Category: Zelda

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up : November 2018

~Game Over~

MGSV: The Phantom Pain (PC) – Done but unfinished. Which describes both the game itself and our playthrough. Will we go back? Only time will tell! (But probably not.)

WarioWare Gold (3DS) – An excellent game that I’d love to invest more time into, but it’s just a little tedious to try to hit a target score on 300+ micro-games, you know?

Marvel’s Spider-Man (PS4) – I spent an entire week off work doing very little other than playing this to completion. Do I feel satisfied with how I spent that time? Yes. Absolutely.

Mega Man 6 (Switch) – Rush turns into a jetpack and boxing gloves. Robot pelicans attack by spitting out robot fish. Submarines masquerade as clouds. MM6 is the hottest mess.

Mega Man 9 (Switch) – Would it kill you to turn the health drop rate up a little? Anyway, I’ve now beaten every Classic Mega Man game in 2018. Good job, me! And Merry Megamas to all!

XC2: Torna – The Golden Country (Switch) – Maybe the best DLC expansion I’ve ever played? It’s a complete mini-prequel, as opposed to simply more quests tacked on to the base game.

MechaNika (Switch) – The sequel to Agatha Knife, which I very much enjoyed. This one’s about an alcoholic seven-year-old who wants to build a mech to destroy everything that isn’t cool. Fun!

Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D (3DS) – It was time for a replay, I thought, seeing as this month marked OoT’s 20th birthday. It’s a very short game if you ignore heart pieces and gold skulltulas!

~Now Playing~

Save Me Mr. Tako (Switch) – A rare retraux game that pays homage to the Game Boy. So yeah obviously I bought it. Only made it through a handful of levels before distractions tore me away.

Dark Souls (Switch) – Dark Souls is sure great! But man, I just don’t have the time for it.

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate (Switch) – Still plugging away at this like once a week or so. G-Rank is a tough cookie, which leaves me at the mercy of online play to make progress.

Super Smash Bros for Wii U (Wii U) – Snuck in a few matches here and there throughout the month. As I post this, there are a mere SEVEN DAYS LEFT until Ultimate.

Star Ocean (SNES) – You have to wonder about a game that, two minutes into your playtime, pits you against a boss who can kill you in ten seconds flat. It’s actually not too bad, though!

Pokémon: Let’s Go, Pikachu! (Switch) – I have so many thoughts about this game… But mostly it really makes me wish that I could have an actual pokémon. Pikachu is just so cute!

Minit (Switch) – A Zelda-like where you die and restart every 60 seconds. I don’t know if the experience would have changed appreciably without that particular feature.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: September 2018

The age of Mega Man X dominating my gaming time has ended. At least for now. Now, instead of being stuck on a series of action platformers, I’m ears-deep in massive RPGs. Super. At least I was guaranteed to finish all those Mega Mans.

~ Game Over ~

Mega Man X7 (Switch) – If you thought I was down on X5… it looks like a sparkling gem next to this turd. Not even really worth playing just to say you’ve played ‘em all.

Mega Man X8 (Switch) – It’s not amazing, but it stands head and shoulders above X7. Playing it brought back some fun memories of when I first bought a PS2. Ah, such simpler times…

The Messenger (Switch) – After my first playthrough, I think this might fall in line with the way I feel about Mega Man X: it’s as close to perfect as a video game can possibly be.

Final Fantasy XV (PS4) – I finally did it! And exactly a year after my last play session! I gave the disc back to my brother, but I kind of want to get the Royal Edition and keep playing…

The Legend of Zelda (NES) – It’s on my Switch now, so… yeah, of course I played it.

The Silver Case (PS4) – A Japan-only PS1 adventure game by Suda 51, remastered and localized. It’s pretty interesting, and I can absolutely see the genesis of Killer7 in it.

~ Now Playing ~

Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate (Switch) – I just hit high rank and already there is so much more content than on the 3DS version. Purchase justified!

Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age (PS4) – Few things feel as purely good as playing a Dragon Quest game. And this one is so got-danged pretty!

WarioWare Gold (3DS) – Whaaaaat a 3DS game in 2018? How even? I was going to skip this, but then my parents got it for me as a birthday gift. Which is awesome because <3 WarioWare.

MGSV: The Phantom Pain (PC) – Hey it’s this again. How many more two-line blurbs am I going to have to write about this friggin’ game? (Probably only one more.)

Picross S2 (Switch) – I could be done, but this time I’m actually playing all the Mega puzzles, too. They can be quite the challenge, which is good because regular picross is too easy.

Dr. Mario (NES) – Now my Switch can play Dr. Mario, so I’m pretty happy!

Frederic: Resurrection of Music (Switch) – I’ve been long intrigued by this, then it went on sale for 65 cents. Verdict: Its heart is in the right place, but I don’t want a touchscreen piano game.

Another miniature NES, in a fashion

The Nintendo Switch Online service debuted a couple of nights ago. I, obviously enough, subscribed immediately. I’m not necessarily happy about having to pay for online play now, but it’s less than half the cost of an annual PS Plus subscription. And I had that nice year-and-a-half of free online play, so I won’t be too butthurt about it.

