Video Games – Page 53

On sleep and moving pictures

Back at work today after another week of vacation. This one was an especially grueling return, as I unintentionally developed a habit of staying up until 3 AM and sleeping until around 11 during my time off. This is not good, as someone who normally sleeps from 11 PM to 6 AM. Needless to say, I had a rather difficult time staying awake at work today. By noon I’d downed three cappuccinos, which is one more than I usually drink during the span of an entire workday.

Why was I staying up so late, you ask. Mostly because of computer games. See, I don’t have a clock in my basement, and if my phone is too close to my PC, it causes a weird disruption in the speakers, which then emit some really annoying staticy beeping noises. So all I have to tell time is the computer clock. Which is covered up while playing games in fulllscreen. When I don’t have any plans, I tend to not worry about time as much, and so I’d often end up playing a game until I started feeling tired, and when I close the game and check the clock: oh my goodness! It’s three in the morning! I didn’t realize I’d been playing for so long.

And that’s why it’s better to play console games.

Or something like that. The point is, that I wasted another week of vacation. But that’s pretty much all I intend to do with them anyway. It’s not like I have any money to go away with, so I just enjoy loafing around at home for a week. Makes me happy, at least.

I did watch the first two Gamera movies, though. I own the 11-movie set (which is only missing the 2006 reboot), and so far so good. They’re pretty short too, running an average time of about 80 minutes. That’s actually a good thing, as you really don’t want a lot of padding in your kaiju films. Basically you just need a set-up, the villain monster doing its thing, and then the good monster showing up for a beat-down. It’s a good time to be had by all, as long as you can see the beauty of two guys swiping at each other while wearing goofy rubber suits.

It’s pretty reasonably priced on Amazon, so if you’ve got a thing for classic kaiju flicks, it’s quite a bargain. And really, how can you not love Gamera? Godzilla is the king of the monsters, sure, but Gamera is so innately lovable. Maybe it’s just because I’ve got a thing for turtles.

I also watched a lot more TV than usual, finishing off the episodes of Portlandia offered by Netflix, and the first two seasons of Seinfeld. The latter is well-known, and still one of my all-time favourite TV shows. Portlandia you may not have heard of. It’s a sketch comedy show that pokes fun mostly at hipsters, but also other wackos like overzealous feminists and hippies. It’s usually pretty funny, and occasionally even hilarious. Definitely a good watch.

I guess that’s about it. I could go into greater detail about my video game adventures, but that’s what the Monthend Wrap-Up is for.Now I’m just going to struggle through the next month of work while I eagerly anticipate my next and final week of vacation time.

Smash Speculation: Ganon

Smash Bros is a fighting game that pits many of Nintendo’s beloved heroes against each other in brutal combat. But why is it all about heroes? To date, there is one villain character confirmed for the new games. Two if you consider Dedede a villain (he’s not). Three if you assume that Ganondorf will be making a return. What I’m saying here is: Smash needs more bad guys!

~ GANON ~

Who better than the original villain of the Zelda series, the evil wizard Ganon? Nintendo has sort of brushed this piggly form off to the side to give his human form, Ganondorf, the spotlight. I don’t like this trend. While they’re essentially the same baddie, I find Ganon to be the more interesting and threatening version. Ganondorf is just a regular old power-hungry sociopath. When Ganondorf claimed the Triforce for himself, it reflected his evil nature and twisted his physical form into the blue pig version that you see above.

Ganon carries a massive trident, but he’s always been more keen on ranged combat. His original incarnation fought by teleporting around the room (while also being invisible) and chucking fireballs at Link. When he got his trident in A Link to the Past, he still only fought by throwing it and warping around his chamber. When that proved to be an unsuccessful tactic, he ditched the trident and went back to magical attacks. This isn’t to say that Ganon wouldn’t use the weapon for close-range combat. No, he’s got to have some physical skills to stay in the game, but I think that his slow speed and preference for magic attacks would make him weaker in the physical department.

So what about smashes? Forward smash is the easy one: Ganon throws his trident out slightly in front of him (think Falco’s reflector in Brawl) and it spins around for a second. Down smash could be a low trident swipe at both sides, or maybe Ganon plunges the trident into the ground and it creates a small lightning field on the ground around him. Up smash is the one where I’m stuck. I like the idea of having Ganon send out a flaming keese though.

Neutral special is the most interesting one here. Ganon fires off a ball of magic straight ahead, though potentially it can be curved like Link’s arrows or Zelda’s fireball. The magic ball can be reflected by a sword or similar attack. Ganon can then strike the returning ball to reflect it again, and this cycle will repeat until it flies away or hits someone. Each reflect would increase the magic ball’s power, and it would have an electrical effect upon hitting a target. This attack is taken from A Link to the Past, where it is Agahnim’s signature move, and the only way to defeat him. Agahnim, if you weren’t aware, is Ganon’s Light World alter ego.

