Monday, September 30, 2013
Mutants playing football?
Ok so in the before times when the retro games this podcast plays were just games I owned a Sega Genesis. Well actually I still have the thing. But I digress. On this console were a pair of games that were outlandish and due to that were just plain fun. These games have alas been neglected up until this point. These games were Mutant League Hockey and Mutant League Football. I actually owned the hockey game and I had bunches of fun playing against my brother. We tended to split games; I'd win on points scored but he'd kill all my guys. Again why exactly am I mentioning this? Well the guy who made the originals on that venerable genesis is trying to remake the game now that the trademark has been something or other. I'm not a legal person. If you want in on a football game that doesn't take itself in any way seriously that includes field hazards such as holes in the field or landmines they've started a Kickstarter at http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mendheim/mutant-football-league?ref=live. Help them get it going and perhaps we can see a game fill the niche of over the top sports games again.
Friday, September 27, 2013
The Ratings: September
Sequel to sequel month is over, like sequel month before it. It'll
probably be a while before we do another theme month, and after Animal
Crossing we'll get back to business as usual, which probably means games
I'm excited to play but don't actually like. However, while I'm still
in a good mood from all the great games we've played recently, lets take
a look at how they stack up!
Super Smash Bros. 10/10
Super Smash Bros. isn't a perfect game, but it has a lot going for it. Simple game play with a lot of depth if you want to delve in, interesting and new (for the time) mechanics. Not to mention a bunch of characters that most people are pre disposed to liking, and multiplayer you can play for days. It's honestly a little bit hard to imagine a virtual console game better than Super Smash Bros. I'm sure there's one somewhere on it, but its the swan song of the Nintendo 64, the most advanced console on the VC.
Mega Man X 9/10
Mega Man X is the game that I expected to throne Castlevainia before we played Smash Bros. I've talked a lot about it, both on that episode and many previous, so I don't know how much more I can say here. The graphics still look good today, the platforming is just as tight as previous Mega Man games, the weapons are all unique and interesting, even if it's usually easier to just use the buster, the bosses are all imaginative and cool, and wall jumping is awesome. Go play it.
Castlevainia Symphony of the Night 9/10
Choosing between Symphone of the Night and Super Metroid was really hard for me. They're both great games. Super Metroid is a little more pure, with a minamalist story, better pacing, and a very strong theme that it never breaks. Symphony of the Night just has more. More isn't always better, I think the terrible voice acting actually hurts the story they're trying to tell quite a bit, and the RPG elements some times make the game feel less focused. But at the end of the day, which is more fun? Leveling up in SotN is awesome. Finding new sweet swords when you kill Skeletons is awesome. Street Fighter spells and Pokemon are awesome. They're very similar games, but SotN takes everything from Super Metroid and adds to it. Sure, they don't quite do the things Super Metorid did quite as well, but there's so much new stuff that it's a marvel it works at all, and I have to give it the edge.
Super Metroid 9/10
Super Metroid is still a fantastic game though. It takes everything Metroid did and improves it, stream lining the obscure bits and adding things like a map to smooth out all the bumps that game had. Then it adds in all sorts of cool new mechanics, like the grappling beam and wall jumping. The game has dark graphics with a sort of washed color pallet, but that really works for it, and it manages to feel like a slow, solitary decent into hell. Plus you have laser gun that you can charge up to shoot your enemies with! Super Metroid is a fantastic game, and if you aren't frustrated by a somewhat slow pace, I give it a hearty recommendation.
Castlevania 9/10
Oh how the mighty have fallen. The NES was a great machine, and some great, simple games were on it, but the more games from newer consoles we play, the more even the best of the NES library looks a bit old and busted. That's not to say Castlevania is a bad game, it's super well designed, and quite the challenge with good themeing. If my previous praise of the game hasn't gotten you to play it, I can't imagine this will, but just in case, play it!
Mega Man 2 8/10
Mega Man is a great game. Mega Man 2 doesn't innovate very much on the original, but its longer and has some what more interesting powers, so it just barely gets the edge on the original.
Mega Man 8/10
The original is still pretty good though, iconic design and tight platforming, with a variety of different challenges, both are good, and if you like Mega Man 2, going back for the first one is probably a good idea.
The Legend of Zelda 8/10
Zelda marks the point in the scores where I stop thinking the games are universally great, and more just that the good outweighs the bad. Since Zelda is at the top of that point, I think it has the most good, and its clearly had more influence on modern games than almost any other NES game. It does a somewhat poor job of guiding you, but like Super Metroid, I think the slow pace adds a little bit to the fun.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars 8/10
Super Mario RPG also has a lot of good, its simple and fun, and does a good job blending the Mario iconography into an RPG. However, the pacing is sort of all over the place, at some points you're getting one of the titular seven stars one after another, at other times progress slows almost completely, and there's a frustrating difficulty spike at the end. Still, it's a pretty good game.
Gradius 7/10
Gradius is difficult arcade action at its finest, with cool power ups, interesting decisions and a whole lot of challenge. A little less challenge probably would have gotten it a higher rating in my eyes, but if that sounds like your thing give Gradius a look.
Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber 7/10
Ogre Battle 64 is the first game we've played that I enjoyed in my childhood, but that doesn't quite hold up. It's still a pretty good game, and I played through it just 3 years ago when it first hit the virtual console, but playing it again the cracks in it really show. The story is slow paced, and while not exactly cliche I've certainly seen everything going on there before. The characters aren't very fleshed out either, for the N64 they've got surprising detail, they all have at least one personality trait, but it just doesn't measure up story wise today. And while it's a different sort of tactical game play, games like X-Com and Fire Emblem are just more fun. If Zach's gushing in our episode won you over check it out, if you want a ridiculous amount of game for 10 dollars check it out, but otherwise, skip it.
Castlevainia II: Simon's Quest 7/10
I'm still surprised that I rate Simon's Quest so high, but the game gets a bad rap. It's bad at telling you where you need to go, and many of the obstacles are annoying to overcome rather than entertaining, but the majority of it is whipping demons werewolves and zombies, which is always fun. Anyone who has any interest in game design should play it to completion, see what works about it, what doesn't, and come to their own conclusions.
Doom 7/10
Doom, one of the First First Person Shooters, gets almost everything right about the genre. It's fast and drops you right into the game, the weapons are unique and useful, the enemies clearly need to die, and most of all its fun. The graphics aren't great, and the levels are maze like enough that its easy to get lost, but its still a fun little title.
Metroid 7/10
Metroid isn't nearly the game Super Metroid is, it's more confusing, the graphics don't do a good job of cluing you on where to go, and the Boss Fights aren't satisfying. It's still a good game, with a lot of depth for an NES title, but pay the two extra bucks and play Super Metroid instead.
Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels 6/10
Another very hard game, Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels is still satisfying, do to incredibly tight controls and good level design. So why isn't it as high up as Gradius or Castlevainia? Well... simply put Mario isn't quite as engaging. There's really only one verb, jump, and while its still fun, its not quite as satisfying as those other games. Still, if you like Mario but think it's usually too easy, this is a game for you.
Super Mario Bros. 6/10
A classic. Super Mario Bros. is perhaps the most important game of the entire 1980s and anyone with an interest in videogames should play it to completion. Is it perfect? Far from it, but its still good to this day.
Super Mario Bros. 2 6/10
The black sheep of the Mario NES games is probably my least favorite. It's still fairly solid though, with nice graphics and each character having unique powers adds a lot to the game. If you're a big Mario or platformer fan it might be worth a look, but here's the point where games become difficult to recommend for one reason or another.
Gunstar Heroes 6/10
Gunstar Heroes is very pretty, and like most Genesis games looks like a vibrant arcade experience a console would have trouble producing. The game play is fun too, but really its about all the colors and explosions, which makes it easy to loose track of what you're doing. It's not a half bad co-op experience, but it's not a game I can strongly recommend either.
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link 5/10
The Adventure of Link is a huge departure from the previous game, and talking simply, it's too hard. The challenge is overwhelming, and failure makes you start over at the beginning, which means you just spend time getting to the spot you're stuck at over and over again. The biggest Zelda fan boys might want to give it a try, but as a Zelda fan boy myself I say skip it.
