Beaten

Contra 3 – see here.

Gradius 3 – see here.

7^th Dragon III: Code VDF –

I am going to have a full post for this game coming soon, but this turned out to be a nice surprise. I bought it out of excitement for the original DS game five or so years ago, a game that looked great but never came out on this side of the ocean. By the time it go to this third numbered game the series had morphed into something different. Still, this is a solid combination of the Wizardry descendant Etrian Odyssey and something with more of a traditional Dragon Quest lineage. It combines some truly unique classes with some of the most uneven difficulty I’ve seen in a long time. It is a weird, fun little game that I don’t expect to remember having played this time next year. It reminds me most of a mid-tier PS1 RPG, which is a uniquely enjoyable experience.

BoxBoxBoy – The original BoxBoy was one of the best games of last year, this is just more. When a game is as good as BoxBoy, more is really all you need. This time it lets the player make two sets of boxes, and then builds increasingly difficult puzzles around the various options that unlocks. With its simple graphics and character design, all the game has to rely on is its level design. Fortunately, in BoxBoxBoy that design is excellent. Each world is a class in introducing a concept before requiring mastery of said concept and finally combining that concept with previously learned concepts. If you own a 3DS, you need to own both this game and its predecessor.

Space Megaforce – 25 SNES post coming soon.

Ongoing

Illusion of Gaia – The further I get into this game the more I like it. I should have a post about it coming before too much longer. This is the good stuff; this is why I am playing SNES games to this day.

Super Mario RPG – I did start over with the WiiU VC version of this, because I am a glutton for punishment. This has always just been one of those games for me, games that I’ve had the chance to play some and really enjoy, but have never been able to find the time to actually sit down and play it all the way through. I am going to make August the time I do that, I swear it this time. And you know my word means … nothing.

Monster Hunter Generations – Now that I’m done with 7^th Dragon, this will be the new fixture in my 3DS’s cartridge slot. I don’t think I ever played Monster Hunter 4 enough, and might actually go back to it this fall, but there is nothing like a Monster Hunter game to eat hours of hours of gaming time. I’ve don’t usually fall for this sort of game. MMOs hold no interest for me, and I never could get more than a couple hours into Diablo or any of its clones, but MH really hits the spot for me. Starting this game out, it seems like they’ve changed things up just enough to make it worth owning alongside MH4U. The styles are a neat idea, if maybe not one they got quite right the first time out. I haven’t played it enough to say for sure. I am trying to stay away from my usual MH weapon, the hammer, this time out. That was the one that immediately grabbed me when I first played MH3U, and I mostly stuck with it in the sequel. Now I am trying out various other weapons, from gunlance to sword and shield. I don’t know what I am going to stick with, though. Every weapon is reminding me the ways that it isn’t the hammer.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE –

This game is so much better than I expected. After building up in my head what SMT X Fire Emblem could be, when it was revealed to be this I was more than a little disappointed. Still, I had enough faith in Nintendo and Atlus to get the game. As goofy and weightless as the game is, it has an undeniable charm. Maybe it’s just playing a full-fledged JRPG on a big screen, something that has become a distressingly rare occurrence over the last console generation, but there is something remarkably well done about TMS#FE. It is a big game with numerous, complex system, but all of those systems complement each other. This is a game made with a vision that has resulted in a something completely coherent.

Kirby & The Rainbow Curse – I’ve played through the first world of this game. The look is wonderful; no one does aesthetics like Nintendo. Who needs realism when you can make a game look like it’s made out of clay? I don’t know that I am as fully sold on the gameplay. It is different and occasionally tedious, but there is something there. I just don’t know if Nintendo found it.

Upcoming

Yakuza 5 – I bought this the day it came out, but have barely put an hour into actually playing it. Now it is available for free with PS+, showing that I am ever good with my money. I am going to keep putting it in this section until I shame myself into actually playing it.

Fire Emblem Fates Revelations – I’ve taken enough of a break after beating both Birthright and Conquest, it feels like time to get back to what is essentially the third part of this trilogy.

