Apparently I played all the video games in April. Despite going back to school. I think that should be a wake-up call that my study habits are not quite where they should be.
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Yoshi’s Island (SNES) – Man, that final battle is cool. Aiming’s a little finicky, but still really cool.
Shantae: 1/2 Genie Hero: Pirate Queen’s Quest (WiiU) – I am bowled away at how much I enjoyed this remixed DLC mode. It’s almost as good as Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse!
The Count Lucanor (Switch) – The great thing about my Switch is that my backlog of unplayed games was sitting at just one, and now I’ve played and finished it. And wrote about it at length.
Into the Breach (PC) – Failed right at the end, so I knocked it down to easy mode for the next run and completely steamrolled the game because easy mode removes nearly all of the challenge.
Part-Time UFO (iOS) – I guess I shouldn’t have been, but I was caught off guard when this cute physics game about stacking objects trotted out a giant boss fight and a crazy-hard final level.
Remember last time I did a write-up of a Nintendo Direct, and I wasn’t really interested in most of what they showed off? Well, there was another one yesterday afternoon and it was a whopper. This time, I found myself profoundly interested in nearly all of the titles shown. That said, let’s take a more detailed dive into the presentation.
The first slew of games are all for 3DS, pretty much confirming my theory that Nintendo intends to keep riding the 3DS train until the end of time.
Wario Ware Gold – Yeah, I’m very interested in this. I haven’t played a Wario Ware game for what seems like forever, and they’re always super fun. But I don’t think I’m actually going to buy it. Since my budget is a lot tighter these days, the fact that I already own all the Wario Ware games I need is reason enough to take a pass on this “greatest hits” version.
Monster Hunter World (PS4) – I’ll level with you, I didn’t actually beat this last month. I write up these entries beforehand based on assumptions and when the game turned out to be much longer than I anticipated, couldn’t be bothered to correct it. But it is beat for real now. Promise.
Super Mario RPG (SNES) – Initially, I thought that this was a game one could burn though in a couple quick sessions. That is not the case. It’s actually respectably long! And still a lot of fun!
Uncanny Valley (PS4) – A neat indie horror adventure, which I played to the least satisfying ending and then couldn’t make more time for because of my obsession with Monster Hunter.
RiME (PS4) – I was having a great time up until chapter 2. Then I was having an adequate time up until chapter 5. Then I just sat there and quietly wept for 20 minutes. (More words.)
Thimbleweed Park (Switch) – I thought it would be a brisk run, but it took me 15ish hours to solve this bad boy, and that’s having used the hint system very liberally. …I may just be really dumb.
Lords Mobile (iOS) – I downloaded and played a bit to get free hashcoins in Greasy Money, but the offer expired long before I reached the requirement T_T What a waste of a Sunday morning.
Mega Man X (SNES) – Much consideration went into the choice of what the first video game I played in 2018 would be. But it really couldn’t have gone any other way.
Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls (PS4) – A shooter spin-off of a visual novel mystery series. So for every 5 minutes of gameplay, there’s 20 minutes of dialogue. Still liked it.
Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Switch) – I purposely waited until 2018 to finish it so I didn’t have to reorganize my “best games beaten in 2017” list. It would have been much too hard to place.
Rhythm Thief and the Emperor’s Treasure (3DS) – Dug this up to beat it so that I could delete it to make room on my SD card. It’s actually an excellent game. Reminds me of Space Channel 5.
Mr. Pumpkin Adventure (WiiU) – A highly surreal point-and-click adventure about helping a pumpkin-headed man with amnesia to remember who he is and why he’s an amnesiac.
Monster Hunter World (PS4) – Tore through the story quests, because the game doesn’t really begin until you gain access to the High Rank quests. Loving it, but longing for portability.
~ Now Playing ~
Resident Evil 7 (PS4) – Booted ‘er up for the first time in a long while to dive into all the DLC from the season pass that I bought with the game last year and subsequently ignored.
Pokémon Ultra Sun (3DS) – The adventure continues, at a rate of about half an hour a week.
