Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Printable Version

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Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th February 2013

Game Boy
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Tarzan: Lord of the Jungle - Kind of annoying but ultimately decent and okay exploration platformer. First you search around each level looking for a bunch of items that are scattered around everywhere, then you go to fight the level's boss. It's definitely not for everyone, but I actually liked it, as frustrating as it was sometimes.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 13th March 2013

Genesis
--
Rolling Thunder 3 - Normal difficulty. Okay to good game, but not as good as the first two. The last boss is really hard and took dozens of tries to finally beat, but the rest of the game is only moderately challenging and can be gotten through without too much trouble with practice. I dislike how they made it a bit more actioney than the previous two; they should have used the second game as a model. Also, why is the co-op mode from that game gone? That's lame. Still, enough of Rolling Thunder remains that most of the game is great fun.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 29th March 2013

DS
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Picross 3D - Beat all puzzles (built-in puzzles only, not including downloads) -- Yes, I finally managed it! The Hard 10 final bonus puzzle was a nightmare and took several days of trying to beat, but I finally managed it. Man, was that satisfying when I finally got it... Bounce

Now what though? I want more puzzles! I guess I'll have to plug in my router and see if the downloadable puzzle packs are still available...

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 9th April 2013

Wii
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Vampire Crystals - So I finally, after quite a bit of trying, managed to beat the game... only to find that there's a second quest, and I'll need to beat it again, except even harder this time, if I want to see the real ending. Now, this is a short game -- there are just three worlds of six levels each in the game -- but still... it's tough! The game has some very hard levels. Hard and frustrating. Level 3-5 took many, many tries to beat... that level was so frustrating! And a lot of the losses were random chance, too. Skill only gets you so far, in a level like that (short timer, so you HAD to get lots of time powerups to stay alive. Hope you bump across enough!). So yeah, I am NOT looking forward to levels like that one in the second quest, if I actually get that far. We'll see.

Still though, overall, Vampire Crystals is a fun twinstick arena shooter. Most people have never heard of it because it's a 2012 WiiWare exclusive, but it's good and well worth playing.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 16th May 2013

PSP
--
Every Extend Extra - Finally managed to get through the game! It's such an awesome game, but because I used a continue I didn't even get on the top-scores list... argh. That list really is absurd, with how high scores it requires to get on it.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 27th May 2013

Wii (WiiWare)
--
Eco Shooter: Plant 530 - finally beat the game. This is a mediocre light-gun shooter from Nintendo. It has somewhat average 3d graphics and a minimum of content -- there are only three not-all-that-long levels, then a mode where you have to beat all three levels in one go, and then you're done (and since it's from Nintendo, don't expect difficulty level choices) -- but... well, I guess it's entertaining. This isn't exactly a great game, for sure, but once I started playing it, I was having enough fun to stick it through to the end. The enemies are mostly various kinds of cans and barrels, so graphical variety is limited, but it is kind of clever when the barrels form into robots, or fly through the air on wings, or things like that. :) The difficulty is imbalanced, though -- the bosses are moderately challenging, and the second and third bosses definitely can be tough, but it's almost impossible to actually lose during a level, and when you die you start the st age (or, for that fourth mode, the game) over. This means that if you're having trouble at a boss, you'll have to replay the whole level over and over, until you get it right.

Oh, the game has a somewhat unique "ammo is health" system. So, you lose when you run out of ammo. Destroying barrels (enemies) gives ammo drops though, and your second button (Z) will activate a vacuum that sucks in the ammo recharges. Your goal of course is to overall gain more shots than you spent on the encounter. The system works well, and helps add some interest to this short and somewhat unbalanced game. Overall... I don't know, this is probably a C-something game, maybe B- at the high end. But it was fun enough to be worth playing for the couple of hours that it lasted. It also helps that I got it as a free reward, so I didn't have to spend anything for the game. :p

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 10th June 2013

NES
--
Vice: Project Doom - NES sidescroller with decent but not amazing graphics and gameplay and a bad, poorly translated story. This game has Ninja Gaiden-style cutscenes, but the story is bad. It's also got some stupid plot points. Fortunately the gameplay is better than the story. It's a somewhat frustrating game, but you do get infinite continues, and the levels are short. Also continues start from the beginning of the stage, not the level, so get to, say, 8-2 and you won't have to do 8-1 again. The game's decent enough to play, but this isn't amazing. Still, the sort levels and solid gameplay make it worth a try. You have three different weapons; the default sword is usually best, but some enemies and bosses are better fought with the gun or bombs. It's a decent mechanic. The game also has two (unfortunately easy) driving-shooter stages, and two first-person-target-shooting stages as well.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 3rd July 2013

Xbox 360
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Akane the Kunoichi - beat 100%. This 2d platformer is short and simple, but it's a $1 XBLA Indie Games title, so what would you expect? FOr the price, it was definitely worth it. The game is a tile-based, 8/early 16-bit-styled platformer. There aren't many enemy types, but at least each boss is different, and each of the five worlds has a new setting. The first three worlds are easy, but by the boss of world 4 it gets tougher, and 5 is definitely the hardest. Fun game though. It's short and cheap, and certainly is worth playing. It won't take long, and is fun. The ending could have been better (even the "you got all the stuff" ending is short and not that great compared to, say, the intro), but at least it was something.

As for the game, it's an action platformer where you play as a female ninja, Akane, and you have to save the lord, who was kidnapped by evil ninjas. The lord is popular with women, apparently, and Akane likes him too. You can probably guess how the good ending goes.

Sega Master System
--
Bomber Raid - Yes, I beat it already. This game is quite mediocre, but for some reason it got me to keep coming back; I've been playing this quite a bit for several days now. The game is short, with only five levels, but the levels are long, and the last two levels are pretty tough. Crazily for a 1980s game from Sega the game actually has infinite continues (most SMS action games from the '80s don't allow any continues at all, except maybe via cheat code!), which is part of why I stuck with it, but it was also because even if it's repetitive, somewhat ear-bleedingly mediocre aurally (the songs are so short and loop endlessly!), and really is a quite generic game -- it kind of feels like 1942 or 1943 with a dash of Compile (Zanac or Aleste) added in... but even so, for some reason, I kept playing. Was I actually having fun? Eh, I don't know. It was kind of relaxing, I guess. It's just a simple game... fly up, shoot the stuff, try not to die. This is one of those games where dying punishes you HARD, since you lose all powerups, which makes you ship very slow and weak. And there's no shield, so you need to be very careful.

I do kind of like the level designs, though. I mean, they're far too long, as was somewhat common in the '80s, but I like that the enemies come from the left, right, and front. This is not one of those games where the enemies just come down the screen at you, lots of them come from the sides as well. It keeps you on your toes, for sure, until you've memorized the levels. The bosses are alright, but they're mostly just a collection of turrets you have to destroy. Oddly, the third level has a two-form boss, with a second form that took FOREVER to kill (though it wasn't too hard since the bullet pattern was easy to avoid), but no other level, not even the last one, has anything like it. Bizarre, and out of place; I'd think the ending would have two forms too, at least. Still though, there's a decent variety of enemy ship types, and I definitely like how they mix up enemy approach angles and patterns. It makes that really annoying music and repetitive gameplay as I played levels 4 and 5 over and over more tolerable.

Overall, Bomber Raid is alright. It's definitely not above average, but it was fun enough to be worth playing through, anyway. That's about it to it though, it has no difficulty settings. It does restart after you beat it (after you watch the ending and credits), but it's just back to the beginning, no difficulty change.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 5th July 2013

Xbox 360
--
Dead or Alive 4 - Beat Story mode with all characters. Now I'll have to play Time Trial with everyone, to unlock Tengu... plus Story or Time Trial a bunch more with some of the characters, who have more costumes than 3-4, to unlock them. This is a really great game though. My current impressions are that it's one of the best 3d fighting games ever. And I might need to keep paying for Xbox Live Gold in order to play it online more; sure, I'm terrible and usually lose, but it's fun... and yes, people are still playing.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 5th July 2013

I actually finished this probably last week, but forgot to post about it. Very good game, had me hooked for weeks until I finally beat the thing.

