January 17th:
Ordered some games online again.
Saturn:
Ghen War
DS:
Grand Theft Auto Chinatown Wars
PlayStation 2:
Battle Engine Aquila (promo)
Operation WinBack
Red Faction
Smuggler's Run 2 Hostile Territory (promo)
GameCube:
Pro Rally 2002
Xbox 360:
Burnout Revenge (new, sealed)
Burnout Paradise (new, sealed)
The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon (new, sealed)
Janurary 31th:
Bought some games and stuff at the local GameStop.
Wii:
Offroad Extreme!
PlayStation 3:
Metal Gear Solid 4 Guns of the Patriots
Ridge Racer Unbounded Limited Edition
Skylanders:
Chill (Swap Force)
Cynder (Giants, Series 2)
Drill Seargeant
Drobot
Hex
Hex (Giants, Series 2)
Stealth Elf
Other:
Pac-Man keychain with authentic Pac-Man sounds!
Also some other stuff not bought at GameStop.
DVD:
An American Tail Fievel Goes West
Family Guy It's A Trap!
Hello Kitty Classic Tales
My Little Pony Tales Vol. 2 Masquerade!
Other:
Crazy-Stuff.biz Fox girl head bike bell
Crazy-Stuff.biz White Rabbit girl head bike bell
Showing posts with label old school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label old school. Show all posts
Saturday, January 23, 2016
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
Gaming Purchases - December 2015
December 8th:
First some bad news, my old original Xbox died last night after many many years of loyal service. I had to open it up to manually get my game out of the disc tray. It doesn't even light up the red or orange warning ring of light so it seems to be pretty bad. The now empty space under my TV is a depressing sight to behold to say the very least.
First some bad news, my old original Xbox died last night after many many years of loyal service. I had to open it up to manually get my game out of the disc tray. It doesn't even light up the red or orange warning ring of light so it seems to be pretty bad. The now empty space under my TV is a depressing sight to behold to say the very least.
I still have some games planned to order that I never got around to ordering last month but already I've got some new gaming realted purchases done. I was out doing some gift shopping for the upcoming holiday and made a quick visit to the local GameStop. Didn't look around too much but I did find something I wanted, a couple of Xbox 360 memory cards. These little things were rare enough to find back in the day when they were still manufactured and nowadays even rarer as they pretty much only exist on the second hand market so I was more than happy to add them to my collection.
UPDATE 1 - December 22nd:
Ordered the games I planned back in November (and some additional stuff) on the 17th, all orders arrived on the 22nd.
Game Boy:
Game Boy Camera (blue)
Game Boy Advance:
Asterix & Obelix XXL (cartridge only)
LEGO Drome Racers (cartridge only)
Mega Drive:
Ballz 3D The Battle Of The Balls
Eternal Champions
Saturn:
Cyber Troopers - Virtual On
PlayStation:
Warzone 2100
Xbox:
Crimson Skies - The High Road To Revenge
Xbox 360:
Race PRO (new, sealed)
PC:
Virtua Fighter 2 (new, sealed)
Collectibles:
Maximo mini figures collection - Queen Sophia (new, sealed)
Music CD:
2 Unlimited II 1998 (new, sealed)
Tuning Hitz 7 2009 (new, sealed)
Music DVD:
Liquid Grooves - Tasty and Fresh Club Music 1 (new, sealed)
Skyclub - Finest Lounge and Club Sounds 1 (new, sealed)
Anime DVD:
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 3 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 5 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 7 (new, sealed)
Argai - The Prophecy Vol. 8 (new, sealed)
Bakugan - Gundalian Invaders Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Balatack Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Beautiful Dreamer (new, sealed)
Blood - The Last Vampire (new, sealed)
Darkside Blues (new, sealed)
Dead Leaves (new, sealed)
Dobutsu Takarajima (Animal Treasure Island) (new, sealed)
Final Fantasy Unlimited Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Final Fantasy Unlimited Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Full Metal Panic! Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Full Metal Panic! Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Full Metal Panic! Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Genshi Shonen Ryu (Ryu The Primitive Boy) Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Genshi Shonen Ryu (Ryu The Primitive Boy) Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Ghost in the Shell - Stand Alone Complex Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Helen Keller (new, sealed)
Kai Doh Maru (new, sealed)
Ken - The Great Bearfist (new, sealed)
Kimagure - Orange Road Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Kimagure - Orange Road Vol. 3 (new, sealed)
Kimagure - Orange Road Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Leda - The Fantastic Adventures of Yoko (new, sealed)
My Neighbors The Yamadas (new, sealed)
Nadia - The Secret of Blue Water (new, sealed)
Nagagutsu Sanjushi (The Wonderful World of Puss 'n Boots - Return of Pero) (new, sealed)
Neon Genesis Evangelion Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Neon Genesis Evangelion Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Requiem From The Darkness Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Requiem From The Darkness Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Requiem From The Darkness Vol. 3 (new, sealed)
Requiem From The Darkness Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 3 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 5 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Samurai Champloo Vol. 7 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 3 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 4 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 5 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 6 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 7 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 8 (new, sealed)
Sandybell Vol. 9 (new, sealed)
Silverfang - The Complete Series (new, sealed)
Space Adventure Cobra - The Complete Series (new, sealed)
Submarine 707 Revolution (new, sealed)
Orguss 02 - Super Dimension Century Orguss Two (new, sealed)
Tenchi Muyo! Vol. 1 (new, sealed)
Tenchi Muyo! Vol. 2 (new, sealed)
Gisaku - The Demon Hunter (new, sealed)
Yatterman (Yattaman) (2009 live action movie adaptation) (new, sealed)
Monday, December 7, 2015
Now Playing - December 2015
Been focusing mostly on the new games I got at the end of last month so far.
