VideoGame_Discussion

#17 down: Kayak VR: Mirage on PSVR2. I'd like to count this one toward the Race Drivin' badge. I finished all of the races and got at least a bronze medal in every one (and higher in some). The Olympic one only has a gold medal, but I still placed #150 in the world on it, so I'm pretty confident that would have been enough to get at least a bronze if they had one for that course.

3/7 #4 - Pac-Man (Arcade) new high score 102790

I have to count this because I got on a tear the other night and blew away my high score by 40k (previously 62550)! It was hard enough to get back to my old score in the 60k range. I discovered a new opening pattern and it was very effective. I know there are guides for patterns to follow, but I've stayed away from them. This is all self-discovered.

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#18 down: Aerial_Knight's Never Yield on PC. I'd like to count this as the game I need to finish off the Grown-A** Man badge (alongside my previous clear of Inscryption).

The tags on Steam for this game include the tag "difficult," and I died tons of times along the way. The game has the feel of an endless runner. You're constantly moving forward but can speed up (and, in fact, have to speed up at times to outrun enemies or run through glass doors). You can jump over things vertically, do a side spiral jump thing, slide under stuff, or speed up and run through stuff. Sometimes there's a little leeway (insofar as you might be able to clear a side jump with a vertical jump, but other times there is not (if you vertical jump when you need to side jump, then it might make you go too far forward, so there's no time to react before you need to slide or do something else). Most obstacles require you to make the one correct choice, and one hit spells death. The checkpoints start out fairly generous, but, by the end, you're going through tons of obstacles between checkpoints, making it progressively harder to get through each checkpoint. To add to the difficulty, some obstacles are obscured by the scenery (e.g., you have to slide under something, but it's hard to see, because there is a gate in front of it obscuring your vision). Toward the end, there are also parts where you start switching between running in one direction to running in the opposite direction or even sideways up a hill (making it so that you either have to try to navigate the game with everything sideways or turn your head sideways at a weird angle. This was pretty wild. I wouldn't recommend buying it, but it was definitely an unexpected departure from what I usually play and interesting enough for something I got free from Amazon Prime Gaming.

I beat WWE2K16 on the xbox1

I finally beat Final Fantasy VI, so that covers my SNES for the year.
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/lxIPePm_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

I already posted my brief thoughts on Renaissance2K’s Game of the Month thread, so I’ll spare you here. Good game and all, but I raged a lot in the second half, which is rarely something I long to do in an RPG.

Just beat Star fox 64 3d on 3ds. Since the space badge isn't existent anymore does this one count towards the destroy the core badge?

Jumbo Airport Story - Ipad

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2nd of March, 6th , 15 overall
Kentucky Route Zero
Earns me Guybrush I guess, Pupperazzi was first title

I started this largely because I heard good things and only really pushed to beat it b/c it's set to leave GP in a handful of days. Very odd 'game' that's more reading dialog than anything else.

The Virtua Fighter party is over, at least as far as this thread is concerned. I played through the game on the last three platforms that were readily available.

Number: 9
Full Title: Virtua Fighter PC
Platform Played: PC
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: PC
Original Platforms: Arcade
Applicable Badge: Street Fightin' (already earned)

Number: 10
Full Title: Virtua Fighter Remix
Platform Played: Saturn
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Saturn
Original Platforms: Arcade
Applicable Badge: Street Fightin' (already earned), Facelift (1/2)

Virtua Fighter 10th Anniversary attempts to remake the original game's aesthetic and sound design with the Virtua Fighter 4 engine, throwing in the enhanced move set and roster for good measure. It's a pretty dramatic upgrade when you pick it up, despite the surface level similarities, so I'm nominating it for the Facelift badge.

Number: 11
Full Title: Virtua Fighter 10th Anniversary
Platform Played: PlayStation 2
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: PlayStation 2
Original Platforms: PlayStation 2
Applicable Badge: Street Fightin' (already earned), Facelift (2/2)

Finally, a Final Fantasy music junkie like myself had to pick up the latest Theatrhythm game when it came out for the Switch. It doesn't use touch controls like its 3DS predecessors, but it's still a good time.

Number: 12
Full Title: Theatrhythm: Final Bar Line
Platform Played: Switch
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Switch
Original Platforms: Switch, PlayStation 4
Applicable Badge: Rhythmic (1/2)

I'm going to play through Virtua Fighter a few more times with the remaining characters in the roster before putting that one to bed. I'm still probably going to be busy with Final Fantasy VI for the next few weeks or so.

#19 down: Kentucky Route Zero on Xbox Series X. I’d like to count this toward the Guybrush Threepwood badge, as it’s a point and click walking sim.

I played this because it’s leaving Game Pass soon, and I’ve never seen it on sale for less than $15. On its face, this is a story of a man delivering his last package for an antique shop, but it’s ultimately a much bigger story about the impacts of capitalism. At varying points, it made me think, surprised me (with real world interactivity like calling an actual working phone number and having it connect to the game in a neat way), and bored me to tears. At times I couldn’t finish it quickly enough, but then it would do something clever and regain my interest. The ending was satisfying but in a quiet nod of respect way. I’m not sure if I could recommend it, and I could completely understand if somehow played it and didn’t like it, but it was a unique journey unlike anything I’ve experienced before.

OP updated!

#9- The Callisto Protocol 7.5/10
I can kinda see why some people didn’t like this. If you directly compare it to Dead Space, you’re gonna have a bad time. It has Dead Space like elements sure like stomping on enemies and shooting tentacles but in most other regards it’s more of an in your face meaty action horror title with a heavy emphasis on dodging, countering and melee attacks over shooting off limbs. It does rely more on gunplay in the final boss fight though and one other before it. You also get a cool GRP force pull feature that allows you to toss enemies and projectiles around which was fun. I really loved the atmosphere here. It was eerie and the prison was haunting at times. The graphics were pretty gorgeous. Lighting was lush and shadows displayed realistic affects with the voice acting being pretty to notch for the most part. The framerate could have used some work though because at times there were too many stutters even on my VRR OLED display. And the controls felt a bit sluggish when aiming a weapon down the sights even when using auto aiming. Other than that this is a solid action horror title that people of the genre would enjoy albeit it’s a rather short romp. Only about 8-10 hours so I say wait for a price drop or get it on a sale. I’d say it is worth about $35-40. Not the asking $70. And do not play this on last gen consoles. It’s very rough around the edges. I tried the XB1 version and I do not recommend. At. All.

My #15 is Resident Evil 2 Remake

What a great game. They really did a lot to the remake. Graphics are amazing and story makes more sense than the original. Played through as Claire. 9/10

#7 is Final Fantasy VII Remake (PS4)

Never played the original so this was an interesting experience. Seen a lot of complaints about bloat and too many sidequests but it seemed like a typical JRPG in that regard to me.

#20 down: Immortality on Xbox Series X. This (alongside my previous clear of Kentucky Route Zero) gets me the Guybrush Threepwood badge.

I can't say enough good things about this game. It's a FMV point and click mystery game in which you try to find out what happened to an actress who filmed three movies and disappeared. On the face of it, this describes something I would normally have very little interest in, but I tried it because of Game Pass and the game's high review scores, and I'm so glad I did. You start with one clip and then can pause the scene and click on various people and things in the scene to unlock other clips. There are hundreds of clips across the three movies and from rehearsals, interviews, and other scenes. You can also fast forward and rewind scenes (which is crucial to uncovering the real story of what happened and to roll the credits). It was really interesting going through the clips. I'm trying to be deliberately vague, because there are some shocking moments you discover by using the various mechanics, and the ending was really well done. This game is going to stick with me for a long time. Once you figure everything out, you realize how carefully every detail was placed. It's just brilliant.

I beat The Walking Dead: The Final Season on the xbox1

Unpacking -

Finally got around to playing my LRG copy of unpacking. Def a fan. Quick fun romp. Definitely has some addictive qualities as I'm already thinking of playing again at a later date to try to earn more hidden stickers. Solid 8/10.

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3rd of March, 3rd , 16th overall
Quake (remake)
Earns me 2nd Amendment badge with High on Life

After averaging basically a game completed every 3 days in Jan, I've for sure slowed down with this only being my 6th in 42 days since the end of Jan. I've been gaming a little less, but also needed to make more progress on several titles it seems. I never played Quake in my youth, was into Wolfenstein and Doom instead for whatever reason. After finally playing it, I'm glad I went Doom instead. That series, especially 1/2/Final just resonated way more with me, could be the nostalgia glasses but Quake was just okay. I got the credits from beating the 4 acts and the final boss level after, but there are I think 2 sizable DLCs on offer, so I may keep this one going, though with so many other games in the pipeline and waiting in the wings, maybe not, especially since I didn't love it.
I've got a goal to beat a PC game from all 7 of the PC store/platforms - why so many, that I have installed and have at least like 2 dozen games on, this is my 3rd.

#21 down: Killer Instinct: Definitive Edition on Xbox Series X. I'd like to count this toward the Street Fightin' badge. (I beat it with Cinder and Sabrewulf). I've never been a big fan of fighting games like this, but KI:DE was easier to get into than some of the others I've played. I also tried Guilty Gear: Survive (playing as Nagoriyuki), but I couldn't beat the CPU Nagoriyuki (Boss 8). He kept pulling out this move that it didn't seem like I could use where he would warp around and his sword would turn blood red and slash across almost the entire screen, taking off a huge chunk of damage. I could beat him one round but not two. Then, I tried to switch characters, but I didn't realize that would start me back at the beginning of arcade mode. At that point, I gave up. I think I'm going to find another game to finish the Street Fightin' badge instead.

#5 Star Ocean The Last Hope International

I've been buying up each Star Ocean since I became a fan after I purchased Second Story around its initial release. That being said, I haven't played a console one since the PS2, these games have been sitting on my shelf for years! Last Hope I believe is the general consensus of when the series started going down hill...maybe even TtEoT. There were some glaringly obvious issues, like not being able to change your target manually in combat, or the need to infinitely mash the square button to dash in the open world. I didn't find the synthesis nearly as exciting in this iteration as in the past entries. Despite these things, I had a decent time with it. The story is fine, and the combat is still fun. Played for just over 68 hours, and did most of the side quests. I did not play the optional dungeon(s) after story completion and do not plan to. Almost 70 hours is plenty of time to spend with this installment. Time to move on!

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#22 down: Tekken 3 on PlayStation. This gets me the Street Fightin' badge alongside my previous clear of Killer Instinct: Definitive Edition and is my first clear of the year on the PlayStation. Tekken 3 is a classic. It's old, but I still had fun with it.

My #16 is Resident Evil 3 Remake.

Wow this is a great game! I got a new computer and the graphics are amazing at 2560x1440. It's scary being chased by the Nemesis and each of the boss battles was done well. 9/10

OP updated! Keep 'em coming!

You have me down in the top list with 3 badges but gave me 4 in my listing, 4 is accurate.

Slickriven wrote:

Fixed.

Number: 7
Full Title: Castlevania II: Simon's Quest
Platform Played:
Collection: Castlevania Anniversary Collection
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: N/A

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails...

This was one of the first few NES games I got way back in 1988(?), and I still have a soft spot for it. Unfortunately, I was a day too slow for the good ending this time.

My #17 is Resident Evil 4 (2005).

https://imgbox.com/liqIAQqM

Still a great game once you get to terms with the tank controls. Some cheesy one liners that I hope make it to the remake. 8/10

Beat 2 matches in munchkin on android and gets me the first half of the all aces badge

River City: Tokyo Rumble -

I sold both River City 3DS games years ago, I got them back again (with keychains). Good game. Stupid of me to sell it. Was fun, glad to finally beat it. And the 3D quality was good (this isn't universally true)

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Number: 8
Full Title: Life Force
Platform Played:
Collection: Arcade Classics Anniversary Collection
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: N/A

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails...

Comparing the US and Japanese (Salamander) versions is interesting. The Japanese has different speech and a theme much closer to Gradius without the organic spin.

I beat these since my last post:

Signalis
Metroid Prime Remastered
Metroid Fusion
Paranormasight

All on Switch.

I beat Picross e .
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/ADkHt6z_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

But more importantly, I beat Kirby’s Return to Dream Land and its new remake, Return to Dream Land Deluxe .
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/iICfqbs_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

This game is a certified classic. It changed what we expect from Kirby in the modern age and created countless treasured memories for those who played it. With a new physics engine, a story with gradually unfolding intrigue, the addition of attack items to break up the gameplay, Challenge stages to test the player’s skills, and ultra-destructive Super Abilities, this game revolutionized the series in 2011. I loved this game to death during my adolescence and still love it now. So what about the remake? Is it a better experience or a step back?

I’d say yes and no. For starters, it has HD visuals and two brand new modes, one full of past subgames to play with friends, and the other a short score attack mode starring the lovable marauder Magolor. These modes are a lot of fun and don’t overstay their welcome IMO (though the subgames can be a mixed bag, depending if you liked certain ones in the past). Some nice additions were made to the main adventure too, like new Copy Abilities and Challenge stages to go with them. Quality of life changes were also made: Midbosses will drop an ability star when defeated, so you can inhale that if you accidentally destroyed the midboss too quickly to inhale him. Flavor text was added to all bosses, and past texts were changed to add more context to the story. Extra Mode is also a bit harder now, as it doesn’t give out healing items very often, and the ones it does give are less potent than in Main Mode. The True Arena has more bosses, too, though it’s debatable if that added difficulty is an improvement over the previous version. (It caught me off guard the first time, but you still get sufficient healing items, so it’s fine.)

