(Retro) What have you been playing this week? Vol.2

[dataDave]

My first version was on the Speccy. Awesome port!!

I don't think there was ever a bad port of it at all really.

[Goemon]

Looking forward to this on Christmas day. Got this lot wrapped up and ready:

Nice set, Dave.
The only other thing I would think about getting is one of these.

http://www.tototek.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=23&products_id=51

I love my PCE but I have to say I'm not a massive fan of the controller. Getting one of these will allow you to use a PS2 pad or arcade stick, which IMO makes the games much more controllable.

[Cepp]

Playing Super Punch Out, it's my first Punch Out game and it's a lot of fun. It has gorgeous sprites.

Made it past the first two guys easy enough but hit my first road block with Piston Hurricane. Not quite figured out the pattern to dodge his barrage of attacks yet but I feel like I'm getting there.

-edit-
Actually I just figured it out and it's super easy lol. Good stuff.

[Cepp]

It's been a long time coming but it's finally time to give Anachronox a go.

-edit-
Three hours in and... yeah, I'm done. The trailer always sold me on this game and the ingame cutscenes are indeed good.

The ingame NPC writing however is poor. The game also has this ugly, samey, dreary aesthetic with a hub world layout that results in you getting lost easily.

Most of the three hours I put into this game was a constant back and forth with a lot of unskipable loading animations (getting in and out of lifts for example). It was tedious and frankly, I felt like the game was wasting my time. The combat is poorly integrated and boring, the music puts you to sleep.

I was really looking forward to this but it wasn't worth my time or money unfortunately.

One to avoid.

[fallenangle]

Finished both Xbox Splinter Cell Chaos Theory and my replay of Rayman 3 this week.

Really rather enjoyed Chaos Theory; hadn't done a proper stealth game since I'd finally sucked dry Tenchu: Return From Darkness much earlier this year.

100%-ing every level in Chaos Theory even on Normal difficultly is a decent challenge as you have to stick to pure (-ish) stealth throughout and there are several levels where that is not easy at all. But, for me, it is a discipline I've generally always enjoyed when a game allows it and does it well. Chaos Theory does that even if it brings/bought nothing new to the series.

I actually made it more difficult for myself accidentally by not reading the instruction manual as thoroughly as I should have done. It is not the first time I've made that mistake.

[NecronomiconUK]

Been playing a bunch of Desert Strike and Jungle Strike on the Mega Drive over the last few days. I’m utterly terrible at them but so much fun.

[gamelife]

after finishing FF3 I've just started Chrono Trigger again, I forgot have great the music was

[Cepp]

I feel like I've had a terrible run with games recently. Perhaps my patience is just wearing thin but old or new, a lot of games just waste your time. Open world games are especially terrible for this as are a number of RPGs frankly.

With that said, I've moved on to Sacred Gold. You can't really go wrong with a Diablo clone although it took a bit of work to get running on a modern system without framerate issues. I ended up using the dgVoodoo wrapper which sorted out my problems with the GOG release but wouldn't work with the Stream version for some reason.

Anyway, the game's been good so far. Work's busy right now so winding down with a fun hack n slash is just what the doctor ordered.

[Arashikage]

I finally decided to start Metal Gear 2 on the MSX. It’s been on the back burner since MGS3: Subsistence came out on PS2 and I’ve been meaning to have a retrospective on the MGS games for a while now. The game oozes style for an 8-bit game, you can see where MGS got a lot of it’s traits from. The story was surprisingly complex for such an old game although there were a few questionable moments here and there. Overall I really enjoyed it, it’s like a prototype Metal Gear Solid but with soldiers who have vision like a hawk. No matter where you are they will see you.

Also the music...it’s godlike.

[Nu-Eclipse]

I had a few goes of Super Tennis. Still a fun game that's full of charm -- Nintendo really should have put it on the SNES Mini.

Along with ActRaiser and Pilotwings.

[Leon Retro]

Along with ActRaiser and Pilotwings.

And you'd think Nintendo would have asked Capcom for UN Squadron and Konami for Axelay. Super Aleste, Parodius, or Pop'n Twinbee would also have also been good options. A couple of shooters would have helped make the SNES Mini even better.

[Cepp]

Still cracking away at Sacred Gold. Feels weird to say but the game's just too big for it's own good. I can only imagine the time investment exploring every area of the world map would require. As it stands I'm sticking to exploring nearby towns as I make my way towards different story objectives after nearly burning myself out trying to explore everywhere.

Regardless, it definitely has that hook that all Diablo clones need, as evidenced by the severe wrist pain I now have from putting too much time into it today.

[CMcK]

My copy of Tanglewood has arrived so I've given it a whirl. It's a pretty good effort. Nym is well animated and the puzzle elements make a nice change from straight platforming. I wasn't keen on the style of the graphics when I back it but I can look past that. The sound design is very much ambient only which kind of enforces the sparse feeling of the levels. Probably the weakest element of the game for me.
Top job on the cart, box and inlays. I'm curious to see what Big Evil Corp do next given sales of this haven't been great and they've lost money on the carts apparently.

[Cepp]

Beat Sacred Gold or at least, I got to the last boss who is bugged and wouldn't lose any health so I'm calling it beat.

It's a really fun game but it could do with some quality of life improvements, in particular not having your movement slow to a crawl when poisoned which happens a lot. I'd say it's enough that your health drops.

[fallenangle]

Finished my replay of original Xbox Yager. Still a good play if you're looking for a futuristic flight combat game that is a bit different from the norm. Essentially helicopter like controls rather than conventional aircraft ones and they work pretty well.

Also started the very 'retro' looking and playing Hydra Castle Labyrinth in its original Xbox port version: HydraX. Plays very well on this platform. A very decent old school 2D platformer/dungeon basher I'm rather enjoying.