Lurker > Underleveled

I saw Ice Age 1 & 2 and Rio and thought all three of them were at least a solid B (eh, maybe Ice Age 2 was a little weaker than that, but it was more than acceptable), and I heard that Horton, Peanuts, Spies and Ferdinand were all fine.

Yeah it's really sad that Disney is now just buying up all their competitors and shutting them down.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

@red13n @JONALEON1 @Johnbobb

I found this pic of a gauntlet we did. The pool was every character that had ever been in a character battle, we did it probably right after the CBX bracket was released. Pretty great result, looking at that top 10 just brings a smile to my face.



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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

So something I realized I did in HZD to make it a little bit harder on myself. Some of the main story quests don't need to be done in order. I skipped the War Queen and Revenge of Nora quests, not realizing they were part of the main story and just trying to chug along, so I did other, later quests earlier and at lower levels than recommended. I went back and did those, a bit overleveled, and did them fairly easily. Now hopefully I can proceed a little easier. Although according to a quest list I looked up, there are still other quests I haven't found yet that are listed before the one I'm on now, so I dunno.

Anyway, I'm at level 16, with 11 story quests completed and just over 11 hours of gameplay.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

I'm stunned that Cap 1 is so low.

Strange or either GOTG being out soon would just be... awful.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

GBA

A couple models popped into my head almost simultaneously (the platinum original GBA I have and the Famicom-themed GBA Micro of all things) but I'm not sure which was first by a split second; regardless, it was GBA.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

Good, it shouldn't have outlasted the far superior controller from the same system.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

StartTheMachine posted...

Your have been epically pwned

This is the best part.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

https://screenrant.com/super-mario-64-donkey-kong-easter-egg-found/amp/

This one COULD be a coincidence but it's a bit too uncanny IMO.

It's amazing that 25 years later people are still making new discoveries about this game.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

The way he words it does sound like an "I'm taking my ball and leaving" situation but it seems like he's got perfectly legitimate beef, so it's a "You screwed me, so I'm not gonna put my game on your dying console" situation.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

Watch Dogs Legion is the only one I've played out of those, and it was a'ight, so it gets my vote. That being said, if you're a fan of the series, be warned that it deviates a lot from the first two, almost enough to call it a spinoff rather than Watch Dogs 3. It does, however, have a character that probably cracks my top 10, maybe even top 5, characters in all of gaming.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

Link's Crossbow Training (Wii)
Remember when we discussed rallying this into a games contest to see if anything Zelda/Link would automatically have at least an ounce of strength? Anyway, needed a break from HZD so I decided to go through this thing I've had sitting around for years and only played a little of long ago (that describes a lot of games I own but I knew this could be beaten in an afternoon).

This is what it is - a tech demo for a peripheral that was only compatible with a few games. I don't think I ever had any of those games, so this was the only thing I was ever going to use it for. It was essentially an arcade shooter with Link as the main character and Zelda-themed levels. There was a surprising variety of gameplay, with four or five different level types, rather than just an on-rail shooter through the whole thing. The stationary radar levels were the worst, because the only way you could turn was by bringing the cursor all the way to the side of the screen. This was particularly frustrating if enemies were right behind you. You should have been able to use the joystick, since it wasn't being used for anything else in those levels. The rest of the level types were good.

The time limit on the final boss was ridiculous and left no room for error. Several times I timed out with one or two shots left to go, which made the next try all the worse because my hands were shaking from the frustration. Technically you could get a medal on the final level without beating him (I actually got a platinum medal on the level without beating him; the only platinum medal I got in the game), but I wanted to beat him to consider the game beaten. To make matters worse, you had to go through the whole final level to try again, which meant I did the other two stages a million times.

The Wii Zapper itself is not a bad peripheral, and I wish it had been used on more games. It would've been a cool option on Metroid Prime Trilogy, for example, and heck, they could have straight up made more arcade shooters for the system. So yeah. I think I paid $15 for this in 2008 or 2009. It is what it is and I didn't expect it to be anything more. Heck, I maybe expected it to be a bit less, so call me oddly pleasantly surprised.

Wow, this was a surprisingly long, detailed write-up for Link's Goddamn Crossbow Training.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 13; Most recent - Link's Crossbow Training

It looks like the completion % encompasses all quests in the base game, not just main story quests, which would explain why mine seems so low compared to how long I've played and how many story quests I've done.