Ganon’s side special would also be pried from Agahnim’s repertoire: a simple lightning bolt. Or maybe multiple bolts fanning out at a shallow angle. I can’t think of any especially interesting mechanics for this move, maybe it could cause a small amount of damage through shields, but not be able to break them? Anyway, it’s not a super long-distance attack, only going maybe three or four body lengths away from Ganon, but it’ll get the job done.

Down special is a difficult one to peg, but at first, I like an earthquake move. Say it’s based on the Quake Medallion for A Link to the Past. Ganon thrusts his trident into the ground (again) and creates a quake effect in a decent radius around him. Obviously it doesn’t affect fighters in the air, and if Ganon himself is airborne, he’ll throw the trident straight down and create the same effect, only the weapon itself would now be able to cause damage if it hits someone. If you don’t like that, maybe he gets a warping move where he vanishes, shows up a few lengths away, and then attacks in the opposite direction. Or maybe he warps directly behind the nearest fighter to attack.

Up special I had to think about for a while, but I like the idea of drawing a little from Ganon’s appearance in Four Swords Adventures, and giving him a tornado attack. In that game, he does manipulate Vaati the wind mage, so why not have a wind-based attack. He also uses a jump move while twirling his trident above his head, so just mash that all up together and you’ve got a special attack. Basically what I’m thinking here is Ganon conjures up a tornado around him and then floats up through it with the twirling trident. The tornado will suck up any fighters who get too close, and if they get hit by the trident, they’ll go flying away.

Ganon’s final smash is, as usual, where I’m getting stuck. We could just go with the obvious callback, where Ganon becomes invisible and teleports around the stage launching fireballs at the other fighters. We could go a little more creative and have him summon up a bunch of monsters to attack. We could have him do a line-of-sight attack like Zelda and Link, invoking his Triforce of Power to stun an opponent while he lobs magic attacks at them, and finishes with a big hit (perhaps he throws the trident at them and a bolt of lightning strikes it?).

I definitely need to workshop this one a little more before it’s a good idea, but I think there’s a solid base there. I honestly believe in my heart that Ganon has a good chance of joining the roster. For the longest time he was the second-most iconic villain in Nintendo’s stable, supplanted only by his less interesting human form. All the kids are clamoring for Ridley, but there’s another Nintendo monster that I’d much rather see.

Previous: Chibi-Robo

Next: Toon Ganondorf

For Shovelry!

I’ve made a handful of posts containing brief thoughts on Shovel Knight. They all essentially say that it’s been added to my short list of Favourite Games Ever. There’s a ton of reasons to love Shovel Knight, but only one exists within the realm of e-commerce: the Shovel Knight Original Soundtrack.

Composed mainly by the exceptionally talented Jake Kaufman (maybe you know him as virt), with a handful of tracks contributed by the legendary Manami Matsumae, the Shovel Knight soundtrack is a thing of rare glory. It’s 48 tracks of nostalgic beauty, perfectly capturing the essence of the best NES soundtracks. Honestly, I’d say that it easily rivals the Mega Man 2 soundtrack, and that’s a pretty bold claim. I won’t say that every track is pure gold, but almost all of them are.

“Strike the Earth” is far and away the best track on the album, and both of the Black Knight battle themes are kickin’. The main stage themes are all really nice, and certainly add an extra dose of personality to their stages. One of the touches that I really love is that The Order Of No Quarter themes are all amped-up arrangements of the a stage themes. Nothing else really stands out to me, but it’s all good listening no less.

If I had to detract points anywhere, I suppose it’s a little silly that they included all three variations of the village theme as separate three-minute tracks. And one after another, even. They’re not really that different from each other, and they certainly didn’t all need to be so long. Ah well, it’s a minor thing, but still pretty odd.

If just the OST isn’t enough to slake your thirst for Shovel Knight tuneage, there’s also an arrangement album available, called Strike The Earth!, which includes 18 remixed tracks by a bunch of artists I’ve mostly never heard of. Most likely they’re arrangement artists from sites OCRemix and whatnot. Also, I guess some are songs that virt made specifically for trailers.

I bought the OST on the day that it was released, but held off on Strike The Earth! for a month or so. That was a mistake, as the remix album is just as good. I don’t want to say better, but it really cuts down on the cruft and keeps all of the excellence. There’s a particularly wonderful remix of the Iron Whale stage theme on there, which was one of my favourite tracks to begin with, so that’s a nice bonus. And of course, the remixes of the Black Knight’s battle theme and “Strike the Earth” are amazing. My absolute favourite of the bunch though, is “No Sense Running,” a dubstep remix of the Lost City stage theme with some vocal flourishes. Normally I don’t even like dubstep, so take that as you will.

