Gremlins 2: The New Batch (Game Boy, 1990)

 

The last game from the Game Boy Player's Guide that I had on my list of things to check out (where it has been for, no joke, 30 years). Always kinda knew this would be the last thing I played from the guide, for whatever reason. I've got kind of an unusual link with this one, which I'll get into in a moment here. Also this is THE WORST GODDAMN GAME EVER.

R-Type III: The Third Lightning (Super NES, 1994)

 

This was the first really difficult game that I ever beat. They totally cranked that difficulty meter from the previous games and made this an ahead-of-its-time murderfest akin to Super Meat Boy. The good news is that rather than repeating the levels on death like all previous games in the series, this one gives you actual checkpoints and lots of them. Also infinite lives. So the incredibly tough levels can be tackled one segment at a time. There are no difficulty levels, but the difficulty is just right, and they pretty much got it perfect here. Though be prepared that this game does take a while to get through if played fully legit, and every stage is a fierce battle.

Super R-Type (Super NES, 1991)

Time for one of my favorite SNES shooters. This is basically R-Type II remixed for the new SNES, with some R-Type content thrown in, and a couple entirely new levels. I got this game as a kid, one of the 10-15 games I got in the 1990's, and really liked it because I kinda had to. It was all I had to play for a few weeks there! It's a good game regardless, and certainly easier on the eyes than the Game Boy ones (which admittedly punch above their weight). Since we hadn't gotten R-Type II in the states at the time, this game seemed almost entirely new. Still no build variety though.

(Originally posted in 2014, rewriting some of it now to go with the others)

R-Type II (Game Boy, 1992)

 

This one I played way later in time than the other one, and for a while didn't even know it existed. The first one was the only one I saw covered or talked about anywhere. And there's a very good reason for this: It never came out in North America. That's right, it got Japan and Europe releases and then they just kinda cancelled the American version. Regardless, this is basically part two of the first game, picking up right where it left off. It has a lot in common with Super R-Type (but not everything). I think most people only experienced this via the R-Type DX compilation on Game Boy Color, especially in the States.

R-Type (Game Boy, 1991)

 

Another Game Boy Player's Guide game, and one I'm surprised I never posted about already. I actually got this game as a kid, one of the ten or so Game Boy games I ever owned. Unfortunately, out of those ten-ish, this was probably the one I got the least out of. I think I played it a grand total of maybe 2-3 hours at the most, and was pretty much done with it in one day. It's a very short game and doesn't pose any particular challenge, especially compared to other games in this series. Still, it's worth a look.

The R-Type series, from Irem, was sorta the Ross Perot of the shooter universe circa the 1990s. Not as popular or well-known as Gradius and not as beloved by the hardcore as the vertical Compile games. It has a number of innovations that set it apart from (and even surpass at times) the Gradius games.

Ranking the Dark Souls 3 Areas From Worst To Best

 

Dark Souls 3 is certainly the most refined of the trilogy (quadrilogy, if you count Demon's Souls). I found that it was lacking a little bit of the grittiness and mystique of the earlier games in the series, but so goes the price of progress.

Ranking the Sekiro Areas From Worst To Best

 

Not a Soulsborne game but I absolutely consider Sekiro to be one of Fromsoft's "big seven" and a part of the overall series. It plays very differently from the rest, though, and is considerably more challenging than any of them. At least until you realize the game doesn't really penalize you much for spamming block. In any case, this game is tremendous and I had a huge amount of fun with it. While ER is their best game overall and Bloodborne is pound-for-pound the most interesting, Sekiro might be the most fun out of all of them. No character-creation in this one, but it allows the game to do a lot more with the emotions of the main character. No build variety either, which allows the game to have really focused gameplay that is centered more on mastery than finding a meta.

Ranking the Bloodborne Areas From Worst To Best

 

Good to finally get some Bloodborne content on here that isn't me hating on the game. While Elden Ring is Fromsoft's magnum opus, Bloodborne might be pound for pound their most interesting game. It's the only other one that sometimes challenges ER's supremacy for me, depending on the phase of the moon when you ask.

Ranking the Dark Souls 2 Areas From Worst To Best

A game with very low lows and very high highs. The dynamic range for zones in this game is a lot more variable than the rest of the series. I'm one of the few people who likes this more than Dark Souls, and I find it much more polished and streamlined. Well, for the most part. the Adaptability/Agility stat was unnecessary (and never appeared in any other From game) and the rolling wasn't nearly as good as the other games - which probably accounts for the vast majority of people's gripes about this game. Level Adaptability to 30ish to get Agility to 105ish and your rolls are basically as good as the rest of the series, which, essentially, "fixes" this game. It's kinda like triggering all of Alia's speeches and then backup-saving so you can play Mega Man X5 normally after that. Regardless, on with the list.

Ranking the Dark Souls Areas From Worst To Best

 

The second game in the series, but as of right now the "oldest" if that makes any sense. It's the only one that doesn't look amazing. Though maybe its muddy grittiness is a plus, I'm not sure. Despite having masterclass-level stage design, this has slowly become my least-favorite of Fromsoft's big seven soulsbornekiros. Not as pretty as all of the others, more rudimentary, and just kinda dark and unforgiving. Which, for some, makes it perfect. After the more normal level and level select format of Demon's Souls, this game's world layout is pretty much the next evolution of the Metroid formula and would define their games from here on out.

