Games Beaten 2017

[Sarge]

I will also sing Phantasy Star IV's praises. Gameplay is basically sci-fi Dragon Quest, and it's awesome. It definitely stands among the best of the 16-bit era, and has aged quite well.

[MrPopo]

Yeah, PSIV is great. I really enjoyed it when I played it last year.

[Ack]

1. Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide (PC)(Action)
2. Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (SNES)(Fighting)

Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 is Mortal Kombat 3 but now Ultimate because it adds back in missing characters and Endurance matches. While not all of this content made it into the SNES version, this particular port brought us the Brutality...which the AI was quite happy to show to me early on as I started playing it. There's also at least one character still cut, dropped sound effects, and various cut corners to make things easier on by-then aging hardware.

That said, it's still Mortal Kombat. The Mortal Kombat games are not about fighting with honor; they're about cheese, exploits, cheapness, and punishing mistakes. UMK3 is no different from its predecessors, though it thankfully still plays like Mortal Kombat 3. We haven't gone back to MK2's ridiculous jumping supermen AI. Still, many of the same old tricks apply, and since UMK3 brings back in my mainstay Scorpion, well, I was more than happy to spear my fair share of opponents.

This also means that many of the SNES port of MK3's flaws are still present in UMK3. For instance, your first opponent generally stands there and lets you beat them into a pulp, but the next opponent will put on their game face and end you like a bag of potato chips at fat camp. Feed in a new credit, and now that opponent who just smashed your hopes and crushed your dreams basically stands there and lets you win. They're not totally defenseless...but they don't really start trying to fight back until they've got 1/4 of their health left, and even then, it's not by much. And bosses? You jumpkick those, just like last time.

Some interesting quirks also popped up along the way. First, either Scorpion's hitbox while throwing the spear is massively enormous, or the sweep kick has a range like a mother, because opponents would sometimes duck when I chucked a spear and knock me off my feet despite the edge of their toes being a couple of meters from me. The mid-air directional input trick still works, so you can jump, put in the directional command for a special move, and then execute with the final attack button as soon as you hit the ground, often letting you catch a completely off-guard opponent. And there are apparently some terrible wonderful ways to chain combos, though I didn't get the hang of it.

Frankly, I just don't have any desire to return to the good old days of Mortal Kombat anymore, and this wraps up the series on the SNES for me. I'm glad it's over with as I have many other SNES titles to get to. Gotta knock out some RPGs at some point this year!

As of now, I'm down to three NTSC-U fighters on the SNES left to beat before I can say I've taken them all down, and two of them are highly questionable as fighters:

King of the Monsters
King of the Monsters 2
DRAGON: The Bruce Lee Story

[TSTR]

Playing old school MK vs the CPU is basically an endurance test to see how much bullshit you can take in a single sitting.

[Ack]

Or how much bullshit you can dish out. I learned years ago how to dish out bullshit in fighters when necessary after playing a ton of Soul Calibur against a guy who knew all of Sophitia's launchers so well he could do infinite juggles. After I got used to people with that kind of playstyle, I got into cheese and got a lot better at the likes of Mortal Kombat.

[TSTR]

Oh yeah, that's the only way to win.

[Markies]

1. Phantasy Star II (GEN)
2. Guitar Hero (PS2)

I beat Guitar Hero on the Playstation 2 this afternoon!

Back when this game was mega popular, I used to play this and Rock Band at several friend's houses. I have also played it at several parties as well. It was a cultural phenomenon for a long while and it is a game that I always wanted to play. I got introduced to Harmonix by Amplitude and I then played its prequel of Frequency. With those two out of the way, it was finally time for me to play Guitar Hero.

After playing Frequency and Amplitude, it was very easy for me to get into Guitar Hero. All I had to do was get used to the controller and I was quickly able to get 5 stars on several songs. I really liked the song selection as some of the songs are some of my favorites. It was fun to play those and sing along to the lyrics that I know so well. It really is very enjoyable to play the game.

It is also really PAINFUL! My finger is rather number because of the raised indentation on the middle fret. Also, some of the later songs were just getting rather brutal. I love playing the game, but holy hell does it hurt! Also, all of the songs are covers and once you realize that fact, it's hard to miss it. Some of them are pretty bad and very obvious that they are not the real song.