Now for the stuff I don’t like. The improved graphics honestly make the game look worse in some places. The HD coat of paint makes everything much brighter, so some areas like the first world end up looking washed out compared to the vibrant saturation of the original. King Dedede was controversially changed to drop his original design in favor of his Forgotten Land appearance, which looks too goofy for the more neutral tone Return is supposed have, and Forgotten Land fans will notice how shrunken he looks. The awesome Scope Shot subgame from Return was omitted because it required motion controls, and that’s a real shame since the new Merry Magoland subgames aren’t as good (Checkerboard Chase comes close). One line of dialogue was changed that makes a later plot point was more obvious, which robs it of its intended effect. Characters aren’t as expressive now.

Also, it doesn’t feel like the game was redesigned with the same intentionality as the original. The original game unlocked Challenges, subgames, and ability rooms based on how many Energy Spheres you collected, and they were methodically chosen to coincide with how many Spheres you could realistically obtain at certain times. If you nabbed all them in World 2 and returned to Magolor’s ship, you’d find you’ve unlocked the first ability room (containing the first few abilities from the adventure), the kinda lame Ninja Dojo subgame, and the Whip Challenge (since you just discovered the Whip ability in World 2). Now that there’s more to unlock, the Whip Challenge is unlocked partway through World 3, and kinda-lame Ninja Dojo is one of the last unlockables period. The new Sand and Mecha abilities are cool, but it’s quite obvious the original game didn’t have them—they’re thrown at you so frequently to hide the fact that they were tacked on.

Altogether, both games are great! Highly recommend! But I still prefer the original.

#23 down: The Light Brigade on PSVR2. This (alongside my previous clear of The Last Kids on Earth and the Staff of Doom) gets me the Heavy Machine Gun badge.

Such a great game. It’s mostly a VR roguelite run n’ gun, but you can also teleport and use a wand (though I only used the wands occasionally). The art style is simple but neat, and the sense of scale is really cool in the last couple of levels.

I beat Road 96 on the xbox1 (beating this and unpacking gets me the guybrush threepwood badge)

#24 down: A Memoir Blue on Xbox Series X. This (alongside my previous clear of Samorost 1) gets me the Brain Teaser badge.

This is a point and click game in which you basically just solve a series of not very complicated puzzles to reveal a story about an accomplished athlete and the price of her accomplishments. It is simple but a bit touching/thought-provoking. I only played it because it’s leaving Game Pass soon, but I don’t regret it.

I beat Puzzlebox Setup .
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/6f3ALjL_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

Bought this for the novelty of playing a 3DS game upside-down. Was decent, but not a major recommendation.

4th of March, 17th overall, 7th
Recore
Want to count this towards Bear & Bird as while you could count it as a 3rd person shooter, there is a TON of collecting of resources and yanking cores out of foes instead of killing them. I earn that badge along with Bugsnax - wow did I pick two totally rubbish games for this badge.

Recore had a lot of potential, it could've been pretty decent, but ultimately the camera and lock-on were really bad, especially when it's asking you to do 3D platforming - that camera needs to show you where you are in 3D space and it failed a bunch. I started this up b/c Xbox had a task to earn an achievement in a woman led title for Women's History Month, but I also had an interest in it for a good while as it was an Xbox exclusive. It's inclusion in GP at least means I didn't pay anything for it, thankfully.
The version I played was the Definitive release that includes the DLC, that DLC gave me access to another companion frame the T8-NK that you could ride around like a tank-treaded ATV, only it didn't control all that well. It also included another area of the map to explore and the new frame was basically required for this area with quicksand that it could ride on, plus 3 areas setup almost like motocross circuits and you had to chase down a security bot on them to unlock the 3 dungeons in which you earned a new form of your main weapon's alt-fire mode. I'm glad I had that DLC as the 1 mode was pretty useful as it did up to 6 locked-on shots simultaneously.
I apparently didn't explore too much as I only hit level 29 in the final run-up to triggering the credits and level 30 was an achievement, before the DLC (I think), so who knows. There are a number of Achievements that I'm reasonably close to earning, so I just might play this a little more, but I do not expect to play enough to get to level 36 which is the requirement for the next (likely final) dungeon in the DLC. This game frustrated me too much to really want to play for several more hours to get there, but a single session for ~1 hr to earn a few Achievements could be okay. It's a shame really b/c I normally like to explore and I liked the color switching in combat (though it mapped to the d-pad left me doing finger gymnastics), I also like the lore/story some but the camera and bad HDR (too bright/blown out most times) dropped this from really a possible solid 8+ to like a 5.

Yikes. I had considered playing this eventually, since it’s an Xbox exclusive, and I have a bunch of those left to play, but now I think I’ll pass. Thanks for the heads up.

Slickriven wrote:

@Bleed_DukeBlue I think @TalonJedi87 liked it and I can see why. I put over 14hrs into it and went back a few times after getting frustrated. My final session wasn't all that bad, it was better than the prior session and thus section of the game.
If you're better at giving up on games that annoy you then it could be worth a shot. I sort of wished that I wouldn't have started it because it has plenty of issues for a bit, but now that I've beat it I am glad I finished it and I've played worse games.
Basically I don't think it's so terrible that nobody should even try it, but I wanted to caution folks that its 60% score on metacritic is deserved IMO.

Recore? It was a solid game pass game, I'll say that much. Plus it came out during a time where Mega Man was enjoying a small resurgeance with it's Legacy collections and it reminded me of the Mega Man games with using certain weapons for enemy weaknesses and such which is why I have a soft spot for it since I love the MM games. Other than that though, it was kinda forgettable and redundant.

OP updated! We got a lotta badges this time!

I beat Feeding Frenzy 2 on the xbox360

Number: 9
Full Title: Mega Man
Platform Played:
Collection: Mega Man Legacy Collection
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: Heavy Machine Gun (2/2)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails...

This has never been my favorite series, but I am revisiting it after lots of years. I wish Contra got 37 same-ish sequels instead of Mega Man.

#10- A Plague Tale: Requiem
It was great returning to this series again after a few years. I didn’t think it would net a sequel even though it was a great stand alone game but am glad to have experienced it until its bitter end. The sequel is just more of the same with more rat hordes and enemies to either stealthily sneak past or strategize how to take out with your limited arsenal of alchemist concoctions. You get a crossbow too for when things get really hairy and can upgrade your tool belt to expand on your gear making surviving and dealing with enemy encounters more manageable. The sequel felt a bit longer than the first game too. I think it took me almost 20ish hours to finish it. Overall if you’re looking for a good stealth game with action elements set during the dark ages with an emotionally driven narrative this will satiate your plague infested appetites.

5th of March, 18 overall, 1st OR MAME since it technically wasn't on the Genesis
Virtua Fighter
Badge Street Fight'n (still need a 2nd)

I beat this for Ren2k's RTT GotM and man was the 2nd title a TON better. When I got my Sega Saturn for Christmas '95 my parents were able to get me the MTV promotion deal with Daytona USA, Virtua Fighter 2 and Virtua Cop, plus the console my dad got also had the first Virtua Fighter inside. I recall playing the first game and finding it okay, but once I tried the 2nd I'm not sure I ever went back. The 2nd played and looked SO much better, plus I really like both new characters - Lion was my go to. So when VF was selected for RTT I sort of hoped that VF2 would count but alas Ren2k said no. I didn't want to dig out my Saturn so I was looking for emulation options and my old PC just doesn't do most Saturn games very well and I haven't got RetroArch setup on my newer gaming focused PC yet. Then I recalled I have a RaspPi4 setup and dug that out and thankfully the 32X version of the game was on there.

So after taking a little while to get my sea legs under me with such a simplistic but still quite challenging title I beat it with Jacky pretty easily shockingly and even beat Dural. Then for this thread I tried with Sarah and she was a lot harder for me. Pai kicked my butt as her and I actually ended up switching to Pai to beat herself. Then Wolf did me in as Pai so back to Sarah, whom I used to reach Akira. Akira then kicked my butt a bunch of times as both Sarah and Pai as I tried to get a better outcome. I was finally able to get him with Sarah and took on Dural, whom I actually did better against but ultimately lost to.

Since I have a MAME icon and this came to arcades and I beat it on the system that I essentially play Arcade games on and I never owned a 32X, let's just list it for MAME.

Number: 10
Full Title: Maniac Mansion
Platform Played:
Collection: N/A
Native Platform:
Original Platform: II /
Applicable Badge: Guybrush Threepwood (1/2)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails...

I have a serious pet peeve with games that won't let you see everything in one playthrough. I didn't want to spoil everything, so I wound up not picking one of the "best" characters in terms of endings.

I beat Power Rangers:Battle for the Grid on the xbox1 (beating this with soulcalibur gets me the street fightn badge)

#1 Toree 3D

Cevil wrote:

Welcome! Been a bit since you submitted your list. Hope to see your beat list grow.

After about a month of play, I finally beat Freakyforms Deluxre: Your Creations, Alive! .
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/UM4rTY9.jpg[/imgt]

It was a weird game for the early 3DS eShop, now given a physical release (which is good, since all versions of Freakyforms were delisted from the eShop way back in 2018). You make weird creatures called Formees using a giant collection of pieces and then make them explore an ever-growing world. I had a good bit of fun creating the Formees on workbreaks. But the gameplay itself leaves something to be desired--you just roam around doing basic sidequests for NPCs and unlocking treasure chests with keys find lying around. It's pretty apparent the game was made for the younger crowd, as it gets repetitive quickly and expects you to make a whopping 50 Formees just to reach the credits. I was ready to be done a while ago, TBH.

Deluxe adds dungeons with auto-controlled RPG battles, but these are just an addition to the main gameplay rather than a new focus. They can get unfairly difficult if you get unlucky with the stats your Formee is randomly given. But I saved King Roy and can call this game soundly done.

Here are my personal favorite Formees, if anyone wants to see/download them.
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/KNxGY1K.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/wXHne3L.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/GMlj76u.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/Y6jnckz.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/iVuH07f.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/qWjSk0k.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/89LYNyy.jpg[/imgt]
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/hNV3N0z.jpg[/imgt]

Just finished Metroid Prime Remastered. I'm going to use that as my GameCube entry though, since that's the console it originated on.

I really enjoyed it, but man was it more difficult than I anticipated. I kept getting very lost. Thankfully I managed to defeat the final boss without having fully upgraded missiles.

#2 Macbat 64

#25 down: Hogwarts Legacy on PS5. This (alongside my previous 100+ hour clear of Marvel's Midnight Suns) gives me the Days Gone By badge. Here's my proof of going over 100 hours: https://imgur.com/a/YsclOjR. Even having put so many hours in, I'm still not finished with the platinum. There is so much to do in this game.

I was never a huge Harry Potter fan, but I like games based around magic, and I did read the first few books and watch a couple of the movies. This game nails the atmosphere and the aesthetics. It also has so many details to appreciate from the Slytherin common room door that appears in the form of a snake slithering into the outline of a door to the paintings that move and talk to the ghosts randomly going around. There's something to look at everywhere you go. At one point, I found a secret kitchen, and there were a bunch of house elves working. When I passed one particular house elf, he was tenderizing some meat with his feet. When I headed back toward the door, he had rolled up the meat and started slicing it into spirals and then was stacking it. You get a strong sense that people in the world are actively living their own lives around you. The combat is solid with lots of interesting ways to chain spells together. The story held my attention, and even the side stories were interesting with characters who seemed multidimensional. The only real downsides are the overwhelming amount of collectibles (which is avoidable if you aren't going for the platinum) and the tedium of a few of the puzzles (but I've never really been a fan of puzzles in general, so take this with a grain of salt). Overall, this is a great game. It feels like Avalanche Software's breaking out moment like Horizon: Zero Dawn was for Guerrilla or Ghost of Tsushima was for Sucker Punch.

Finally beat Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana -

Not that I didn't enjoy it. But I beat it on back in the day. And it's pretty long. I have a backlog and was ready to move on to the next game in my switch collection.

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I actually beat a game, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity
I really like this game, it had na interesting story, but the time travel thing really threw me off. The old characters were kinda like "yeah so that just happened... oh well" and it's never explained how the new champions go back in time to the old champions.

If you've played any Warriors style game before, you know what this is all about. It's just a good ol hack n slash button masher. I never got into the original Hyrule Warriors, but that might have to by my game to beat this year! I don't like fighting games too much because I can never remember the combos but in HW it's all just Y then X and you get to kill a whole slew of enemies.

I played through this game to get hyped for TOTK, and I am so ready for it to come out in a month and a half!

great game @ErickRPG

ErickRPG wrote:

Nice! I played that over the span of a year in 2020. Right when I was ready to pick it up again, my cat died, and I set it down for months again. But I got there eventually.

My #18 is Resident Evil 4 Remake

https://imgbox.com/liu0lQ08

What a game! Stays true to the original while updating things and adding some new content. I spent the most time not with a boss but with the defending the house early in the game. I think it took me 3 hours to finally beat it. 9.5/10

DemonAlcohol wrote:

Is it still corny? I won’t play it if it’s not.