Both the OST and Strike the Earth! are available on Jake Kaufman’s Bandcamp page, so I highly suggest that you click over there right away and get busy buying these. Have I mentioned that they’re really good? Because they are. And you can pay as much or as little as you want for them, so there’s really no reason not to get them. If you have any interest in NES-styled video game music, this is pretty much the cream of the crop. Help support an awesome game with an awesome soundtrack and buy at least the OST. Shovel Knight is exactly the kind of video game that I want to be playing, and I’m damn well going to spread the word where I can.

Year of N64 Bonus Round Q2 – Pokémon Snap

It might surprise you to learn that I wasn’t overly kind to Pokémon Snap back in its day. I played the game obsessively to completion, and then dumped all over it for being too short and too easy if anyone asked. Of course, this was my professional Stupid Teenage Gamer opinion, trotted out mostly to save face in a harsh middle school world. Deep down inside, I knew that Pokémon Snap was something special. Something magical.

Pokémon Snap is a short game. There are six courses, which take around 5-8 minutes to traverse, and one shorter special course to cap it off. I dragged my wife along for the ride this time, and while the five hours it took us to clear the game 100% seemed like a leisurely afternoon gaming session to me, she was chomping at the bit to get moving onto something else at around the three-and-a-half hour mark. She did stick it out to the end for me, and the experience was all the more special to me for it. That’s why I love her!

So! Pokémon Snap. What is it? It’s a photography game, which is an unusual kind of game to make, but that’s kind of what Nintendo is all about. You choose a course (unless you’re just starting out) and then you’re plopped into a weird vehicle which guides you along the stage. Pokémon litter the environments, and your job is to take the best darn picture you can of each and every one of ’em.

What makes this more interesting is the way that you can interact with the pokémon. At first, you can’t do anything but take pictures, and you’re at the whims of the game to find opportunities for good shots. As you progress though, you’ll be given a few different items. Apples will draw the attention of pokémon, who will gravitate over to any apples thrown in their vicinity. Usually they’ll just eat the apple, but some pokémon may do a little happy dance afterward, or perhaps even fight over the foodstuffs. You can even throw apples right at pokémon to bonk them and provoke different reactions.

Pester balls are basically the opposite of apples. You toss one at a pokémon and it’ll run away or get angry at you. They probably do other things too, but I can’t be bothered to remember what. The poké flute is exactly what it sounds like, and when you play a tune on it, nearby pokémon will start dancing. As a reference to Pokémon Red and Blue, it also wakes up sleeping pokémon. The poké flute plays several different tunes, but I never experimented with them to see if they got different results.

Stages are all preset, and your movement through them is automatic. If you don’t throw anything at them, pokémon will always play out the same actions every time you visit a stage. The final item, the motor, increases the speed of your vehicle so that maybe you can see what pokémon are doing before you’re supposed to arrive at their point. It’s not overly useful, but it’s nice if you’re returning to a stage for a single pokémon and just want to zip past the rest.

Only 63 of the 151 original pokémon are featured in the game, and not all of them are just sitting around waiting to get their pictures taken. You’ll have to take full advantage of all the tools at your disposal if you want to snap ’em all. Some are easy enough to coax out of hiding, but some of the methods for making certain pokémon appear are totally inscrutable without a guide. You’ll probably make Starmie appear eventually if you keep playing the Valley course, but you’ll never guess what it was that triggered it.

It’s not a particularly beefy game, but what is there is really worth playing. It won’t take you too long to get to the end, but you’ll need to be clever and resourceful if you want to complete the pokémon report. Of course, hours upon hours can be added on if you enjoy trying to take the highest scoring pictures of every monster. Pokémon Snap is a great game, and the perfect way to spend a lazy weekend afternoon.

(If you’re interested, I wrote a thing about the Virtual Console release of Pokémon Snap a few years ago.)

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: July 2014

I touched on it briefly last month, but as you’ll see if you keep reading, I’m really getting into the swing of my personal Steam Train. It’s time to start actually playing some of the 150+ games registered on my Steam account! Also I had a week of vacation early in the month, so I had a lot of extra time for gaming this month and this may be the longest MVGW to date.

I would like to direct your attention to the banner below, which was uploaded and visible when this post went live, as opposed to a few days later. Maybe I’m actually starting to clean up my act here?

~ Now Playing ~

Tokyo Jungle (PS3) – One of the two PS3-exclusive games that I have any interest in, I’d say that Tokyo Jungle is worth owning the console for. For me, at least. It gets awfully repetitive, but there is enough randomization and a huge roster of animals (50ish, then even more as DLC), so it’s stayed fresh enough for me to pour a good number of hours into it. I’ve still only started unlocking the cooler animals though, so there’s lots and lots of game left for me to experience.

Toki Tori 2+ (PC) – Working to scratch more games off my PC to-do list, I booted up Toki Tori 2+, and it’s quite a unique game! It’s a puzzle platformer, but every puzzle has to be solved with a only two actions and the way those actions affect the environment and other animals. It’s pretty fun, and some of the puzzles are downright devious. I’ve gotten myself stuck though, and I think that I might like this game enough that I’m not willing to consult a FAQ just so that I can move on. I feel like this one is worth solving on my own. But nuts to gathering all the collectibles. That’s a fool’s errand if I’ve ever seen one.