Nintendo DS
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Puzzle Quest: Galactrix - I got this on PC some time ago, but while I liked it, somehow I stopped partway. After getting the DS version, though... I stuck with it this time, and finished the game. Overall. Galactrix isn't quite as good as the first Puzzle Quest, but it is a good game well worth playing, for fans of the original anyway. This is a sci-fi game, not fantasy, and has hex tiles, instead of square ones like the first game. The game is shorter than the original Puzzle Quest, unfortunately, and doesn't have as much postgame content either (no "conquer the cities", no expansion, no sequel...). That's unfortunate, this game deserves more. I wish the game was a bit longer. While it lasts it is a pretty good game, though. It's not perfect, sure, as the story is kind of messed up at times (I hate that it forces you to do some pretty unpleasant things... but this isn't exactly a branching story, so you have no choice for the most part.), and the game balance is a bit off as through the first half of the game I probably spent more time hacking jumpgates than I did actually fighting battles (the game doesn't have nearly as many required fights as the first game had), but still, I liked it overall. I really like the hex-grid puzzles, it makes things much more complex than the first game, which is interesting. So yeah, overall, PQ: Galactrix is a somewhat flawed game, but it's pretty good even so.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 30th July 2013

Saturn
--
Mega Man 8 - Yeah, I finished it. Decent game, though I still don't think it's quite as good as most of the NES games (better than 6, maybe, probably not the others).

Xbox 360
--
Soul Calibur IV - beat story mode with some characters.
Battle Fantasia - Also beat story mode with several characters.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 16th October 2013

TurboGrafx-16
--
Spin Pair (JP import game) - This is a quite unique spin on a block-dropping puzzle game. You have to match the shapes to form full images: each tile has a full half and an empty half, and you have to match them to get full ones to make them disappear. This is a very challenging game which does not play quite like any other block-dropping puzzle game -- it's all about color and shape and matching, and I find it really, really tricky. Beating this game took me several days of leaving the system on, since you can't save your progress in the Story mode. On that note, Story mode is pretty much a misnomer since the game has next to no plot, but it IS true that "Story" mode has an ending with credits after you finish it, so there is something. The game has simple but effective and well-drawn graphics, and decent music. It looks a LOT like a Hudson game, but isn't from them; Media Rings must have been trying to copy Hudson's style with this game. Well, they succeeded. So yeah, fun game overall. I like it. The TG16 doesn't have many puzzle games, so it's cool that it has this one.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 16th October 2013

Also, here are games I completed during the lost two months. Yes, I have a saved copy of that list in the OP, so I updated it now with the complete version.

NES
--
Commando (JP import copy, "Wolf of the Battlefield") - okay run & gun game

TurboGrafx-16
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Sidearms - very fun Capcom shmup
Blazing Lazers - Compile shmup, one of the greatest games of the generation
Cyber-Core (used infinite continues cheat) - good vertical shmup
Wonder Momo (JP import) - mediocre at best side-scrolling beat 'em up
W-Ring: The Double Rings (JP import) (Normal difficulty) - Gradius-ish shmup, I love it
Dungeon Explorer - great Gauntlet clone!
(plus Spin Pair today)

SNES
--
Melfand Stories (JP import) (easy path) - super easy but fun sidescrolling beat 'em up

Saturn (all JP import games)
--
Asuka 120% Burning Fest. Limited (beat with a few characters on Normal) - okay 2d fighter
Vampire Savior (beat with several characters on difficulties 2-4 of 8) - very visually impressive on Saturn!
Sonic Wings Special (Easy difficulty) - good shmup, very Psikyo-like game (some of the same staff, so that makes sense)
Magical Drop 2 (beat Story mode multiple times with different characters, completed Puzzle mode once) - great puzzle game classic

Wii
--
Sengoku 3 [Wii Virtual Console Neo-Geo title] (default difficulty)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Dark Jaguar - 22nd October 2013

I'm going to go ahead and just move this to Tendo City. There's no reason this should be limited to admins.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 27th October 2013

Do we even have any non-admin regular members still?

Well, I guess we do, they just don't show up often... so eh, okay.

Also, I beat a game. It ... wasn't hard.

SNES
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Fighter's History - I beat this the first time I played it, on the default difficulty, without losing even a single round. Yes, the default setting is absurdly easy. You need to turn up the difficulty to get challenged at all. Also, it's definitely the Street Fighter II clone that everyone always said it was. Okay game, but incredibly unoriginal...

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 4th November 2013

So I just noticed that you put this in the wrong forum (it was in some empty "Tendo City" forum, not the actual one that's a bit lower on the list), so I moved it to the proper place. Now it can actually be seen.

TurboGrafx CD
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Avenger (J) -good shmup with Under Defeat-style controls, some decent ship designs, and good music too. This is a quite under-rated game, really! Look past the often-bland environments; otherwise it's good.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 7th November 2013

Turbo CD
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Down Load 2 (J) - Good but not great shmup. The multi-layer parallax scrolling in the graphics is quite nice, but the game needed another level and some options... the game is way too easy. There's only one difficulty, it's not that high, and replay value is somewhat limited... this game is disappointing compared to how great the first Down Load (for TG16) is. It is good, but should have been better. Still though, you DO kill reborn Hitler at the end, so it's not all bad!

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 12th November 2013

Nintendo 64
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Xena Warrior Princess: The Talisman of Fate - beat on Easy.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Sacred Jellybean - 12th November 2013

Dark Jaguar Wrote:I'm going to go ahead and just move this to Tendo City. There's no reason this should be limited to admins.

We could probably get away with just one forum nowadays. :(

Quote:So I just noticed that you put this in the wrong forum (it was in some empty "Tendo City" forum, not the actual one that's a bit lower on the list), so I moved it to the proper place. Now it can actually be seen.

Whew!

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Sacred Jellybean - 12th November 2013

There should probably be a rule against lamenting the forum's considerably light traffic, then making a snarky comment about the content we do have.

It's cool, guys, I'll just be over in the corner, beating my back with a knotted rope.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Dark Jaguar - 13th November 2013

Weird... I didn't know there was a quasi- TC floating around here.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 13th November 2013

Yeah, I had forgotten about that one, but TC has several secret forums (much more secret than Forum 5!) nobody has used in years now, but still exist...

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 5th December 2013

PSP
--
Class of Heroes - I didn't list this earlier, even though I beat the main game and saw the credits at least a week ago or more, because I wanted to beat the postgame content too... but now I've probably given up on that. I'll probably go back to this game sometime, but getting through the postgame content would require a mountain of grind, and I hate grind! It's kind of sad, if it ends like this, because I'm over 80 hours into this game now (yes, really) and have been playing it steadily for several months now, but all of that was steady progress in this first-person anime-styled dungeon crawling RPG. For the most part so far the game's been doable, and not super hard like some games in this genre are. But now? I'm faced with floors where I just die so quickly that grinding on earlier floors is the only option, and I really don't want to do that... argh. But I DID see the credits, so it counts for here anyway. I mean, beating the main game but not the postgame content because of the massive grind that would have been required is as far as I got in the first Etrian Odyssey, too...

