New Game Pickups 7/28/23

 New Game Pickupssssss

Back again with the new game pickups. I haven't been shopping for games as much as I used to over the past year or two, but that still doesn't mean I don't pick something up from time to time. I was able to sell some items I haven't played and that contributed to my budget, as well as take some friends to an arcade about 45 minutes away from me which was nice. They have an awesome media store there with a little bit of everything, and they were also one of the only stores I came across local to me that were willing to take my extra import Saturn games. Eventually I want to get a Neo-Geo CD and they actually had a few games, I should've picked up Crossed Swords there while I had the chance, but such is life. With that being said here are the games I was able to find local to me!

ESWAT is an early action platformer similar to your Rolling Thunders and Splatterhouses, where you aren't so much focused on the platforming but more the action side of things. Trying it out I had some issues in level 2 trying to figure out what to do, but after about 10 minutes or so I was able to progress. Other than that, its a solid, challenging experience that isn't very expensive either which is nice. These types of games are the reason I bought a Genesis so I'm happy I could expand more on my collection.

Yet another Genesis game we have Forgotten Worlds, a horizontal shooter by Capcom. Horizontal shooters for me always have had more personality than vertical ones, and Forgotten Worlds is no exception. In the game you can control the direction you shoot with a decently intuitive control scheme, where A and C rotate you and B shoots. I feel like the music leaves a little to be desired, and the game isn't exceedingly hard especially during the first few stages once you learn the controls and the stages. Another nice addition to the collection and one that feels feasible to beat in a short amount of time. 

I'm gonna be honest, I didn't even know this game existed. Pinballs games are something I wish were still being pushed out on occasion. Growing up I played some Pokemon Pinball as well as Fantastic Pinball on Saturn more recently, and I think video pinball gives experiences that you can't get from normal pinball games. The table in Pinball of the Dead is pretty neat and I'll definitely play more of it. Now I just have to get the Ruby and Sapphire Pokemon Pinball as well as Sonic Pinball Party both on GBA.

I've been playing my Vita a lot more recently, and so I was on the look out while at the arcade for some Vita games. This one was a recommendation from a friend that works at the arcade, made by the same people that worked on Odin Sphere and Dragons Crown which I was all about. My friend had some pretty high praise for the game so I may check it out sooner rather than later, but we will see. 

This was the other Vita game I was able to pick up while at the arcade, complete as well! I know Teraway was one of the few games that really took advantage of all of the Vita's features which some people may not be about, but as someone who grew up with a DS and Wii, gimmick controls are something I'm more accepting of. I wasn't a huge fan of LittleBigPlanet when I played it, but I have more faith in a 3D platformer I feel. Outside of Persona 4 Golden this was one of the Vita games I knew I wanted from the point of initially getting the system, so I'm happy I was able to find this one.

Expanding the Vita collection once more with a visual novel mystery game from part of the same series as 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors. Visual novels are a genre that I'm wanting to get more into as of recent, and from what I've heard this series is a good one. Another game I'll be on the lookout for will be the Nonary Games which is another entry in the same series. It might be a while before I actually do end up playing this one, but I'm happy I was able to find the game for cheap!

If you've read my recent magazine spotlight you may recognize this one. Let's Tap was one of the first creative endeavors after Yuji Naka left Sega and formed his own company named Prope. I remember reading about this game back in the day with the fascination of being able to play the game without actually having to hold the controller. I don't know if I have a suitable surface for the Wii remote to sit on, but I'm sure I'll be able to find a suitable substitute. I was looking a little more into it and in Europe the game actually came with a foldable box along with the manual for you to rest your Wii remote on. 

I recently got to experience the Mister in all its glory as something to play my retro games on, and Kickle Cubicle was one of the games that we played while testing some things out. A fun little puzzle game that actually reminds me quite a bit of the arcade game Pengo by SEGA. Basically you push blocks around a top down stage to try and kill enemies and complete the stage. A fun little game which I found at a local shop, the same as Xexyz. I don't know much about Xexyz but I liked the name of it and it's by hudson who makes a lot of games on NES that I enjoy, so I figure that I give this one a shot as well. For me, games like these are a main reason why I love collecting for the NES, with a lot of games that I've never even heard of turning out to be someof my favorite games on the platform. Kabuki Quantum Fighter is a great example of a game that unless you collect or know about it, you'lll likely never play. But, I'm getting ahead of myself as this is a post for another time.

Another game I enjoyed on the Mister was Devil Dice on PS1.  How I had never heard of this game prior to this point is beyond me, but this one was right up my alley. Devil Dice is a two-player competitive multiplayer puzzle game where you play as a lil' devil climbing on top of dice and trying to match the faces up to eliminate them from the board. It really is unlike any other game I've experienced and was a ton of fun. They also mad e some further sequels on PS2 named Bombastic which may be a bit easier to find in the wild. Still, give this one a shot if you ever get the opportunity!

