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The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Finally a Zelda game where you play as Zelda! Aside from HYRULE WARRIORS of course, but that isn’t exclusively you playing as Zelda. Yes, a game using what appears to be the same engine as the remake of Link’s Awakening did a few years ago, only this time you’re Zelda and you don’t really fight anything because you have a magic wand and can use it to summon items and creatures you have previously scanned with it. Yes – it’s The Legend of Zelda (Actually Zelda This Time): The Magic 3D Printer!

Except it isn’t all Zelda, is it. Because not only do you start the game playing as Link, but at any point you like you can turn into a sort of clone of Link for a limited time. Cop-out, innit. Luckily, the first bit as Link is only very short (he’s soon captured and you have to save him), and the Link Clone is used at your behest for the most part so can be (and was) ignored almost entirely. At least, until you find some of the bosses are only able to be damaged when you’re in Link form. Boo.

But, it doesn’t really matter too much. As with other non-Zelda-based Zelda games, it’s mainly about the puzzles and the cloning wand makes some of the traditional ones (such as “hit the switch from a distance” or “press these two buttons at the same time” take on a different dimension when you can throw bats about or drop a bed on stuff.

As it’s all in the graphical style of Link’s (Re)Awakening it all looks lovely too which that tilt shift-like thing going on and everything looking like a little toy in a giant diorama. It isn’t very difficult, especially once you discover that you the beds you generate can be used to nap in to regain hearts, but it is very lovely and enjoyable. The fact the overworld is pretty much all unlocked from the get-go is nice too, as you get the option of which order you complete the “dungeons” and can – with judicious use of various cloneables – climb onto and over pretty much everything so exploring is fun. And essential if you want all the extra hearts.

Perhaps not the best Zelda game, but certainly the best Zelda Zelda game and it’s fun to play and has lots of silly characters and quests to keep you entertained.

Auf Wiedersehen, Monty (Switch)

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Nah mate. Look, I tried. And, it looks so much better and plays so much better than the previous two Monty games, but I just couldn’t make head nor tail of the map, where I’m supposed to go, or what I’m supposed to do. Collect plane tickets, go to other countries? Then what? Why? There’s money pick up, I think? And other items?

Just utterly flummoxed by it and wandering the map with a dwindling number of tickets which are needed to get around wasn’t fun. I looked up the original game cassette inlay and that didn’t help either. Abandoned!

Monty on the Run (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Another Monty game. It’s very similar to the first one, really, but with the added feature that you have to collect five specific items en-route to the exit or you can’t escape.

I think I was lucky in that I found them automatically or accidentally, because I certainly remember when I’ve played this previously a very long time ago I must have missed some. It wouldn’t surprise me if backtracking to find them again was impossible too.

The jumping physics and general collision detection seems a bit improved over the first game, and graphically it’s a bit nicer too. There is a teddy that looks like you should pick it up but it kills you, which seems a bit unfair as there’s no warning. Bloody teddy bears.

Wanted: Monty Mole (Switch): COMPLETED!

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The Monty Mole games were always Too Hard. You only have to look at the random nature of the instant-death Crushers to see that. I sort of liked them at the time, but not enough to struggle through with not-my-fault deaths threatening to cut my play short – it was just too frustrating. Plus on the Spectrum I had a million other games I could play instead.

So, why I bought The Monty Mole Collection, a set of three Monty and one Monty-adjacent games on the eShop, I don’t know. Madness.

But! Save states! Sure, emulators have had these for a Very Long Time but it’s just easier to play things on the Switch these days, isn’t it? And with these save states I can work around the stupid randomness and relieve some of the other frustrations that are always part of pixel-perfect platformers with slightly wonky collision detection.

And so it came to pass that I played and completed Wanted: Monty Mole. Obviously it’s a simplistic, if not exactly simple, game these days but it was fine enough. There was a bit where you have to collect items to get past a certain screen and the items I needed did nothing. Not sure if that’s a bug or I did something wrong, but I ended up starting the game again, did exactly the same thing, and it worked. Haunted.

This wall should “open”. It didn’t.

Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Konami changed things in the Metroidvania formula for Order of Ecclesia in a number of ways. Firstly, you play solo as An Actual Woman, a rare thing in Castlevania games. Shanoa is part of an organisation tasked with protecting the world from the possible resurgence of Dracula in a time in history when the Belmonts seem to have disappeared. Spoiler: the organisation actually wants to resurrect Dracula.

Secondly, there’s a world map with many discrete, and mostly small levels. Like with Portrait of Ruin this means many more non-castle themed areas, but also like Portrait of Ruin, some are just recoloured versions of others. There’s still a lot of variety though.

Additionally, Shanoa’s powers are sort of similar to Soma’s, where she absorbs glyphs (rather than souls) from enemies and can then make use of their powers herself. However, each power drains magic points, so even basic attacks can leave you magicless and you have to wait for it to recharge. A bit annoying when all you want to do is slash a boss in the face over and over.

The graphical style is somewhat different to previous GBA and DS Castlevania games too, which, coupled with the new areas and related foes, does mean that the much-maligned asset reuse of the series isn’t apparent here.

When I played this originally, I gave up for some reason. I don’t know why, as I was enjoying it. Presumably something else came along at the time and I just never went back. It means that this time through, I remembered almost nothing bar the first half an hour or so where the story is set up. Imagine my surprise, then, when after completing a load of levels it turns out there is a castle after all – and an huge one, if not quite a full size one, at that. You get to what you think is pretty much the end of the game and suddenly you’ve a whole extra game, sort of, to do!

I think I ended up preferring this to Portrait of Ruin, but all three of these DS Castlevania games have been excellent in their own way.