Let’s talk features: Playing online is cool. I have a Monster Hunter on Switch now, so it’s an absolute necessity. Also I like to entertain the thought that I will play Splatoon 2 again at some point. I think those are the only two online games I care about. There’s ARMS, I guess, but I’m even less likely to play that than Splatoon 2. Smash has historically bad online play, so we’ll see about that one.

Cloud saves… I honestly don’t care about. Yeah, it would suck to lose hours of progress through a thing. The truth of it is that I always have way more fun with the beginnings of games anyway. Dunno why, and I don’t have the time right now to do a deep psychological examination of myself.

Apparently Switch Online subscribers will get exclusive deals. I’m hoping that means bigger discounts on games in the future, but all you get right now is the opportunity to buy the special joycons shaped like NES controllers. Which is not something I’m interested in. They’re $80, which is less than a regular joycon pair, but they also don’t function with any games aside from…

NES Online is the real “value add” for the subscription service. It’s basically NES Netflix, NESflix, if you will, in which you are granted unlimited access to an ever-growing library of NES games. This is cool! I prefer owning things, but this is the way that media is offered now, so I’ll go with the flow. There are currently 20 games on offer, with a paltry three to be added each month. That’s not enough, but what can you do?

Me, I plan to just enjoy what I get. There’s no point in complaining, especially since Nintendo is going back and adding online play to any games that can support it. At first, this seems like a dynamite feature. But then you try to go and play some online Dr. Mario and realize that you’re only allowed to play with people on your friends list. That, I’m going to be salty about. I want to be able to just hop in and play online River City Ransom and Tecmo Bowl with randos. But instead I have to schedule playtime with someone on my friends list. Now I have to download the Discord app and figure out how to use Discord, and also how to actually interact with people in a way that will make them want to play Double Dragon with me. It’s an all-around bummer.

The one “saving grace” if you will, is that you can also download the Famicom Online from the Japanese eShop, if you want to play the Famicom versions of all these games. There aren’t really a lot of reasons why you’d want to do this (aside from being a dumb weeb), but The Legend of Zelda at least has enhanced music and sound effects in the Famicom version. It’s not much, and I’m reasonably certain that Nintendo will keep the library of games the same between regions, but it’s still a neat little feature.

So yeah, that’s about that. I kind of hope we see something like the PS Plus or Games With Gold deals where subscribers get free modern games, but the slate of NES games is enough to satisfy me. And there’s the suggestion that SNES games won’t be far behind. It’s pretty good!

Nintendo @ E3 2018

This is it: the big collection of video game commercials that I’d been aching for since March. Okay, yeah, with that qualification, it’s obvious that I was 90% in it just for the Smash. But hey, there were other neat things, too! Let’s take a look at the sentence or two that I had to say about them!

Daemon X Machina – OOH ANIME MECHS. I LIKE. It’s like the best parts of Xenoblade X but made by Platinum and Suda51. (Except not. It’s actually Marvelous making it.)

Xenoblade 2 DLC – Speaking of Xenoblade… Hey it’s that promised story expansion DLC for the game that I’ve still only seen like 50% of. It’s a prequel with a new titan, I guess? I don’t know, the narration was Japanese and my phone was sitting on a stand that obscured the subtitles. Obviously I’m going in on it, because Xenoblade 2 is freakin’ sweet and yeah I’ll take any more of it that they’re willing to give me.

Pokémon Let’s Go – No new information here. Just Reggie pimping the lame Pokéball Plus accessory. But it does give you a free Mew, so…

Super Mario Party – I don’t have friends, so I don’t care. And even if I did, I’m sure they’d just dump all over it instead of playing with me. Dig the logo, though.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses – It’s Fire Emblem on Switch, which is so cool, which I’m down with. But I have played exactly one Fire Emblem game ever, and I have my doubts that I’ll be adding this one to the list any time soon.

Fortnite – Nope. Don’t care. I do like how not-gritty it is, though. And cool that it’s out NOW.

Overcooked 2 – I’ve heard many times that Overcooked is great, but again, with the lack of friends and all.

Killer Queen Black – Like, seriously. No friends. Okay, one friend. But that’s still not really enough to care about multiplayer party games.

Hollow Knight – Ah! A single-player game! There we go! But I’ve played it already, so… oh, what? It’s available today? And only $17? Hey, I mean, it’s not like I paid money to play it the first time…

Octopath Traveler – New demo with carry-over data… but I really don’t have time to fit that in at the moment. I don’t even know that I’ll be able to make time for the full game come July.

Sizzle reel – Mostly things shown at other presentations, or that are already out, or are getting DLC soon. Nothing that made me shriek with joy. Dark Souls still doesn’t have a release date, and Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate made an appearance. Hi, 5 seconds of Mega Man 11!

Super Smash Bros Ultimate – There was a lot to process here, so rather than trying to clean it up, here’s my stream-of-consciousness notes, hastily typed as I was watching: Oh Sakurai, you joker. Link has new moves!  Zelda is Link Between Worlds style!! (<3) Ice Climbers are back! Pokémon trainer! Lucas! Ryu! Ganondorf looks better than ever! Cloud! SNAKE IS BACK! Pichu! Toon Link AND Young Link! Wolf! MEGAMAN! Every fighter ever is back! This is amazing news!  BIG BLUUUUE! Daisy?? (Aw, dangit.) Inkling seems awesome, and I love the Squid Sisters assist trophy. But where’s Off The Hook? Bomberman assist trophy? Nice! Ooh and a deadly Fake Smash Ball! GOOD LORD RIDLEY MURDERED MARIO AND MEGA MAN.

Verdict: Super Smash Bros Ultimate is out on December 7 and that’s all that matters. Everything else was gravy at best, or I just didn’t care. Smash is all I wanted from this presentation. It’s all I wanted from this E3. And by God, they delivered!

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – May 2018

Only two more weeks, and then I can go back to not feeling bad that I’m spending far less time studying than I should be.

~ Game Over ~

MGSV: Ground Zeroes (PC) – Completed the mission and… that’s only seven percent of the game!? Oh boy, it looks as if there’s much more to this than it first seemed!

Agatha Knife (Switch) – I thought there was going to be a stronger element of horror than there actually was. Turned out to be mostly comedic in tone. Still a fun adventure game.

Horizon: Zero Dawn (PS4) – Even though I liked it overall, I’m mostly just glad that it’s over. Could have used a lot more dinosaur-based robots. Too many modern herbivores.

Beyond: Two Souls (PS4) – Story-based game about a girl and her ghost pal. Fairly boring and a real struggle to get through. The “Homeless” and “Navajo” chapters were pretty good, though.

MGSV: Ground Zeroes (360) – Played through again for a better rank, and was awarded an A. Then I did it again and again in a vain attempt to get an S rank. Didn’t happen 🙁

Mega Man 4 (Switch) – I bought both Mega Man Legacy Collections on Switch and this was naturally my starting point. Playing it without the slowdown or sprite flicker is a revelation.

Mega Man 10 (Switch) – Maybe it’s because I’m less familiar with it than the original sexology, but I’m not digging this as much as I did when it was new.

Continue reading Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – May 2018

Isolation

I have a Legend of Zelda coffee mug at work, and it’s been there for some time. Most co-workers don’t bother to comment on it, though I’ve had a few remark “That’s a big mug” or ponder “How do you drink from that?” when they see it.

Recently I’ve had two co-workers actually say “Oh, so I guess you like Zelda, huh?” to which I cheerfully agree, because obviously (but I would love to have an ironic coffee mug). They both then followed up with “Is that still a thing?” To which I utter a weak affirmation and then hang my head and realize that I’ll always be alone here.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – April 2018

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.

~ Game Over ~

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.

Continue reading Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – April 2018

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – March 2018

No foolin’! I played games in March!

~ Game Over ~

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES) – Done and dusted. Always a great time, and even that danged Ice Palace wasn’t nearly as bad as I remember it.

Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards (N64) – I can’t think of anything meaningful to say about this game in two lines. How about you go read this much bigger thing I wrote about it?

Kirby: Star Allies (Switch) – I might not have played this if not for a change to the My Nintendo program right before release that allowed a nice big discount on the purchase.

Knack (PS4) – I tried to be positive about it for a long time, but by Chapter Nine I was fully willing to admit that I hate it. Yet I powered through to the end anyway. What is wrong with me?

Continue reading Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up – March 2018

Revisiting Hyrule

As a sort of celebration of the Switch’s first birthday, I’ve been playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild again. As a preface, I would like to note that despite the probably 100+ hours that I sank into the game last year, I came nowhere close to finishing it. Sure, I defeated Ganon and saw the ending, but I didn’t find all the shrines or complete all the side quests. I didn’t even reclaim all four Divine Beasts. I never got around to exploring any of the DLC, either.

This time around, I’ve invoked the DLC Master Mode, which is this game’s version of Hero Mode, which is Zelda’s version of Hard Mode. Hero Mode, in most cases, makes Link take double damage and removes heart drops, so you have to heal with potions. I don’t know if the double damage thing is true here because I didn’t bother to do any testing, but Master Mode does make a few more noticeable changes. For one, it levels up every monster that works on a scale. So red bokoblins/mobilns and green lizalfos are gone forever. This alone makes the Great Plateau the most dangeous place in the game. Tree branches are basically useless against blue bokoblins, and Hylia help you if you accidentally run into a black one. It’s basically one-hit kills all the way, so the best strat until you get off the Plateau is to stay far, far away from all monsters. Apparently there is also a new “gold” enemy class, but I haven’t seen any yet. And considering that the silver ones are already extremely difficult to defeat, I expect the gold ones to be impossible.

Continue reading Revisiting Hyrule

Thinks and Thoks – Nintendo Direct (March 8/18)

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.

Continue reading Thinks and Thoks – Nintendo Direct (March 8/18)