13th October 2014, 11:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 14th October 2014, 12:34 AM by A Black Falcon.)
Dreamcast
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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
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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
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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.)
--
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.)
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