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Complete disaster
For some things, there's just no excuse.
I promised it! Now I am delivering on it! Come for the incredibly bad taste, stay for the mocking that will ensue!
First writeup in the next post.
(Oh, and as for spoilers, I'm going to put a spoiler warning around every writeup, just as a precaution. If the writeup will contain actual spoilers, which I'll try to avoid but some might slip by, I'll put a second warning in bold or something.)
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best track: Rainy Day - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rP93eavHbXo
Animal Crossing consumed my life for like... 8 months, starting a few weeks before I even bought it. That's a pretty impressive time span for any game, even if I only played less than an hour a day after a certain point.
I think Animal Crossing has a lot of atmosphere. If you ask people to name games with atmosphere, you'll get Metroid Prime, Shadow of the Colossus, etc. - this game really hit it out of the park for me, though. I spent hours on this game just fishing at ocean while it was raining. Redecorating my house. Planting fruit orchards. Designing new clothing patterns. Etc.
I bought an extra memory card to have a second town. I bought the GCN-GBA link cable to visit the island. I snuck away from my family for a few minutes on Christmas/Thanksgiving/New Years/etc. so I could visit the virtual celebration in my town. It was pretty nuts how seriously I took this game. In fact, thinking about it, I don't think there are many games I've taken more seriously than Animal Crossing. And Animal Crossing is usually listed as a "non-game", whatever that's supposed to mean these days. It's not fair, I tell you. <_<
I own the DS version, too, but I think by that point I had squeezed all the enjoyment I could from this series.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Deck I usually ran: Modified Haymaker
This is the first of many Pokemon games on this list.
I didn't play the Pokemon TCG for very long, compared to YGO and MTG, but I collected it for a pretty significant amount of time. This game, though. This game kicked ass. It was pretty simple - there are opponents, you should beat them, beating gets you new cards, use them to improve your deck, eventually challenge gym leader-equivalents and the E4-equivalent. But it worked. It was actually fun. It not only stuck to the actual rules of the card game, but also included a small adventure element. YGO games tend to get one or the other. MTG games... well. They try. Suffice to say, there are no MTG games anywhere near this list.
You know how I know this game is awesome? Wizards of the Coast recently announced another Magic: The Gathering video game. One of the first replies on their message boards about this announcement was, and I'm paraphrasing, "blah blah blah, another game that ignores the perfect formula put forth by Pokemon TCG for the GBC, yawn, wake me when something interesting is announced". And the damnedest thing is, he's right.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best gun: GL 40
One of the only games that manages to make the list via multiplayer.
Goldeneye is definitely the superior game objectively, but my friends and I got a lot more mileage out of this one because of one thing: bots. Somehow it just made the game a lot more fun to play. Frequently, we'd make the strongest bots possible, find some place on the map, set up camp there, and try to fend them off for as long as possible. This would invariably lead to one of us running out of ammo and having to leave to find some more while the other provided cover fire. Pretty awesome.
Funny story: I'm hilariously incompetent at any FPS made after the N64. If I wasn't, I'd probably be on Xbox Live 23 hours a day playing Call of Duty or Left 4 Dead or something, and my top 50 games list would no doubt be completely different. <_< Make no mistake, I'm incompetent at every FPS ever made, but only hilariously so when dual-analogue controls come into the picture.
The campaign of TWINE was also solid, but I never got past the horrible, horrible stealth level, so I can't comment on most of it. (Also, my N64 memory card was shoddy at best.) Still, this is definitely one of the most underrated N64 games. Seems it's forever doomed to live in Goldeneye's shadow.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Amount of money I paid for this game, which some people still deem too much to pay for one of the best platformers ever: $10
Second best Donkey Kong game ever made. Incidentally, number one isn't on this list, because this list only includes games I own, and I don't own Donkey Kong Country 2.
Anyway... if there's one game that gets unfairly critiqued by people who haven't played it, I'd say it's this one. I'm sure I'd change my answer if you asked me a week from now, though. The combination of playing a platformer game with plastic bongos, and the perceived blasphemy of changing the setting Rare spent several games establishing (as if Rare didn't do the exact same thing to this very series...) has led this game to get immediately written off as another Nintendo cash-in that doesn't match their classics. The association with Donkey Konga probably didn't help either.
This couldn't be further from the truth. This same game, made by a lesser developer, would surely be a disaster, or at best a largely forgotten cult classic. But Nintendo is talented enough to make this work. The way the game controls never fights against you. This is not a platformer that you're forced, for some reason, to play with a set of drums; this is not a platformer where you want a normal control scheme. Instead, the controls work for you, and work with the level design, and create what can only be described as a mix of a platformer and a rhythm game. There are no colored notes or dance steps: instead, enemies and obstacles and jumps are there, and require certain beats at certain times to surpass. Except those beats aren't telegraphed - you just know "I need to jump here" because it's a platformer. This is an odd game in that, if you watch a video of it, it's just a simple platformer. It only becomes a rhythm game once you start playing it, and once that happens, you realize that the drum controls work perfectly. Shortly thereafter, any thought of playing the game with buttons will be immediately equated to blatant heresy and stricken from your mind.
