What Are You Playing (Summer 2013)?

Digging into my recent Japanese Saturn games.

Virtua Fighter: Holy shit is this port a pile. I could forgive the graphics seeing as how it was revolutionary at the time, but this port has framerate issues and all sorts of graphical problems. It's still kinda fun, so...

Virtua Fighter Remix: This is more like it. The art direction seems off compared to the later games, but it looks and plays pretty good.

Virtua Fighter 2: This game still plays smooth as silk, but also reminds me that I have forgotten how to really play VF. I still remember the moves, but I'm getting my ass kicked by the computer on Normal. Also, fuck this game using half of the available save memory.

I'm beginning to dig these slow release summers where I can go all retro most of the time:

Gradius (FC) - I'm stubbornly beating my head against this wall. I have now seen level 4, but the key remains getting through level three without losing most of my lives. One of these days, I need to throw in the Deluxe Pack to see how the difficulty compares to the arcade version. It's been fascinating to read up on all of the various ports of Konami's shooters, because lots of them have exclusive levels, including this one.

Salamander (FC) - This one was probably my absolute favorite as a kid, so the only reason I jumped a bit ahead was to make sure I wasn't nuts about Gradius' difficulty -- I wasn't. Salamander is an easier but more interesting game. I'll come back to this once I banish its predecessor.

Arumana no Kiseki (FDS) - Though it's not as good as "8-bit era Konami does The Temple of Doom" should be, this one is still worth checking out. I had no idea it existed until maybe two years ago. Other than the potential licensing issue, I don't know why this wouldn't have been released here.

My overarching plan with the vintage (and not retro) stuff is to continue to go year-by-year through the FC/FDS stuff, then the SFC stuff, then the PS1 and PS2. I don't feel the need to go back to Genesis and PCE yet, as I've gone through a much larger chunk of their libraries than the SFC's and more recently than the FC's. The PlayStation stuff I am pretty much only going to play 2D stuff, so those should be pretty quick at the end.

I want Salamander so bad. I had ordered it a while back but my credit card company was being stupid about ordering something from Japan and wouldn't process payment.

More Saturn:

Daytona USA: There is little need to play this thanks to the XBLA/PSN ports, but it's still fun and has slightly better music. I couldn't tell the difference between the Japanese and US versions but the speed being in KPH was throwing me off so I'll stick to the US version.

Daytona USA Circuit Edition: I used to play this on PC a lot back in the day but the US Saturn version had terrible controls, and I heard the Japanese version fixed them. Well, the controls are still terrible with either the UFO or the regular pads. Profound sadness. I'll give it another try when I dig out the steering wheel.

Street Fighter Zero: just as I remember it, except in moon language. Has a weird bug where it cuts the music that is supposed to play in between loads.

It was fun playing alternate versions of games I was already familiar with, but it's time to tear into games I've never had before.

There was definitely a difference between the US and Japanese CCE. Wasn't it that the Japanese version supported the analog controller?

The Japanese version does support it, but it's way too sensitive. I'm pretty good at Daytona and I was bouncing off the walls the whole time.

I'm still hooked on Animal Crossing. Most played game of the summer so far. Just got shampoodled!

Also playing War of the Roses from the last Steam sale. Game plays surprisingly well with a 360 controller. Its a fun game that I don't get too upset if I don't win lol. Kinda like TF2. Its just fun to be in that space. Its a new setting for me in FPS(or 3PS). I encourage PC-TNL to play it. Its awesome!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by GohanX

The Japanese version does support it, but it's way too sensitive. I'm pretty good at Daytona and I was bouncing off the walls the whole time.

---

Now that you mention it, I remember that too. I'm so glad the PS3 version finally exists and put all these compromises to bed.

Just started hitman absolution since it was only $10 the other day on Live. Seems like a lot of fun from the bit I played.

Still playing Last of Us. Just got to the University. If it wasn't for the story I would have quit by now.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by A Robot Bit Me

[Fire Emblem] games are so much more fun if you can put a lid on your OCD and just play the game, gaining, losing, and perma-missing all over the place.

---

Yeah. Yeah, this is easy to say until a few of your better characters are lost to surprise reinforcements. I'd conjure Mr. Resetti if it hadn't happened at the end of a 1.5-hour-long campaign.

Batman: Arhkham Asylum

I don't care for comic book heroes much, but I'd heard this was good, and Batman is much less fruity than most of the alternatives. $5 for PS+.

It's kind of a cross between Metal Gear Solid, Tomb Raider, Metroidvania, some generic beat 'em up, and the wonderful old 3D collectathon games of a bygone (and much better) era. The Riddler squirreled a bunch of question marks and puzzles (which boil down to: scan the thing I'm hinting about) around these big environments, and it's quite fun to go a huntin'. "Oooh, I can see that one behind the security field; gotta remember to come back when I can disable those."

I could do without Joker's absolutely unending announcements over the loud speakers. Can't believe a developer hasn't yet seen fit to include a uniqueness check for dialogue. Hell, I'll take a 3-time repeat limit at this point. But no, they will the say the same things over and over and over and over with no regard for the player's sanity, or sense of immersion for that matter.