N64 Time - Duke Nukem 64

[noobish hat]

Wonder Project is absolutely doing my filbert in now. According to the two (utterly worthless) guides on gamefaqs, you only need to complete 60% of the achievements to finish the game. I've struggled my way up to 92% now, and the sequence of events that leads to the ending STILL won't occur. If I have to sit through the same set of unskippable animations one more time, I'm just gonna go bananas. This game is like the very worst aspects of point and click games. Remember how sometimes in Broken Sword, it would seem like an event or a conversation topic wouldn't open up until you had just dicked around long enough, and you'd have no idea what it was you'd done to suddenly be able to proceed? Well that's what this entire game is like. But in Japanese. And with no plot. You see, that's the problem here - there is no plot progression. In Broken Sword, generally you know your ultimate goal is at any one time, so you have a place to start. The only reason I know what my goals are in Wonder Project is because the guides told me, and they were written by people who HAVE dicked around long enough for the game to randomly progress. Only, those people didn't bother to write down what they did, they just say things like "go talk to the Pearl in the park", seemingly oblivious to the fact that Pearl probably isn't going to BE in the park. I'd have thought that at 92% I would have done enough stuff in the game to allow most scenes to unfold. But they won't! NOW CAN YOU SEE WHY I'M SO ****ING ANGRY!? I JUST WANNA PLAY BLAST CORPS, AND THIS GAME WON'T LET ME!!!

[importaku]

Where exactly have you reached in the story? I don't remember it been that hard. The ending is totally worth it dont give up.

[noobish hat]

Jason, seriously, I'm about to eat my own head in frustration, I HATE this game. I've got 100% of the achievements now, and been everywhere and done EVERYTHING. But it STILL. WON'T. END. I'm at the part where you're supposed to make friends with Pokko. I met him in the Pipeway, and raced him, then I met him at Karen's izakaya, where he tried to touch the ocarina, and Josette got mad. Now whenever I go back to the Dolphin ship, Pokko is there and Josette gets mad. According to the guides on gamefaqs, from this point, I'm supposed to scold Josette for getting angry, go talk to Pearl in the park, then come back to the ship and make up with Pokko? Problem is, Pearl has vanished from the game, so I can't do that. Pretty much all the characters have left now, since I completed their stories. If I go to the execution place, it's deserted, but after Josette runs off, Harben appears and a soldier runs after her. If all this is sounding insane and nonsensical to anyone, that's because it IS.

[egparadigm]

How about watching a Youtube video? Sometimes they can be clearer than an FAQ. The following is the end of the game, so don't open the link unless that's what you want to see!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl1VfNWzrDQ

[noobish hat]

Haaaaaaaaaaaaallelujahhhhhhhhhhh! Last night, after (no joke) two full days of fannying around in this ludicrously poorly designed 'game', it randomly, magically, FINALLY decided to let me progress to the ending. Of course it was very late, and I didn't want to be up till the dawn watching the 45 minute ending sequence, which is just an unskippable and poorly animated cutscene (although no surprise, since the entire game has thus far just been one long unskippable and poorly animated cutscene). Hopefully I will be able to kill off this game TODAY (I've been saying that all week), and be can at last move onto something with some actual gameplay.

[noobish hat]

I honestly cannot explain how awful this game is. But let me try. I'm at the final part of 'game' before the amazing 45 minute finale. Imagine you're playing Pacman, but in 3D. Now imagine you're playing in first person mode, looking through Pacman's eyes, inside the maze, and have no overhead view of the map at all. Now imagine the ghosts are actually soldiers with guns, and there are twice as many of them. You have to get through 8 levels of this crap and if you get caught EVEN ONCE, you have to start ALL OVER AGAIN. Now imagine the worst controls ever in a video game, and you can only make 90 degree turns. There are first person games on the POCKET STATION with better controls than this. Welcome to the final level of Wonder Project J2. It's pigdribble.

[importaku]

That end dungeon was horrible indeed, now try imagine doing it with only a rudimentary grasp of japanese LOL. Saying that i did love the ending, then again i loved the super famicom one too. I did get a sense of satisfaction knowing i managed to complete a game that even N64 magazine hadn't completed. Hehe they failed on goemon too

[noobish hat]

Which Goemon? Oh, you mean the import review?

[importaku]

Yup Ganbare goemon neo momoyama bakufu no odori, a fun platorm game but a little buggy to say the least but for goemons first go at 3d i thought it was an excellent attempt.

[noobish hat]

Well yesterday I finally finished this hideous, hideous game and can honestly say it is one of the worst things I've ever played. It's up there with Deep Blue. The ending is SO long, and, like the rest of the cutscenes (bear in mind the game is about 90% cutscenes), you can't pause it, and there is no confirm button for the dialogue, it just keeps going on its own, so once you get to the ending, you have to sit there until it's done. This game offers no consideration for the player whatsoever. That's the end of the discussion, let us never mention this game again.

