Lurker > Djungelurban

Ok.

I guess that's in the eye of the beholder... But personally I liked Long Live the Princess... Featuring an actual story with some decent writing. There are some actual twists and turns and mysteries that are genuinely surprising. It even features its very own somewhat original mythos. Gameplay strikes a good balance between a sandbox and visual novelesque storytelling. And unlike most games of it's kind it actually has an ending now, and it's an ending the actually works, even though it doesn't nail the landing 100%.

Summertime Saga on the other hand doesn't seem to be about much of anything. I mean yes, the father's death is supposed to be the main story, but you spend like less than 5% of the time on it and most of the time you're just doing rap battles, fetch quests and delivering pizzas. It's not bad or anything, but it feels shallow and not just in the way that porn games usually are shallow but rather in a way that makes you feel like no real passion was put into the stories being told. Feels like a classic case of someone trying to extend their game as much as possible in order to milk the Patreon bank dry. To his credit though, he actually is still developing the game, so it's not an actual scam unlike some other "developers"...

51. Beat three games in a series

Donkey Kong Country 3

2/3 done. After having replayed all three in short succession now I think I have to make the slightly scandalous statement that DKC3 is probably the best of the SNES series. Yes, the Kiddy Kong character design is a bit off putting, but he plays pretty much like an improved Donkey and he compliments Dixie better than Diddy does. And the level design it the best and most interesting here too. All in all, DKC3 is a fantastic game that just isn't appreciated enough...

RySenkari posted...

Square needs to finally do Secret of Mana justice by remaking it in Trials style and adding all the cut SNES CD content.

Considering that many aspects of the CD version were recycled into Chrono Trigger and also considering the removal of that content radically changed the structure and story of the SNES game... That would probably be much more jarring than we'd want.

9. Beat a remake or enhanced port

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX

Enhanced port in the loosest definition of the word perhaps... But it's certainly both ported and enhanced... With colors and an extra dungeon so I think that's fair...

PrestonWheee posted...

Who and who?

Oberyn Martell (My eyes! My eyes!) and Lyanna Mormont (The kid that was the head of House Mormont that verbally bitch slapped everyone in every scene she was in) from Game of Thrones if you watched that.

Why not play both? And Summertime Saga is hardly the echelon of pervy gaming...

Probably cause Lola fit the theme. She's a flight attendant after all.

38. Finish a game in one day

Kirby's Dream Land

If this was released today it'll be hard for them justify even charging $5 for it... But it's of course totally charming and adorable and I love it in all of its simplicity. Of course not my first time through, but I'm enjoying replaying old classics these days so yeah...

31. Beat a game with a child lead

Illusion of Gaia

I've never played a game that needed a retranslation more. It's just a mess. First of all the tone is all over the place. Half the time the story seem like something from a book for toddlers, and then it's like "how about some scenes about child slave trafficking and the source of human suffering". I mean, having played Soul Blazer before, I'm pretty sure I understand the tone they're going for, it's just not working with this translation.
The scenes are also never developed enough. All the more serious themes are introduced out of the blue and later dropped just as quickly. There's very little in the way of resolution and any resolution we do get is glossed over very briefly.
And dialogue is even worse. It's sometimes completely incoherent with characters saying sentences taken out of thin air relating to absolutely nothing. Sometimes they refer to themselves as "you" and at other times they have intense arguments with themselves. It really feels like whoever translated this had no idea what they were translating, the context of what was being translated, who said what and how anything fit together. If I didn't know better I'd say it was google translated... Except it was released in 1994 so ehum... What? Besides, Google Translate has been more coherent than this for many years now.

The gameplay is fine though...

33. Beat a game with a robot/artificial lead

Mega Man X2

Not the first time through, probably won't be the last. Personally it's the weakest of the first 4 X games, I know it's not the popular opinion but it feels a bit uneven to me. Still an very good game though. Like I said, I'm sure I'll go back to it again...

3.33/50

29. Beat a game with comedy as a central theme

Ninja Baseball Bat Man

Or could this be considered a sports game. I mean, the theming here is pretty damn strong after all... Also it's nuts... I imagine this is what happens when you combine a weekend of binge watching baseball with lots and lots of LSD... As a brawler it's perfectly serviceable too..

47. Play a technically unbeatable game for at least six hours

NHL Eastside Hockey Manager 2007

Technically it happened weeks ago... And it's happened several times since.