Continue reading Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: July 2014

Dark Souls: Amazing chest, indeed

Previously on Dark Souls: Morgan finally breached Anor Londo castle, and then after navigating the place, accidentally fell out of a window.

Before I was viciously slain by bat-demons, I had unlocked what I was assuming was a shortcut into the Anor Londo castle hall. Unfortunately, the last bonfire I’d rested at was all the way on the other side of the castle, so I was forced to fight my way through all the silver knights again to get back into the great hall. I retraced my steps up the balcony and out the window, then booked all the way back across the bridge to the little bonfire room on the terrace opposite of the castle.

After setting a slightly more convenient respawning point, I ran back to the castle again, but without the horrible sense of dread that usually accompanied the approach. I beat up the sentinel guarding the newly unlocked path, and inched my way through the gate, hoping to catch the bat-demons off-guard. I wasn’t able to get the drop on them, but at the very least, I managed to take them out one at a time.

Just past the bat-demons was a tower. Inside the tower was a staircase leading upward and into the castle’s main hall. Also, there was a gigantic blacksmith hammering away. I browsed his wares and had him make some upgrades to my equipment before moving on.

I came into the main hall on the opposite side that I’d first entered it. A silver knight with a dragonslayer bow waited for me at the bottom of the stairs, and there was a summon sign waiting halfway down the staircase. I ambled down and summoned the phantom of my old friend Solaire. He immediately jumped off the ledge and engaged the nearby sentinel as I more cautiously descended the stairs. The two sentinels in the hall were a little more advanced than the ones that I’d been fighting up until now. For one, they jumped around a lot more often. They also had a wide-ranged burst attack and were able to heal themselves if Solaire and I gave them enough time.

We eventually felled the sentinels, but had taken quite a bit of damage in doing so. At the far end of the hall was the main castle gate. We wandered over to it, but it was far too large for us to open. Luckily, there was a handy lever off to the side, and pulling it opened the massive doors for us. Since I was hurting pretty bad, I opted to run back to the bonfire for a recharge, but Solaire got distracted by the sentinel standing outside. I assume that it finished him off, as he didn’t ever catch up to me.

I returned to the castle and ran past the regular sentinels into the hall. I thought that they would give up if I ran in far enough, but they did not. So I had two regular sentinels and one super-sentinel hounding me. It did not go well. You Died.

I quickly found that the safest way to enter the castle was via the giant balcksmith’s tower. The shortcut gate was too small for the sentinel to pass through, which caused him to forget about me after I made it through, and the bat-demons didn’t follow me very far if I just ran past them. I summoned Solaire again and we fought the super-sentinels. Things took a turn for the worse and we accidentally angered them both at once. You Died.

That happened at least one more time. You Died. Probably even twice. That whole area was like a fever-dream of death and resurrection. You Died.

We did eventually kill the super-sentinels without being critically wounded, and there was nothing left to do at that point besides enter the Fog Gate. On the other side stood the most grueling test of my entire journey: Ornstein and Smaugh. Dragon Slayer Ornstein was a knight twice my size, who carried an equally sizeable spear. Executioner Smough was a massive blob of a man (the fat:muscle ratio I couldn’t tell), equipped with a war hammer that could easily crush me in a single blow. The two rushed us and we decided to split up: Solaire took on Ornstein and I drew Smough’s attention.

The fight did not go well. Solaire was slaughtered almost immediately, and I was crushed very quickly after the two rejoined forces. You Died.

Before round two, I decided that it might be best to simply run past the super-sentinels in an effort to conserve health for the bosses. I made it to the Fog Wall unscathed, but Solaire took a few lumps on the way. The rematch did go better, but still not well by any stretch. The both of us unleashed our fury on Ornstein, thinking that taking out one as fast as possible would be our best hope for survival. Smough was still pounding away at us of course, and Solaire died off quickly, but Ornstein was very near death and it was trivial to finish him off.

It was not the boon I’d hoped for though, as Smough stepped up and absorbed the power of his fallen comrade, imbuing him with additional speed and lightning powers. Super-Smough quickly turned me into paste, as I was not at all ready for his new jumping attack. You Died.

Round three was about the same, only we killed Smough first. This was a terrible, terrible mistake. For all the power that Super-Smough had gained, when Ornstein powered-up, he grew three sizes and became much more vicious. Super-Ornstein was slower than his original form, but I wasn’t able to run away for long. Before I knew it, I was impaled on that spear, watching everything fade to black. You Died.

Knowing now that Ornstein should be the first to go, we tried again. I managed to put up a fight against Super-Smough for a while, but his butt-slam attack sprayed out a field of lightning that caused my body to seize up long enough for him to turn me into a fine paste with that giant hammer of his. You Died.

That was pretty much what happened over and over again. You Died.

