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Plus Adventure is pretty awesome.

Sarge wrote:I forgot that I finished off Monument Valley: The Forgotten Shores a few weeks ago.

I forgot about that! I need to pick that expansion up on my phone. (Last Droid game I bought was this actually.)

dsheinem wrote:

Stark wrote:I've been thinking about doing the challenge, especially since the first couple of years should go quick and I'm a year off from Dave. Any suggestions for 1978-A?

Edit: Looks like Atari Football or Avalanche?

You could fudge it and do Adventure, as there is a lot of dispute about what year that game came out: http://blog.hardcoregaming101.net/2012/ ... ar-of.html

Well if nothing else, that article was a great read! I loved Adventure as a kid, would be nice to finish it.

1. Painkiller - PC
2. Front Mission 4 - PS2
3. Wasteland 2 - PC
4. Arcanum - PC
5. X-COM Terror from the Deep - PC
6. Military Madness - TurboGrafx-16
7. Unreal - PC
8. Shadowrun - SNES
9. Warcraft III - PC
10. Dungeon Keeper - PC
11. Final Fantasy X-2 HD - PS3
12. Descent - PC
13. Quake Mission Pack 2 - Dissolution of Eternity - PC
14. Quake 2 Mission Pack 2 - Ground Zero - PC
15. Sokobond - PC
16. Hybrid Heaven - N64
17. Sonic the Hedgehog - Genesis
18. Castlevania - NES

I was waiting for the oven to preheat over the weekend (and then for the food to finish baking) so I popped this in to my NES which is in my bedroom, while everything else is in the media room a flight below the kitchen. I had dabbled in this a bit back when our TR was Castlevania but the furthest I ever got was to the mummies. This time I found I had the patience and willingness to use items to first make it to Frankenstein, then midway through Death's level, but I was hitting a real roadblock there. I went and watched the current record on Speed Demos and saw just how critical the holy water was for Death's level (not to mention Death) and decided to push forward tonight. After a few tries I managed to get a good run where I kept the holy water from beginning to end and made Death my bitch. Then it was on to Dracula's level, which took a few tries before I realized that spamming the stopwatch was the way to go. Then came the many many retries against Dracula until I got the timing down for his first form. I spent several continues fruitlessly trying to do a pattern of jump and crouch under the aimed fireballs but I kept getting screwed whenever he would teleport close. Then I had an epiphany and switched it up to the jump over the fireballs and hit strategy. On my best run I only took two hits, which gave me more than enough buffer for his second form with the holy water. Since I started off without the double I wasn't able to keep him stunlocked, but in one moment where he could attack I killed a few fireballs and got a double, and from there he was locked down until I won.

The game is quite tightly designed and you can get a lot if you know the right tools for the job. In that way it reminds me of Final Fantasy V, where many really hard fights become trivial if you know what you're doing. There were definitely a few bullshit deaths, but most of the time I died because I was getting careless.

Congrats on beating Castlevania legit. (Personally I have no problems getting all the way to Dracula's second form. But once the blue demon form appears, it's always a crapshoot whether I'm going to be able to holy water him to death or not.) It's definitely a very tightly designed game that still holds up today.

Good on ya Popo! Castlevania is one of those games you love, and after beating it never want to see again for at least six months.

First Dracula..easy. But you can't take a single hit as...

Second Dracula...bastard.

I say that because most of the game has a specific time pattern to it and that pattern is constant. Crouch, whip, jump, stop, wait, forward, repeat. Then "Second Dracula" comes in out of nowhere, looks like e Wendigo and completely throws you a curveball.

And this should go in the Random Gaming Thoughts Thread, but I'll just post it here: An IRA based GTA game could be brilliant. The story writes itself, and the landscape would be amazing.

Second Dracula nailed me the first couple times, but the third time I approached it a little more methodically. Throw holy water, a couple of whips and back off so he doesn't jump in my face, if he hasn't jumped by the time the water is finished throw another and repeat, if he has wait for him to land and water.

1. Super Smash Brothers - N64 (January 3)
2. Shovel Knight - Wii U (January 6)
3. NES Remix - Wii U (January 14)
4. NES Remix 2 - Wii U (January 14)
5. Streets of Rage - Genesis (January 16)
6. F-Zero - SNES (January 21)
7. Super Mario 3D World - Wii U (January 28)
8. Hyrule Warriors - Wii U (February 5)
9. Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D - 3DS (February 23)
10. Double Dragon Neon - PC (March 1)
11. Mario Kart 8 - Wii U (March 3)
12. Hotline Miami - PS3 (March 14)
13. Pokemon White - Nintendo DS (March 17)

Hotline Miami was a decent game, in my opinion not necessarily mind blowing or truly innovative. But it was good. I don't know that I'm sold on the prospect of the sequel unless it truly does something ground breaking. The game was difficult enough and felt more of trial and error. Its aiming scheme takes something to truly get used to and there's still a degree of luck to it. I'd say it's worth giving a shot. 7/10

Pokemon White - 1CC Clear, No Blackouts. This might have been the best Pokémon game I've played on the DS. I haven't really played through Soul Silver, which I was holding off on until I beat this one. I really enjoyed the new features to White, liked that Team Plasma as a plot was better than the usual Team Rocket, Team Galactic, etc. I'd definitely go through Black 2 / White 2 sometime in the near future. Most of the Pokémon are decent in terms of design, some feel like they're really scraping the bottom of the bucket. All that aside, it was an enjoyable and memorable experience. 9/10

MrPopo wrote:I was waiting for the oven to preheat over the weekend (and then for the food to finish baking) so I popped this in to my NES which is in my bedroom, while everything else is in the media room a flight below the kitchen....

What were you cooking? Did you have a moment of negligence where you felt like you were going to inadvertently burn down your house? I hope you were able to beat the game, and then beat down the rising flames. Good job on your victory!

I was heating up some cheese bread bites I got from the grocery store.