Mohawk & Headphone Jack, for SNES, from Black Pearl, is a very, VERY strange game. This is one of the games I got this summer... a NeoGAF thread (about 2d platformers with Mario Galaxy-style gravity effects) got me to write most of this (though I've improved the writeup now), but it deserves to be here too because of how strange this game is. :loopy:

Seriously, I don't know if any other platformer fits that label any more perfectly... Mohawk & Headphone Jack is a very strange game. One the one hand it is a traditional platformer with plenty of jumping, attacking enemies, and collecting items. On the other hand it is unbelievably, ridiculously confusing, strange, and unique. Despite having a built-in detailed level map you can access from the pause menu, It's easily one of the most disorienting games ever made... if this sounds strange, it won't for long. :rolling:

To be short, M&HJ is done in 100% Mode 7. Instead of simply running through the levels, the levels rotate around you depending on the floor surface you are standing on and, if you jump, its size (and thus gravity). Your character stays standing upright, in the middle of the screen, while the level rotates or spins around you as you run and jump along the often curving paths. Levels are enclosed spaces -- there is a "floor" all around the edge of the level, with many obstacles and walls and small platforms and other things filling the inside of the level. You can't run around every corner, as 90 degree (or more) corners or edges are barriers you cannot run along. You can only run around more shallow curves. You will also jump through (and land on the top of, normal platformer style) thin platforms; you will only attach to the underside of larger, round or oval blocks of land. Every one of these surfaces you can run along has its own gravity that depends on its size, so that when you're on a floor and jump up and there is a platform (with a floor surface facing you -- a small round platform, for instance) at some point you'll get caught by that platform's gravity and the screen will flip around and you'll be on the platform, looking up at the floor you just jumped from (because remember, unlike something like MetalStorm for the NES (action/platformer with gravity flipping which causes you to attach to either the ceiling of floor), here your character always stays right-side-up while the level flips around behind you...). This gets very confusing very fast.

To compound the issue, you can run really, really fast. In fact, the characters in this game rival Sonic for his speed. There are very few enemies in the game and no instant-death pits, but because of your speed the enemies that there are can be tough to avoid because when you're running at full speed there's no way you'll see them before they hit you... the best solution is to attack constantly while you are running, because when you press the attack button you transform into a rolling spike-ball form, so you can attack while moving. Then you just either hope you run into the enemies or memorize their locations. Most of them are easy, but later on some harder ones you can't just run into but have to jump on or over show up, forcing you to be more cautious or die.

You complete the level by collecting 100 CDs and then finding the level exit. There are a lot of CDs so that part isn't hard... it's finding the exit that can be. Collecting special giant CDs unlocks additional music tracks. THe game does have a password save system so that you don't have to start over each time, thankfully, though of course you only get new passwords at the end of each level. Oh yes, the characters. Mohawk and Headphone Jack are these really strange guys made of putty or Play-Doh or Jello or something like that. They have naked, featureless (except for their faces and the hair on their heads and the headphones they always wear) yellow bodies which can change shape. They can squeeze through very narrow tubes by turning flat, they attack by turning into a rolling spiked wheel, using a Bomb causes your character to explode into little yellow bits which bounce around the screen for a while,damaging or destroying anything on it, before you reform where you were, some special powerups add things like a wheel on the bottom of the sprite instead of legs or wings instead of arms...

Most importantly, though, is that map on the menu screen. While you can complete level one without it, once you know it a bit at least, without that map the game would be IMPOSSIBLE. You just get so totally disoriented so quickly that it's ridiculous... it's a very interesting and unique game, but it's also almost unplayable in a way.

Perhaps oddly, despite the speed and strangeness, at times the game feels boring. Evemies do not respawn so that even if you get hit, if you kill the enemy in question until you die or get game over at least they'll stay dead (I don't remember offhand for sure if enemies respawn upon death, but I think they do). It is also true that there are no instant-death pits and few enemies, so you do spend a lot of time just running around and hitting spike (attack), though later on of course tougher enemies show up who require more strategy. Level one is a bit tame, really... level two is where the game really starts to get crazy. Level one does have its moments, though, particularly when you accidentally jump too high at the end of the level and find yourself back at the start with nothing to do but run through the stage again it's annoying (he almost does it at the end of the video... made me nervous for a moment...), but overall the first level isn't too bad. Level two gets weirder... the game introduces transit tubes (the things your guys squish into and speed through), warps that send you to some other location on the map (so the map is of only limited help, as it's not easy to identify the warp points or where they will send you on the zoomed-out Mode 7 map you scroll around), flames that hurt you badly (but that you need to get past anyway, of course), a giant double infinite figure-eight loop... but yes, you spend a lot of time running around lost or watching the screen spin in circles. It allows you to run so fast that as soon as you jump on a small platform and start moving if you accidentally tap jump you have NO IDEA where you'll end up...yeah, 'weird and unique' here definitely also comes along with 'frustrating and disorienting'. Even so, it's a quite interesting game, that's for sure. I gave up on trying to beat it after a couple of levels, but it's pretty interesting. And what's wrong with playing a game where you're not in danger of being killed every two seconds, really? Well, unless you do what the game lets you and unthinkingly run around, that is... then you'll die fast just from running into enemies. :)