Over and over and over again. You Died. You Died. You Died.

Finally, our luck turned. Solaire managed to outlive Ornstein, which gave us a bit of an advantage. He distracted Super-Smough while I ran in to deal a truckload of damage. That strategy didn’t last long, but it was enough to get my licks in. Solaire’s phantom vanished after a particularly vicious assualt, and I was left to try to dodge the swings of the hammer as I kept picking away at Super-Smough’s life. It was such a blur that I didn’t notice that he had died, and kept swinging at his body even after it had stopped moving.

I collapsed on the ground and chugged my last dose of Estus. I don’t know how long I laid there, appreciating the silence.

I moved on to the back of the room, where I found an elevator that took me to the room’s upper balcony. Above, I found an entrance into another room, in which I met the Princess of Sunlight, Gwynevere. She was a massive woman, many times larger than the giant blacksmith and Super-Ornstein. As she laid there, with her equally enormous assets hanging out for all the world to see, she started prattling on. I was still a little shook up from having been killed so many times so quickly that I mostly just tuned her out.

Honestly I was also a little too mesmerized by that rack to listen.

In the end, she gave me the Lordvessel, which I would use to collect some special souls or something. More importantly, it would allow me to instantly travel from any bonfire to… most other bonfires. Why it was picky about the destination I’ll never know, but it was a great help at any rate.

As it happens, there was a bonfire right in front of the door to Gwynevere’s room, so I hobbled over and put my new toy to work. Before I knew it, I found myself back at Firelink Shrine. Things were starting to go my way again.

Tune in next time for Part 28: Blast From The Past

Smash Speculation: Chibi-Robo

A long, long time ago, there was a little purple video game machine known as the GameCube. It was home to may a whimsical game, but none quite as lovable and absurd as Chibi-Robo!, a game about doing chores as 10-centimeter-tall robot.

~ Chibi-Robo ~

I’ll put this right up front: Chibi-Robo is my number one most wanted Smash Bros character. I know that I’m coming up with all sorts of wacky ideas in the coming weeks about characters I’d like to see included as playable fighters, but if Chibi-Robo made it in to the mix I’d never ask for anything again.

Like I said, Chibi-Robo is a 10-centimeter-tall robot. He also has a (comparatively) massive plug hanging out of his butt. This may not seem like an ideal fighter. But things are not always as they seem in Smash, and I don’t think anyone’s heart would be broken if Cheebo was scaled up so that he would stand a chance against the rest of the brawlers.

The cord, though? That’s going to be a big part of the character. A handful of fighters have their own weird gimmicks; in fact, most of the Smash Bros 4 newcomers have a unique element to them. Cheebo’s is his plug. First and foremost, it’s going to add some weight to the otherwise lightweight robot. This is important, because he’s going to look like a light character (he’s made out of recycled aluminum, after all), but move a little slower and have a little more knockback resistance than you’d expect.

I have more to say about the plug, but smash attacks come first, yes? Forward smash is going to be the Chibi-Blaster, which I thought might be a special, but putting it on a smash instead allows for more creativity with those special moves. Chibi-Blaster works exactly the way you’d think. Up smash will have Chibi-Robo flip open his head and shoot out a little firework. Down smash can just have Cheebo spin around and sweep his opponents’ legs with his plug.

As for special attacks, Cheebo’s down special will be somewhat of a variable attack. Executing down special once will have Chibi-Robo hoist up his plug. From there, he can throw it forward or upward a short distance, and then it’ll snap back behind him. If you do down special again while holding the plug, Cheebo will plug it into the ground (a socket will appear from nowhere) and power up. Over time, Cheebo’s attack power will slowly diminish, and plugging in will fill his batteries. You could probably even use it to get a temporary boost if he’s already full. The stamina drain is essentially the same as the way that Pokémon Trainer had to cycle his Pokémon in Brawl, but it’ll be unique now that Pokémon Trainer no longer exists.

Cheebo’s neutral special would shoot his little buddy Telly Vision out in front of him. Telly could have multiple effects, to make him more than just another projectile attack. Telly might rush forward and attack, for example, or maybe he’d grab a fighter and suspend them in the air, rendering them unable to do anything for a moment. Maybe sometimes a Chibi-Tot would pop out instead and run around in circles, causing damage to anyone it touches, or actively chase another fighter. I’m sure there are other things that could happen, but I’m at a loss at the moment.

Side special would have Chibi-Robo Pull out his spoon and give his opponent a good whack. There isn’t a lot to this attack other than causing more damage and stronger knockback. In comparison, most of Chibi-Robo’s normal attacks would employ use his toothbrush. It makes a certain amount of sense, as the toothbrush has the softer bristles for light attacks, and the spoon is harder metal for knocking foes away.

Up special really couldn’t be anything but the Chibi-Copter. And it’s just what you think it is. The copter pops out of Cheebo’s head, and propels him straight up into the sky. Then it slows down and makes Cheebo float back down to the ground. Hitting anyone with the blades on the way up will cause damage, but on the way back down, contact would cause the blades to retract and make Chibi-Robo fall at normal speed again.