I beat Detana Twinbee (originally ).
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/xwEzsiR_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
I like it. It’s challenging and a little short, but it’s a nice little shmup. I’m still working on the Hard mode, but I cleared Easy and Normal. This counts as the first half of Localize Mother 3, since this version of the game was never localized outside of Japan. (The arcade version was, but not the TG16 version.)

SupremeSarna wrote:

Yes I think you mentioned it. You offered condolences for my Oliver who died around that time I think. Sorry bout your cat. I've got two 1 year old cats now. It took me a year and a half b4 I was ready to get another cat. But I've never had a bonded pair, and they are super close, it's wonderful to see.

ErickRPG wrote:

That’s wonderful! My last childhood kitty is in her final days, which is sad to see—it’s one per per year these days, sadly. But we have adopted a pair of happy cats (bro and sis—they love each other) amid the deaths, so maybe we can get some peace for a while.

SupremeSarna wrote:

Ya, still has some of the same lines from the original and a few new ones.

I've had a really hard time sitting down and finding the time to spit out a write-up, but with April fast approaching, I think it's time to call out that I finished another game and another platform, in the name of the Retro Talkshop Thread. And it's a big one.

Number: 13
Full Title: Final Fantasy VI
Platform Played: MiSTer
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Super Famicom
Original Platforms: Super Famicom
Applicable Badge: Level Up! (1/2)

I've been jumping around between Crisis Core Reunion, Doom 64, and Circle of the Moon, but once the Retro Talkshop Thread vote is over, things will likely settle on another longer title, based on how things are going.

SupremeSarna wrote:

It's incredibly hard to lose a cat. But we'd never get to enjoy all the happy times if we didn't do it again. My 2 babies are both almost 1 year old. I'm already so much happier with them around, they are a joy to watch and play with. And it's the first time I've personally had a bonded pair, I never would get to see that if I just made Oliver the last cat I'd ever own.

Number: 11
Full Title: Contra
Platform Played:
Collection: Contra Anniversary Collection
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: Facelift (1/2)

https://steamcommunity.com/id/yossydesune/screensh...

I'm not as fond of this one as I am of the NES version, but it's still enjoyable.

#11 Stray
I thought this was a solid 5ish hour game and felt that even though it mostly encompasses what it feels like to be a feline some things felt more so constructed solely for progressing in the story like there’s one part which pretty much turn the cat into a dog by having them fetch and retrieve something but anyone who owns a kitty knows the majority of the time while they will run after toys and play with them they’ll as soon as swipe the object down a drain or off a cliff before returning it to you. Other than that I felt while the focus on a dystopian future was appreciated it was mostly forgettable in the end and was solely there to drive the game forward but on the other hand I would rather a story based game about being a cat vs a goat sim like game where there’s no direction other than to do anything you want. But perhaps if it was structured more like that untitled goose game with a clearer focus on small objectives of mischievous deeds it might have fared better.

Oh and @SupremeSarna I’m not sure if you saw yet but my #10 was A Plague Tale Requiem on I noticed my list still says 9 games beaten and that’s the missing link. Thanks!

My 1st of April, 19th overall, 6th
My Friend Pedro
Badge: Counting towards Heavy Machine Gunner as it's somewhat similar to Metal Slug, only with platforming

This was another GP title that's been installed on my system for a good while b/c I was curious about it and I finally pulled the trigger (literally) and started it up a few days ago. It's was pretty enjoyable, though the talking banana's voice was just noise and that was actually rather grating, but since you can't understand it, you have to read the dialog bubble and can hit B to skip forward faster. Otherwise it was your somewhat standard fare of head generally right and shoot the dudes and other things that get in your way. There's also a decent bit of platforming and obstacles to maneuver around. I did generally alright with the shooting, but didn't dodge or take advantage of the bullet-time like feature a ton. You get ranked on your performance each level with C-B-A ranks generally. I mostly got C's. Got a handful+ of B's and only a few A's and I think maybe 2x S's.
Game was decent, short but I have about zero interest in replaying any levels to rank-up or whatever. Moving on to the next one. I would generally recommend this as it was surely enjoyable and easy to jump in/out of and overall only like 2-3 hours I think. Plus if you were into chasing leaderboards I could see that appeal - most levels were pretty quick.

I beat who wants to be a millionaire on the ps1 beat on ps2

Got my 2nd of April, 20th overall, 1st
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Don't think there's a badge I could apply it to

Was just clicking through some older, longer owned, untouched games and decided to give this one a try. It wasn't bad, didn't overstay its welcome and was worth the couple of hours I put into it. I did collect every power-up but missed 4 of 2 different categories of collectables while exposing 99% of the map. Without fast travel points I was ready to move on and didn't care about those last few missed things.
I suppose the game could *almost be called a metroidvania, as areas of the map do require upgrades, but it was pretty short and didn't have much else in common so eh.

#26 down: Gotham Knights on Steam Deck. With my previous clear of the Deadpool DLC for Marvel’s Midnight Suns, this gives me the Quest for Peace badge.

I was on the fence about this game given the negative reviews, but it was part of a bundle for Ukraine, so I went for it. The story’s not bad, the combat is reasonably fun, and the traversal is pretty solid as well (you zip across on hookshot type lines you shoot out or ride a motorcycle). I appreciate that the movement doesn’t feel boxy or weighed down, and you can actually run at a reasonable speed. There are some annoying parts (like fighting talons, which dodge almost everything, and the process required to find and interrogate people). The graphics are pretty disappointing. It basically looks like a PS3 game. However, I had some fun with it.

I'll update this today after Splatfest ends.

Number: 12
Full Title: 1943
Platform Played:
Collection: Capcom Arcade Stadium
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: N/A

image

This is a noticeable improvement over 1942, but it is still too long. Surprisingly, I liked the fuel bar mechanic, despite my general despise for Euro shooter that employ it. It made for some interesting choices about when to take a new weapon and when to restore fuel.

#12 Little Hope
I got this with my PS Extra upgrade and decided to give it a whirl since I enjoyed Man of Medan. I thought this was better than Man of Medan in the biggest way which was that Silent Hill 2 like feel with walking on fog dense filled streets. I also enjoyed the Salem witch trial esque plot going on here but did think the ending I got with that one big twist was kinda silly to an extent and the voice acting felt really stiff at times minus Will Poelter that is. And whenever you actually had to control and move players that too felt rigid as it did in Man of Medan. And that was fast button still feels just as useless as it did in Man of Medan as well.

Got my 3rd of April, 21st overall, 7th
Forza Horizon 5: Rally Adventure DLC
Not counting towards any badges since DLC doesn't count IMO at least

FH5 is a game that I've continually gone back to weekly since it came out and according to Xbox info I've got over 11 days worth of time spent playing it, I really enjoy it. When the Hot Wheels DLC dropped last year I bought the offered DLC pack for both, so I had paid for and was waiting for this to come out. Overall it's pretty good. It's nowhere near as impressive as the HW one b/c it's not a toy-like floating island in the sky - but the roads, courses and overall feel is good and I enjoy most rally titles and team Horizon did a pretty good job.

I beat the 'story' aspect here, which consisted of

I will have some things remaining as I didn't do every single thing, but I did a very large chunk and what is considered the core of the DLC. I will for sure keep playing this, just like I have been over the past many weeks and months. But it's certainly completed now.

OP updated for March! With that month done and dusted, here are some stats:
-We collectively beat 71 games this month, trouncing February's 59 but falling short of January's 97. I can't decide if St. Patrick's Day drunkenness helped or hindered that total.
-We earned 16 badges this month. That's a lot! That tops January's 11 and February's 9. I noticed Guybush Threepwood and Street Fightin' were the popular ones, the latter inspired by Virtua Fighter becoming the Game of the Month in a different board.
-Cevil beat a few games. Welcome in, dude! RVM, nonamesleft, and Scott haven't beaten anything yet, but I hope you'll update whenever you can.
-I spent way too long beating Freakyforms Deluxe, but enjoyed making weird creatures. Kirby's Return to Dream Land and its new Deluxe remake were a lot of fun, too!

Let's keep the momentum up in April! And don't forget to investigate any strange icons you might see around GameTZ; you won't regret it!

As always, late to the stats post. For March:

Bayonetta 2 (Switch) Took me multiple months to finally beat this. The experience gets better and faster once you stop trying to make any sense of the story and just treat it like a score attack thing. Now that I know that, I might play the first one at some point, as it didn't make any sense for me either some years ago. The over-the-topness is on another level, lol.

Red Death (PS4)
Project Starship (PS4) A couple of fast shmups. Red Death is better IMO, although nothing too memorable. What's the deal with the obsession with Cthulhu?

Sine Mora EX (PS4) You start playing this and you don't know wth is going on. You finish this and you might have an idea of what's going on. Cool effects and enemies.

Tembo the Badass Elephant (PS4) Some nice references to Rambo, and a couple of challenging levels.

#'s 8, 9 and 10 of the year for all three games in the Mass Effect - Legendary Edition (PS4). I think this is my 5th time through the trilogy, first time on PS4. Still as epic as ever :)

Number: 13
Full Title: Metal Gear
Platform Played: (GOG)
Collection: N/A
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: Grown-Ass Man (1/2)

I could not remember how to take screenshots through GOG, so I hosed this up.

It's pretty amazing how well this one has held up over more than a quarter century. This was one of the few Konami games I didn't play on NES, and it makes me regret it. The free time and patience of youth would have benefitted me greatly.

@SupremeSarna hey I just noticed my list isn’t updated still. Missing #11 Stray , #12 is Little Hope and my #13 is below, Mario+Rabbids Sparks of Hope Thanks!

#13- Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope
A bit on the longer side than the original for my tastes between 30-40ish hours and yea those constant enemy respawns within almost every battle get quite tedious and frustrating. But overall it was still a solid sequel I thought adding onto what made the original game such fun and simple strategy turn based combat. The story was cookie cutter defeat the dark energy yadda yadda to save the Star bits blah blah but we all know what we came here for. That sweet turn based combat with elemental twists. And there’s just something that satisfies a primal need watching you dash into enemies and making them go flying into a combo maneuver passive counter attack. 👌🏻 But alas I did enjoy this one as a whole. Not sure if I’d play a 3rd installment or not, especially if it’s as long as this entry and has those damn enemy respawns. I got my fill for a while.

Happy Birthday @SupremeSarna

@Slickriven Thanks! I’ve got a heck of a day lined up for me tomorrow, so I hope to wring every drop of birthday fun from it! I’ll be adding a special game then, too.

@TalonJedi87 All this week’s April clears will be posted on Friday/Saturday. Hope you understand. I’m trying to keep things organized for ease of use.

Ah okay. I understand. Thanks again!

Happy Birthday @SupremeSarna!

Happy Birthday @SupremeSarna

Happy Birthday dude! @SupremeSarna

Number: 14
Full Title: Darius
Platform Played:
Collection: Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: N/A

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails...

This is one of my favorite series, and it really shines in ultrawide, making it so unique among classic and definitely not "retro" games. I will cop to taking the "easy" path, though I think R may be easier than S.

Thanks for the birthday wishes, everyone! I’m having a great day-off so far! For one thing…
I beat one of my all-time favorite games, Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon .
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/HpULvFx_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

What a game! It changed the direction of the series into more of a (button-controlled) point-and-click action-adventure game, and given how great LM3 turned out, I think that’s for the better. Prof. E. Gadd has more character than ever, the combat has a layer of nuance that no other has matched, there are five whole mansions to explore, and it stays creative the whole way through. Next Level Games pumped a ton of charm into it, too. My favorite part will always be the ScareScraper, which pits you and up to three friends against a gauntlet of ghost-filled floors, constantly searching for a way to the roof. It even has a slew of unique boss ghosts to catch and keep!

I wanted to celebrate this game’s tenth anniversary, and now I can celebrate my birthday at the same time. Genius!

Best1989 wrote:

If you don't mind, I'd rather count these toward April, since the March sheet is already squared away. It makes it easier to update the thread when I'm working off a single sheet.

#27 down: A Robot Named Fight on Steam Deck. This is my first clear toward the Metroidvania badge. It was also my first Metroidvania roguelike, and it was rough. It's fun to play (addicting even), but it's also frustrating, because nothing carries over from playthrough to playthrough except for more items being unlocked as possible pickups in subsequent playthroughs. To make things even worse, you unlock new biomes the more you complete that can be randomly included in your future runs, and the new biomes are even harder than the previous ones. I mostly was able to stick with this thanks to being able to play it portably and having a lot of time at the airport.

#14 for me is Kirby’s Dream Land on via the Game Boy emulators

It is nice to be able to finish a game in under 90 minutes at times. Sometimes the simple things in life are the best.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Bet you can't beat it four more times to earn the Gamer's Day badge!

Ooooooo. Challenge accepted!

I didn't even know that badge existed.

So multiple clears of the same game in the same year count? Didn't know that.

I've already started, I'm making a kairosoft ipad game mine. And don't say I'm cheating because those games take at least a good 10 hours to beat each time!

Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:
I was watching some gameplay of this. It makes me think of Metroid.

A Metroid like rogue? Interesting.