Despite the flaws, Mohawk & Headphone Jack is worth the experience, for sure, if just because of its uniqueness. It's just so totally weird and different that it should be seen. It's kind of too bad that it was totally unknown at the time of its release... It came out in 1995 and vanished immediately. Finding almost any information about it online is very difficult. I do remember an article about it in Nintendo Power back in 1995 around its release, but that's it... There is a decent video review of the game on Youtube, though. The voiceover isn't that great, but the video shows the game nicely (though he spends a really long time in a bonus room near the beginning. Really once you've run around that sphere and picked up the few items there you're supposed to warp back, not float around in space for like a minuite. :))... or rather, it shows how weird it is. It's kind of amazing a game this bizarre actually got published, in a way... they certainly showed what you can do with Mode 7, though, and the gravity effects are quite interesting.

Watch the video. It must be seen!
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http://kotaku.com/342985/darth-vader-yod...calibur-iv

Jedi, apparently.

Also, it would seem that they are doing the "console exclusive thing again. Vader on PS3, Yoda on 360, and squat for Wii. (Fact is, companies are really not interested in the massive overhauls they'd need to do to the games on those platforms to get them to play on the Wii.)

Remember when I suggested that EVERY world should be featured in the Kingdom Hearts series at least once, from like every fictional thing ever devised? I seem to recall someone fervently shouting in a mad pitch that there's no way George Lucas would just do something like that. Well, doesn't seem so crazy now does it?

gamespot

They are going to update the graphics and make it xbox live compatible.

Because I have PH now so that thread is outdated. :)

Yesterday
--
Sunset Riders (Genesis)
ESWAT - City Under Siege (Genesis)
Space Invaders (SNES)
Dead Or Alive (PSX)
Yoshi's Island DS (DS)

$15 for the first four, $11 for Yoshi's Island DS.

Today (from a place I hadn't been in before...)
--
Redjack: Revenge of the Brethren (PC CD) (complete, in box, sealed)
Descent: Freespace (PC DVD version) (disc only)
Claw (PC DVD version) (disc and case only)
PowerSlide (PC CD) (disc and case only)

$25 for all four. The place had a few more good (PC) games -- complete in box: RoboSport (Maxis), HardBall 5, X-COM: Terror from the Deep, and MetalTech: EarthSiege, and others (including boxed versions of X-Wing (floppy version) and Rebel Assault II, but I have those games already... from collections and not original boxes, but I have them...), and disc/case only: SimIsle, SoulBringer, Heroes Chronicles (forget which one of them), Amazon Trail II, and a couple of others, but I just got a few.

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Don't be...

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Because it's perhaps vaguely interesting. And I spent the time to calculate those percentages, so why not post it here too? :)

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.p...ost9171519

NES
Japan: 19.35m
America: 34.00m
Other: 8.56m

SNES
Japan: 17.17m (11% decline from previous gen)
America: 23.35m (31% decline from previous gen)
Other: 8.58m (0.002% increase from previous gen)

N64
Japan: 5.5m (69% decline from previous gen)
America: 20.6m (12% decline from previous gen)
Other: 6.75m (21.3% decline from previous gen)

GC
Japan: 4m (27% decline from previous gen)
America: 12.8m (38% decline from previous gen)
Other: 4.8m (29% decline from previous gen)

That really shows how huge the SNES-to-N64 collapse was in Japan. No other transition comes even close, though overall sales decline every time but one. It's also interesting how much Sega hurt Nintendo in the 16-bit race, while in Europe Nintendo was flat... though I think Sega's European sales were definitely above Nintendo's.

In the US, the N64 was actually Nintendo's biggest success of its post-NES consoles by this reckoning, given that it ended up with only a 12% decline while the SNES and GC both dropped over 30% from their predecessors. Of course that doesn't tell the whole story, given that 23 million was enough for the SNES to win the US while 20 million put the N64 at half of the PSX's ~40 million sold in the US, but that looks pretty good compared to the GC's 38% decline competing against a system that again sold over 40 million. Even so though, with 62% of its worldwide sales in the US, the GC was much more successful here than anywhere else.

aired six months before 9/11

What is chilling is that the xfiles creators made a tv episode based on the idea that there would be a plot to hijack airliners and smash them into skyscrapers in new York city in the Lone gunmen pilot months before the events of 9/11; Its like the guy who wrote a book about a sinking ocean liner called the titan just a few years before the titanic sank.

