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Messages - regmcfly

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Podcast Discussion / Re: RetroActive 51: Kirby and the Rainbow Curse
« on: November 27, 2022, 05:19:37 AM »
Halfway through. The biggest frustration is my wife keeps telling me how good it looks on the TV screen but my eyes are firmly on the Gamepad. The eternal struggle.

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TalkBack / Vigil: The Longest Night (Switch) Review
« on: December 17, 2020, 07:39:59 AM »

A unique take game that isn't shy about its insperation.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/review/55805/vigil-the-longest-night-switch-review

Before we talk about Vigil: The Longest Night on its own merits – of which there are many – it would be remiss not to namecheck the liberal borrowing of elements from the Dark Souls series. Granted, Vigil is not the first game to do so, but several of these, most notably in the UI, are pretty egregious. Therefore, let’s get them out of the way first. There’s the health and stamina bars: the former replenished by blood syringes that have their own animation window to administer, the latter diminished by attacking and rolling. There’s the arcane lore attached to each item, with cryptic definitions for each displayed on loading screens. There’s the use of bonfires to give the player information about mechanics – here delivered by the developer, not user generated. There’s the owl statues that act as save points, teleports and places of return following death. There’s a similar equipment structure, down to rings that can be equipped which provide nebulous buffs. Last but not least, there’s the menu system, which when accessed does not pause the game, and which spits a plethora of numbers related to different player stats.

There’s a lot of similar DNA, but what makes Vigil such an exciting and enjoyable game to play is where it diverges from the Souls formula. In the first instance, there is a protagonist with a tangible personality. Leila, the player controlled character, is one of a number of Vigilants, city defenders, on her way to completing her training. Returning home for her sister Daisy’s birthday, which happens to also fall on the day of the Shimmerless Festival, she begins to discover that a lot has changed in Maye Town. Daisy is missing, as is another young girl, Bruna. Leila sets out to find both, and the game begins a strange and surreal descent into fascinating and terrifying places. The player discovers each new facet of horror with Leila, and her confusion and fear is ours. The desire to learn more and more about what is actually going on becomes one of the key draws of the game, and whilst extraneous elements such as the lore for inventory items can add flavour to the world, it is the player progression to new and increasingly unsettling environments and situations that provides the drive.

These environments are another of the game’s strong suits, with an incredible variety far surpassing a Souls title. Each area in the game boasts its own unique style, and whilst there are the traditional adventure stomping grounds such as medieval towns and graveyards populated skeletons, these sit alongside beautifully rendered, horrendous locations including cult-test labs, caves with Lovecraftian tentacles emerging, and even parallel universes. Each new location comes with its unique visual tricks, whether they be destructible background elements, clever use of foreground visual tricks, or use of weather, to keep propelling the player onwards to the next locale. Within each world there are also unique sets of enemies ranging from the standard tropes of soldiers and skeletons, to some downright disgusting creations.

Another major change from the Souls template is in the actual gameplay. Simply put, this is a far snappier, action packed title that provides more, and more frequent rewards to the player as they progress. The game rewards a far more aggressive style of play, with experienced players able to steamroll through locations. Killing enemies gains experience, and the frequency with which I saw the ‘Level Up’ animation splash across the screen was incredibly gratifying. Even better, each level increase restores health and stamina bars, meaning that there is a real incentive to continuously attack, even when health and health supplies are low. There are a set of four different weapon types to use, including ranged, heavy and quick attacks, but to be honest, I rolled through the game using the standard sword model. Each of these can gain perks through their own skill trees using points from level up rewards. The animation and combat mechanics are responsive, and fun to use, even after several hours, and combat itself is its own reward.

There are some knocks, however. At times the plot can be too obtuse for its own good, and the game’s recording and logging of quests could be more streamlined to differentiate between story-related ones and side options. Sadly the Switch version also seems to have suffered in the port too, and one of the most frustrating elements is the length of and frequency of load times. Most notably when loading into the game for the first time from the title screen, this can take more than a minute to drop into the game world. Granted, this allows the opportunity to read the item descriptions that pop up, with many far more flippant and funnier than a Souls game, but it becomes a real slog. The game also suffers from some significant slowdown, especially during some of the latter screen-filling bosses that inhabit the world.

Despite these issues, Vigil: The Longest Night absolutely holds its own, both in 2D adventure games, as well as in the glut of Souls-alikes that have emerged in recent years. It’s fast, fun and rewarding to players who manage to overcome the initial similarities to FROM Software’s series, and manages to carve its own unique take on the formula, with strong narrative and combat hooks to support it. If only those load times could let us get to the action sooner.


