Paid Members Jazzy G Posted December 31, 2024 Paid Members Posted December 31, 2024 According to the article it was originally intended to be released on Dreamcast. I wonder whether it would have helped shift a few more units if it'd been released on it. Quote
Paid Members Onyx2 Posted January 2, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 2, 2025 For the first time I've played (and completed) the first 4 Castlevania titles. Thoughts you never asked for: I: holds up pretty well. Good soundtrack, good level variety and satisfying bosses. Trying to go up and down stairs is kind of maddening though. The boss Death is absolutely joypad crushing, the original O&S. II: oh let's make a pseudo RPG with no map, levelling structure or clues how anything works! On second thoughts, let's include clues but translate them wrong from Japanese! Literally unplayable without a guide, but enjoyable when you do so. Actually not that difficult. III: oops II was a fuck up wasn't it? So let's just make I again. It's The Force Awakens to I's A New Hope. IV: many times easier than the previous outings, the SNES edition has possibly the best soundtrack of any game ever. Seriously amazing. Graphics are gorgeous, fun use of mode7 and just an enjoyable romp. And finally throwing a subweapon is on another button. They were all good fun and glad I played them all. I'm working my way through the NES classics I missed first time around. Metroid next. Quote
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted January 2, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 2, 2025 I'm contemplating picking up a Powkiddy A13 to scratch my arcade cabinet itch. It's only a 10" screen, but it folds out and there's a tiny joystick. Looks like it could be a decent little machine. Quote
Paid Members FLips Posted January 2, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 2, 2025 14 minutes ago, Onyx2 said: For the first time I've played (and completed) the first 4 Castlevania titles. Thoughts you never asked for: I: holds up pretty well. Good soundtrack, good level variety and satisfying bosses. Trying to go up and down stairs is kind of maddening though. The boss Death is absolutely joypad crushing, the original O&S. II: oh let's make a pseudo RPG with no map, levelling structure or clues how anything works! On second thoughts, let's include clues but translate them wrong from Japanese! Literally unplayable without a guide, but enjoyable when you do so. Actually not that difficult. III: oops II was a fuck up wasn't it? So let's just make I again. It's The Force Awakens to I's A New Hope. IV: many times easier than the previous outings, the SNES edition has possibly the best soundtrack of any game ever. Seriously amazing. Graphics are gorgeous, fun use of mode7 and just an enjoyable romp. And finally throwing a subweapon is on another button. They were all good fun and glad I played them all. I'm working my way through the NES classics I missed first time around. Metroid next. Glad you enjoyed them, me and Mrs Flips got really into them last year, especially 1 and 3. The trick with 1 is to get through the Death stage without dying (easier than it sounds) and keep hold of the holy water. If you can reach Death with it you can melt him before he even starts attacking. There's actually a lot of fun to be had setting that challenge and managing it. I really should go back to 2. I made it a few towns in but as you said, needing a guide to get through it became a chore and I didn't have the patience. The mechanics of the game are fun though, very Zelda II. Quote
Paid Members Onyx2 Posted January 2, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 2, 2025 12 minutes ago, FLips said: The trick with 1 is to get through the Death stage without dying (easier than it sounds) and keep hold of the holy water. If you can reach Death with it you can melt him before he even starts attacking. There's actually a lot of fun to be had setting that challenge and managing it. I really should go back to 2. I made it a few towns in but as you said, needing a guide to get through it became a chore and I didn't have the patience. The mechanics of the game are fun though, very Zelda II. I heard about the Death cheese but I was savescumming and didn't want to redo the previous level! There is a fan mod about that fixes a lot of the weirdness of II, corrects the translations, speeds up the day/night transition etc so if you're thinking about it look for that. Quote
Paid Members BigJag Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 12 hours ago, Jazzy G said: I'm contemplating picking up a Powkiddy A13 to scratch my arcade cabinet itch. It's only a 10" screen, but it folds out and there's a tiny joystick. Looks like it could be a decent little machine. It does look good value for the price. There are other similar options available. They can get up over £300 though. That's once you add higher quality buttons, joystick, and other options. I have seen the Powkiddy A13 at under £100. Quote
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 It's £60ish on Aliexpress at the moment. I know it's tiny (as is the Powkiddy) but it's the design. The only other thing tempting me is that there are some of the MyArcade Street Fighter 2 bartop machines that are going for about £130 on eBay, they've got all the main Street Fighter 2 editions from World Warrior through to Super Turbo. Although I'd probably mostly be playing them alone and the AI in Super Turbo is ridiculous. Quote
Paid Members Chris B Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 Worth looking at the Pandora consoles on AliExpress? Quote
Paid Members Scratch Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 (edited) My wife knows me well. She bought me the new Bitmap Books edition - The Unofficial GBA Pixel Book and as with all of their stuff, it’s incredible. Even my wife was taken back by how nicely made and packaged it was when it arrived. I’ve also got the King of Fighters one (which is masssive) and the Neo Geo one. I’m tempted to get Go Straight which is all about scrolling beat em ups. Edited January 3, 2025 by Scratch Quote
Paid Members Arch Stanton Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 Their books are gorgeous and the packaging is the best I've seen for anything I've ever had delivered! I've got the N64 and Point & Click ones. Quote
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 I got the one about beat em ups. There's one about King Of Fighters that looks interesting. Quote
Paid Members FLips Posted January 3, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 3, 2025 There was a Bitmap Bros one I thought looked fantastic as well. Great looking books. Finished Star Wars Dark Forces which was a fun, if a little basic, DOOM style DOS FPS. A bit less focus on action and more on exploration and puzzles. Brilliant soundtrack and story too. I then moved onto the sequel Star Wars Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight which is a few years younger and more in the style of Half Life. I prefer the graphical style of the former, though the latter has some really brilliant live action cutscenes. I would suggest to anyone playing them though to get the remastered versions though because I got the originals on GOG and they're both a nightmare to play without 3rd party patches and launchers. DF1 has old school keyboard controls, movement with the arrow keys, firing with the ctrl keys and all that jazz. I'll make sacrifices to play old games more often than not but I can't ever wrap my head around those controls for old PC FPS games. The launcher fixed that and modernized it and it was fine from thereon. DF2 is a crime though, has a plethora of issues, most notably default inverted mouse aiming, so down is up and up is down. The hell is wrong with these people? A patch and a full manual remapping of all the controls sorted it enough to play, but in hindsight I should have gotten the remasters and saved the bother. Quote
Paid Members BigJag Posted January 4, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 4, 2025 15 hours ago, Scratch said: I’ve also got the King of Fighters one (which is masssive) and the Neo Geo one. I’m tempted to get Go Straight which is all about scrolling beat em ups. I can definitely recommend the Go Straight book. Lots of nostalgia in that one. Does the publisher still include a digital copy of the book with purchases? Quote
TildeGuy~! Posted January 4, 2025 Posted January 4, 2025 Yep I pre ordered the Go Straight book from Bitmap, one of my favourite purchases in years. Quote
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted January 4, 2025 Paid Members Posted January 4, 2025 It [Go Straight] is a cracking book. I think it allows you 4 digital downloads with each purchase? I may have to get the King Of Fighters one. Quote
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