Ranking the Demon's Souls Areas From Worst To Best

Time for some Fromsoft content. They're my favorite game devs and make my favorite games, and I've barely mentioned them on here except to not like Bloodborne before I understood what it was (a mistake previously made with FFVI in 1995 and Xenogears in 1999). I think I later revised that, at least. Doing several of these lists, now that I've played most of these games several times over.

The 1000 Games I've Beaten (#474 - 500)

 

#474 Contra (NES) – Fall 2013

Got to the rest of THIS series a good decade and a half after I should have (much like the Castlevania series). This is pretty much the quintessential NES action game. No bullshit, just cool weapons and nonstop battles. It also draws heavy inspiration from Alien and Aliens, which begs the question of why that series never got any games based on it that were just THIS. Nope, they always had to get cute and mess it up. Well, this game gives you the blueprint on how to make a good game, all they had to do was follow it. The only real downside is that it's a very difficult game. The thirty lives code helps a lot and I only play it with that.

Battle Unit Zeoth (Game Boy, 1991)

 

One of the many games I wanted as a kid and didn't get. And also one of the many games that I'm kinda lucky I didn't get because it isn't anywhere near as good as I thought it was. It's a fairly basic action game, nothing great, nothing bad either, but it can be finished fairly easily in about 30 minutes at the most. The same could be said for Kirby's Dream Land, but as a first game launching pad it does what it does very well. After that I wanted things that had a bit more longevity, given that I'd only get a game every couple months. This one wouldn't have fit the bill at all, and it has the illusion of complexity that isn't there. At least it has a mech in it, that's pretty cool.

The 1000 Games I've Beaten (#453 - 473)

#453 Bioshock Infinite (Playstation 3) – Summer 2013

One of those games that I thought was a masterclass the first time I played it, only to find all kinds of flaws with it on subsequent runs. Nowhere near as deep as the previous two games. Basically plays like a Call of Duty, with the main "attack spell" functioning just like a grenade. Doesn't have the variety or the interesting spells of the previous games. Gets rid of traps and the weapon wheel in favor of "loadouts" where you can only carry two weapons at a time. There are more weapons, but even then they're heavily redundant (aka a bunch of them will do the same thing). The gameplay is lacking on this one and it's carried by the story and setting.

I really did love it the first time through though. It has some heart and soul, and it was probably the first real "multiverse" story I saw in a game/movie, or at least the first interesting one. This was before multiverse stuff was completely overdone in pop culture. However I'd take the first or even the second game over this one any day on gameplay and storytelling. Main thing going against this is that it's in the same series as an all-timer like Bioshock and if it were its own standalone game I wouldn't judge it as harshly.

The 1000 Games I've Beaten (#432 - 452)

#432 Mario Bros (Arcade) – Winter 2013

The start of the Three-Decade Project. Got this idea to play something from every year of the previous 30 years, which got me a bunch of new #'s. First was 1983. This game...did not take long at all. Probably like a half hour? It's a very basic arcade game with one screen.

The Top Twenty Classic Final Boss Themes in Gaming

Today I'm listing what I consider to be the twenty best final boss themes in the lexicon of classic gaming. There are many final boss themes that I've never heard, so your mileage may vary. RPGs will be over-represented, as most of the great epic final battle scores that come to mind are from those very games.

(Originally posted many years ago as a top 17. Now with several more added and all of the broken music links fixed)

Mario Kart 7 (Nintendo 3DS, 2011)

 

I mentioned playing this back to back with the DS one in 2015 or so. Well, let's see if I form any new opinions playing them back to back for a second time. Originally I liked this one a lot more, but ever since I've heard about how great the DS one is.

Fun Fact: This was the first 3DS game I ever bought/played/finished, which shows how much I like this series.

Mario Kart DS (Nintendo DS, 2005)

 

Back in the day I did most of the Mario Kart series, but couldn't get a couple of the portable ones. That's no longer the case. Doing something a bit different and giving a rundown of every course here. I was never crazy about this game back when I first played it, probably because the DS in general was a system I wasn't crazy about. Also, Mario Kart 7 on 3DS was already out, so I was just playing this for completion's sake before the new one. It was just an appetizer! Yet ever since then I've heard that it's better than its 3DS counterpart. Heck, I've heard that this is one of the best games in the series, so we'll see if I have a higher opinion of it this time.

The 1000 Games I've Beaten (#411 - 431)

#411 Batman: Arkham City (Playstation 3) – Summer 2012

This is the point where my game-finishing took off because I decided to go for 1000. Played more short games from this point forward to get that number up. So the finish-rate basically doubles for the rest.

Castlevania - Harmony of Dissonance (Game Boy Advance, 2002)

 

Second of the GBA trilogy and generally agreed upon to be the weakest of the Big Six portable 'Vanias from this era. They're all good, but this one is a step down. At least it's canon, unlike Circle of the Moon. They also brightened this one up to the point of being neon since CotM was so difficult to see on GBA hardware. It's basically the flipside of CotM in pretty much every regard. You can also tell from the main character design that they were really trying to emulate Symphony of the Night. It also marks Koji Igarashi returning to directing after skipping CotM.