(As an aside, another thing regarding this game that the masses are uninformed about is that, yes, you can play it with a normal controller. And don't get me wrong, I'd rather you play this game with a normal controller than not at all. But when a developer like Nintendo says, "play this game with a set of bongos", you take the game and the bongos and play it that way, because what they're doing is important. They're challenging the conventions of this art form and if you're willing to form a mock band just to play Beatles songs with plastic instruments, it's not like a lack of dignity in video games is a problem for you.)
Unfortunately, as with all rhythm games it seems, I am terrible at this game and could never get the platinum medals for all the stages and unlock the bonus boss. But $10 for one of the best, most original platformers ever made was an absolute steal regardless of that.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best opponent: Don Flamenco
Going straight from one unconventional game to the equally unconventional game that probably inspired it, say hello to one of the best sports-but-not-really-sports games ever made. Officially, I think Punch-Out!! is a reflex-based puzzle game that masquerades as a boxing game, but I'm not going to subject you to another rant about that. Especially because, for once, I don't care. You play a boxer and the gameplay is all boxing, therefore it's a boxing game to me. No, shut up. I really don't care.
Punch-Out!! is an all time classic and one of the most likeable games ever. It manages a rare mix of being incredibly simple to understand but hard to master. It's pretty damn difficult but never feels unfair. Pretty much everyone likes this game at least a little, and if you don't, play it for five minutes and you will. And if you still don't, I hate you.
Let me make it perfectly clear: even if you hate boxing, play this game. Even if you hate video games, play this game. Worst case, completely unrealistic scenario, you won't like the gameplay but you'll still be amused by the incredibly racist ethnic stereotypes that make up your opponents. Yes, you fight a French man named Glass Joe who tells you to hurry up and beat him so he can retire. Yes, you fight an Indian man who teleports and throws magic punches, telegraphed by a gem on his turban. Yes, you fight a drunken Russian who says that he can't drive, so he's going to "walk all over you". And it's awesome.
(To be honest, I've never gotten past Soda Popinski legitimately, though not for a lack of trying. <_<)
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Why the hell is this guy playable?: Waddle Doo
The Kirby series has always been about fun, simple platforming. The games are pretty easy, short, and not challenging (by which I mean, they don't challenge you mentally or emotionally, or challenge your preconceptions about the genre or medium, and so forth). There's a time and place for stuff like that, but the lack of it, and a heavy dose of nostalgia, is what continues to draw me to Kirby games.
This game is not your typical Kirby game.
For one thing, it's actually fairly hard, especially the bonus content. For another, it's a platformer where you don't really control the character at all. At a time when the DS was struggling to find its niche, to make its primary features accepted on the world stage, Canvas Curse was one of the first games to say, "okay - we'll roll with that" (no pun intended). The result is an entirely stylus-driven game that tasks you with drawing paths for Kirby, who has been transformed into a small orb with no limbs or means of self-propulsion, that guide him safely to the end of the level. It's a breath of fresh air for the Kirby series, and was one of the first games that made people look at the DS and say, "maybe they've actually got something here".
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best gun: Wyrm
I'm sure I'll receive flak if I call this game an RPG - people seem to be pretty dead set about it being a fighting game - but screw it, if I cared about receiving flak my whole list would be completely different. Also, I don't think anyone on TFN has even played this game.
*ahem*
In a similar vein to the Tales series, this is an RPG with a battle system that plays like a fighting game. Except while Tales is closer to a 2D fighter, Custom Robo is more similar to, say, Power Stone. More importantly, rather than stats, you unlock parts for your Custom Robo. These fall into a few different categories - guns, mines, legs... I forget the rest. I think main bodies must be one. But anyway, each of these has different features/stats. For example: The legs affect how high you can jump and how many times. Guns are your main weapon and vary from weak but rapid firing to slow but powerful to a gun that shoots dragons.
Yes.
You can get a gun that shoots dragons. Homing dragons.
There's also a chicken mech. It's superfast, jumps all over the place, and is one of the best mechs in the game.
This is a game that attempted to have a serious storyline. <_<
On that note, best non-standard game over of all time: before the final battle, your friends ask if you'll help them defeat the main villain. If you say no, they'll ask again. If you keep saying no, eventually the game will announce, "Your friends left without you. They were never heard from again."
Hilarious. </spoiler>
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Message last edited by Kenri of the Yuri on 2/15/2010 at 09:59:13 PM
New Moderator
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
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IIRC it was like $10 a few years ago, so...
