River City Ransom

Now Playing July 2018

/ skoce / Leave a comment

Beaten

New Super Mario Bros U – I finally finished it up. I should have a post ready to go up soon. I was shocked at how much I enjoyed this, which says a lot when I went in expecting to enjoy it.

Pokemon Ultra Sun – read review here.

Ongoing

River City Knights of Justice – I had a long car ride and I had finished Pokemon and hit a snag on the next game I am trying to work through (see below), so I fired up River City Knights of Justice, the beat-em-up from a couple years ago that was a spin off River City Ransom, maybe my favorite game of all time, and set in a fantasy world. It is fine, but somehow also completely unsatisfying. It shouldn’t take me long to finish this, I think I am nearing the end, and will post my complete thoughts on the game somehow next month.

Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers – I don’t know if I ever posted it, but I started something about the giant stack of unbeaten Shin Megami Tensei games I have sitting around a couple of years ago and was planning to make a genuine effort to beat them. Since then, I think I’ve beaten two of them, including the newly released Persona 5. The games in this mega-series tend to be long and challenging, not something that a person can just play. But I pulled this out while searching around for a new to play on my 3DS. While I am only three or four hours into it, I like it so far. It is clearly a much earlier game in the series than what I am used to, so plenty of the streamlining that has made the games more playable are not present here. That doesn’t mean it’s bad, just a little more cumbersome than most 3DS games. It is definitely a SMT game. You recruit demons and fight through first person dungeons. The odd thing here is that the main character doesn’t have any magic. Which means that the magic stat for him is all but useless and cutting down build possibilities for the one character you get to make choices about down to nil. Still, so far it has been a good time, though I frequently I am not sure exactly where it wants me to go.

Suikoden V – I made a little progress and another post is coming about this game. I love this game.

Upcoming

Super Mario Galaxy – I started this up again a few months ago, but I intend to speed through this sooner rather than later.

Yakuza – Probably Yakuza 0, but I’ve also got Kiwami and 6 ready to go. I plan to get my PS4 back from my brother, after only 9 months, and I’m itching for the unique menacing goofiness of the Yakuza series.

25 Years 25 Games 14: Shin Nekketsu Kouha

/ skoce / 2 Comments

The next game in my yearlong celebration of the SNES is not one that was on the list when I posted it at the start of the year. This youtube video reminded me that this game exists, which was all the push I needed to actually play it. This game is Shin Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-tachi No Banka, which means something in Japanese; the game is a sequel of sorts to one of my favorite games of all time, River City Ransom, that never came to the USA and is virtually unknown.

Snk1

It isn’t a long game, taking no more than 3 or 4 hours the first time through, but that was enough for me to be really disappointed in some parts of the game. Not the music, which is pretty dang awesome. It is clearly along the same lines as the NES Kunio games (River City Ransom, Renegade, World Cup Soccer, Super Dodge-ball, Crash and the Boys Street Challenge) but done in that distinctive and or so enjoyable SNES style. The graphics are sharp as well. The problem is in the very structure of the game.

snk3

Shin Nekketsu Kouha loses me because it really isn’t the game I want it to be. That really isn’t the game’s fault; it isn’t trying to be that game. I wanted a follow up to River City Ransom, but this game is actually a follow up to Renegade. They are both parts of the same diverse, inconsistently localized series, but they are very different games. Renegade is an earlier, much simpler game than RCR was, and Shin Nekketsu Koha mostly sticks to that simpler format. There is no exploration or rpg elements, it is just a straight forward brawler. Really, it is simple even for a brawler. There are barely levels, only small room where you fight 3 or 4 enemies, then go through a door to the next area. Repeat that about three times before you fight a boss. The only things in the game to change things up are some Outrun-esque motorcycle stages. They are fine, if lacking in checkpoints, but aren’t really a draw. And while the combat itself is fine, it does lack variety. There are four playable characters: Kunio, Riki and their respective girlfriends, but their movesets are all similar. They have different special moves, and those are almost all you want to use. It gets repetitive.

snk2

Those areas can be interesting. Kunio and Riki’s quest takes them all over Tokyo. They start in jail, framed for a hit and run they didn’t commit, only to break out and search for answers at their schools, an amusement park, and a nightclub, among other places. The amusement park at least makes an attempt to break up the super simplistic level design, with one area having Kunio fighting on top of an in use Ferris Wheel and another having a Roller Coaster to ride that is nothing more than a novelty, a neat but unnecessary inclusion.