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th December 2013

Nintendo DS
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Professor Layton and the Curious Village - For some reason or other I decided to play this game again, despite how annoying some of the puzzle are, and finished it up recently; it's not that long. I completed 118 of the 120 puzzles in the main game; on I can't find, and the other I don't seem to be allowed to retry, or whatever. I also finished 6 of the 9 bonus puzzles you unlock after the game. It looks like there should be six more, but those are greyed out... I haven't tried going online with the game though, maybe I have to do that to unlock the rest?

The game is okay, but some of the puzzles are flawed, either thanks to poor instructions or questionable mechanics. I had to look up a few of them, and I'd never have figured out stuff like that stupid "text me" one or puzzle 67, I think it was... oh well. I guess if I find some more Layton games for cheap I'll get them, though. Hopefully the sequels have better-written puzzle instructions. Oh, and the story was alright, and even though I knew part of the ending it did keep me going to the end.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 15th January 2014

Turbo CD
--
Hihou Densetsu: Chris no Bouken (J) - This is a fairly average, but decent (at times) platformer. You play as Chris, a girl who is looking for her father, who went missing in the Americas somewhere while searching for a legendary treasure ("Hihou Densetsu" means legendary treasure). This game has some bad, probably unfinished elements, but I enjoy it overall despite them. http://www.chrismcovell.com/games_illustrated/arc-hihou_densetsu.html That page has a nice summary of the game, but despite its flaws I did enjoy it... when I wasn't hating it for being so frustrating, that is. This isn't all that long of a game, but they try to make up for that by making the game hard and annoying. There are some tough jumps, tight time limits, and annoying enemy placements in this game. You really need to memorize everything in order to get through.

The story also feels incomplete, since some things just weren't explained at all. Sure, it's all in Japanese, but even beyond that, a lot of stuff just wasn't explained. As that page I linked says, the game never really explains how the main villain died, and it doesn't bother mentioning what happened to Chris's to surviving friends, either -- they don't appear after something like level 5 or 6's cutscenes. And the jump from the stage 4 cutscene to the stage 5 one doesn't make any sense, either -- where did her father come from? Why is that guy threatening them now? Maybe this stuff was mentioned in words, but not all of it I know that much, and it's sure never shown on screen! Also, as that page mentions, the connection between Atlantis, South/Central American Indians, and ancient aliens is tenuous at best. Sure, I get the idea -- it's the whole "Crystal Skull and ancient aliens made all those civilizations" thing -- but the game doesn't really explain any of that. So yeah, the cutscenes feel disjointed and incomplete, and the ending is very short and rushed, I think. It's over very quickly. Some other cutscenes earlier in the game feel too short too; I wouldn't be surprised if the story and cutscenes in this game weren't really finished yet when it was shipped. Oh yeah, and it sure was ridiculously convenient that that random kid Chris ran across in some town in the cutscene after level 1 seemed to have the magic jewel thing that they needed, for no apparent reason... and yes, as that page I linked makes clear, Fillia is an obvious knockoff design-wise of the goddess in the Ys title image. Also, apart from the final boss, no characters from the cutscenes ever actually appear in the game. Her father, that child, Fillia, the traitor guy... they're all cutscenes-only, and have no role in the actual game. It's kind of weird, particularly for that last one. And on the other hand, there's no mention of any of hte people you ARE fighting in the game during the cutscenes, at least not shown at least; maybe they mention something in the script? I hope they do. Are these actual Indians (Indio, whatever) I'm killing, or are they ancient spirits or something? I have no idea. The various animals, crystal robots or whatever, and the like aren't seen in cutscenes either of course, though that's typical videogame stuff. I know this kind of issue, cutscenes and gameplay not fitting well together, is a common problem in games, but this game has it.

So yeah, the story is disjointed and incomplete. Fortunately the gameplay is a bit better. Flawed, but better. I covered this game already in my TGCD games thread, but now I've finished it. And yes, it was worth it; this game is frustrating and relies almost entirely on memorization, but the background and environment graphics are often good, and the music's great too. The best track is level 7's music, that one is really good! It's too bad that level 7-2 is probably the easiest level in the game after 1-1, because you should be listening to that great music more... oh well. The worst thing about this game, gameplay-wise, is that you can't save your progress. Like, one block to save that level-select menu, that's all I'm asking for... having to play it all in one sitting, or without turning the system off, is annoying. Second worst is the weapon powerup system. You need two colored orbs in order to get a stronger weapon, and you NEED one because your default weapon is completely pathetically weak thanks to its two-millimeter (only a slight exaggeration) attack range. Good luck hitting things without taking a hit with that thing, it won't be easy. In the later levels I found myself not caring about if I died with my first and even second life of each continue, since all that really mattered was getting a decent weapon so that the next time I could attempt to actually beat the level. Even worse is that two of the same color orb get you nothing; you must get two different colors in order to power up. And these powerup orbs are random drops that drop from enemies or things which pop up out of the ground which may have items in them, so there's no guarantee that you'll get one. Often you don't, and end up dying because of that because the game won't give you powerups. Yes, it's frustrating.

On that note, this game has virtually no exploration. This game is entirely linear, and you need to keep moving in order to finish levels before the tight time limits run out. I'm alright with that -- not all sidescrollers need to have you going around collecting things during your adventure -- but it does reduce replay value and make the game shorter. Ah well. The level designs in this game are simple, but I thought they were okay. There's just enough variety to keep things interesting, and the later levels have somewhat weird visual/audio themes. Seriously, from levels six through eight particularly, this game got weirder and weirder... and yet there's very little to no reaction from Chris like that in the cutscenes. Maybe there is in Japanese, but shouldn't she say something obvious about how this trip to the Americas to look for her father has turned into a battle against ancient-alien Atlantean demigods or something in their spaceship hidden under a Latin American jungle temple?? But no, just some fairly calm conversations with Fillia, after the drama with the traitor guy got resolved after level 5. She's tough.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th January 2014

Turbografx CD
--
Puyo Puyo CD - Beat the story mode on Normal difficulty. This is the best version of the first Puyo Puyo game, and it's a really fantastic puzzle game! Great game. It's challenging, nice looking, silly, and lots of fun.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 6th February 2014

Playstation
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Sorcerer's Maze - Decent Arkanoid-style game. This game is missing a lot of stuff from the Japanese version -- no saving or analog support here, while the JP version has both -- but otherwise it's a fun game.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 27th March 2014

32X
--
Space Harrier (Arcade mode, Easy, 5 lives per continue) - I first played 32X Space Harrier in emulation years ago, and it was one of the earlier games I bought after getting the system. It's one of my favorite rail shooters ever, no question, but I'd never managed to beat it before... but, after a solid week of playing the game frequently, I FINALLY managed it. It did require turning down the difficulty to the easiest setting, that is easy, 5 lives, and in Arcade mode, a mode you access with a cheatcode where you get 3 continues instead of two checkpoints with infinite continues; the last checkpoint is at level 13, and beating the last 5 levels without using up 5 lives was so hard that I eventually gave up and went over to arcade mode. Even that took quite some time to beat, but I'm really thrilled that I finally beat it! What a hard, hard game... amazing, but hard, even on "Easy".