It's really fun when you get the right combination of power-ups. It's just rough starting a Metroidvania game over with a new procedurally-generated map each time you die. However, it does give you a code when you die for the specific seed you're playing, so you can do a seeded run on the same map. You still have to start over, but it gives you an opportunity to learn the map as you try again. It just locks you out of achievements if you play a seeded run.

nonamesleft wrote:

Best1989 wrote:

Only for the Gamer's Day badge specifically. It will still count as beating one game, but you get a badge for beating it five times, since it shows dedication to that game. It's best applied to speedrunners or people trying to get a high score. Beating the same game across multiple systems counts for the badge and multiple clears, though. But it has to be the exact same game, not a modified port or remaster, since those change the experience.

So if you beat Super Mario Bros. five times on NES, you get one clear and the badge. If you beat it once on the NES, Wii, and Wii U, you get three clears but no badge. Beat it once on NES, Wii, Wii U, 3DS, and Switch, and you get five clears and the badge. Makes sense?

Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:
Very cool that you can use the seed code. I've done that before. But in order to imitate previous results wouldn't you have to precisely mimic every action you did on the previous run? (This is what my limited knowledge of rng is making me think)

Probably. I never had exactly the same run twice. Even knowing the seed, it’s easy to get lost or forget what you need to unlock a particular part.

nonamesleft wrote:

#15 The Quarry
I heard this one was kinda dull in comparison to the Dark Pictures series but while it was indeed a slow burn for the first several chapters I thought the pace picked up nice in the second and third acts. Also the graphics were incredible. I now know where all the budget for this game came from to make those slime balls at 2K have the balls to charge $70 at launch for this 8 hour movie for the most part. But alas I did rather enjoy it in the end. I’m a sucker for the mythos creature portrayed here and thought the acting was much better than the stiffness in the last Dark Pictures game I played Little Hope. I got the ending where all the counselors survived too. Complaints of course come in the form of all these Supermassive games in where you controlling anyone feels janky and awkward and the damn walk fast button is as useless as a screen door on a submarine. Overall if you liked Until Dawn you’ll enjoy this one from the same devs.

#16- Kirby’s Dream Land 2 Online

Man this was way more fun than the first game. More power ups from enemy assimilations and you get your pet pals to ride throughout most of the levels. They really encompassed the best parts of the SNES Kirby games into a neat little Game Boy package. The first Dream Land felt like a demo only having about 4 levels but the sequel here had 7 levels and about 25-30 stages in total. Not too shabby for a GB game.

@TalonJedi87 KDL2 has my respect for being the most deviously designed Kirby game. As it goes on, the stages start to reveal more and more insidious design choices and enemy behaviors to challenge the player. The stage that really gets me is in Cloudy Park—there’s a draft that pushes you upward through a tall room. Flying enemies appear all over the left and right sides of the screen out of harm’s way; if you simply remains still, the enemies won’t actually hit you. But because you see all the enemies flying around so suddenly, your instinct is to move to potentially avoid them, likely causing you to crash into at least one foe. It’s such a clever bit of design that speaks to Shinichi Shimomura’s talent.

Oh yeah absolutely. That entire cloud level made you use the force and channel your inner Kirby Jedi to try and anticipate where and when they would spawn while having limited control as the wind pushed you around. It was def the most challenging level for me and well crafted.

SupremeSarna wrote:

I occasionally think about trying to speedrun SMB1 since it's a game I love and it's so short. Maybe this is a good excuse to give it a shot.

I started this game back in October as part of the Retro Talkshop Thread's Castlevania month, but I didn't finish it until late last night. Despite long stretches of item farming and lots of juggling special abilities, I had an absolute blast with this game and can see why it was heralded as one of the best Game Boy Advance launch titles.

Number: 14
Full Title: Castlevania: Circle of the Moon
Platform Played: Analogue Pocket, GBA Consolizer
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Game Boy Advance
Original Platforms: Game Boy Advance
Applicable Badge: Metroidvania (1/2)

I've started Golden Sun for April's Retro Game of the Month, and with only a few levels remaining in Doom 64 (finally), I'll be able to put the time into Crisis Core that I've been trying to find since last December. It's not a very long game, so there's a chance I may pick something else up before April is out, but I doubt it.

My #19 is Resident Evil 5.

https://imgbox.com/UnCQLcXq

They took out all of the survival horror in favor for a straight up action game. You have a partner that shoots, has her own inventory, and is required to open the many doors with two buttons. That by itself takes much of the tension out of the game. Inventory system is much weaker than RE4. Boss battles are dull and uninteresting. Overall a mediocre game. 7/10

River City Ransom - Retroid Pocket
image

This was the last on my playlist from last year. Not saying I'll never play another NES game. But I played a ton of them last year and this was the last of the long list of personal "essentials" so I can knock NES off my short list for a while.

#15 Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins via

This took me right back to when I was in elementary school. I remember the idea of having a Mario game on the go was amazing to me and this game didn’t disappoint and still holds up pretty well via emulation minus some random pockets of framerate stutter here and there whenever there’s a lot going on screen at once.

Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins via

8.5/10

This took me right back to when I was in elementary school. I remember the idea of having a Mario game on the go was amazing to me and this game didn’t disappoint and still holds up pretty well via emulation minus some random pockets of framerate stutter here and there whenever there’s a lot going on screen at once.

I’ll update the OP tomorrow.

I beat Picross e2 .
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/dvY2Noc_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
Picross is always good, and this sequel adds a Micross mode, where you solve one puzzle and then each of the filled boxes becomes a puzzle in itself. As a result, e2 is superior to its predecessor.

#28 down: The Caligula Effect: Overdose on PS4. This gives me my first clear toward the Level Up badge.

This was leaving PS+ Premium, so I thought I should play it (especially since I actually own the sequel (which is still sitting sealed on my shelf)). This got pretty bad reviews (in the 50s on Metacritic), and I can see why, but it’s not without redeeming characteristics.

I’ll start with the good:

-The battle system is pretty unique. You plan out our your moves for all of your characters in advance and then can see them previewed before you commit to them, so you can gauge whether tactics will likely work or not before you engage. However, what you anticipate to happen can still fail (as there are accuracy %s and some parts of the chain can miss). There are a variety of things you can do, like heal, reposition to a better place to avoid attacks as you envision them coming with the preview system, launch an enemy in the air for the next character to knock down, etc. Lots of combo types are possible. It was a neat way to set up fights, although the strategy becomes less necessary if you level up enough, and you can end up just doing a few shield breaker moves and then spamming basic attacks.

-Some of the character backstories were fairly interesting.

-The overarching premise of the game is interesting.

The bad:

-Many of the characters are gratingly obnoxious, and the dialogue is frequently awful.

-The story never goes beyond the obvious, and, though it’s interesting, nothing about it is surprising.

-I don’t play animeish games like this often, and I was not at all a fan of the weird stuff like characters randomly deciding to take a bath multiple times and then a villain’s whole storyline being that he is a pervert who gets attacked after being discovered morphing into objects to spy on women. It was messed up and not even at all relevant to the overarching plot. At multiple points, I found myself asking what was wrong with the people who wrote this stuff.

#16- Hi-Fi Rush

Man I loved this game and it came out of nowhere. It was like Devil May Cry with rhythm based contextually timed button presses. You hack and slash with a robotic guitar thru 12 levels while gathering health and energy upgrades and collecting parts to unlock new crazy combos and special modes. You also get support summons from members of your crew which prove highly useful throughout the game and there’s even some minor platforming puzzle like elements in which you incorporate your crew to assist with. The music was kick ass, the acting and humorous writing was great, the anime style graphics were superb and minor platforming issues aside, this was one of the best action games I have played in a while. Highly recommend.

Just beat Macbat 64 on


I beat this back when it came out in 2017, but I learned that Siactro added a bonus level in 2019, so I did another full playthrough. Really fun but short experience!

Number: 15
Full Title: Police Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel
Platform Played:
Collection: Police Quest Collection
Native Platform: (DOS)
Original Platform: , et al
Applicable Badge: Guybrush Threepwood (2/2)

image

Thank goodness the VGA version of this exists, as it was borderline too antiquated. The EGA might not have had staying power. I am looking forward to later games in this series.

OP updated! Tell me if I missed anything.

Looks great to me. Thanks again!

Yoshi wrote:

I have real nostalgia for the old old originals, CGA version, arrow key walking, space bar typing. But I enjoy the VGA and later point n clicks too. I actually beat a bunch of those last year. Larry 1-3, Space Quest 1-2, King's quest 1-3, Police Quest 1-2, Colonials Bequest, etc. .

Dug out my old DSi this morning. I totally forgot about it. @SupremeSarna mind adding it to my list?

Also might as well add Frogger Returns as my game for as well. I just played through all 4 courses in about 29 minutes. This game is definitely rough. Terrible framerate and slowdowns, and awful depth of field.

Edit: That will make my console count 29 (it's currently at 28 but you have it marked 27)

@Frank
Gotcha covered!

#6 Heroes of Might and Magic II

Cleared all original maps on normal difficulty....whew. Probably 120 hours or better to complete. On to shorter experiences...

@SupremeSarna You've got me listed for 6 consoles, but I've got 7. 7th was

Doom 64 was the Retro Talkshop Thread's first Game of the Month of 2023, and it kicked our collective asses. Though I usually prefer to play through a game on its original platform for my first playthrough, I was really missing the controls and the in-level save functionality of the Bethesda re-release. After three months of slow progress and many grueling attempts at the final battle, I finally closed the book on the Nintendo 64 version last night.

Number: 15
Full Title: Doom 64
Platform Played: Nintendo 64
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Nintendo 64
Original Platforms: Nintendo 64
Applicable Badge: 2nd Amendment (1/2)

Progress in Golden Sun and Crisis Core continues, albeit at a slower pace than expected. It turns out that Evercade's current Game of the Month - Donut Dodo, a callback to single screen arcade games of the early 80s - is surprisingly awesome. I've been cutting my gaming sessions short to take another whack at the kleptomaniacal peacock wannabe.

And on that note, I'm adding Evercade to my platforms list and retiring the Neo Geo CD. With a NGCD core imminent on the MiSTer side and a library that doesn't have much going for it, I've disconnected it and looking to find it a new home.

I beat The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures on
Pretty fun game- the levels take 10-20 minutes each, so it's a good game to play in sessions when you've only got an hour or so. I beat the game in singleplayer, but in multiplayer I like that all 4 links can travel anywhere in the stage using the gameboy advance. The story is kind of lacking, that is until the wind palace and the end. A double final boss is always fun in a game, and I thoroughly enjoyed the fights, even though if you've played Four Swords you'll already know how to kill Vaati, and the Ganon fight is very similar to the classic 2d ganon fights.

incubus421 wrote:
If you can prove that time, you can count it toward the first half of the Days Gone By badge.

El Viento - Retroid ()

Continuing my emulator fun, El Viento for Sega Genesis.
image

I beat Dead Rising 2: Case Zero on the xbox360

I also beat Resident Evil 6 on the xbox1 (beating this and resident evil 5 gets me the raccoon city badge)

I also beat Resident Evil 5 Lost in Nightmares (DLC) on the xbox1

#29 down: Resident Evil 4 Remake on PS5. This (alongside my previous clear of the Dead Space remake) gets me the Raccoon City badge.

I had never played Resident Evil 4 before, and this was everything I had hoped it would be. The gunplay is fun, there are lots of interesting ways to navigate each scenario, the bosses are epic, and the graphics look great. Definitely a GOTY contender.

I beat Mega Man 6 (originally NES).
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/V2T2KeA_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
Great game, as expected from ‘90s Capcom. I haven’t played the NES Mega Mans since high school, so I can’t compare them. I recall digging 6 back then, though.

4th of April, 22nd overall, 8th
Ryse Son of Rome
Badge - earns me Hackin' & Slashin' with Jedi Fallen Order

Tis another Xbox exclusive I've had for a good while and finally just dove in and played it. There actually was a challenge this month to earn 3 achievements in just 5 games of which Ryse was the best choice for me as I played the first mission around 2 years ago for another Xbox Rewards thing and figured it was time. Overall I mostly enjoyed my time with it, though I wasn't great at it. The Achievements didn't work 100% as it didn't credit me for beating the 2nd mission and thus not the game either, so I might replay that and see if I can do better and get the achievement. The final boss fight was rough for me as I wasn't nailing the block timing initially, but when I got it down I did a lot better.

This was pretty good and I'd recommend to anyone who's not played it. But it doesn't support Quick Resume on the XSX, and I went to my X1X for the final session to see if that would cause the achievements to pop - which did the trick for Recore, but not here. The game really hid the collectables. I enjoy exploring and finding them, but I got less than half as they were seemingly well off the beaten path. I did notice some branching paths and assume many of those I missed where on such paths. One gripe would be the general lack of variety of foes, it's really only like 4-5.

#30 down- Drink More Glurp on Steam Deck. I would like to count this toward the Bo Knows badge. It’s a bunch of Olympic track and field-style challenges with weird physics. You’re this strange creature whose arms and legs are all wobbly and who sometimes has wheels for feet or sticky limbs. It’s frustratingly difficult at times as the controls are awful. I went through all of the challenges managed to get a silver or bronze trophy for most events though after running them way too many times. I will never play this game again.

