Dark Souls: Flutter By, Butterfly

Previously on Dark Souls: Morgan left the sewers to explore a forest, nearly got pulverized by a high-pressure water blast, and fell off a cliff like a dork.

I was wary of heading back down into the Darkroot Basin, but I had to recover the large bundle of souls and few humanity points that I was toting around. It took me a while to spot my bloodstain, but I finally caught a bit of a break and was able to pick it up without drawing the attention of the Black Knight that had scared me off the cliff in the first place.

I trekked back up to Darkroot Garden, intent on discovering what the upper path held in store for me. I was a bit unnerved to learn that there were bottomless pits all over the place up there too, but there was a lot more solid ground to maneuver around on, and the weed enemies were a big joke compared to the Black Knight and the crystal golems.

Near the end of the trail I came across a huge door that appeared to be sealed with magic. I remembered noticing that Andrei was selling an amulet or something that was supposed to open a door deep in a forest, but it cost far more souls than I was willing to part with, and I didn’t want to know what was behind such a secure door anyway.

To the right of the door was a path leading downward, which led to a Fog Gate and a small clearing off to the side. In the centre of the clearing was a treasure box holding a pithy amount of souls. And then of course, the trap is sprung and three weed monsters ambush me. They are pitiful alone, but the team-up causes me a notable bit of damage. So I ran back to the bonfire in the Parish to heal up before going through the Fog Gate.

When I come back here a million updates later, I will discover a bonfire behind a false wall right by the sealed door. And then I will slap my forehead hard enough to knock myself off balance.

I headed back to the Fog Gate, and breathed a sigh of relief as it dissipated behind me. I wasn’t at a boss yet. I’m not sure why some Fog Gates are randomly scattered around like that; maybe just to psych players out. There were some big new enemies in the next area: stone soldiers. These guys are big and slow, but they hit hard and liked to cast spells that made me slow as well. There were a half dozen or so of them scattered around the large room, and they only caused trouble when they teamed up with the weed monsters.

Pretty drained from the fight, I turned to leave the area and saw… A huge, quivering tree. It stood out pretty plainly from all the other trees, and I had no idea what it’s deal was. So I swung my sword at it, and wouldn’t you know, the thing up and died like a monster. And that was it. Odd.

After a trip back to the Parish bonfire, I ran the statue-man room again, this time having taken slightly less damage. Moving on, I found another Fog Gate. Foolishly assuming it was another fake-out like the previous one, I stepped through and was horrified to see that it had not vanished behind me, and that I was now locked on the top of a rather thin wall. Then a massive butterfly showed up.

The Moonlight Butterfly attacked exclusively with magic shots. The first one wa a large burst that connected directly and cleaved off a goo two-thirds of my life bar, so I drank up two of my remaining Estus charges and decided that I’d have to play on the defensive to survive this battle. The boss was too far away to hit, so it’s not like I even had a choice. The Butterfly’s other shot was a spreader, which was easier to avoid than the large blast, and did less damage besides.

After dodging a few more shots, the Butterfly flew over the wall and came in for a landing on the side. Seeing my opening, I ran up to it and hit it with everything I had. I had taken it down to less than half of its HP when it resumed flight and hit me with another blast. I drank the last of the Estus and crossed my fingers that it would land again soon. It hit me with another magic bolt, and at that point, I’d die if I was hit with even the spread shot. It was down to the wire, and my heart skipped a beat with every shot I successfully dodged.

Finally the Butterfly landed again, and I murdered it with reckless abandon. My rewards were the Butterfly’s soul, and passage both forward and back. While it was risky, I decided to venture forward, and ascended another long stairwell. At the top was a dead end, but I did grab myself a Divine Ember (whatever that is) and a Watchtower Basement Key. When I was done pillaging, I started back down the stairwell but misstepped and tumbled down the shaft to my death. You Died.

After a short trip back to collect my souls, I started the hunt for the door that my new key would unlock.

Tune in next week for Part 12: Back to the Sewers

Dark Souls: Out of the Sewers (For Now)

Previously on Dark Souls: Morgan fell down a bunch of holes and faced the most horrible monstrosities the sewer could conjure up, but managed to survive it all.