Space Harrier is a classic Sega arcade game from the mid '80s, and it's one of their greatest rail shooters, right up there with Panzer Dragoon and Panzer Dragoon Orta on my list. The game has beautiful, colorful graphics, is full of interesting sprite work and weird enemies, and is fast, fun, and tough. This game requires both skill and luck to beat; it's more skill-based than After Burner (32X), but somehow is harder as well -- I beat 32X After Burner years ago. That game feels very random, but I had more luck getting through it based on chance. But in Space Harrier, luck will only get you so far; you'll need some, for some of the tough sections full of fast-oncoming obstacles, but skill is absolutely vital. Beating Space Harrier took a lot of learning and memorization, as I learned, and tried to replicate, what to do at each challenge. Among the 18 levels there are a nice variety of different level settings, and several different styles too. Level 17 was probably the hardest, but I died regularly at every level other than level 1 and the two bonus stages. Some were definitely harder than others, though; 13, the last of the three speed-dodging "tunnel" stages, is very tough for instance. So are levels 11 and 16; even in this game where I beat the game, I managed to die four times on level 11. Fortunately I had done better than usual in the first ten levels, and hadn't used a continue yet -- and then managed to do well after that too, and got to level 17 with two continues still left. That brings me to just about the only bad thing about this game, though: the last level. The last level is a boss rush, and I DID die there the first two times I reached it, but this time I got through it, and it's actually pretty easy. You just re-fight some of the bosses from the game (some of the bosses from the first 15 levels), and not even all of them, and they aren't much harder than before; their shots might move faster, but that's about it. And then there isn't even a new boss at the end! You just fight that same dragon boss again and that's it. Levels 16 and 17 had interesting, unique bosses who I thought I'd face again... but no. It's pretty odd, particularly considering how the level 16 'boss' flies away and can't even be attacked.... and then you never get a chance to defeat that mothership? Too bad. As a result I beat the game easily, and still had a continue plus several lives left at the end.

Apart from the lacking ending, though, Space Harrier is exceptional and absolutely one of my favorite rail shooters ever. With great graphics and great gameplay, it's one of the best games in the genre. The 32X port has a few downgrades visually, but they're very minor; this is an outstanding port and I have no issues with it. I wish that it saved your high scores, like newer ports do, but otherwise it's just about perfect. Incredible game, and I'm very happy to finally have beaten it!

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 31st March 2014

SNES
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Doraemon 1 - Short and easy but fun and nice-looking licensed platformer. I didn't get all of the hidden bells, so I didn't get everything, but I beat the game. Not too bad, provided you're not expecting an actual challenge -- but given that it's a licensed kids' game, that isn't surprising.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 30th April 2014

Saturn
--
Tokimeki Memorial Taisen Puzzle Dama - Finished arcade (story) mode in Normal with a character. I got the bad ending, but that's close enough for now... just like the arcade game, you only get one chance at the final match, and if you fail it, bad ending for you. That's cruel, in a puzzle game this hard! As for the game, Konami's Puzzle Dama series is clearly Puyo Puyo inspired, but they changed a few things, so it's not exactly the same. It's a fast-paced, fun game that I quite like.

SNES
--
Block Kuzushi [Block Breaker] - beat the main story mode. This game is a Japan-only Arkanoid clone. It's got some issues, but overall I liked it. The game is MUCH better with the SNES Mouse, though -- without the mouse's vastly improved controls, I don't think I'd have enjoyed this game very much. The main story mode has text (in Japanese of course) after each of the boss fights -- and yes, there are boss fights about every 20 levels in this 101-stage game. You choose your route after each stage, though, so you'll only play 38 actual stages, max, in each game (fewer with warps). This adds some replay value, if you want to see some of the stages you didn't before. The game has very nice graphics, too -- the art design here really is impressively good for the genre and platform. The core Arkanoid/Breakout gameplay is solid and mostly well-designed, and there are plenty of powerups.

However, the game also has some problems. The music tracks are very short and repeat constantly, which gets annoying. In addition, this game gets boring at times -- many stages are absolutely LOADED with unbreakable (without specific powerups) bricks, and getting the ball through the mazes of bricks to those few you need to actually break gets tedious at times. Arkanoid is more fun than this, it's better balanced. Making this worse is that if you die you lose your powerups, and many cannot be replaced, since most powerup-generating blocks do not respawn. Also, the boss fights are mostly too simple -- the boss graphics look great, but only one, the third or fourth boss, actually presented a challenge; the others went down easily. The starting ball speed is SLOW, too, which does not help the tedium problem at all. So, you get a nice powerup, lose the ball, and then have to go through the rest of the frustrating stage without any powerups and with the ball barely moving for a while. This happens too often. The game also really should have had an Arkanoid-style gun powerup -- there is one laser shot weapon, but it's one-time-use, and clears a big chunk of blocks. Other powerups include a ball bomb (to blow up the area around the ball), a ball splitter (for two balls at once), paddle-lengheners, a warp that sends you to a higher level, etc. There are also some negative powerups as well, though -- there's a backwards warp I got once (ARGH!), paddle-shrinker, and slower-ball. There are a dozen powerups in this game overall, and about a dozen block types as well. This may sound like nice variety, but you see all of them early in the game; there's nothing new added here, just more levels with the same stuff and maybe new backgrounds and music. So yes, it gets repetitive. Also, you cannot save. This game isn't hugely long, but with how it gets boring sometimes, and you should have been able to save. Annoying. I had to leave the system on for a while instead. (On that note, you can't pause with the mouse; have to just leave it on one of the in-between-stage screens.) You have infinite continues here, and lose no progress when you continue (you just start from where you left off), so there really wasn't any reason not to have saving.

Still though, overall, Block Kuzushi for the SNES is a fun game, if you have the SNES Mouse. Without it I don't know if I'd recommend this -- you really need the improved controls the mouse brings to enjoy this game fully. But with a mouse, the game is a decent Arkanoid-style title worth a look for anyone who likes the genre.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 2nd May 2014

PSP
--
Galcon Labs - This game is short and easy, but quite fun! I'll definitely need to get more games in this series.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 17th May 2014

Turbo CD
--
Super Darius II - Normal difficulty, 9/9 lives and continues. Super Darius II is a fantastic enhanced port of the arcade game Darius II. The TCD-exclusive soundtrack is really great, and the gameplay is quite good as well. This is definitely a very good shmup, Turbo CD or otherwise, and on as shmup-rich a platform as this one, that's saying a lot. It's a somewhat tough game, but the last level I chose, Y, wasn't that bad... I'll have to play other routes and try the other final stages. The game has an Outrun-like level tree, and five endings at the end. The Y ending was pretty dumb, but in a funny way; I know Darius II is known for its weird endings, and this sure was that! Oh, and yes, the endings are in English text, nicely.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 17th May 2014

DS
--
Professor Layton and the Mysterious Box - beat the main game. This game is pretty much like the first game, but a new crazy story and new puzzles. It's slightly better than the first because of some improvements to the note-taking system in puzzles, but otherwise it's about the same quality. And yeah, it's good. The crazyness of the stories in this series is kind of overdone, though... I think they might be better with less insane plots, honestly. [spoiler]"Everyone in the last town is a ghost and you only saw them because of the crazy gas coming up from the mine"? WHAT? Oh come on, that's completely stupid...[/spiler] Also there's too much "save the girl" stuff is central to both games' plots, and it's unfortunate. In this game you think that the girl you saved in the first game is going to join you, but... no, it's just for a little bit in the middle of the game, then she's gone for the rest of it again. Ah well. But otherwise, it's a good game and I liked it. The puzzles definitely get tricky, and tough puzzles are certainly the main attraction of Layton games.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th June 2014

PS1
--
PuchiCarat - Played the JP PS1 version of this now; I've previously beaten the US PS2 Taito Legends 2 collection version. This is similar, but with a few more options and the story text actually present. This is a pretty great game -- basically it's anime-themed 2 player versus Arkanoid.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 24th June 2014

