The Gamer's Quarter

GSL · Posted: Tue Nov 28, 2006 5:49 pm Post subject:

It's gotta be a good game if it makes Morning Musume sound good!

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

schild · . Joined: 28 Nov 2006 Posts: 30

I'm only here as a refugee (but i ruv the magazine). My website had a thread on it recently so I took an hour and gave my thoughts on 46 games. Here.

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

schild, did you ever do wifi in animal crossing? I only did it a few times but the whole idea of it, that you open a gate to your town and people (who you prescreen with friend codes) can wander in, that town members will move from one town to an other based on this, all of it was genius. Short of making a full MMO out of it, I think it's leaps and bounds more advanced than the gamecube version.

dessgeega · Posted: Tue Nov 28, 2006 8:35 pm Post subject:

yeah, what exactly makes the gamecube version better? explain yourself!
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mechanoriINtransit · . Joined: 21 Jan 2006 Posts: 33

seryogin · Posted: Tue Nov 28, 2006 9:15 pm Post subject:

Well, I am now the owner of black DS Lite. It's much shinier than I anticipated.

I was actually wavering for a bit about getting it. I mean, do I really need another videogame system that I don't play? I already have three. But I bought it with the firm conviction that once I acquire a pair of headphones and a case of some sort I will play it on the subway. I've really wanted to start playing games again, as I've been ignoring them for the past six months.

I also couldn't decide, which game to buy it with. Since money is a little tight at the moment, I decided to purchase Advance Wars DS, because Advance Wars 2 was the first GBA game I ever bought and because it was $20 bucks. I kind of regret the decision now, since I'd been growing increasingly sick of strategy games around the time I stopped playing games at all and starting off again with a genre, whose last title to please me was Shining Force: The Sword of Hadja for the Game Gear, was not a good idea. I guess, I was really psyched by the back of Advance Wars' box, since one of the drawings was most likely inspired by an Eastern Front photograph. And I remembered that I really liked that one of the COs was dressed in a Soviet general's post-war parade uniform.

Still, starting out with a game that I essentially played four years ago is not good in instiling a sense of progress...it feels like I'm just going in circles. I'll play this for a few days and then purchase myself a few more original games this Friday, when I get my paycheck and when my B&N employee discount goes up to 20 percent at Gamestop for a few days.

I bought the DS to try and find something original and strange, something that would show me why I needed to play games again. I hope that in due time something will come along and prove this to me.
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Gouki · . Joined: 25 Nov 2006 Posts: 32 Location: Australia.

Advance Wars DS is good. It's just incredibly hard. I don't remember the first Advance Wars game being this hard until the Mighty Kanbei stage.
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... Maybe Later.

schild · . Joined: 28 Nov 2006 Posts: 30

Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

Harveyjames · the meteor kid Joined: 06 Jul 2006 Posts: 3636

Westacular · Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2006 12:17 am Post subject:

Toto · 4th Man Joined: 21 Mar 2006 Posts: 122

On the topic of Wi-Fi, I think Nintendo should implement measures against people being cunts (for want of a better word) in future releases. I mean, Mario Kart DS is hell online. It's just snaking hell, and you can imagine some smug, self-satisfied son of a bitch MOTHERFUCKER chuckling to himself about how hard he "pwned" everyone else with his antics. it just destroys the whole atmosphere.
But voice chat in the new Pokemon game is a very positive step.

Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

I'm in agreement with you, Toto. I can snake, and I can use it to win races, but I think the only people who can do that for more than ten minutes at a time without horrible wrist pain are twelve years old, and twelve year-olds are generally cunts.

Related--I found myself recently browsing the GameFAQs message boards for Animal Crossing: WW out of utter curiosity regarding what people are still doing playing this game. It turns out that everyone who has kept up with it have amassed gargantuan piles of cash, and have basically set up a simple commodities market for items in the game using those message boards as a market exchange. People whose towns are selling turnips at low prices or buying them at high rates will let visitors come trade and charge a commission on the sale. They then take their profits to buy and sell rare items, with prices determined and traders connecting through public bargaining on the board.

Of course, people are, as we mentioned, generally cunts, and the lack of methods provided within the game to protect ones interests makes it a sort of libertarian stock market with no regulation at all. For instance, there is little to do to stop someone from altering the terms of a closed sale once you connect or outright stealing from you, by showing up to your town to trade, waiting for you to present your goods and then running off with your rare Samus Aran mannequin--other than turn the power off, if you're quick. With no way to prove any allegations you may make, the staff at GameFAQs (the regulatory body, if you like) can't do anything about it, so the other trader goes on with his business inculpable. And this is to say nothing of the unfettered theft or vandalism that can occur without your even noticing if you leave a fellow trader unattended in your village for even a minute; the bungled attempt at a market in human servitude; or the occasional incidents of hacking via packet substitution that can, for instance, permanently isolate one's village from the world by replacing the Gate with a Museum, thus disabling Wi-Fi access for that person forever.