[Tetsuo]

I've noticed a trend appearing that seems to suggest your tolerance for a bit of a challenge in games is somewhat low, noob

I dread to think how you're going to get on with Blast Dozer, unlocking cheats in GoldenEye, Puyo Puyo Sun, Conker's Bad Fur Day...

[noobish hat]

There's a difference between a game that is difficult by design, like R-Type, and Goldeneye's 00 Agent setting (both of which are games that I love), and games that are difficult because they're poorly designed, like Mario Kart 64. Having said that, I AM the kind of person who would prefer a game to be fun, rather than challenging (if I had to choose). Of course, the ideal situation is for a game to be both, but there are precious few games that strike that perfect balance.

[noobish hat]

With Wonder Project J2 finally put to bed, and Doom 64 also completed I've moved onto the next two games in this month's lineup. I started with Wave Race because a friend came over and wanted to play more multiplayer (I was thrashed again - damn).



This game came to me free (in a massive massive bundle) courtesy of the lovely Parkinho, so many thanks to him. This is a game unlike any I've played before; it can't really be compared to any other racer. The wave effects change the game completely and make it MUCH more of a test of skill than something like Mario Kart 64. The problem is I don't appear to have any skill, but I'm enjoying it all the same. Pulling off a stunt after bouncing off the crest of a giant wave makes you feel so cool, it's hard not to love. The whole game also has such a 90s feel to it, which of course I love. As a further bonus, I discovered the soundtrack was done by Kazumi Totaka (KK Slider from Animal Crossing!). Check out one of my favourite tunes:



You may be interested in this link too - http://www.nindb.net/feature/totakas-song.html
It has lots of information on Totaka's signature tune, what games it features in, and how to find it. Wave Race happens to be one of the few games it's never been found in - who knows, maybe I will get lucky and stumble across it!

At the same time, I've been playing



Blast Dozer! It just came out in Japan, so I'm playing the Jap version of course.I have to admit, I'm a little confused about the release dates. It was developed by Rare, but it came out in JAPAN first? What the hell. Wikipedia also reckons it came out months earlier in the US in February 1997, but the magazine is covering the Jap version like it's the first version released.

The game itself is a lot of fun, but some levels are hard as hell. For those out of the loop, the game is about a nuclear missle carrying truck thing which is out of control and is ploughing mercilessly (although very very slowly) through cities and such. Your job is to demolish everything in its path, plug holes and construct makeshift bridges etc, all using a plethora of creatively destructive vehicles. If anything even touches the nuclear truck - KABOOM! I'm currently stuck on what is apparently the most frustrating level of them all - Oyster Harbour. You have to shoot missiles at a bunch of crates on the dock, drive the Ram Dozer over to a crane, load TNT onto it, then use that to destroy walls on a bridge for the truck to cross over. Then you have to race to the other side of the bridge and push blocks (some hidden behind destructable buildings) into holes, line up some barges and then push another TNT box across them all to blow up the final building. It's so complicated! I can get right to the final part, but I can never manage to push the TNT right up to the building - it's hellishly tricky to manoeuvre the box, especially with almost invisible railings on the barges meaning you have to be dead centre to ensure it will go through without getting caught.

One BIG problem with the game, which almost ruins it, is that oftentimes you will be required to line things up PERFECTLY, for no reason. For example, you drive the Ram Dozer onto a barge, then drive the barge to an area that needs to be crossed (marked by the differently coloured ground) - the barge must be in the exact position decided upon by the developers or else you will be unable to drive the Ram Dozer off the barge. This costs you a lot of vital time because you then have to exit the Ram Dozer, get back into the barge and try to line it up a little better - and of course, you have no way of knowing if it's lined up satisfactorily until you get out and try to drive away. Also bear in mind that you press Z to exit a vehicle, but to enter it just only have to walk into it. I have wasted many seconds (which feel like minutes flying by when a truck carrying nuclear missiles is edging closer and closer), exiting a vehicle and then accidentily nudging as I walk around it, causing the little jughead to clamber back in!

Similarly, the Ram Dozer must be in some magical sweet spot on the barge before your little man will get out. I have no idea what where this sweet spot is. You'd assume it would be dead centre, with the Dozer perpendicular to the edges - not so. I usually just fidget around like crazy, hammering the Z trigger until the game is happy with it and lets me get out. Infuriating.

Despite all that, the game STILL possesses that 'one-more-go' allure, and you convince yourself that with one more attempt you will have the level licked.

One other thing though, how do you get to replay a level? There was one level I wanted to have another go on (after completing it), but when I re-entered the level, it was deserted, and all the buildings remained destroyed. I don't get it.

[noobish hat]

HEY GUYS! Look what turned up today:


I'm SUPER excited.

[egparadigm]

The EDGE review (or was it the look-back column?) said the difficulty curve of Wave Race was poorly assigned. Having beat the first tournament easily, and then struggled greatly with the second, I have to agree. So it might not be your fault, noob.