#31 down- Xeodrifter on PC. This (alongside my previous clear of A Robot Named Fight) gives me the Metroidvania badge. Xeodrifter has simple graphics and presentation, but the mechanics are deeper than meets the eye. You get power-ups like the ability to shift into the background (which means there are boss battles in which you fight in both the foreground and background, and secrets and routes hidden in both). Some of the boss battles are tough, but each introduced a little bit more challenge in an arc that helped me get better as I went along at a reasonable pace. Not a great game but not a bad one either.

Number: 16
Full Title: Sega Ages: Shinobi
Platform Played:
Collection: N/A
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: Grown-Ass Man (2/2)

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Shinobi to me is "the other" great pure action series (as opposed to, say, run 'n' gun) from the 1980s and 1990s alongside Castlevania. This one was relatively fair for a 1987 arcade action game. After a few tries, I believe I beat the last boss without getting hit.

Those last couple levels of Shinobi are hard, it's one of my favorite games and I've never beaten it, great job! Definitely going to tackle it again.

Got my 5th of April, 23rd overall, 1st
Gals Panic SS
Badge - 1 towards Localize since it's in Japanese

I've been moving my ROMs from my older PC to a new one and my last machine didn't do emulation great for the Saturn and others, so I wanted to try some games on this new machine and go through some of the massive library I have. I focused on getting rid of a lot of games that I simply wasn't going to play like late 90's sports titles and a lot of Japanese titles that I couldn't read or follow along with. This game was one that I checked on to see if I wanted to keep it in my library and it was one of those hidden images you need to expose by dragging your cursor around to expand the exposed space. You then 'win' by exposing 80% or more of the focused object behind - being an image of a girl in this case, while dodging the floating objects that could break your line. It has some era-worthy anime/manga art that you exposed, whatever, guess I'm not a 12-14 year old boy. There were 5 boards per girl and 10 girls total with unlimited continues, though your progress on a board would reset after continuing, so I resorted to using some save states. I got a little impatient at times, but overall it maybe only took me an hour+ to finish it since there is a timer you're also up against on each board - thus you don't want to waste time and more time = more objects to avoid.

This weekend got away from me, considering my grandfather had two unexpected strokes in the past 48 hours. I'll get to the weekly update tomorrow, and any prayers would be appreciated.

I’m really sorry about that. I’ll pray for your grandfather and your family.

SupremeSarna wrote:

#32 down: Final Fantasy on PS3. This (alongside my previous clear of The Caligula Effect: Overdose) gets me the Level Up badge.

As a kid, I never played the original Final Fantasy games, so I thought it might be nice to try this out. For how old it is, it actually holds up pretty well, although there are definitely some issues with quality of life. Random encounters with enemies are very frequent, saving is tricky (only in towns in inns or outside of dungeons using specific items), and there isn’t much visually to indicate progression or better gear (except in one minor case that I’ll leave vague so as not to spoil it). The graphics are old school, and traversing is often confusing and difficult without a walkthrough. Still, the turn-based combat isn’t bad, there’s decent variety in enemies and dungeons, and I uncovered a few secrets here and there that were neat. Looking forward to Final Fantasy XVI!

Sorry to hear about your grandfather @SupremeSarna - hope he recovers fully. If you need any help with this thread, let me know if I can help you out since you helped me last year.

As of today, April 16, it's officially been ten years since the elusive Wii RPG Pandora's Tower released in North America. As such, I felt it fitting to send developer Ganbarion my thanks on Twitter, and beat the game once again.
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/11YtlVZ.jpg[/imgt]

Pandora's Tower is absolute fire. Your love has come down with a terrible curse to gradually become a beast--can you save her? Scaling massive towers with the Oraclos Chain weapon and taking on horrific servant beasts is oh-so satisfying. Then you take their still-dripping meat to feed to your girlfriend Elena, who is such a charming lady. She's optimistic and stands up for herself, even when things look hopeless! You really find yourself caring for her... but you're missing part of the experience if you keep her in her human form the whole time. For the full effect, you should sometimes spend a little too long in the Thirteen Towers and return to her. You'll feel repulsed and saddened by her hideous transformation, and her behaviors and dialogue will also change to reflect her sorry state. The various weapons give combat more variety, and the memorable nomad Mavda can enhance them to give you combo chains! With ominous lore to discover and a booming, classical orchestral soundtrack to enhance the mood, this game is a masterpiece!

It's a thrilling juxtaposition, really. It's a gothic horror game with the most wonderful romantic atmosphere, and also a charming dating sim where both the monsters and your girlfriend spew purple gore everywhere. Depending on your mood, you may long to spend time with Elena and help decorate your observatory, or you might want to see how grisly things get as her heinous curse progresses. There are a handful of errors in the game--most notably a game-crashing glitch in the last dungeon if you play the North American version--but nothing that will ever make me turn my back on this shining jewel of a game. Even like this, I still love it; never doubt that.

Oh, and Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles was good and stuff.
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/vGwgDcU.jpg[/imgt]
Good remake, but not as punchy graphics-wise as the original game. I didn't expect to unlock Symphony of the Night in a random stage, but I'll take it! I got this for Christmas after reaching out to another user here, and only just now got around to finishing the last few stages.

I'm now updating the OP... please be patient.

I finished Bayonetta 3 on Switch. Also AI: The Somnium Files - Nirvana Initiative on Switch a week or two ago.

OP updated! As always, everyone let me know if I made a mistake or missed something. Now for a knock-knock joke:

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Wii U.
Wii U who?
Wii U just buy a Switch already?!

#19 Kirby 64 The Crystal Shards via

Another simple and clean Kirby game in the books. I never finished it on the 64 when I was a kid but man once you get that fireball and great sword combo power up it kinda breaks the game and that’s just fine to me. Completely breezed thru this in a few hours. Kirby games are great for serene easy going gaming. Next stop another chill game. Yoshi’s Story as my nostalgia trip continues.

#20 Atomic Heart

I have no idea why I played this until the end. It was kinda boring even with it being an action shooter. The plot was dull, acting felt crass and forced, puzzles felt overly complex and not in a good way. More in a frustrating way. Controls were wonky especially when aiming and platforming. The crafting and upgrades were okay but nothing to write home about and the boss fights were too chaotic and frantic and felt like I wanted it over just as quickly as they begun. Even the basic enemies were just annoying AF to encounter whereas they felt like chores as was the theme of the entirety of this game. A chore. And the only really redeeming quality I could find without much flaws were the music. It had a nice mix of classical orchestral music somewhat remixed and I thought it fit nicely with the theme and setting. But yeah this game is trying to become Bioshock so much it blatantly referenced it in one scene hoping for that crossover that’ll likely never happen. Plus to add salt to the wound, it’s buggy as hell. I had to restart the app so many damn times because it either soft locked me without letting me open a door or a scene wouldn’t pop when it should have to progress again I do not know why I saw this thru to the end. And you have a choice in the final part of the game to walk away and get the bad ending or stay and do a set of boss fights and get the good ending and because I pitied this title I stayed and trucked thru the final battles to get the “good” ending which don’t ask me what it’s about because like the rest of the game it’s too uninteresting to care about. Thank the maker it was on Game Pass. I cannot see why someone would charge nor spend $70 on this.

Here's some more, having some fun with my retroid pocket 2+ with some shorter games before I move on to the RPGs.

Twinkle Tale - retroid ()
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Mega Turrican - retroid ()
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Demolition Man - retroid ()
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#33 down: Cult of the Lamb on PS5. I’d like to count this toward the Mustache-Twirlin' badge.

You are the last lamb sacrificed to the Bishops but are resurrected by The One Who Waits to kill the Bishops and free him. You are tasked with starting a cult to raise your power along the way. As an evil cult leader, you sacrifice your followers, have them build a colony, farm, heal the sick, preach sermons, declare holidays, marry, etc. There are also other locations you visit with interesting storylines. All of that is to get you strong enough to fight the bishops who each have a realm with a series of procedurally generated places you have to navigate with roguelite gameplay. The combat is fast and fun, and there are some unique powerups you can unlock. It’s like an easier, less complex version of Hades mixed with a farming simulator. The length is perfect. You can get all of the achievements in under 20 hours, and it was enjoyable the whole way through. This was an impulse buy that turned out really well. One of my favorite games I’ve played this year.

It took a while, but I finally 100%ed Pikmin 2 .
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/470GOW9.jpg[/imgt]
A bigger, more ambitious Pikmin adventure that takes a big step back. The point of Pikmin is to be an RTS game with a ticking clock. This game keeps that for the overworld areas but puts a big emphasis on Cave dungeons, which have no time limit but tons of floors. These really drag the pace down. It feels like your motivation to play is entirely motivated by corporate greed this time around as opposed to survival, so there's less of a hook to keep going. The second half of the game has you searching for your kidnapped partner (who controls the final boss, lol), so at least there's that. It's decent, but I suspect Pikmin 3 will be better.

#21 Yoshi’s Story via

Such a weird Yoshi entry this was but I get what they were trying to convey. A choose your own adventure book so to speak. You select which levels you want to experience within each world and it tells a story at the end of the game in a storybook format. But the gameplay is just strange. The basic objective is eat enough fruit to make the Yoshi happy to end the stage with a final boss fight at the end of the game which was the only real fight I felt in the game. The rest of the game was basically eating fruit.

I beat Alleyway .
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/SfxAbAT_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
It’s a decent little bit of breakout action with surprisingly good ball physics. Breakout games usually have a problem with getting the ball to hit the last couple blocks but the trajectory is just never right. This game doesn’t really have that issue, for the most part. This was a worthy use of $3 as the eShop closed.

#34 down: Darius II on Sega Genesis. I would like to count this one toward the Destroy the Core badge.

Darius II is a space SHMUP that is incredibly difficult. Not only do you die from a hit or two and have only a handful of lives and a few continues, but you also carry over powerups permanently until you die, so, if you die, you go from formidable to helpless immediately. It takes a long time to get enough power-ups to be reasonably strong again. Even with a ton of power-ups, some of the bosses are brutal. There's definitely a bullet hell element to this game. I'm still not totally sure how I managed to beat this. It was exhausting.

Retroid - Super Off-Road ()
I've played about 50 races. Maxed out boosts and gear. Can win every single race.
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#35 down: Mars Matrix on Sega Dreamcast. This (alongside my previous clear of Darius II) gives me the Destroy the Core badge. This is another brutally difficult, bullet hell SHMUP. This time, it's a vertical one. I am very ready to be finished with SHMUPs for the year now and can't see myself playing another anytime soon.

I beat BurgerTime Deluxe (originally GB). Beep this game.
[imgt w=1280 h=720]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FuNuchvaUAA2Nnz?format...[/imgt]
I thought I'd like it, and I partly did... but hot dang, are levels 4 and 6 dreadful. I had to use save states to make it to the end--I would've quit had it not been for save states at the start of later stages. Stage 4-2 in particular is heinously designed, with too many enemies climbing up too many ladders on the left side of screen, not even mentioning the right side. It's just too hard for its own good.

Number: 17
Full Title: Rygar
Platform Played:
Collection: N/A
Native Platform:
Original Platform:
Applicable Badge: Metroidvania (2/2)

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I know I played this around when it was released but never got far. It was probably an overnight rental and didn't stick. It's definitely worth a play through on NSO. It's not too dissimilar from Castlevania II, though probably harder.

OP updated! We've sure earned a lot of badges!

Just beat super mario rpg on super Nintendo and counting it towards first half of level up badge please

#7 on 4/19
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origins

Took about 30 hours to beat, including all side missions and cleaning up a few trophies in end game. It was neat experiencing the first Final Fantasy story in a different way, but in the end it left a little too much to be desired. I didn't hate it entirely. The nostalgic enemies and bosses were cool to see. The ending was chaotic and fun. Still, this is a 5.5 or 6 out of 10 for me. Without being too long-winded, here are a few of my gripes:
- Sure you can up the difficulty, but this game was easy from the get go. A single strong attack breaks the guard of almost all mobs in the game. You can R1 > R2 most of the way through the game. All this depth in the combat: job classes, attack combos, monster skills, and it was all lost on me because you can blow right through with an R1 > R2 combo for 90% of the game.
- You acquire gear at such a rapid pace, and most of it is meant to be discarded for upgrade materials. So much so that you can set filters to auto discard gear you pick up. However, even the upgrade system is a lost cause, as you'll probably just find better gear on the next mission.
- Why did we not remix the OG soundtrack? Not even Mt. Gulg...

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#8 on 4/23
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

This needs no rating or review from me. Me and my family got on a Mario Kart kick in the last few weeks. We obtained 3-star gold on all original cups 50cc, 100cc, 150cc, and Mirror. We earned just the gold trophy, not caring about the star rating, on 200cc. Some of those tracks on 200 are brutal! Neo Bowser City and Twisted Mansion are particularly terrible.

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I beat Game & Watch Gallery 3 yesterday, but I intend to keep playing to get the remaining stars.

My #20 is Resident Evil 6.

https://imgbox.com/i2DA33Ga

At first I didn't like this game. But once I embraced the ridiculousness of it's settings, plot and enemy types, then I began to relax and have fun on this Micheal Bay mess of a game. The story is told from four points of view with none of them being particularly good. Leon is over the top sky scraper leaping. Chris plays more like a Call of Duty zombies. Jake is mostly boss fights from the other campaigns. Ada is doing spy things in submarines. None of it is horror except the enemies you face. The inventory system is the worst of the series. 7/10

I beat Mega Man 5. This one's pretty rough compared to MM6. It has a jerkier framerate, a good number of the weapons are really situational, and I can't tell at a glance with Robot Master is weak to which weapon. Enemies seem to drop lives really frequently here, which I don't remember happening in the others. Throw in an uninspired plot hook (the good guy Proto Man is actually eeeevil? Gasp!) and two final castles, and you have a good but not great MM game.

