It’s been a packed second half of the year for major releases. I imagine that people held off on beginning Starfield until they wrapped up a few other things on their plate, since it’s such an investment in time. As for me, I have over two weeks off work starting today, so there will be a lot of quality time with this game in my future.
Level 25 now!
I agree with this. I wonder if Nintendo is secretly remaking the Oracle games into a single release with the Link’s Awakening visual style. It would be a natural fit given the original visual styles are basically identical.
This year I finished Final Fantasy 3-7 on Switch, along with 100% on Super Mario Bros. Wonder.
Last weekend I wrapped up Super Mario Bros. Wonder with 100% completion and so I’ve returned to Starfield. Level 21 and counting, currently playing through the Crimson Fleet questline.
I wish I could fly my ship wherever I wanted…
It’s the best 2D Mario since Super Mario World. I finished it with 6/6 medals (i.e., completed every last thing in the game). The five-star levels are a good challenge, although “The Final-Final Test” (final special level after acquiring 5/6 medals) is just cruel.
That’s a fun cover illustration!
Sinistar was terrifying back in the day. Every time he came after me I’d start to panic, haha.
Congrats! I’ve beaten most of the Zelda games and this is one of my favorites. (I tend to like the quirky first sequels where they tried something different, even if it doesn’t quite work: Zelda 2, Mario 2 (USA), Final Fantasy 2 (Japan), Castlevania 2…)
Following persistent threats targeting its employees, which it said had recently spread to attendees and event staff, the Splatoon Koshien 2023 National Finals and Nintendo Live 2024 will no longer go ahead.
[…]
The Splatoon 3 World Championship 2024, the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Online Challenge Final Stage, and the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe World Championship 2024, which were scheduled to take place at Nintendo Live 2024, have been postponed.
Threats of violence because of Splatoon and Mario Kart, really?
These people need to go outside.
For eShop games, sure. But if you want a physical copy, it’s often a good idea—especially if you want a limited edition, especially in a niche genre. Anyway, these games have already been released previously, so it’s not like game quality is really a factor in the decision.
An Atari 800 joystick, which was basically the same as the 2600 one. Many evenings spent playing Zaxxon, Miner 2049er, and so on, as well as simple games typed in from magazines.
Then I bought an NES and didn’t look back. Super Mario Bros. was way more advanced, not only in terms of graphics but also the fluidity of movement and the game pad design. And it was more fun!
Boy. It’s really hard to justify that price unless you only play on original hardware.
I have a bunch of original consoles, but I also own a bunch of Analogue FPGA consoles for direct HDMI output. MegaSD for Sega CD FPGA. GameCube has the Carby. Wii U for Wii games. And I’d probably be more inclined to play PlayStation 1 & 2 on my PS3 with hardware backwards compatibility and direct HDMI output.
So that leaves Dreamcast, which I just need to sit down and mod for HDMI since I already have it ready to go; Xbox, which just recently saw an HDMI mod (although I have the original component cables and an old Onkyo component to HDMI receiver I could set up if I were so inclined); Nintendo 64, which also has HDMI mods available; and PSP, for direct TV output (knowing I could get a PSTV if I were really so inclined).
So the question is, is upscaling to 4K worth the trouble on its own if the original signal is digital to begin with and I’m playing on a good LG 4K TV? And if so, is it worth $750 when I could theoretically use that money toward a few classic games in near mint condition instead? Hmm…
This stage was tough, but it wasn’t unfair; I beat it many times. The next stage, the one with the Turtle Van—that one was tough because of the mob enemies and because I had no idea what I was supposed to do. Watching long plays of it later, it’s really obvious why I only beat it a few times. The Mechaturtle boss was also brutal!
I never did make it past the airport. This game was ridiculous.
From this list it would be Final Fantasy 5, because of its similarities to the Final Fantasy Tactics games, which I adore. I really loved 5. Final Fantasy 7 is probably the better overall game from the perspective of ambitious goals versus what it achieved, but I had a lot more fun with 5.
I still haven’t played any mainline Final Fantasy game after 7 (except for a few hours of 8), but with all the various sequels I’ll get to 16 eventually! Well, it’ll probably be 17 at this rate.
Final Fantasy 6. I’ve played five other Final Fantasy games for the first time over the last 18 months (7, Crisis Core Reunion, 3, 4, 5), but this will be my last one for awhile. I need a break from random battles!
Exactly, every couple of years there was another big leap in verisimilitude.
Exactly, every couple of years there was another big leap in verisimilitude.
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It’s an interesting video, I suppose more so if you didn’t experience game history in real time like those of us who did. No one ever thought Half-Life looked real. But wow, if you experienced games starting with text only and colored squares like I did, each new capability was incredible.
In Zork, you were wondering around an entire dungeon, simulated in text. Anything was possible!
Then a game like Ultima VII came around. The world was so huge, and it felt like a whole world where I could do anything. It was to me how Skyrim was in its time.
Ultima Underworld (or Wolfenstein 3-D or Doom for most people) felt incredible because it was movement in a 3D space, but without step transitions like the earlier dungeon games. When I walk, I actually see my movement in real time!
Each step was bringing us closer and closer to reality, and when you get to a game like Half-Life, where it feels like a small section of a world was being faithfully simulated, it was incredible.
Is this the moment John Romero finally makes us his bitch?
But seriously, I have the big box version of the first SIGIL and it looks like I’ll be picking up one for this too.
It’s Skyrim, but instead of overworld exploration and emergent encountersa, it’s fast travel from mission to mission. As someone who put 350 hours into Skyrim, it really hit me that half of the fun to be had in Skyrim was the overworld exploration and emergent encounters.
The universe feels very small when you complete a mission, open up your mission list, and after a brief loading screen are standing in another city on another planet with a new set of tasks.
That’s why I said in my comment below that I just want to fly my damn ship into outer space. The system would have felt so much more satisfying if you could select a mission and then that star is highlighted from your in-ship augmented display, and you press the buttons to warp there, and then you’re at the edge of that solar system and can navigate to the specific planet in real time. During that time, you might encounter pirates, or find an asteroid mining installation, or hear a distress call, or detect a fleet of ships near a moon planning an attack.
And that’s another thing: the backstory for this game is all about the Colony War, a conflict between three sides that involved mechs and xenowarfare (using alien creatures to attack settlements). That sounds amazing: why didn’t we play in that time frame? By the time we’ve joined the universe, everything’s resolved and relatively peaceful, except for random psychopaths. I guess Bethesda didn’t want to invite ethical questions about killing people who were fighting for a good cause on each side, but, like… why not?