It was time for a short reprieve from the sewers. Nobody likes a sewer level, especially when it’s full of giant rats, horrifying frog mutants, and brain-sucking slimes.

I hauled my tuchus out of the Depths real quick-like, and started making my way towards the Undead Parish. The Depths are huge and confusing, so I don’t know if I’d explored every inch of the place, but I was sad that I hadn’t yet found a shortcut back to Firelink Shrine. Having to trudge all the way back out was a pain in the butt. Maybe there would be one in Blighttown.

After the long journey, I met with Andrei the blacksmith and bought the Weapon Smithbox, so that I could upgrade my weapons without trekking back to the Undead Parish every time. My goal completed, I breathed a heavy sigh and prepared myself to go all the way back to the Depths.

Then I saw the door across from Andrei. Somehow I’d completely missed it the handful of times I’d been there before. On the other side of the door was a huge ruined hall, and in the middle was a giant stone monster who started chucking lightning bolts at me immediately. The bolts were easy to dodge, but trying to get close to score a few hits was a little trickier. The statue monster had a very long staff, and a single unblocked blow was enough to cleave off most of my life. By the time I was able to fell the beast, my Estus Flask was empty and I was about ready to keel over.

Fortunately, that monster is one of the few who don’t respawn after visiting a bonfire, so I was able to skip across the hall and into the Darkroot Garden. A lush, foresty setting, Darkroot Garden didn’t seem so bad. A couple weed monster popped out of the ground and tried to whip me with their vines, but they were about as easy to kill as the basic undead enemies.

It was when I came across a split in the trail that things started going downhill. Literally. I decided to go right first (that seems to be a recurring choice), and ended up on a ledge high above the area known as Darkroot Basin. I saw a shiny item way off in the distance, and started making my way down the long, winding trail, hugging the wall so that I didn’t accidentally slip off into the abyss.

When I finally reached the bottom, it became very clear that this was not a place I wanted to be in for very long. Far in the distance, beyond the trees, I could see something writhing about in the fog. I couldn’t tell what it was, but I got all the information I relly needed: it was big. I should have just booked it right then, but curiosity got the best of me and I started inching closer to get a better look.

Then the crystal golems came out of nowhere and started trying to bash my head in. A pair of them has noticed me, and I could see others lurking deeper into the wooded expanse. These guys were big, but not very quick, and not nearly as tough as they looked. Fighting two at once was a chore, but they shattered to pieces after only a few hits each.

Confident in my ability to take them down, I headed into the trees to try to lure another one over. But before I could get its attention, I heard a strange noise that I couldn’t quite place. I looked up, and saw a cluster of huge water blasts tearing through the trees. I dashed away from them and slid behind a large rock as the projectiles slammed into the ground around me. Maybe finding out more about the giant on the other side of the forest could wait until another day.

I began heading back up the cliffside trail, and about halfway up I saw another shiny item on a corpse on a dangerous-looking outcropping. I carefully made my way over, and nearly took a halberd to the face for my efforts. A Black Knight was waiting just around the corner to ambush treasure-seekers.

I carefully backpedaled up the path with my shield drawn, trying carefully to block the Black Knight’s attacks while keeping my balance. I drew him further up the trail, where there was a more open area to duel in, and started to fight back in earnest. The Black Knights don’t mess around though, and it was looking like I’d need to try to escape if I didn’t want to get cut down.

That plan didn’t work out so well though. As I circled around the knight in an effort to reach the path leading up and away from the basin, I miscalculated a dodge of his blade and lost my footing near the cliff’s edge. Down I tumbled into the blackness of the canyon, wondering where my bundle of souls and humanity would end up. You Died.

Tune in next week for Part 11: Flutter By, Butterfly

You maniacs! You blew it up!

Yeah, so, I guess I haven’t had Froot Loops for a while, or else this change in the box art is really recent…

I suppose it was inevitable that they’d eventually render Toucan Sam, but I just didn’t want to believe it. It’s totally for the worse, too. He looks absolutely awful and more than a little bit creepy now.

Kellogg’s, please listen to me. Make Sam two-dimensional again. You don’t have to go all the way back to thick black lines and solid colours (though I’d certainly appreciate that), but this… this is just an abomination. Even though I’m not comfortable with it, I’ll accept that most of the time, change is a good thing. I’ll even argue for it in some cases, but this is not one of those times.

