Post — Page 81

LocoRoco Cocoreccho (PS3): COMPLETED!

Posted on 13/05/2016 Written by deKay

A short post for a short game. LocoRoco Cocoreccho was a disappointing item on the PS+ free rental list this month. Not because it’s a bad game, more because it’s was already almost free and it’s very, very short.

It’s charming though, and reminded me a lot of Hohokum. Of course, it reminded me more of the PSP LocoRoco games, but this plays much more like Hohokum than those. Perhaps this game was a source of inspiration for Hohokum?

Er, so the game then. Or “interactive screensaver” as I think it was even sold as. You vaguely guide little blobs around flowers and platforms and water, waking up other sleeping blobs and jiggling the controller to make things move. Wake up enough blobs and you can move on to the next area. In the final area, you shoot your collected blobs at baddie spider blobs. And then you win. All while the blobs sing at you.

And I won! Yay?

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Sonic 3 & Knuckles (MD): COMPLETED!

Posted on 08/05/2016 Written by deKay

I’ve completed this many times through the years, but it’s been quite a while since last time, and even longer since a full all-emeralds run. So I did that.

It’s clear that Sonic 3 & Knuckles is still the best Mega Drive game. It looks and sounds incredible, has varied levels, gimmicks and bosses, and is actually huge. Yes, I know it sort of cheats by spanning two cartridges, but that’s irrelevant as far as I’m concerned as together they are the best game. Some people will say Sonic 2 is better. Those people are wrong.

In total, it probably took about four hours. I’d forgotten just how big it was. I only died three times, one death being a Time Over on Flying Battery 2 (I’d spent ages looking for Super Emeralds, and just squeaked past the final lamppost when the time ran out – lucky!), but then the game was never really difficult – especially once you’re able to be be Super or Hyper Sonic. Nor does it matter that it wasn’t hard – it’s just great. Apart from Tails. Oh god does he need to die. He actually killed me on one of the end boss fights as he hit Eggman first and I fell through him instead of bouncing off.

Click to view slideshow.

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Streets of Rage 3 (MD): COMPLETED!

Posted on 07/05/2016 Written by deKay

Streets of Rage 3 is certainly the hardest of the trilogy. As far as I recall, I’ve only completed it once before, and then I don’t think I got the best ending.

And so it is that I didn’t get the best ending this time either, unfortunately. I reached the chief in Stage 6 too late (and only just too late as well), and so Shiva was the final boss for me. It’s frustrating, as I played through the game three times today, and on the second attempt I did save the chief – then died on Stage 7. On my third and final try, I didn’t save him. Annoying.

Click to view slideshow.

Streets of Rage 3 probably isn’t as good as Streets of Rage 2. It has lots more moves, bigger sprites and in some parts (like the disco) some incredible graphics, but SoR2 plays better and has more variety and much, much better music. Also, Zen (in 3) is rubbish. Where has Max gone, anyway?

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Hudson Hawk (GB): COMPLETED!

Posted on 07/05/2016 Written by deKay

I seem to recall, back in the day, that although the film Hudson Hawk was utterly dire, the games based on it for various platforms were actually rather good. The Game Boy version, which I decided to play today for no specific reason, wasn’t fantastic as it turned out, but was reasonably playable.

Hudson Hawk is a platformer (because of course it is – pretty much all film licences at the time were), where Bruce Willis throws balls at things and steals paintings. There are two puzzles in the entire game, both really quite simple, and aside from not being able to see very far ahead of you (making some baddie appearances a bit of a surprise), the whole game was surprisingly easy. And short. It’s a very short game, especially since the first mission is longer than the other two combined, giving you a false sense it’ll be a much bigger than it was.

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Affordable Space Adventures (Wii U): COMPLETED!

Posted on 06/05/2016 Written by deKay

Affordable Space Adventures was, like Freedom Planet, another one of the recent Nintendo Humble Bundle games. It’s a game I’d intended to buy at some point anyway, but I just never got round to it.

Taking control of a tiny spaceship lost on a strange planet inhabited by long forgotten machines, you have to pilot around taking care not to get spotted, crushed, frozen or lasered. As your damaged ship starts to self-repair, additional systems come online, and eventually its fully functional with two different drive systems, a scanner, assorted types of landing gear and so on. Each on-board system generates noise, heat and/or electricity, and the machines you come across are variously sensitive to these, so you have to be careful which ones you activate, and how you use them.

This makes the game a bit more of a puzzle game than I was expecting. Tweaking power outputs and turning off unnecessary systems using the “heads-down display” on the Gamepad is genius, watching your outputs to ensure you can safely glide past a sentry or a mine undetected. Sometimes you need to coast along on minimal (or no!) power, other times you have to switch from your fuel engine to electric engine, or make use of your heat shutters to appear cooler to enemies. It’s very clever, really.

Later on, environmental hazards start playing havok with your ship’s computer, changing settings for you or completely disabling certain abilities, so you have to pay attention to your computer at all times.

It’s a beautiful looking game, and quite unlike anything else I’ve played. It’s hard to see how it would work properly on any system other than the Wii U (expect, perhaps the 3DS at a push), and it shows just what kind of thing can be done with Nintendo’s unusual hardware. It’s a shame more games don’t. There’s a multiplayer mode too, which is how the game was really designed to play, with up to three players taking over different aspects of the ship – a pilot, and engineer and a science officer – but I played through solo without too much difficulty. Apart from Level 37, the final section of which took over an hour’s worth of attempts. I scraped through eventually. Affordable Space Adventures is an essential game for any Wii U owner.

Click to view slideshow.

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