Anyway, this game is very overwhelming and I'm going to need to take little breaks from it like to play another game for a day or so.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Underleveled posted...

Okay I'm getting a LITTLE better but it's still not a great sign that I'm doing this bad this early.

I've gotten quite a bit better at this. I'm still too weak to take down most of the machines with stealth. I just did the Deathbringer battle at Maker's End which I found surprisingly easy considering I had just encountered two ambushes on my way there which depleted most of my health reserves. Still took me like three tries, but most big machines or battles against large numbers of enemies have been taking me, like, 5-6 tries at least, and half the time I get lucky and have something stupid happen that I didn't intend that takes out the biggest threat.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

GTM posted...

So... is that real Preston on the board or a imitator with too much time

It's the real deal.

Dunno why people default to imp when these notorious users keep coming back. We've never really had a successful imp.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Okay I'm getting a LITTLE better but it's still not a great sign that I'm doing this bad this early.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Yeah, I'm REALLY not doing well with this game. Trying to get to the second corruption area I died about 12 times, and now I can't beat the enemies there.

With all my deaths I've probably played about 7 hours, meaning I'm on pace for this game to take me 100+ hours which just isn't gonna happen.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Yeah, this might not be the game for me. Too bad because I was really looking forward to it. I can barely get around because i suck at combat with the machines. I'm also 4 and a half hours in and it says I've only made 7% story progress.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Oof, I really really suck at HZD :(

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

G is for geode, that good enough for me.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Wii U Pro should not be out before Joycons or anything on the NES.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Planning to start HZD tonight.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Super Mario Run (Mobile)
First time I think I can ever say I finished a game on a break at work. Finally wrapped this up having played most of it when it was fairly new. It's a free-to-play mobile game. It's fun for what it is and at times surprisingly tricky. Nothing I'd have paid more than a dollar or two for. I suppose this is exactly what I'd expect from a one-button 2D Mario platformer. It's nothing to write home about but it's not meant to be.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 12; Most recent - Super Mario Run

Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage (PS4)
Such an improvement over the first one! Level progression was much better, and even though I think the game was actually smaller in area than the first, there was so much more to do. Collecting orbs was way more involved and fulfilling than rescuing the dragons. The story was much better and the final boss fight was actually fun, unlike the awful one in the first game. Very satisfied with this one and I've heard that the third one is even better still.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 11; Most recent - Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage (Reignited)

Is anyone else having deja vu? I feel like this exact topic was made a year or two ago.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Torlovsk posted...

Oh damn, sorry to to hear he's gone. Just days after Hal Holbrook, too. Despite the age of some of his like, I always feel as though they could just keep on chugging for years to come.

Yeah he's one of those that I've always felt that way about.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

paulg235 posted...

Those who don't know who he is

That ought to be like, nobody over the age of 10, really.

RIP.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Cube > Switch Pro > Wii U Pro > Wii Classic (Pro) > SNES > Wiimote > Wii U Gamepad > Wavebird > N64 > NES > Virtual Boy > Joycons

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Leonhart4 posted...

Breath of the Wild

I actually thought of throwing this out there.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Yes. I mean he's like, legit the weakest between himself/Cookie/Ernie/Bert/Oscar/Grover/Count, but you can't not like him.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Astro's Playroom, for reasons already stated, plus it's actually exclusive to next-gen consoles and wasn't released alongside a downgraded version for PS4.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Is the main story longer in the complete edition, or the same length and all the additional stuff is optional?

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Pokemon

Specifically, the leaf energy symbol, on the Game Boy.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Nominate murder

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

RaidenGarai posted...

Aerosmith - I Don't Want to Miss a Thing

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Semisonic - Singing in My Sleep

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Spider-Man: Miles Morales (PS5)
Obviously not quite as good as the first, which is to be expected since it really isn't a full-fledged sequel, but I think calling it an expansion is not quite doing it justice. It feels kinda like what Lost Legacy was to the Uncharted series. A smaller-scale entry, but still a full-fledged game. Still a lot of fun. The changes to the combat took a lot of getting used to, despite the fact that they were mostly relatively minor tweaks. That being said I do like how these changes established Miles as his own Spider-Man rather than just being the same Spider-Man with a different person behind the mask. I liked Miles as a protagonist and the more personal relationship he had with the antagonists, whereas Peter's was mostly professional. I also wasn't a fan of the app. I liked just randomly finding crime in the first game, which felt rather absent in this one. I look forward to this series continuing. Hopefully the next one will be a joint-venture where you play as both Peter and Miles. Looks like they're finally setting Green Goblin up for the villain.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 10; Most recent - Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Not sure if you mean in regards to Rick or Chris, but if you mean Rick then I agree, but Chris winning in the fashion he did is probably the best result the twist could have realistically provided.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

Committing myself to HZD and I will keep an eye on sales for GRIS.