#9 on 4/25
Oregon trail

Ran through a DOS version of Oregon Trail today. 1409 points, just stock pile food and run it!
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I haven't been paying much attention to the Evercade Game of the Month promotions, but I decided to try out this month's entry on the Evercade EXP to put it through its paces. I was completely taken off guard by how fun and addicting this bite-sized, retro arcade-style game is. Every time I have five minutes to spare, I've been picking up Donut Dodo just to put the diabetic bird through its paces. I finally made it all the way through the game today.

Number: 16
Full Title: Donut Dodo
Platform Played: Evercade VS
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Evercade
Original Platforms: Windows, Switch
Applicable Badge: Quarter Muncher (1/2)

My update is pretty much the same as it's been all month: I'm still working on Crisis Core and Golden Sun. I put hours upon hours into Crisis Core's side missions, and now, I'm less than halfway through the game, have beaten the game's superboss, and am expecting a cakewalk through the rest of the game's so-called challenges. We'll see.

#22- Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros 3 via

I forgot how much fun SMB3 was. It really set the template and precedence for my favorite SMB 2D game of all time, Super Mario World. And it looked great on the GBA with all of the enhanced colors, sprites and even Mr Martinet adding in some audible Mario VO work.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Did you play all the e-Reader stages? It was really cool that Nintendo packed those in. They're way more interesting than the main game IMO, and they feel like they were made in the mid-2000s rather than 1990. They really play around with new ideas for level design.

Are the e-reader stages available via emulation via Switch? Cause that’s how I played it.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Yep! They revived them on Wii U and then ported that version over to Switch Online.

Interesting. I’ll have to go back and find them. Thanks

Can you just go straight to the E-readers stages? Or do you have to play a certain amount of the game first?

I remember being amazed by the idea of the E-reader levels when I first learned about them, and wanted to try them for the longest time. But, I didn't get around to it until after Mario Maker had been out for a little while, so the new ideas they tried out really didn't seem all that special anymore.

You can go straight to the extra stages. They have their own separate world map.

I’m willing to count those as DLC, since that’s more or less what they were on the GBA.

Anybody else not able to access the spreadsheet?

I'm late to posting it, but I beat Pokemon Scarlet earlier this month.

legendrko25 wrote:
Got it sorted. I had to create a copy and use it to replace the original, but I forgot to reenable the viewing permissions.

Here's an update to some games I beat and didn't talk about:

Game & Watch Gallery 3
[imgt w=1280 h=720]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FuxgaBrakAIoWQF?format...[/imgt]
An awesome, nostalgic collection of updated Game & Watch games featuring Mario and co. Still super fun and challenging. The best game is a tossup between Egg and Turtle Bridge, with the worst game being Greenhouse. If you have NSO, give this game a try!

Battletoads Arcade
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/9wOPvQu.jpg[/imgt]
A fun, surprisingly gorey arcade game starring the Teenage Muta--I mean, the Battletoads. Beat'em ups get pretty samey for me, so I'm glad this one wasn't too long. It's got nice visual presentation and some good humor.

Crashmo
[imgt w=1536 h=2048]https://i.imgur.com/FlAUQFz.jpg[/imgt]
A much, much harder sequel to Pushmo. Most fans don't seem to appreciate this game, and I can understand why. The game is pretty good overall, but the new puzzle system requires much more thought and experimentation than all other Pushmo games. I noticed that this game has a problem with tutorials--they'll introduce a mechanic by explaining how it works and then immediately throwing you headfirst into a legit puzzle that requires the taught trick. I almost had to look up one of the first stages because they did such a bad job of explaining what I was supposed to do in it. Even when I unlocked bonus worlds, I lost interest when the credits rolled.

Paper Airplane Chase
[imgt w=2048 h=1536]https://i.imgur.com/Lci9X2e.jpg[/imgt]
A simple DSiware game that lets you play a WarioWare Inc. minigame endlessly, or in a few time attack stages, or against a friend. I scored over 200 points on Endless Mode and cleared every Time Attack stage. It's fun, but I prefer Bird & Beans.

Kirby's Dream Land
[imgt w=1280 h=720]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FuxgZ-laEAEMvM5?format...[/imgt]
Happy birthday, Popopo (that is, Kirby's conceptual name)! For his 31st anniversary, I figured I'd devote a few minutes to beating his first game. It's a good one, though obviously not his magnum opus. I beat both the Main Game and the Extra Game in under an hour. Did you know that by his own admission, the hermit crab Coner is believed to be the first enemy Masahiro Sakurai created for the Kirby series?

#36 down: Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy's Edge on PSVR2.

I know people complained about wanting more light saber stuff in this, but I enjoyed getting to use all of the different guns (especially the storm trooper ones). The graphics are decent, the characters are interesting, and the gameplay was pretty fun. The way the guns handle is about as good as I've experienced in VR before. You can also play darts with darts that you aim and let go with something like a rocket propulsion system, eat tacos, use a hoverpack, etc. This was a solid game. I don't think it's worth full retail (at $49.99), but, since I got it free with points at GameStop, I'm happy.

I beat Club Penguin: Game Day

I had this game many years ago, bought it about a year after release to get all the stamps on Club Penguin, and I 100% beat the game back then. I recently found it at my parents' house when I was flying back from a business conference a few weeks ago, and decided to replay it for nostalgia. Club Penguin shut down 6 years ago, so this this one of the only pieces of media keeping the franchise preserved (There are also 2 DS titles)

It's just a minigame collection like most Wii shovelware titles. It has a story mode where you pick a team and you have to conquer all of the other areas of Club Penguin Island for your team during the Game Day party. You do this by going to an area and playing a selection of 4 minigames, then 1 final microgame to take over the area. Once you have all 6 areas on the island, you win.

Simple enough game, You can beat it in around an hour

I beat Battle Garegga (arcade), Final Fight (arcade) and Aliens (arcade) recently. Hooray for unlimited continues! Never would have been possible when I was a kid.

I'll be updating the thread Sunday night instead of Friday or Saturday. Makes sense to conclude the month without a minor update in between.

@Staraang Are you officially joining this thread? If so, I'll need a complete list of your gaming consoles.

Captain Toad Treasure Tracker -
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yes I did complete all 3 chapters

Time Gal - Retroid ( )
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Fire Emblem Engage -
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I beat Saints Row:Gat Outta Hell on the xbox360

I beat Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge on the xbox1

SupremeSarna wrote:

Yeah sounds good. I have NES, SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, TG-16, GB, GBC, GBA, DS, N64, PS1-3, Xbox 360, Xbox Series S. Are arcade systems just generally under ‘arcade’ or the different arcade systems?

@ErickRPG Nice! Solid. Keep those pics coming. :)

How was Fire Emblem Engage?

And how was Treasure Tracker? I've been wanting to try that one for a long time.

DragonmasterDX wrote:
Nice.

Haven't seen you on here in awhile. How's it going?

Scott wrote:
Sweet. How was it? I'm not even close to playing Scarlet/Violet. (I'm still only a couple hours into Shield 😅)

My #21 is Resident Evil 7 Biohazard.

https://imgbox.com/7FFgrk1u

A reboot for the series, this game does away with it's franchise's previous characters in favor for a new guy, Ethan Winters. It's gameplay is much slower than the last few games that allows more horror moments. I was jump scared at this game a few times which hasn't happened in a previous RE game. Normal was much too easy, I wish there was a harder difficulty option available at the beginning. 8/10

Staraang wrote:

Are you playing from an official arcade unit or a different platform (i.e. MAME)? MAME is categorized as MAME, Steam Deck is categorized as , and acade machines are categirized as .

SupremeSarna wrote:

It’s MAME.

Got my 6th of April, 1st , 24th overall
Fire Electric Pen
Badge - earns me the Localize one, with Gals Panic SS as my first

Was doing some more ROM management and Launchbox didn't know what this game was, well it's one of those 'Don't touch the Walls' style games and that means I really didn't need to read/understand Japanese to play it. There are only 6 boards to beat and I did alright and beat the first after not too many tries... and I was hooked. I resorted to save states b/c you control the pen with the analog stick, which isn't the best with accuracy it has a rather tight time limit as well as ZERO forgiveness, so instead of playing it legitimately I used states and a few too many sections I have absolutely zero faith that someone could clear them without touching a wall/obstacle and do it fast enough to beat the time and not go crazy. I even had to look up how to get RetroArch to slow down a few sections b/c the final board was beyond BS. I only used that in like 3 sections, 1 I think it was nearly mandatory because of the lack of precision with an analog stick while the other 2 was more of me getting tired of playing it.
It's not a game I would recommend unless you wanted to use save states, heck a section of 2 is so tight and precise with moving things that there's zero chance I would have made it there over and over without save states and Not thrown my controller in frustration, the window was tiny. It's apparently related to some bonkers Japanese TV show and there's an announcer yelling out as you progress as well as some intense music, so at one point I muted it especially with all the times I was failing it just got too annoying to listen to.

I'm updating the OP now. Please refrain from posting until it's done...

Thread updated! As always, correct me if I made any errors--it's 1 AM over here, so things may slip past my fatigued eyes.

April is squared away, bringing rise to May. I'll run down a few of the stats for Beat a Game this month:
-I tallied 92 clears this month, absolutely dominating February and March, and coming close to January! A couple of those were posted-too-late March clears, but my policy is to lump all posted clears into the current month, regardless of when they technically took place. So if there are any stragglers for April, I'm puttin' 'em in May.
-Our top player this month was SupremeSarna, who played a number of short games on 3DS to get 14 clears. @TalonJedi87 was very close as well. He beat 12 games and had a real penchant for Nintendo Switch Online the past few weeks.
-The top badge earner this month was SupremeSarna as well, with five badges (though that's only because I forgot to apply a badge months ago and put it in April). @Bleed_DukeBlue won four badges and @Yoshi earned three, which are numbers I love to see!

Let's keep things going strong as summer gears up! 'Til then, nighty-night, everybody!

nonamesleft wrote:

Fire Emblem Engage was really good, not Three Houses good, but solid. I found myself enjoying the past character emblems and chosing who gets which. I found myself also wanting more, that I even considered the $30 expansion pass. I think if it ever went 50% off I'd get it and play again to get even more emblems.

Treasure Tracker was decent. I had never beaten it even though I've played it on both WiiU and 3DS. So I finally stuck to it and got to the end. It's not the first 3DS game I'd recommend but I'd certainly put it in the recommend list.

ErickRPG wrote:
Thanks for the feedback.

Have you played Fire Emblem Awakening? I beat that one not too long ago. Put a nice amount of time into it. Around 60-80 hours. Enjoyed it. If you played it, how would you compare Engage to Awakening?

nonamesleft wrote:

I think Fire Emblem has gotten better. Meaning the Switch ones are even better than the 3DS ones. I liked Awakening, but I went from in the DS one maxing out EVERY character (I loved optional grinding) to not doing it in Awakening. Because with the marraiges/kids there were just too many characters for me. This one is just about right. I picked my 12 characters and went with them. If I play again I'll try to play as many new characters I didn't play the first time.

ErickRPG wrote:
I hear what you're saying about Awakening. I liked the mechanic of passing on parents' abilities to their kids, but I was spending so much time trying to get specific abilities passed down. It was fun, and it was time well spent in terms of enjoying what the game has to offer, but it was very time consuming. Cool to have certain units with certain abilities though.

For April, counted for May I suppose:

Ice Cream Surfer (PS4): Quick shmup, nothing too spectacular or fancy. Beat it with all the characters and got all the trophies.

Null Drifter (PS4): Quick game, can get hectic in later levels. Got the plat.

Days Gone (PS4): Wow, really liked this one. Everyone was kind of a douchebag, but even so I genuinely cared about the characters. Driving the motorcycle was great and dealing with the enemies was interesting, even if I'm not a big fan of zombie games. I hope they get the change to make a sequel or something at some point. Kinda silly Sony shut it down just because it didn't sell 15 billions, lol. Got the plat.

Need for Speed Heat (PS4): I'm definitely a NFS fan, lol. Really had a good time escaping cops and racing in Miam... eh, whatever the city was called. The main plot isn't half bad, kinda like an old F&F movie. Having to tune the cars to work in different types of races was interesting too, although once you have access to the best parts and cars it's just a matter of throwing money at the mechanic and going fast.


Aside from that, I've played some Astral Chain and Skyward Sword, but got distracted and haven't finished those.