Super Dodge Ball 5/10
Super Dodge Ball is hard to talk about, because its fun and quirky but very short. If you're interested in old NES games it's worth a look. If you like quirky humerous video games, it's worth a look. If you're looking for depth, skip it.
Final Fantasy 5/10
I really want to give Final Fantasy another try some time, but I don't think I'm ever going to. The game simply processes too slowly, the gap between making your choices and seeing the outcome is too long for the game to be fun. It's easy to see why with improvements, they were able to make another dozen of the things, but the original needed a little more love.
Excitebike 5/10
Excitebike is a simple little game that's surprisingly fun, you race a dirt bike, you go off jumps, and you try not to crash. Simple but fun. Unfortunately five dollars seems a little steep for what seems like a flash or phone game.
Kirby's Adventure 4/10
Speaking of simple, Kirby's Adventure really feels like baby's first platformer. It's colorful and it has a lot of cool power ups, but it's so easy it becomes boring quickly, despite all that color. I recommend you skip it.
Doom 2 4/10
Doom 2 takes all the good of Doom, adds a few new weapons, and keeps all the frustration. It honestly feels more like an expansion pack than a sequel. If you finish Doom and can't wait for more, pick up Doom 2, but I was quite satisfied with what the first one offered.
Zombies Ate My Neighbors 4/10
Zombies Ate my Neighbors is another simple little game that feels like it should be a phone game... only with a whole lot of progress blocking. While the theme is good, it feels way too simple for the Super Nintendo, and I have to say pass on it.
Harvest Moon 4/10
Harvest Moon suffers from this weird problem that plagues few other games. It's only fun for about a third of the length of the game. That third is still long enough to justify the price of the game... but when that clashes with the desire to complete a game, it just becomes frustrating. It's not a bad game, it just overstays its welcome. And has a dozen sequels that have improved on the formula, I recommend you take your pick of those instead.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3/10
I'm surprised that I still have Sonic so low on the totem pole with all the bad games we've played, since Sonic isn't strictly speaking bad. It's just really frustrating, the mechanics and visuals are all centered around speed, something the game punishes you for. Metroid, a game about isolation, does more to encourage speed. And that's terrible.
The Legend of the Mystical Ninja 3/10
Like Sonic, I feel Mystical Ninja probably deserves more than a 3. It's not a bad game, it just didn't offer anything special, other than some Japanese humor, though I don't think a video game is the best medium for that. The co-op makes the game fun, but there are definitely better games out there.
F-Zero 3/10
The last of the games that just isn't flat out bad, F-Zero is a racing game, not all that different than racing games today, other than having HP and lives. I don't know that that really adds anything to the game, and I don't really think I recommend it, but it's not offensive.
Act Raiser 3/10
Act Raiser is a worthy experiment, and it has a lot of potential. I'd actually love to see a sequel to the game, although Act Raiser 2 isn't on the virtual console, and I've heard it's not very good. If you like genre mixing, it's an interesting example, but the platforming that makes up most of the game isn't very fun, so don't go in expecting much.
Bases Loaded 3/10
Bases Loaded is an impressive Base Ball simulation for the NES. It's also not much fun, since hitting the ball is almost as difficult as in real life, but with none of the physical feed back. Unless you're a sports video game nut, I suggest you skip it.
Ogre Battle 2/10
Ogre Battle is kind of terrible. There are some good ideas there, but most of them were retained for Ogre Battle 64, which fixes all the major issues. Play that instead.
Comix Zone 2/10
Comix Zone is visually striking, but short, artificially difficult, and uses cheap game play techniques. Just skip it.
Double Dragon II The Revenge 2/10
Double Dragon II is ok, the "story" is pretty "great", and it has co-op which always makes a game more fun. The controls are incredibly shaky however, which sort of ruins the whole thing.
Double Dragon 2/10
Double Dragon has all the problems of its sequel, but ear piercing terrible music and no co-op. Double skip it.
Ghosts and Goblins 2/10
Ghosts and Goblins is a hard game, but not in a fun way like Lost Levels or Castlevainia, where you always know you're at fault for your mistakes. Instead, the difficulty feels nearly random at times, and unless you feel you have something to prove skip it.
Phantasy Star 1/1
I can at least understand the person who tortures themself with Ghosts n' Goblins. Phantasy Star is terrible on so many levels... just play any other RPG instead.
Super Smash Bros. 10/10
Super Smash Bros. isn't a perfect game, but it has a lot going for it. Simple game play with a lot of depth if you want to delve in, interesting and new (for the time) mechanics. Not to mention a bunch of characters that most people are pre disposed to liking, and multiplayer you can play for days. It's honestly a little bit hard to imagine a virtual console game better than Super Smash Bros. I'm sure there's one somewhere on it, but its the swan song of the Nintendo 64, the most advanced console on the VC.
Mega Man X 9/10
Mega Man X is the game that I expected to throne Castlevainia before we played Smash Bros. I've talked a lot about it, both on that episode and many previous, so I don't know how much more I can say here. The graphics still look good today, the platforming is just as tight as previous Mega Man games, the weapons are all unique and interesting, even if it's usually easier to just use the buster, the bosses are all imaginative and cool, and wall jumping is awesome. Go play it.
Castlevainia Symphony of the Night 9/10
Choosing between Symphone of the Night and Super Metroid was really hard for me. They're both great games. Super Metroid is a little more pure, with a minamalist story, better pacing, and a very strong theme that it never breaks. Symphony of the Night just has more. More isn't always better, I think the terrible voice acting actually hurts the story they're trying to tell quite a bit, and the RPG elements some times make the game feel less focused. But at the end of the day, which is more fun? Leveling up in SotN is awesome. Finding new sweet swords when you kill Skeletons is awesome. Street Fighter spells and Pokemon are awesome. They're very similar games, but SotN takes everything from Super Metroid and adds to it. Sure, they don't quite do the things Super Metorid did quite as well, but there's so much new stuff that it's a marvel it works at all, and I have to give it the edge.
Super Metroid 9/10
Super Metroid is still a fantastic game though. It takes everything Metroid did and improves it, stream lining the obscure bits and adding things like a map to smooth out all the bumps that game had. Then it adds in all sorts of cool new mechanics, like the grappling beam and wall jumping. The game has dark graphics with a sort of washed color pallet, but that really works for it, and it manages to feel like a slow, solitary decent into hell. Plus you have laser gun that you can charge up to shoot your enemies with! Super Metroid is a fantastic game, and if you aren't frustrated by a somewhat slow pace, I give it a hearty recommendation.
Castlevania 9/10
Oh how the mighty have fallen. The NES was a great machine, and some great, simple games were on it, but the more games from newer consoles we play, the more even the best of the NES library looks a bit old and busted. That's not to say Castlevania is a bad game, it's super well designed, and quite the challenge with good themeing. If my previous praise of the game hasn't gotten you to play it, I can't imagine this will, but just in case, play it!
Mega Man 2 8/10
Mega Man is a great game. Mega Man 2 doesn't innovate very much on the original, but its longer and has some what more interesting powers, so it just barely gets the edge on the original.
Mega Man 8/10
The original is still pretty good though, iconic design and tight platforming, with a variety of different challenges, both are good, and if you like Mega Man 2, going back for the first one is probably a good idea.
The Legend of Zelda 8/10
Zelda marks the point in the scores where I stop thinking the games are universally great, and more just that the good outweighs the bad. Since Zelda is at the top of that point, I think it has the most good, and its clearly had more influence on modern games than almost any other NES game. It does a somewhat poor job of guiding you, but like Super Metroid, I think the slow pace adds a little bit to the fun.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars 8/10
Super Mario RPG also has a lot of good, its simple and fun, and does a good job blending the Mario iconography into an RPG. However, the pacing is sort of all over the place, at some points you're getting one of the titular seven stars one after another, at other times progress slows almost completely, and there's a frustrating difficulty spike at the end. Still, it's a pretty good game.
Gradius 7/10
Gradius is difficult arcade action at its finest, with cool power ups, interesting decisions and a whole lot of challenge. A little less challenge probably would have gotten it a higher rating in my eyes, but if that sounds like your thing give Gradius a look.
Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber 7/10
Ogre Battle 64 is the first game we've played that I enjoyed in my childhood, but that doesn't quite hold up. It's still a pretty good game, and I played through it just 3 years ago when it first hit the virtual console, but playing it again the cracks in it really show. The story is slow paced, and while not exactly cliche I've certainly seen everything going on there before. The characters aren't very fleshed out either, for the N64 they've got surprising detail, they all have at least one personality trait, but it just doesn't measure up story wise today. And while it's a different sort of tactical game play, games like X-Com and Fire Emblem are just more fun. If Zach's gushing in our episode won you over check it out, if you want a ridiculous amount of game for 10 dollars check it out, but otherwise, skip it.
Castlevainia II: Simon's Quest 7/10
I'm still surprised that I rate Simon's Quest so high, but the game gets a bad rap. It's bad at telling you where you need to go, and many of the obstacles are annoying to overcome rather than entertaining, but the majority of it is whipping demons werewolves and zombies, which is always fun. Anyone who has any interest in game design should play it to completion, see what works about it, what doesn't, and come to their own conclusions.
Doom 7/10
Doom, one of the First First Person Shooters, gets almost everything right about the genre. It's fast and drops you right into the game, the weapons are unique and useful, the enemies clearly need to die, and most of all its fun. The graphics aren't great, and the levels are maze like enough that its easy to get lost, but its still a fun little title.
Metroid 7/10
Metroid isn't nearly the game Super Metroid is, it's more confusing, the graphics don't do a good job of cluing you on where to go, and the Boss Fights aren't satisfying. It's still a good game, with a lot of depth for an NES title, but pay the two extra bucks and play Super Metroid instead.
Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels 6/10
Another very hard game, Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels is still satisfying, do to incredibly tight controls and good level design. So why isn't it as high up as Gradius or Castlevainia? Well... simply put Mario isn't quite as engaging. There's really only one verb, jump, and while its still fun, its not quite as satisfying as those other games. Still, if you like Mario but think it's usually too easy, this is a game for you.
Super Mario Bros. 6/10
A classic. Super Mario Bros. is perhaps the most important game of the entire 1980s and anyone with an interest in videogames should play it to completion. Is it perfect? Far from it, but its still good to this day.
Super Mario Bros. 2 6/10
The black sheep of the Mario NES games is probably my least favorite. It's still fairly solid though, with nice graphics and each character having unique powers adds a lot to the game. If you're a big Mario or platformer fan it might be worth a look, but here's the point where games become difficult to recommend for one reason or another.
Gunstar Heroes 6/10
Gunstar Heroes is very pretty, and like most Genesis games looks like a vibrant arcade experience a console would have trouble producing. The game play is fun too, but really its about all the colors and explosions, which makes it easy to loose track of what you're doing. It's not a half bad co-op experience, but it's not a game I can strongly recommend either.
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link 5/10
The Adventure of Link is a huge departure from the previous game, and talking simply, it's too hard. The challenge is overwhelming, and failure makes you start over at the beginning, which means you just spend time getting to the spot you're stuck at over and over again. The biggest Zelda fan boys might want to give it a try, but as a Zelda fan boy myself I say skip it.
Super Dodge Ball 5/10
Super Dodge Ball is hard to talk about, because its fun and quirky but very short. If you're interested in old NES games it's worth a look. If you like quirky humerous video games, it's worth a look. If you're looking for depth, skip it.
Final Fantasy 5/10
I really want to give Final Fantasy another try some time, but I don't think I'm ever going to. The game simply processes too slowly, the gap between making your choices and seeing the outcome is too long for the game to be fun. It's easy to see why with improvements, they were able to make another dozen of the things, but the original needed a little more love.
Excitebike 5/10
Excitebike is a simple little game that's surprisingly fun, you race a dirt bike, you go off jumps, and you try not to crash. Simple but fun. Unfortunately five dollars seems a little steep for what seems like a flash or phone game.
Kirby's Adventure 4/10
Speaking of simple, Kirby's Adventure really feels like baby's first platformer. It's colorful and it has a lot of cool power ups, but it's so easy it becomes boring quickly, despite all that color. I recommend you skip it.
Doom 2 4/10
Doom 2 takes all the good of Doom, adds a few new weapons, and keeps all the frustration. It honestly feels more like an expansion pack than a sequel. If you finish Doom and can't wait for more, pick up Doom 2, but I was quite satisfied with what the first one offered.
Zombies Ate My Neighbors 4/10
Zombies Ate my Neighbors is another simple little game that feels like it should be a phone game... only with a whole lot of progress blocking. While the theme is good, it feels way too simple for the Super Nintendo, and I have to say pass on it.
Harvest Moon 4/10
Harvest Moon suffers from this weird problem that plagues few other games. It's only fun for about a third of the length of the game. That third is still long enough to justify the price of the game... but when that clashes with the desire to complete a game, it just becomes frustrating. It's not a bad game, it just overstays its welcome. And has a dozen sequels that have improved on the formula, I recommend you take your pick of those instead.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3/10
I'm surprised that I still have Sonic so low on the totem pole with all the bad games we've played, since Sonic isn't strictly speaking bad. It's just really frustrating, the mechanics and visuals are all centered around speed, something the game punishes you for. Metroid, a game about isolation, does more to encourage speed. And that's terrible.
The Legend of the Mystical Ninja 3/10
Like Sonic, I feel Mystical Ninja probably deserves more than a 3. It's not a bad game, it just didn't offer anything special, other than some Japanese humor, though I don't think a video game is the best medium for that. The co-op makes the game fun, but there are definitely better games out there.
F-Zero 3/10
The last of the games that just isn't flat out bad, F-Zero is a racing game, not all that different than racing games today, other than having HP and lives. I don't know that that really adds anything to the game, and I don't really think I recommend it, but it's not offensive.
Act Raiser 3/10
Act Raiser is a worthy experiment, and it has a lot of potential. I'd actually love to see a sequel to the game, although Act Raiser 2 isn't on the virtual console, and I've heard it's not very good. If you like genre mixing, it's an interesting example, but the platforming that makes up most of the game isn't very fun, so don't go in expecting much.
Bases Loaded 3/10
Bases Loaded is an impressive Base Ball simulation for the NES. It's also not much fun, since hitting the ball is almost as difficult as in real life, but with none of the physical feed back. Unless you're a sports video game nut, I suggest you skip it.
Ogre Battle 2/10
Ogre Battle is kind of terrible. There are some good ideas there, but most of them were retained for Ogre Battle 64, which fixes all the major issues. Play that instead.
Comix Zone 2/10
Comix Zone is visually striking, but short, artificially difficult, and uses cheap game play techniques. Just skip it.
Double Dragon II The Revenge 2/10
Double Dragon II is ok, the "story" is pretty "great", and it has co-op which always makes a game more fun. The controls are incredibly shaky however, which sort of ruins the whole thing.
Double Dragon 2/10
Double Dragon has all the problems of its sequel, but ear piercing terrible music and no co-op. Double skip it.
Ghosts and Goblins 2/10
Ghosts and Goblins is a hard game, but not in a fun way like Lost Levels or Castlevainia, where you always know you're at fault for your mistakes. Instead, the difficulty feels nearly random at times, and unless you feel you have something to prove skip it.
Phantasy Star 1/1
I can at least understand the person who tortures themself with Ghosts n' Goblins. Phantasy Star is terrible on so many levels... just play any other RPG instead.
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Episode 32: Apparently the Chozo were Flightless [Super Metroid]
This week, we return to Zebes, and take on Metroid II: The Return of... wait, no we skip that game, and play Super Metroid instead! How does Tyler's favorite child hood video game stack up? Listen and find out!
Is that a download behind that bombable wall?
(00:40) We get side tracked right away and talk about some movies.
(2:00) What we've been playing! Zach's still playing Shin Ten, with leads us to game length and content vs grinding.
(4:40) Geremy is playing Cloudberry Kingdom in addition to his normal games.
(9:30) Also Fire Emblem Awakening, Zach and Geremy discuss the characters and their outlandishness.
(18:00) Super Metroid!
(19:30) The beginning, feelings of isolation. Can atmosphere of a game make you feel things?
(23:00) New powerups and features.