Nominate:
Yoshi's Woolly World

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

No

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

Lopen posted...

"what is it good for"

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

Yeah, Edge of Extinction isn't good but it's not bottom 5 bad.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

ffmasterjose posted...

They made capturing it in Gen 3 one of the hardest Pokemon to find in the wild.

Munchlax sure is hard to find in Gen 3.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

By extremely minor I mean those with just minutes or even seconds of screen time but still manage to evoke hatred in you.

The Last of Us - That sniper that taunts you as you make your way to him down the desolate street. Hated that fucker so much and I was so happy when Joel finally snapped his neck.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

So right now I'm on pace to beat 108 games this year. That's obviously not gonna fuckin' happen, but I think I could easily beat my personal best of 27 in a single year.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 8; Most recent - Man of Medan

One more to wrap up January...

A Hat in Time (Switch)
Sooo, based on how this board had spoken of this game in the past, I was expecting a masterpiece. I... didn't get that. I sure do have a lot of thoughts, but let's start with the good. I love how this was clearly a throwback to N64/PSX/Game Cube/PS2 era 3D platformers. The style, level design, characters, even animation were all reminiscent of those times, while looking just crisp enough to be on new platforms. The level design was great. Honestly, it reminded me a lot of Super Mario Sunshine (and I don't just mean the Time Warp levels, but the influence is particularly blatant in those), and, despite my gripes with the game that I will get to, I will probably recommend this to a friend who really, really loves that game. The music was fantastic. As a music lover, this is always a huge plus for me in any game I play, but particularly in platformers it seems to affect me the most. The humor was spot-on. It wasn't laugh-your-ass-off hilarious or anything, but I really appreciate when a game (or really any piece of media, but especially a game) can so pointedly and deliberately not take itself seriously. The characters, dialogue, and scenarios were so ridiculous that the game didn't just serve as a throwback to early 3D platformers; it was practically a parody of them. Mustache Girl, The Snatcher, DJ Grooves and The Conductor were all great, memorable characters.

And now for the bad. The first time I tried to play this game, over a year ago, I started to feel sick very early on (after just five hourglasses). I didn't really think the game was the cause, but because of an almost Pavlov-like reaction, I didn't go back to it. I restarted for this run through and once again, I started to feel sick very quickly. This time I figured it was the game, so my first thought was to turn down the brightness, which helped. So yeah, I had to turn down the game's default brightness to play it without getting sick. Great start. Technically, the game was a mess. The camera sucked. I have no idea how you can mess up a free-roaming camera on a 3D platformer in 2017, but they friggin' did it. The physics, specifically Hat Girl's interactions with objects, terrain, and enemies, were weird. It made it difficult for me to pull off the type of precise acrobatic maneuvers that I'm used to pulling off in, say, a 3D Mario game. These two things combined led to a lot of deaths that I really didn't feel were my fault. Lots of graphical glitches too. This, combined with the bad camera and wonky physics, made for an experience that felt very unpolished. Was that intentional, being a throwback to older games? If so, I didn't like it. A lot of the hourglasses were way too long for just a single hourglass. Murder on the Owl Express comes to mind (even though I loved it), but the biggest offender was the Alpine Skyline, which was just way too big and way too long for its own good. The Disease Has Spread was particularly annoying, basically having to go through the whole giant level all over again for one more hourglass. Oh, and in that level, it didn't autosave after every hourglass like it had done the entire game up until that point. You had to exit the level in order to save. This wasn't made clear to me and I shut the game off after getting two of them, and came back to find the level untouched. This frustrated me so badly that I put the game down for a week. Real nice.