As my 50th clear, I beat Rhythm Thief & the Emperor's Treasure .
[imgt w=1536 h=2048]https://i.imgur.com/5Q82FOR.jpg[/imgt]

It's a great rhythm game by SEGA. The stylish Parisian art thief Phantom R and his dog Fondue must solve an growing mystery surrounding his father's disappearance, a possibly-resurrected Napoleon Bonaparte with an evil army, a mysterious symbol appearing on various magical treasures, and more, all while dodging the authorities and supporting a new friend. The story and characters are fairly memorable, even if some moments are a little stupid or pointless in the long run. As for gameplay, you spend a lot of time in visual novel-mode, tapping the Touch Screen to find collectibles, recording sound effects for use around the overworld, and solving minor sound-themed puzzles. When you're not doing that, you get to play rhythm minigames that usually advance the story. They use various inputs, like button controls, swiping with the stylus, and even gyro controls. The tunes are catchy, but I'll have to listen to them again to really memorize them. It's satisfying knocking out Napoleon's knights with single palm strikes, quickly sneaking around museums at night, and kicking a soccer ball to pummel a bratty child detective.

All that stuff is good, and the game is really cool because of it. But I do have some critiques. A fair number of the minigames are just annoying. The difficulty curve is pretty forgiving until about Chapter 7, when this go off the rails. Before you know it, the game expects you to divide your attention between two sides of the screen with little time to breathe or quickly flip between six different inputs. (The poodle minigames especially are abysmal.) You can spend coins to use items to enhance your performance, which I strongly encourage in the later chapters. The most obnoxious part is the grading system. You hit the right notes to fill the groove bar from E to A, and any mistake drops it down at least one grade. So you can still get an A if all your mistakes happen early on, but a late mistake is basically a guaranteed B. I can handle that, but the real kicker is the high score system. You can earn an A and still have a low score, but you can also get a D or C and have a high score, depending on when you messed up. The game prioritizes your score over your grade, so a worse letter grade can overwrite your better one. Did I mention some level content is locked behind getting all As? So if you're not careful, you can play yourself into a corner, getting an extremely high score but making just one or two mistakes at the end to net yourself a B. Now you have to outperform your amazing score to replace it. I had to reset the game without saving in order to feasibly get an A on a few difficult minigames, which isn't how this system should work. Your score and overall grade should be saved separately so average players can prioritize getting As to unlock that final bonus chapter, while dedicated players can keep trying to top their scores without fear that the bonus chapter unlock could be affected.

Tapping everything on the screen to find important--and missable--trinkets is a tad irritating when you just want to get a move on. The art style is one part nice and another part cheap. It looks like a lower-budget Prof. Layton game, which is nice until you see Marie's character portrait, as it in particular looks amateurish. The voice acting is adequate but can be flat at times, and there are countless moments where the actor says something completely different from the subtitle--as an example, every time Napoleon says "hare" in the subtitles, his VA says "rabbit," perhaps because they didn't think Americans knew what hares were. Sometimes entire sentences will be changed, shortened, or restructured, which is distracting and just looks sloppy.

Overall, I give it an 8/10. Not amazing, but compelling and stylish enough to play all 18 hours of it and nab every A rank. I recommend buying it on the 3DS eShop while it's still $20, because if you don't, tracking down a rare cartridge will run you a fortune! ...Huh? The eShop's closed? Good luck, then!

Just finished Just Shapes & Beats on Steam for the Game Club.

Really fun and unique rhythm game. Highly recommend it for anyone who's a fan of electronic music.

I beat Call of Duty 2 on the xbox 360

It is with a heavy heart that I say that my grandfather, who I previously stated had two strokes recently, has now passed on. He’s in a better place now, leaving my family to grieve and honor his memory. Thank you for reading.

SupremeSarna wrote:

Very sorry to hear that. My condolences to you and your family.

I’m sorry for your loss.

SupremeSarna wrote:

I beat Mega Man 4 .

A great Mega Man game for sure. The Charge Shot is a great addition to the series. I think they might’ve gone a little too hard on the Robot Masters, as I needed Energy Tanks to beat a few of them, both during the initial fight and the rematch. I’m not the biggest fan of there being two fortresses at the end, but it’s nice having a new faux-villain for a change.

My #22 is Resident Evil 7 Biohazard: All DLC.

https://imgbox.com/PhWZe0wu

This took me about as long as the main game to complete. Lots of different stuff here, with different playstyles and mechanics. 8/10

#23 for me is Metroid Fusion via

Easily my all-time favorite 2D Metroid title hands down and it has aged like fine wine here from the first time I played it over 2 decades ago. From the sense of wanderlust for completing the map and finding new areas and items to the slow churn anticipation of recovering your abilities one by one and the awesome music and boss fights to the airtight crisp controls, this is the complete Metroid package for me. I wish it had a NG+ cause the mere 3.5 hours it took me to run through this game was not nearly enough. Luckily, I'll be replaying Metroid Prime Remastered soon enough.

The first year I participated in this thread, I played through Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII for PSP. The game has a short campaign, only about 20% of which is interesting to a homecoming Final Fantasy VII, and a truly awful script, but it's chock full of bite-sized, portable-friendly content, and the combat is great. Flaws aside, I was incredibly pumped and pleasantly surprised to see that Square was giving the game the remake treatment; and unlike the rushed, buggy, and poorly-optimized remasters that so many of their classics get, they actually did a fantastic job with this one.

Number: 17
Full Title: Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII Reunion
Platform Played: Steam
Collection: N/A
Native Platform: Windows
Original Platforms: Windows, Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Applicable Badge: N/A

My backlog is starting to feel unruly again. With a week to go before Tears of the Kingdom drops, I still have a long way to go in Golden Sun, so that may be set aside for a while. On the home front, I've started exploring Just Shapes & Beats for Frank's Game of the Month thread, and I'm looking forward to diving into Rayman for the Retro Talkshop Thread.

I'll update this once Splatfest wraps tomorrow. I had relatively little time to play this weekend with the funeral and related errands taking up much of my time.

#37 down: Redfall on Xbox Series X. I would like to count this toward the You're Winner badge. It has a Metacritic user score of 2.9 for the version I played and caused Phil Spencer to say that he was upset with himself, so I feel like that category makes sense. It's even worse on Steam, where it has one of the lowest scores of all time.

That being said, I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. Despite its flaws, it still has some of the things I love about Bethesda games (and Arkane games in particular). The gameplay is fun, the skills of my particular character made for some interesting scenarios, the guns provide options in terms of how you approach a situation. (The sniper rifle helped tremendously at times.) Some of the boss fights are pretty neat, and the environmental details are really interesting at times (random bodybags and candles as if a ritual is taking place in someone's office, a story about people being sacrificed to a monster whenever someone lights a red candle in a particular window, etc.). There are two human factions at war in one part of the game, so you can end up fighting them both and vampires, or you can lure some vampires over and get them to fight the vampires while you pick off whoever you want. The looter shooter aspect of it is nice, because you can keep doing side quests and looking for new guns when you start to hit a difficulty spike. (That being said, though, the bosses all have strategies that make them reasonably beatable even before you get more powerful, but a couple can be tough if you don't know what you're doing. The final boss fight wasn't bad once I figured it out, but it is pretty annoying.) One neat thing that I didn't expect is that, if you kill enough important vampires, a new enemy type stalks you in the middle of a red lightning storm, which was intense whenever it happened, particularly since it tended to happen in places where I had to quickly run for shelter.

I think this is going to go down as the most underrated game of the year for me. I feel like it suffered mostly because people put way too many expectations on it as needing to be a home run for Microsoft.

OP updated! I missed @Scott 's Pokémon Scarlet clear last month, so that's fixed now.

I beat Star Wars: The Clone Wars on my XB1. I love the backwards compatibility on this thing.
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/kcq9R9I_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

Despite the name, you’ll find no mention of Ahsoka Tano or Asajj Ventress here. This game’s based on the Geonosis battle in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, not the 2D or 3D animated shows of the same name. I was delighted to hear Terrence “T.C.” Carson, Tom Kane, and Corey Burton playing the same characters they’re now famous for playing in those animated shows (Mace Windu, Yoda, and Count Dooku), but using the likenesses from the live-action film. The game has that trademark attention to lore that Lucasarts games often do—for example, the Wookiee planet Kashyyyk appears here three years before it would show up in Revenge of the Sith, since it was used in more obscure works prior to that movie. John Williams’ prequels score is used, too, and it’s brilliant as always.

The game has you piloting tanks, gunships, and walkers to destroy enemies on the battlefield, gaining ground against the Separatist Alliance and thwarting Count Dooku’s evil scheme to use old Sith tech to wipe out the Republic. The vehicles control decently enough and can shoot down enemy weapons from a good distance, which is fun to do. They aren’t all fun, sadly—the walker is really slow, and on-foot portions are incredibly janky and undercooked. You run around like a marionette when outside your vehicle, flailing your lightsaber all over the place in a vain attempt to hit something. The voice acting in the cutscenes is super quiet for some reason, and the story doesn’t make much sense.

The last thing to comment on is the difficulty. It’s jarringly hard to beat on normal difficulty, with enemies getting the better of you quite often. Some enemy shots will hit you dead-on without damaging you while other potshots will drain your health like nothing else, so it can be hard to know what attacks will kill you and what won’t. I just about blew a gasket when I fought the double Protodeka (which look nothing like Droidekas, thanks for asking), as they fire homing missiles that are difficult to outrun and can shred your health to zero in seconds. Winning this war ain’t a cakewalk, but at least it puts some midichlorians on your chest.

It’s a decent tie-in game, but a one-and-done for sure.

I beat Zelda II: The Adventure of Link . I loved the heck out of this game last year, but I haven't played it since last March. Going back to it now, I'm way worse than I was before, and I had to resort to more EXP grinding than I could in my prime. Hey, that happens when you step away from a practiced game for so long. I still had a great time, though!

That Shadow Link fight was intense. Bravo 👏

My #23 is Resident Evil 8 Village.

https://imgbox.com/rziILcuM

Fastest enemies in the entire series. I played hardcore and the opening village section took me about 2 hours to beat. Even though the game says 10 hours, my steam has 17 hours due to sections needing a few replays to get through. Great wrap up to my Resident Evil game series, excited to play something that's not shooting zombies in the head. 9/10

I beat Saint's Row 4 on the xbox1 (I beat this and TMNT shredders revenge with online partners, getting me the BFFL badge)

I beat Kirby: Canvas Curse , getting me my first DS clear.
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/20UIs0f_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/iqE9XjW_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/IU3bK8f_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

Canvas Curse is a great spin-off game. It has a ton of personality, weird but quality remixes of classic Kirby tunes, awesome graphics for an early DS game, fun gameplay, and a memorably deranged final boss. There are even time trials and multiple playable characters! I highly recommend it. There’s only one issue: the length. It’s a 2-hour game to beat the bare minimum, a 10-hour game to beat 100%. I feel like it’s an incomplete experience without getting 100%, but you have to play every stage five times to do that—that’s repetitive. Other than that, super game!

Funnily enough, I could've just used this for the Gamer's Day badge. Oh well, playing Wild Guns Reloaded five times is never a bad thing.

#24 Resident Evil 4 Remake

9/10

Minus some learning curve with tweaking the controls, I simply adored this remake to pieces. RE4 is my all time favorite RE game so I had high standards here and it almost exceeded my expectations in many ways. I love how they complimented most of the original game’s moments and environments with little nuanced extras from expanded locations within chapters or by just adding a new enemy or boss because reasons. Graphics wise, the RE engine is still one of the best graphics engines of late I feel and I played in performance mode with ray tracing on and it ran smooth as butter. Even the more annoying parts of the original game like babysitting Ashley didn’t feel as aggravating here for some reason and her sections with some new additions were pretty cool too. They also made some moments that I found scary and eerie in the OG game even more terrifying like the first encounter with the regenerators. And the replay value I feel is higher than ever with NG+ and collecting all the weapons and upgrades along with the merchant’s shooting gallery and mercenaries mode. I’ll definitely be returning again sooner than later for another play through. Alas,, Capcom continues its trend of being the poster child for how to do remakes just so right.

Finally got my first of May, been working on a few concurrently
Crysis 3 on the
25th overall, already have badge

I finally got around to playing and beat the first Crysis game like 2 years ago and had the other 2 as well from I think GwG so I beat 2 last year and finished off 3 tonight. Game was decent, they all felt generally similar, with 1 being the most unique I suppose since it starts in the jungles of North Korea while 2/3 are mostly in NYC. Don't ask me to give you a rundown on the story though, b/c in 3 it's confusing as all get out, not that 2 is much better. But it's an FPS, do we really care about the story that much? I generally don't.

I wanted to beat another long running (for me) FPS as well tonight, but I have a 4TB drive connected to my XSX which I've had a while as it was on my initial X1 and then X1X and I have played a lot of games off of it. Well the last 2 times I was playing this other title the system lost connection to the drive and thus the game crashed. So that wasn't fun and I need to look into that and get it resolved. I did try to move the game to the internal storage, but it failed 3 times in that process, so something is up with the drive or cable. I did switch to a different cable and a different USB port on the console and it seemed to be okay, but then my time with the TV ended so I haven't been able to investigate further. At least I could just redownload it onto another drive or the internal if I need to, but I'll be wanting to fix or replace that drive as I generally have like 140+ games on it that and as mentioned have played a lot from it. When it was down, I only had like 15 games on the internal 1TB.

Beat legend of zelda link between worlds on the 3ds this morning and gets me the first half of the hylian hero badge

#38: Star Wars Jedi: Survivor on PS5. I would like to count this toward the Hyrulian Hero badge please. This was really good. The fast travel option (which I didn't notice until probably halfway through) was much appreciated and will make getting the rest of the collectibles far less painful than was the case with Fallen Order. Compared with the previous game, the map is still annoying, but the combat is better, and the story was engaging by the end. Graphically, it looks really solid, and it played smoothly as well.