Dear God… I don’t even want to think about what’s happened to Tony the Tiger.

Picross e3 – Soul-crushing Satisfaction

Picross e3 came out at the very beginning of October last year, and despite my so-called “addiction” to picross, I didn’t actually play it until early last month. Maybe it’s because I was already knee-deep in another, cheaper picross game on my iPhone, or maybe it’s because I wasn’t completely blown away by the first two Picross e games. Most likely it has something more to do with me having played way too much picross last year. What kind of piss-poor picromaniac am I, anyway?

Continue reading Picross e3 – Soul-crushing Satisfaction

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: January 2014

Another year is upon us, and with that year comes a long a whole buttload of new games that I’ve purchased on both Nintendo eShops and Steam. Because those year-end sales were absolutely mad. And not “angry” mad, but “British” mad. Of course, I’m not playing all of those games at once, so you won’t see them all here, and that kind of defeats the purpose of mentioning them at all.

2014 is going real swell so far.

As it turned out, January was absolutely swamped with short games that I was able to beat in a matter of hours. So this is a big one. Hold onto your butt.

~ Now Playing ~

Super Mario 3D World (Wii U) – The wait to Christmas was absolutely killer in 2013, because I was waiting for this very game. And yet, I did not burn through it in a week like I could have. No, I find that a new Mario game is best when savoured a few levels at a time, and man oh man, have I ever been savouring this one. This is the special kind of game that you buy a system for. Technically I have beaten it, but there’s so much more to do that I’ll leave it in Now Playing for the time being, and move it to Game Over once I’m good and done with it.

Dark Souls (360) – Yeah, I’m still at it. I play more than once a week though, so I’m way ahead of the weekly blogs.

Chibi-Robo: Photo Finder (3DS) – It can’t possibly live up to the standard that I set by the original Chibi-Robo game, but it’s still got a lot of the heart that made the first game a winner. The real problem here is the game’s main gimmick: taking pictures of stuff. It would come off a lot better if the 3DS’ camera wasn’t awful. Heck, it would probably even be a lot of fun with a decent camera. Alas. I have no idea how long this game is going to be, but I’ve filled up two museum displays so far.

Plants Vs. Zombies 2 (iOS) – My wife and I are racing to see who can get to the end first, and neither of us are making progress quickly. Me, because I play like once a month, and her because she’s stuck on a particularly hard level. She’s also quite a bit farther than I, so if she gets over that hump I might be in trouble! Oh, and EA? If you’re going to insist on locking stuff away behind micro-transactions, please make them reasonably priced. There’s no way I’m going to buy any extra plants or power-ups at $3 a pop. If they were $1 each, I’d probably already have them all.

Valdis Story: Abyssal City (PC) – This is like, my dream game (after Super Mario 3D World). It’s a colourful metroidvania with multiple playable characters, a focus on combat, and a Borderlands-style perk tree. Now if only I could play it with a controller from the comfort of my couch on an actual Video Game Machine. Sigh… PC exclusives make me sad. I really have come to loathe playing games on my computer.

Super Monkey Ball (iOS) – Logic would denote that playing a game whose main mechanic is tilting the playfield would work great with tilt controls. That’s not quite the case, as Monkey Ball on my iPhone is very difficult to play, and even harder to enjoy. If you need a Monkey Ball fix, I’d recommend just picking up one of the GameCube games. Maybe the one on Wii. I never played that one though. I’m on World 2 of 5, but I doubt I’ll bother finishing it.

Long Live the Queen (PC) – I’m not into text adventures or anime princesses, but for whatever reason, I felt like I needed to own this game. And it’s sort of blah. All you really do is choose which skills to learn between scripted events, and hope that Elodie doesn’t get murdered along the way. Finding all the ways she can die is probably the most fun you can have with this one though. To date, I’ve only played enough to suffer one death. Here’s a really good review that makes me wish I appreciated it more.

Body Harvest (N64) – Yes, I started my N64 game for February early, but my goal is simply to beat one per month, not to only play one a month. Also I’ve never played Body Harvest and have no idea how long it’ll take me to finish it. Currently I’m on part three of the second mission, and I’m fairly impressed. It’s long since become obsolete, but if I’d played this when it was new, my mind would have been blown wide open.