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TalkBack / Endurance - Space Action (Switch) Review
« on: November 25, 2020, 10:45:44 AM »

An unfortunately accurate title.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/review/55590/endurance-space-action-switch-review

At the start of Endurance, the player is presented with a splash screen of text from the developer, who seems to be a lone programmer named Ivan. This initial opening is more telling than a simple note of thanks for playing their game. For better and worse, Endurance feels like the product of a lone designer, unfettered from secondary voices in their game design, and also producing a product without the polish and attention that larger teams can afford.

Endurance itself is set on a Nostromo-like spaceship, one of a plethora of pop culture references throughout the game that feel jarring and out of place. The player takes the role of one of several choices of characters, all of whose first names are variants on the name Sam – Sammie, Samantha, and so on. After an initial flash forward showing a trail of corpses and a lifeless ship, the game jumps back to three days earlier, putting control into the player’s hands and tasking them to discover what has happened on the ship.

The game itself is a top down shooter in the now ubiquitous pixel art style, with the left stick used for movement, and the right used to rotate the axis that the protagonist’s gun is aimed at in the environment. Shooting is on bumpers rather than triggers, which feels an odd decision – one of the first of many. One unique aspect is that it claims RPG elements, which in reality, boils down to levelling several different attributes such as speed, shield and health regeneration and ‘trap detection’. That last attribute exposes one of the great frustrations with the game: as the player progresses through levels, invisible traps, often on ground tiles, chip away at their health.  All of these attributes can be increased with credits claimed from killing the rogue members of the player’s ship who appear to have been possessed by some type of alien life form. In addition, the player can also spend credits to restore their own health – something that is likely to be far more common than any stat-building. Enemies are often bullet sponges, and bosses moreso. They move faster than the player and the game demonstrates a ‘challenge’ by throwing numerous villains at the player in tight corridors – also causing significant slowdown.

The shooting itself feels floaty and weightless, and player movement equally so; even choosing the speediest starting character resulted in slow trudges through generic looking corridors. Once again, the spectre of the lone developer rears its head as there is essentially no variation between the aesthetics of differing floors of the ship, just the layouts. Progress is often laboriously slow, not simply due to the speed of the character, but also the endless backtracking necessitated to open doors to progress to new areas – areas that are identikit cut outs of the previous one.

We need to talk about that gun rotation, though – likely once again a result of the fact that the game was the product of one person. Each character is made up of pixel art sprites and crudely animates as they make their way through the ship. The guns, however, appear to be separate sprites that are layered on top of the character art. Therefore rotating the gun around the axis reveals a secondary pair of hands lurking below on the main character model. It is quite a jarring sight, and one that provided no end of hilarity and Switch video clips to share.

Sound design is similarly slight, with generic rattles and hums of the ship, along with sounds of different guns. To be fair to the game, the lack of detailed audio design actually does serve the atmosphere of the game, and the desire to mimic Alien, somewhat positively.

Alien is not the only reference in the game, and it seems that Ivan has been keen to put in as many pop culture references as they can throughout the game. Once again, these feel somewhat out of place and remove any of the isolating and unsettling atmosphere the game is conversely trying to create. A visit through a stasis hold reveals an Arthur Dent in a tank, an NPC ponders aloud if the 200 year anniversary episode of Friends will be on Netflix, and at one point, the main character quotes from an Audioslave song, apropos of nothing. I’m not sure what was worse here – the fact that this once again pulled me from the fiction, or the fact that I got the reference immediately. It also appears that English is not the first language of the developer, and although there is nothing overt, some dialogue features strange grammatical choices that once again remove the player from any form of immersion.

It’s hard to recommend Endurance, particularly at the price, given that so much of it feels unfinished, and cheap. It is very possible to brute force through the game, solely using credits to restore health, but there is little satisfaction here. Plaudits to the sole developer for creating the game, but this alone is not enough to warrant any type of recommendation.


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Yep, I'm using one that takes up two USB ports. Takes a few seconds for everything to load into the menu but works fine following.

