Retro Gaming – Page 6

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: October 2021

It’s A Very Castlevania Halloween!

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Tales of Arise (PS5) – Cleared all postgame activities and nabbed that plat.

Castlevania (NES) – I used to be okay at this game? But it’s even harder than I remember. Save states were basically compulsory for the last two stages.

Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (GBA) – The one GBA-vania I’ve never played more than about half an hour of. The first half was far too easy, and the second half was a brutal grind-fest. Maybe I was better off without??

Castlevania: The Adventure (GB) – Speaking of brutal! This game moves at about 10 frames per second at the best of times, never mind when there’s an enemy on the screen. Also suffers from a lot of cheap level design and way way way too many pixel-perfect jumps.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: September 2021

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Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim (PC) – This one is in the same gameplay style as The Oath in Felghana and Ys Origin, and while I like it more than the former, I don’t think it’s quite as good as the latter. It’s a brisk, fun game, but a good quarter of its runtime is still caught up in level/money grinding. As usual, the soundtrack is pretty boss.

Deltarune: Chapter 1 (PC) – When the second chapter released this month, I opted to refresh myself on the first, since I last played it about two years ago. Three hours well spent, and I even beat the secret boss this time!

Deltarune: Chapter 2 (PC) – I had no idea how Toby Fox planned to continue this story, and what happened in Chapter 2 is nothing at all like I would have expected. But it was still excellent! And I’m happy that the secret boss in this one wasn’t quite as difficult as the last one… Looking forward to Chapters 3-7 being released over the next 999 years!

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: August 2021

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Mr. Driller: Drill Land (Switch) – I honestly can’t believe that Namco decided not to localize this back in 2002. It’s easily the most robust Mr. Driller game I’ve ever played, and the five different game modes add a good amount of variety. Though, I’m still pretty bad at Mr. Driller, so I was only barely able to pass level 2 of each mode :I

The Medium (PC) – Very good spookventure. Clearly influenced by the Silent Hill series, but removes combat altogether to make the gameplay experience a little simpler. The story is a bit opaque, but is definitely more and more interesting as you put the pieces together. Which, I think, is a hallmark of good storytelling.

Stela (Switch) – A “walk forward and solve simple platforming puzzles” game much like LIMBO or Little Nightmares. Only I got no joy out of this one. Mostly because it was completely disjointed, due to every area being totally different from the last. If Stela is telling a story, it’s an impenetrable, convoluted mess. That, and it just never really made an impression otherwise.

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2

When I played the original Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, I had an absolute blast with it. As a game that called back to Castlevania III, but without the excruciating difficulty, it was something I was really able to sink my teeth into. A retro-styled game executed perfectly.

Then the sequel came along. CotM2 would obviously be similar to the first game, except probably bigger and flashier, if Inti Creates’ history was anything to go by. And that is not an inaccurate assessment! However, this sequel also ramped the difficulty way, way up.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: July 2021

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Doki Doki Literature Club Plus (Switch) – It loses a little bit of its punch once you know all the twists, but still a “good” time. The additional content was worth the purchase, and the way that it was made to work on console wasn’t nearly as janky as I’d worried it would be, and actually added a lot to the experience.

Robo Recall (Oculus) – Finished this one off at long last. That final stage has been outstanding for months now, but I finally did it. It’s a super fun game, though I don’t know that I’ll go back to complete the extra objectives.

Shutter (PC) – Boop.

Ys: Memories of Celceta (PS4) – One of four versions of Ys IV, and the most modern. While all the Ys games are fast-paced action RPGs, this one might be the ideal fast-paced action RPG. It’s an absolute joy to play, as movement and combat feel great, and there are so many completion percentage trackers. Not to mention that the main gameplay conceit is exploration, which I think is my absolute favourite thing about video games.

More words about Ys

My “theme” for 2021 was playing through all the main games in the Legend of Zelda series. But somewhere along the line I also got completely hooked on the Ys series, and am now through five of the ten games in that franchise.

Most recently was Ys: Memories of Celceta, which, to put it in simpler terms, is a remake of the fourth Ys game. But then I was looking into the original, and… it’s not quite that simple. Apparently, there were two similar but distinct games bearing the mantle of “Ys IV”, one for PC Engine and one for Super Famicom. There was even a third version in the works for the Mega Drive, but that one got canned. And then a PS2 “remake” happened that deviated quite a bit from both of the previous versions. And now we have Memories of Celceta, which goes even farther out from the source material and probably is more of an original game that was inspired by the previous games, rather than an actual remake. Also it’s the canonical version of Ys IV, since it was the only one fully developed by Falcom.

See? It’s a bit messy!

But I have good news for you: Hardcore Gaming 101 has an unbelievably thorough write-up on everything related to Ys IV. It’s a very interesting story, and quite honestly, the whole history of Ys is pretty well worth looking into, if just for the sake of seeing how many console ports each title got and how different they all ended up being.

I don’t know if I’ve ever plugged HG101 before, but it’s an amazing website, and you owe it to yourself to check it out if you have even the slightest interest in video game history and/or localization.

PZ35/21 – July check-in

Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks are now in the outbox, and I get a nice, little Zelda break until my copy of Skyward Sword HD arrives later in the month. I know that I suggested in one past blog post that I wasn’t too interested in buying SS again, but… I’m a consumer whore!

Not that I haven’t been taking breaks between Zeldas anyway. I mean, I spent a little more than an entire week playing nothing except Subnautica. Actually, outside of work and sleep, I barely did anything other than play Subnautica that week. For a game so broken, it really got its claws into me, and I still can’t stop thinking about it.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: June 2021

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Ys: The Oath in Felghana (PC) – The remake of Ys III, which is the game that made me want to learn more about the Ys series, after having randomly watched a speedrun. Wildly different from the original, but also very similar to Ys Origin, a game that I liked so much that I played it three times in a row. Felghana was… also very good in general, though it was a heck of a lot more grindy than I would have preferred.

Crooked Silence (PC) – A PS1-looking, horror-themed FPS that I purchased on Itch.io for seventy-five cents. It’s shockingly good, at least for that price. Needs some polish, but I had a good time with it. Plus it came with three extra DLC mini-games that were all fairly unique and fun as well. I’d recommend this one.

Picross S5 (Switch) – Completed all modes. So much picross!

PZ35/21 – June check-in

Okay, uh, what happened last month? It was all such a blur.

Oh, right. Twilight Princess HD happened. Very slowly. I can’t quite place why. Something about werewolves, and… the letter Y is really standing out in my mind of some reason?

Yeah, so… I still really like Twilight Princess. I think that actively commentating on it as I played helped the cracks to show a little bit more, but it’s still very solid as far as I’m aware. The HD remaster’s few little quality-of-life changes go a heck of a long way, too. And I actually didn’t completely detest the forced-wolf sections this time. That’s new.

Ys II: Another Video Game Review

First off, apropos of nothing, I’d like to vent a little bit about how friggin’ difficult it is to get a Wii U pro controller to sync up to a PC. I get it, I do. Nintendo sells their controllers to be used with their video game machines. But, it’s nice to play PC games with a high-quality controller too, you know?

Anyway! Ys II Chronicles+: Ancient Ys Vanished ~ The Final Chapter is another title that maybe in retrospect could have been simplified a little. Calling it “The Final Chapter” is overselling it just a bit when it’s part of a two-chapter series. Don’t even get me started on how it’s not actually the final chapter.

Title woes aside, however, Ys II is a very excellent video game! It’s just like the first one! Except it’s a whole lot bigger, and all of the issues I had with the first game have been addressed! Which is not really saying a lot, because I had like, two issues with the first game.