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

[Kotatsu Neko]

I've been playing a Mega CD visual novel lately, one of the better ones from that era. It's called Urusei Yatsura Dear My Friends, and is of course based on the legendary Rumiko Takahashi manga and anime. The game is by Game Arts (Silpheed, Lunar etc) and the production values are through the roof. The full screen animated cut scenes are beautiful (and aren't video, so no compression artefacts), it's fully voiced too by the original voice actors.

[Cepp]

I've been playing a Mega CD visual novel lately, one of the better ones from that era. It's called Urusei Yatsura Dear My Friends, and is of course based on the legendary Rumiko Takahashi manga and anime. The game is by Game Arts (Silpheed, Lunar etc) and the production values are through the roof. The full screen animated cut scenes are beautiful (and aren't video, so no compression artefacts), it's fully voiced too by the original voice actors.

I wish there was a fan translation for this game. I know it'd be a nightmare, if not impossible to do, but the game looks so cool!

[Kotatsu Neko]

I wish there was a fan translation for this game. I know it'd be a nightmare, if not impossible to do, but the game looks so cool!

I don't imagine it would be possible, as the game doesn't have any subtitles. That said, the Japanese is mostly pretty basic stuff, so if you know a bit of the language you won't miss much. There's very little kanji in it, and again, the little that is tends to be pretty simple.

[Cepp]

I don't imagine it would be possible, as the game doesn't have any subtitles. That said, the Japanese is mostly pretty basic stuff, so if you know a bit of the language you won't miss much. There's very little kanji in it, and again, the little that is tends to be pretty simple.

Someday I'll get back to learning Japanese and play this game... someday

[Leon Retro]

After getting back into C64 gaming, I decided to buy the modern version of Uridium called Hyper Sentinel for £2.99 on the Xbox. I really like how the graphics and music have a very 8-bit vibe but with a modern sheen, and it plays really well. I'd say it's a must-have for people who like the way Uridium plays. It's only 59p on Steam at the moment.

[QualityChimp]

With my daughter watching The Croods on the projector, my son on the Switch and the wife listening to music in the lounge, gaming choices were restricted.

So, because the laptop was free, I started up Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy, which I bought on Steam a while back, but never got around to replaying it since it first came out.

Firstly, the music is amazing, it's all proper Star Wars stuff, so the game is really atmospheric.
Secondly, the graphics have really aged.
Finally, it's still a lot of fun.

I'm mainly walking around with a lightsabre, force gripping everyone, then throwing the lightsabre through them.
Not strictly in the Jedi handbook, but it works!

Really tempted to call up the console and cranking up all the powers, but that would take away any challenge.

EDIT: After trying the Touryst demo on the Switch, I started the Gradius Collection again.
The first game is really hard! So I looked at the controls and turned autofire, reconfigured the power-up button and changed fire to fire+missile and things got a lot more fun.

I didn't realise just how much Gradius V references the original and I'm spotting enemies and bosses that are in both games.

Tried some of the others, Nemesis and Salamander and some of those graphics are great!

[Leon Retro]

I didn't realise just how much Gradius V references the original and I'm spotting enemies and bosses that are in both games.

Yeah, Gradius V is a love letter to the series. I wish Konami would get Treasure to celebrate the franchise again with something even more impressive. Modern hardware plus 4K could do wonders.

[QualityChimp]

Just the PS2 game playable on PS4 would sate my Gradius hunger, but yeah, although I think that dream team ship has sailed, a new Gradius would be ace.

I played a bit more last night and felt a bit of progression, even surviving tough bits where I'd lost my power-ups after dying (stupid Easter Island guys).

It actually reminded me what a technical marvel that Nemesis on the Game Boy is.
It's a little easy, but it's got all the weaponry and enemies of the arcade, plus secret levels and you can use the Konami code.

I mentioned before, but I showed my son the Konami code whilst playing Gradius V and his mind was blown.
"Can you use that in any game?!"
"No, but let's try it on Alexa..."

If you have an Amazon Alexa, give it a try!

[Escape-To-88]

Just the PS2 game playable on PS4 would sate my Gradius hunger, but yeah, although I think that dream team ship has sailed, a new Gradius would be ace.

I played a bit more last night and felt a bit of progression, even surviving tough bits where I'd lost my power-ups after dying (stupid Easter Island guys).