Project X Zone to me makes complete sense and I don't know why I didn't have this game sooner. From what I understand its a crossover between Sega, Namco and Capcom all wrapped up into a tactical RPG experience . I read and watched some reviews on this game before buying the special edition that I found, and some people were complaining about the story, but the story isn't the main reason I would play this game. For me, its all going to be about the fanservice and which characters I recognize and can build my team around. There was a 2nd one of these actually made as well (how the hell that happened I'll never know) but its a little more expensive than this game, so I'll have to see how this one turns out

Lastly, these two were a complete surprise to me as I hadn't even known of their existence until I saw them. The Magnavox odyssey 2 is a console I don't often collect for just because its not something I have hooked up very frequently. From time to time I do come across some Odyssey 2 games in the wild, but I was very surprised to see these two. Let's start with the Great Wall Street Fortune Hunt. Unfortunately I found out I was missing a few pieces including the manual and some smaller pieces involved in the higher levels of difficulty offered, but even without you'll still be able to play the game. Its a one or two player game where you're able to trade stocks on the open market. As long as you buy low and sell high you should turn out just fine. As far as the 2nd game, The Quest For The Rings looks to be similar to a DND adventure. I don't know too much about this one so I'm excited to learn more as I play because I have all the pieces for this one. 

That's all for my recent pickups! I got some big games I'm looking forward to in the month of August like Sea of Stars and Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, but those won't come out physically until much later I'm sure. I know this article is coming out a bit later than when I started writing it, but I wasn't stressing myself out getting a post out. If you read all the way through let me know if there are any other games I should keep my eye out for! Thanks again and I hope you have a great rest of your day!

Magazine Spotlight: Nintendo Power May 2009

 Magazine Spotlight!

Welcome to another magazine spotlight, where I take a look at gaming publications and give some shout outs to articles and games during times when they were most relevant. This time we have another Nintendo Power issue to look at, this time from a few years earlier when I was first subscribed to the magazine. This was a special time for me, I was just starting to get old enough to figure out what kind of games I liked and this was my main way of learning what new games were coming out. Now that being said, I wasn't reading the magazines to their fullest extent until some time later, I mainly just liked looking at the pictures and some of the review scores on games I was looking forward to. However, this was a good way to introduce me to franchises I had never had much experience with and this issue is a prime example with some of the main cover titles being Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and Klonoa. With that being said, lets take a brief look at some of the games and articles

One of the parts that I did read when I was a kid was the Pulse, because I enjoyed reading peoples' letters and some of the funny stories they wrote in, like after Sonic Unleashed asking the question why everyone was turning into a werewolf, also including Link from Twilight Princess. What I want to focus on today is Nintendo Power asking the question of "What's the coolest thing that Nintendo could reveal at E3?". It's neat to see what peoples' ideas were in 2009 and how some of them evolved into games that we would see later and some that would just remain as ideas. For example, someone had thought of the idea for Miitopia waaaay before Nintendo had even thought about that. "One thing I'd like to see at E3 is an RPG starring Miis! Imagine this: the game starts and it tells you to pick the characters that you want to use. So, if there's a box labeled Bad Guy, you'd click on it and then pick the Mii character that you'd want to be the bad guy...When the game starts you see all of the Mii characters that you love." I liked the idea for Miitopia when it was initially announced, I thought along the lines of Find Mii from Streetpass but much more expanded upon, but this guy had the idea about 8 years before the game even came out in the states! 

Prior to this issue, the Download section was solely focused around the Wii Channels and games from the Wii Shop. Starting with this issue they add DsiWare into the mix as well with a preview on Mighty Flip Champs by Wayforward. It was games like Shantae and Mighty Flip Champs that got me interested in Wayforward as a company in the first place and it's awesome to see how far they've come working on the recent Advance Wars 1+2 Reboot Camp. Mighty Flip Champs is a cute puzzle platformer that was one of the must-haves from the Dsi Shop that involved flipping the top screen down to the bottom screen in order to traverse and reach the end of the level. 

On the next page they also have a preview on another game that was very influential on me, Cave Story. Easily one of my top ten favorite games of all time. Here they're previewing the WiiWare version of the game with some characters, weapons, locales etc. with some cute descriptions on them. Cave Story is a metroidvania with some awesome gameplay, some darker story moments, multiple endings that's tightly paced. If you haven't played Cave Story, give it a shot as it's still available on all modern platforms and the original version is free. 