50. Beat three games in a series

Donkey Kong Land 2

Maybe I'm jumping the gun here a bit, but I've already decided to play two more DK games this year. Did the first three last year and doing this DKC3 and DKL3 this. I've beaten the Country games many times before, but hadn't touched a Land game since I played the original 25 years ago. It's a slightly wonky game, but worthwhile I guess since it's kinda distinct from the SNES original... DKL2 however... This was my first time through it and it's just a strait downgrade of DKC2 really. At release it had an existential purpose I guess, but at this point there's no point in playing this over DKC2... Even if you've played through DKC2 50 times... It's not a bad game, but at no point are you not wishing you were playing the SNES game instead.
DKC3 is next, which is a game I really like. I have no problems with Kiddy Kong...

1.33/50

Ryu

Doctor Doom?
I don't even like Fantastic Four...

Oh dear god! I certainly did not expect this. As you say, this is probably something you should dislike based on your preferences. I mean, it definitely ranks quite highly on the pulsating beat scale. And yet here it is, on to of the charts! I'm not sure if I should take pride in this or something, I'm mostly just happy that I've been able to share something I like with someone who appreciated it... In fact, I think you might actually have ended up liking it more than I do in the end! :D
But the song is undeniably high energy and uplifting, I'm not sure it's possible to feel sad when listening to it. It's like the song just wanna be your friend and cheer you up and somehow it kinda reminds me personally of being a kid, having a sleepover at a friends house and the two of you secretly playing Unirally until 4AM instead of going to sleep. It has that kind of youthful simplicity to it.

And the racing angle is actually a good catch since this genre is generally associated with the Initial D anime where it apparently plays a featured role. And while many of the songs in that show are noticeably more directly related to cars and driving in terms of lyrics and even sound effects at times, that association has made the entire Eurobeat genre intrinsically linked with racing.

Always, unless there's a specific and very good reason not to.

Oh gosh, Nuage in the top 10. It was pretty much my "Oh, I have one more nom, let's just throw this thing in here". I mean it is a favorite of mine for sure, especially within the Eurobeat genre, but I didn't expect too much from it. Goes to show what I know.

Advent Rising... Literally failed at being a franchise...

If you like Maria Mena's style I would strongly recommend listening to her entire discography. For being an artist who mostly deals with guitar pop, alot of it is surprisingly varied. But more importantly, she pretty much exclusively writes about her own experience. So by listening through her whole career, since she started at the age of 15 until last year when she turned 34, it's like you can see her grow up. How her concerns and worries change over time as she mature, and yet how some never fully leave you. And she's brutally honest with herself and the listener, talking about things that most artist would shy away from. Her complex and slightly strained relationship with her family, especially her mother, is a constant topic throughout her career, several songs are about her own struggles with her own self-image and anorexia and most of the album Growing Pains is specifically about her going through a divorce. And of course, some songs are about normal and lighter topics too, she's not permanently borderline suicidal like Lene Marlin undeniably is, there's some light there too.

So yeah, strongly recommend Maria Mena's music in general.
But if I have to choose a specific album I'd go with Viktoria I think. The stuff from her younger years are still good, but both lyrically and musically she's very obviously still a teenage girl with teenage girl thoughts and while it's kinda endearing in its own way, it lacks a bit of the deeper reflection of the later years. And the reason why I choose Viktoria specifically is because I feel it's the most varied of her albums as an adult, both in terms of musical styles and lyrical topics. It's a good entry point to all things Maria Mena...
But if you don't feel like listening to it now, maybe I'll just sit on this until next time this topic comes around... If I knew Maria Mena would rank this highly I might have nominated her album first time around anyway.

Also, I did not expect Nuage to be my last representative standing.

Wow, that's quite the jump by Massive Attack! Wow... And for the record, I kinda agree, that is a very long outro, probably longer than it needed to be... Especially when you have over 600 songs to listen to and then it probably feels like the song is wasting your time a bit. But the atmosphere is close to unrivaled...

Yeah, I wouldn't worry about Kent's lyrics. There are those that feel they convey a deep and complex meaning, and also those that believe that the lyrics are just random hodgepodge that the singer has come up with without real rime or reason... In fact, the band itself have publicly claimed both of those things at various times, as well as anywhere in between. I think they just enjoy keeping people guessing. The truth probably lies somewhere in between anyway... And I'm sure you can figure out some kind of meaning from all of their songs if you try hard enough, but if you have to try that hard, can you be sure you just didn't invent something that wasn't there in the first place? Personally, I'm in the "don't bother" camp.

And Jasmine is just a little gem...

SNSD songs have good lyrics? I didn't know that was a possibility... I learned quickly that looking up the lyrics to their songs will only result in my palm connecting with my face... And also, you know, I spend not an insignificant amount of my music listening time listening to music without any lyrics so I guess lyrics aren't the most important thing to me in the first place... So I had no idea about Catch Me If You Can... Gonna look them up now...