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
New Moderator
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
Editor
Best spell:
This game has a spell that lets you punch someone so hard, they turn into a butchershop. I'm pretty sure that's all I need to say about it.
More than any other game on this list, I think SS' placement is affected by its community. The reasons for this are A) obvious and B) because the vast majority of the list is singleplayer. I didn't plan that, it just happened that way.
SS is pretty much a grindfest, but it's an hilarious grindfest. The fact is, games exist to be fun and allow players to experience something. A game that can provide as many fond memories as SS did for me earns a place on this list. Period.
Also, quotes from the SS topics!
Ogor: Marutin has been added in the same place as before (f. 150). I don't think anyone can kill him, however. :\
xp: You're joking, right?
Marutin I was killed!
That was easy.
Ogor: I forgot about you, xp. >_>
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[xp has just annihilated Link Dude's entire team in one turn with Judgment]
xp: Moral of the story, don't piss off the gods.
Ogor: Something tells me Judgment might be overpowered.
I think it's the part about how it's thousands of virtually uncounterable damage.
xp: No, it's underpowered
It does like... 12 to Island Turtles.
Since when the hell can Island Turtles resist the wrath of the Gods?
Ogor: The stronger your opponent, the less damage it does.
Go figure.
xp: Going from 5,642,712 damage on Bass to 25 on an Island Turtle seems a bit extreme though.
Ogor: The formula allows for that. >_>
xp: Well, yeah, but come on. 25 on a ****ing turtle.
We need a stronger version.
Find some better gods whose wrath I can call upon. >_>
Ogor: Maybe these Gods will direct their wrath toward you next time. >_>
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(Also, see sig.)
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best power combo: GIGA DRILL BREAKER
This, however, is a traditional Kirby game, in the best sense. It's pretty easy with a few moments of genuine difficulty, it's fairly short, it's a game you can play to relax while still having an actual goal and chance of death and stuff.
Interesting fact you may not have consciously realized: there are two styles of Kirby games. The first is more fast-paced and more focused on powers and on using powers to fight. This includes Kirby's Adventure, Super Star, Amazing Mirror, Squeak Squad, and maybe Canvas Curse. (This style also has Meta Knight.) The second is slower and more focused on platforming and combining powers for utility purposes. This includes Kirby's Dream Land 2, Kirby's Dream Land 3, and Kirby 64. If you play Kirby's Dream Land, you can see emerging elements of both styles, so it makes sense that the series as a whole would be taken in two different directions. Personally, I like the second style better, and Kirby 64 is definitely the best of them. That should not, however, be taken as a criticism of KDL3, which is also awesome and by far the most underrated game in the series.
There are also quite a few cool powers in this game that never appear elsewhere. Tetherboulder and Giga Drill Breaker, I'm looking at you.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best wooable girl: Karen
...I'm not sure why this is above Animal Crossing, in retrospect, despite it being arguably the finest farming simulator on the GBA.
This game is seriously addictive as crack, which I am led to believe is very addictive. It's got a lot of separate elements and they all work pretty well to keep the game from getting boring despite being repetitive. It also has Chef B, the only chef gutsy enough to improvise his recipes... by adding rocks. If GameFAQs had taste, Chef B would have won every character battle including the villains contest and the female bracket and would get like 3280% on Cloud.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best non-wooable girl: Ruto
39 places too low mirite
And yes, I played this on the GCN.
There's really not anything I legitimately dislike about this game. Okay, some of the sidequests are garbage and the Water Temple can go **** itself, but overall OoT maintains a level of quality that is not only higher than most games, but more consistent, too.
No, it is not my favorite game ever, and it's actually sort of hard for me to understand how this could be the favorite game of such a large number of people, but it's definitely a better candidate for that reputation than a lot of other games I can think of.
As an aside, I'll never understand the whole "OoT is LttP in 3D" argument. Yes, they're sorta similar, but in terms of 1 to 1 parallels? Pretty much stops at "you collect 3 MacGuffins, then go to a different world and collect a bunch of other MacGuffins". Which is, admittedly, a fairly large parallel, but not more so than what you'd find in any other given sequel.
Speaking of dungeons, this game has some of the best dungeon design in the series. There's really not a single dungeon here I dislike - okay wait **** you Water Temple - which is something the majority of the series can't pull off and an easy way to hit my top 5 Zelda games.
Yeah this is the first of five Zelda games on this list. God, this list is such a trainwreck. That's why the opening post has a picture of a trainwreck. In case you didn't figure that out already.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Kenri's obligatory female main: Sabrina
I'm not even going to pretend this is an objective placement. I mean, this is an awesome, awesome puzzle game, but still.
Basically, my sister and I played this game a lot. A lot. There's a pretty significant amount of singleplayer stuff to do, and we finished a vast majority of it over the span of several years.