I did like how story based it was. Not that the story was anything great, just the two heroes on a quest to clear their names. It is the sort of thing that would have worked in an 80’s action movie. The twists are largely predictable, but it is enjoyable to watch things play out.

snk4

I don’t have Shin Nekketsu Kouha, it just isn’t the game I want it to be. It is a thoroughly competent brawler, though one that came pretty late to the brawler scene. I think there is a reason that this game has languished in obscurity. It just isn’t great. It hit years too late and followed up a rough draft of a game that was never that good in the first place. I am always eager to see more of Kunio, but that group of characters starred in a wide variety of games with just a wide range of quality. Still, I’ll always have River City Ransom.

Goodbye Nintendo Power

/ skoce / Leave a comment

The news earlier this week that Nintendo Power would cease publication hit me pretty hard. For many gamers who grew up in the days of the NES and the SNES, Nintendo Power holds a special place in their hearts. While it was blatant Nintendo propaganda and the strategies found within were frequently not ideal, the amount of love lavished on the games found inside was made the magazine eminently enjoyable. NP made each and every game seem like a classic. Yes, it existed to sell more games, but in those pre-internet days information was not that easy to come by. The loss of Nintendo Power feels like a big step away from gaming as I grew up with.

I wasn’t always subscribed to NP. I was for about two years around 89-91. I bought the magazine occasionally for the next decade before resubscribing a little before publishing switched over to Future. The magazines fortunes mostly followed its namesakes. In the 8 and 16-bit days Nintendo Power was amazing. There was always tons of excitement and plenty of games to cover. In the N64 and Gamecube days the excitement didn’t flag, though there was a lot less to be excited for. It sometimes made the magazine a depressing read. When it switched over to Future, it immediately got better. I’m not trying to bad mouth it from just before, but Nintendo Power over the last 5 years has been the best video game magazine on the shelf. I am disappointed that I let my subscription lapse in the last year. I have saved most of the issues I ever received and have spent plenty of time over the last week looking over them. It is truly sad to see it go.

In many ways Nintendo Power helped shape my gaming tastes, even when I wasn’t able to find or play the games it covered. I had no idea what an RPG was before I read the NP that covered Final Fantasy II. I didn’t play that game, at least not for more than an hour, until it was ported to the GBA but still I know that game front to back just from pouring over Nintendo Power. It made the game seem like such an amazing adventure that I had to play, but I was never able to find it. Then there was River City Ransom. Another game that just captured my imagination but this time I was able track it down. For once, at least, a game was everything Nintendo Power promised it would be. It was the usual beat-em-up with some RPG mechanics. Seeing those two games helped me realize just how many different kinds of games were out there, and seeing all the maps and screenshots in NP helped me visualize exactly how those games worked.

The loss of Nintendo Power is kind of forcing me to realize just how far from the mainstream I’ve become when it comes to gaming. I don’t think my tastes have really changed, but gaming has. I still like the same kinds of games I always have, but they are apparently not popular anymore. In the last year or so I’ve got so many new games that cater almost perfectly to me, games like Xenoblade, the Last Story, Solatorobo and Rayman Origins, but still this seems like an aberration rather than a trend. Most of the games I’ve really enjoyed have not enjoyed much in the way of sales success. The few interesting games that Japan is able to produce often have a hard time making it to America. I’m never going to be a fan of shooters and I’m never going to want more than one sports game for any system. It’s not that I think they aren’t good games, they just aren’t games that interest me. I’m not saying I am going to quit playing video games, but things like the shuttering of Nintendo Power show me that the current gaming industry doesn’t support the kind of things I like. Still, I have nearly 25 years of great gaming memories to look over and there are still plenty of great games I haven’t played.