~ Game Over ~

Picross e3 (3DS) – It’s the weirdest thing, this game had been out for months, and I wasn’t even slightly inclined to buy it. Mostly because I was waiting until I’d finished Paint It Back, but also a little bit because I may have overloaded on picross in 2013. If that can even happen. Burned though it in a week though, because I’ve got to burn through something in a week.

Mario & Luigi: Dream Team (3DS) – Wifey gave me this for my birthday last year, and I played it until the game decided to send me back to all the corners of the map that I’d already explored for a big fetch quest, and my enthusiasm petered out. I spent most of January slowly slogging through the second half of the game, and I’ve got to say that the guiding principle behind the whole project must have been making everything twice as long as it needs to be.

Gone Home (PC) – A game about wandering around a house, trying to find out where your family has disappeared to. It’s a cute little game with a lot of heart, but it’s not something I’d necessarily recommend. Not at full price anyway. If you see it on sale and narrative-based wandering games are your bag, go for it. Maybe I’d have liked more it if my PC had been able to run it at full speed.

Attack of the Friday Monsters! A Tokyo Tale (3DS) – Gameplay-wise, it’s very similar to Gone Home, but I liked this one so much better. Maybe because it has a more fantastical story, or maybe because it’s much more lively. I don’t know, but I really enjoyed this one. I just don’t like that you have to grind for collectables to truly finish it. :p

Bugs Vs. Tanks! (3DS) – Exactly what it sounds like; you play as an officer in a battalion of tanks that have been shrunken down, and have to combat insects to survive. It’s not a superb game by any means, and can get somewhat frustrating at times, but it’s fun. Also, it’s one of the exceptionally rare 3DS games where the 3D effect actually adds something.

Brain Age Express: Sudoku (DSi) – I finally finished all the sudoku puzzles in there. Guess I wipe it now and start again? Nah, probably not.

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP (PC) – I actually finished this game in December, but totally forgot about it. That’s because despite the fact that I want to say I like it, it’s a pretty forgettable game. Also it has a stupid mechanic where you have to wait entire days to make certain critical events happen, and that’s just a huge pain in the butt. And making me wait to play a game more often than not makes me forget about the game altogether. It’s still pretty good, though.

~ Reruns ~

Kirby’s Dream Land (GB) – I tend to play through this one every few months or so. It only takes half an hour, and I think it’s pretty fun despite the simplicity. Also I love the music.

Super Mario Land (GB) – Same as above.

GoldenEye 007 (N64) – It felt really good to go back to a game that I spent so much time with, but have never pick up again since. I even wrote a whole thing about it. The word for it may or may not be “retrospective.”

Dark Souls: Who Am I, James Sunderland?

Previously on Dark Souls: Morgan began slogging through the sewer level, and as expected, had all sorts of rat-related fun.

Already itching for a reprieve from the stanky sewers, I decided that I was going to adventure somewhere else for a while. Namely, back to the Undead Parish, where I could buy an ACME Home Weapon Smithing Kit from that one blacksmith guy. I could improve my own armor already, but found myself wanting for the ability to upgrade weapons as I saw fit.

Just as I was about to leave the Depths, however, I noticed that there was a doorway hidden behind some crates in the kitchen. I smashed the crates up good, and wandered through the doorway to see what was back therAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!

A hole. A long, terrifying hole is what was back there. As if it wasn’t bad enough that I had almost died from the fall, the place I’d fallen into was a small ledge overlooking the giant rat’s room. This turned out to be a blessing, however, as I found a rather nifty Spider Shield on a body. Also I was in the perfect position to murder the giant rat without putting myself in danger. I lobbed a few firebombs to soften him up, and then lept off the ledge and finished it off with a plunging attack.

I scoured the area for treasure, and then ducked into a waterway that seemed to be the only way out of the giant rat’s room. Unfortunately, that turned out to be another, even longer hole. As I was falling, I decided that if I survived, I was going to start watchign where I stepped.

The fall left be with only a sliver of life, but that wasn’t even the half of it. The room I’d fallen into was infested with the most horrifying monstrosities that I’d come face-to-face with yet. These quadruped beasts had huge, cartoonish eyes plastered to the tops of their heads, and barfed out a disgusting black liquid from their oversized mouths. The closest thing I could liken them to was some sort of horrible mutant frog.