The Team Rocket mode - basically, you chase Team Rocket through a bunch of their disguises taken directly from the anime - was one of our favorites, probably just because she was a huge Team Rocket fangirl. >__>
In the end, I think I managed to do everything EXCEPT beat Mewtwo, the bonus boss, on the absolute hardest difficulty (IIRC, the difficulties were: Very Easy, Easy, Normal, Hard, Very Hard, and Super Hard), while she could do everything on Very Hard but never got to Mewtwo on Super Hard. Note that, against the later opponents on Super Hard, you tend to lose in the first 1 second of the match unless you hit the ground running, so to speak. Against Mewtwo, this drops to about .5 seconds; hopefully you can understand why I never beat this. I was pretty good at the game, but not THAT good.
Oh, this game also has an awesome multiplayer mode, which also saw a lot of use for me and my friends and family. It's great because you can choose your character and there's no real difference between them except for what they quip constantly while you're firing off combos. I picked Sabrina because A) it's pretty much a Kenri tradition that I'll end up maining a female character in any given game and B) she was an enormous troll. Nothing beats "Play with me! Play with me! Play with me! Play with me! Play with me! Play with me!" for annoying whoever you're playing against. <_<
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Another game I'm hugely nostalgic about. This should really be like 37 places higher.
I'm pretty sure I learned how to play CivII before I learned long division, and even though I was never any good at it, it was a game I really enjoyed because my dad and sister - neither of them
My usual strategy for this game was to look up Gunpowder on the tech tree, make a beeline for it, and then massacre everybody. Elephants and catapults vs. Marksmen, who ya got. It was funny, because sometimes you'd get to automatically learn one of the next two subjects in your tech tree, and for me it would be like: "Do you want to learn: 1) Nuclear physics or 2) the Alphabet". Oh, CivII. You are a silly, silly game. <_<
As an aside: **** the Carthaginians. I swear to god, they are on ****ing steroids, and just destroy you mercilessly. This is why I usually played as them, because the alternative was having to fight them, and that was bad news.
Civ games aren't exactly known for having great characters, but this one deserves note for your advisors. Basically, there's a group of like 5 people who will periodically yell at you and/or demand trivial crap that you don't have time for. Suffice to say, your entertainment advisor? Elvis. Awesome.
I do own CivIII, but I could never get into it. It was just so much more complicated than CivII, and CivII was already toeing the line of just how complicated a game can be while still being accessible to the Kenri demographic.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best gun: Inertial Element
One of the newest games on this list, so its position is less concrete than most of the others. Could move up or down. If I had to guess, I'd say up, but I obviously don't know for sure. Definitely need to replay it one of these days and see what happens.
This game was all-but marketed as the "next gen Super Metroid", which to me seems grossly unfair, because saying a thing is the "next gen X" implies that it will be X subjected to Y years of refinement, instead of simply ripping off X wholesale. Let's not beat around the bush here: there are red missile doors, you get a weapon that can freeze enemies so you can stand on them, there's a Speed Booster that activates when you run for a certain distance... This isn't next gen Super Metroid, it's Super Metroid with bullets instead of lasers. Funny thing is, the gameplay is good enough that they didn't have to rely on crutches like that. So I'm not sure why they actively chose to.
I've mentioned before that Shadow Complex's setting puts it behind both Metroid and Castlevania, and I stick by that. Real world + robots will never be as compelling as the fantasy realms of the other two series. Likewise, I've mentioned before that Shadow Complex's plot is just embarrassingly bad. But those are minor problems because the game just kicks ass regardless. Let me restate: if you have a 360, buy this game. Just do it. Sell a kidney if you have to. I want more of these to be made in the future.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Word the correct application of which can solve any puzzle: "Black hole"
This, on the other hand, I never want to play again. Not because it's bad, far from it, but do you realize that 100% completing it requires playing through the whole game four times? Oh my god, I do not understand why I did that in the span of a few weeks.
Basically, for those who don't know, Scribblenauts is a game where you're given puzzles, and you have the ability to summon (almost) any noun, which have their own properties and may be helpful to solving the puzzle or, more likely, will not be helpful, because why the hell did you think a lamp would help you climb a mountain? Summon some wings or something, jeez.
The game is hugely original and incredibly ambitious; if I had to name a single flaw, I'd say that it's a lack of difficulty. Some levels are genuinely hard, but many are just... not. The devs promised levels that would make us cry. There was no crying. I want my tear-inducing difficulty, dammit!
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
So let's get started.
[Spoiler for 35. Super Mario 64 DS, click to show]#35. Super Mario 64 DS (DS)
Surprisingly good water level: Jolly Roger Bay
The DS presents DS' Super Mario 64 DS (DS), by the DS. Exclusively on the DS.