Lastly, in their evaluation station they review a few standout titles along with the first few Commodore 64 titles that were just placed on the Wii Shop. Here we have a handful of shmups in Gradius Rebirth and Life Force, along with Ogre Battle: Macrh of the Black Queen all getting recommended from the NP staff. Their best reviewed C64 game to this point was the Last Ninja which only got a Hmmm... rating from them. They also have poll on which games Nintendo fans wanted the most on virtual console. The readers' choices include some heavy hitters that eventually would be released like Majora's Mask and Smash 64 as well as some games that they would have to wait for the Wii U's virtual console to release like Earthbound and Mother 1. The NP staff have some killer games on their list like Castlevania Rondo of Blood on TG16 and Terranigma! Looking back these guys really were perfect for editing and writing this magazine. 

The cover game on this issue is Silent Hill Shattered Memories, back when Silent Hill was still a relevant franchise. This was somewhat of a weird release at least to me, people tend to look at the Wii as a casual game console, and for the most part it is. So seeing one of the all-time great horror franchises in Silent Hill show up on here was a bit weird at least to me when I first was looking at the magazine. I personally haven't played the game yet, but now its something that I'm looking out for. The article goes in depth with screenshots and descriptions from the first bit of gameplay that you could experience, all standard stuff. They also have several interviews with game staff such as Akira Yamaoka who created the music and sound design for the game, as well as lead designer Sam Barlow, producer Tomm Hulett and game director Mark Simmons which is all awesome stuff to see as well. Going back to how much Nintendo Power loves games and franchises with some history, they have blerb on "a History of Violence" going over each game in the Silent Hill franchise up to this point. I always thought the cover for Silent Hill 4 was crazy looking and a crazy concept, where you wake up one day and the door leading out of your apartment or house is chained shut. I am excited to see what the new Silent Hill 2 remake looks like in the future as well, hopefully it doesn't get canceled.

This game is a perfect example of something that you could only get coverage on in Nintendo Power. Let's Tap is a game developed by Prope, Yuji Naka's company after he left Sega, and this was his first game from the company. The game itself is a minigame collection where the concept is you can play every single game without actually touching the controller. You actually rest the Wii controller down on a flat surface, and as the name implies, tap on the surface to control the minigames. Interesting concept and something you could only find on Nintendo Wii. One thing to note here is that in the promotional art along with the pictures associated in the interview with Yuji Naka a few pages later, the Wii remotes they're using are placed on branded Let's Tap boxes that were released in EU and Japan but not in the USA. Speaking of that interview, Yuji Naka talks about the games development and how he got the initial idea, along with his creation of Prope as a company to create new games. He mentions the size he wants his company to be in terms of employees to be around 50 people, and speaks from experience saying "When I was the head of Sonic Team, we had about 140 employees, and I just wasn't able to talk with each of the developers individually. I don't think that's a good thing". Rereading this article has me on the lookout for a clean copy of Let's Tap that's for sure!

This month has some reviews on some great games, some of which had growing up and were favorites of mine and some that may become future favorites. Starting off with the feature interview of this issue is Rhythm Heaven on DS. They give the game a 9.0 and I couldn't agree more with them. The minigame collection has awesome tunes, a ton of charm in its artstyle and super easy to pick up and play make it one of my favorite games of all time and right up there with Elite Beat Agents for DS games, which the magazine also points out. Other featured reviews this month include Excitebots: Trick Racing, Klonoa, Pokémon Platinum and Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars all which scored very well.

 Looking a bit deeper into Pokemon Platinum's 9.0 rating, they mention the updated story and the main hook of the game being the Pokemon you can encounter. They also mention "Platinum's tastiest novelties are reserved for its community features" and dive deeper into the Nintendo Wi-Fi plaza and BattleTower. I would've loved to experience more of the global functionality and Wii communication that the game offered, but I was just too young at this point and I didn't play Platinum until a bit later. Lastly, they give some average reviews to games like The Dark Spire and Dokapon Journey which I appreciated at the time. Review sites now tend to only look at games that will review well or are hyped up, but Nintendo Power looked at a little bit of everything released for Nintendo consoles at the time and weren't afraid to give their opinion. 

This was a pretty standard issue to take a look at, and the magazine doesn't really change a lot in between the issue I did from 2012 previously, but it doesn't need to. Nintendo Power focuses on showing anything and everything Nintendo-related and that is exactly what they do best. I'm happy I was a fan during this era of the magazine because it was such an exciting time where Nintendo was releasing plenty of quality titles and they had great 3rd party support as well. The next magazine spotlight I'm planning on doing will be to a competitor's magazine around this same era that I think will be interesting to compare to.

Thank you for reading!