Hyper Light Drifter – I’ve got a controller to play this, since it is compatible with my current set up, but I got this with the Kickstarter and really want to play it. I intend to make time sometime in the coming weeks.

Eliiot Quest – I started this early in the year, but got distracted. I have a lot of games I need to finish before I get back to this, but I really want to.

Secret of Evermore – I am putting this on her as wishful thinking as much as any real intention to get to it in August. Illusion of Gaia should be finished soon, and hopefully Super Mario RPG not long after that, but I don’t know that how much time I’ll have for yet another 16-Bit RPG (of sorts) in the next month. Maybe I should have put Skyblazer or Wild Guns here, but I really think Evermore is next after Illusion of Gaia.

Beaten

Kirby Planet Robobot – see post here.

Bravely Second: End Layer – full post coming soon.

Sparkster – see post here.

Ongoing

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE – I only just got started, but so far this game has vastly exceeded my expectations after more than the title was revealed. The subject matter may not be to everyone’s taste, but the gameplay is great so far.

Super Mario RPG –

I swear, I will beat this game. Now I’ve got a decision to make, since this game finally came to WiiU VC. I am fairly certain that my save won’t transfer, but I know that I am much more likely to play the game on the tablet than through Wii mode. I do most of gaming on my 3DS while watching sports or something on TV; I don’t spend a lot of time playing on the big screen. I’ll figure out which route I take and finish this game up soon.

Illusion of Gaia – I’ve cleared the first few hours of this game and it isn’t quite what I expected. It is some sort of very linear Zelda game. It looks great, sounds great and plays great. I can’t wait to get back to it.

Kirby & The Rainbow Curse –

Nintendo had an E3 sale, and I bit the bullet on this. I absolutely adore the graphics, Nintendo consistently blows everyone else out of the water when it comes to art design, but I can’t say I wouldn’t have just rather had a regular Kirby platformer. Still, this is what the Kirby series does, some platformers mixed with weird experimental stuff. This is more like Canvas Curse on the DS, which is interesting, but frustrating to control at times. It is just something different than the player is used to.

Upcoming

Box Box Boy – Box Boy was an absolute delight, this sequel looks like just more of the same. That is exactly what I want, more Box Boy. There do have some wrinkles – I saw color in the trailer – but more box pushing puzzles are all I need.

Monster Hunter Generations – I have greatly enjoyed the last two Monster Hunter games that have come to the West and this one doesn’t look to change anything. I am a little unsure of how much I need this when I have large amounts of MH4U that are still unexplored, but I kind of plateaued on that game right at the edge of G Rank. That is when I stop really enjoying those games.

7^th Dragon III Code VFD – I was really excited for the first game in this series, but it never left Japan. When this one was announced to come over here, I immediately preordered it. It appears to play quite similarly to Etrian Odyssey, but from a third person perspective.

When I saw Kirby Planet Robobot was coming out soon I was a little surprised. The previous Kirby 3DS game had just come out, right? In fact, it has been more than two years since Kirby Triple Deluxe delighted players. So maybe enough time had passed for a new Kirby platformer. Planet Robobot at least brings something completely new to the table, with Nintendo’s adaptable pink puff ball getting a big pink mech suit to stomp around in. It isn’t much of a change, just a slight adaptation of the usual Kirby gameplay. Still, what this game lacks in originality, it more than makes up for in polish and design.

Planet Robobot looks and plays largely identically to Triple Deluxe. That is a very good thing. It looks great; bright and colorful with expressive characters and monstrous bosses. Kirby has his usual array of copy abilities, as well a few new ones. In other words, it is a Kirby game. The move sets of his abilities aren’t the series most complex, there is still a wide variety of skill and maneuvers to master. It also keeps Triple Deluxe’s plane hopping, with the player forced to solve puzzles by leaping back and forth from the foreground to the background.

The game isn’t hard, no Kirby game is, but it does set up some very interesting puzzles and just enough collecting to be interesting without overdoing it. It is easy to speed through the game and ignore that stuff and it is just difficult enough to slog through and collect every last thing. It strikes a very good balance.