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I am here to let you know I fired up my WiiU yesterday for some PROPER Mario Maker

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TalkBack / Adventures of Chris (Switch) Review
« on: November 13, 2020, 09:07:38 AM »

A retro throwback with a bit more under the surface.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/review/55493/adventures-of-chris-switch-review

Nostalgia is a fickle beast. In order to accurately replicate and honour legacies, modern game makers have to keep one foot firmly in the past, whilst acknowledging the progress made by subsequent titles over the years. Perhaps that’s why the moniker “nostalgia” is often applied mostly to pixel art aesthetics wrapped around modern trappings. Adventures of Chris both manages to have some modern elements, but unfortunately at times remains too slavish to the 16 bit platformers it yearns to evoke.

The titular Chris is a large teenage boy. It is well known that his size is a factor, because every NPC in the game seems to want to comment upon this, in often crude attempts at humour. On his way home in 1995, Chris is magicked into the air and arrives in Romania, outside Count Junior’s (and definitely not Kid Dracula) castle on his birthday. Friendless, Junior has rounded up other kids from around the world, and as Chris tries to save them, Junior’s magic turns him into a balloon. Upon escaping by floating away, Chris encounters the balloon kingdom, and begins a globe trotting quest to vanquish the associates of Kid Junior and save the world. It’s a slow start, and one that can put the player off initially, until the main world map opens up.

In essence, the majority of the game most closely resembles the Mega Man series. Chris can visit any country on the map in any order, and in each one can collect a new ability through traversing 2D combat platforming levels. It must be said that first impressions are not great. In trying to evoke games such as Chuck Rock, Cool Spot, and Boogerman, among others, the animation style in an HD context looks more like a Flash game than a cartoon. It’s quite jarringly rough. In addition, the enemies that Chris can dispatch, whether with his fists, weapons, or magic, have no sense of tactility upon death, bouncing quickly off the screen. Yes, this is exactly how it was in 1995, but that doesn’t mean it is actually enjoyable. Thankfully, there are some saving graces. Chris’ balloon ability initially allows him to inflate once for as long as he wants before deflating and hitting the ground to refresh it – think something akin to Celeste’s dash mechanic. The number of inflations can be upgraded, and if Chris touches a balloon in mid-air, the mechanic refreshes. This leads to several quite clever platforming sequences as the player utilises this (and other later mechanics such as a belly flop that allows Chris to jump higher) to negotiate some tricksy level design. Thankfully, like Celeste, death results in an instant restart to the beginning of the screen the player last entered – very welcome later in the game.

In addition, the levels themselves are commendable for their variation. A visit to Australia sees Chris floating behind a player-controlled sub in a 2D side scrolling shooter environment. An extra level of complexity is added to this in that although the player controls the sub, it is Chris who is vulnerable to enemy attacks whilst the sub is not, so the level becomes about managing Chris’ flotation level as much as anything. In Los Angeles, latter screens involve smog-filled rhythmic platforming and careful utilisation of fan mechanics. Not all are as successful, and a trip to Japan’s poorly realised stealth mechanics, alongside an annoying Ninja House maze, are less enjoyable. Each stage has its own soundtrack, and unlike the graphics, these are very successful in evoking the 90s melodies of the Mega Man series, or in Romania’s case, something that wouldn’t feel out of place in a Castlevania title.The countries are very short, however, and upon clearing all of them in around two hours, alongside side quests in the Balloon Kingdom, I was both expecting the final battle with Count Junior, and wary about recommending the game due to its perceived brevity and simplicity. That’s where Adventures of Chris throws a sideswipe at the player. Without revealing too much, clearing the initial worlds is only a part of the game – there are return trips to familiar locales, but with twists on the mechanics of the game – for example, what if Chris was unable to deflate? And then there is the final assault on Count Junior, who by the end of the game has amassed monstrous creative power, or as he calls it, his ‘Toy Box’. At this point the game becomes very much like a toy box of its own, as the developers throw new and creative ideas on every screen. The platforming, and negotiation of levels becomes seriously intense, and culminates in a final battle where the player must manage several mechanics at once. It really is a treat. Following completion of the main game, a ‘Mean Mode’ opens up, essentially with more enemies, spikes and pits, with the game’s dialogue changing to be more self-aware – for example, characters feeling relieved that the pit they have fallen into isn’t bottomless. The humour still fails to land, but mechanically it is an interesting remix mode. Once this is cleared there is a final mode with a developer’s commentary, a la games such as Portal.

Adventures of Chris is not a pretty game to look at. Initially, it is slow, somewhat uninvolving, and ostensibly simplistic. However, for players who persevere beyond those opening levels, there are some genuinely clever and fun platforming elements to be discovered, adapting and evolving the 16 bit template. It’s just a shame that the first part of the game is so slavish to the formula. There’s fun to be had here, just at the expense of the legacy it evokes.


