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Super Mario Land (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Ah, who doesn’t remember the chart-topping MC Mario “Folks round here think I’m crazy, but I gotta rescue Daisy” song that was based on the music from this, slightly odd in hindsight, Game Boy Mario game? Kids, that’s who. Tch.

And it is a bit odd. Super Mario Land starts out as a seemingly normal, low resolution and black and white approximation of the NES classic, but adds different enemies and the fire flower is a bouncy ball and there are scrolling shooter levels. It isn’t a bad game, but put it next to Super Mario Land 2 and it’s like they’re not even the same console generation, let alone in the same game series.

I completed it, of course, and it was ridiculously easy. But not actually bad.

Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown (Switch): COMPLETED!

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I have mentioned many times here how I do like a good (or even, a fair-to-middling) Metroidvania game. So when I discovered that the already great looking Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown was such a game in that genre, I leapt on the demo and was so struck by it I did a very rare thing – I bought an actual physical copy.

It’s really good. It does all the great things Metroidvanias do, by giving you additional powers to defeat new foes and reach new, and previously unreachable, areas, eventually turning you into a walking tank. It also has excellent combat, with a huge number of sword based attacks but also a bow and arrow, a boomerang-like chakra thing, magical special attacks, and all sorts of dashes, juggles and dodges making each fight enjoyable and varied. Metroid Dread was a great game, but the combat was mostly shoot or missile or bomb, whereas here it’s much more deep and fluid.

Although not linked to any of the previous Prince of Persia games in any way, there are thematic similarities. There’s the obvious one – it’s set in Persia – but also there’s a “sands of time” thing going on. The story involves Sargon (you) and his friends chasing after a kidnapped prince into a cursed city, In this city time had gone weird, with time loops and stopped time and future, past and alternative timeline events all occurring. Sargon also manages to learn some time related skills, like slowing it or pausing it.

Despite being based in a city, there are a number of varied areas, most housing a boss of some kind. There are a few distinct areas to the city itself (including one that is at night), but also dark caves, an icy mountain, and a whole section where storm-tossed ships are frozen in time. Bosses are difficult, but all can be bested by carefully noting their attack patterns and weaknesses so they always seem fair.

I did run into a game breaking bug, however. Near the end of the game you have to reach and ring three gongs. En-route to one of these you have to fight a series of enemies and every time I killed the second one, the game crashed. It turned out to be a bug introduced in a previous update, which also affected other platforms the game was on, and to be fair Ubisoft did fix it (although it took over a week before I could continue playing). Annoying, but it didn’t make me think anything less of the game, which I loved. So much so I even went and 100%ed it after completing the story!

FAR: Changing Tides (PS5): COMPLETED!

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Remember a while back I completed a game called FAR: Lone Sails? If not you can just click that link. I refer to it because the ending of that game was a bit of a damp squib and didn’t make any sense. Turns out, this sequel is actually sort of the other half of the game and that’s why.

Whereas in Lone Sails you had a land-boat where you travel across what appears to be a dried up sea, in Changing Tides you pilot a sea-boat across what appears to be a flooded world. The game plays out in much the same way, with the same sorts of puzzles and areas you get out of your boat to do things which allow your craft to progress (like open big gates or operate cranes or something) but this time there’s more water. In parts of it, you actually become fully submersible.

The tie-in to the previous game is a bit of a spoiler, but when you get to the end of Changing Tides suddenly everything – assuming you recall the ending of Lone Sails at least – makes sense.

So the game isn’t really any better or worse than before, although they’ve fixed everything being too small a bit (it’s still a little too small, but it’s easier to make stuff out – this might be just because I played this on the PS5 not the Switch). It’s just more of the same only not quite the same as it’s a slightly different. Which is fine, I think?

Streets of Rage 4 (PS5): COMPLETED!

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Oh would you look – a PS+ monthly game that’s actually good and I don’t already own! How rare.

And yes, it is good! It’s a long awaited sequel to the original Mega Drive fighting games, if we ignore the Fighting Force game which was obviously supposed to be Streets of Rage 4 for the Saturn anyway. And even that was decades ago.