Besides that, there is not much to say. Guitar Hero is a game I think everybody has played. I'm not good at music games, but I absolutely love playing them. Guitar Hero is quite an iconic game and I can see why it is!

More Importantly, I am now under 100 Unfinished Games on my Backlog! I finally reached my goal!!

[alienjesus]

More Importantly, I am now under 100 Unfinished Games on my Backlog! I finally reached my goal!!

Congrats. Just make sure you don't follow my example - I was down to about 60 unbeaten at one point, now I have over 250

Anyway, update from me:

1. 3D Power Drift 3DS
2. Maze Hunter 3-D 3DS
3. Hyrule Warriors Legends 3DS *NEW*

Hyrule Warriors Legends


Hyrule Warriors was a game I rather enjoyed when I first played it on Wii U. It's a big, dumb, stupid game, but it's a big, dumb, stupidly fun game too. You run around chopping up legions of Stalchildren and Bokoblins and other Zelda enemies as popular Zelda characters like Link and Zelda, and les spopular ones like Agatha. There was a ton of content, the game could take hundreds of hours to complete, plus there was a crapload of DLC with new characters and new weapons and even more damn content. Hundreds of hours. You'd never feel like you were short changed with this game, that's for sure.



Cue Hyrule Warriors Legends, a 3DS port of the Wii U game. There are obvious downsides to this version - the graphic quality is way lower, and less enemies can be rendered on screen at once. It's not terrible - if you've played the Wii U version in multiplayer, it's kinda like that for enemy numbers at once - but it does mean it takes longer to wipe out a large enemy group as you can quite literally hit less at once - the others haven't spawned in yet!

But the game also has obvious advantages too. Not only does it feature all the base content from the original game, but it also adds in all the DLC characters and weapons from the Wii U game too - that's a lot of bonus content. On top of that, the main campaign has increased from 15 to 29 maps, there's a whole extra adventure mode map, and there are 6 brand new characters introduced which weren't originally in the Wii U version too - Toon Link, Tetra, Medli and King Daphnes from The Wind Waker, Skull Kid from Majora's Mask, and new character Linkle, who is a badass character who looks like Link but even more girly (because she is a girl) and thinks she is the legendary hero. This isn't even mentioning the additional DLC which adds a ton of characters from other portable Zelda adventures - we're talking Marin from Link's Awakening, Yuga and Ravio from Link Between Worlds and Toon Zelda in Phantom form from Spirit Tracks.



So, somehow, this game has managed to make the Wii U version feel like a bad deal. It contains twice the amount of base content, all the extra DLC characetrs and weapons from the Wii U game, and a bunch of new content not available in the Wii U game (the DLC characters and weapons are available now, but not the DLC Maps or new content from the 3DS game). And it does this all on 3DS for a lower price than the original.

However, the concessions made to the console are notable. Graphically it doesn't bother me too much, but the sense of spectacle and the speed of completing levels is made a lot slower due to lower on-screen enemy counts. I have a New 3DS too, and my understanding is that this game is practically unplayable on the original 3DS or 2DS too.



Hyrule Warriors is an impressive port to underpowered hardware, and it manages to keep most of what made it fun. It has all the problems of the original game and basically the whole 'Warriors' series - it's mindless, repetitive and honestly, overly padded in many respects, but it's still a lot of fun. If you have a choice between the 2 versions, well, it's a tricky one in my eyes. For the most content, the 3DS version is king, but I can't help but feel I had a bit more fun with the extra grandeur of the Wii U game. Either of them are worth a shot though!

[BoneSnapDeez]

I have a New 3DS too, and my understanding is that this game is practically unplayable on the original 3DS or 2DS too.

That's too bad. I was wondering if this was worth checking out in addition to the Wii U game. Probably not.

[Blu]

1. Runbow - Wii U
2. Battlefield 1 - Xbox One
3. Until Dawn - PS4
4. Super Mario Sunshine - Gamecube
5. Titanfall 2 - Xbox One

This campaign was awesome. I think it was something that Titanfall 2 severely lacked. It gave me the feels, was pretty engaging and some of the levels were really awesome in terms of helping redefine the FPS genre. I think if you're on the fence about shooters in general, this one will definitely engage you and provide some thrills.