(24:50) Color pallets and different areas.
(28:00) Game play! It's like Metroid. Go figure.
(30:00) Sequence breaking.
(32:00) Is it ok for a game to make you look around and try to find its content? Or is it on the game to present itself to you immediately. Obviously a game needs to do something to grab your attention, but does Super Metroid do enough?
(35:00) Exploration in video games, 2d vs 3d.
(37:15) Games with mechanics that help you find hidden items. Are they good, or do they defy the point of having hidden items in the first place? Are you entitled to all the secret items/achievements in a game without work? Achievement Hunter would say so.
(41:20) Compared to Symphony of the Night. Videogames stopping and slowing your progress, is it a problem?
(47:45) The pacing of video games. Are modern games faster paced than older ones? Is this a bad thing? Also, the Pomodoro Technique.
(51:00) Final thoughts, and some giggling about Metroid Prime.
Next week, we jump a little further into the gaming present than normal for this podcast, and play Animal Crossing. If you're interested, New Leaf is available on the 3DS, but as its a full cost game, you may wish to skip this one and just listen in!
Contact information? No need to search for that, it's right here!
Is that a download behind that bombable wall?
(00:40) We get side tracked right away and talk about some movies.
(2:00) What we've been playing! Zach's still playing Shin Ten, with leads us to game length and content vs grinding.
(4:40) Geremy is playing Cloudberry Kingdom in addition to his normal games.
(9:30) Also Fire Emblem Awakening, Zach and Geremy discuss the characters and their outlandishness.
(18:00) Super Metroid!
(19:30) The beginning, feelings of isolation. Can atmosphere of a game make you feel things?
(23:00) New powerups and features.
(24:50) Color pallets and different areas.
(28:00) Game play! It's like Metroid. Go figure.
(30:00) Sequence breaking.
(32:00) Is it ok for a game to make you look around and try to find its content? Or is it on the game to present itself to you immediately. Obviously a game needs to do something to grab your attention, but does Super Metroid do enough?
(35:00) Exploration in video games, 2d vs 3d.
(37:15) Games with mechanics that help you find hidden items. Are they good, or do they defy the point of having hidden items in the first place? Are you entitled to all the secret items/achievements in a game without work? Achievement Hunter would say so.
(41:20) Compared to Symphony of the Night. Videogames stopping and slowing your progress, is it a problem?
(47:45) The pacing of video games. Are modern games faster paced than older ones? Is this a bad thing? Also, the Pomodoro Technique.
(51:00) Final thoughts, and some giggling about Metroid Prime.
Next week, we jump a little further into the gaming present than normal for this podcast, and play Animal Crossing. If you're interested, New Leaf is available on the 3DS, but as its a full cost game, you may wish to skip this one and just listen in!
Contact information? No need to search for that, it's right here!
Geremy@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Categories:
Adventure,
Episodes,
Geremy,
Metroid,
Nintendo,
Platformer,
Super Nintendo Entertainment System,
Tyler,
Zach
No comments:
No comments:
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
Broken Controllers: Diablo 3
So a while back a game released on the PC and it was, not universally panned, but constantly compared to the game that came before a game that was one of the best games released in the nineties for the PC. My inner Blizzard fanboy might be peeking out on that but whatever. I'm talking of course about the Diablo games recently the third installment of this series made its way to the console and I had the opportunity to try it out. Follow the jump to defeat the great evil.
Well Diablo 3 follows its forebear of being a hack and slash dungeon crawler. The whole point of the game of course is to find all the demons and complete the story but to do so you have to navigate all kinds of randomly laid out dungeons where the boss isn't where you might have left him on your first playthrough. During this you unlock sills and find new and interesting gear to equip your chosen hero with. 3 has five classes, Barbarian, which takes the fighter slot as a big hulking damage taker and dealer, Monk, the other frontline class which does damage . . .and that was about as much as I could see. The Demon hunter which is a ranged bow user and I think its supposed to be a heavy damage dealer but I didn't see any of that on my use of it. Finally two mage classes, the voodoo priest and the sorcerer round out the classes. The choice of class determines the narrative that your character brings to the story but does nothing to alter the story because Blizzard wanted to deliver a very specific one to the player.
The story begins as a meteor has fallen on a town and now the dead are rising all around the site. Your character has shown up because of whatever reason they have to investigate. From the very start upon your arrival in the town your character is pulled into a battle against the forces of hell and the attempt to save the entire human race from extinction. Not really a shock to anyone who has played a Diablo game before.
Now that my overview is complete lets talk a bit about the game and the things that I felt might need work. From the start since it is a hack and slash game there is some repeating gameplay and I felt while the graphics were good it sometimes felt as though they just didn't have enough variety early on in the monsters and that never really felt like it changed. Compared to Diablo 2 which also had a lot of reskinned and not different monsters it made that work by interspersing different monster types within the same groups as others. So while in Diablo 3 you are always fighting the same three or four zombies in 2 you would be fighting zombies with fallen with quillbeasts and spiders in the same room. Does that make the game bad? No not really but it felt like a wasted opportunity especially within the dungeons. I understand that the first boss is the Skeleton King but come on guys! The combat is all about hitting a routine by finding the combination of available skills work best but since you don't start off with all of your skill types unlocked and they remain locked off until a predetermined point it might be more accurate to say its about getting through until you have these options opened up. Now Diablo 2 had an approach like that but since you were limited in options to the two mouse buttons and with a skill tree it felt like you had more control over your character than there is in 3. Consider this; in Diablo three there are about 15 active skills per character along with several passive skills. In 2 there were about that many skills PER tree and each character had three trees that they could use. It gave the player the control to play a summoner druid or a shapeshifting druid while three feels really limited. Character choice aside the story is something that I have in my crosshairs so lets make the jump.
Diablo 3 starts off so promising with the fully animated cinematics to start things off and the narration from your chosen character class but later in the game it feels like it loses steam. While this might be just a feeling that I had it felt that I spent the vast majority of the game in the first act while the other three just began a downhill run that ended with them becoming shorter and shorter. It felt rushed like the whole game was supposed to have these kinds of long arcs because again I'm going back to 2 here each of the acts in that game had a more structured six quests that once complete, the final one was always kill the demon lord, you were finished with the act and moved on. My point is each level felt like an entire experience in hunting each one of these evils down and killing them off while Three feels like it is leading up to just one climax which in my opinion was a let down.
Spoilers!
Now here I'm going to talk about some of the moments that drove me nuts. First there is really only one moment that felt like the kind of great evil boss I'm supposed to be taking on. That giant thing in the Diablo Three commercial? Second act boss. The other bosses in the game while they are very Diablo 2 felt off. The Skeleton king didn't but that was because I hadn't fought the other one yet. My point is that if you are going to make a multi-phase boss make it the last one. Comparatively the killing of Diablo is kind of pathetic. I remember when I first killed him in Diablo 2 it was an epic marathon of just watching the health bar slowly creeping down and weathering the deaths of my character to go at him again. This one I beat him handily on my first try and was left unsatisfied. "Really?" I asked, "that's it?" This is the problem that stems from a lot. Here is Diablo a character that is supposed to be the baddest ass of them all and he is dropped easily by a human despite handily crushing an Archangel. I understand that I'm the hero of the story but why not make me freaking earn that win?
Is Diablo three a bad game? No I wouldn't go that far but it is fairly mediocre when compared to many other available games out right now. It gave me the same kind of feeling I had when sitting with a few friends and chilling with Baldur's Gate or Gautlet Legends. Fun for a while and with people to kill some time working together but it won't light the world on fire. Compared to Blizzard's other recent release it falls flat. It's a pretty game when it isn't darker than hell with the lights off but other than my listed issues it's functional and if you need a time-killer there are worse options. I don't know if it is multiplayer on console, by which I mean a bunch of buddies on a couch because I never got a chance to test that out so take that for what its worth.
I'm going to start putting what I think the game would be worth to purchase based on what I personally had fun with. Take it for what its worth, which means not much in my case.
