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Holy Potatoes! A Weapon Shop?! (Switch): COMPLETED!

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89p? Well why not. The two other Holy Potatoes games were also 89p each, so I got them as well. Yes, I know I have them on Steam already. Shut up. You’re not my mum.

I’d played a little bit of this before and seem to remember it’s one of those management type games, like the Kairosoft ones, only you’re potatoes and you run a weapon shop. I mean, you could have discerned much of that from the title of the game, but I was right. That’s exactly what it is.

You make weapons, sell them to heroes, they pay you depending on how well you made it and how close to their preferred weapon type or attributes it is, and you use that money to hire and train staff, buy materials, and purchase shop upgrades and holidays for your overworked tubers. As you advance, you open new areas and have more people to please, weapons to make and so on.

it’s pretty addictive, if a little clunky (it’s clearly designed for a mouse driven system and joypad controls aren’t great), but definitely worth 89p.

Spider-Man 2 (PS5): COMPLETED!

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It’s not often I play a big all-the-graphics modern games these days. In fact, even Spider-Man 2 is now a few years old. It does look amazing but the important thing is how it plays.

Very few games are this much fun to just get from A to B. Batman: Arkham Knight was, and the first Sony Spider-Man was, but most other games don’t give you the freedom and the tools and the verticality that just make it a joy to get around. This adds gliding and air-streams to the original, making long distance travel even faster – which is just as well as the map now covers more of New York. Or you can just be boring and fast travel, which actually looks all fancy because there’s no loading thanks to The Power of the PS5 SSD. Which, as I said before, is only fast in-game, not when doing file management. Tch.

So actually being the Spider-Man, or Spider-Men, or Spider-Mans (it is debated in the game as to the correct term) is a lot of fun, but the story needs to be good in order to take you through. And it is, if not quite as good as the previous instalments. You’ve got Pete still dealing with the death of Aunt May, and trying to mentor Miles while getting fired from a teaching job and generally not having any time or money, and you’ve got Miles who has college applications to sort and his dead dad to get over and him feeling increasingly concerned about Pete when, well, spoiler if you’ve not already heard about it, Venom makes an appearance. Plus all the Spider-Stuff they’ve both got going on, Harry Osborn on the brink of death for most of the game, and a number of Spiderfoes all being broken out of jail so that Kraven The Hunter can take them down meaning, weirdly, the Spider-Men have to save them.

It’s a lot.

And that’s before you get all the random side quests and street crimes and Sandman B-plot and photos you have to take and everything. I think this might be partly why the story just doesn’t hit like it did in the previous games – there’s too much distraction. That said, Kraven really isn’t a top tier Spider-Man villain like Doctor Octopus was, so it’s not the only reason. Sure, there’s Venom, but, I was expecting the Green Goblin. Maybe in Spider-Man 3? If they ever make it.

In conclusion (written like an AI, I know), it’s an excellent game, with lots to do and some amazing combat and traversal mechanics. Please don’t make me buy a PS6 for the next one.

Spider-Man 2 (PS5): COMPLETED!

Posted on Written by

It’s not often I play a big all-the-graphics modern games these days. In fact, even Spider-Man 2 is now a few years old. It does look amazing but the important thing is how it plays.

Very few games are this much fun to just get from A to B. Batman: Arkham Knight was, and the first Sony Spider-Man was, but most other games don’t give you the freedom and the tools and the verticality that just make it a joy to get around. This adds gliding and air-streams to the original, making long distance travel even faster – which is just as well as the map now covers more of New York. Or you can just be boring and fast travel, which actually looks all fancy because there’s no loading thanks to The Power of the PS5 SSD. Which, as I said before, is only fast in-game, not when doing file management. Tch.

So actually being the Spider-Man, or Spider-Men, or Spider-Mans (it is debated in the game as to the correct term) is a lot of fun, but the story needs to be good in order to take you through. And it is, if not quite as good as the previous instalments. You’ve got Pete still dealing with the death of Aunt May, and trying to mentor Miles while getting fired from a teaching job and generally not having any time or money, and you’ve got Miles who has college applications to sort and his dead dad to get over and him feeling increasingly concerned about Pete when, well, spoiler if you’ve not already heard about it, Venom makes an appearance. Plus all the Spider-Stuff they’ve both got going on, Harry Osborn on the brink of death for most of the game, and a number of Spiderfoes all being broken out of jail so that Kraven The Hunter can take them down meaning, weirdly, the Spider-Men have to save them.

It’s a lot.

And that’s before you get all the random side quests and street crimes and Sandman B-plot and photos you have to take and everything. I think this might be partly why the story just doesn’t hit like it did in the previous games – there’s too much distraction. That said, Kraven really isn’t a top tier Spider-Man villain like Doctor Octopus was, so it’s not the only reason. Sure, there’s Venom, but, I was expecting the Green Goblin. Maybe in Spider-Man 3? If they ever make it.

In conclusion (written like an AI, I know), it’s an excellent game, with lots to do and some amazing combat and traversal mechanics. Please don’t make me buy a PS6 for the next one.

Puzzle Bobble (Evercade): COMPLETED!

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New Evercade cartridges arrived last night! one of them is the Taito Arcade 3 compilation, the highlight (for me) on it being Puzzle Bobble. The original one! In the arcade!

As I already knew, it’s great. Only, because it’s the arcade version, it only has 30 levels so I was done within an hour. 30 levels! I’m sure later home versions had many hundreds of them or randomly generated endlessly, but no.

Virtual Boy Wario Land (Switch 2): COMPLETED!

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Yes! I was one of those idiots that paid SIXTY SIX POUNDS for a piece of plastic that you put your Switch (or Switch 2) in, so you can sit awkwardly while playing games made for one of the worst consoles ever made! It’s like having two red-tinted Game Boys stuck in front of your eyes that you can only really play at a table (or, as I did, on the sofa with a teetering pile of lap cushions), all so you can get a not especially impressive 3D effect in some poorly realised games. Idiot.

Just lookit though. LOOKIT.

Although I’ve never owned a Virtual Boy, I have played on a few and can say that this Switch peripheral manages to recreate the ridiculous of the original flop console admirably. With my Nintendo Online subscription I also get access to 7 games (about a third of those ever released – most of the rest are on the way), and having tried them all only Virtual Boy Wario Land really works.

And, against all the odds, it’s great.

It’s a pretty straightforward platformer, with about 20 levels and some power ups that let you smash blocks or shoot fireballs, but the 3D comes in as there are “front” and “back” layers to the playfield. Much like Mutant Mudds, I suppose, which I know came much later. There are special blocks that “throw” you in and out of the screen, as well as pipes and doorways that sometimes do the same. Some of the levels are almost 3D mazes as you try to find a key to open the lift to the next level. Every few levels you get a boss, which also tends to swap plane in some way or another.

The 3D effect is subtle, but it’s nice. I don’t think the game would have suffered by being a straight Game Boy or SNES title, though. It’s hard to see from the screenshots how well it works because it seems so damn dark and the dual-screen thing (one for each eye) means you lose the 3D completely. But anyway, nice game shame about the delivery mechanism, I suppose.