Yooka-Laylee (Switch) – I don’t know how the game was when it initially launched, but I think that the current version is generally a very good homage to Banjo-Kazooie.
Volgarr the Viking (Switch) – Almost beat world 2, but man, the boss is really tough.
Horizon: Zero Dawn (PS4) – After a painfully slow start, it’s definitely getting its hooks into me. Except when I had to kill a bunch of people with a chain gun. That was really dumb.
Milkmaid of the Milky Way (iOS) – Retro-style adventure game about a rancher who must… rescue her cows from aliens? Fun, but the rhyming text often feels forced and gets annoying.
Super Mario RPG (SNES) – Played via emulator, which caused the game to crash quite often. Funny, I don’t have that problem when playing on an actual console…
Nintendo shadow dropped a little Nintendo Direct this morning. I mean, sort of. The date leaked online a while ago, and Nintendo had been making vague tweets in the days leading up to it, but it was never formally announced. So as a Nintendo-focused blogger, I feel like it’s my sworn duty to go over it and write up some thoughts.
The World Ends With You: Final Remix – I bought the original version on DS, and played it for roughly an hour before it got lost in the tide and I sold it due to lack of interest. I can tell you definitively that this port would suffer the exact same fate, so I’m surely just going to take a pass on this one.
Pokkén Tournament DX DLC – I didn’t buy Pokkén DX, because I have the original on Wii U. And while adding Blastoise is a very effective hook if you’re trying to get my money, it’s still just not enough to get me to buy this game a second time. I didn’t get into it as much as I hoped I would the first time around, I doubt the second time will be the charm.
Kirby Star Allies – Okay, now we’re talking. I love Kirby games, obvi. But to be honest, I was thinking about skipping over this one. I mean, I know that I’ll enjoy it, but Kirby side-scrollers are all pretty samey, so I was thinking maybe just play Planet Robobot again and save myself the $90. Can you believe that things have gotten so bad that new video games cost $90? (After tax, that is.) That’s just ridiculous. I need a cheaper hobby.
I’ll probably end up buying it anyway. It’s just to gosh-darn pretty!
Some demos – I have zero interest in Kirby Battle Royale, and I already have Dragon Quest Builders on PS4. Pass. Pass.
Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition – I already own this game on Wii U and 3DS. I’ve purchased the DLC packs on both versions. I’ve spent approximately $185 on this game already. And yet, I can’t help but desperately yearn to buy it again on Switch. I’m going to do my best to ignore it, but don’t be surprised if one day I write a blog post about how I couldn’t afford food for two weeks because I bought friggin’ Hyrule Warriors a third time. I don’t mind buying a game a second time if there’s some added value, but when you get to a third or fourth purchase, that’s where I have to start drawing lines. This version adds nothing but Breath of the Wild costumes. Not exactly a major draw.
Mario Tennis Aces – I like that Camelot seems to be putting some heart into this one, after the last three or four Mario Tennis games were half-assed disappointments, but the fact of the matter is that I never really get into these Mario sports games. Likely because I have no friends to play them with.
Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana – I won’t lie, 90% of the appeal here is that Dana character and her excessively skimpy outfit. I don’t usually care for the terrible costumes that female characters get in JRPGs, but this one really clicks with me for some reason. Other than that… ehhhh. I don’t know enough about the Ys series to care, and my budget just doesn’t have room for something that I don’t get an immediate urge to purchase.
Super Mario Odyssey: Luigi’s Balloon World – It’s a free update for a game I already own. So yeah, I’ll probably give it a go. Don’t see much appeal, though.
SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy – Meh. I have a King of Fighters game on my Switch. I already never play that enough.
ACA NEO-GEO Art of Fighting 2 – What did I just say?
Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle DLC – I love this game and I love this trailer, but I don’t think I’ll be buying this DLC. I’ll give it an honest consideration if I ever get around to finishing the main game. But, that’s not looking too likely.
PAYDAY 2 – Don’t care.
Fe – Sorry, I stopped watching. What was this?