Dreamcast
--
Get!! Colonies (Japan only release) - beat the main game. This is actually an Ataxx clone, or, as I know the game better, Hexxagon, except with a square grid instead of Hexxagon's hex grid. Basically think Reversi, except you flip the other tiles just by touching them, instead of surrounding them. Ie, after a move any enemy within one space (including diagonals) flips to your color. Also if you move one space you can 'spawn' another tile while leaving the original in its place, while if you move two spaces (the maximum) you jump and abandon the old spot. Hexxagon is a game I loved back in the early to mid '90s, so it was pretty awesome to find this; there are strangely few console Ataxx (/Hexxagon) clones! This game has very low production values, with no voice acting or speech, no character animation, and something like one song that loops endlessly during play, but it's great fun anyway. The main game has six rounds, as you play as this schoolgirl character and try to beat the other six opponents. Each opponent has five boards to clear, so there are 30 levels total. Each one has a different layout, and they get pretty interesting. More levels would have been nice, but what's here is great. The game does save your progress after beating an opponent, thankfully. It also saves your high scores for each round. There's also a single-round mode where you can redo any match you've beaten. Unfortunately, the main game has no difficulty options, and the default is too easy. This is another of the games' faults -- the AI is seriously lacking and makes stupid moves far too often. Hexxagon released a good seven years before this game, and it has three or four AI difficulty options... why does this have none, in story mode anyway? Unfortunate, choices would have added some longevity to this short game, for people who don't have others to play against. And on that note, in addition to the 1v1-only main game, Get!! Colonies also has a 4-player single-match mode. This mode has 10 boards to choose from, so only a third of the levels are available; many of the others would be too small for four players, surely. For another sign of the low budget, this mode is four player only -- all players must be human or AI-controlled. There seem to be two AI options here. Why in the world is there a harder difficulty choice here, but no choice in the main 1v1 game? How bizarre! Also here you can play as all seven characters, which is nice. The boards are crowded with four players on them, but still it's a lot of fun. Hexxagon... that is, Ataxx... uh, I mean Get!! Colonies is a great boardgame-style game, addictive and well-designed. It's entirely unoriginal, of course, as the ruleset is 100% standard Ataxx with no variation apart from the 4 player mode, but it does it well. So yeah, I like this game quite a bit. I don't know how often I'll replay the main mode, but I'm sure I'll play the 4-player battles sometimes! 4 player Hexxagon... pretty great. So yeah, I finished story mode quickly --started yesterday, finished today -- but this game is pretty good and is well worth looking up.

Oh yeah, at the end, when you win, it says "Congraturation". Yup. :)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 26th June 2014

Saturn
--
Virtua Cop - So I got a Saturn mouse recently, and it works with the Virtua Cop games thankfully, making them much more fun than with gamepad! And given how bad I am with light guns, it makes them easier than with a gun too, for me. Unfortunately Maximum Force doesn't support the mouse (shame!), only pad or gun, but this and its sequel do. So yeah, I beat the game, with almost a full continue left (at 9 lives & 9 continues, but still). I haven't done that before. Nice! Short but fun game.

Nintendo 64
--
Super Robot Spirits (J) - finished it once. This is a Japan-only 3d fighting game. It's mostly 2.5d, but there IS some 3d movement, so it's not entirely on a flat plane. Mediocre game, but not all bad. The slow pace is a little dull, but most N64 3d fighting games aren't exactly fast... and this isn't the best of them, but isn't the worst either.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 14th July 2014

Game Boy Advance
--
Kururin Paradise (J) - beat the game (finished all levels). This is the second Kururin game, and the last one on the GBA -- the third and final game in the franchise is on the Gamecube. Of course, none of them released in the US because Nintendo is incredibly stupid, but these games are amazing and some of my favorite action/puzzle games around! I played the first game years ago in emulation, but held off on the second game then, and finally was able to play it now on a real cart. I'm a little disappointed that this game isn't any longer than the first one -- both of the GBA games are pretty short -- but at least there's a significant amount of replay value if you want to try to beat all the levels without ever touching the walls. If you beat a level without touching the sides ever you get a star on the map replacing that stages' dot, so there is a little reward for it. But yeah, these games are fantastic. They're topdown maze games where you have to maneuver a spinning line ('helicopter' supposedly) through a complex environment without touching anything. Hard, compelling, and great fun! I'll need a Freeloader to play the GC game of course, but I'll finally have to get one for this game... there aren't all that many import-only GC games worth getting, I think, but Kururin Squash is definitely at the top of that list for me.

Digidrive - I beat the hard computer opponent and saw the credits, so I guess that counts as "beating" this game, even though the main mode is endless. Digidrive is part of what later became known as the Art Style series, and also has a US DSiWare release, but I got the original GBA cart version, and this game is amazing -- this is a really, really good puzzle game! It gets brutally hard very fast, and my best score is only in the 6000s, but this twitch-response action/puzzle game is great fun even when I lose quickly. In the game you try to get points to keep yourself alive by sending three different colors of 'cars' different ways at the intersection of the games' + shaped map. Basically all you do in the game is use the dpad to tell the 'car' at the center which way to turn. If five of the same color go down one path without one of another color breaking the chain they form a shape that you can start filling by putting more of the same color on that path. Get shapes on all four paths and it goes into a faster bonus game, and the 'timer' chasing you on the score/progress meter on the right side stops moving as well, so you can't lose until messing it up (by sending one down a path of the wrong color); this will happen though, as the game gets very fast. There's a bit more to the game than that -- if you get one of those bonus-modes, when you end it you'll get a ship, and then if you hit A you'll send it out. These can be sent down a path, to send that shape to that score/progress meter, to get you points and keep you alive. These ships will also occasionally appear on their own, but you can't always rely on them so high scores will depend on being good at getting into, and staying in, the bonus mode. So yeah, it's hard, hard game, but compelling and addictive. Definitely look it up for either import GBA or DSiWare, where it goes by the title Art Style: INTERSECT.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 18th August 2014

Playstation
--
Extreme Go-Kart Racing - Bad, low budget, but I stuck with it to the end anyway... this is more Ridge Racer or something than it is Mario Kart. It's bad, but at least it's not just a straight clone. I'll write a more full review of this one quite soon. The game is interesting, as bad games can be. I haven't done everything in the game -- there are four unlockable characters, but beating the game didn't unlock any of them, and I have no idea how to unlock them -- but still, I did finish the championship and see the credits, so that counts as a win! This game was hard; each track took a lot of practice. You basically have to be near-perfect in order to actually finish in the top three, and I never managed to even SEE the person in first. Perfect those perfectly-executed drifts! Oh yeah, and no, the game has absolutely no analog support. The Dual Shock controller appears in the control settings menu, but the analog sticks do nothing; this game is d-pad only, ridiculously shameful for a game developed in 2000. There are also very few options. The graphics look badly dated, too. You can see to the horizon, but with graphics this awful, I can see why... there's a jaggy polygon seam between pretty much every single polygon in the game!

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Dark Jaguar - 18th August 2014

Games I've played: P.T.

There's a crack in the door...

Day 666, in the ghost house...

Damn you sink baby! Stop it! Stop making me look!

You got your sanity effects in my Silent Hill!

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 13th September 2014

In addition to the below, I also just got my best score ever in Digidrive for the GBA -- just over 99,000! I love this game...

Xbox 360
--
Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate - I beat Story mode in this game, and saw the end credits. I like the DoA series quite a bit, and this game is no exception! I don't know if it quite matches up to the second or fourth games, but without Itagaki, I wasn't expecting it to be quite as good. The graphical overhaul works better than I thought it would, and the game is still great fun to play. I do wish that the box warned you about the now almost 1GB of required downloads, but other than that, and the annoying "connect to the internet!" stuff that's all over (no, I should NOT have to be online just to play a single player game and look at the high score table at the end!), this is good.

Odyssey 2
--
Quest for the Rings - Yes, I have beaten it, first like a month ago.