Gift (PlayStation 2)
An obscure classic that was hyped for the impressive lighting and shadows back in the day. I was looking forward to it but sadly never got hold of it, at best I got to play the demo of the PC version. But that's all changed and now I finally get to experience this forgotten piece of videogame history! I have to say, because of how impressive it was back then it maganes to still look good today. It's your standard 3D platformer for the most part but with a strong focus on light and shadow puzzles, many enemies are light and shadow based and your weapons and attacks are as well. The humor is a bit of a swing and a miss sometimes but mostly I like the cheesy story and cutscenes, it's like a reminder from a simpler time when all games didn't have to be Oscar winning movies. One problem so far is that it refuses to recognize my memory card having plenty of free space, probably because it's a third party memory card, so if I wanna save I'm gonna have to dig out an older 8mb Sony original memory card. And I don't think I have one with any free space left. Very annoying as I want to play more but can't as I'm forced to restart from the beginning every time.
Headhunter (PlayStation 2)
Has some problems loading the main menu, most likely due to some minor scratches on the disc, but once in-game it works fine. It really doesn't hold a candle to the original version on Dreamcast, gone are the crisp textures and detailed shadows, replaced with muddy low-res textures and simple blurry shadow blobs that seem taken directly from an early N64 game. It still plays the same, which isn't that great either as that means it doesn't use the second analog stick very well, instead of adding camera control (missing in the Dreamcast original as Dreamcast only has one analog stick) they just use it to cycle through items and weapons, in other words a total waste as that could've been done better in many other ways. As it stands Headhunter on PS2 is a disappointing port that leaves a lot to be desired. No wonder some people thought the Dreamcast had so much more to offer than PS2 back in the day when poor ports like this was part of their comparison.
Wreckless The Yakuza Mission (PlayStation 2 and GameCube)
I love Wreckless on Xbox, it's an arcade style mission based driving game with visuals that were jawbreaking at the time and still impress to this very day. Shortly after the Xbox exclusive version came out we got the two altered ports I've finally added to my collection after so many years. The ports seem to have been first ported to PS2 and then ported over to GameCube using the PS2 port as basis. I say this because the PS2 port is superior in just about every way and the GameCube port is more or less a poor copy & paste job. They share the exact same content but with more glitches and much uglier visuals on the GameCube. Neither versions compare to the Xbox original visually but at least the PS2 version still has quite a lot to offer, much thanks to the added content but also because it still looks and plays great in it's own right. Sadly some things are missing from the Xbox original, the missions with tanks are all gone, including the mission where you get to drive a tank yourself blowing stuff up, instead all cars now fire rockets and have a slow motion feature, this adds some variety to the gameplay but it's got very limited ammo so it's only something you can use sparingly unless you activate the cheats, so the gameplay still remains very much the same as it always did. The Xbox original didn't have cheats, just unlockable stuff, these ported version unlocks both cheats and other stuff, but again some Xbox stuff is missing, you can no longer mix the scenarios with vehicles from the other scenario or use different screen filters, instead they've added all the normal traffic vehicles and a whole list of brand new missions to be unlocked. There are also unlimited this and infinite that cheats for time, weapons etc. and even a get out and walk around and hijack other cars cheat, ultimately making the ports more like an open world vehicle combat game if you so please. Overall I like how the PS2 port is and I'm disappointed at the GameCube version. On GameCube it loads a little faster than it does on PS2 and it has better anti-aliasing, but with much uglier textures, visual glitches galore and special effects that are so poorly done you can't even see them properly it's easily the worst of the three. Additionally, in PAL regions the GameCube can be enabled 60hz playback with some games like Metroid Prime 2 Echoes and The Legend of Zelda Collection, which can then be used to prompt a question in other normally 50hz limited games if you wish to play them in 60hz as well. Well, turns out some select few games automatically override the question and force 50hz no matter what and Wreckless on GameCube just happens to be one of those games, as if it wasn't plagued with enough shortcomings already.
XGIII Extreme G - Extreme-G 3 (GameCube)
Speaking of select few games that force 50hz no matter what, here's another that does just that! Because of this it's basically identical to the PS2 version only with 4 player split-screen multiplayer instead of just 2. It even plays in NTSC50 with black borders on top and bottom, so not even PAL50 like other 50hz GameCube games do. So yeah, I already have the PS2 version since many years back so this version will probably never get played again. I guess if you don't have a PS2 this would've been fine but considering PS2 and Extreme G 3 on PS2 are both more common and cheaper to find and get hold of there really is no reason to ever bother with this version. Unless you're really desperate for that 4 player split-screen multiplayer there is no reason to ever buy this on GameCube and a waste of your time and money.
Shadow The Hedgehog (GameCube and Xbox (Xbox version played on Xbox 360))
Starsky & Hutch (Game Boy Advance)
V-Rally 3 (Game Boy Advance)
Tomb Raider The Prophecy (Game Boy Advance)
LEGO Drome Racers (Game Boy Advance)
Star X (Game Boy Advance)
B-Movie (PlayStation)
Star Ixiom (PlayStation)
Twisted Metal (PlayStation)
Decided to play this old classic a bit. Played as Roadkill and defeated Minion, it was a good playthrough. I still love this game the most of the entire series. Been thinking about maybe trying to get hold of the PS3 game but I'm on the fence about if it's worth the asking price, it doesn't seem that great to be honest and the extremely censored PAL version of Twisted Metal Black fiasco has never truly been forgiven despite the excellent Twisted Metal Head-On on PSP, the trust that was lost has simply not been regained.