I shouldn't have to tell you why SM64 is great. It set a standard for 3D platformers that most games of the genre are still falling short of. SM64 is definitely a game everyone should beat at least once, just because it's such a part of gaming culture. (I say this having never beaten FFVII, or beaten any Mega Man or Metal Gear game... Yeah I'm clearly an expert on required games to play.)
That said, I have a lot of problems continuing SM64 once I reach the levels situated in the uppermost part of the castle. It's not that these levels are bad, they're just... less good, and they tend to have some annoying element that I don't want to deal with. Like raising and lowering water levels, which is never fun in any game ever. As such, I think I've only done two full playthroughs - usually I get to the end and then play something else (which is slightly different from when I get to the end of a game and then get distracted by something else, in that this is intentional).
As for which version to play, it doesn't really matter. Playing the game period is more important than which version. However, I will say that SM64DS has 30 extra stars, somewhat amusing minigames, and controls that I personally did not have any problems with. I know that that's an unusual opinion, but what can I say? Maybe I'm just naturally predisposed to using a D-Pad.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Kenri's obligatory female main: Talim
Another multiplayer game. I think there's like one more on the whole list, so enjoy it while it lasts.
SCII is, well, it's an awesome fighter. It's awesome because I don't need to learn any bullshit to kick ass. Yes, there is a significant amount of bullshit to learn, a factor that has driven me away from 99% of the fighting games on the market even though it's potentially one of my favorite genres. I just don't have the patience to memorize stuff like down down-forward forward forward kick when the result for those five button presses is a dinky fireball that should be mapped to "A". I think bullshit covers it quite nicely.
Like I said, SCII has this stuff, but nothing is stopping you from just picking someone and spamming strong attacks (your basic moves being divided into strong attacks, fast attacks, and kicks, mainly) until everything dies. Unless your friends are assholes, or worse, actually talented, then you might have to actually learn how to play the game. Dear God, I hope that does not happen to you.
As an aside, I generally tend to play Soul Calibur II in much the same way Kenpachi Zaraki does battle, which is I ignore defense entirely and focus only on relentless offense. Worse, I focus only on the most offensive offense available. It's not that I can't play in other ways, I just have more fun not doing so. This has led to one of my favorite gaming moments of all time. To set the stage, it was a match between me and my best friend. I was getting absolutely destroyed, and he was mocking me, but then I suddenly started returning the destruction tenfold.
Friend: ...Is it me, or did you just get like five times better?
Me: I started blocking.
Anyway! Another great thing about Soul Calibur II is that it has an honest to god storymode. The story itself is vaguely interesting, but more importantly it does exactly what a storymode in a fighting game should do: string together a lot of regular battles with varying conditions under the pretense of a story. This is very appreciated compared to, say, turning a fighting game into a platformer for the story mode, for no reason. Luckily, I don't know of any games that attempt that. And why would they? It's a godawful idea. You'd have to be stupid to think that would work.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best ROM hack: -AIR- - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDSIuAg8F_U
Rejected second line: "#1 threat to the Mushroom Kingdom: LAKITU!!" God, **** Lakitu. **** it so hard. I cannot even express how much I ****ing hate these ****ing Lakitu. Oh my god. I'm moving on.
So! This is the definitive version of SMB1. No, I'm not going to tell you why. I haven't played this game in years and I can't even remember. It just is. It has extra content, thus it's better. Super Mario All-stars + World is probably the better package overall (a statement that is almost invariably true no matter which game you're comparing it to), but I don't own that. And now I'm moving on again.
I think I like SMB1 a lot more than most. It's my third favorite Mario platformer, which is something that seems outright incomprehensible to most people. It doesn't waste a lot of time on powerups, or flashy levels, or anything like that, which I'm sure is part of it. I also prefer the physics of SMB1 to most other games in the series, and I'm sure nostalgia plays a role.
...God, I cannot believe I'm doing a writeup for SMB1. Is there anyone who hasn't played this game? If you're reading this and haven't played SMB1, gtfo and play it instead of reading this. Much better use of your time. Emulate it if you have to. Now, **** it, I'm not going to talk about the gameplay anymore. I'm going to talk about a weird subject, because goddammit I did not take all those liberal arts classes to not subject people to my insane ramblings.
*ahem*
I might be the only person in the world who thinks this game is absolutely beautiful. I'm not even sure why. Something about the simple design and the muted, almost pastel choice of colors. I love how there are very few background elements, so it's really just Mario set against a solid blue sky. It makes the outside levels feel like they take place up in the sky, and it amps up the atmosphere by making you feel completely alone and detached from the rest of the Mushroom Kingdom (which, as we will learn in later games, is quite colorful and bustling). Then in World 8, the background's color shifts to solid black, and you really feel like you're moving towards an incredibly imposing stronghold of a very threatening villain.