I ran as fast as I could from the monsters, but it seemed that around every corner there was another one or two of them waiting for me. Eventually I put enough distance between them and myself to chug some Estus, and then finally faced them down. The frog-beasts, thankfully, were pretty fragile and went down with a single strong blow. Once I’d cleared the area, I picked up a fancy-lloking ring off a corpse and started trying to make my way back out of the sewer.

The deepest part of the sewer was a twisting maze of corridors and waterways. I was startign to panic, as I was low on Estus and having a hard time navigating the halls that all looked the same. It was here that something very odd happened: I was invaded.

This was unusual because I was offline, so there was no way any other players could invade me, right? But here I was, and there was the invader: the Knight… Kirk? What the hell kind of name for a fantasy character is Kirk?

I was too shocked by the sudden invasion to raise myshield, however, and Kirk immediately skewered me on his sword. I turned and ran, hoping to get to a safe distance where I could drink some Estus. It was difficult though, as the sewer halls were cramped and Kirk appeared to be very driven in his goal of murdering me. I managed to confuse him with a short staircase though, and that gave me enough time to recompose myself.

The fight with Kirk was not an easy one. He fought very similarly to the many knights I’d already defeated, but he was much more aggressive and had enough life to shrug off quite a few hits. I eventually did take him down, but at the cost of the last of my Estus. Now, getting back to that bonfire was of dire importance.

A few frog-men later, I emerged into a large hall. On one end, I found a massive gate and a peddler who informed me that it led to a place called Blighttown. I seemed to remember the first fella I met in Firelink saying something about Blighttown after I’d rung the bell in the Undead Parish. This must be where I needed to go, but the gate was quite locked. The key had to be in the sewers somewhere..

A staircase from the large hall led up to what seemed like a castle wall overlooking a massive underground courtyard. Off in the distance, though, there was a crack along the wall with sunlight pouring in. It was a welcome sight after spending so much time navigating by nothing but torchlight. I tried descending to the courtyard, but the final doorway was barred by a Fog Gate, and in my condition, the only thought that passed through my mind was to run as far away from it as I could.

A few more slimes and some rats tried to stop me, but I did make it back to the sewer bonfire. Refreshing my Estus Flask, I steeled my resolve and pledged to myself that this time, there would be no distractions. I would head straight for the Undead Parish, not stopping for anything but to kill any monsters who tried to get in my way. I’d had more than enough excitement in the last hour to last me a lifetime.

Tune in next week for Part 10: Out of the Sewers (For Now)

Year of N64 – January: GoldenEye 007

Let’s not beat around the bush here; everybody’s played Goldeneye 007 for the Nintendo 64. Everyone. It’s that one game that was a must-have if you owned an N64, and if you didn’t own an N64, you probably bought one so that you didn’t look like a fool when your friends came over and asked why you weren’t playing GoldenEye. So you probably don’t really need me to tell you all that much about what it is.

Being the first game in TE’s Year of Nintendo 64 though, I’ve made a paper-thin commitment to write something about it. And now that I think about it, I guess that it’s old enough now that there are kids who are so young that they’ve never played it. That’s a little spooky, and makes me feel very old. But then, a lot of things make me feel old, so let’s not dwell on that.

Today, I want to take a look at GoldenEye from the perspective of someone who hasn’t played the game in over ten years, and see how the real deal holds up against the GoldenEye that is perched upon a pedestal in my memories.

Continue reading Year of N64 – January: GoldenEye 007

Top 13 Games I Played in 2013

Hey look, another year’s passed, so you know the drill. Let’s look at a selection of the games I played throughout 2013 that I thought stood out from the rest.

This year, the only criterion that I’m going by is that I have to have beaten the game in question for the first time in 2013. Anything that fits into that criterion is fair game. So, for example, there are a few games that weren’t released in 2013, but that I only finally played last year.

There were just over 50 eligible titles, but I found that whittling that number down to 13 was actually very easy. The ones that I picked were just so much better than the ones I left behind. You can check out a full list of the games I beat in 2013 (including replays) here.