Frogger (PlayStation)
I really like this game despite how unforgiving it is, it's a nostalgic classic I felt like playing again.
Final Fantasy VII (PlayStation and PlayStation version running on PSP)
Picked back up on my two newly started games. On PSX I'm just out of the Mythril Mine, having recently calmly walked across the soggy marshes and defeated the Midgar Solom with ease thatnks to some time being spent leveling up and getting some more practical Limit Breaks, before either visiting Fort Condor for the side mission or going directly to Junon (I'm heading for Fort Condor first, of course) and on PSP I'm outside Midgar, aquired Matra Magic and a whole bunch of Atomic Scissors that will later sell at a high price, just about to enter Kalm to do the first lengthy flashback.
UPDATE 1 - December 22nd
Asterix & Obelix XXL (Game Boy Advance)
As far as I know this is the only 3D platformer on the system. I've played a few other platformers with 3D visuals but they've been 2.5D type games, like that one atrocity based on Osmisis Jones... the less said about that game the better. This is instead something so rare as a not just competent but genuinely good 3D platformer on the Game Boy Advance. It uses the same impressive game engine that powers V-Rally 3, Stuntman and Driv3r on GBA so if you've played either of those you'll know the level of technical quality I'm talking about. As a game it's like most platformers, you play as either Asterix or Obelix, selecting between the two by pressing Select during gameplay, as you run around bashing romans, viking, greeks etc. doing some platforming, door unlocking and stuff on the side to advance through the levels, the usual repertoire. You get to buy upgrades like more health and new attack combos for the helmets you collect after defeating enemies and collecting throughout the levels. There are also some on-rail levels thrown into the mix to break the monotony. It's impressive to see a 3D platformer executed so well on the GBA and I've had a blast playing it so far. I'm currently about half way through the game and I'll definitely keep playing.
Warzone 2100 (PlayStation)
A 3D real-time strategy game where you get to design your own troops and control them each manually if you so wish. Sound too good to be true? Well, it's true, and what's even more impressive is that it's all done on good old PSX. I loved playing the demo of this back in the day and finally I have a copy of the full game to call my very own, and I gotta say it's every bit as great as I remembered it to be, maybe even better.
Crimson Skies - High Road To Revenge (Xbox (played on Xbox 360))
A flight sim arcade hybrid action game set in an alternate timeline where WWII wen't down a different path and old school propeller planes and zeppelin airships became the norm and the polar ice caps melted and covered earth with water or some Waterworld wannabe plot like that, I forgot to pay attention to the story as I took to the skies and started blasting everything in sight. It's a good game, looks great for an Xbox title and could easily pass as next gen in most regards. I like the way it plays, it reminds me a lot of other great games like WarHawk - The Red Mercury Missions on PlayStation, AquaNox and AquaNox 2 Revelation on PC and Yager, also on Xbox.
Race PRO (Xbox 360)
An Xbox 360 exclusive from 2009 that in my opinion does what the Forza series has failed to do all these years, it makes racing fun. Sure it lacks the size of a Forza game in sheer content and stuff to do like advanced car customization and a decal editor but it nails the driving and has some really welcome sound options where you can tweak what you want to hear and not better than any other game I know. I personally love the roar of the engine and can live without the sound of the clutch and gear changes, this game allows me to have the engine louder than anything else and the gears etc. turned off completely if I so wish, I don't take it to that extreme but it's nice to be able to tweak the sound experience in such detail for once, especially in a racing game. It didn't take long to get used to the driving physics in this game, they're very consistent and once I got the hang of one car the rest followed despite being wildly different in performance, it's all about how they handle within the game engine that does it for me, again something that games like Forza and Gran Turismo's never done right for me. It looks good too, the only real issue I have is the screen tearing, it's not so bad it ruins the game but it's one of the worse cases I've seen in an Xbox 360 game, nowhere near as bad as Alien Isolation or anything remotely close to that degree but for a racing game it's still notable. It's still a fun game, I like that you can really crash, with flips in the air and everything, unlike virtually all other sim racers that heavily restrict car damage and crashes or sometimes even remove it altogether this is most welcome. For once I'm even enjoying the carreer mode, something I rarely enjoy forcing myself though in racing games otherwise. This game had a lot of content available at the start too which was great as I love jumping into new racing games with Time Trials or other free racing modes just to get used to how the game handles as no two games handle quite the same, this game allowed me to do so without obstacles, only a select few high performance cars were locked away. There's even a split-screen mutliplayer mode with co-op and stuff in this game, I haven't seen luxury like that since the generation before it!
Sly Cooper - Thieves in Time (PlayStation 3)
Gift (PlayStation 2)
An obscure classic that was hyped for the impressive lighting and shadows back in the day. I was looking forward to it but sadly never got hold of it, at best I got to play the demo of the PC version. But that's all changed and now I finally get to experience this forgotten piece of videogame history! I have to say, because of how impressive it was back then it maganes to still look good today. It's your standard 3D platformer for the most part but with a strong focus on light and shadow puzzles, many enemies are light and shadow based and your weapons and attacks are as well. The humor is a bit of a swing and a miss sometimes but mostly I like the cheesy story and cutscenes, it's like a reminder from a simpler time when all games didn't have to be Oscar winning movies. One problem so far is that it refuses to recognize my memory card having plenty of free space, probably because it's a third party memory card, so if I wanna save I'm gonna have to dig out an older 8mb Sony original memory card. And I don't think I have one with any free space left. Very annoying as I want to play more but can't as I'm forced to restart from the beginning every time.