It's amazing what people have accomplished, but it is frustrating to see how much better it could have been with a few simple changes and better code security. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's no contest to say that until a month ago they had a better approach to the Internet than any other handheld or console apart from the XBoxes. But Nintendo never took cunts into consideration, and as a result their online service is still not quite to the point where anyone would want to spend a lot of time with it.

Then again, since Nintendo doesn't receive any direct revenue for its online service, maybe this was the whole point. Cazart!

dmauro · . Joined: 20 Jul 2006 Posts: 303 Location: Brooklyn

churippu · . Joined: 30 Nov 2006 Posts: 22 Location: Alabamy

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

GSL · Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2006 4:22 pm Post subject:

dongle · . Joined: 25 Nov 2006 Posts: 290

I have the Japanese version. There is no necessary text in the game, and there are scans of the English manual. GET IT. Electroplankton is wonderful.

Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

OKAY. Based entirely on the recommendations in this thread I just picked up NANOSTRAY. And based entirely on nothing at all I snagged Gunpay too. Don't you intarweb haters dare say anything to make me question my poor restraint until I've had a chance to try these games out!

simplicio · . Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1091

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

I think you mean "twisted" there.

seryogin · Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:25 am Post subject:

Nana Komatsu · weak sauce Joined: 17 Jul 2006 Posts: 1293

Let me say about Phoenix Wright: If you start getting sick of it by the third case, stop playing the game. Take a break and put the game down because if you force yourself to keep playing you will get annoyed with it very fast.

GSL · Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 4:05 am Post subject:

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

Who the hell recommended Nanostray? That game’s pretty crap.

Also, I have no idea if Squeek Squad is anything like Canvas Curse. I kind of doubt it. If you want to feel really Japanese Sergei you could just buy the JPN version with the pink stylus. Otherwise you’ll have to find it used probably.
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“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

grumbel · . Joined: 13 Oct 2006 Posts: 27

dessgeega · Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 10:54 am Post subject:

i'm told squeek squad is closer to kirby's adventure in design than any other game in the series.
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GSL · Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 4:14 pm Post subject:

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

You mean aside from the terrible implementation of the touch screen, and that the game is way too forgiving/stupidly balanced in difficulty (read also: due to the terrible perspective you can't tell if your going to get hit or not).

Oh and the bland enviroments and music.
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“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

GSL · Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 1:10 am Post subject:

Just to be sure that we're on the same level--you ARE talking about Nanostray, correct?

Sure, I give you the horrible touchscreen implementation--it was a lousy design choice made by the whole, "Crap, this system has a touchscreen so we'd better use it!" mentality that pervaded quite a few of the earlier titles (and still arguably persists in some recent releases, sadly).
As far as the difficulty goes, which is it--too forgiving or stupidly balanced? I've had no problems with the perspective but the trick is to accept the Axelay-esque perspective rather than fight with it to try and play the game like a standard vertical shooter. That seems to be the major problem most people have with the game, and I'm thinking the true issue is that people just refuse to accept this gameplay aspect and would instead prefer to fault the game as if this was some sort of glitch. It's not, and once you decide to work with it you discover that the game is a lot tighter than it initally feels. And even once you've got the perspective down and you realize that the enemy patterns are a bit more memorization-based than most shooters, I still find it quite challenging, especially when you start working for high-scores to post on the Nanostray website. Trying to figure out how to squeeze another 10,000 points out of a level you thought you had down pat is quite fun, in my opinion.

Environments and music seem to just be a matter of taste--I think the levels look quite good, and they certainly have their own distinct look to them. Music is a point I'll have to concede--there are some catchy tunes (the main menu is the one that pops to mind) but yeah, most of the in-game music is pretty bland. Then again, I can only think of a handful of shooters in which the music really grabbed me anyways, so I don't consider it much of an issue.

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

stupidly = terribly = poorly

The perspective is not natural, and Axelay is pretty bad too.

Have you played Iridion II? It's pretty much the same damn thing. Touch screen really has almost nothing to do with it. They're just pretty lame games.

Make them hori shooters and quit trying to dick around with a horrible perspective.
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“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

dessgeega · Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 6:44 pm Post subject:

axelay is bad mostly because its mode-7 gimmickry makes it unplayable. the way the vulcan is implemented is fantastic, but aside from that they game is a tech demo, and a pretty dumb one.

in a game as dependent on precision as a shooter, a plain vertical perspective is definitely preferable to a difficult-to-gauge into-the-screen one. i havn't played nanostray, though, so i can't really speak about it.
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Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

H A T E R S

I'm a bit into Nanostray and I must say, the perspective is a little odd, but I've never died from it. And I've died quite a bit so far. Not being able to switch weapons easily is the bigger problem, in my eyes... ultimately the game is just a sort of mish-mash of other shooters, crammed into one DS game, but I am okay with this too. Anyway, show me a better shooter for the DS (or the GBA, even) and I will buy it.