Final rating 20$ out of 60$
Well Diablo 3 follows its forebear of being a hack and slash dungeon crawler. The whole point of the game of course is to find all the demons and complete the story but to do so you have to navigate all kinds of randomly laid out dungeons where the boss isn't where you might have left him on your first playthrough. During this you unlock sills and find new and interesting gear to equip your chosen hero with. 3 has five classes, Barbarian, which takes the fighter slot as a big hulking damage taker and dealer, Monk, the other frontline class which does damage . . .and that was about as much as I could see. The Demon hunter which is a ranged bow user and I think its supposed to be a heavy damage dealer but I didn't see any of that on my use of it. Finally two mage classes, the voodoo priest and the sorcerer round out the classes. The choice of class determines the narrative that your character brings to the story but does nothing to alter the story because Blizzard wanted to deliver a very specific one to the player.
The story begins as a meteor has fallen on a town and now the dead are rising all around the site. Your character has shown up because of whatever reason they have to investigate. From the very start upon your arrival in the town your character is pulled into a battle against the forces of hell and the attempt to save the entire human race from extinction. Not really a shock to anyone who has played a Diablo game before.
Now that my overview is complete lets talk a bit about the game and the things that I felt might need work. From the start since it is a hack and slash game there is some repeating gameplay and I felt while the graphics were good it sometimes felt as though they just didn't have enough variety early on in the monsters and that never really felt like it changed. Compared to Diablo 2 which also had a lot of reskinned and not different monsters it made that work by interspersing different monster types within the same groups as others. So while in Diablo 3 you are always fighting the same three or four zombies in 2 you would be fighting zombies with fallen with quillbeasts and spiders in the same room. Does that make the game bad? No not really but it felt like a wasted opportunity especially within the dungeons. I understand that the first boss is the Skeleton King but come on guys! The combat is all about hitting a routine by finding the combination of available skills work best but since you don't start off with all of your skill types unlocked and they remain locked off until a predetermined point it might be more accurate to say its about getting through until you have these options opened up. Now Diablo 2 had an approach like that but since you were limited in options to the two mouse buttons and with a skill tree it felt like you had more control over your character than there is in 3. Consider this; in Diablo three there are about 15 active skills per character along with several passive skills. In 2 there were about that many skills PER tree and each character had three trees that they could use. It gave the player the control to play a summoner druid or a shapeshifting druid while three feels really limited. Character choice aside the story is something that I have in my crosshairs so lets make the jump.
Diablo 3 starts off so promising with the fully animated cinematics to start things off and the narration from your chosen character class but later in the game it feels like it loses steam. While this might be just a feeling that I had it felt that I spent the vast majority of the game in the first act while the other three just began a downhill run that ended with them becoming shorter and shorter. It felt rushed like the whole game was supposed to have these kinds of long arcs because again I'm going back to 2 here each of the acts in that game had a more structured six quests that once complete, the final one was always kill the demon lord, you were finished with the act and moved on. My point is each level felt like an entire experience in hunting each one of these evils down and killing them off while Three feels like it is leading up to just one climax which in my opinion was a let down.
Spoilers!
Now here I'm going to talk about some of the moments that drove me nuts. First there is really only one moment that felt like the kind of great evil boss I'm supposed to be taking on. That giant thing in the Diablo Three commercial? Second act boss. The other bosses in the game while they are very Diablo 2 felt off. The Skeleton king didn't but that was because I hadn't fought the other one yet. My point is that if you are going to make a multi-phase boss make it the last one. Comparatively the killing of Diablo is kind of pathetic. I remember when I first killed him in Diablo 2 it was an epic marathon of just watching the health bar slowly creeping down and weathering the deaths of my character to go at him again. This one I beat him handily on my first try and was left unsatisfied. "Really?" I asked, "that's it?" This is the problem that stems from a lot. Here is Diablo a character that is supposed to be the baddest ass of them all and he is dropped easily by a human despite handily crushing an Archangel. I understand that I'm the hero of the story but why not make me freaking earn that win?
Is Diablo three a bad game? No I wouldn't go that far but it is fairly mediocre when compared to many other available games out right now. It gave me the same kind of feeling I had when sitting with a few friends and chilling with Baldur's Gate or Gautlet Legends. Fun for a while and with people to kill some time working together but it won't light the world on fire. Compared to Blizzard's other recent release it falls flat. It's a pretty game when it isn't darker than hell with the lights off but other than my listed issues it's functional and if you need a time-killer there are worse options. I don't know if it is multiplayer on console, by which I mean a bunch of buddies on a couch because I never got a chance to test that out so take that for what its worth.
I'm going to start putting what I think the game would be worth to purchase based on what I personally had fun with. Take it for what its worth, which means not much in my case.
Final rating 20$ out of 60$
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
Episode 31: Menu Battle 64 [Ogre Battle 64]
Team, assemble! You hit him with that thing you always do, and I'll flip a coin to determine which spell to cast! Afterwards, we can walk through town and, if they think exactly like us, we'll free them!
This week, it's Ogre Battle 64, the game of tactics and valor on the battlefield. Join us as we find out just how many soldiers it takes to get to the center of a fighter!
Is your alignment right to Liberate or Capture our download?
(00:55) Games and us. Specifically, ones with which we've interacted lately. DoA is a game about... fighting. Seriously, though, it's got a pretty decent story and gameplay. The 3D fighter with combat damage we mentioned was apparently Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus. If you're in the market for used... anything, 2nd and Charles is pretty awesome. Black & Read in Arvada is a superb books and music store.
(05:30) Anima looks so amazing, it's almost sad that we'll likely never play it.. No, Jean, don't do it!
(08:00) Pokemon Pinball! Tyler's current high scores... there may be a preference there. Nintendo had humble, and quite different, roots. high scores, All the wizard modes. It allows you to play a mean game. Alex's parents own a Xenon table. Read the Notes section. My hobby: replacing hyphens.
(13:00) The mysterious overlap between RPGs and tactical games.
(14:30) OGRES!
(16:45) Tome of Innaccuracy.
(22:00) This game has loooong battles.
(24:00) Pedras hurt them if they hurt you.
(28:30) This game is deep, man.
(31:45) Decision making.
(34:00) The reward pacing of this game is a little odd.
(37:00) This game is somewhat about minmaxing. Also, it has a story? History lesson!
(43:00) A brief commentary on whether a game that is narrative-centric should just be a movie.
(44:30) Some discussion about the necessity for rational humans to justify realistic violence within the game's story. It's a meaty topic that we don't nearly cover. Also, for some reason it seems easier to do this in a tabletop RPG than in a videogame.
(47:40) Spec Ops: The Line deals with the aforementioned subject through our favorite medium!
(50:40) Apparently not feeling weighty enough this episode, we dip into a discussion about videogames as an art form. I would ammend our discussion here that videogames may already be art, but be truly transcendent were they to meet the criteria we outline here.
(51:30) Final thoughts about Ogre Battle 64: It's pretty good!
Next week, Super Metroid! Get read to explore and shoot things (not necessarily in that order).
Morph ball on over to us at
This week, it's Ogre Battle 64, the game of tactics and valor on the battlefield. Join us as we find out just how many soldiers it takes to get to the center of a fighter!
Is your alignment right to Liberate or Capture our download?
(00:55) Games and us. Specifically, ones with which we've interacted lately. DoA is a game about... fighting. Seriously, though, it's got a pretty decent story and gameplay. The 3D fighter with combat damage we mentioned was apparently Tao Feng: Fist of the Lotus. If you're in the market for used... anything, 2nd and Charles is pretty awesome. Black & Read in Arvada is a superb books and music store.
(05:30) Anima looks so amazing, it's almost sad that we'll likely never play it.. No, Jean, don't do it!
(08:00) Pokemon Pinball! Tyler's current high scores... there may be a preference there. Nintendo had humble, and quite different, roots. high scores, All the wizard modes. It allows you to play a mean game. Alex's parents own a Xenon table. Read the Notes section. My hobby: replacing hyphens.
(13:00) The mysterious overlap between RPGs and tactical games.
(14:30) OGRES!
(16:45) Tome of Innaccuracy.
(22:00) This game has loooong battles.
(24:00) Pedras hurt them if they hurt you.
(28:30) This game is deep, man.
(31:45) Decision making.
(34:00) The reward pacing of this game is a little odd.