Did anyone else get this? Holy krap the last levels are hard and before you say go to gamefaqs this is a small effort at generating some convo

brief review:

visuals: not blow you away awesome but better than GC. Lots of care in the effects and tiny details like the bump mapping look great. In general, nice to look at. The increased draw distance (nearly infinite) comes with a price: pop-up. It's rare but it happens. Explosions look CGI, really well done and of course there's more on screen, bigger armies and larger battles.

Sound: I dont have my surround sound hooked up so i'm just in stereo. They had fun designing the sound and incorporating the wiimote speaker, there's satisfying sounds of reloading in the battleships that just beg to be admired and the aural effect of ambience has been increased. Something I keep noticing on Wii with its sound in games is the dynamics of position and distance. Think of a car driving by you or hearing a train pass you, yunno how it changes in pitch and depth? I heard it in MP3 and SMG as well and BWii is no different. Play it with the music off to get the full effect. Your army talking shit back and forth is back too. After using an assault vet to take down a bazooka vet and hearing him say "Stay down!" you cant help but smile.

controls: odd, takes some getting used to. There's absolutely no learning curve with the controls, you're just thrown in (which is kinda nice), once you get used to it though it becomes second nature.

Gameplay: I love it when a well made game can make you feel like a genius when you figure something out and accomplish a victory, BWii tells what to do but not how to do it so much as hint as it. In some levels it leaves things open to go explore and in others it's very linear. It's a good mix. The AI is increased and the rock, paper, scissors mechanic is in full swing but has been made more detailed and dynamic. Subs can dive to avoid all enemy fire (except for subs and frigates), frigates themselves are anti-air but automatically switch to depth charges when near a sub. It's all very polished and perfected, if you lose some of your men it's entirely your fault since you can "perfect" the level with practice. At first, you'll die all over the place but once you get it down, you'll wipe entire armies out without having to join the fight. It is real-time Advance Wars in every way, much more so than the first BW. Major downside (imo) is that you cant point to a location and send your troops there, something you could in the first BW. However there is a new command called Guard, point at a friendly location and hit A, they dig in and secure the location... pretty cool. No local multiplayer and I haven't tried wi-fi multi yet but I hear it's a lot of fun. The ability to control units from the map screen, as far as I can tell, did not make it in to the final version

Presentation: Think of every great war film. Make it a cartoon. Throw in british humor. Now make it feel like you're playing war with the most interactive toys ever made and you have BWii. What's also nice is that you can unlock concept art and a gallery to get info on units and view the models. Sometimes the voices are questionable in their ability to offend, I cant help but think as a designer and making General "Ah-Qira" (get it?) sound like a bad Japanese impersonator and how well that would go over with... yunno, Japan. But everyone is made fun of evenly, including the Western Frontier (guess who they represent) with making comments of shock and awe and being overbearing assholes and the Anglo Isles commanded by a semi-retarded Gretson - "I say I do believe the Solar Empire is launching an offensive, wot. Care for a tea? *chandelier lands on the table as the house is bombed* Right..." It's great stuff and of course lighthearted.

If you like strat, buy this. If you liked Pikmin, buy this. If you're looking for something like a third person shooter, avoid it - it's an AAA strategy game through and through.

I'm not giving away the surprise till I'm closer to the finish line....
But me and Ryan are cooking up something HUGE for Tendo City.

Involving the following......

• More .net then alcohol in Britney Spears.
  
• Even more .net still.
  
• TovenNet servers
  
• TovenNet SQL server.
  
• TovenNet SMTP server
  
• TovenNet POP3 server.
  
• 15 Meg's of bandwidth per user, per session.
  
• A lot of sleepless nights.
  
• A lot of Grilled chicken and sausage gumbo soup..
  
• Some TV turned down low...
  
• Microsoft AJAX 2.0
  
• Me giving up my job to become a clown stripper who performs at parties for the hopeless and ugly people because I'm the best they can get.
  
• Even more sleepless nights...
  
• Death to my kittens.
  
• The end of pie
  
• More Adult Swim
  
• New StarTrek episodes
  
• The following smiles....
  • :what::disgust::woah:
    
• But not this one...
  
  • 
    
• A lot of anime
  
• The biggest thing to hit the net since email.
  
• This smiley...
  
• Followed by enormous release..... Then gas.