Chibi-Robo could also have a unique blocking animation, using his mug for protection instead of the usual bubble shield. It might be a little too hard to animate smoothly though, so I’m not too sure if that’s a good idea or not. It’d be pretty cute though. Maybe it would just be a taunt, like Snake’s cardboard box.

To be honest, I haven’t come up with a final smash for Cheebo that I like yet. I was thinking that he could summon a bunch of his friends, or perhaps Giga-Robo? Maybe Drake Redcrest flies in and shoots up the place? That might actually be better for an assist trophy though. I kinda like the idea of Cheebo flying up to the top of the screen as Spydors invade and attack the other fighters, then Chibi-Robo just lets loose with the Chibi-Blaster, damaging anyone he hits and clearing out the spydorz. Yeah, you know what? I like that. Let’s go with that.

I feel like I should be elaborating a little more on Chibi-Robo, since he’s my number one wanted Smash character, but what I’ve already written should be enough to give you a pretty clear picture of the fighter that I’m envisioning. I really don’t see Cheebo being included as a fighter, but weirder things have happened (ROB, Wii Fit Trainer), so I won’t lose hope until the game is finally released and I’ve unlocked every playable character.

Previous: Yarn Kirby

Next: Ganon

Year of N64 – July – Gauntlet Legends

Unlike the last few Year of N64 games, Gauntlet Legends is one that I spent a ton of time with back in my youth. Or, at least I think that I did. Having played it through again, I’m not sure if it is quite as much of a timesink as I remembered it being.

Gauntlet Legends is essentially a reboot of the Gauntlet franchise long before reboots were a thing. The previous game, Gauntlet III: The Final Quest, came out in 1991, and Legends hit the arcades in 1998. The N64 port didn’t show up until the next year. I’ve only ever dabbled in “classic” Gauntlet games, so I don’t know how much Legends changes the formula, but it brought the franchise into the world of polygons, so that’s a big enough leap for me.

If you’ve never played Gauntlet anything, you’re missing out on a fairly entertaining multiplayer arcade experience. The game has you set up a character from a small roster of classes, then sends you on your way through a couple dozen stages, where you will collect cash and slaughter countless numbers of monsters. The goal of the game is more or less to survive and make your way to the end of each stage, but Gauntlet offers a little more than that.

Enter the “dreaded” RPG elements. You choose your character class, give them a name, and then they gain experience and level up as you play. Level ups increase your stats, and when you hit certain milestones, your character will gain special upgrades, like fancier weapons and a familiar that tags along and adds to your firepower. Each player also has their own inventory for stockpiling items, and can spend their accumulated gold on either items or stat boosts. Items can be useful, but I found that their true value was just selling them at the store so that I could buy the stat boosts instead.

The stages come in four colourful flavours: the mountain, the castle, the town, and the ice domain. Defeating the bosses of each world will unlock a pseudo-final stage in the cathedral, and when you beat that, you unlock the battlefield world. Finally, you will descend into the very depths of the underworld for the final showdown.

So there’s a fairly good variety of levels on display here. Even stages within the same world vary greatly, rather than simply having one default look and a handful of different layouts for example, the mountain world has you start at the lush base of the mountain, then as you ascend, it becomes more barren and rocky. Eventually you find your way inside and have to work your way through a cave, culminating in a stage that takes place on a set of rocky platforms and catwalks suspended above a massive pool of lava.

The stage layouts are usually fairly good too. Almost all of them have twists and turns everywhere, but the critical path is usually not too difficult to follow. It wasn’t until the ice world that the levels started to get annoyingly complex and I found myself wishing that they were about half as long. Most of the stages are huge, and the amount of enemies that populate them is staggering; it’s a wonder that this game didn’t cause the Nintendo 64 to simply melt down. As it is though, there’s not even very much lag considering how many moving objects can end up on screen at once.

While most of the items you find during your adventure are power-ups of varying effectiveness, there are three important collectibles that you need to keep your eyes open for. There are plenty of hints to their locations, but actually sussing them out can sometimes be a hassle. Obelisks are scattered around the first three worlds, and you need to find all of them in one world to unlock the next. There are a total of thirteen Rune Stones to find, and without them all, you can’t enter the final showdown.

Lastly are the boss weapons, one in each of the four main worlds. These are not strictly necessary to complete the game, but they give you a slight advantage in the boss fights. And if you’re playing solo (as I did), you need all the advantages you can find. The bosses are brutal, and when they’re focusing all of their attacks on you, the fights generally just boil down to whose HP depletes first. They aren’t fun, and a solo player will have to grind his or her butt off before they even stand a chance against a boss. This stands in stark contrast to the regular stages, where you’ll generally never have to grind levels to progress.