(37:00) This game is somewhat about minmaxing. Also, it has a story? History lesson!
(43:00) A brief commentary on whether a game that is narrative-centric should just be a movie.
(44:30) Some discussion about the necessity for rational humans to justify realistic violence within the game's story. It's a meaty topic that we don't nearly cover. Also, for some reason it seems easier to do this in a tabletop RPG than in a videogame.
(47:40) Spec Ops: The Line deals with the aforementioned subject through our favorite medium!
(50:40) Apparently not feeling weighty enough this episode, we dip into a discussion about videogames as an art form. I would ammend our discussion here that videogames may already be art, but be truly transcendent were they to meet the criteria we outline here.
(51:30) Final thoughts about Ogre Battle 64: It's pretty good!
Next week, Super Metroid! Get read to explore and shoot things (not necessarily in that order).
Morph ball on over to us at
Geremy@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Monday, September 16, 2013
Last Rant on Videogames: Heroes and Hostages
I've been talking a bit lately about returning to a game of my youth. Way back when, the other hosts and I went to a cyber cafe and played long hours of Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat, shouting at each other across the room and generally having a grand ol' time. Given that we were the only ones there most days, I don't find it hard to believe that they went out of business, but it was one of my first encounters with the now bloated genre that is FPS games.
In preparing for this article, and to back up some wild claims I planned on making, I stumbled across this list, which is fairly complete, and highly informative. That said, Counter-Strike doesn't even make an appearance. Given that this was one of the most defining entries to the genre for me, I am a little surprised. I suppose it might fall under the tactical FPS genre, but I feel they're all fairly similar.
At any rate, I feel that, while it's definitely not the first, it might have been one of the most defining games for what we see in modern shooters today. I've played my share of Call of Duty, and have never found it terribly engaging. Yes, I'll play indefinitely, but that's only because I have some primal craving for competition. Really, though, I've felt these games somewhat lacking. I always feel sluggish, have a far harder time aiming than it seems I ought, and randomly get caught on obstacles outside my peripheral vision.
Counter-Strike, by contrast, feels clean and fast. Maybe it's just that I have a far easier time with computer controls, but there's a certain amount of frenetic energy in every match that I just don't get in a Slayer round, even though there's arguably more happening there. Zach pointed out that it's probably because of the size of the maps, and I would further add the effectiveness of almost every weapon over the range of the map. I think it would be folly to claim that the weapons behave realistically, but you can drop a guy from a fair distance away with a shotgun if you're persistent, which is a feat you should be able to accomplish if you were actually attempting it in our version of reality.
Let's break it down a bit. The weapons come in multiple flavors, and are grouped for you. I'll explain the mechanics of acquiring them in a moment.
Pistols are low in damage and fairly high in firing rate and accuracy. They're side arms, and are used as such. You won't generally have much use for them unless you need to reload in the middle of a fire fight, but having a good one can save your hide on occasion.
Shotguns are shotguns. Have you played an FPS? Then you're educated.
Submachine guns are good in this game at what they're supposed to be good at in real life. They're the every-man's weapon. They're great at mid to close range and allow you to spray bullets indiscriminately while more specifically armed teammates do the rest. There's rarely a bad situation for one, unless the other guy's got a sniper rifle and you haven't noticed him.
Rifles come in two flavors, but are lumped under the same category. Similar to SMGs, there are assault rifles. You can think of them as the big brothers of most SMGs. They've got a bit better accuracy at a distance, and some let you zoom your sight a bit.
Snipers, on the other hand, do massive damage from a range with insane accuracy. Additionally, all guns fire in the exact center of your screen within an error tolerance, so it's quite possible to noscope everyone if you're good enough.
Finally, there's a machine gun. Just one. It never runs out of ammo.
There are also some grenades, of the flash, smoke, and HE varieties. Buying some armor will often save you. Really, I didn't need to tell you any of this, though. IF you've ever played an FPS, you know this.
Counter-Strike, then differs in that every action may affect your bank account in some manner. By default, you have a limit of $16000, but you'll be hard pressed to get there very often. Killing guys gets you more money, as does completing some of the map objectives. By default, you start with a small amount and participate in what is known as the "pistol round." Because you have so little money, the only thing you may buy is a new pistol, and everyone tries to kill each other with them. It can be one of the more amusing moments in the game, but since the winning team of each round is awarded bonus cash, it can really decide the opening momentum of the game. The weapons between the opposing sides, Terrorists and Counter Terrorists, don't differ much, but I feel that the Terrorists have a better pistol available.
When you get enough cash, you can start buying your preferred loadout for the map. Some people love their shotguns, while others hang back with rifles and let others do the dirty work. It partially depends on which team you're on and the map style.
In the standard Source game, there are only two game types, but near infinite maps if you're willing to look. My preferred game type is CS, in which the terrorists must prevent the counter terrorists from escorting some number of hostages to escape zones. I feel there's a bit more strategy involved in this game type, and can lead to some interesting experiences.
The other game type involves the terrorists attempting to plant a time bomb and make sure it detonates before the counter team defuses it. You can totally be killed by the bomb. Watch out for that.
Really, though, it comes down to really fast matches and a lot of action. The downside is that each round is permadeath, so if you suck, you can expect to spend a lot of time not playing. That said, the online scene is fierce. The game's been around since '99, and most people who are playing it have been for a long time. It took me a bit to ramp up to a point where I could feasibly participate, but thanks to copious TF2 and a non-trivial amount of time playing against the remarkably decent bot AI before venturing online, it wasn't too bad.
By the way, this game has bots, and they're pretty good. If you're like me and have some irrational phobia of playing online, you can do that pretty much forever.
It's usually $5-10 on Steam, and not super graphically intense. If you've got a decent computer, you can prolly run this without much trouble, and it satisfies and itch I didn't know I was trying to scratch.
That said, if you prefer more specialization in your actions, I might recommend just picking up TF2 instead. It's pretty awesome, and free.
In preparing for this article, and to back up some wild claims I planned on making, I stumbled across this list, which is fairly complete, and highly informative. That said, Counter-Strike doesn't even make an appearance. Given that this was one of the most defining entries to the genre for me, I am a little surprised. I suppose it might fall under the tactical FPS genre, but I feel they're all fairly similar.
At any rate, I feel that, while it's definitely not the first, it might have been one of the most defining games for what we see in modern shooters today. I've played my share of Call of Duty, and have never found it terribly engaging. Yes, I'll play indefinitely, but that's only because I have some primal craving for competition. Really, though, I've felt these games somewhat lacking. I always feel sluggish, have a far harder time aiming than it seems I ought, and randomly get caught on obstacles outside my peripheral vision.
Counter-Strike, by contrast, feels clean and fast. Maybe it's just that I have a far easier time with computer controls, but there's a certain amount of frenetic energy in every match that I just don't get in a Slayer round, even though there's arguably more happening there. Zach pointed out that it's probably because of the size of the maps, and I would further add the effectiveness of almost every weapon over the range of the map. I think it would be folly to claim that the weapons behave realistically, but you can drop a guy from a fair distance away with a shotgun if you're persistent, which is a feat you should be able to accomplish if you were actually attempting it in our version of reality.
Let's break it down a bit. The weapons come in multiple flavors, and are grouped for you. I'll explain the mechanics of acquiring them in a moment.
Pistols are low in damage and fairly high in firing rate and accuracy. They're side arms, and are used as such. You won't generally have much use for them unless you need to reload in the middle of a fire fight, but having a good one can save your hide on occasion.
Shotguns are shotguns. Have you played an FPS? Then you're educated.
Submachine guns are good in this game at what they're supposed to be good at in real life. They're the every-man's weapon. They're great at mid to close range and allow you to spray bullets indiscriminately while more specifically armed teammates do the rest. There's rarely a bad situation for one, unless the other guy's got a sniper rifle and you haven't noticed him.
Rifles come in two flavors, but are lumped under the same category. Similar to SMGs, there are assault rifles. You can think of them as the big brothers of most SMGs. They've got a bit better accuracy at a distance, and some let you zoom your sight a bit.
Snipers, on the other hand, do massive damage from a range with insane accuracy. Additionally, all guns fire in the exact center of your screen within an error tolerance, so it's quite possible to noscope everyone if you're good enough.