For other 2nd gen games, it's hard to decide which actually count as "beatable". I mean, I've finished Haunted House and Adventure on the 2600, but those games are like five minutes long, is it even worth mentioning? And most other games are endless. For instance, what about Speedway on the O2? It's a two minute game, and you play for seeing how far you can get. So, I've "beaten" it, but you finish the game every time you play, unless you turn it off before two minutes elapse. The same goes for Helicopter Rescue. Does that really count as "winning"?

DS
--
Picross DS - beat all included puzzles, and also all puzzles I could download and fit on the system (can't get the other sets, now that Nintendo has shut down WFC... :( ) Yes, I've been very addicted to picross, 2d and 3d, for a while now. :)

Wii
--
Eduardo the Samurai Toaster - For some reason this wasn't listed yet, and I did finish the game again recently, so it's on the list now! It's a decent game, and it was very cool to see almost all of our names in the thanks section in the credits. DJ wasn't there, of course, but most of the rest of the TC regulars from the time (me, Weltall, etoven, dmiller, lazy...) were. Good stuff. :)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 14th September 2014

Turbo CD
--
Bokushou Yoshimoto Shingeki - This is a short and easy platformer. It's a Hudson game, and was their second TG16 attempt at a platformer starring a real comedian, after the successful 1987 title JJ & Jeff (Kato-chan & Ken-chan). However, that's a much better game than this one is, despite releasing seven years earlier than this 1994 effort, and being on a HuCard instead of a Super CD as well. This game is really, really easy; that its its main flaw. There's just almost nothing here! The game makes somewhat weak use of the Super CD format, too. This feels like a HuCard game with some CD audio and voice acting at times. The game is Hudson's last platformer for the system, and it might be their worst. It certainly is the easiest; I beat the game the first time I played it without getting a game over, and the game has no difficulty level options either. There are only six or seven levels, with minigames at the end of each one, and that's it. The game is broken into levels, each themed differently -- so there's a wild west level, etc. Each level is a separate stage show by the comedian protagonist, essentially. There are some bits of voice acting here and there, in Japanese of course; I imagine this game would be better if you know the language, because at least the humor would all make sense. I often get the sense that this game is more about the comedy than it is gameplay, though there's not a LOT of comedy either -- just short bits before levels, and during them on occasion. The humor that I could understand is mostly pretty dumb stuff too, which doesn't help. After each level, there's a minigame. These minigames substitute for boss fights. In one, you play rock-paper-scissors, and the winner then throws food at the other players' face. That's the level of the comedy here. That would be okay if the game was challenging and fun like JJ & Jeff is, though; that game's loaded with really stupid humor, but it makes up for it with tough classic platforming gameplay. In this game though, the minigames are often amusing, but the levels are so insubstantial that the game feels lacking. Only the last level presented any challenge at all, and even that wasn't hard! It's kind of sad when even a quiz/platforming minigame is easy for someone who can't read Japanese to beat on their first try... just get to the top first, and it doesn't matter how many times you choose the wrong answer! And getting to the top first is easy, even though this is one of the last challenges in the game. Oh, and as for the graphics, it looks okay, but not really any better than Hudson games from four years earlier. While everyone else showed graphical improvement in their platformers over the early '90s, Hudson was pretty much stuck in neutral up until at least '95. Too bad. There's very little parallax in this game, relatively few enemies most of the time which are almost no threat to you, and not much that really explains why this is a Super CD either. I do like the few places where you have multiple routes, and the stage going down a river looks kind of nice, but still, this game could, and should, look and play a lot better than it does. This game is Hudson's only Turbo CD-exclusive platformer that isn't an action-RPG, and it's thoroughly mediocre at best missed opportunity.

So yeah, this is a somewhat disappointing game. I went in with low expectations, and the game was about as subpar as I expected. Too bad. If you want a much better sidescrolling game published by Hudson in 1994, get anything else they released that year -- the Westone action-RPG Blood Gear for Turbo CD is pretty good, for example. They had good platformers on Nintendo p[latforms that year, too -- Adventure Island IV (Takahashi Meijin no Bouken Jima IV) for NES, Super Bonk for the SNES, Bonk's Revenge for Game Boy are all from '94; those games are where their main platforming focus went that year, clearly.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 30th September 2014

Genesis
--
Universal Soldier - I got this game back in '06; it was one of my earlier Genesis games, I believe. I got to level 4-1, the second to last stage, and stopped there because that level was quite long and difficult. Well, looking for a Genesis game to play (since I've barely played the Genesis in some time now...) I finally went back to the game today, and finished it! This game is, of course, actually the Genesis port of Turrican 2, a fantastic European computer game. It's an under-rated game on the Genesis, but it is great. The "Universal Soldier" theme is silly -- all they did is change a few sprites, add in three new levels, replace the ending, and call it a day, this is obviously Turrican -- but that's great, I want Turrican, not some random Van Damme movie game. Turrican 2 is a huge improvement over the first game. There are no blind jumps anymore, and the gameplay and graphics are improved across the board as well. The music is better too; these conversions by the guys who made this port aren't as great as Huelsbeck's own music in Mega Turrican, but they're good. The three new levels in this version are even good! (Sure, that they removed the shmup section of the game is unfortunate, but ah well.) And this is also the only Turrican game ever that has a save system, with passwords, so I didn't have to start the whole game over; I picked up from the stage I left off at years back. I, of course, think that save systems make games better in almost every case, so the save system is another of the things I really like about the game. Sure, it's still clearly a European game in some ways, and has some questionable design decisions still, such as the health system (as in Turrican 1, health decreases VERY fast and there's no hit invincibility, flash, sound, or anything; touch an enemy without paying attention and you're dead in a second), but you get used to it. The levels are large and full of secrets, and exploring is fun. The first level I played today, 4-1, is the largest in the game, and it took several tries to finish. Well worth it, though! The one disappointing thing is that the final boss is really easy. Is the final boss this easy in Turrican 2 (Amiga/C64/PC) too, or did they make it easier in the port? I don't know. Other than that though, I really like this game. Turrican 2 isn't as polished as Factor 5's games, but it's also quite good. This variant of the game, Universal Soldier, is as well.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 13th October 2014

Dreamcast
--
Pod 2: Speed Zone - I've been playing this one for the past week or so, trying to finally beat everything since there are actually races to win in this game, even if there's not much of a point to it since the game has no ending or even reward screen. Pod 2 is of course a game I both love and hate; I love it because it's a lot of fun, and hate it because it's an atrocious sequel to Pod (for the PC), one of my favorite racing games ever. I've talked about all its flaws before, though, so I won't again... I'll just say that I was wrong when I said the game had no progression. It actually does -- each of the six tracks has a Normal, Hard, and Thriller race to try to beat. You start with only the Normal races unlocked, and then get the Hard races by beating each track in Normal, and then the Thriller races by beating each track in Hard. You have to finish first in Normal and Hard for your wins to count, which adds to the challenge. You don't get anything for beating the Thriller races, but I did it anyway so that I could say I've beaten the game, and because I wanted to (it IS fun, after all, as lacking as it is). Hard is another standard race but with harder AI. Thriller races are elimination races -- so the person in last gradually loses health until they are eliminated, and the last one alive is the winner. In Thriller mode there are no powerups, so you only get the one boost bar you start with and that's it. Using boost strategically is important, considering how little of it you get in these races! It was great to actually have something to do in this game. It actually took effort to beat all the races in Hard and Thriller modes, Hard particularly; I'd under-rated it before, some of the tracks are tough. Somehow I'd never tried to actually unlock this stuff before, if I even realized you could... not sure why. Well, I finally rectified that mistake! I'll write more about this game soon; I wrote up my thoughts on it once before, years ago in my Pod 1 thread, but now that I've beaten it I have a lot more to say. :)