The plot of this game is that some sort of evil corporate robot is taking over Kirby’s star world, turning everyone else into robots. It is little more than an aesthetic change, but it does give an excuse to remix the classic Kirby bosses into slightly more robotic forms. Then there is the Mech suit, which largely operates like ones from Mega Man X, except that it too has Kirby’s copy powers. Again, that opens up plenty of interesting gameplay possibilities. There are destructible portions of levels, but getting all the secrets means realizing what needs to be destroyed and what needs to be preserved.

Nintendo tosses off routinely excellent platformers like this a couple of times a year. Not all of them are transcendent masterpieces like Super Mario Galaxy or Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze, but even the worst of their output is leagues better than what anyone else is doing. Few other big game companies are even attempting this sort of game anymore and the indie titles rarely manage this supreme competence. Kirby Planet Robobot is not among Nintendo’s upper echelon of platformers. It doesn’t match the Wii’s superlative Kirby Return to Dreamland. Still, it is excellent from a technical standpoint and the robot trappings are engaging. That big pink mech is somehow both badass and adorable. As I said wrote earlier, there is a routine excellence to this game. It plays perfectly well, but it never feels like Nintendo is really laboring for it. It is thoroughly satisfying but not especially memorable. Ah well, on to Box Box Boy, the next game from Nintendo’s platformer factory.

500-700

Beaten

Run Saber – wrote about it here.

Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse – wrote about it here.

Ongoing

Super Mario RPG – I keep promising, but I keep putting this off. I don’t know why. I like the game, I like it a whole lot. AS is obvious by the emptiness of this post this month, I just haven’t had the time to play much of any game, let alone get enough time to play through an RPG on an actual TV. I will have it finished shortly this time.

Bravely Second –

When I am finally able to finish this I will have a full write up, but this game is really good. I liked the first one enough and this one seems to have fixed almost all of the problems that game had. I can’t say for sure if it fixed the single biggest flaw of that game, having to beat it five times to get the real ending, but it has improved the rest of it. The new classes are a lot of fun so far.

Upcoming

Kirby Planet Robobot – I have a well-established record for liking Kirby games. I loved the last game on the 3DS and this one looks like more of the same in all the best ways.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE – I am pretty nervous about this game. The idea of a SMT and Fire Emblem crossover was hugely exciting, but this game seems to have taken the worst parts of both franchises. I’ m still in, but I’m not as excited for it as I was for my idea of it before I actually saw it. Still, I haven’t given up all hope that it will be worth playing.

Illusion of Gaia – I am getting on this sometime on June. I’ve just got to get my old TV working so I can play it on my real SNES.

Sparkster – After Super Mario RPG and Illusion of Gaia, this is my next SNES game.

Okay, I know I’ve been promising Super Mario RPG for at least two months, but this entry on my celebration of the SNES is Run Saber, another fairly short action game. A pretty great action game, as well. I mean, its Strider. While it isn’t quite a 1 to 1 copy of that game, it is definitely more than just reminiscent of that Capcom’s classic. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, Run Saber is a copy of a pretty dang good game.

The story of the game is some generic sci-fi stuff. The Sabers are some sort of cyborg super soldiers, dispatched to deal with a mad scientist bent on conquering the earth, as well as a rogue saber. The player gets to choose between Allen, the male Saber with lightning powers, and Sheena, the female Saber with ice powers, or both if playing two players. It controls well, with the player given a decent array of moves. You can jump and attack, as well as use a screen clearing super attack. The player character is very mobile, able to climb walls and ceiling as well as perform a Mega Man like slide. It is a solid set up for a game.

It all plays out about the same way as Strider, with fast paced over the top action. The game has five fairly sprawling levels. The levels are more elaborate affairs than just going left or right, taking good advantage of the acrobatic skills to move the levels up and down and back and forth. The regular enemies aren’t particularly varied or numerous, but they are enough to keep the player busy. There are quite a few bosses, most of which look nice. I never really learned them, opting instead to cheese through with an emulator, but they provide new and interesting challenges. The boss of the first level takes place on top of a flying jet, with the player character hanging on for dear life as the plane flips and rolls.