The final boss, however, is a bit of an exception. You have to fight him twice, and the first time, he is just as bad as the rest. It’s a very difficult fight, but he drops four superweapons when he’s defeated. If you keep one of those weapons until your second fight with him, using it will make the final battle exceedingly easy. If you don’t, it’s basically impossible to win alone. I wanted to do it the normal way at first, so I leveled up to 90 and maxed out my defense stat through the shop. Still I died. So I used the cheap way, because nuts to that.

I should mention that grinding up to level 90 did not take very long. I burned through this game in a week, and it didn’t really seem to overstay its welcome. I remember having maxed out several characters back in the day, and I suppose that it would have been much less tedious because I was actually able to play with other people. I wanted to do this playthrough with my wife, but the fact of the matter is that the control sticks on my spare N64 controllers are almost completely limp, and I really didn’t care enough to buy a new one or attempt a repair.

So there you have it. It’s not a very deep experience, but I still have a pretty strong appreciation for Gauntlet Legends. So much so, that I kind of want to track down a copy of the incredibly buggy sequel (expansion?), Gauntlet: Dark Legacy, to give that a quick playthough. I also sort of want to try out the oft-maligned Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows, but it seems to be so different that it might not be worth the investment. Anyway, Gauntlet Legends was a bunch of fun while it lasted, and I can only imagine that it would go down even smoother with a friend or three to share it with.

Smash Speculation: Yarn Kirby/Prince Fluff

Masahiro Sakurai, the director of Super Smash Bros, is also creator of Kirby and was the director of many of the earlier games in the Kirby series. Kirby has been a fighter in Smash since the start, and each sequel seems to take a few more cues from Kirby games than the last. Smash has no shortage of love for Kirby, so why not introduce a second Kirby into the fray?

~ Yarn Kirby ~

There are already two Links in Smash after all: regular Link and Toon Link. Both even have the same abilities, though with a few slight differences in speed, weight, and what have you. Yarn Kirby here would be a completely different character from Kirby. Kirby’s Epic Yarn just plays so differently from any other Kirby game, it’d be hard to argue that Yarn Kirby doesn’t deserve a spot. Of course, if you really can’t stand the thought of having two Kirbys, Yarn Kirby could just as easily be swapped out with Prince Fluff, who is the second-player character in Kirby’s Epic Yarn.

The biggest difficulty in implementing Yarn Kirby would be in the fact that he’s a mostly see-through character, and that might make it very easy to lose track of him in a game like Smash, where there can be a lot going on on the screen at any time. The image above shows Kirby and Fluff on patches, but in the game proper, they don’t have that backing to them. The best solution I can come up with for this problem would be to make their yarn outlines a little thicker. Maybe there’s a more creative way to do it, or maybe the best way is to just pop ’em in as they are and let the players sort it out.

Yarn Kirby’s main method of attacking in Epic Yarn is a yarn whip that extends from his body. This would likely figure into many of his regular attacks. Maybe the whip would factor in more to Yarn Kirby’s smash attacks instead, and he’d have a more standard set of fighting moves as normal attacks. If nothing else, it would definitely work as a tethered grab attack, like Link’s hookshot or Samus’ grapple beam.

Smash attacks, as with Classic Wario, would make use of Yarn Kirby’s many transformations. However, I’d give him something a little different for his neutral special: bead toss. Kirby’s Epic Yarn has you gathering piles upon piles of beads, and I think that having Yarn Kirby chuck them as a projectile weapon would be a good basic special attack. Beads come in all shapes and sizes in Epic Yarn, and in Smash, the bigger beads would do more damage, and a star-shaped bead might have a stronger knockback effect.

Yarn Kirby transforms into an adorable little car when he runs in Kirby’s Epic Yarn, and that should definitely remain a trait of his Smash character. He also has a monster truck transformation, and I think that would make a pretty cool side special. I’m not sure what kind of special properties this special move would have, but maybe it doesn’t need any. It could just be a really big hit, not unlike regular Kirby’s hammer special.

The up special would obviously be Yarn Kirby’s rocket transformation. It would take a second to charge up, then create a big poof of smoke as it blasts off, damaging anyone it rams into. The flames coming out of the thrusters would obviously burn anyone who touches them. The rocket should be able to be directed left or right after it takes off, but always maintain a vertical course. The original rocket shoots stars, but that might be unnecessary for Smash.

Finally, Yarn Kirby’s down special would be the weight. Just like regular Kirby’s stone attack, it would simply drop down and smoosh anyone below it. No frills, just a straight-up butt slam attack, but cuter. If you need to mix it up, I don’t know, maybe have him turn into the surfing penguin thing and do a wave attack like Squirtle’s surf. Maybe on the ground, it’d produce a small wave and crash into enemies that are straight ahead, while airborne it could ride a wave at a downward angle. I’m thinking watery version of the Falcon Kick, here.