Nintendo 64
--
Susume Taisen Puzzle Dama - Beat on Normal (difficulty 4) in Puzzledama and Tokkaedama modes. This is the N64 version of Konami's Puzzle Dama franchise of Puyo Puyo-style puzzle games. It doesn't have the licensed characters of the PS1/Saturn Tokimeki Memorial versions, but it does have both Puzzle Dama and Tokkaedama in one, while on PS1/Saturn you have to buy the two games (both with the Tokimemo license) separately. It's great that this gives you both modes on one cart, nice addition! There's also a third mode, a pretty poor top-down bowling game, but I don't know why it's here; it doesn't even have AI opponents, only you alone or 4-player alternating play. The reason to get this are the two puzzle modes. The cast is amusing, and more varied than Tokimemo's cast of anime girls, but I'm not sure which one I prefer. The music is great, as expected from Konami, and gameplay is really good! This is like a simpler version of Puyo Puyo -- you only need to match three instead of four in Puzzledama. It also has garbage blocks (match next to them to turn them into normal pieces), bombs which turn the blocks around them into garbage blocks, and smilie faces which turn the garbage blocks around them into normal blocks. Fast-paced and fun game! I quite like it. As for Tokkaedama, in this you have to match three again, but this time the lines come up from the bottom of the screen. You have a cursor, and select a piece with the cursor, and then can place it anywhere else. So, you swap pieces from your cursor to the highlighted space. It's fast-paced and frenetic, but I'm not sure when you win -- you can go over the screen and not lose, there's some hidden limit or something. Kind of odd. I like Puzzledama more, but Tokkaedama's some fun too, and it's great to have it without having to buy it separately; I don't know if I would. I will be playing this game more, though! About the only bad thing about the game is that both puzzle modes are two player only; four player splitscreen would have been cool. Ah well. Few puzzle games have four player simultaneous, but a few on the N64 do -- The New Tetris, Bust-A-Move '99, Puyo Puyo 4: Puyo Puyo~n Party (Japan only title), and Dr. Mario 64 do.

Game Gear
--
GG Aleste 2 (Power Strike 2) - Beat on Normal. This is a fun Compile shmup. It's not nearly as good as their TG16/TCD, Genesis/SCD, and SNES games, but for an early '90s handheld game, it's decent fun. This game is short, but does present some challenge. It's no match for most of Konami's GB shmups, honestly, but it's a pretty fun game and I like it, even if I don't like it nearly as much as Compile's best games; I really love their shmups for the platforms I listed earlier! This one's just good for the time and platform, not an all-time great like most of those are. Ah well, at least it's fun, and is also one of the better handheld shmups of the '90s as well, along with its very similar predecessor, GG Aleste [1], which I do not have yet. The game feels a bit cheap compared to the first one --the first game has an intro, but this one's just got a title screen with minimal 'ship flying onto screen' animation. The first games' intro is not long, but at least it's something. The ending does have some cinema scenes, but they're smaller than the ones in the first game. The first game is longer, too -- GG Aleste 1 longplays are about 31 minutes of actual gameplay (start to end), while GG Aleste 2 longplays are nine minutes shorter. And the gameplay of the two is very similar. Still, it's a good formula, and GG Aleste 2 does have nice graphics and fun gameplay. It gets challenging near the end even on Normal, too, which is good. It's really stupid that Sega decided to not release this one here! Even Europe got it... but there are a surprisingly large number of good Game Gear games Sega stupidly didn't release in the US, so oh well. (Other examples of GG games Sega should have localized -- Gunstar Heroes, Royal Stone, the other two Shining Force games, Lunar Walking School, GG Aleste 1, Eternal Legend, Sylvan Tale, and more.)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 8th November 2014

So looking through my list of games I have, I saw some games missing from this list that I have finished but had forgotten to mention:

Game Boy
--
The King of Fighters '96 (J) - This is a very easy game, as usual for Takara's SNK ports, but it's quite fun! It's too bad it didn't get a US release, but this is just about as good. I beat this game earlier this year, not too long after getting the game.

Bionic Commando - I'm not sure when I beat this, but it wasn't this year, it was earlier than that. A few years ago I think. I got the game in '09. Bionic Commando for the GB is a pretty good game. It is of course original, and not a port of the NES game. It's inspired by it of course, but not a port. I might like this game more than the NES game, because it has password save and thus is more fun to actually play, and gameplay-wise is just about as great, but it's not quite as amazing as my favorite Bionic Commando game, BC: Elite Forces for the GBC. The controls are in between the NES and GBC games, tighter than the GBC game but improved over the NES original. Level designs are great, though, for sure. Even if BCEF is even better, though, this is a really great game, highly recommended! BCEF is one of my absolute favorite handheld games ever, so being not quite as amazing as that game still leaves this is a pretty fantastic game.

Game Boy/GB Color Dual Mode
--
Test Drive 6 - I'd held off on mentioning this one after playing it, oh, sometime within the last year I believe because it messed up (or otherwise has some secret internal requirement I don't know about) and kept refusing to recognize that I had indeed won all the circuits in first place and thus should have unlocked everything, but I did it, so really it counts regardless of whether it recognizes it or not. This game is far from great, but I had fun with it anyway. It's an average-at-best topdown racing game, but it's amusing for a little while.

Game Boy Color
--
Pokemon Puzzle Challenge - I believe I beat this on all the difficulties in the main (vs. story) mode.

Neo Geo Pocket Color
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Samurai Shodown! Pocket Fighting Series (J) - After getting this game earlier this year, I played through it once. This is a very good game, and is, for some reason, more fun than its US-released sequel. Interestingly, even though this game wasn't released in the US (it's a B&W game, and none of the B&W games were), in a system set to English the game is in English; SNK did that in many titles, which is nice. Also, even though it's a B&W game, it actually has limited colorization -- there are maybe ~7 colors on screen when you play this game in a NGPC. I don't see this mentioned anywhere, but it's a pretty cool feature! This has to be one of the later B&W titles, because this can't be just something applied by the system -- other B&W titles don't colorize like this. Cool stuff. And the game IS good, too; it just plays better than the second one!

NES
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Gotcha! The Sport - This super short and easy game didn't take long to get through. It's somewhat unique, as it uses both a gamepad and light gun. Nothing special here, but not too awful for a budget third-party light gun game. It's average-ish.

Turbo CD
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Ultra Box 6 - I beat the little racing game on this collection of mini-games. The Ultra Box discs are so weird and Japanese, they're neat stuff. I have volumes 3 and 6 (of 6).

Sega Genesis
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OutRunners - This game is surprisingly decent! Most people seem to dislike it, but I liked the game... it's good. It's nowhere near Outrun 2019's level of quality, but I do like it more than the Genesis version of the original Outrun -- it feels slightly less choppy, the horrible framerate and scaling ruins Genesis Outrun for me. This one's still bad, but not quite AS bad. Maybe the graphical downgrade helps there too... (graphical downgrade to make room for the forced-splitscreen nature of the game)

Xbox
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Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball - I managed to get through this stupid, boring thing at least once. WHY do some people actually like this game? Fanservice isn't enough when there's absolutely no actual competent gameplay to be found! But each playthrough is quite short, so I got through it once.

Castle of Shikigami Evolution Red [Shikigami no Shiro Evolution Aka] (J) - This is the second version of the Xbox version of the first Castle of Shikigami game. I got this game earlier this year... and actually finished it! Unlike the US version of CoS1, which was released here on the PS2 as "Mobile Light Force", this improved "Evolution" edition for the Xbox has no cuts (the US game has the whole story removed), an additional playable character, a bonus disc with a few little extras, and... infinite continues! That last change is the key, of course. I've never finished the US game because of the limited continues, but this one I can finish, and I did. This is a decently good game, but not as good as its sequels, I think. I don't love this series, because I'm no good at it and much prefer 4th gen-style shmups to bullet-hell games like this, but it's a solid bullet-hell shmup I don't regret getting.