Headhunter (PlayStation 2)
Has some problems loading the main menu, most likely due to some minor scratches on the disc, but once in-game it works fine. It really doesn't hold a candle to the original version on Dreamcast, gone are the crisp textures and detailed shadows, replaced with muddy low-res textures and simple blurry shadow blobs that seem taken directly from an early N64 game. It still plays the same, which isn't that great either as that means it doesn't use the second analog stick very well, instead of adding camera control (missing in the Dreamcast original as Dreamcast only has one analog stick) they just use it to cycle through items and weapons, in other words a total waste as that could've been done better in many other ways. As it stands Headhunter on PS2 is a disappointing port that leaves a lot to be desired. No wonder some people thought the Dreamcast had so much more to offer than PS2 back in the day when poor ports like this was part of their comparison.
Wreckless The Yakuza Mission (PlayStation 2 and GameCube)
I love Wreckless on Xbox, it's an arcade style mission based driving game with visuals that were jawbreaking at the time and still impress to this very day. Shortly after the Xbox exclusive version came out we got the two altered ports I've finally added to my collection after so many years. The ports seem to have been first ported to PS2 and then ported over to GameCube using the PS2 port as basis. I say this because the PS2 port is superior in just about every way and the GameCube port is more or less a poor copy & paste job. They share the exact same content but with more glitches and much uglier visuals on the GameCube. Neither versions compare to the Xbox original visually but at least the PS2 version still has quite a lot to offer, much thanks to the added content but also because it still looks and plays great in it's own right. Sadly some things are missing from the Xbox original, the missions with tanks are all gone, including the mission where you get to drive a tank yourself blowing stuff up, instead all cars now fire rockets and have a slow motion feature, this adds some variety to the gameplay but it's got very limited ammo so it's only something you can use sparingly unless you activate the cheats, so the gameplay still remains very much the same as it always did. The Xbox original didn't have cheats, just unlockable stuff, these ported version unlocks both cheats and other stuff, but again some Xbox stuff is missing, you can no longer mix the scenarios with vehicles from the other scenario or use different screen filters, instead they've added all the normal traffic vehicles and a whole list of brand new missions to be unlocked. There are also unlimited this and infinite that cheats for time, weapons etc. and even a get out and walk around and hijack other cars cheat, ultimately making the ports more like an open world vehicle combat game if you so please. Overall I like how the PS2 port is and I'm disappointed at the GameCube version. On GameCube it loads a little faster than it does on PS2 and it has better anti-aliasing, but with much uglier textures, visual glitches galore and special effects that are so poorly done you can't even see them properly it's easily the worst of the three. Additionally, in PAL regions the GameCube can be enabled 60hz playback with some games like Metroid Prime 2 Echoes and The Legend of Zelda Collection, which can then be used to prompt a question in other normally 50hz limited games if you wish to play them in 60hz as well. Well, turns out some select few games automatically override the question and force 50hz no matter what and Wreckless on GameCube just happens to be one of those games, as if it wasn't plagued with enough shortcomings already.
XGIII Extreme G - Extreme-G 3 (GameCube)
Speaking of select few games that force 50hz no matter what, here's another that does just that! Because of this it's basically identical to the PS2 version only with 4 player split-screen multiplayer instead of just 2. It even plays in NTSC50 with black borders on top and bottom, so not even PAL50 like other 50hz GameCube games do. So yeah, I already have the PS2 version since many years back so this version will probably never get played again. I guess if you don't have a PS2 this would've been fine but considering PS2 and Extreme G 3 on PS2 are both more common and cheaper to find and get hold of there really is no reason to ever bother with this version. Unless you're really desperate for that 4 player split-screen multiplayer there is no reason to ever buy this on GameCube and a waste of your time and money.
Shadow The Hedgehog (GameCube and Xbox (Xbox version played on Xbox 360))
Starsky & Hutch (Game Boy Advance)
V-Rally 3 (Game Boy Advance)
Tomb Raider The Prophecy (Game Boy Advance)
LEGO Drome Racers (Game Boy Advance)
Star X (Game Boy Advance)
B-Movie (PlayStation)
Star Ixiom (PlayStation)
Twisted Metal (PlayStation)
Decided to play this old classic a bit. Played as Roadkill and defeated Minion, it was a good playthrough. I still love this game the most of the entire series. Been thinking about maybe trying to get hold of the PS3 game but I'm on the fence about if it's worth the asking price, it doesn't seem that great to be honest and the extremely censored PAL version of Twisted Metal Black fiasco has never truly been forgiven despite the excellent Twisted Metal Head-On on PSP, the trust that was lost has simply not been regained.
Frogger (PlayStation)
I really like this game despite how unforgiving it is, it's a nostalgic classic I felt like playing again.
Final Fantasy VII (PlayStation and PlayStation version running on PSP)
Picked back up on my two newly started games. On PSX I'm just out of the Mythril Mine, having recently calmly walked across the soggy marshes and defeated the Midgar Solom with ease thatnks to some time being spent leveling up and getting some more practical Limit Breaks, before either visiting Fort Condor for the side mission or going directly to Junon (I'm heading for Fort Condor first, of course) and on PSP I'm outside Midgar, aquired Matra Magic and a whole bunch of Atomic Scissors that will later sell at a high price, just about to enter Kalm to do the first lengthy flashback.