The game looks good as well. Good, not great. The player’s sprites a big and colorful, but they seem to be lacking some animation. The animations they do have look good, but there are times when it seems like there should be more there than there is. The big one I am thinking of is the running animations, because there aren’t any. Double tapping one direction will set the player running that direction, but while the character goes faster the moving animation stays the same. It is disorienting.

In all, Run Saber is a lot of fun. It is clearly derivative, but it still possesses its own charm. It is also apparently the only output by its developer Horisoft, which is sad since this is a very solid first effort. I don’t really know where they could have taken Run Saber from here, other than to make it bigger and prettier, but gameplaywise this is about at the pinnacle of 2D action.

There is nothing less surprising than the reaction by the gaming press to a Nintendo release that experiments with motion controls. Most reviews were little more than tantrums, with the reviews coming off as spoiled toddlers crying about being told to eat a new kind of food. Not even vegetables, something that is not expected to taste good, more like a dessert that just happens to be green or something. Instead of considered evaluations of the game, I’ve seen a lot of kneejerk wailing and whining about motion controls. That being the subject of discussion is a disservice to the game that is Star Fox Zero.

With the Star Fox series, Nintendo seems to be stuck. They have an admirable yet disappointing refusal to just make Star Fox 64 again (except with Star Fox 64 3D, which was exactly that), which is what everyone wants. And they can’t quite figure out what to do with that series otherwise. It is worth noting that Star Fox Zero is only the fourth Star Fox game Nintendo has both developed and released. The original was perfected with 64, but after that the series ground to a halt. Ignoring the farmed out games, both of Nintendo’s Star Fox games have stuck tightly to the structure of SF64, but have experimented with controls. Many parts of Star Fox Command just didn’t work quite right, aside from the game having a story that was filled with batshit insanity. Star Fox Zero, once the player learns the controls, approaches Star Fox 64 in feel and quality.

The game doesn’t put its best foot forward. The first few stages are easily the game’s weakest. It is frontloaded with a couple of levels that use some of the game’s least fun vehicles. Aside from the Arwing, Star Fox Zero puts the player in control of the Landmaster, Gyrowing, and the Walker. Each one has different controls. For the most part adapting to each set of controls only takes a little bit of time, but the first few levels switch the player from Arwing to Walker and Gyrowing mid-mission, giving no time to learn them. The second and third levels can be extremely frustrating due to that, at least on the first time through. After that they work just fine.

While each of the vehicles is a fun time once learned, the game is at its best when it just lets the player fly the Arwing. Those portions are just as good as Star Fox 64. There are some changes, including a view mode that locks the TV on a target, making the player deal with a strange camera or play on the tablet using cockpit mode. It is awkward at first, but it soon feels, if not natural then just not particularly cumbersome. For the most part the Arwing missions, and to a slightly lesser extent the Landmaster ones, perfectly capture that joyous feeling of being in a Star Wars style dogfight.

Star Fox Zero is not a home run all-time classic like the best of Nintendo’s output, but it is still a solidly fun game. At its best moments it is on par with the untouchably good Star Fox 64. It is too bad the game is caught in that inescapable trap that the wider gaming community and Nintendo themselves have caught Nintendo in. The story goes that the WiiU is a failure because no one takes advantage of it dual screen set up. Except that when a game does, like Star Fox Zero or The Wonderful 101 or even Pikmin 3, the complaint is that the game uses both screens and has tied itself too closely to the WiiU hardware. There is nothing changing the narrative of the WiiU at this point, but the unrelenting negativity to one of the only companies that seems at all interested in moving games forward in some meaningful way is why I am feeling more and more disconnect with the medium at large. No, Star Fox Zero is not a perfect game, or even a great one, but it is damn fine game in a genre that doesn’t get much love these days that also tries to explore new ground with how games are played. I would much rather play it than yet another FPS.