Final smash seems obvious: Tankbot. I’m worried that it would end up being a little too much like another Landmaster, so let’s try something different, okay? UFO! Now, the UFO in Epic Yarn works a little differently than the standard UFO copy ability, which I don’t think would work overly well in Smash. So let’s have the Yarn UFO with Copy UFO’s beams and such, yes? Yarn UFO would be able to fly around the screen freely, blasting opponents with its high-powered beam. The UFO’s armor is strong enough to withstand any attacks, giving Yarn Kirby a short period of invincibility. It’s a little bit like Super Dragon Yoshi again, but at least it’s not another Landmaster.

Kirby’s Epic Yarn wasn’t one of the Kirby games that Masahiro Sakurai had a hand in personally, but it is a beloved entry, and quite possibly the more adorable video game ever made. Seeing Kirby get an alternate representation based on his yarn form would be great, and subbing in Prince Fluff to diversify the character roster further would be just as good. I’ve got no beef with Fluff. Hopefully one of these characters makes the cut; it’ll make Smash feel that much more like pants.

Previous: Classic Wario

Next: Chibi-Robo

Smash Speculation: Wario

Okay, so for week one of this project, I’m going to cheat and choose an existing character. Sort of. Phoning it in right out of the gate; is there any other style which is so unquestionably mine?

~ CLASSIC WARIO ~

Yeah, so Wario made his big Smash Bros debut in Brawl, but he wasn’t really Wario. At least, he wasn’t Wario the way I know him. Perhaps to give him a more unique flavour, Wario came to Smash dressed up in his biker duds from the Wario Ware Inc series. Along with this came a bunch of weird attacks, like biting his opponents and blasting out deadly farts. This is all well and good, and I have no intent to suggest that Biker Wario should be kicked out, but I think that there should be an alternate Classic Wario to choose from.

In Brawl, it’s possible to change Wario’s costume from his biker gear to his familiar purple overalls. This doesn’t change how he plays, but I think that it should. Classic Wario would, for one, move less erratically than Biker Wario. The current character shuffles around in alternating poses, giving the impression of old sprite animation, not unlike how Mr. Game & Watch moves. Classic Wario would move smoothly, like the rest of the cast.

Classic Wario has a pretty deep pool of moves to choose from, making it hard to narrow down exactly what should go where. I’d suggest that his smash attacks make use of his various hats from the first Wario Land game. Up smash would shoot out the bull horns, maybe even getting your opponent stuck to them to perform a throw or follow-up attack. Side smash would have him charge forward with the Jet Hat, and the burner in the back would hurt anyone who touches it. Down smash would use the Dragon Hat to have Wario lay a flame across the ground around him. It’s kind of hard to describe, but imagine Samus’ up smash, but along the ground.

Classic Wario’s special moves would be a little harder to pin down. I’d imagine that they’d use a number of his transformations from the later Wario Land games. Up+B, I think, would make use of Vampire Wario’s bat mode. Obviously, this would have him poof into a bat and fly upward. I don’t know if the bat would cause damage, but maybe you’d just be able to fly around as the bat for a few seconds instead of making it an actual attack.

Down+B is the really hard one. The best fit I can come up with is Fat Wario. Like so many other characters, it’d be a butt-slam type move. I guess it’d work a little like Bowser’s Down+B while on the ground, propelling Wario slightly forward before the stomp. The move would probably have a little lag, as Wario would have to chomp down on an apple or a donut before bulking up and doing the slam. Of course, you could also just give him a standard butt slam, but it’d make more sense to wedge a transformation in there.

The side and neutral specials have many options, but a lot of them are fairly similar. Frozen Wario would fit well as Side+B, turning Wario to ice and having him slide along the floor. Any opponents hit have a chance of being frozen, though I’m not sure exactly how Wario would be unfrozen. To keep the move useful, Wario would probably be able to jump/break out after a certain distance. Staying true to the games would only cancel the move when Wario hits a wall, but that would make it a very suicidal move.

Finally, the neutral special would be Flaming Wario, igniting Wario’s butt and causing him to run forward in a panic. The player could control Wario’s direction and jump, and burn anyone he comes in contact with. After being on fire for a couple seconds, he’d be completely consumed by the flame, and his mobility would be reduced. A couple seconds later, the fire would go out and Wario wold shake off the ash. Any contact with the big flame would cause increased damage.

For the sake of laziness, they could probably keep Wario Man as Classic Wario’s final smash. If you want me to really stretch, maybe give him the King Dragon hat from Virtual Boy Wario Land. Giving Wario the ability to fly and shoot fire, it would probably be very similar to Yoshi’s final smash. Or instead, it could cover the screen in a red and black Virtual Boy-esque overlay, and have Wario jump onto a foreground platform while something damages all the fighters left on the main playfield.

The model for Classic Wario already exists in Smash, all they have to do is give him his own set of moves to make him a unique character. Of course, that is the most complicated part, but I think it would be worth the effort. The current Wario just doesn’t feel like Wario, you know?

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Next: Yarn Kirby