Weekly Roundup

[@M]

GBA:
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance. Almost done, about 196% map completion. I'm still missing one of Dracula's parts and I refuse to use a FAQ to help me find it.

GB:
Warioland: Super Mario Land 3. Playing WarioWare made me want to revisit Wario's first adventure again. The end of level bonus game where one of two buckets either doubles your money or drops a 10 ton weight on your head is a fun metaphor for life. I love Wario's face as he gazes hopefully at said buckets before you pick one (I cheat and use save states to make sure I really line Wario's pockets after boss battles! )

Mobile:
Scatterslots. Unlocked another new slot and grew my bank to about 73 billion. 260 billion is the most I've ever had, but, there are advanced high roller players with trillions.

 

[Late]

PS4 : Nioh 2 NG+ not really feeling it, the divine weapons that give you around 200k experience when sacrificed make leveling up incredibly easy, also the content is pretty much the same, everything else is in the dlc. I'm not that much into this that I'd purchase it. Also some of the harder training missions are bullshit where you have to do with 3 health potions and a wooden weapon while the sensei has all manner of defense-upping, poison, etc. power ups.

Looking back the plot was a mess, suddenly at the end these western characters appear, also what was with the (dutch?) guy looking exactly like Geralt, talk about uninspired. Also, the fact that your friend was only power hungry, greedy, and evil because he was possessed, and even came back to life in the end was quite lame.

 

[Neo_Mike_81]

OG XBOX
Capcom fighting evolution
Soul Calibur 2
Genma Onimusha

 

[fake]

Smitch
Secret of Mana / Collection of Mana

This is my third and hopefully final attempt at this game. The previous times, I wouldn't use a guide and I got super frustrated. This time, if I'm lost for more than 45 minutes, I just look up what to do. The game really doesn't give you hints in certain parts, and you're left just wandering around hoping to talk to the right person. So far, I'm at the Upperlands / the Sprite's home.

Secret of Mana is such a fantastic game while also being a shit game. The friendly AI is atrocious – to the point where it's easier to just let them die, revive them before a boss fight, and then use their spells. The combat is nearly as clunky because of the knockdown system; you can easily get cornered or just plain trapped in a loop of attacks with no way to fight or flee. Usually this just means you lose a lot of HP but it's not uncommon that it's a KO. I wonder if this game would be so great without the Square polish – great graphics and animation and an incredible OST.

 

[prof]

I've been playing a lot of Duke Nukem on the Gameboy Color this week. It's basically a reworked version of Duke II from the dos days. Really a lot of fun. Many of the enemies are alien scientists who look like the bad guy from Maniac Mansion. The game has a ton of personality.

 

[Lastblade]

Finished Panzer Dragoon Remake (meh) and working on Age of Calamity, both on Switch. I am shocked how much I enjoy AoC since Musou games tend to be very repetitive. It is still repetitive but a Zelda/BotW skin and reworking the shorter/variety of missions make the formula more enjoyable.

 

[Darklighterx]

GBA
The Minish Cap.

 

[@M]

I almost finished Minish Cap many years ago, but, got frustrated on a boss, possibly the last, and lost interest. Great game though! I remember getting addicted to collecting all the gashapon figurines.

 

[prof]

I got Minish Cap when it was new, back in college, and played the crap out of it. At the time, I hadn't played a Zelda since the original on NES, but I read about it in a magazine or something, and got it in my head that I needed to pick it up. I think the fact that Capcom was involved piqued my interest.

I had the original purple wide style GBA back then, so you needed good light to see worth a darn. But I have fond memories of playing it outside around campus for the natural sunlight, in between classes that spring. I beat it, but I'll be danged if I remember a lot of it at this point. I recall when you put on the cap you shrunk into Tiny Link and you could get into different areas that way. It was a really cool game overall, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[ggallegos1]

I got Minish Cap when it was new, back in college, and played the crap out of it. At the time, I hadn't played a Zelda since the original on NES, but I read about it in a magazine or something, and got it in my head that I needed to pick it up. I think the fact that Capcom was involved piqued my interest.

I had the original purple wide style GBA back then, so you needed good light to see worth a darn. But I have fond memories of playing it outside around campus for the natural sunlight, in between classes that spring. I beat it, but I'll be danged if I remember a lot of it at this point. I recall when you put on the cap you shrunk into Tiny Link and you could get into different areas that way. It was a really cool game overall, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

This is mostly how i feel. I remember playing it, beating the game in college and enjoying it but not remembering much of the game itself

 

[HellioN]

Switch/Series X
Pinball fx3

SNES
Sinistar
Robotron 2084

 

[100proof]

Been playing a bunch of Starcraft II lately with friends. I was huge in to the original and played LAN games for years with friends but when SCII first hit, I didn't really have many friends who played PC games much less an RTS so I played through the campaign and largely dropped it. The quality of life stuff over Brood Wars is great but it feels much more constricted compared to BW. Could just be the way I play though.