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Podcast Discussion / Re: Episode 697: Gerard Depardieu, Vampire Hunter
« on: November 02, 2020, 12:39:46 PM »
I found Control worked perfectly cromulently on my WiFi in the UK.

Also when do we get the 90 minute bonus podcast episode for the Patreon people where it is just an RFN commentary track for Commando?

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Podcast Discussion / Re: RetroActive 48: Super Mario 64
« on: October 13, 2020, 04:36:34 PM »
Firstly I should say I refuse to play the DS version again - the game that Donkey Kong 64-ified a perfectly tight playformer with the incessant character swapping. Shan't.

Having not played 64 in about half a decade I found a lot of the memories of the stars, particularly the first half of the game (up until Dry Dry Docks) pretty straightforward to get. The back half of the title was a little less memorable, although much more enjoyable. Tick Tock Clock remains my overall highlight of the time (sorry) I spent with it.

Two criticisms, however. I eventually realised that the most incessantly frustrating enemy in the game was Lakitu. The inability to continually turn the camera one direction indefinitely was a real source of frustration, and one which I hope any subsequent re-release addresses.

But the main issue, the crime of the title, lies in the fact that there is one whole world which is so full of bile, hatred and animosity to the player, that I feel it outdoes anything Sunshine dares to throw their way.

Shifting
Sand
Land

A level so devoid of personality; a level with a meagre overall coin count, necessitating a near perfect run; a level with an unstoppable vulture who steals the player's hat for no discernable reason other than they are a bad bird; a level with a tower, part of a required star to get 100%, that is so fiddly to climb, surrounded by instadeath quicksand.

Shifting Sand Land is the nadir of Mario gaming. And I include when it was 'all about the gold in that.

Aside from that, pretty good game.

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TalkBack / The Ambassador: Fractured Timelines (Switch) Review
« on: October 05, 2020, 04:00:00 PM »

An interesting premise that fails to leave a lasting impression.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/review/55136/the-ambassador-fractured-timelines-switch-review

Fantasy trappings go hand in hand with action games – Diablo and Magicka have long become the standard for the ‘click-em-ups’. Yet whilst fast paced action with the markers of wizards, elves, and the like are de rigueur in the gaming world, there are not many that describe themselves as a ‘twin stick shooter’. The Ambassador: Fractured Timelines does exactly that, although in its actual play, there is more of a puzzle element to it, both in dealing with the action of dispatching enemies, and in several of its core mechanics. Despite this intriguing, and unique fusion of elements, the game fails to leave a long-lasting impression, or to rise massively above a glut of other Indie action titles on the system.

The player controls Gregor, the titular Ambassador and new recruit into The Fellowship, a group with the ability to manipulate time. In classic quest manner, the Fellowship’s homestead is attacked and left asunder, and Gregor ventures on a quest to find out who, or what, launched the attack. It’s a fairly flimsy and simplistic tale without many exciting twists or turns. Along the way, Gregor can speak with a variety of NPCs who don’t really offer much beyond slight flavour text – slaves in the Druid mountain don’t do much beyond mourn their lot in life in a couple of sentences, for example. There are optional tomes to be found in levels that do somewhat flesh out the world, but this is not rich and deep lore.

Those tomes feed into many of the puzzle elements and are often hidden behind areas requiring use of Gregor’s skillset. Gregor can be equipped with a primary weapon, wand variant, and set of armor. New variants are doled out fairly regularly on the completion of levels, and they offer fairly standard deviations. A heavier set of armor offers an extra heart of health at the cost of speed, whilst the opposing variant reduces Gregor to two hearts from the standard three, but with the benefit of a movement boost. In play, the game feels more akin to something like Hotline Miami or Superhot than a ‘traditional’ twin stick shooter. Each level features a selection of enemies who always start from the same place, and always in the same number and type. Gregor’s job is to clear the screen of enemies, opening the portal to the next area. Failure results in an instant respawn, and the room repopulated, so negotiating each level becomes about understanding enemy location and figuring out an optimum route through. The respawns are mercifully instantaneous which does somewhat alleviate the frustration when killed by the final stone monster upon clearing the rest of a level for the third or fourth time.

