My Phone Does Amazing Things - A Retro Games Announcement

As the title says: my phone does amazing things. Generally that boils down to getting me in trouble, refusing to send coherent texts and breaking. On the odd occasion when it works properly I get the chance to play all the old games I missed out on due to being a Sega fanboy (after the release of the megadrive they seemed to do everything first: memory cards, internet connection, colour handheld consoles, light up handhelds, CD games, you name it). Check it: the Xperia Play, one of the most missold phones to grace the market.

The Xperia Play (left) in comparison to the PSP Go (right). The Play, for unknown reasons, does NOT play PSP games. Good work, Sony, good work (Y)

Despite this shitty phone's massive drawbacks, it does allow for absolutely excellent emulator usage. Currently I have a SNES, Mega Drive and GBA emulator running on it, and all of them work a dream (I'll list the versions at the end). With no need for unscreen buttons, you can play the games as they were meant to be played without on the go with no problems. The amount of crap I've played through is reaching record amounts and I thought I should share this with you. If I'm lucky, it'll also keep my mind busy from squatting on the poor decisions I've made recently in real life. Joy for all of us, hopefully.

Basically: this coming while I will be uploading a review of any one of the many retro games I've played. From Ninja 5-0 to Mercs and back to Metroid Fusion. Some of these you will have played, others you won't have played. Hopefully this will help you work out what you SHOULD play.

Peace.

Currently running Android emulators: 

AndroGens - decent Mega Drive/Genesis emulator. Bit of an iffy menu system, and the ads suck. Sometimes it has trouble loading games. But hey. It's free

My Boy! Free - always a good choice. No problems with it at all. Easily my favourite. Offers save state if you buy it, too, which is handy. Minimises if you hit the homescreen so you can dive in and out reeeeeal easy.

SuperGNES Lite - Brilliant menu system, pictures alongside game choices which is nice. Apart from that pretty standard.

I Wanna Be The Guy: NRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH

You guys all remember playing Super Meat Boy, yes? Or how about N+ Way Of The Ninja? Any platforming game which is insanely hard? Hell, I'll accept any of the Trials games? If not, go play them so that you've at least got some understanding of how hard platforming games can get in the modern day and age. And then come and play this game: I Wanna Be The Guy: The Movie: The Game. Yes, that IS the actual name. Be scared.

Nice bit of high quality WordArt. Anyone else remember WordArt?  LIKE THIS STATUS IF YOU REMEMBER WORDART!!!!!!!

The year: 200X. The story: The Kid wants to be The Guy so sets out to become The Guy. That's it. That's all the story there is. No names, no towns, nothing. Pure retro simplicity. John Carmack once said: "Story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important" and he was pretty much talking about this kind of shit-on-your-face platforming hell game. It doesn't matter about that though, as during the intro you see a giant 8-bit gorilla climbing the side of a skyscraper, so you know it's going to be good. And then you see your character: The Kid. A tiny, Alex Kidd-esque dude with a cape (and if you pick normal mode: a bow in his hair...cheers). Cool. Awesome. Kid with cape, best start the game, probably...

Ah, yeah, no. That looks nice and easy, eh? Just make your way down, learn the controls, right? No. Death ETA: imminent. 

Now, I don't want to spoil it but: I died about 5 seconds in. Then 10 seconds in. Then 20 seconds in. Then switched the game off. Then reloaded it. Then died 10 seconds in. The switched it off again and laughed for about 3 minutes. The game is brutally difficult. Maybe even insanely difficult. The problem is that every time you die you know that there's a perfectly visible and mostly logical way through the problems, even if you can't actually make your way through it. Not going to lie, it boosts the frustration levels pretty fucking high as you can imagine. Thankfully, similar to Super Meat Boy and Trials this game relies on constant comedy to keep you coming back for more. The way that you die is more often than not pretty funny, and overcoming those obstacles is crazy rewarding. More rewarding than any of your bullshit FPS games or FIFAs. Considering how many obstacles and curve balls are on the screen at once, it's impressive when you manage to work your way through them all. This makes reaching the next screen feel like some kind of prize; you cheer, you laugh, you cry, you look at the next screen and think:

What's wrong? Don't you like having no floor, walls fully covered in spikes, walls that attack you , invisible platforms and the game developers laughing straight in your face?