SoR4 doesn’t deviate from the previous games very much at all, really. You punch and kick through loads of baddies, most of whom are straight from the previous games, with playable characters that are, or are related to in some way, the original characters. Axel is a beefy boi now, with a beard, and Blaze has covered up a bit, but otherwise, it’s more of the same. Well, with modern graphics of course.

As she loves playing these sorts of games with me, I completed it with my daughter.

Pokémon X: completed!

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The little diversion saw me travelling through fields of flowers and encountering a large number of new pokémon, meaning that I depleted my stocks of all types of pokéballs while travelling through the flora. I also met a couple of trainers with a massive unit of a pokémon. I finally found Wulfric, the eighth gym leader, frolicking in the meadow, and convinced him to return to his responsibilities in the ice world. Was it finally time to battle for the final badge?

Yes, it was. Now, I have mentioned before that I felt I might have spent a little too long on side quests, and as a result my pokémon were feeling a little overpowered as I took down gym leaders with one hit. Since that point my core team has changed little, with the main exception being Xerneus replacing Pikachu. This meant that I no longer had any electric pokémon – or even any electric moves – which is very much unprecedented in the way I’ve played pokémon games before. Electric moves are often quite powerful and have potential to cause paralysis, which has been beneficial many times in the past. They are also strong against water pokémon – and when the first opponent in the Snowbelle City gym sent out Cloyster I was starting to regret the change.

I needn’t have. Every other pokémon in the gym was an ice type, meaning that Delphox could generally dispatch them immediately, and as the availability of fire moves waned then Lucario’s fighting moves substituted. All gym trainers, plus Wulfric, were defeated very quickly.

And with that, I was invited to go to the Pokémon League. Getting there was possibly the most difficult part of the game, with a very long trek up victory road against high-level trainers and powerful pokémon. I had to travel back to Snowbelle City twice to revive and heal all my pokémon, before finally reaching the next pokécentre. This was conveniently located outside the Pokémon League building, and so refreshed and revived I went in.

In other pokémon games I have struggled a lot at this point. In Leaf Green I got to the Elite Four and managed to beat three of them before losing, more than once – and in the end I moved on to other games. In Sapphire I was so discouraged by my Leaf Green experiences that when I got to the Pokémon League my team felt far too underpowered to even attempt battles, and I ended up wandering off to do other things instead, never returning. In Pearl I managed to beat the Elite Four, only to get beaten by the champion afterwards. This has always been the climax of the game, and I have never got past it.

The entrance to the League, and the settings for the Elite Four battles was certainly impressive, with the Four themselves having a great deal of personality. I was told that they had their own specialisms – water, fire, dragon and steel, and I prepared for which of my pokémon should be first out in each case. By now most of my team was up to the high seventies, with the exceptions of Lucario and Xerneus who were a few levels lower. I reviewed my moves; I shifted around my pokémon, and then, with trepidation, I entered.

I needn’t have been so worried. Sure, most of the opposing pokémon posed some threat, with few instant defeats, but I beat all four at the first time of asking. Xerneus’s dragon-type move was invaluable against the dragons, but even other pokémon took off large amounts of health. Blastoise was a monster in the fire battles. The most difficult was the water champion, since I no longer had Pikachu – but I managed to adapt.

Then heal up, check the order, and it’s off to see the champion.

This wasn’t an easy battle. The champion, Diantha, had a large variety of pokémon, some of which I hadn’t seen before and so I was unaware the best way to face them. Luckily I had Edward looking over my shoulder, who told me, for example, that Gourgeist is a ghost/grass type and so I should use fire moves against it, and Tyrantrum is rock-type so would be dispatched with ease by Blastoise’s hydro pump. After defeating five of her pokémon, I had four still standing, and I threw out Lucario to use the mega evolution as a finale. That worked very well indeed.

Yes, I forgot to turn the 3D off when taking that screenshot.

There’s still a lot to do, of course. I recall seeing someone blocking me from a cave in the winding woods, saying it was only for champions. There are many waterfalls to go up. There are many black entries in the pokédex. But I’ve seen the credits roll, and so I can finally say I’ve completed the story in a pokémon game.