Other Mario games have technically better graphics, but they fail to capture this sort of beautiful melancholy. That's probably intentional - it really doesn't fit the rest of the series from a thematic perspective. Heck, it probably wasn't even intentional here. That doesn't mean I can't appreciate it.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best move: Blaze's super-jump
When I first played through Sonic Rush Adventure, I beat it fairly quickly and decided it was a good game. Not amazing, but good. I replayed it recently and have changed my opinion to "pretty amazing, yeah". This is not a Sonic Genesis game. It does not pretend to be a Sonic Genesis game. It's similar in many ways, but it's also distinct. And it's just as good, if not better.
The best thing I can say about this game is that, if you're playing correctly, the world just feels puny and insignificant compared to you. You are a god in hedgehog or cat form and this? This is a playground for children. You are here to dismantle it. Enemies can't even slow you down. The biggest obstacles are just a button-press away from being an avenue for you to show off. And if you don't like something? You can just jump over it. I'm serious. For example, I was having trouble with the time trial in one of the first levels (might have even been the actual first level), as there's a part right before the end where you're forced into a third person, rail-grinding segment where you can't increase your speed. This sucks up about 5 seconds of time, time I didn't have. I was stuck here until I was told you could just jump over it. This is not sequence breaking. This is just Sonic and/or Blaze reaffirming that even ****ing game mechanics cannot contain them. If only this carried over to the 3D games, we'd really have something.
I suppose there is a story and some minigames and stuff, but let's be honest: even though none of that is godawful or anything, it is not why you are here, nor should it be.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Most interesting character that sucks: Renault
...AKA Fire Emblem 7, AKA just Fire Emblem.
This was my introduction to Fire Emblem, my introduction to SRPGs, my introduction to, uh, games that are actually difficult... You know what? I'll just say that despite owning video games since I was like 5, I didn't become what most people would call a "gamer" until I was like 12.
And yes, I did wonder why they had changed the names of Marth and Roy when I first started this game. Self, I am disappoint.
But anyway. If you're trying to get into SRPGs or just Fire Emblem, this is a pretty good place to start. It's pretty non-threatening, has a tutorial, gameplay's fairly simple, and you don't need to be brilliant/crazy to beat the game. Hard mode, yes, the regular game, not so much. At the same time, it's hard enough to force you to get decent at the genre if you want to continue. That, or cheese the game with Hector and Oswin. That definitely works too.
There are a few things I really like about Fire Emblem as a whole, all of which were introduced to me here. The very limited EXP and strict game progress prevents you from powerleveling and then just destroying everything like you can in most RPGs. There is a very real possibility of you screwing up horribly and being unable to finish the game (okay, not really, because again: Hector). Perma-death forces you to evaluate each move you make on a higher level than you normally would, because one mistake - one - and you either start the entire level over, or go on with a character permanently dead.
The funny thing is, normally I hate games with intrusive luck-based elements. In this case, it's sorta like Riviera's strict inventory limit: if you take something bad and make it a major focus of the game, and force the player to think about it from a tactical perspective, it can be transformed into a good element. Presumably through some sort of black magic that man was not meant to know, lest all of video gaming fall apart.
Oh, and I have a somewhat amusing Fire Emblem story to tell, but I'll save it for my FE9 writeup.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best track: Lost Courage - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g33NAdYB8GU
It's weird, the game soundtrack is really nothing special, except for that one track, which is absolutely amazing. Definitely one of my favorite tracks in any video game. Also, my obligatory female main is Videl/Great Saiyaman 2, but Lost Courage took priority there.
So DBZ. I don't even like DBZ, a fact I feel the need to consistently point out, because I KNOW I act like a closeted DBZ fan. But I don't like it. I really, really don't. Mainly because the pacing is horrible and just ruins it completely. You know what I DO like? Fighting games that actually try to have a compelling singleplayer mode. I don't require this, and I'm usually not going to knock them for trying and failing, but it's something I definitely enjoy when it's there. And every so often, a fighting game will succeed not only in offering a decent singleplayer mode, but a singleplayer mode that is actually worthy of being deemed the "main game". DBZBT2 delivers one like that, and in doing so chops out a good 90% of the anime's pacing woes. It's a marriage made in heaven!
Of course, I can't go any further without pointing out the other big draw of DBZBT2 besides its awesome, awesome story mode: the roster. The roster is enormous. Absolutely massive. Unbelievable. We're talking around one-hundred twenty playable characters. You know that scene in Animorphs, when a scout is reporting to one of the Yeerk leaders and says that Earth contains 6 billion potential hosts, and the guy's like "ahahaha surely you meant to say 6 million"? Yeah, it's kinda like that. And yes, a lot of the characters are very similar but goddammit, this game is fanservice anyway, might as well crank the fanservice up to 11.
