Games Beaten 2020

Post by **Markies** » Thu Aug 27, 2020 9:00 pm

Markies' Games Beat List Of 2020!
*Denotes Replay For Completion*

1. Pikmin 2 (GCN)
2. Banjo-Tooie (N64)
3. Contra: Hard Corps (GEN)
4. Super Baseball Simulator 1,000 (SNES)
5. Chip 'N Dale Rescue Rangers 2 (NES)
6. Pinball Hall of Fame: The Gottlieb Collection (PS2)
***7. Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (PS2)***
***8. Cruis'N USA (N64)***
9. Arc The Lad Collection (PS1)
10. Halo 2 (XBOX)
11. Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings And The Lost Ocean (GCN)
12. DuckTales 2 (NES)
13. Atelier Iris 3: Grand Phantasm (PS2)
14. Rocket Knight Adventures (GEN)
***15. Skies of Arcadia (SDC)***
16. Dragon Quest V (SNES)
17. Marvel Vs. Capcom (PS1)
***18. Street Fighter II: Special Championship Edition (GEN)***
19. Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic II - The Sith Lords (XBOX)
20. Disney's Aladdin (SNES)

I beat Disney's Aladdin on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System this evening!

As a kid, I loved the Aladdin movie. I was a giant Robin Williams fan and I loved every moment of him on screen in the film. Growing up, I had a Sega Genesis and I remember renting the Aladdin video game that was made by Virgin for the Genesis. The game was incredibly difficult and I only got a few levels into the game before I became bored and frustrated. Once I got the Super Nintendo, I realized that I could play the other Aladdin game made by Capcom. I remember watching a review by my favorite reviewer and talking to my friend who gave really high marks for the game. With a way to break up the RPG's that I had on the system, I decided to try it for myself and I finally snagged myself a copy at a local game convention. And with the Together Retro theme about Birds who are Jerks, it only seemed fitting to play it now.

I am happy to say that they are both mostly right. My favorite part of the game is probably the variety of each level. There are smaller levels within each stage that are similiar, but each stage feels like its own unique place. From the city to caves to dungeons to inside the Magic Lamp to a romantic ride through the night, which was probably my favorite stage, each one brought something new visually and feel to it. Besides that, the game is pretty much a standard Capcom platformer. You have apples that you can throw, you bounce off enemies like Mario and most of the time, you have a sheet that helps control your falls. There are a few bosses, but not after every level or stage. There are also ten hidden red gems that you can collect throughout each stage which changes the ending a bit, adding a bit more to the challenge. It's all pretty standard fair, but it is still done exceptionally well.

I just wish Aladdin controlled slightly better. Momentum is a key factor in the game and it screwed me up several times. Aladdin doesn't stop on a dime, but he'll keep going for a step or two. When navigating tiny platforms or jumps, it got to be a little annoying. It took a while to get used to it, but it was still annoying.

Overall, Aladdin on the Super Nintendo is a really great platformer. It's not one of the best games on the system, but it is an incredibly good game. It is worth your time and effort to pick this game up and give it a shot, especially if you love platformers or anything that Capcom touches.

Post by **prfsnl_gmr** » Fri Aug 28, 2020 12:09 pm

First 40

41. Tcheco in the Castle of Lucio (Switch)
42. The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (Switch)
43. Stories Untold (Switch)
44. Boxboy! + Boxgirl! (Switch)
45. R-Type Leo (Arcade)
46. Cybarian: The Time-Traveling Warrior (Switch)
47. Duck Souls+ (Switch)
48. Daggerhood (Switch)
49. Gravity Duck (Switch)
50. Biolab Wars (Switch)

R-Type Leo is an R-Type game in name only. There is no force pods; it doesn’t have checkpoints; it supports two players; and it plays much more like a “traditional” shmup. It’s also pretty easy, and you can credit feed to get through it, unlike other R-Type games. (I got through it for $2.75.) Nonetheless, it’s a pretty solid shmup that’s a lot of fun. You aren’t punished too much for failure, and although it starts out relatively easy, the last few levels are really tough. Recommended.

I bought Cybarian: The Time-Traveling Warrior on a whim, and I was pleasantly surprised by it. It is a side-scrolling action-platformer that plays a like a Mega Man/Volgarr the Viking mash-up. The story is very silly: you’re a barbarian thrown into a cyber-punk future, and the game is very pleasing aesthetically with an upbeat chip-tune soundtrack, faux scanlines, and distortion at the edges of the screen (just like a real CRT!). The levels are solid, but the boss fights are AMAZING. You can beat the whole game in a little over an hour, which is just about the right length. Highly recommended (if, like me, you can get it on sale).

Duck Souls+ is a charming die-and-retry platformer with 100 levels, each of which you can get through in a few seconds. (In other words, it’s really short.) It has a “casual” mode with generous checkpoints for those new to the genre, and a “hard” mode for more experienced players. It also has charming graphics, a pretty great soundtrack, and an ending where the developer says, in overly effusive terms, that he loves everyone who plays his game. I paid $5 for it, which is a bit stiff in light of the limited content, but I had enough fun with it that I’m not holding a grudge. Hesitantly recommended at full price, recommended on sale.

Daggerhood is a fantastic precision platformer that incorporate elements from 1001 Spikes, N+, and Portal. In it, you play as a thief who can double-jump, jump off walls, throw knives, and swap places with his knife while it’s in midair. This last ability makes for some stupendous platforming, such as double-jumping off a wall before free-falling into a pit of instant death spike, throwing a knife into a spike-line corridor, and swapping places with it as it crosses over a ledge and a few milliseconds before your character is impaled. Each of the game’s 100 levels has four goals: (1) making it to the exit alive; (2) making it to the exit alive under a certain amount for time; (3) finding five hidden treasures; and (4) finding a fairy that disappears from the level after only a few seconds. The knife moves faster than your character can run; so, hitting the par time and finding the fairy are often dependent on you navigating horizontal space very efficiently. (Thankfully, you don’t have to accomplish all the goals in one run.) The game’s goals aren’t unrealistic, however, and once I learned a level well (typically after a few dozen deaths), I could often finish a level a few seconds before the “par” time and grab a fairy with a second or two to spare. Every twentieth level is a “boss” level, two of which are battles against a bird and a beholder and three of which are escapes from a giant burrowing insect, rising lava, and a big spooky ghost. There are also items that reverse gravity, reveal invisible platforms, etc. that just make the game even harder. (Wall jumping upside down is a trip.) Finally, the game has one of those underwhelming “congratulations!” endings endemic to the hardest NES games. Although I loved it, the game is by no means perfect. The music isn’t that good, and both wall jumping and double-jumping can be a bit stiff. Still, I played it compulsively until I had accomplished every goal in the game, and I really can’t recommend it highly enough.

Gravity Duck is a puzzle platform game where you reverse gravity and rotate it 90 degrees. It has 100 levels and it controls like an old DOS platformer. You can beat it in less than an hour. It’s not bad or good; just OK.

Biolab Wars is a an action platformer that many reviewers compared to Contra, but that I thought played a bit more like the old Taxan G.I. Joe games. (You can’t shoot vertically, and the jumping is a bit loosey-goosey.) It’s very silly, and you can play as a buff dude with sunglasses, a dog in a robot suit, or the wonderfully-named Becca, a young woman with a ponytail and, inexplicably, a face covering. (I guess COVID-19’s still a thing in the mutant and robot infested future in which the game takes place? Also, “Becca” is an amazing name for a cybernetic warrior from the future.) You run left to right, throwing grenades and shooting everything that moves, but there are a few sections that scroll vertically and a few auto-scrolling sections. (In those sections, you also throw Grenada’s and shoot everything that moves.) The frequent, very silly, boss fights are fun. The game is short and easy, and it’s frequently on sale for $0.49. I got at least $3 of enjoyment out of it, however, and recommend it easily.

Post by **BoneSnapDeez** » Fri Aug 28, 2020 3:39 pm

Good stuff -- I see you're enjoying the eShop!

I actually had no idea Biolab Wars was on Switch (saw it on Steam a year ago). I just grabbed it myself.

Post by **prfsnl_gmr** » Fri Aug 28, 2020 4:45 pm

BoneSnapDeez wrote:Good stuff -- I see you're enjoying the eShop!

I actually had no idea Biolab Wars was on Switch (saw it on Steam a year ago). I just grabbed it myself.

Yeah...I have a backlog of really short (i.e., 1-3 hour) games I’m trying to work through quickly so my eShop backlog doesn’t get out of control.

Post by **BoneSnapDeez** » Sat Aug 29, 2020 8:09 am

prfsnl_gmr wrote:so my eShop backlog doesn’t get out of control.

I don't even want to admit how many Arcade Archives releases I've purchased this year.......

Post by **prfsnl_gmr** » Sat Aug 29, 2020 12:06 pm

BoneSnapDeez wrote:
prfsnl_gmr wrote:so my eShop backlog doesn’t get out of control.

I don't even want to admit how many Arcade Archives releases I've purchased this year.......

Those don’t count as backlog!

Post by **Note** » Sat Aug 29, 2020 6:29 pm

1. Streets of Rage 2 (GEN)*
2. The Ninja Warriors (SNES) [3x]
3. TMNT IV: Turtles in Time (SNES)*
4. Golden Axe (GEN) [3x]*
5. Beyond Oasis (GEN)
6. Super Double Dragon (SNES)*
7. Shenmue II (DC)
8. Shining Force 2 (GEN)*
9. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (SNES)
10. ActRaiser (SNES)
11. OutRun (GEN)*
12. X-Men 2: Clone Wars (GEN)
13. Captain Commando (SNES)
14. The Pirates of Dark Water (SNES)
15. Final Fight (SNES)
16. Gradius III (SNES)
17. Super R-Type (SNES)
18. U.N. Squadron (SNES)
19. Super Castlevania IV (SNES)
20. Arrow Flash (GEN)
21. Forgotten Worlds (GEN)
22. Contra III: The Alien Wars (SNES)
23. Wonder Boy in Monster World (GEN)
24. Resident Evil 6 (360)
25. Skies of Arcadia (DC)
26. Streets of Rage 4 (Switch)

27. Star Fox 64 (N64)*

Star Fox 64 might be my favorite title on the N64. This game is a go to on the console for me, something I can always pick up and get into. I originally got this game on July 4th, 1997 at a Toys R Us location, a few days after its June 30th release -- it was the big box version that came bundled with the rumble pak. I vividly remember my parents taking me to pick up the game, and then we went straight to a family barbecue event for the remainder of the day. I appreciated seeing my extended family, but was pretty amped to finally go home and try it. Lol. Anyway, I hadn't played Star Fox 64 in a few years, and felt like taking it out again.

The graphics are impressive in this title for the time of release, and I especially like the opening of the first level, starting with your ship being over a body of water, and then moving into a destroyed city environment. The soundtrack is very memorable and has both sequences that add a dramatic flare to the title, as well as pieces that are really calming (the level select screen, for example). The tunes bring back good memories of playing the game with friends when I was young. The voice work for Star Fox's buddies is also hilarious, and gives the game great personality. My cousins and I would sometimes say lines from the game to joke around, but it's fun to see people still mention these phrases all these years later. Hey Einstein! I'm on your side!

Gameplay wise, I like how there is multiple paths in the game, based on events that happen (or don't) during gameplay. This adds a lot of replay value, especially as one plays more often, gets better, and is able to manage the harder paths. It's also cool that you can earn gold medals on each level, based on the amount of hits you get. This is something I still haven't achieved all these years later, and will bring me back to playing the game some more, to try to get the gold medals I'm still missing. The controls are very smooth and accurate. I have mixed feelings about the N64 controller, and have an issue with it for some games, but it works well for this title. The additional feature here of the packed in rumble pak is also a huge bonus. This was the first time I ever experienced a rumble feature for any controller or game, so the experience was pretty mind blowing at the time.

During my session the other night, I managed to beat my original high score, which was still on my cart from 1997. Was not expecting to top that old high score!

Star Fox 64 has aged very well IMO and is one of the best titles on the N64. For anyone that's a fan of the console or a fan of on-rail shooters, I encourage you to check it out. Try playing it on original hardware with the rumble pak for the best experience! But just play the game any way you're able to. I highly recommend it!

Post by **Note** » Sat Aug 29, 2020 9:43 pm

1. Streets of Rage 2 (GEN)*
2. The Ninja Warriors (SNES) [3x]
3. TMNT IV: Turtles in Time (SNES)*
4. Golden Axe (GEN) [3x]*
5. Beyond Oasis (GEN)
6. Super Double Dragon (SNES)*
7. Shenmue II (DC)
8. Shining Force 2 (GEN)*
9. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (SNES)
10. ActRaiser (SNES)
11. OutRun (GEN)*
12. X-Men 2: Clone Wars (GEN)
13. Captain Commando (SNES)
14. The Pirates of Dark Water (SNES)
15. Final Fight (SNES)
16. Gradius III (SNES)
17. Super R-Type (SNES)
18. U.N. Squadron (SNES)
19. Super Castlevania IV (SNES)
20. Arrow Flash (GEN)
21. Forgotten Worlds (GEN)
22. Contra III: The Alien Wars (SNES)
23. Wonder Boy in Monster World (GEN)
24. Resident Evil 6 (360)
25. Skies of Arcadia (DC)
26. Streets of Rage 4 (Switch)
27. Star Fox 64 (N64)*

28. Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers (SNES)*

I haven't shown much love to fighting games this year, so it's something I'd like to do a bit more in the upcoming months. I still remember the first time I saw the original version of Street Fighter II being played on a SNES, it was pretty amazing as a young kid to see that game in action. When I received my SNES console on Christmas day 1992, SF II was one of the games that I got with it. Two years later, I received Super Street Fighter II on Christmas day 1994, and was pretty excited to check out this updated version of the game.

To start, the opening for this game is pretty awesome -- with a huge animation of Ryu covering the whole screen. This edition in the SF II series adds four new characters (my favorite of the bunch being Cammy), spruces up the graphics from the earlier titles, and adds a few additional gameplay modes including group mode, tournament, and a time challenge. A combo system was also added in this title. The turbo aspect of the game that was introduced in SF II Turbo: Hyper Fighting is still present, but I don't believe you can bump up the speed as much as you could on Turbo. Even on the default setting, the game still runs a lot faster than the original SF II: The World Warrior. The sound effects in this title is also different than the earlier versions. I've read complaints about the sounds effects being changed, it never bothered me, but I do agree the chunkier sound effects of the hard punch and hard kick in the earlier games is more satisfying.

Gameplay wise, this is what you'd expect if you've played any of the other SF II titles, with the same move sets, and everything be easy to pull off once you have a grasp of it. The Super Nintendo controller is great for this type of game, with the four face buttons and shoulder buttons very convenient for fighting games. I played the single player mode with Ken this time around, as he's my preferred character in the game. To switch it up though, I sometimes play with Cammy or Sagat.

My only nitpick complaint is that I wish the cover art for the US release was different. The Super Famicom had good art but for the US we got this dud. The other console releases of SF II had illustrations of fight scenes, but for this game we simply get the title text breaking through a brick wall, which always seemed lame to me. It could've been an awesome illustration of a fight with a mix of the original characters and new characters, and maybe one of the new levels as a backdrop.

This is my preferred Street Fighter title on the SNES, as this is the better of the two titles that I grew up with. However, I'd be interested in hearing if anyone prefers SF II Turbo over this one. There is so many versions of SF II out nowadays and it's appeared on so many consoles, but if you're looking for a fighting title to play on the SNES, I definitely recommend this one! The release of the original SF II was a huge moment in gaming, and I'm glad I was able to be there for it.

Post by **PartridgeSenpai** » Mon Aug 31, 2020 6:55 pm

Partridge Senpai's 2020 Beaten Games:
Previously: 2016 2017 2018 2019
* indicates a repeat

1-50

51. Ratchet & Clank 2: Going Commando (PS2)
52. Ratchet & Clank 3: Up Your Arsenal (PS2)
53. Nier: Automata (PS4)
54. Ratchet: Deadlocked (PS2)

55. Itadaki Street Special (PS2)

Known as Fortune Street in America (or Boom Street in Europe), Itadaki Street is a board game by Enix (now Square Enix) that has been around for over 30 years (the 30th anniversary game coming out on PS4 a few years ago). Itadaki Street Special was the first game in the series published by Square Enix after their merger, and it's the first one to start featuring their licensed characters. It's a game I've had my eye on for a long time but never had an opportunity to buy for cheap until recently. After a week of a lot of playing (I'd say at least 40 hours), I finally finished the last of the normal tournament mode. There's still more to do, technically, but I've beaten every map on single player mode and seen the credits, so I'm calling this game finished. It's begun to show its age a bit, but it's definitely still a really fun entry in the series.

Itadaki Street is a variation to the popular game Monopoly. It's the same sort of idea, going around a board trying to get properties in a set to gain a monopoly there all in an effort to earn more money than your opponents, but Itadaki Street adds some very significant changes beyond the fan service to really make it a far more compelling board game. Firstly, there are many maps with different shop values and gimmicks in each. Some maps are more circuit-like, but many have multiple paths, meaning that there is often some element of player choice in how to best utilize their die rolls. You also don't just need to get back to GO (in this case, the bank) in order to get your free payday, and instead must collect 4 playing card suits from around the board, and knowing when trying to get your paydays isn't worth it can be a really big deciding factor in your victories. Another big change is how districts don't increase in value as you go around the board, with shops instead having varying values within each district that can go from 80 gold to 800 gold for the base market price. These spaces can even be outright taken (at great cost) with a hostile takeover after you land on them, at least if you're wiling to pay five times the current market price of the property. There are also casino spaces where you can play little minigames (sometimes alone, sometimes with the other players) for a little boost of extra quick cash.

The most significant change, though, is how Itadaki Street has a stock exchange system. You can only buy stocks at the bank, but you can sell them anywhere. Factor that in with how you can invest in a property even if you only own a single property in that district (think like building houses in Monopoly) and how you can buy stocks in ANY district, not just your own, and there is a LOT of strategy on when and how to invest your money. There is even a good strategy on when to divest yourself, as slowly selling off stocks in the district of a player ahead of you (something my friends and I call "investment bullying") to make their more numerous stocks lose value, meaning they'll take longer to hit the target goal of net worth they need to win the game.

There is still a lot of luck in this game, don't get me wrong. Landing on the space a suit sits on will get you a chance card, and some chance cards are so good they can easily turn the tide of the game (or at least give you a very healthy lead quite early on if it's something like a free payday from the bank). Then there are special "empty plot" property spaces, where you can build special buildings that have different effects depending on the type you build and what you do with it. These spaces are incredibly overpowered, and those who control them often control the game (with some buildings like the temple making the player that lands on them lose 10% of their NET WORTH to the player who owns it). You can absolutely get hecked over by bad luck in this game, but it's still possible to play from behind and come out in second or even end up winning if you play your investments right in most games.

After finishing the main single-player mode, you unlock another tournament set of the same boards but with "Sphere Mode" rules. Sphere Mode introduces a lot more opportunity for calculated risk, as it gives each player a Sphere Die to roll after they've done their normal move. You can find certain spheres as you play the maps to slot into your Sphere Die, and rolling it gives you the benefit of that sphere whether you like it or not (you may not always want to roll again immediately, for example). It's a neat idea, but it added a bit too much randomness for me to want to engage with after having just beaten all of those maps, even if half of the unlockable characters in the game are locked behind winning that second set of tournaments.

The appeal of this particular entry, at least historically, is that it was not only the first game where four players could play together, but it was the first one to have licensed characters in it. Flexing their Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy franchises, the game has 20 playable characters with another 16 unlockable ones. The characters don't have any differences between them other than aesthetics (although I think they do have different mechanics on the Sphere Mode boards), at least for player characters. Different characters have different levels of AI difficulty inherent to their characters instead of the AI being able to be assigned manually. The AI also isn't super amazing even on S Rank difficulties, and I've seen some of the AI do massively foolish things even at that high difficulty. It's not dead easy by any means, but it can really surprise with how foolish it is as times regardless.

The series representation is both very good and quite disappointing. For Dragon Quest, it has a really good variety from DQ1 all the way to DQ8 and even Terry from DQ Monsters. From Final Fantasy, however, there isn't a single character from before FF7, and there are even TWO Yunas in the game (FFX-2 Yuna and FFX Yuna). It's not a super big deal, but for a game where the fan service is so fun with how much silly personality the characters have to them when they do their lines as NPCs, it's disappointing to see how heavily stacked the newer games are all for the effort of promoting Squenix's newer games (like FFXII, which wouldn't even be out for another year and a half).

Verdict: Highly Recommended. I really loved my time with this game. It's got silly and fun writing, good mechanics, and tons of boards and characters to play with. While it's a bit hard to recommend this particular version to anyone who can't speak Japanese, the Wii game is well worth tracking down if the mechanics of this sound appealing to you. Enix hit a good formula here, and it's good to see Square Enix not seriously messing with something that was never broken.

Post by **Syndicate** » Wed Sep 02, 2020 6:10 pm

...so I've been playing through the Mega Man Legacy Collection and have finished games 1-4 and will be wrapping up 5 and probably 6 this weekend.

racketboy.com

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