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River City Girls 2 (Switch): COMPLETED!

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My daughter and I were big fans of the original River City Girls so the sequel was sat on my wishlist for ages waiting for a bit sale. That came around, and we played it through together.

It’s more of the same, really. A side-scrolling, semi-open-world beat-em-up with RPG elements set in the world of Kunio-kun/River City Ransom and made by Wayforward, just like the first game. It has a great cartoon style, loads of in-jokes (with both River City adjacent links, like Double Dragon and Crash And The Boys, and Wayforward properties like Mighty Switch Force) and satisfying and upgradable combat.

As it’s set in the same city as the first game, many locations are back – like school and shopping centre) although they have been modified so aren’t a complete copy-and-paste. There are plenty of new areas though. Similarly, there are both returning and new characters, although I don’t think most of the new ones are as good as the ones in the original. Also returning is another soundtrack from Megan McDuffee, which is also excellent.

The plot is mostly concerned with revenge on the Girls taking down the bad guy in the last game, although there are a couple of twists.

Gameplay-wise there are a few tweaks to improve stuff from before. Shop purchases work slightly differently, and there’s seemingly a lot more money available with which to buy them. The game seems easier too, meaning less death (which causes both progress and money loss).

It’s not all improvements though, sadly. Loading times are particularly bad, but also there are a number of bugs like items getting stuck out of reach, sound cutting out, and a few full crashes. Nothing major because of frequent save points but annoying nonetheless. Some of the new areas, like the overdone game trope of the “forest maze”, aren’t great either, and I’m sure there’s more backtracking this time round too, hindered by the aforementioned loading times.

That said, the fun, humour and style of the game massively outweigh the issues. It’s maybe not quite as enjoyable as the original, but doesn’t miss it by much.

Metaphor ReFantazio (PS5): COMPLETED!

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I seem to have really gotten back into long RPGs again in the last year or so. Sometimes they can seem daunting to start as you know you’ve 75 or 100 hours ahead to invest, and usually they’re a slow burn getting used to the mechanics. But, Metaphor came highly recommended and once Xenoblade 2 was out of the way I gave it a go.

I wrote a bit about it the other day already, so I don’t have a lot more to add now I’ve finished it except to say it continued to entertain, and there were plenty of plot twists along the way. Also, I was worried that going into the final area would lock off both the remaining time in the game (all events have deadlines, time passes each time you do anything, and you’ve a finite number of days to complete the game) and the ability to grind to level up, but luckily the game deals with that do you need not be concerned.

Overall, I’m not sure it’s a good as Persona 4, but then, very little is. It improves on the mechanics of that game, but as intriguing as the characters and world in Metaphor are, those in Persona 4 just beat it. It’s still amazing though.

The Good Time Garden (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

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This was a quick play after Thank Goodness You’re Here!, and it’s sort of a prototype for what that game ended up being. It’s more abstract, but still very silly.

This time, you’re a sort of naked onionman thing who has to find food for a creature in order to progress. There’s not a lot to it, but it was enjoyable enough – and free on Steam! Bargain.

Thank Goodness You’re Here! (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

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Sometimes, a game comes along which is properly hilarious. Sure, there are funny games, and games with funny events or “player made” hilarity, but it’s rare for a funny game to be this funny.

Thank Goodness You’re Here! is what we used to call an arcade adventure game. I suppose, in some ways, it’s the spiritual successor to such British 8-bit computer games as Everyone’s A Wally and Jack the Nipper. You, as a little (although his size randomly changes somehow) yellow man have arrived at the mayor’s office only to find you’ve some time to kill so wander outside. Then begins a ridiculous chain of events across this northern town where you’re expected to help out in various stupid and nonsensical ways.

For example, one of your first tasks involves freeing a portly gentleman who has reached into a drain to reach a tuppence and got his arm stuck. Off you go to the bakery to nick a load of butter with which to lubricate the arm, which frees him and reveals it to actually be a thruppence, not a tuppence. What joy!