*looking and reading*

Huh... That was more insightful than I expected... A far cry from their days of singing things like "Oh-oh-oh-o-ppa I love you. Ah-ah-ah-ah Many Many.". So yeah, that's interesting.

In semi-related news, I'm very pleased to see so many of my noms doing so well.

Wow, Above & Beyond sure managed to go much further than I excepted. I don't wanna overstate my influence here, but did I actually manage to lessen your seemingly instinctual dislike for thumping beats? Sure seems like first time you hear them you dislike them and then they rapidly shoot up the charts as you know what to expect. Maybe you've been exposed to a lot of unusually bad electronic music before... Melodic trance with good vocalists seems to be what you respond to the most so if you're interested I'd be happy to provide you with a few other songs from the past that fit that genre. They would still contain more or less pulsating beat though of course... So maybe not.

Oh, and Perfume totally pre-date Hatsune Miku, just saying. :P

StealThisSheen posted...

It's pretty clear you have very little idea of US law and what they've actually done over here, so you should probably stop trying to argue.

EDIT: They've all broken laws. Numerous of 'em.

If they've broken laws, then they can be prosecuted for those things, but I don't see inciting riot and treason as one of those things... Unless your name is Donald of course.

Peace___Frog posted...

Djung, I'm going to be real here.

You're acting like reading the spark notes to book 6 of Harry Potter gives the full breadth of context and detail that reading all seven books does.

The family has done a lot more than just "support trump," they've demonstrably benefitted from his power and enabled him.

Edit because apparently it is not clear - I don't mean everyone with relation to him. Barron is not an adult and has no part in this. But Eric, Melania, Ivanka, Don Jr? Absolutely, get them all the fuck out of here.

I don't know, to me it seems you want them all to be punished because you just really don't like them. Like what they done and said is morally wrong and there should be consequences for being so morally wrong. But that just can't be accepted in a democratic society. You may be the worst and most slimy selfserving bastard in the history of the earth, but unless you've explicitly broken laws you're safe. You have to be safe. Otherwise you'll end up with populism or mob rule, and that never ends well.

StealThisSheen posted...

Okay but they didn't just question the result, they outright knowingly spread false information and encouraged people to "fight" for Donald.

Spreading false information is basically America's favorite past time at this point though. At that point we might as well just finish the Mexico wall, make another one along the Canadian border and rename The US "Prisonland", cause no one's innocent there.
Trump, and his favorite news network, may be the biggest enthusiasts of the practice, but it's an activity all sides and political persuasions gleefully take part in. People don't care about factual information anymore, they only care about winning the argument. Sure, this is a problem everywhere, I think it's just a side effect of the echo chambers internet communities creates... But within the developed world, you guys are really unparalleled. And instead of actual facts, people treat opinions and feelings as facts. It's all very problematic...
Ok, that was a bit of tangent. But point is, I don't think any group in the US has any right to cry foul about false information. That's a systemic problem that's a part of modern American mainstream culture. Root that shit out first, and then we'll talk...

StealThisSheen posted...

All of them with the exception of maaaaybe Tiffany have been going along with this narrative and pushing it themselves.

Any one of them could have stepped up and went "You lost, Donald" and spoke out against his delusions. Instead, they supported them.

Also this is something thousands of other people did, and you can't prosecute everyone. Beside, questioning an election result is not against the law. It's embarrassing and makes you look bad to the rest of the world, but it is within the realm of your legal rights. You, or I, or anyone else not liking what they say is quite frankly completely irrelevant.

TheRock1525 posted...

Eric and Don Jr. have absolutely been pushing for shit like this.

As a Swede I only get the cliff notes version of the Yankee Circus so if this is true, maybe there's a case for it... But the same would be true for hundreds, if not thousands of other people and you can't prosecute everyone. Ultimately, Trump the one in charge here and thus the one who should bare the responsibility.

StealThisSheen posted...

Enabling absolutely can be a crime when it comes to treason and sedition. When you know something and don't say something, you become party to it.

I don't see how any one of Trump's family members had any involvement in Trump's actions today. This is a mess of his own doing.

StealThisSheen posted...

It's called enabling, which she has done with plenty of defense of him.

Let's not defend Melania, here. She's proved numerous times she's also a shitty human being.

Enabling is not a crime though, nor is defending someone... Or being a shitty human being.

Peace___Frog posted...

The entire trump family needs to be prosecuted for treason and sedition, have their assets taken by the government, and banished out of the country. There is no repercussion too harsh for them to face.

That seems excessive. I highly doubt Melania has any part in this, her role begins and ends with being a treasure wife. I know hot takes are tempting, but legal overreaches is part of Trump's playbook, why would you wanna act like he does?