I have to say that the thing I like most about the versus mode of this game, and I've talked about this before, is how fights almost never end anti-climactically. Matches in other fighters frequently end with one character getting kicked in the shins one too many times and just keeling over. Doesn't happen here. You're more likely to finish off an opponent with an attack that can be seen from space and destroys a good fifth of the planet. It just feels more satisfying.
"Ah! L-Lord Frieza!" best attack ever
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
[Spoiler for 29. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, click to show]#29. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii)
The best character in the entire Zelda series: Midna
So, yes. Midna. Midna is just... great. Easily the best character in the entire series. Actually, I think this game has a pretty good plot overall. Probably the best one in the series, though Wind Waker was pretty good in that regard too. (FYI - there are 3 more Zelda games on this list, and none of them are Wind Waker.)
Gameplay wise, this is my favorite 3D game in the series. Giving away more of my list! This would be profoundly unwise if I hadn't posted the list in advance. But anyway, I mentioned that OoT has great dungeons. TP has better dungeons. Even the Water Temple here is great. And Arbiter's Grounds is one of the best dungeons in the series.
The one thing WW has over this game is graphics, but that's not enough to affect my ranking.
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[Spoiler for 28. The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, click to show]#28. The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (DS)
Best character who is totally not Captain Jack Sparrow, we swear: Linebeck
I like this game a lot more than most. It combines the gameplay of LttP with the setting and art design of Wind Waker, which is a winning combination no matter how you look at it. The controls work, the puzzles are quite clever, and the dungeons are great.
It also takes a lot of the flaws of WW and fixes them. Sailing is now done by plotting a course on a map; your ship will move automatically. There's also no changing the wind's direction every five minutes which was the most tedious thing in the world in WW.
If I were to find a complaint with this game, I'd say that A) there are only like 8 items and B) none of them are new. On the other hand, all the items are taken to a level beyond how they're normally used, thanks to the touch controls and great puzzle and level design.
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[Spoiler for 27. The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, click to show]#27. The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap (GBA)
Lamest cane: Cane of Pacci
Oh goddammit another one of these already why did I agree to do this. LOOK GUYS IT'S A FUNNY COMIC LOOK AT THE FUNNY COMIC:
http://www.awkwardzombie.com/comic1-030308.php
Whew. Now this is a quality writeup. Well, it's a writeup that is located close to something of quality, at least.
Okay so Minish Cap. I've always liked the 2D Zelda games more than the 3D ones. I don't know why, it might have to do with nostalgia or something. Minish Cap is sort of a strange entry because it really dials down the size and scope of the world. Check out this world map:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/gbadvance/file/920670/34470
See? Tiny. And because of that, the world has a lot more personality; it manages to rival Wind Waker in that department, which is a pretty decent feat.
Did I mention that there's also a boss that is a pair of giant, flying manta rays that you fight in the sky over Hyrule by jumping back and forth between them? That boss is pretty awesome, yeah.
On the bad side, fuck Kinstone fusing. "Link. This sidequest involves tracking down everyone in the world and having the right Kinstone in order to fuse with them, then remembering the very, very slight change in the world that results and tracking it down. Oh, and some of these people will fuse with you more than once, and some of them won't fuse with you unless you leave the screen and reenter, for no apparent reason. There is no way to know which people you haven't fused with yet, so if you're missing one fusion... good luck with that! Link. Are you up for it?"
I repeat: Fuck. That. Shit.
Pardon my language.
As an aside, I find it hilarious that there are still people who deny that Minish Cap happens first in the timeline by citing a 145 year old interview that took place before TMC was even in development, that says that OoT comes first. Even though TMC is the story of why every Link wears a green hat. And the Link in OoT wears a green hat. No, I'm sure it's just a coincidence, wouldn't want to contradict the statement that this game blatantly contradicted! That would just be blasphemous.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best character: The Great Mizuti
Oh thank god no more Zelda games for a while.
Funny story: The GCN might have the best ratio of good JRPGs to total JRPGs of any console. I mean, it has less than 10, and almost all of them are worth playing! Whereas the PS2 has like 374 and only 97 are worth playing. Clearly this makes the GCN a superior console.
So Baten Kaitos. There are three things I want to talk about here. First of all, the graphics are amazing. Take a look at some screenshots some time. There's no reason these environments should even be playable; luckily, they're pre-rendered, which helps. It's crazy. There's a town entirely made out of candy, for example. I'm told the sequel has an area made of clay - actual, physical clay, modeled in real life and used as an in-game enviroment - which is why I haven't played the sequel yet, I'm pretty sure that would literally blow my mind.
Two, the game has a good story. If I was ranking the games on this list based on story, A) I wouldn't because that's a terrible idea, but B) Baten Kaitos would probably be top 3. There's also "that spoiler" which I won't mention because it's a huge spoiler, but seriously, "that spoiler" is so awesome. So awesome.
