TR 2018 - Year In Review

[noiseredux]

something I often like to do at the end of the year is go back and look at the TR calendar that we had, and sort of reflect on the games chosen for the year; how much I actually participated; and how much I enjoyed the experience. And of course I'd like to read others' accounts of the year as well.

JAN - Licensed To Thrill

I ended up playing through Way Forward's HD remake of Ducktales and having a blast. This remake wasn't new to me; neither was the original. But I'm a big fan of both so it was nice to remind myself to play it again.

FEB - Final Fantasy Spin Offs

The month that I was in charge of... I ended up playing Final Fantasy Type-0 and sort of love/hating it. Type-0 was a total mess of a game that had so many ideas that it was pretty much baffling. Yet in the end I had found myself strangely enjoying its failures in a "you're tearing me apart, Lisa" kind of way. I doubt I'd ever play it again, but I feel like I have a bit of a soft spot for it now.

MAR - 80's Ladies Night

Ooh, two JRPG's in a row! This time I went back to Phantasy Star II, which I've started multiple times and never finished. This month didn't change that, unfortunately. There's plenty to love about Phantasy Star II... the music, the graphics, the world... but there's also a bit of a disdain for the player's time, and I ultimately got burnt out on the grind. I still feel like this game is important to me, I just can't seem to finish it in one go. And I'd rank the original above it, which may be an unpopular opinion. I feel like I should give IV another go this coming year, and maybe finally get around to III.

APR - FMV Frenzy

I really wanted to participate this month, but unfortunately wasn't able to find a fitting game in time. Too bad Night Trap hadn't released physically on Xbox One or Switch yet. Sigh.

MAY - First Person Dungeon Crawlers

I was really busy in May so wasn't planning to participate. Then towards the middle of the month I decided to try to squeeze in Morrowind. Then the ebay seller took too long to ship it so I had less than a week to play and ended up not even touching it. Bah.

JUN - Beat Em Ups

So for this one I decided I'd replay Guardian Heroes - a game that *everyone* raves about to see if I was wrong about it. I beat it and... Nope. I still hate it.

JUL - Virtual Boy Exclusives

A month dedicated to a system I don't have? Curtain down!

AUG - Animal Main Characters

Ugh, a month I was really excited about! I pre-ordered Okami for Switch in anticipation only to find that my order got screwed up from Japan and the game arrived too late for me to actually get to dive in. This compounded by a very very busy month. Drag. I still have Okami sitting on my shelf sealed, so hopefully I get to it this coming year as well.

SEP - Welcome To Treasure Island

No disrespect to the month's organizer, but I'm just not a huge Treasure fan. I gave Gunstar Heroes another try. I liked it more than Guardian Heroes, anyway. But ultimately I find it really nice looking but rather tedious. But hey, I did beat it so there's that.

OCT - Golden Age Of Survival Horror

I started out strong for the month with my replay of Resident Evil and then soon found out that my wife was expecting so much of my attention turned away from gaming for the next month or so as we had other things on our minds, haha. The ten hours or so I put into RE again were great, though!

NOV - Time Travelers Never Die

Chalk this month up to my own indecision. I knew I wanted to play something on 3DS instead of being confined to the game room. I initially planned on Majora's Mask, then flip-flopped to Oracle Of Seasons since I already owned it. I got kind of meh on Oracle Of Seasons pretty quickly and then decided I might play Chrono Trigger but couldn't get a copy in time. In hindsight, I should have just stuck with my gut on Majora's Mask. Dammit.

DEC - SHMUPTACULAR

I've only played a bit of Space Invaders Extreme so far, but it's really good.

So in the end, it looks like I can say I really participated in 50% of the TR months this year. Not bad, but not great. Still, I had a good time with a good mix of games this year, so cheers!

[alienjesus]

As usual I ended up participating more early this year than later, but I've tried to join as much as possible. I haven't started any shmups for the month yet but I will endeavour to this weekend!