Finally, there's a machine gun. Just one. It never runs out of ammo.
There are also some grenades, of the flash, smoke, and HE varieties. Buying some armor will often save you. Really, I didn't need to tell you any of this, though. IF you've ever played an FPS, you know this.
Counter-Strike, then differs in that every action may affect your bank account in some manner. By default, you have a limit of $16000, but you'll be hard pressed to get there very often. Killing guys gets you more money, as does completing some of the map objectives. By default, you start with a small amount and participate in what is known as the "pistol round." Because you have so little money, the only thing you may buy is a new pistol, and everyone tries to kill each other with them. It can be one of the more amusing moments in the game, but since the winning team of each round is awarded bonus cash, it can really decide the opening momentum of the game. The weapons between the opposing sides, Terrorists and Counter Terrorists, don't differ much, but I feel that the Terrorists have a better pistol available.
When you get enough cash, you can start buying your preferred loadout for the map. Some people love their shotguns, while others hang back with rifles and let others do the dirty work. It partially depends on which team you're on and the map style.
In the standard Source game, there are only two game types, but near infinite maps if you're willing to look. My preferred game type is CS, in which the terrorists must prevent the counter terrorists from escorting some number of hostages to escape zones. I feel there's a bit more strategy involved in this game type, and can lead to some interesting experiences.
The other game type involves the terrorists attempting to plant a time bomb and make sure it detonates before the counter team defuses it. You can totally be killed by the bomb. Watch out for that.
Really, though, it comes down to really fast matches and a lot of action. The downside is that each round is permadeath, so if you suck, you can expect to spend a lot of time not playing. That said, the online scene is fierce. The game's been around since '99, and most people who are playing it have been for a long time. It took me a bit to ramp up to a point where I could feasibly participate, but thanks to copious TF2 and a non-trivial amount of time playing against the remarkably decent bot AI before venturing online, it wasn't too bad.
By the way, this game has bots, and they're pretty good. If you're like me and have some irrational phobia of playing online, you can do that pretty much forever.
It's usually $5-10 on Steam, and not super graphically intense. If you've got a decent computer, you can prolly run this without much trouble, and it satisfies and itch I didn't know I was trying to scratch.
That said, if you prefer more specialization in your actions, I might recommend just picking up TF2 instead. It's pretty awesome, and free.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Episode 30: Future Robots Are Cool [Mega Man X]
This time around, we take a look at a classic that Geremy and Tyler won't stop talking about. Zach dissents! Really, it's about the same as usual, except it's Mega Man X! And it's awesome, despite what certain curmudgeons say.
X! Enter this pod to receive a sweet download!
(01:00) We've been playing videogames like it's an addiction! On a related note, Cloud 9 is apparently awesome.
(04:20) Kazooie or Tooie? You decide! Also, the best 120 star time, distinct from the minimal run we mentioned.
(09:20) Future is cool. Megami Tensei is crazy sprawling. We talk about series vs. franchises for a bit. Tyler tangents about an awesome game in that series for a bit.
(15:00) Camp meters would be amazing, especially for him.
(20:00) Norse mythology, fools! Also, Mega Man X or something. It's pretty!
(24:40) Awesome mechanics help make awesome games. Wall jumping and dashing makes this almost not a Mega Man game. Maybe some sort of X thing.
(28:00) Button mappings may or may not matter.
(33:00) Zach rants about game limitations and how they shouldn't exist. The level he's talking about with the mace guys at the beginning is Boomer Kuwanger's.
(43:00) Tyler eats his words and admits to doing buster only runs of X.
(48:00) A bit of a tangent, but sections of games that mess with your normal control scheme: good or bad?
(51:30) Alternative takes on stories. Also, we mention visual shorthand hinting at potential strategies.
Next time on Last Time, Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber! Tactical!
You can engage us automated battles in at
X! Enter this pod to receive a sweet download!
(01:00) We've been playing videogames like it's an addiction! On a related note, Cloud 9 is apparently awesome.
(04:20) Kazooie or Tooie? You decide! Also, the best 120 star time, distinct from the minimal run we mentioned.
(09:20) Future is cool. Megami Tensei is crazy sprawling. We talk about series vs. franchises for a bit. Tyler tangents about an awesome game in that series for a bit.
(15:00) Camp meters would be amazing, especially for him.
(20:00) Norse mythology, fools! Also, Mega Man X or something. It's pretty!
(24:40) Awesome mechanics help make awesome games. Wall jumping and dashing makes this almost not a Mega Man game. Maybe some sort of X thing.
(28:00) Button mappings may or may not matter.
(33:00) Zach rants about game limitations and how they shouldn't exist. The level he's talking about with the mace guys at the beginning is Boomer Kuwanger's.
(43:00) Tyler eats his words and admits to doing buster only runs of X.
(48:00) A bit of a tangent, but sections of games that mess with your normal control scheme: good or bad?
(51:30) Alternative takes on stories. Also, we mention visual shorthand hinting at potential strategies.
Next time on Last Time, Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber! Tactical!
You can engage us automated battles in at
Geremy@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Last Rant on Videogames: It turned out to be more of an informal gathering than a challenge
No post last week and now this one's late? I could give an excuse. The last couple of weeks have been hectic; we've gotten a new cat, I've been participating in extracirriculars, and some odd events have come up. Nothing too major, though. Really, I'm just lazy.
That said, better late than never. Even my own lassitude can't stop me from writing occasionally, only delay it.
I've mentioned this game a few times on the show, and I think it needs a small boost in its player base. Still. The game is Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, an insidiously addictive mix of what Alex would call housewife games and a generic fantasy RPG.
In a world where monstrous creatures and fey wildlings near some conveniently placed, and rather expansive, mountains, a young knight in training, but somehow not a squire, is about to embark upon an epic journey. And by epic, we mean pretty generic, but cool, we guess.
The premise is that you fill the role of a character whose class you get to choose. You're called a knight most of the time, which is a bit confusing given that knight is actually one of the classes, which you may or may not actually be. Each class has its strengths and weaknesses, but they're not how you traditionally associate them.
That's because this is a game of resource acquisition. Kinda. You see, you spend most of this game in combat. Thankfully, it's not random, so you know when a fight's coming. However, you enter every fight with full health, so that's not really a concern. Depending on your skills and equipment, you may also start with some mana.
Your four battle resources, mana, are all flavors of the classic elements. In order to garner yourself some more mana points, you must match three or more gems of the appropriate color on the board. You get however many you matched, in addition to some bonuses based on your skills or equipment. If you get four in a row, you nab an extra turn, and if you get five, you get the extra turn and a wildcard for any color and a bonus number of points. You can deal damage to your opponent (I'll get to that) by matching skulls. You can also pick up bonus experience and gold, but that matters less for winning a combat.
So far, it sounds pretty bland. You've seen it before. Where this game really shines is that each class learns different abilities to affect the board. My personal favorite turns a large number of gems into red gems and skulls, making certain you can dish out some damage that round. Red generally powers damaging/combat abilities, green and yellow play intermediate roles, and blue usually helps with healing. While this role for the elements isn't particularly new, it does lend a bit of strategy to what is otherwise a mind numbing diversion.
You and your opponent take turns matching gems and making use of your abilities to put an end to each other. You can learn new abilities by capturing enemies, done by solving a puzzle, forge weapons, done by collecting runes and getting really lucky, pay money to train skills, buy new equipment, and generally minmax your way to victory. It's a lot of fun, even if every combat is essentially the same.
This game has two main failings. If you've been following some of the links, you may have gotten my impression of the story.
Spoiler: it's super generic.
Great spoilers, I know.
Basically, some undead guy is threatening your kingdom, but you're constantly getting sidetracked, usually by orcs or something. Eventually, you'll have a showdown with him, and... you win or something? It's actually a pretty clean cut ending, and some of the characters are amusing, but the story itself is nothing to write home about. I don't know how many of you are abroad while reading this, but save yourself the postage. We have the Internet.
My second complaint about this game is that the combat is essentially random. On occasion you're given a wonderful setup to exploit with one of your ability combos, but it's pretty much up to luck to guide you to victory. This makes it mildly frustrating when you keep losing combats because you only get to make two moves while your opponent gets to make ten moves in a row. Thankfully, the penalty for a loss is pretty light; you just have to try again.