Xbox 360
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Tekken 6 - Had to force myself to finish this game once. Why do people like this series, exactly? It's not any good at all, really!

The King of Fighters XII - This games' single player mode is so short that it barely even counts, and the game doesn't have a boss, but it IS there, so I should list it. KOF XII is a great first half of KOF XIII, basically. What's here is really good, but there's vast amounts of missing content; don't bother with this, just skip to KOF XIII, which is the same basic thing but it's actually a complete game. And it's a really good game, too!

PC
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The King of Fighters XIII: Steam Edition - I got this a few months ago, and have finished this a few times now. It's pretty great, another classic SNK fighting game for sure!

Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords - It took some time after initially buying the game, but eventually I finished this quite good fantasy puzzle game. I like it a lot, and still need to get the sequel! Puzzle Quest 2, that is; I have Puzzle Quest Galactrix, which was made in between the two fantasy games, and liked it quite a bit too, but I don't have PQ2. I'm sure it's also great.

Skullgirls - This is another recent 2d sprite-art fighting game, like KoF XIII, except this one is an indie game. It's not quite as SNK's level, but it's a pretty good game for sure. The sprites look fantastic, and the gameplay's very good.

So yeah, there were quite a few! And there may be more, too. Not as many now though! :)

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 27th November 2014

PC
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Hexcells - On the plus side, this game has a great hex-Minesweeper-with-some-Picross concept and plays great. On the negative side, there are only 30 puzzles, with no random mode, and I just 100% completed the game in two hours, and I just got the game! Yeah, I know that it has two sequels (which I will surely play soon!) and apparently the third one finally has a randomizer mode, and yeah, I've played quite a bit of Minesweeper and Picross and are decently good at the games, but still, short game. At least I got it with the sequels, so I won't have to wait for more! What was here was great. I love this kind of game.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th December 2014

Nintendo 64
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Excitebike 64 - Yes, after over 14 years, I finally beat this game today! It feels pretty good... I'd gotten to the Platinum circuit of Professional difficulty years ago, but got stuck there. A few days ago I started playing the game again, and after a lot of tries got lucky and snuck through with a weak win in the Platinum circuit. I got only 1 first, two seconds, and two fourths, but it was just barely enough for a 13-point tie win... yeah. A more convincing victory would be great, but I'll take it! The final cup, made up of five one-lap 1-on-1 races on motocross tracks, took a day or two, but after quite a few tries I finally won earlier today. It wasn't nearly as hard as the Platinum circuit, obviously, but did present a nice challenge, even if I wish that some of the tracks were the outdoor ones because those tracks are so, SO much better than the less fun and comparatively bland-looking indoor ones. So yeah, I finally, at long last, unlocked Excite 3d. It's alright, but not that great... but that's what I'd always heard, so that's not a surprise. It's still a very cool bonus! Too bad the Desert and Excite 3D modes don't support multiplayer, they should have. Ah well. Amazing, amazing game, still one of, or maybe THE, best motorcycle racing game(s) ever.

Playstation
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Extra Bright - Japanese rail shooter...shmup... thing. It's a simple but moderately fun game; average overall, but interesting enough to stick with for one completion, at least. It's a somewhat easy game. Fly along, blow stuff up, see the anime cutscenes between levels.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 19th February 2015

... I think I beat something last month but forgot to post about it... argh, that's one reason I need to remember to always keep track of this stuff. :p

That said...

Xbox 360
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The King of Fighters XIII - beat Arcade mode on default difficulty. The final two bosses are really hard, classic SNK Boss stuff here! This is a really fantastic game, which really should have gotten more recognition than it did for its outstanding graphics and great, classic KOF gameplay. Will this be SNK's last fully 2d-animated game? If so, they sure went out on top, at least... incredible game. I have played it before on PC, but now that I finally got an X360 hard drive (um, yeah, I didn't have one until yesterday; only a year and a half after getting the system, I know... a few games fit in that 4GB flash space, but not full retail ones like this. It's great to finally have one.), I can play this on X360 too (I do also have the PC version). It's really good. I hope SNK makes good games again at some point.

Playstation 1
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Megatudo 2096 (beat on Normal) - This is a decent Japan-only 3d fighting game. It's got okay graphics, gameplay that's very heavy on circle-strafing around arenas while shooting at the enemy, ranged and melee weapons for each character, special moves, and more! Oh, and giant robots, of course. The game has issues, but it's fun stuff, well worth a look.

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - Dark Jaguar - 20th February 2015

Lately I've been trying to get the rainbow of colors that N64 cartridges came in. Of course, we've all got a gold one or two (or three, if you count the duel color Pokémon Stadium 2). I've also got a yellow DK64 cart, and a red "Robot on Wheels" cart (he's only got the one wheel though, well, maybe internally there's another one, but he can't be said to be "on" that one).

Now, I'm looking for Green, Blue, and Black. To think we could have had a black Perfect Dark, but too many people back then were all "there's already a bunch of black ones, let's have a RED one!" even though thematically red didn't make any sense (and also, retrospectively, there's an overabundance of red carts on that system now too). Rare ended up pleasing no one in that regard because the fans couldn't just agree on the issue. Still an amazing game though.

Anyway, unlike SOME Lego pieces around here I don't collect bad games, so I'm looking for the very best each color has to offer. That basically rules out EA sports games. For black, I'm fairly certain I'll be picking up Turok 2. For Blue, well, TWINE seems a good bet. I didn't think it was as good as Perfect Dark, but compared to a lot of current FPSes, at least it's more clever and a competent Goldeneye clone. That leaves green, and frankly I'm not sure if there IS a good green N64 game outside Rayman 2, which wasn't even an N64 exclusive. Hmm, maybe BattleTanx Global Assault? Anyone know if that was a good game? If so, I've got an outline for my full rainbow.

Oddly enough, Rainbow Six? Not rainbow colored...

Games I Have Finished (as far as I can remember) - A Black Falcon - 20th February 2015

Yeah, the non-grey N64 carts are cool.

Gold... I only have Majora's Mask for that.

Green? Army Men: Air Combat is decent to good, and BattleTanx: Global Assault is great, I've always loved that game - it's one of the few N64 games I got new and for full price back when it came out.

Blue? Hydro Thunder! TWINE as well, but Hydro Thunder is one of my favorite racing games of course. Yeah, the N64 version isn't the best, but it IS the only home version with 3-4 player support, and it's still great even if the DC version is a little bit better. Of course, it helps that the arcade game is one of my favorite arcade racing games ever.

Black? Turok 2, Turok: Rage Wars (though what you really want is the bug-fixed grey-cart release, that is VERY expensive), Turok 3, Aidyn Chronicles. Most people like Turok 2 the most, but I like Turok 3 more because it's not quite as punishingly hard. Other black carts I have include Battlezone: Rise of the Black Dogs (it's okay), Rally Challenge 2000 (I actually like this one, it's not great but is a decent game), Scooby-Doo: Classic Creep Capers (fun if you like the cartoon, otherwise don't bother), Tony Hawk 3, Road Rash 64 (some people like this, but I don't), Fighter Destiny 2 (good, just like the first game; few changes from the first one, though), Nuclear Strike 64 (it's okay, but I've never really been a series fan...), and Armorines (okay FPS). Yeah, there are quite a few black carts.

For red carts, in addition to Rocket (which is fantastic of course), I also have the fairly average Jeremy McGrath's Supercross 2000.

Interestingly, Tony Hawk 1 for N64 is blue, Tony Hawk 2 is green, and Tony Hawk 3 is black. They changed colors for each release.