Continue reading Top 13 Games I Played in 2013

Dark Souls: The Sewer Level

Previously on Dark Souls: Morgan killed the Capra Demon with an incredibly cheap tactic, and butchered a butcher.

Ugh. The sewer level. The absolute worst part of pretty much any video game that doesn’t star a team of adolescent turtles. Although this isn’t a turn-based RPG, so at least we won’t have to deal with a stupidly high random battle encounter rate.

The kitchen area had a flooded lower area with a few dogs and a single zombie. It seemed like a dead-end at first, until I noticed a section of the wall that had crumbled away, which I climbed up into a hallway. I chose to check out what was to my right first, and I made it all the way around the corner and to a far door before I heard somethign stomping up behind me.

It was another butcher, though where he had come from, I had no idea. The hallway had seemed empty when I got there, but I decided to go back and investigate the room that was on the opposite end of the hall, to make sure there weren’t any more butchers waiting to stalk me.

The far room was filed with nothing but barrels and boxes. Or so it seemed. In the far corner, I saw a head poking out of one of the barrels. I approched, and the head informed me that his name was Laurentius and begged for me to free him before the monsters turned him into lunch. I shattered the barrel with a single kick, as slicing it open with my sword seemed like it would do more harm than good. Laurentius thanked me profusely and ran his hippie ass back to Firelink.

Heading back though the door on the other end of the hall, I descended some stairs into the sewer proper. There I saw a corpse with a shiny item, and as I went to claim it, a huge blob of goo dropped onto my head and started sucking away my life. Eventually I was able to shake it off and stabbed the thing like mad until it dissolved into the grimy water. The bundle of souls I pilfered from the corpse afterward was probably worth the damage I took from the slime, though.

I wandered through the sewers, slaying zombies and slimes as I went, until I came to a small room with iron bars separating it from a larger room. In that larger room was the biggest freaking rat you’ve ever seen. The thing could have easily swallowed me whole, and I was eternally grateful that those iron bars were keeping it from doing just that. The huge rat stared at me as I passed through the room, and I was all to happy to leave there.

Just outside of the giant rat’s observation chamber, I came across a small pack of more reasonably-sized (but still way too big) rats. There were at least five of them, and they all started running from me the moment they noticed me. Assuming this would just be a handful of easy souls for me, I approached the rats and started stabbing them. They didn’t like that, and by the time I had killed them all, I was covered in bites and horribly poisoned.

Having no antidote of any description, and the poison very swiftly depleting my life, I had no choice but to start running the marathon back to Firelink. Through the sewers and taking the shortcut through the Lower Undead Burg, I sipped the last of my Estus, hoping I had enough to make it back to the bonfire before succumbing to the poison. I dashed down the aqueduct and pushed past the undead guarding the staircase to Firelink, and collapsed in front of the bonfire with only a sliver of health left.

Restored, I sought out the dirty hippie Laurentius, to see how he’d repay me for saving his life. He gave me a Pyromancy Flame and told me that he’d sell me some pyromancies. I didn’t really understand any of it, but bought Combustion and Fireball. Equipping the Pyromancy Flame instead of a real weapon allowed me to use the spells I’d just purchsed, and I immediately felt buyer’s remorse. Combustion was absolute garbage, just creating a poof of fire in front of my hand. Fireball was a little better, as I was able to actually throw a little ball of flame a distance. I practiced by torching a few undead, and then traveled all the way back to the Depths.

I took my revenge on the gang of rats by burning them alive with my new fireball spell. I noticed a shiny on one of their corpses, and investigating it I found… a humanity? This was easily the most unlikely thing that had happened for the duration of the adventure up until now.

The rats also managed to get one last laugh, As I strolled away from the scene of the slaughter, a rather unsuspecting box burst apart and a rat flew at me, scaring the absolute bejesus out of me. Needless to say, I quickly turned the rat into little more than chunks of rancid meat floating in the sewer water.

Venturing even deeper, I found another grate looking into the giant rat’s nest, and pressed up against the bars was most of a man’s body. He held on him a key. From here, I had three options: I could head down a narrow waterway to my right, follow a hallway through a Fog Gate to my left, or head back to a locked door I’d passed earlier and see if the key worked on it.