And three, the game technically has a card-based battle system, but you should be thinking less Yu-Gi-Oh and more Poker. Because that is what it is: Poker, with HP and elemental rock-paper-scissors and healing and cameras and ****. It's fantastic. Especially if you're smarter than me and figure out how to do it competently BEFORE the end of the game. But really, you wouldn't think poker would work as seamlessly as it does as the basis for an RPG battle system, but there you go.
So, tl;dr: play it play it play it play it play it. There is no goddamn reason that ****in' Tales of Symphonia should be considered _THE_ GCN RPG. And I like Tales of Symphonia, but oh my god, Baten Kaitos is so much better in every way.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best quote: oh god cannot decide
Star Fox 64 is basically an hilarious pastiche of a bunch of sci-fi/war movie tropes, mixed with incredibly solid rail-shooter gameplay. You're the inexperienced leader of a ragtag group of mercenaries and the son of a great hero who was killed on his last mission. Your co-pilots are your elderly mentor/your father's best friend, a cocky ace pilot who thinks he should be leading the group, and a kid genius who is great at building contraptions but a crappy pilot. Along the way you will encounter a rival group of mercenaries, an old buddy from military academy, and the ace pilot's clingy ex-lover. The main villain is an evil scientist that wants to rule the galaxy. What I'm saying is, it's not entirely original, but it works despite - or because of - that.
There's also the fact that, for example, if you play a level well, you'll send a cocky boss and his giant, heavily armored train colliding with his own supply depot, destroying them both in a giant fireball. I submit to you that that is one of the biggest "fuck you [insert awesomeface.jpg]" moments in all of fiction. Or, as you approach Venom, the planet where the main villain is hiding out, if your team botches the stealthy entrance, they decide to just blast their way through the entire enemy fleet, singlehandedly. Cue increasingly desperate banter between the level's bosses about how these four crazy guys are punching through every single defensive line they've got (the trio of "They've broken through the first line.", "They're through the second line!", and "THE LAST LINE HAS BEEN BREACHED!!" are actually some of my favorite quotes from this game). So, basically, the game works because it's awesome.
I guess the excellent gameplay doesn't hurt either, but I'm not really sure how to quantify that. It's just... good. Arcade-y and not too difficult (unless you're trying to get medals; fuck medals), and it controls well and remains fresh throughout. Though part of that is probably the game being only 2 hours long.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best power-up: Fire Flower, **** you Cape
Yeah I played this on the GBA.
My favorite 2D Mario game. I generally don't care about powerups and enjoy being able to revisit levels, which might explain why I like SMW and SMB1 more than, say, SMB3.
That could also be explained by SMB3 just being by far the worst game of the three.
SMW is a timeless classic, which is supported by the fact that it still has an active hacking community today. Not only does the game have amazing level design - there really aren't many levels I genuinely dislike, and the game has enough levels to make that pretty impressive - but that level design is used to hit a really good difficulty level. Most of the game is pretty simple, but some of the levels - the Ghost Houses, Castles, and Special World, in particular - are difficult enough to be challenging without being frustrating.
...Unless you're me, in which case you'll die 70 times trying to get one of the last two goals. I guess I was rusty, but I think that still warrants an epicfail.jpg
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
Best character: Drachma
"'Impossible' is just a word to let people feel good about themselves when they quit."
IN A WORLD
WHERE RPGS ARE GRIMDARK AND FILLED WITH ANGST
ATTEMPTING TO COPY THE SUCCESS OF FINAL FANTASY VII
ONE GAME
WILL MAKE A STAND
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wv6myhNrayg
Skies of Arcadia is pretty much the best RPG you'll ever play where the main character is a sky pirate who goes beyond the impossible, the main romantic pairing is a threesome, and even the minor characters will do something more incredibly awesome than most other RPGs' entire casts combined. No. Especially the minor characters.
Skies of Arcadia is a pretty flawed game in a lot of ways. There's the insane number of random encounters, the cliche story, the insane number of random encounters, the easily broken turn-based battle system, the insane number of random encounters, the insane number of random encounters, and last but certainly not least, the insane number of random encounters.
Incidentally, that's about the number of random encounters you'll run into every .3 seconds when playing this game. Oh, and you can't run from any battles if you want Vyse's best title. So THAT'S awesome.
Luckily, the rest of the game more than makes up for that. Even the cliche story I can't really fault because, well, cliches are cliches for a reason. They work. At least when done right. And Skies of Arcadia does just about every cliche just right. Also: if you have enough awesome characters doing awesome enough things, cliches become irrelevant.
Did I mention the ship battles? Best thing ever. I want a Skies of Arcadia 2/Skies of Babylon with the Tales battle system for random encounters and 10x more ship battles. It would seriously be the best JRPG ever.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic