So, what you playing at the mo? Retro Edition

OwaynOTT

Lotus Turbo Challenge on Megadrive at the moment, well not right now as I'm in work(hence the increased amount of posts), and I'm liking it more than Outrun, is that okay?
Is there sound effects in the game at all? It's kinda off putting that there's no engine noises.

Think I'm going to get Cruis'n Usa next, that's a brilliant racing simulator.

James Howlett

Played the first hour of Final Fantasy VIII the other night. Squall is the poster child for emo-ism. His first handful of responses in the game include "whatever" and "I'm more complicated than you think". I had to stop playing in order to preserve the good memories of the game that I do have.

Retr0gamer

If it wasn't for the Kingdom Hearts series then FFVIII would have the worst storyline written by mankind. Thankfully the battle system is gloriously broken and breaking it is what will keep you going.

Myrddin

OwaynOTT wrote: »

Lotus Turbo Challenge on Megadrive at the moment, well not right now as I'm in work(hence the increased amount of posts), and I'm liking it more than Outrun, is that okay?

Not really...

Think I'm going to get Cruis'n Usa next, that's a brilliant racing simulator.

Seriously??

ghostchant

Was playing Kid Dracula for the Famicom last night, and noticed the first boss, that I assumed was a ghost, had a swastika on its forehead. Turns out it's not a ghost but a KKK member. Rather extreme for a kids game! Lot of fun to play.

Myrddin

ghostchant wrote: »

Turns out it's not a ghost but a KKK member. Rather extreme for a kids game! Lot of fun to play.

Why? If it makes a kid ask "what was the Ku Klux Klan & learn from the mistakes of the past I'm ok with that. I'm not a believer in burying heads in the sand when it comes to history & some things should never be forgotten.

Besides, surely the swathes of meaningless killing in modern games is a worse message

OwaynOTT

EnterNow wrote: »

Not really...




Seriously??

:P

ghostchant

EnterNow wrote: »

Why? If it makes a kid ask "what was the Ku Klux Klan & learn from the mistakes of the past I'm ok with that. I'm not a believer in burying heads in the sand when it comes to history & some things should never be forgotten.

Besides, surely the swathes of meaningless killing in modern games is a worse message

Well the symbol was dropped from the western release of the Game Boy game (NES version never left Japan), and the KKK member was replaced with a wizard in a cloak apparently, though as far as I know the sprite looks the same (sans swastika) until post-battle.

I agree with you on not forgetting and teaching kids lessons learnt from the past, but in this particular instance the KKK member (and his KKK child...I think) is living in a haunted castle (the Castlevania mansion) and gets in a fight with a fireball-spewing Dracula in child form, only after his kid has been trashed by the very same precocious vampire. It doesn't seem to tie into the overall story either. There's no dialog indicating what the enemy is or what it represents, and I imagine the kids thought they were fighting a ghost. The fact that the Shinto religion native to Japan uses the swastika symbol widely would add an extra layer of confusion I would have thought. Not sure what the lesson is really!

Myrddin

ghostchant wrote: »

It doesn't seem to tie into the overall story either. Not sure what the lesson is really!

There probably is no lesson, sometimes a sprite is just a sprite I just don't find such things automatically offensive like the pc brigade of today [nothing to do with you at all, just my own observations].

o1s1n

If anything, I think kids games need more comical KKK guys and swastikas.

Imagine how much better Mario would have been if the flower power was in fact a burning cross.

On a side note, it seems if you google anything, there will be a picture for it.

Retr0gamer

It's ok to gun down Russian soldiers in CoD but heaven forbid you get the chance to fight Nazi's or KKK members. As long as you are communist or the US population associates you with communism then it's fair game.

The PC brigade get on my nerves as well, especially their selective bandwagon hopping and tendency to blame everyone except themselves for bad parenting skills.

johnny_ultimate

Ah, good times!

ghostchant

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It's ok to gun down Russian soldiers in CoD but heaven forbid you get the chance to fight Nazi's or KKK members. As long as you are communist or the US population associates you with communism then it's fair game.

Aren't there bazillions of WW2 shooters where you're fighting the Nazi regime, some of them COD games? I was surprised at Kid Dracula containing the KKK the same way I'd be surprised at a Kirby game containing the KKK.

Myrddin

ghostchant wrote: »

Aren't there bazillions of WW2 shooters where you're fighting the Nazi regime, some of them COD games? I was surprised at Kid Dracula containing the KKK the same way I'd be surprised at a Kirby game containing the KKK.

There are loads of WW2 fps indeed, it seems to be more socially acceptable though because they're [Nazi's] in an 18 rated game & are getting slaughtered by the bucketload.

Once your killing them, it's ok. Heaven forbid there was a game today where you played as a Nazi soldier. It's ok though, coz the Americans are the good guys :rolleyes:

I'm not saying kids should be running around embracing Nazi ideology or being KKK sympathizers...but the established good guys these days, are every bit if not worse than the crimes of the bad guys of old. It's just not politically correct to think so, but ya know what...fukc politically correctness...I'm a pretty good judge of whats right & wrong without being spoon fed it by some toss pot who wouldn't know the meaning of the words weapons of mass destruction

jaxdasher

Been playing NetHack again after years. I had to reacquaint myself with the commands. Still soo fun and just as addicting as before. Anyone else play NetHack or other rougelike games? ZangbandTk is another fine game.