Overall, while I'm glad I played it, I was a bit disappointed and didn't get the experienced I expected and hoped for going in. I can absolutely see what they were going for. There's something there, and even as it is there was plenty of good, but there were just too many flaws and the end result was a game that just didn't quite click as well as it could have. If they had just ironed out the creases, I think this really could have been an all-time stellar 3D platformer. Instead, it's just okay.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 9; Most recent - A Hat in Time

Amazing Race. I have a couple of niche favorites above it but the fifth season is almost universally considered the best.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 8; Most recent - Man of Medan

@Corrik7 the noises that my system makes after being turned off have subsided quite a bit (though not completely). How about yours?

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 8; Most recent - Man of Medan

The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan (PS4)
Oof, I kinda sucked on that one. My only survivors were Alex and Brad. Better than I predicted though. I predicted (rather arbitrarily) that I'd only get Alex out alive. Fliss died by failing the QTE when Brad was attacking her with the wrench. Conrad died by jumping instead of facing the pinup zombie. Julia died because when Brad went to crush Orson with the door, I thought the QTE was a single button press. By the time I realized I had to mash the square button repeatedly, it was too late. But I do consider this type of game "beaten" if I get at least one survivor, so there's that. This wasn't nearly as good as Until Dawn. Fewer characters meant less grouping/splitting up, which is an aspect of anything with an ensemble cast that I really enjoy, and none of these characters were nearly as good as the upper tier of Until Dawn's characters. On the plus side, I didn't outright dislike anyone in this one, which is more than I can say for Until Dawn. I hope eventually this series gets back up to UD quality. I might replay this in the future to try and get everyone out alive.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 8; Most recent - Man of Medan

TAR17:
1. Brook & Claire
2. Gary & Mallory
3. Jill & Thomas
4. Nat & Kat
5. Connor & Jonathan
6. Andie & Jenna
7. Katie & Rachel
8. Ron & Tony
9. Michael & Kevin
10. Chad & Stephanie
11. Nick & Vicki

I just rewatched this a year ago and already can't remember why I had Jill & Thomas so high which is probably a good indicator that I over-ranked them. Kevin's attitude towards his father really turned me off, and Nick's abusive behavior toward Vicki totally negated any hilarity their dumbassery brought to the season. I remembered ranking both of those teams highly when the season first aired. Never liked Chad though. His "LET'S GO STEPHANIE" is right up there with Karyn's "LENNYYYYYYYY!"

And since I never posted my full rankings...

TAR15:
1. Maria & Tiffany
2. Sam & Dan
3. Mika & Canaan
4. Zev & Justin
5. Brian & Ericka
6. Meghan & Cheyne
7. Flight Time & Big Easy
8. Gary & Matt
9. Marcy & Ron
10. Eric & Lisa
11. Garrett & Jessica
12. Lance & Keri

TAR16:
1. Jet & Cord
2. Carol & Brandy
3. Jordan & Jeff
4. Steve & Allie
5. Joe & Heidi
6. Dan & Jordan
7. Jodi & Shannon
8. Monique & Shawne
9. Dana & Adrian
10. Louie & Michael
11. Brent & Caite

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 7; Most recent - Sackboy: A Big Adventure

Sackboy: A Big Adventure (PS5)
A cute, fun, and at times surprisingly challenging 3D platformer a la Super Mario 3D World. The levels were very well-made, the music was catchy (I especially enjoyed the levels set to actual popular songs), there were extras worth seeking out (although I did give up on a few of the Knitted Knight challenges... that 8th one I was never ever gonna beat), the villain was very entertaining and most of the other side characters were worth a chuckle as well, and I really loved Sackboy's facial expressions in the cutscenes even though he never spoke. I also like how they never really abandoned ideas. To my recollection, nothing was introduced just to be in one level and then never revisited. A couple of negatives - I wish they had done more with the aforementioned songs set to pop songs, like actually have you platform to the beat instead of just having enemies and a few stage elements move to them. I never really cared too much about changing costumes; I guess none of them really appealed to me. Plus the costume seller was the most annoying character in the game. And some of the level objectives weren't very clear. I still don't know what the spade was one each level. Other than those few minor gripes, I really enjoyed this and might go back to collect some more of the stuff I missed. I'd never played a game in the LPB series before, but now I'm inclined to dive deeper. As the PS5's launch platformer, this was a pretty solid effort.

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darkx
Games beaten in 2021 - 7; Most recent - Sackboy: A Big Adventure