UPDATE 1 - December 22nd
Asterix & Obelix XXL (Game Boy Advance)
As far as I know this is the only 3D platformer on the system. I've played a few other platformers with 3D visuals but they've been 2.5D type games, like that one atrocity based on Osmisis Jones... the less said about that game the better. This is instead something so rare as a not just competent but genuinely good 3D platformer on the Game Boy Advance. It uses the same impressive game engine that powers V-Rally 3, Stuntman and Driv3r on GBA so if you've played either of those you'll know the level of technical quality I'm talking about. As a game it's like most platformers, you play as either Asterix or Obelix, selecting between the two by pressing Select during gameplay, as you run around bashing romans, viking, greeks etc. doing some platforming, door unlocking and stuff on the side to advance through the levels, the usual repertoire. You get to buy upgrades like more health and new attack combos for the helmets you collect after defeating enemies and collecting throughout the levels. There are also some on-rail levels thrown into the mix to break the monotony. It's impressive to see a 3D platformer executed so well on the GBA and I've had a blast playing it so far. I'm currently about half way through the game and I'll definitely keep playing.
Warzone 2100 (PlayStation)
A 3D real-time strategy game where you get to design your own troops and control them each manually if you so wish. Sound too good to be true? Well, it's true, and what's even more impressive is that it's all done on good old PSX. I loved playing the demo of this back in the day and finally I have a copy of the full game to call my very own, and I gotta say it's every bit as great as I remembered it to be, maybe even better.
Crimson Skies - High Road To Revenge (Xbox (played on Xbox 360))
A flight sim arcade hybrid action game set in an alternate timeline where WWII wen't down a different path and old school propeller planes and zeppelin airships became the norm and the polar ice caps melted and covered earth with water or some Waterworld wannabe plot like that, I forgot to pay attention to the story as I took to the skies and started blasting everything in sight. It's a good game, looks great for an Xbox title and could easily pass as next gen in most regards. I like the way it plays, it reminds me a lot of other great games like WarHawk - The Red Mercury Missions on PlayStation, AquaNox and AquaNox 2 Revelation on PC and Yager, also on Xbox.
Race PRO (Xbox 360)
An Xbox 360 exclusive from 2009 that in my opinion does what the Forza series has failed to do all these years, it makes racing fun. Sure it lacks the size of a Forza game in sheer content and stuff to do like advanced car customization and a decal editor but it nails the driving and has some really welcome sound options where you can tweak what you want to hear and not better than any other game I know. I personally love the roar of the engine and can live without the sound of the clutch and gear changes, this game allows me to have the engine louder than anything else and the gears etc. turned off completely if I so wish, I don't take it to that extreme but it's nice to be able to tweak the sound experience in such detail for once, especially in a racing game. It didn't take long to get used to the driving physics in this game, they're very consistent and once I got the hang of one car the rest followed despite being wildly different in performance, it's all about how they handle within the game engine that does it for me, again something that games like Forza and Gran Turismo's never done right for me. It looks good too, the only real issue I have is the screen tearing, it's not so bad it ruins the game but it's one of the worse cases I've seen in an Xbox 360 game, nowhere near as bad as Alien Isolation or anything remotely close to that degree but for a racing game it's still notable. It's still a fun game, I like that you can really crash, with flips in the air and everything, unlike virtually all other sim racers that heavily restrict car damage and crashes or sometimes even remove it altogether this is most welcome. For once I'm even enjoying the carreer mode, something I rarely enjoy forcing myself though in racing games otherwise. This game had a lot of content available at the start too which was great as I love jumping into new racing games with Time Trials or other free racing modes just to get used to how the game handles as no two games handle quite the same, this game allowed me to do so without obstacles, only a select few high performance cars were locked away. There's even a split-screen mutliplayer mode with co-op and stuff in this game, I haven't seen luxury like that since the generation before it!
Sly Cooper - Thieves in Time (PlayStation 3)
Sunday, November 15, 2015
Now Playing - November 2015
Because of the death in the family I haven't played much games recently but I have started playing a bit now that things have settled a bit, mostly old PSX games.
Grudge Warriors (PlayStation)
A tank buggy vehicle combat mission based game not too unlike Red Dog Superior Firepower on Dreamcast. Great fun driving around blasting stuff and has a good multiplayer mode as well, again much like Red Dog. The singleplayer game is hard and unforgiving as you can only refill your armor, not your health, with very limited refill stations scattered around the levels, thankfully you can save between levels but it's still easy to get stuck as the game not only has tough enemies and bosses but also incorporates exploration to find everything, kind of like a Metroid game, many a player have been stuck in their tracks not being able to find their way in this game even if they've been able to take care of the enemy forces.
Grandia (PlayStation)
On the Rule 34 chat we were talking about games and Grandia came up, I felt like replaying it a bit, still a great game, I do wish they would've taken a bit more care of the port from Saturn though as there are manu minor flaws to be found, nothing that braks the game or changes the gameplay but lots of visual stuff, like textures facing in the wrong direction, abcent shadows, abcent sky textures and some abcent 3D geometry here and there, also some other stuff like the water effect the Saturn version had but that's at least understandable seeing as there's a genuine difference in the hardware between the two machines. Thanfully the PSX port did get some enhancements to make up for the shortcomings, like better shadows for the characters, better looking screen effect when going into battles, some more advanced smoke and steam effects and of course being in English and released worldwide unlike the unfortunately Japanese exclusive Saturn version, so I think the PSX version still holds up nicely with those pros over the admittedly minor cons. A great game regardless and every PSX gamer with even the slightest interest in RPGs should give this game a try.
On the Rule 34 chat we were talking about games and Grandia came up, I felt like replaying it a bit, still a great game, I do wish they would've taken a bit more care of the port from Saturn though as there are manu minor flaws to be found, nothing that braks the game or changes the gameplay but lots of visual stuff, like textures facing in the wrong direction, abcent shadows, abcent sky textures and some abcent 3D geometry here and there, also some other stuff like the water effect the Saturn version had but that's at least understandable seeing as there's a genuine difference in the hardware between the two machines. Thanfully the PSX port did get some enhancements to make up for the shortcomings, like better shadows for the characters, better looking screen effect when going into battles, some more advanced smoke and steam effects and of course being in English and released worldwide unlike the unfortunately Japanese exclusive Saturn version, so I think the PSX version still holds up nicely with those pros over the admittedly minor cons. A great game regardless and every PSX gamer with even the slightest interest in RPGs should give this game a try.
Grudge Warriors (PlayStation)
A tank buggy vehicle combat mission based game not too unlike Red Dog Superior Firepower on Dreamcast. Great fun driving around blasting stuff and has a good multiplayer mode as well, again much like Red Dog. The singleplayer game is hard and unforgiving as you can only refill your armor, not your health, with very limited refill stations scattered around the levels, thankfully you can save between levels but it's still easy to get stuck as the game not only has tough enemies and bosses but also incorporates exploration to find everything, kind of like a Metroid game, many a player have been stuck in their tracks not being able to find their way in this game even if they've been able to take care of the enemy forces.
Medal of Honor & Medal of Honor Underground (PlayStation)
They both hold up rather well, they're not perfect games but arguably two of the better FPSs of the 32-bit generation.
The Adventures of Mighty Max (Mega Drive)
A platformer based on the toyline with little playsets in the shape of monsters and stuff, a favorite toyline from my childhood to say the least, sadly I never got to play the game or watch the animated series as a kid but after having spent some time with the game and seen some clips of the show on youtube it appears I didn't miss anything important, the toys were easily the strong part of the franchise as the game is rather mediocre and not particularly well designed with questionable levels and controls and the cartoon looks rather cheap as well. Not an awful game but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone but the most old school fans of the toys like myself, I enjoy it to a bit but it got old really fast with repetitive gameplay and levels with so little variation at first I thought I had done something wrong and started the same level over again, but nope, it's the next level alright, they just didn't change a whole lot is all.
Cat Planet (PC)
A free downloadable 2D platformer type of game where you must manuever a girl with angel wings around a planet called Cat Planet inhabited by little cat planet cats that you need to find, 67 of them in tital. It's kind of a speedrunning game where you replay it often to get a better time with as few deaths as possible, you have unlimited lives. I've been able to average a time of about 5 minutes with 2-3 deaths which is an okay score I think, not world record material but I play it more for fun than serious business and my computer isn't strong so the game has a lot of slowdown despite being a rather simplistic 2D game with very barebone visuals, it's all about the programming I guess.
Cat Poke (PC)
In similar fasion to Cat Planet this is a little free downloadable game where you play as a little girl who can't go out and play because it's raining outside, so she decised to poke all the cats the in the house to pass the time. Poking all the cats requires you to not only find them but also lure them out of their hiding places so it's more of a puzzle game than a platformer. It's also similar to Cat Planet in that it times you to see how fast you can complete it if you're interested in that sort of thing, I just like playing it for fun though so I haven't kept much track of my times, I think it probably averages in around 5 minutes when I play unless I forget some item and need to backtrack and go get it, but a smooth run from start to finish can easily be done in under 5 minutes.
Façade (PC)
More of a social interaction simulator where your goal is to see what can happen than an actual game but a fun time waster nonetheless. It's a free download just like Cat Planet and Cat Poke but it's noticably larger as it's a 3D game with a lot of voice acting. Basically you get invited to visit some old friends and talk to them about their relationship in real time using your keyboard. I find it's hard to type fast enough and a lot of the time I end up missing to respond and the situation changes and moves on in perhaps not the direction I had in mind. I've gotten a few different endings so far but only one was anything interesting, the rest were just abrupt because I apperently said the wrong thing and got kicked out of their apartment.
Starsky & Hutch (Game Boy Advance)
A 3D open world driving game on GBA? Yup, and a damn good one at that! Regardless of what some less serious self-proclaimed game critics would like you to believe it's an excellent little game for the GBA, you have your story mode, free roam and other additional mission modes, lots of cars to drive and a nice big city to drive around in. It's rather slim to begin with but you unlock more as you play through the story. I like the visuals, they remind me a lot of GTA Chinatown Wars on DS. You can also shoot your gun out the window of the car so there's some action in there as well alongside the driving.
V-Rally 3 (Game Boy Advance)
Another 3D driving game on GBA, of the rally racing type this time. I was never a big fan of the V-Rally series back on PSX but this one really steps it up, it's closer to the Colin McRae and WRC games and much better for it. The controls are nice, the visuals go by smoothly and look very nice for GBA, I'd even go as far as to say they rival some PSX games, at least somewhat, the car itself is a 2D sprite with some rotation frames but the rest of the environment is all 3D and very varied and detailed, they did a good job not making the backgrounds repetitive which can often be the case. They have some basic damage info in the main career mode but beside that it's very much an arcade game, somewhat similar to Sega Rally. I find it interesting that they included a driver view from inside the car, it actually looks and handles very well from that angle, better than a lot of other games do.
Tomb Raider Legend (PlayStation Portable)
I'm not a huge fan of the Crystal Dynamics developed Tomb Raider games, I much prefer the Core Design developed games, but every now and then I play some Legend and/or Underworld. This time I felt like picking up where I left off in my current playthrough of the PSP port of Legend. It's not the best version of the game but it is the only portable version and it does offer some unique bonus content, so I still think it's a worthy addition to any PSP collection. It's still fully playable and enjoyable, they managed to fit just about everything in there with only minor visual drawbacks and some tweaked controls, it might take a minute or two to get used to at first but soon enough you'll feel right at home.