Celeste – I was only half paying attention while this game was on. I don’t know what it’s about, but the visuals certainly smack of something that I would dig.
DKC: Tropical Freeze – Oh hey look another Wii U port that I’m not going to buy. Don’t get me wrong, Tropical Freeze is a magnificent game in every regard, but I haven’t even finished it. And the Funky Kong mode looks like a good way to give players an “easy mode” without shaming them like Super Kong. Still. Unless it’s coming in at half-price, I can’t see it happening for me.
Dark Souls Remastered – UH HUH YES DAY ONE.
Praise the sun! To think that a port of a game released in 2012 is the thing that excited me most from this presentation. But, it’s Dark Souls. Dark Souls. In Japan it’s been confirmed that it won’t even be a full-price release, so woop woop here I go again to Lordran! Gonna be prepared to die on the bus! On my lunch break! On the toilet! Prepared to die everywhere!
Plus I never bought the DLC for my 360 copy, so there’s even some new-to-me content in there!
End of the line, 2017! It’s been a good’er, I’ll miss ya!
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Hollow Knight (PC) – If you’re looking for a Metroidvania that is expertly crafted and hard as balls, this is your game. I look forward to playing it again when it releases on Switch.
Mega Man X (SNES) – Couldn’t remember if I had already run it this year. Had to make sure.
Shovel Knight (3DS) – Sometimes you just need to close out the year by replaying a couple of your favourite games.
Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria Simulator (PC) – FNAF6 came out and I didn’t know it until three weeks later. Such is the downside of living in relative isolation. But hey, FNAF6! Hooray!
Chiptune Champion (PC) – A nerdy alternative to Guitar Hero. I may try to rip the music because it’s pretty good, but playing Guitar Hero on a keyboard just doesn’t have the same appeal.
~ Now Playing ~
Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Switch) – It’s not quite as perfect for me as Xenoblade X was, but I’m still having a Goddamn ball. Read more thinks and thoks here.
Hammerwatch (Switch) – Yeah! Hammerwatch! I thoroughly enjoyed playing through this on PC, and I have been waiting for something similar to come to Switch. The real deal is even better!
Pokémon Ultra Sun (3DS) – Trying to play through it with poison-types only. I’ve never done a mono-type run before, and poison is probably one of the harder ones to start with.
Pokémon GO (iOS) – Might as well mention that I’ve been playing here and there to catch some of the new ‘mons. Gen 3 has a lot of my favourite guys, after all.
Skyrim (Switch) – I have barely touched it because Xenoblade 2 is eating all my video game time.
Yooka-Laylee (Switch) – I have barely touched it because Xenoblade 2 blah blah blah….
Volgarr the Viking (Switch) – I have barely touched it because… it’s super difficult and I can’t even get past level 2. But it’s really cool and I’ll deffo give it some more time in the future.
Super Mario RPG (SNES) – Long overdue for a replay. This run is more leisurely and taking advantage of infinitely-spawing monsters and emulator 30x speed abilities to level up quick.
Life is Strange: Before the Storm (PC) – For some reason, I just don’t care. The original game was excellent, but I cannot be bothered to give even half a shirt about Chloe.
Nine Parchments (Switch) – Just played the demo. Ramblings here.
Adventure Capitalist (PC) – I thought I’d kicked this habit, but then accidentally opened the game (damn Steam taskbar thing) and got sucked into another stupid event for a weekend.
Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You! – Lots of words about this here.
Akira – It would be… generous to say that I actually watched this movie. The situation was more me struggling to stay awake while it was on in the background.
As such, I only sort of know what was going on. Being an 80’s anime I’m sure made it even harder to follow. From what I can tell, it was the story of a biker punk whose friend gets kidnapped by super-scientists, and develops some sort of powers as a result. I cannot tell you what those powers were supposed to be, but at the end he loses control and becomes a massive Cronenbergian horror, and it’s up to biker punk to save the day. Or not. I think some psychic children actually saved the day. With a psychic nuke. Anime!