Though it's definitely flawed, the idea is genius. It's a ton of fun, and disturbingly good at picking at your neuroses. Humans have this tendency to notice patterns, and this game exploits and abuses the fact that we enjoy doing so. It's definitely worth a look, especially if you own a 3DS since it's on the VC there. However, this game came out on damn near everything.
From what I've heard, the sequel is superior in just about every way, but I haven't yet gotten around to letting that game consume my life for a while. It's pretty well suited to "pick up and set down" styles of play, but you'll have a hard time actually setting it down because you were so close to beating that damn centaur and if you could just get that one combo off maybe you could win and...
You might see where that's going. Give it a try if you feel like wondering where you lost a few hours.
That said, better late than never. Even my own lassitude can't stop me from writing occasionally, only delay it.
I've mentioned this game a few times on the show, and I think it needs a small boost in its player base. Still. The game is Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, an insidiously addictive mix of what Alex would call housewife games and a generic fantasy RPG.
In a world where monstrous creatures and fey wildlings near some conveniently placed, and rather expansive, mountains, a young knight in training, but somehow not a squire, is about to embark upon an epic journey. And by epic, we mean pretty generic, but cool, we guess.
The premise is that you fill the role of a character whose class you get to choose. You're called a knight most of the time, which is a bit confusing given that knight is actually one of the classes, which you may or may not actually be. Each class has its strengths and weaknesses, but they're not how you traditionally associate them.
That's because this is a game of resource acquisition. Kinda. You see, you spend most of this game in combat. Thankfully, it's not random, so you know when a fight's coming. However, you enter every fight with full health, so that's not really a concern. Depending on your skills and equipment, you may also start with some mana.
Your four battle resources, mana, are all flavors of the classic elements. In order to garner yourself some more mana points, you must match three or more gems of the appropriate color on the board. You get however many you matched, in addition to some bonuses based on your skills or equipment. If you get four in a row, you nab an extra turn, and if you get five, you get the extra turn and a wildcard for any color and a bonus number of points. You can deal damage to your opponent (I'll get to that) by matching skulls. You can also pick up bonus experience and gold, but that matters less for winning a combat.
So far, it sounds pretty bland. You've seen it before. Where this game really shines is that each class learns different abilities to affect the board. My personal favorite turns a large number of gems into red gems and skulls, making certain you can dish out some damage that round. Red generally powers damaging/combat abilities, green and yellow play intermediate roles, and blue usually helps with healing. While this role for the elements isn't particularly new, it does lend a bit of strategy to what is otherwise a mind numbing diversion.
You and your opponent take turns matching gems and making use of your abilities to put an end to each other. You can learn new abilities by capturing enemies, done by solving a puzzle, forge weapons, done by collecting runes and getting really lucky, pay money to train skills, buy new equipment, and generally minmax your way to victory. It's a lot of fun, even if every combat is essentially the same.
This game has two main failings. If you've been following some of the links, you may have gotten my impression of the story.
Spoiler: it's super generic.
Great spoilers, I know.
Basically, some undead guy is threatening your kingdom, but you're constantly getting sidetracked, usually by orcs or something. Eventually, you'll have a showdown with him, and... you win or something? It's actually a pretty clean cut ending, and some of the characters are amusing, but the story itself is nothing to write home about. I don't know how many of you are abroad while reading this, but save yourself the postage. We have the Internet.
My second complaint about this game is that the combat is essentially random. On occasion you're given a wonderful setup to exploit with one of your ability combos, but it's pretty much up to luck to guide you to victory. This makes it mildly frustrating when you keep losing combats because you only get to make two moves while your opponent gets to make ten moves in a row. Thankfully, the penalty for a loss is pretty light; you just have to try again.
Though it's definitely flawed, the idea is genius. It's a ton of fun, and disturbingly good at picking at your neuroses. Humans have this tendency to notice patterns, and this game exploits and abuses the fact that we enjoy doing so. It's definitely worth a look, especially if you own a 3DS since it's on the VC there. However, this game came out on damn near everything.
From what I've heard, the sequel is superior in just about every way, but I haven't yet gotten around to letting that game consume my life for a while. It's pretty well suited to "pick up and set down" styles of play, but you'll have a hard time actually setting it down because you were so close to beating that damn centaur and if you could just get that one combo off maybe you could win and...
You might see where that's going. Give it a try if you feel like wondering where you lost a few hours.
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Episode 29: Somebody Call Me a Belmont [Castlevania: Symphony of the Night]
This week, we tread where no man dare to tread. No man except a vampire! And most people who own a PSX way back when. It's a terrible night to not know how to backdash!
Let us download tonight for pleasure. The bandwidth is still great.
(01:00) A brief alcoholic interlude, followed by what we've been playing. Geremy and Zach played some SC2. Nocturne, for the uninitiated, is a game about demons n' stuff. Wonderful 101 is super weird, but kinda fun! Bat nipples... Tyler talks a bit about Thomas Was Alone.
(10:30) In Showdown Effect, katanas are the default. Also, Burnout: Paradise is a pretty cool game that doesn't afraid of crashing.
(13:15) Videogame treadmill. It's a thing that needed to be.
(14:10) When to get a new console. Bungie continues to lend its mighty aid to Microsoft. The PS2 may have been a thing.
(18:30) Why buy a console over a computer.
(21:40) What game would you play for the rest of ever if you only had one?
(23:00) Castlevania: SotN is pretty sweet. CD loading rooms: Amazing. Zach and Tyler briefly debate the merits of 2D games and whether they should exist.
(28:15) WHY?!
(29:30) Cross-douken!
(30:30) Just a list of things this game does...
(31:30) What Zach was talking about. Also, Alucard definitely gets vengeance. Nooo! My powerups!
(35:20) Sweet opening music. The rest of that video has the full soundtrack; it's killer.
(39:45) Pointlessness of sub-weapons. They may help you get it all done.
(43:30) What is a man? Die you monster!
(45:30) Just text is worth exploring.
(47:30) Play it! It's worth the price.
Next week, you'll be cool enough to play Mega Man X!
Super lemons? We have them at
Let us download tonight for pleasure. The bandwidth is still great.
(01:00) A brief alcoholic interlude, followed by what we've been playing. Geremy and Zach played some SC2. Nocturne, for the uninitiated, is a game about demons n' stuff. Wonderful 101 is super weird, but kinda fun! Bat nipples... Tyler talks a bit about Thomas Was Alone.
(10:30) In Showdown Effect, katanas are the default. Also, Burnout: Paradise is a pretty cool game that doesn't afraid of crashing.
(13:15) Videogame treadmill. It's a thing that needed to be.
(14:10) When to get a new console. Bungie continues to lend its mighty aid to Microsoft. The PS2 may have been a thing.
(18:30) Why buy a console over a computer.
(21:40) What game would you play for the rest of ever if you only had one?
(23:00) Castlevania: SotN is pretty sweet. CD loading rooms: Amazing. Zach and Tyler briefly debate the merits of 2D games and whether they should exist.
(28:15) WHY?!
(29:30) Cross-douken!
(30:30) Just a list of things this game does...
(31:30) What Zach was talking about. Also, Alucard definitely gets vengeance. Nooo! My powerups!
(35:20) Sweet opening music. The rest of that video has the full soundtrack; it's killer.
(39:45) Pointlessness of sub-weapons. They may help you get it all done.
(43:30) What is a man? Die you monster!
(45:30) Just text is worth exploring.
(47:30) Play it! It's worth the price.
Next week, you'll be cool enough to play Mega Man X!
Super lemons? We have them at
Geremy@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Tyler@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
Zach@lasttimeonvideogames.com,
or LTOVG@lasttimeonvideogames.com.
You can also go to the show page at plus.google.com/+LastTimeOnVideogames or comment on the site at www.lasttimeonvideogames.com.
Also, you can follow our tweets @LTOVG.
Categories:
Adventure,
Castlevania,
Episodes,
Geremy,
Konami,
Platformer,
PlayStation,
Tyler,
Zach
No comments:
No comments:
Subscribe to:
Posts (RSS)