ICO & Shadow of the Colossus Classics HD (PlayStation 3)
Not much to say, it's ICO and SotC, what can be said about these games has already been said enough. ICO is virtually the same as it was on PS2 only adapted for HDTVs, SotC on the other hand has gotten a slight upgrade with better framerate overall than it had on PS2.
UPDATE #1:
Tomb Raider - The Prophecy (Game Boy Advance)
An original old school entry in the Tomb Raider series and a good one at that. It's a bit repetitive in the gameplay but at least it's approachable and the 4-letter password system makes it easy to get where you were last without having to worry about managing saved games and losing them due to the internal cartridge battery dying some day in the future.
Star X (Game Boy Advance)
Think Super Nintendo StarWing (StarFox in US) on Game Boy Advance and this is as close as it gets. Nintendo never made a StarWing for GBA so this third party developed game stepped up and filled the void. I have to say they did an excellend job as this game not only lives up to the task but even outperforms the original StarWing on Super Nintendo completely without any additional enhancement chips, it runs on just raw GBA power! It's not a direct copy of StarWing but the gameplay is nearly identical on-rail shooting with a flat shaded polygonal spaceship.
LEGO Drome Racers (Game Boy Advance)
Anyone like me who loves flat shaded polygons and racing games like Virtua Racing owe it to themselves to play this game at least once. It's a flat shaded polygonal 3D racer with offensive/defensive weapon pickups and speed boosts. While the tracks are fully 3D the cars are 2D sprites, but the game runs smoothly and at high speeds with lots of action so it's all good. There's also a version available for PS2, GameCube and Xbox but I sadly haven't gotten hold of it or even played it. Maybe, hopefully, one day I will.
B-Movie (PSX)
A fun little game where you pilot different customizable aircraft and take on an invading alien armada attack Earth while helping your fellow humans survive. It draws clear inspiration from games like Defender and old sci-fi movies.
Star Ixiom (PSX)
Kind of like a space RPG adventure. The main part of the game is similar to games like Colony Wars Red Sun but you also get to dock at space stations and walk around, talk to other characters to advance the story and change or customize your ship.
Sonic Adventure 2 - Battle (GameCube)
It's sadly not as good as the Dreamcast original but it does unlock some multiplayer bonus characters by default. It's visually muddier, both in screen clearness and texture definition, and certain effects such as character shadows have been drastically reworked and simplified. It also doesn't feel as controllable with lots of hit detection problems and different behaviour I'm not used to in the Dreamcast original, and sadly none of this is for the better. Regardless of the shortcomings it's nice to play the Rouge and Knuckles levels again, I love Sonic Adventure 2's huge treasure hunting levels, they were on a level of their own back in the day and even these days only a small handful games have been able to do something similar successfully.
Shadow The Hedgehog (GameCube and Xbox)
A game I've played a lot on PS2 over the years. It's nice to finally get to enjoy the superior versions with better framerates, faster loading times and more colors on screen. Beside those upgrades it's still the same game I know and love, with big multi-choice levels and paths to take throughout the game and good multiplayer options made even better with the addition of native 4-player split screen, not sure if the PS2 version could do that even with a multi-tap, by default it could only do 2-player split-screen. Still, the PS2 version is good enough and being cheaper and easier to find and get hold of in general still makes it a worthy purchase for anyone interested.
They both hold up rather well, they're not perfect games but arguably two of the better FPSs of the 32-bit generation.
The Adventures of Mighty Max (Mega Drive)
A platformer based on the toyline with little playsets in the shape of monsters and stuff, a favorite toyline from my childhood to say the least, sadly I never got to play the game or watch the animated series as a kid but after having spent some time with the game and seen some clips of the show on youtube it appears I didn't miss anything important, the toys were easily the strong part of the franchise as the game is rather mediocre and not particularly well designed with questionable levels and controls and the cartoon looks rather cheap as well. Not an awful game but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone but the most old school fans of the toys like myself, I enjoy it to a bit but it got old really fast with repetitive gameplay and levels with so little variation at first I thought I had done something wrong and started the same level over again, but nope, it's the next level alright, they just didn't change a whole lot is all.
Cat Planet (PC)
A free downloadable 2D platformer type of game where you must manuever a girl with angel wings around a planet called Cat Planet inhabited by little cat planet cats that you need to find, 67 of them in tital. It's kind of a speedrunning game where you replay it often to get a better time with as few deaths as possible, you have unlimited lives. I've been able to average a time of about 5 minutes with 2-3 deaths which is an okay score I think, not world record material but I play it more for fun than serious business and my computer isn't strong so the game has a lot of slowdown despite being a rather simplistic 2D game with very barebone visuals, it's all about the programming I guess.
Cat Poke (PC)
In similar fasion to Cat Planet this is a little free downloadable game where you play as a little girl who can't go out and play because it's raining outside, so she decised to poke all the cats the in the house to pass the time. Poking all the cats requires you to not only find them but also lure them out of their hiding places so it's more of a puzzle game than a platformer. It's also similar to Cat Planet in that it times you to see how fast you can complete it if you're interested in that sort of thing, I just like playing it for fun though so I haven't kept much track of my times, I think it probably averages in around 5 minutes when I play unless I forget some item and need to backtrack and go get it, but a smooth run from start to finish can easily be done in under 5 minutes.