In addition to the base mechanics of combat, the game borrows a key mechanic from Breath of the Wild, namely the stasis effect in that title. One of the key skills of Ambassadors is the ability to slow down time in a circle around Gregor. Ostensibly this allows the player to manipulate themselves to a place of safety when enemy attacks are raining down on them, or a particularly speedy enemy approaches or teleports nearby; however, the secondary function allows Gregor to build up a series of hits on moveable objects on levels. Almost beat for beat, equipping the slowdown feature and hitting them repeatedly displays an expanding, Breath of the Wild-style arrow which can also be turned to face in specific directions before the time dilation mechanic ends, and the object flies ferociously towards an enemy or breakable piece of scenery. In practice it does play well within the title, but the similarities to Nintendo’s 2017 hit are somewhat jarring.

Health can mercifully be restored by eating two portions of food per heart. These can be found by destroying barrels or completely slaughtering helpless animals that roll around the level. These explode, much like the main enemies, with a satisfying comic explosion of blood.

Much like the visual flourishes of blood, there are some interesting aesthetic choices in the game. Although the title utilises the now fairly standard pixel-art style, there is a definite variety in both the enemy type and environments, as well as the music that plays through each world. Druids are cast in shades of purple amid snowy white landscapes replete with an ethereal soundtrack, whilst shambling zombies and exploding creations akin to The Binding of Isaac lurk in the ruins of Tamaris and are scored to some much more up-tempo gothic tunes. It keeps the jumping between worlds interesting if at least the mechanics don’t change much.

A number of elements are intended to encourage replay after an initial run is complete: three difficulty settings run from one-hit-death to no reset of levels upon death, whilst an in-game achievement system based upon enemies killed and clear conditions such as not using any food per level are nice additions. A time attack mode seems brutal in the par conditions – I must confess I did not manage a single one, however I did not feel the incentive to revisit levels, particularly upon clearing them on a third or fourth attempt in the first instance. Upon clearing the game, a horde mode unlocks, but I must admit by that point I felt I had had my fill.

Some other gripes mar what is a generally fine game, and one that for the price is worth an afternoon’s play. The final boss, although true to classic arcade roots, demands that players repeat all of the previous bosses to be cleared before confronting them – failure at any stage on normal difficulty returns them to the start of the encounter, which can be frustrating. The game also supports rumble on Switch – however there is no nuance to this, and the same jarring and intense ‘bzzt’ that occurs when killing any enemy retains the same intensity (albeit a longer duration) when Gregor dies. I would strongly advise turning it off in the settings before beginning play.

To call The Ambassador: Fractured Timelines simply serviceable feels slightly unfair: the blend of mechanics from other games, along with a title that does at least offer more than a simple one-and-done run with hidden items, achievements, and no performance issues on Switch is commendable. However, it does little to particularly stand out beyond being a good enough game, lacking  a unique selling point akin to Hotline Miami’s drug-fuelled sound and visual handling of similar gameplay. The title functions as a worthwhile enough ambassador itself to the development team’s skills, but not one that will linger in memory.


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Podcast Discussion / Re: Episode 692: J.O.C.K.S.T.R.A.P.
« on: October 04, 2020, 04:14:38 PM »
Yeah, my shout for GBA would have been Kuru Kuru Kurunin as well. What a great game.

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The camera in 64 is a bigger villain than Spike.

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Podcast Discussion / Re: RetroActive 47: Crystalis
« on: July 08, 2020, 03:10:38 PM »
I've just fired this up and the immediate fear is that of Zelda 2.

Not sure I'm gonna enjoy further than that... Will keep going.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 03:19:19 PM »
Closed now. Hope everyone got what they needed.

I need to be on here more often after 15 years of lurking and existing on the Discord.


Keep fighting the good fight for a Cho Aniki RFN retrospective.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 02:45:02 PM »
Closing in 10 minutes. I've got a splatfest t to level up!

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 01:52:15 PM »
Thanks everyone for visiting. Will be open for probably one more hour.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 12:55:55 PM »
Apologies it's 3Y31R

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 12:40:19 PM »
Well, well, well. Look who came crawling back to the real and true forums.  ;)
Savage.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 12:39:44 PM »
Had a disconnect, new code

313YR

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 12:35:30 PM »
Have had the discord crew all come in, so should be quiet for everyone else. Code as above.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Animal Crossing Turnip Prices
« on: May 06, 2020, 09:10:19 AM »
Right, it's died down with other friends , so  NWR peeps can get into my island Cooltown 2 now with Dodo code 35CQP.

557 Bells per turnip.

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