It actually reminded me what a technical marvel that Nemesis on the Game Boy is.
It's a little easy, but it's got all the weaponry and enemies of the arcade, plus secret levels and you can use the Konami code.

I mentioned before, but I showed my son the Konami code whilst playing Gradius V and his mind was blown.
"Can you use that in any game?!"
"No, but let's try it on Alexa..."

If you have an Amazon Alexa, give it a try!

One advantage of installing CFW on a PS4 is that you can not only install custom PS2 games, but it upscale too in a similar fashion to PCSX2. When I had my hacked console I had Gradius V on there. Played it for about 20 minutes and then decided it was indeed good as I remembered. And never touched it again.

[QualityChimp]

That sounds pretty cool, but I'm scared to hack a console!

I played some more Gradius/Nemesis last night and discovered there's a save function, so I worked my way through the game, which you might say is cheating, but flip me the game is a cheat, so it's even Stephen!
Gradius V is hard, but never feels unfair, which I was definitely sensing. I don't know if it's the early days of Konami Vs. the experience of Treasure with the benefit of years of hindsight or arcade Vs. console requirements. Maybe the Nintendo home version is easier?

Those last few levels are insane! Also, there's no real ending. The ship blows up and it all starts again, I wasn't sure if I'd done something wrong, so reloaded and finished it again!

Moved onto Salamander/Lifeforce, which removes the ability to select your weapons, you just pick up what's dropped.
Now, despite never playing it in the arcade, I have strong memories of the attract mode as the game plays the power-up sound and shouts out the weapons collected: "RIPPLE!" "LASER!" "MISSILE!"

The game itself is pretty weird, and sounds like you're shooting you way out of the insides of a giant monster: "KIDNEY STONES CANNOT BE DESTROYED!" "SHOOT THROUGH THE LIVER!"

I think I was near the end, but it just got impossible with a zillion blue balls bouncing around, which gets pretty hard to see what's happening, and I just was exhausted from a couple of hours of frenetic blasting.
Not sure how I'll get past it, tbh.



One thing I realised was that I thought there were more Gradius games than this, but there's only really Gradius/Nemesis, Salamander/Lifeforce and Vulcan Venture/Gradius II. It's the "Arcade Collection" with a couple of other games (Twin Bee, Haunted Castle). Maybe I was getting confused as they all have at least two names, or maybe I was getting confused with the content of the Gradius Collection on the PSP:
Gradius (1985)Gradius II: GOFER no Yabō (1988)
Gradius III (1989)
Gradius Gaiden (1997)
Gradius IV (1999)

I may end up picking up a PSP just to blast through these!

[Leon Retro]

It actually reminded me what a technical marvel that Nemesis on the Game Boy is.
It's a little easy, but it's got all the weaponry and enemies of the arcade, plus secret levels and you can use the Konami code.

Gradius Galaxies on the GBA is also really nice. The graphics and sound are top quality. I haven't tried the Konami code yet.

[Goemon]

Due to the newly released English patches for both Goemon 2 and 3 on the SNES, I’ve started a playthrough of Goemon 3.
All the SNES Goemon games are great, completely original even between each other. Goemon 3 is the one that was the most unplayable if you had no JPN knowledge so it’s great to see these games translated.

They’ve done an excellent job, even translating environmental graphics like the Inns.

Couple of minor downsides. I’ve had a couple of flashes of graphical corruption, but just for a split second

The other was a questionable translation. speaking to one person they told me they were transsexual but hadn’t told their boyfriend. The only issue I had was that the translation says “I’m a tranny” which I’m not sure is the best translation although I’m not sure how the Japanese described it so it could just be a raw, slang, translation.

But then this is why these games never made to the west and if they did then they got butchered from a text/story point of view.

[QualityChimp]

Due to the newly released English patches for both Goemon 2 and 3 on the SNES, I’ve started a playthrough of Goemon 3.
All the SNES Goemon games are great, completely original even between each other.

It sounds like you're talking about yourself in the third-person!

[Leon Retro]

[MENTION=152]Goemon[/MENTION]

That's great news. I've completed #2, but having English text will be nice. And I can finally get to grips with #3.

Goemon 2 is easily one of my all-time favourite games.

[Goemon]

Oh man, that ‘tranny’ line has started a whole sh!t storm.
The translator has been getting harassed to the point where he says he’s not going to do translations any more

https://nichegamer.com/2020/01/27/translator-harassed-over-using-trans-in-goemon-3-english-fan-translation-abandons-project-and-translating/