Anyway, I feel like this film has a pretty strong following, Maybe because it was one of the rare anime movies that got localized in the 80’s? I did notice that the animation was excellent, but I was so half-asleep that the story didn’t really make an impression on me. By the end I was still having trouble identifying characters. I think I’ll have to give it a few weeks and then try watching it again. Hopefully to better results.
Another course done, back to spending all my time playing video games, hurrah!
(And just in time, because Xenoblade Chronicles 2 comes out today.)
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DOOM (PS4) – I love this game. I try to limit use of the L word to describe my feelings for not-people, but holy mother of Hell, do I ever love this game! It is exactly what I want in an FPS.
Fire Emblem Warriors (Switch) – The story mode is complete. Unlike Hyrule Warriors, it looks like I could actually finish this game’s secondary mode as well. But we will just have to see…
Yono and the Celestial Elephants (Switch) – It was a cute ride that I was able to conclude in an extended afternoon. Lots of existential monologues made it stand out from other Zelda-esqes.
Star Fox (SNES) – For all the time I’ve put into this game, apparently I’ve only ever played the Easy path. Because when I did a Normal run, every stage after Corneria was new to me!
Donkey Kong Country (SNES) – Rolled from start to finish in a single sitting. I didn’t literally roll the whole way, though. That’s a technique for speedrunners only.
Doki Doki Literature Club (PC) – A game that masquerades as a visual novel until… yeah, let’s not spoil it. It’s no Frog Fractions, but it does a nice job of twisting into something else.
Deep Space Waifu (PC) – A unique and interesting shoot-’em-up. Unfortunately, its defining mechanic is built around shooting the clothes off of giant anime girl stereotypes. So… yeah.
Believe it or not, the Pokémon franchise is old enough to drink in all 50 States. 21 years is a pretty long time! The Pokémon anime has been on the air for 20 of those years, and is still going strong, which is a pretty impressive feat. Maybe even more impressive is that there has also been a Pokémon movie for every year since then. That’s twenty Pokémon movies! The only one of them that I’ve ever seen up until now was the very first one. In a theatre, to boot.
Creating a nice opposite bookend, my brother and I went to see Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You!last weekend three weekends ago. It’s a special movie that was made to celebrate Pokémon’s 20th anniversary (which was last year…), and is partially a retelling of the anime storyline. I say partially because it goes wildly off-course after the first fifteen minutes and I have no idea if the movies/show will continue in this timeline or the original one. Though it really doesn’t matter to me, because I don’t follow this series at all.
Despite a couple misgivings, I really enjoyed this movie! We go through the classic rigmarole of Ash partnering with an unruly Pikachu as his starter and heading off on his grand Pokémon adventure, to be the very best like no-one ever was. Only this time, after the Spearow attack, it does the theme song and then jumps forward in time to Ash besting Erika (to get his third badge? Sequence break much?), after which the plot moves on to telling its own original tale, placed in some undefined wilderness.
Okay, so technically it’s Day Six, because the game launched on the 17th. But my copy only arrived last night! And even then I only had like an hour to play after class.
Those little issues aside, things are looking good for Pokémon Ultra Sun. Mostly because it’s Pokémon Sun again, but with a few tweaks here and there. If you don’t recall, I was really into Pokémon Sun.
I think the only real changes to the game in the first hour are how you get your first Pokémon, and that there are some new weirdos (the Ultra Recon Squad) bumbling around and speaking in vague, cryptic terms. So nothing that really makes any difference. I’m not going to lie, I’m fully aware that almost all of the new content is mashed into the post-game.
I have had two issues with the game so far. Firstly, it locked up as soon as I chose my starter. So that was a pain in the butt because I had to go through the intro sequence twice. Blah.
Secondly, you’re locked into certain times of day until you hit a certain plot trigger, regardless of what time of day it actually is (the in-game time reflects real-world time). This was only a pain because I wanted to catch a Spinarak right away, which only appears at night, and the game demanded it be daytime until X event happened. Not actually a problem, but annoying no less.
And that’s about it so far! Probably not even really worth writing about!