Now Gunpey, that was just a waste of cash.

helicopterp · . Joined: 13 May 2006 Posts: 1435 Location: Philadelphia

dongle · . Joined: 25 Nov 2006 Posts: 290

Tim said it was like playing pinball with the glass cover removed while manipulating the ball with your hands. To me, the game feels like sliding shit around while some sound effects play. Note that I'm a big Meteos fan. There's none of the multi-tasking/chaining or any real depth to the game that anyone has been able to find thus far.

i can see the game being more interesting on the PSP since the limited control encourages efficiency in tile switching. On the DS, though, it's too convenient.

Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

I agree completely.

Also, there are furries.

dessgeega · Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 7:36 pm Post subject:

GSL · Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 5:50 am Post subject:

Shapermc · Hot Sake! Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 6279

Gradius Galaxies is not that good in the grand scheme of things, but it is probably the best shooter that's easily available.

Darius-R is really, really simple and ugly. It looks like a GBC+ game. If you can survive through the first level and a half without dieing you will be able to beat even the hardest difficulty fairly easily.

Steel Empire is terribly hard to find, and I'm sure just getting the Genesis game would be sufficient. I hear it's not that good anyways (pretty to look at yet bland).

R-Type III is an abomination (not the SNES game, just the port).

Sigma Star Saga is worse thatn R-Type III.

Look, seriously, just because there aren't any good ones for the GBA/DS doesn't mean that you should settel for the lesser of a dozen evils.
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“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

SuperWes · Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 11:05 am Post subject:

Putting in a note to say that I too enjoyed Nanostray. I'm a casual shooter fan (I don't play for score). I loved Axelay and I liked Nanostray too! I'm also part of the blurry screen right thumb touchscreen crew.

Iridion I, Iridion II, and Nanostray are all graphics games. They rely on wowing you with a smooth engine more than anything else, and I can understand why that turns some people off. As stated earlier, an overhead perspective is much more precise in shooters, but Nanostray wouldn't be appealing at all if it was played from this perspective. It's precise for what it is, but you can tell the developers focused more on making a game that looks pretty.

Iridion II works on this principal as well. It's got an amazing engine for a GBA game, but in that case, the limited technology meant that the background was set on repeat for the whole thing. This was a problem because technology can only be appealing for so long and repeated backgrounds don't give the player a reason to advance even when the enemy patterns get more difficult. Nanostray corrects this by doing away with the repeating backgrounds, and it does wonders for the player motivation. Each section of each stage is unique. Backgrounds are a shooter's story - they establish a setting, mood, and in many cases motivation. Nanostray's backgrounds are the reason to keep playing. They're very pretty and present challenges unique to that level. It's a game you play for sightseeing rather than score, and I can see it turning off hardcore shooter fans looking for something where balance and precision are a higher priority.

For me the calibur of a game is based on whether or not I'm compelled to keep playing. Little imperfections are fine as long as there's something there to keep me interested. Nanostray kept me interested for the whole thing and then some. It doesn't overstay its welcome, and currently it's not too expensive. I recommend it too!

-Wes
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dessgeega · Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 12:14 pm Post subject:

the gba is shooter wasteland. there was a yakyak thread on this recently too.

gradius generations / galaxies / geraniums isn't too bad, but i wouldn't try to play it on a handheld.

buy mr. driller a and activision anthology. play them and be happy.
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Perseus · . Joined: 24 Sep 2006 Posts: 56

So there's an 8-player Bomberman game for the DS, and nobody's mentioned it! Does it suck or something?

dongle · . Joined: 25 Nov 2006 Posts: 290

The WiFi is neat but the two sector battle field (top screen, bottom screen) is kinda weird. If WiFi Bomberman makes you excited, you already know what you think of the game.

Mister Toups · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 4:02 am Post subject:

has anyone mentioned time pilot yet?
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where were you when nana komatsu got a wii?

GSL · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 6:06 am Post subject:

No! What's Time Pilot?

Fred · . Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 99 Location: Iowa

Oh man, if I had seven friends with DSes, WiFi Bomberman would be great. Sad

There's a DS Time Pilot?

OtakupunkX · . Joined: 23 Mar 2006 Posts: 730

WiFi Bomberman has a mode where you can yell in the mic to drop bombs. It can be entertaining at times.
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Redd · Posted: Tue Jan 02, 2007 6:01 pm Post subject:

If FFIII hasn't been mentioned, it's pretty rockin'. I'm not that far into it, but I'm enjoying it.
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Having a smoking section in a restaurant is like having a peeing section in a pool.

GSL · Posted: Tue Jan 02, 2007 6:24 pm Post subject:

Too right! I mentioned FFIII a while back, when it had just came out and I had only played for about an hour or so. I've spent a lot of time playing it over this Christmas break, though, and now I can wholeheartedly recommend it as being a lot of fun. Despite being a fancy remake, it still feels like one of the classic Final Fantasies, which is a very good thing.

Also, Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin is huge and awesome, and the unlockable game modes that come after completing the game are even more awesome.