As for playing the game itself, it's delightfully simple. All that's used are your arrow keys, shift, Z and R for move, jump/double jump, shoot and restart. That's it. No useless sprint button (Super Meat Boy, looking at you...), somersaults, Tanooki skins, power orbs or anything. Just a pure platforming hellfest. To be perfectly honest the amount that you die would negate any cool button things you would have anyway, but that's not the point. The movement style is easy to manage, with none of the Mario-slide going on, no jump acceleration, no harsh Castlevania knock back from damage...it's pretty much as easy to control as you can imagine. Almost the opposite of the difficulty of the game. It feels good when you nail a jump between obstacles or invert direction mid jump to avoid death and the easy control system accentuates that. It's so easy that you know outright that any mistakes you make are entirely on YOU and not the game. Man-up, restart and play better. It's your own fault you died, unless it's your first time in that area in which case you can take that as a trial run. This ease of playing applies to the entire series: I Wanna Save The Kids and I Wanna Be The Guy Gaiden. They're pretty decent, but this is the first and best, don't forget.

"What did you say about me? Nice and easy to control? Then control your fucking way through this! THIS ISN'T EVEN MY FINAL FORM!"

Now, I love when games make you try hard. It makes me feel like a kid again, back when finishing a game was something to brag about in the playground and it feels good. I still think games need to bring more of this back, and thankfully Live Arcade and PSN are giving the opportunity for players to find this feeling again (as long as you can wade through the piles of shite). I Wanna Be The Guy has got to be the king of this games by not only being stupidly hard, but also by testing your reasoning skills, your reactions, your memory, your basic game knowledge, and your goddamn stamina. It's worth downloading for free, if only for the laughs you get from the first few screens (I assume there's more but...y'know...I've not got very far...) and the pop culture references. I can guarantee that you won't be complaining about the difficulty of your shoddy CoD games or your Need For Speeds with their difficulty curves. This has a difficulty CLIFF. And you will fucking love it. If not, you can always downgrade to Super Meat Boy and just watch a speedrun of this game on YouTube.

This never gets old. Every time you die this plays. And when you've been playing for a few seconds and this busts in: genius.

Peace.

Links to download the game: http://kayin.pyoko.org/iwbtg/downloads.php Voila. Download and play, suckas!

Cliff Notes: It'll make you laugh, it'll make you cry, it'll ruin other games for you. I'm still not sure about it myself. It steps over the "Too Fucking Hard Line" and does a little dance. Hot damn.

Rating: 7/10 I loved it. But I've barely seen any of it outside YouTube vids and that makes me a bit sad. Realistically if I was better at games it would get higher...

Friend Recommend: Dude, it's free...why WOULDN'T you download it? 

KING OF DRAGONS: simplistic fun-funs

So my week of reviews (remember that thing, true believers?) ended embarrassingly quickly, like some kind of virgin's one night stand. It was my birthday so I'm going to go ahead and blame other people. Namely Sir Vodka and Miss Tequila. Best friends. <3

Anyway, thought I would just do the final review before kicking back and reviewing whatever whenever so here is KING OF DRAGONS. Enjoy.

NNNNRGH. It's like they looked up "90's nerd" and just copied and pasted the definition into art somehow.

Side scrolling beat 'em ups have been done to death, but even so there are very few that anyone can say are bad. Hell, just look at the success of Castle Crashers and you can see that there will always be a place in gaming for these games. A fairly unknown game in this genre is KING OF DRAGONS (or KoD. Fuck you, CoD, you don't own that word) which is a massive dissapointment due to it being an awesome game. It features your standard fantasy fighters (Elven archer, wizard, warrior, cleric, dwarf) in your standard fantasy settings of forests and castles fighting standard fantasy enemies like orcs, evil knights and hydras. Completely standard in every way. Except it's awesome. Like, CAPITAL LETTERS AWESOME.