Here's what I played and my thoughts:

JAN - Licensed To Thrill
This was my month, and my hastily chosen themes were mainly interesting ways to present games I had to hand to play already as I was short on time when making them. I played through and beat Little Nemo and Batman for NES, and Mickey's Wild Adventure (AKA Mickey Mania) for PS1. All of the games had their problems, but I had a decent time with all 3. They were pretty damn tough though!

FEB - Final Fantasy Spin Offs
I did join in this month, getting stuck into Kingdom Hearts on PS2. However, after 10 hours in it was very clear that I really did not like Kingdom Hearts on PS2, so I sold it and every other game in the series I owned and never looked back. Sorry!

MAR - 80's Ladies Night
I put in a lot of effort on this one. I started by playing through Legacy of the Wizard on NES, which was pretty flawed honestly. Then I played a patched version of the original Legend of Zelda where you play as Zelda and rescue Link, which I thought was very cool, followed by playing the modern remake of Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap as Wonder Girl, which was equally cool. I gave Valkyrie No Densetsu a go, but didn't get very far as it's really tough, and I started Earthbound Beginnings to finish up, which I eventually finish months later, and which was super grindy but very charming.

APR - FMV Frenzy
I played 2 games this month - first up was the very difficult but very fun Shinobi X on Saturn, which had some great cheesy FMV cutscenes and a bizarre digitised actor design, but it played great still and I enjoyed it - not the best, but better than it's given credit for. I then followed up by having a serious go at my longest unbeaten game - Wing Commander III for 3DO. I made some decent progress in it and was enjoying myself, but the difficulty level rose WAY too quickly for me and I just hit a wall about a third of the way through the game, and never finished. Maybe I'll try again one day.

MAY - First Person Dungeon Crawlers
So, this is the one month I didn't participate in this year, because I couldn't find a game I wanted to play (I briefly looked at Shadowgate 64, but it costs a fortune for the PAL game). However, I feel bad for missing just this one, so I plan to try and make up for it next year by playing through the fan translation of Madou Monogatari on Game Gear. I hope Bonesnapdeez can forgive me


JUN - Beat Em Ups
I played through 2 games this month - Guardian Heroes Advance for GBA and Alien Storm for Mega Drive. Both were decent but nothing special, but I had a good time nonetheless.


JUL - Virtual Boy Exclusives
This is where I started playing only 1 game a month. In this month I played through Vertical Force, a shmup for Virtual Boy. It was a pretty decent game, but it went from way too easy on one difficulty to balls hard on the other.

AUG - Animal Main Characters
I played through Conker's Bad Fur Day this month - it's one of the few remaining Rareware games I needed to beat on N64, and whilst I enjoyed it overall, it's probably the weakest of their games on the system of what I've played.

SEP - Welcome To Treasure Island
I love me some Treasure, but I only found time to play through one game this month - the fun but repetitive and short Wario World. I did play Guardian Heroes Advance earlier in the year and I've beaten Silhouette Mirage since, so at least I managed to play a little more overall this year

OCT - Golden Age Of Survival Horror
I'd beaten Resident Evil for the Summer Games Challenge, so I wasn't too keen on playing another traditional survival horror this year. However, I compromise by playing through Koudelka on PS1, an RPG which I really enjoyed despite it's flaws. I think it might be better than the sum of it's parts.

NOV - Time Travelers Never Die
I played through 2 DS games this month - a replay of the phenomenal Ghost Trick, and a first time play through of the less-than-stellar Flower, Sun and Rain which was certainly interesting, but unfortunately pretty damn bad. Look forward to my review when I finally write it.

DEC - SHMUPTACULAR
I have yet to start anything this month, but I planned to sit down with my SNES shmups - UN Squadron and Super SWIV. Hopefully I'll get stuck in this weekend.

[Markies]

I didn't participate much this year, but I did do a few months.

I mostly played it in April, but I did play Final Fantasy II for MAR - 80's Ladies Night.

For my month of September, Welcome To Treasure Island, I played Mischief Makers. An interesting game that was a bit frustrating in spots.

For November, Time Travelers Never Die, I played The Lost Vikings. A very interesting experience that is unlike any game I've ever played.

And for December, Shumptacular, I hope to play UN Squadron on the SNES over Christmas.