you fast and do a good chunk of damage, so it's important to be ready for them at any time. Luckily you have a good set of weapons to rely on - the standard machine gun will be you main weapon early on, but you also have a very handy instant-kill flamethrower, a slow but powerful and long range rocket launcher and some grenades to make use of. Each have their own role - I generally used the flamethrower to deal with surprise attacks, the rocket to shoot aliens above me on ladders and the grenades to drop on enemies below me on ladders.

The level designs are convoluted, especially close to the end, and you need to rescue all hostages to finish the level.Aliens often ambush you from ceilings and due to the limited SMS control scheme (you need to hit down and jump to cycle through weapons) being ambushed unexpectedly often leads to cheap hits. Because of this, learning the level is essential so you can have your limited ammo flamethrower ready for when an alien drops. Once you know where the Aliens are, you main enemies are the level timer (which strangely is very tight on early missions, but gives you more than enough time mid to late game) and the games dodgy jumping controls -stage 3 has a lot of jumping over instant death pits, and that is easily the hardest level in the game by my reckoning.

The game can get a little repetitive over it's 15-20 levels (15 regular stages and 5 boss fights, all of which are pretty easy besides maybe the last boss who is easy once you figure out where to stand) but it's not lacking in quality. From the little I know about the 16 bit versions of Alien 3, this game easily holds up alongside them, and some people claim it even surpasses them. I think that the game might not be the greatest game ever made, but it's absolutely a game worth owning for your Master System. Buy it!

Next up: I'm still (slowly) working through my summer list, and I'd like to try and get at least 7 done before the month's out. We'll see though. I'm also (very slowly) continuing with the alphabet list by playing Hyperdimension Neptunia. Lastly, I'm working on Retro Game Challenge on DS just because.