A little exhausted from splashing through the sewers, I decided to try the door. Much to my surprise, the key worked! And even better, there was a nice quiet room with a bonfire inside! I kindled the fire, and sat down to rest for a while. I really wasn’t looking forward to whatever the rest of the sewers had in store for me.

Tune in next week for Part 9: Who Am I, James Sunderland?

Something blurry this way comes

I’ve had a bit of a fascination with Nintendo 64 lately, though why this is happening is a complete mystery to me. Nostalgia probably has a lot to do with it, as is usual for a lot of the things I do. It’s been on my mind for a while now, but only a couple days ago did I actually take the initiative to dust the thing off and give it some playtime.

The N64 is the one pre-2000 console that I’ve never packed away, but it hasn’t so much as been plugged in for well over a decade now. So imagine my surprise when it decided that it didn’t want to play nice with my TV. That is, everything was connected properly, but the N64 refused to output anything to the TV. I don’t know why; maybe it’s because it’s an old machine, maybe it’s because the TV is too new. Maybe Ijust wasn’t putting the jacks into the correct plugs, but I’m pretty much an expert at plugging video game machines in, so I doubt it’s that one. I did eventually get it working, but I have no idea what I did that made the two decide to finally cooperate.

The next hurdle was deciding what to play. My Super Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time cartridges have mysteriously disappeared, so my first choice wasn’t plausible, and I couldn’t play Zelda either. I would be more worried about them, but I have multiple other ways to play legit copies of those games, so it’s not a big deal.

Eventually I settled on Goldeneye 007, which felt like the right choice, but I was a little worried that it would be the hardest game to get back into because of the N64 controller. And let me tell you, getting used to playing a first-person shooter with the N64 controller after about 12 years of dual-stick controls is not a task for the weak-willed. I fumbled my way through the Dam stage as quickly as I could, accepting that this was not going to be an easy or competent playthrough. By the time I hit the first Surface stage, the controls were starting to feel almost natural again. As I reached the end of the game, I felt like I had regained enough of my skill to maybe even play it again on Secret Agent difficulty. Or maybe I’d just go back and try to unlock all the Agent-level cheats. I still haven’t decided.

Playing through Goldeneye again has been a lot of fun, though I must admit that I’m not sure what to hit up next. The truth of the matter is that I’ve got a hankering to try out some games that I don’t own, so I’ve been poking around the internets to see if I can score some N64 games on the cheap. So far I haven’t turned up much, and I’m finding it odd that for a console that gets no respect, N64 games don’t come dirt-cheap. I mean, we’re still only talking about $15-$25 bucks, but I was hoping that I’d be able to find some in the $5 range (that are not sports games). It’s hard to justify spending $20 on an old game that’s probably not as good as I remember it being when I could just as likely put that $20 towards a decent current-gen game. At least none of the ones I want are hitting crazy SNES prices.

I was pretty happy when I found a copy of Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes for $10 on eBay. I know it’s not a very good game, but I spent a lot of time playing it when it was new, so the value is there for me. Hell, that’s what I’d be paying for a Virtual Console version anyway. You know, if Nintendo hadn’t completely dropped the ball on the N64 side of Virtual Console. Yes, we got the Marios and Zeldas, but I’m in it for the curiosities right now. I’m in it for games like Doom 64, Bomberman 64, and Quest 64. Games I may have rented in the day but never beat. Oh, hey there it is. Apparently I’ve gotten myself back into Nintendo 64 for some silly, past due sense of closure.

I also found copies of Body Harvest and Jet Force Gemini for $10 and $15 apiece in the local used games shop. A quick look on eBay shows that I may have been able to get them for a dollar or two less with good timing and a lucky bid, but I’m willing to pay the difference for convenience. Body Harvest is a game that I never played back in the day, but seems to be one of the better N64 titles, and I did rent JFG once, but none of my friends liked it so I had to dump on it too to fit in. It seems like something I’d enjoy though, so here’s to second chances.

Anyhow, I’m declaring now that my big video-games-style goal for the year is to beat one [1] Nintendo 64 game each month. Whether they’re new games or games I already own and have beaten before, it doesn’t matter. Just one a month. I need to get this 64-bit monkey off my back. Also I might publish a review of each one. Maybe. It’s the Year of Nintendo 64 here on TE. Hold onto your butts, it’s gonna be mediocre.