Façade (PC)
More of a social interaction simulator where your goal is to see what can happen than an actual game but a fun time waster nonetheless. It's a free download just like Cat Planet and Cat Poke but it's noticably larger as it's a 3D game with a lot of voice acting. Basically you get invited to visit some old friends and talk to them about their relationship in real time using your keyboard. I find it's hard to type fast enough and a lot of the time I end up missing to respond and the situation changes and moves on in perhaps not the direction I had in mind. I've gotten a few different endings so far but only one was anything interesting, the rest were just abrupt because I apperently said the wrong thing and got kicked out of their apartment.
Starsky & Hutch (Game Boy Advance)
A 3D open world driving game on GBA? Yup, and a damn good one at that! Regardless of what some less serious self-proclaimed game critics would like you to believe it's an excellent little game for the GBA, you have your story mode, free roam and other additional mission modes, lots of cars to drive and a nice big city to drive around in. It's rather slim to begin with but you unlock more as you play through the story. I like the visuals, they remind me a lot of GTA Chinatown Wars on DS. You can also shoot your gun out the window of the car so there's some action in there as well alongside the driving.
V-Rally 3 (Game Boy Advance)
Another 3D driving game on GBA, of the rally racing type this time. I was never a big fan of the V-Rally series back on PSX but this one really steps it up, it's closer to the Colin McRae and WRC games and much better for it. The controls are nice, the visuals go by smoothly and look very nice for GBA, I'd even go as far as to say they rival some PSX games, at least somewhat, the car itself is a 2D sprite with some rotation frames but the rest of the environment is all 3D and very varied and detailed, they did a good job not making the backgrounds repetitive which can often be the case. They have some basic damage info in the main career mode but beside that it's very much an arcade game, somewhat similar to Sega Rally. I find it interesting that they included a driver view from inside the car, it actually looks and handles very well from that angle, better than a lot of other games do.
Tomb Raider Legend (PlayStation Portable)
I'm not a huge fan of the Crystal Dynamics developed Tomb Raider games, I much prefer the Core Design developed games, but every now and then I play some Legend and/or Underworld. This time I felt like picking up where I left off in my current playthrough of the PSP port of Legend. It's not the best version of the game but it is the only portable version and it does offer some unique bonus content, so I still think it's a worthy addition to any PSP collection. It's still fully playable and enjoyable, they managed to fit just about everything in there with only minor visual drawbacks and some tweaked controls, it might take a minute or two to get used to at first but soon enough you'll feel right at home.
ICO & Shadow of the Colossus Classics HD (PlayStation 3)
Not much to say, it's ICO and SotC, what can be said about these games has already been said enough. ICO is virtually the same as it was on PS2 only adapted for HDTVs, SotC on the other hand has gotten a slight upgrade with better framerate overall than it had on PS2.
UPDATE #1:
Tomb Raider - The Prophecy (Game Boy Advance)
An original old school entry in the Tomb Raider series and a good one at that. It's a bit repetitive in the gameplay but at least it's approachable and the 4-letter password system makes it easy to get where you were last without having to worry about managing saved games and losing them due to the internal cartridge battery dying some day in the future.
Star X (Game Boy Advance)
Think Super Nintendo StarWing (StarFox in US) on Game Boy Advance and this is as close as it gets. Nintendo never made a StarWing for GBA so this third party developed game stepped up and filled the void. I have to say they did an excellend job as this game not only lives up to the task but even outperforms the original StarWing on Super Nintendo completely without any additional enhancement chips, it runs on just raw GBA power! It's not a direct copy of StarWing but the gameplay is nearly identical on-rail shooting with a flat shaded polygonal spaceship.
LEGO Drome Racers (Game Boy Advance)
Anyone like me who loves flat shaded polygons and racing games like Virtua Racing owe it to themselves to play this game at least once. It's a flat shaded polygonal 3D racer with offensive/defensive weapon pickups and speed boosts. While the tracks are fully 3D the cars are 2D sprites, but the game runs smoothly and at high speeds with lots of action so it's all good. There's also a version available for PS2, GameCube and Xbox but I sadly haven't gotten hold of it or even played it. Maybe, hopefully, one day I will.
B-Movie (PSX)
A fun little game where you pilot different customizable aircraft and take on an invading alien armada attack Earth while helping your fellow humans survive. It draws clear inspiration from games like Defender and old sci-fi movies.
Star Ixiom (PSX)
Kind of like a space RPG adventure. The main part of the game is similar to games like Colony Wars Red Sun but you also get to dock at space stations and walk around, talk to other characters to advance the story and change or customize your ship.
Sonic Adventure 2 - Battle (GameCube)
It's sadly not as good as the Dreamcast original but it does unlock some multiplayer bonus characters by default. It's visually muddier, both in screen clearness and texture definition, and certain effects such as character shadows have been drastically reworked and simplified. It also doesn't feel as controllable with lots of hit detection problems and different behaviour I'm not used to in the Dreamcast original, and sadly none of this is for the better. Regardless of the shortcomings it's nice to play the Rouge and Knuckles levels again, I love Sonic Adventure 2's huge treasure hunting levels, they were on a level of their own back in the day and even these days only a small handful games have been able to do something similar successfully.
Shadow The Hedgehog (GameCube and Xbox)
A game I've played a lot on PS2 over the years. It's nice to finally get to enjoy the superior versions with better framerates, faster loading times and more colors on screen. Beside those upgrades it's still the same game I know and love, with big multi-choice levels and paths to take throughout the game and good multiplayer options made even better with the addition of native 4-player split screen, not sure if the PS2 version could do that even with a multi-tap, by default it could only do 2-player split-screen. Still, the PS2 version is good enough and being cheaper and easier to find and get hold of in general still makes it a worthy purchase for anyone interested.
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