Other tasks include arranging smoking fish in a fishmongers, repeatedly annoying a quiet old man by plopping through his chimney sooting up his living room, and fetching meat to make pies. There’s a huge number of proper Northern people who populate this town, ably voiced by Matt Berry and Jon Blyth, amongst others, who add even more silliness to the proceedings. Events that just happen around you, like the singing rats in bins, the Sausage Man, and the chap who sells bricks, as well as a few romances and rivalries (there’s a near war in the Big Pie vs Little Pie side story). Every few seconds there’s a funny event, new character, or bit of dialogue, and it all feels a bit Python-y and a bit On The Buses-y in the best possible way. There’s also a load of adverts for in-universe products which are hilarious.

The gameplay is pretty simple, mostly involving some minor platforming and fetch and carry requests punctuated with a bit of exploration and pathfinding as various areas are revisited in different ways as routes open up or close. That’s not a criticism like it might be with a “straight” game, as the point here is to enjoy the people and the setting (and the accents) more than the gameplay itself which is mostly just the vehicle to progress the story and events.

It’s a really unique game, and I wish I could forget all about it so I can play it again and re-discover it all.

Pokémon Blue: completed!

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Going South seems to have been the right path, as I came across Cinnabar Island, the location of the seventh gym and also a large science laboratory and ruined house. I spent some time exploring the house, then went to the lab and had my fossil and amber studied and converted into pokémon – Kabuto and Aerodactyl. This gave me a couple of well-needed slots in the pokécentre item storage system, but I’m not sure I’ll actually find space for either of the new pokémon in my main team.

I went to Vermillion City, stopping in at my house on the way, and found that the gym leader had returned. It was Giovanni! Shock, amaze, horror. I am sure that the surprise would have had slightly more impact if I haven’t so easily defeated him twice already, and his pokémon roster was largely unchanged. His ground and rock monsters were defeated easily by Vaporeon and Zapdos, and I took the Earth Badge – completing my trophy cabinet – with little difficulty.

Greater difficulty was to come.

By the time I got Gyrados, I didn’t need it any more.

I went along routes 22 and 23, passing the guardians who checked each of the badges in my possession, until I got to the cave system known as Victory Road. Not a road, and not actually the location of victory. I battled through, with Haunter and Vaporeon doing the majority of the heavy lifting, and managed to manipulate the current in the basement to enable me to find Moltres. Tempted as I was to swap the new bird to my team, I had too much emotional connection with Charizard, and fire types aren’t actually as powerful as you’d expect. I found myself at the end of route 23 in the Indigo Plateau, and I healed up, bought a lot of revives, potions, and heals, and I set off for the Elite Four.

On Pokémon LeafGreen I managed to defeat the Elite Four, after many attempts, only to be foiled by the final battle against my rival. That was the furthest I’d ever managed to get, until I managed to complete Pokémon X. As such I was pretty anxious as I made my way into the first battle arena, and this feeling didn’t disappear since Lorelei proved herself to be a formidable foe with her water and ice monsters taking a lot of strategy to take down. Eventually, however, she fell, and the next three trainers were dispatched with comparative ease. Lance was a little tricky, with his dragon-type pokémon, but Dugtrio in particular dealt a lot of damage in each turn.

And then it was on to the champion; my rival who had beaten me to the position. I have no idea why I named him Quillum, but it mattered not. I was expecting an incredibly difficult battle, but I chose my team well so each opponent took a maximum of two hits before fainting.

I won. I beat Pokémon Blue. I saw the credits roll, I had my team entered in the hall of fame, I saw a very definite final screen before the game reset to the title screen.

Zapdos proved to be the key to victory

Of course, that’s not quite the end. I’ve only caught 70 different pokémon of the 150 available, and even if not all of them are going to be obtainable (since I have no friends with the 3DS games) there’s at least one I have my sights on …