#11 Mass Effect: Andromeda (PS4). Pales in comparison to the original trilogy of course, but overall not a terrible game.

Updating... Please save new clears until I've finished...

Done! I would've put River City Ransom EX for me, but I can't be bothered to beat it since it's garbage.

Since you're done Sarna I'll post now.
Got my 2nd of May and 26th overall, 1st
Mighty Doom
I almost want to count this towards You're Winner - I'll explain.

I played a similar game to this a few years ago on my phone that I can't recall the name of currently, but it was an auto-shooter and it hooked me, but it was great with progression and you would hit level gates but it always felt like you were slowly making progress, earning upgrades and moving forward, the grind was there but was fair, in Might Doom they are so MF'n stingy with upgrades the progression is nearly broken. It was so bad that I hate that I liked that style of game and got sucked into it, I hate myself for spending $$ on the game too, but I pretty much had to.

Here's a quick premise of the game, you are the Doom Slayer and can equip a helmet, chest, gloves and boots, as well as you need a main weapon that you fire constantly, then a heavy weapon that is on a 10 second cool down that resets each floor, plus an auto-canon on your shoulder and an ultimate weapon that takes kills to earn, generally I could fire it about every 8-11 floors. You start a run with your gear and get up to 11 'random' perks from 3 options each time you level up. You have to clear each floor to move forward and some foes will get stunned momentarily before dying such that you can glory kill them for health. The 5s floors (5, 15, 25, 35) you get 'an offer' of either healing some or 1 of 3 minor boosts (crit, fire rate, damage) and after you beat the bosses on floor 10, 20, 30 you get either a spinning wheel or a perk and curse option like melee damage boon for ranged damage curse. Your main weapon can be the assault rifle, shotgun, plasma gun, burst rifle or chain gun; heavy can be rocket launcher, gauss cannon, super shotgun or ballista; shoulder canons can be acid, ice, electric, explosive or fire and lastly the ultimate can be the chainsaw, crucible sword, BFG9k or unmaker. All pieces of gear come in 4 levels, common, uncommon, rare, epic and 3 of a lower level can be merged into a higher rank. Floor 40 is the final boss and if you die you can revive once per run via watching an ad, or using some gems currency or 2 different floppy disk things you can get. Every dead enemy also drops a base currency used to upgrade your dude or gear as well as about a 0.0001% chance of getting a piece of gear - no joke I made likely legit over 2 hundred runs and got maybe 20 things, it was BS.
So I started playing and got 'stuck' on a few worlds where I needed to gain XP it seemed to progress, then in April they did a month long Easter event with daily missions vs. bunny zombies and a perk tree you could unlock. That's when I spent $7 (thankfully from Google Rewards so not my actually $$) to access the 2nd track of upgrades for that month. By the time it was over I was maxed at level 60, had my preferred chain gun to a green (uncommon) max of 40, my rocket launcher at blue 60 max, BFG9k blue 60 max and a blue shoulder canon at 60 max. I also had a helmet, chest and gloves I preferred all at blue 60 max, but my boots were only green 40. And. I. Could. Not. Beat. World 9.
I could absolutely blitz 1-7 with this setup and generally beat 8, sometimes having issues, but mostly not. I nearly quit then, frustratingly stuck on 9, but May started and a new monthlong event and I eventually earned all of the free upgrades and got a different shoulder canon up to magenta epic and started to push it's level above 60, I also got a new set of gloves that I didn't love to epic and pushed above 60... and still couldn't get World 9. I could finally get to the floor 40 boss a few times, but floors 31 and up were brutal. They also raised the Slayer's max level to 70 and I eventually hit that peak and still no dice, it was clear that I needed a stronger weapon. I had the shotgun to blue and around level 48, but it's shorter range and slow fire was tough. I also got different boots to blue and hit level 45.
So I broke down last night and bought the May pass (again for $7 and again with Rewards funds). It included like a dozen keys to chests that I opened, hoping for another green or grey (common) chain gun to merge up... and I got jack squat. But I also got like 200+ of these gems to redeem towards chests and S.O.A.B. I got the grey chain gun I needed. Since then, with the gun now upgraded to around level 55, as well as pushing the canon and gloves into the low 70s, I finally had enough damage and health to beat World 9. When the May update dropped, they released a new World, 10 and it's like World 5, with a slightly different progression layout, but since it wasn't part of the original release, I'm counting this dumpster fire as completed.

All that said, I really don't think this is You're Winner worthy, b/c the game is well made, it's just total trash in terms of stingy with upgrades that are 100% required to beat World 9 - which really is a mobile game's way of doing things. I took 1 run at World 10 and got to floor 13 (of only 20) so I think I'll keep playing this disgusting game until I max out a few of the gear pieces I'm using and beat World 10 - I 100% will NOT buy any more passes, I will not play it further if they add an 11th world. I gave it a 1/5 stars on the play store and a nasty review, it's just a crap game that hooked it's claws into me and I'm so glad I finally beat it. I'm looking forward to NOT playing too much more of it b/c I for sure put a LOT of time into it across the past 7+ weeks, when normally mobile games lose my interest in 1-2 weeks tops.

#10 - Super Mario World

Beat all but Special Road. I hadn't beat this since...best guess...early teens. Felt great to go back through it. I even remembered most of the secret paths to levels. Crazy how good our memory can be when we're younger. I could memorize much more back then...
Took about 7 hours.

image

Now time to finish up FFIX this month. I just hit disc 3 this morning.

I bought an NES on Saturday with about 13 games, so I beat one of them to get the system out of the way early. It was Batman Returns .
[imgt w=640 h=853]https://i.imgur.io/an6jeSB_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]
It’s a good if not great Konami beat’em up based on the controversial Tim Burton film Batman Returns. While there’s no Danny DeVito biting a reporter’s nose off, Christopher Walken overacting, Catwoman tazer-kissing a man to death, or Alfred Pennyworth having the hots for a woman half his age, it’s still a decent summation of the film. As a beat’em up, it’s not as versatile as Final Fight or something similar, and it gets repetitive pretty quickly. The later stages are super hard, but with enough persevere, you’ll save Gotham from the cold-blooded animal that is The Penguin.

This gets me halfway to the Quest for Peace badge. It looks like I’ll have to return to (sigh) River City Ransom EX if I want that darn Pile Drivin’ badge.

I beat enter the domminatrix (Saint's Row 4 DLC) on the xbox 1 I also beat South Park the Stick of Truth on the xbox1

My #24 is Resident Evil 8 Village: Shadows of Rose DLC

https://imgbox.com/Y6MNK63C

Didn't care for this one a whole lot, which I can't say why without spoilers. It just had some content that I thought was dumb. Being able to dodge at the end was nice though. 7/10

incubus421 wrote:
Did you do the haunted house shortcut? It was one of the first ones I ever found out.

FFIX? Ahhh, been on my to play list for a long time now.

I beat Monster Party . It was okay. You go around killing enemies and bosses as either the human, Mark, or the pterodactyl, Bert. They have different attacks and attributes. Bert is almost always the better pick for any situation, sadly. A few stages are frustrating or not thought out super well, but I managed. The ending is weird. I probably won't play this again, but at least now I can say I'm more skilled than JonTron.

nonamesleft wrote:

A lot of the Haunted Houses have secret paths, but I assume you're talking about the one in Donut Plains that leads to the 'Top Secret Area' level. I made tremendous use out of that spot as a kid!

Believe it or not, I have never played more than 5 hours of FFIX growing up. 23 years later, and I'm just now getting around to beating it...

I beat Locoroco .
[imgt w=640 h=480]https://i.imgur.io/KbSpUhK_d.webp?maxwidth=640&sha...[/imgt]

It’s a positive, quirky game where you tilt the world and pop colorful blobs into the air, scaling hills and bashing enemy Mojas in the process. Sometimes you’ll spring off bounce pads, other times you’ll catch a gust of wind to fly away, but you’ll always be singing a merry tune in a goofy, alien language. There are walls that can fall away to reveal secret characters to obtain, so your goal is to explore more than anything. It can get a little tedious after a while, so I’m glad it only has five worlds. It’s a pleasant little game, but I’ve had my fill for now. I bought the sequel at the same time, so I’ll get around to that someday.

3rd of May, 27th overall, 2nd
Rayman
Badge: 1st towards Hop 'n Bop

Beat this for Ren2k's RTT-GotM selection mainly. I hadn't jumped into a selection from there too much in the past few months and this one seemed worthwhile. I had tried my ROM for this on my last PC and it didn't run great, it ran pretty well on this newer machine and I took full advantage of save states as the game is generally pretty challenging and when I use save states I get dumb and go for a zero death run basically. That likely lengthened my time spent but the game was solid, it looked good on my monitor, full of bright and vibrant colors. Had some decent music and lots of cool mechanics sprinkled in. The platforming was more difficult than any foes or bosses really, outside of maybe 1 or 2. They were largely pattern matching, though earlier ones mixed up those patterns more vs. some of the final ones.
I might look to play some other main Rayman titles that I have, since I have Rayman 2, 3, the GBA ones, Legends and Origins.

4th of May, 28th overall, 9th
Doom (2016)
Already have the 2nd Amendment badge

I got this game with my original Xbox 1 way back in 2016 not long after it came out, but while it was only 1 of a few games I had, I really didn't play it much back then. And so it sat for a long while until this year when I wanted to focus some on non-GP titles (it is on GP, but I technically own it as well). Anyhow I jumped back into it several weeks ago and slowly made progress. I had apparently picked the 'Hurt me Plenty' level of difficulty which is more akin to hard and I didn't want to change it. So a few sections I needed to play 2, maybe 3-4 times, but in general I got pretty adept at it. Taking advantage of the staggered foes and constantly moving were key and then busting out the chainsaw when ammo got low.

The final boss was a little bit of a challenge, but after about my 5th attempt I got it. I also wanted to finally beat it to move forward onto Eternal, so I hope to get that a whirl sometime later this year.

Slickriven wrote:

I played that during the 2020 quarantine. I haven't played any other DOOM games, but I recall liking it. It was quite difficult, though.

I beat PAC-MAN with a high score of 44,970. Just shy of 45k. I didn't like PAC-MAN as a kid, but I've been coming around to it recently. I quite enjoyed my time with this. What I didn't like was trying to get it running. The NES I just bought on Saturday is a tempermental beast, and booting PAC-MAN gave me by far the most trouble out of all the carts I've tried. Very annoying!

Is it just me, or is Clyde particularly aggressive in the Tengen version of the game? It's not just me, right?

SupremeSarna wrote:

I cut my teeth back in the early 90s on the original Doom, Final Doom, Ultimate Doom, and Doom2. I also beat the PC port of Doom64 in '21 and the first title again in '19 for Frank's GotM club. It's a series I love, especially as it reminds me of my dad since he enjoyed those early Doom games on PC.

I got my 5th of May, 29th overall and 1st
Shock Troopers: 2nd Squad
Badge - I'm thinking I might seek to beat this 4x more times as it was generally fun, quick and there are 3 different paths, so I sort of want to try the other 2 at least.

This is also my 300th game since 2020, or so - I know some folks blew that out of the water nearly last year alone, but I had been recording my beat titles for this thread in a basic text document and recently decided to put them into a spreadsheet for better tracking/metrics and with a few others from before I joined this thread, I'm at 300 now. Kinda blows my mind that I've beat so many, if anyone cares I got 66, 120, 80 and 29 recorded in '20, '21, '22, '23 (so far) and that's 295, but I had beat 5 GamePass games in the later part of '19 that I also had recorded and thus included.

For this game, I was going through my still incomplete console list and picking a title to pursue for each when I got to NeoGeo. I decided to try to play something and my emulation wasn't setup, so I got that working and ended up giving Shock Troopers a go. Well 10 credits and maybe 30+ mins later I beat the mountain path. Game plays like a twin-stick shooter, but only with 1 stick, so if you hold down the fire button you remain aiming in that 1 of 8 direction and can move all around which gets a touch odd to control. You can also dodge-roll with B and fire a sub-weapon (grenade, rocket launcher, etc) with C. In a few sections I did great with not taking damage, but in others not so much. Game is kind of cool with like 8 different characters whom actually perform differently and have different sub-weapons. You can also select just 1 or 3 per credit, allowing you to try them out, it felt like they shared a 'normal' health bar as I would burn through the damage limit, per person, in that mode a bit faster vs. if I selected just the 1 character. Regardless, with the diff characters and paths, it surely lends itself to replaying, and as an arcade game at heart, that tracks. Only needing 10 credits, I thought, wasn't all that bad, since I was likely a touch iffy learning the controls and some boss fights or segments were tough, but apparently not as BS as some quarter-munching titles are.

I beat this on my PC via a ROM, but it's on my mini, so I think I will do at least 1 run on there to see how different that feels, could try 2 since there's on-device controls and I have a controller for it and they are different.
Once (if) I beat it 4x more times I'll let you know Sarna and you can give me the badge.

Slickriven wrote:

Wowzer! That's a lot of games, amd certainly a momentous occasion! Go out on the town top celebrate.