I'll try to participate this year actually. Always thought about doing it but never did... Usually cause I had that thought in like July or something.
This was my TV Tropes page:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DiscountLesbians

Looking through the list I'm leaning towards either Iji or Mass Effect.

Also, for favorite game... My favorite game is already selected as someone's favorite but I can see that every game is mentioned only once as someone's favorite. So should I select a different game as my favorite or should I just break the trend and mention a game someone's already mentioned?

And there's my personal favorite song! But if trance music ain't your thing then I guess this isn't a bad grade. Heck, it even made the 60 point range which means you like it. Nice!

Santa Clause

Almost right, just one word wrong, right answer is "A Moment to Remember".

Ice Man Stage

Not_an_Owl posted...

i dunno man, nuclear mutually assured destruction seems like something any world government would care about

We already have that, and China is acting the way it is despite the threat of mutually assured destruction. They're already not caring about that.

HeroDelTiempo17 posted...

You really don't have to act like world politics were uniquely better in the past, dude.

Well, atleast in the past a war with Germany wouldn't threaten billions of dollars in trade with Germany. There just wasn't much international trade going on, compared to now atleast.
And also there's the fact that, you know, there was a war in the end. UK and France guaranteed the independence of Poland and when Germany entered Poland they felt forced to honor that guarantee... Somehow I don't see a scenario where that outcome would be replicated... Like what would China have to do for the west to decide that had have to act strongly towards China? Annex Taiwan? Mongolia? North Korea? South Korea? When is the limit reached? Is there a limit? And what would the response be? Would it actually be strong enough that it would force China to care? I highly doubt that...

Wanglicious posted...

i mean china is legitimately modern day nazi germany right now and the attitudes we give them are the same the world gave germany at the time. genocide, check, along with a couple other massacres on the side. general evilness, check. turning a blind eye as land grabs are occurring, check and it's on multiple fronts including our allies too. biggest difference here is that they're better at playing politics, using our weaknesses against us better, and put their propaganda globally.

The only difference is that no nation would officially declare a 100% guarantee any other nations sovereignty at this point. An all out war with a superpower like China would be WAY too costly in every way imaginable and that's pretty much what China's betting on. And since that's not an option, cutting all economic ties is the best nations can do and then, unless the response is truly global, you and your businesses are gonna be at a huge disadvantage compared businesses in other countries. Which would result in your businesses lobbying hard for you to lift those sanctions ASAP. Meaning that there's no response that any nation may be willing to make that is impactful enough for China to reconsider their behavior. Heck, all of the western world could put up a united front against China and China would still be fine for the foreseeable future seeing how they already got most of Africa in their pocket.

Leonhart4 posted...

I mean they tried appeasement and turning a blind eye to Nazi Germany at first too

Somehow I kinda doubt that China annexing Poland would generate much in a way of response though. There would be a strong condemnation for sure, which is the equivalent of telling Charles Manson he's a naughty boy who did a naughty thing and you're very disappointed in him, but it would probably end there. Maybe some trade sanctions too, which later would be quietly lifted as soon as the public has found something new to be upset about. If I was in Taiwan I'd be seriously worried by now...

China's strangehold on the world is quite shocking honestly. Shows that the Nazi's biggest problem, apart from the genocide and general evilness, was that they entered the scene a century too early. If it happened right now countries would be all like "but let's remember the corporate interests and business opportunities and growth potential" and then turn a blind eye and do nothing.

Wow... This is fucked up...

MRWeebl! Those songs are just the best kind of stupid. Other faves include "Narwhals", "Owls" and the "Magical Trevor" series.
And of course there's "Badgers"... But that's kind of its own seperate internet phenomena thing.

The site says Xiansheng is the most common name in the world. That's essentially the chinese word for mister and/or teacher... I'm not sure this site is entirely accurate...

Ice Climber

The Superman Lovers - Starlight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h61QG4s0I3U

That should have been The Firemen instead...

Raetsel_Lapin posted...

Sorry for the delay tonight, running behind on things but we should still get through the next ten songs... just, ya know, slightly later than usual.

...also Im sorry about the unfortunate timing on this elimination, but rearranging the list to avoid awkwardness would be cheating.

Well, it can't be helped I guess. And considering that you seem to be warming to it, give a few more listens and maybe it'll rise even further! Won't do much for it's official rank but atleast you might appreciate it even more. Personally I don't really listen to the beat when I listen to trance music, it's just there for maintaining the tempo, so it being repetitive doesn't phase me. I think it's just something you naturally learn to ignore as you listen to the genre more.

And since you mentioned you wished it had lyrics... There's a version of the song with the lyrics from Axwell's "Feel the Vibe" applied to it and it works better than expected. I still prefer the original but this is good too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-1EwxuqtT4