Beyond that, it's largely the usual suspects:

PC

Killing Floor 2
Rainbow Six Extraction
GTFO
Risk of Rain 2

PS5

Final Fantasy 7 Remake (slowly)

 

[SML]

GBA:
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance. Almost done, about 196% map completion. I'm still missing one of Dracula's parts and I refuse to use a FAQ to help me find it.

I just finished a third play through of this on my RG351p. (First play through was on VisualBoyAdvance, with frame skip, way back when the game first came out, the second play through was with the double pack on my GBA Micro.)

I had to use an FAQ, regardless. The castle(s) are a chore to navigate. The body part you're looking for is probably the one you have to slide through an "invisible" passage to get to.

There are a lot of little parts of the game that are good, and there are really cool effects, etc., but the game as a whole is the worst of the three on the Advance. I remember how hard it was to see Circle of the Moon on the original unlit GBA screen, so I know why Harmony looks the way it does, with bright outlines and tiles that look blown out, but it's still ugly. I remember being excited the first time I found the energy circle for the whip, because I liked the whip spin in Circle of the Moon, but, like most of the features in Harmony, it ended up being a reminder of a different game where the same thing was done better.

 

[@M]

I just finished a third play through of this on my RG351p. (First play through was on VisualBoyAdvance, with frame skip, way back when the game first came out, the second play through was with the double pack on my GBA Micro.)

I had to use an FAQ, regardless. The castle(s) are a chore to navigate. The body part you're looking for is probably the one you have to slide through an "invisible" passage to get to.

There are a lot of little parts of the game that are good, and there are really cool effects, etc., but the game as a whole is the worst of the three on the Advance. I remember how hard it was to see Circle of the Moon on the original unlit GBA screen, so I know why Harmony looks the way it does, with bright outlines and tiles that look blown out, but it's still ugly. I remember being excited the first time I found the energy circle for the whip, because I liked the whip spin in Circle of the Moon, but, like most of the features in Harmony, it ended up being a reminder of a different game where the same thing was done better.

Yeah, Harmony is rough in some respects, and I agree that castle navigation is a chore (they could have fixed that easily by allowing you to choose to teleport between castle transfer points, instead of only going castle A<->B, which doesn't help much late in the game.) On the upside, wandering around does get me more experience levels and rare item drops.

You might be right about the missing Dracula part being a hidden slide point, as I don't recall finding any of the other 4 that way.

 

[ggallegos1]

Yeah, Harmony is rough in some respects, and I agree that castle navigation is a chore (they could have fixed that easily by allowing you to choose to teleport between castle transfer points, instead of only going castle A<->B, which doesn't help much late in the game.) On the upside, wandering around does get me more experience levels and rare item drops.

You might be right about the missing Dracula part being a hidden slide point, as I don't recall finding any of the other 4 that way.

Once you're done check out Aria of Sorrow, such a great game

 

[@M]

Yeah it is, I own it and have beaten it multiple times. Definitely the most polished of the GBA trio.

 

[@M]

You were right, it was the Dracula part you have to slide through the wall to get, thanks! As luck would have it, I was already saved nearby, because I've been trying, in vain, to win that race against that dumb giant marble to get that last spell book and piece of furniture I'm missing... there's probably some trick to it, but, I can't remember what.

 

[SML]

I use a particular spellbook combination to help me with those races.

 

[@M]

I've been using cross+wind, which creates a whirling shield of crucifexes that takes care of the enemies for the most part, but, I just can't beat that ball (I successfully did the easier course in one castle, but, the harder one in the other has me flummoxed.)

 

[prof]

There's a Game Gear game called Vampire: Master of Darkness that is Castlevania-esque, but still has its own personality. It has an old school Universal horror movie atmosphere, but the gameplay itself is very early Castlevania, similar to the NES games. There is a Master System port for it as well, but I've only played the GG game. I had never heard of it before, but came across the cart last year, and I was curious enough to buy it. It's definitely one of the best GG games I've played, and Castlevania fans should love it.

 

[@M]

Yeah, I played that one on an emulator many years ago. It was all right, but, I don't recall if I beat it or not.

 

[Darklighterx]

Switch
Shredder's Revenge.
Cup Head

Arcade
Asura Blade.

 

[ggallegos1]

Switch
Final Fantasy IX - on disc 2 (it never says the disc explicitly) and made it to the Outer Continent. Of note, the physical version is super unstable, I've had to close out of the game at least 3 times within the first disc. Luckily there's a checkpoint saved every time you enter or leave a room, or before big story events so it's not a complete setback but it is irksome.

 

[Tron]

PS4
tmnt shredders revenge:i have a few challenges left but i'm stuck on the ones where you can't get hit
Pinball Arcade:Sure there's pinballfx3 but it's lacking for certain tables.

 

[Late]

PS4: Started the RE 2 remake, this is really well done, and quite difficult on the hardest setting. On the other hand what kind of special needs world we live in nowadays that it's considered "hardcore" to have a limited amount of saves? This also makes the PS4 sound like a hair dryer, I noticed that it becomes totally silent if you take the top off the console.