Retr0gamer

I really want to try Spec Ops the Line because I heard it really goes against the grain in portraying the US as the good guys.

johnny_ultimate

Yeah, Spec Ops is meant to be the Apocalypse Now of third person military shooters. It's the third person military shooter part that seems to be the slight problem :pac:

On a related note, I'm playing through the Darkness II at the moment. Surprised to find it actually has some storytelling smarts and visceral mechanics. Of course, said smarts are diminished slightly when your demon imp pet pisses on corpse of the grunt whose spine you just ripped out through his arse while abusing the 'c' word at a rate that would make a Scottish person blush.

o1s1n

jaxdasher wrote: »

Been playing NetHack again after years. I had to reacquaint myself with the commands. Still soo fun and just as addicting as before. Anyone else play NetHack or other rougelike games? ZangbandTk is another fine game.

I love Nethack. Haven't played it in ages either though! Used to a lot in work as because it's in ASCII, it doesn't look like you're playing a game

CiDeRmAn

Regarding the US as bad guys, Deus Ex (original as well as reboot) and the under-rated XIII had you blowing away American forces to beat the band, if memory serves... so they turned out to be following lunatics/Illuminati/lunatics who thought they were Illuminati, still counts!

ghostchant

I really liked XIII, have distinct memories of playing the hell out of it on multiplayer. Looked rather lovely too

Retr0gamer

Played Malicious on the PS3 last night and finished. I went from initially loving th art style then not understanding the game. Went back to it last night and read the instructions and finally got a grasp of it and ended up loving it and finishing it. For such a cheap PSN title it really looks stunning and is really polished.

It's a bit like Megaman where you can choose between 5 stages and gain abilities when you beat one. However the levels are all just boss fights some of which are huge. The music is also amazing. It's a short game, only about 4 hours long but I'd love to see it fleshed out into a full game. The only real problems with the game are it's a bit too complex for it's own good meaning it takes a while to get into, the camera can be erratic and it's very difficult. The bosses get tougher as you kill other bosses and one of the them, a small female with a sword, is a nightmare if you leave her last.

Doge

Driver San Francisco is pretty much the best racing game I have played in the last few years. And the best fiver I've ever spent.

I remember when I first saw it online i was like:

"meh, just looks like a generic modern racer"

But boy was I so wrong, there's a perfect balance between new vehicles and old classics.

The challenges in the game are very creative and there's just so many of them!

Best of all is the remade classic car chases from movies like Gone in 60 Seconds, Bullit etc...
and the remade training mission of Driver 1 was a big surprise!

Tearing down the hills of SF never gets at high altitude never gets old,
it almost brings me back to days of playing Test Drive 4 on the PS1!

And the game also runs beautifully on a PC with modest specs.
(I'm only running it on an entry level graphics card - HD 5770)

Definitely worth buying even at full price, should keep you entertained for ages.

And I've barely scrope the surface of the multiplayer!

jaxdasher

o1s1n wrote: »

I love Nethack. Haven't played it in ages either though! Used to a lot in work as because it's in ASCII, it doesn't look like you're playing a game

Ha I never thought of that, I recently played again because I found a perfect port of in on android. Never actually played it in ASCII, remembering all the commands off the top of my head can be tricky enough. I use to play Angband games too.

I haven't finished nethack even once yet, never got deeper than level 10 but thats what keeps me coming back for more. Perma-death is a very under-rated concept.

CiDeRmAn

waveform wrote: »

Driver San Francisco is pretty much the best racing game I have played in the last few years.

I've been mulling over picking it up for ages but have yet to do so.
I would probably pick up the 360 version, but that's going pretty cheap right now.

Thanks for the recommendation!

jetblack1981

Onimusha series
Another great Capcom title

unky chop chop

Anyone played Fez yet?
Great reviews...I thinks me will have to part with 1200 MPs for this.

johnny_ultimate

Yeah Fez is very good, and pretty sure it's only 800 points It has smart mechanics throughout.

The post game is when you get to crazy town, though. You need to sit down with a notepad and start deciphering these delightfully obtuse puzzles. I had fun with it for a while, but it reached a point when my note page was full of furious, contradictory scribblings and I had to put the controller down. Some the crazy complicated puzzles would be rewarding for the particularly obsessed though!

unky chop chop

Yeah I love the sound of that.
Bringing back the days of scribbling maps/puzzles down on paper.
Tis been a long time since I've done that, I'm sold

CiDeRmAn

Started to play Psychonauts again, determined to play until I get stuck.... shouldn't be long so!

johnny_ultimate

Myself and three friends sat down for a THPS3 retro evening tonight. Was meant to be an old-fashioned two player split-screen tournament, but we said we'd unlock Canada first because we couldn't find our memory cards. We ended up playing the single player campaign to completion taking it in turns :pac:

Some game though. Shame the series went down the ****ter soon afterwards.