I'd tell you about the story but I have no fucking idea what happens to be honest and I don't really care. You're making your way to a castle thing to save someone and kill a KING OF DRAGONS who I'm pretty sure lives in a crystal tower on a bed of gold, naturally. I'm not even sure why your character has to do this when he clearly has the means to butcher his way into power in another kingdom somewhere else and probably live peacefully with the KING OF DRAGONS in the neighbouring land.

This is like, the second or third boss. He's a piece of piss. Might as well just shake hands and ask if he needs any help, it'd be easier, more profitable and take less time. Except he doesn't have hands because he's a wyvern.

The fighting system is rather nifty. There's one button to attack. No combos. None at all. You don't need combos, combos are for wimps and losers. Each character has their own attack schemes, though, with the elf being long range but weak, the wizard being mid range and mid power, etc etc etc. As you progress you pick up and auto equip better equipment that looks snazzier and attacks cooler depending on the character type. If you want the best looking, check the wizard, he's badass. You also upgrade your offhand weapon, which in the case of the melee guys is a shield which you can use (I think. It never really comes up) and for the ranged guys it boosts attack speed (probably. Again, it doesn't matter). But fuck that. You'll soon learn that attacking while jumping is the only real way forward. There's a magic button too, possibly  but there's only really a point if you're the wizard. So ignore that, too. You won't need it.

Look! Here's the warrior again! Blocking like a champ. I think. I've never seen what blocking looks like, tbh...

The difficulty level of the game is intense but oddly manageable. I mean, I've never completed the game so...y'know... But each time you do get a little further. The enemies spawn in a recognisable pattern and learning this spawn style wins you the game. It'll have you using ability spheres like a champ and smacking down enemies quicker than they can attack. Unless you play cleric. NEVER DO THIS. He attacks with a flyswatter and it's just embarrassing to watch. Once you start to recognise attack patterns of both the enemies and the bosses you can start to power through some of the levels in a couple of minutes. The first boss is a good example: you can actually stand in-between his dual wielded chain-maces and beat him in seconds. It's amazing. Soon you can start hitting the last levels no problem and enjoy the ride. Also the quicker you do it the more points/exp you get leading to your character levelling up and being able to survive longer. In some respects this game is a weird race, even though it's an rpg beat 'em up. 

Some chests actually freeze/damage you. Serves you right, cleric, for not being a ranged guy. That puny elf down the bottom is having no problem at all. And is fully clothed (looking at you, warrior...)

There are some bad points as always. KING OF DRAGONS recycles enemies more than any other game I've played barring Dynasty Warriors. There's about 5 or 6 different enemies who just do the age old colour transformation trick as the game progresses. Even the bosses do this. Though this might be a downside, it kind of twists into a odd good side. You don't want to have to deal with new enemies all the time in a game like this. You want to learn how to move to save your ass, and the repeating enemies help this by making you finesse your attack system all the time. You can actually plan attacks the moment a colour comes on the screen, and it's reassuring to know how to handle a situation when you don't have a special move to save the day like in Streets of Rage or Golden Axe. The only irredeemable bad point is that the last boss, the KING OF DRAGONS is insanely hard. I play this game on easy, and I still haven't beaten him and his RIDICULOUS GODDAM MOVES FUCKSHITNRRRRGH. No-one should plan a game where the last boss just shits all over the preparation you have done so far. It's a sour end to an otherwise frikkin' sweet game. 

That's not a natural position for a head to be. Serious. Also, you're as big as the last boss's toe...

So yeah. I like this game, and this was less of a review and more of a praise session. But that's what I feel this game deserves. It's simplistic but in a way which demands that you pay attention. The bosses are nicely thought out and the progression through the (ridiculously) short levels is enjoyable and varied. If you've ever wanted to play an RPG and not fuck about with all the customisation and just get down to it then this game fits the bill. If you want something to do for an hour this is the thing. If you want to actually play a good game, then pick this beast up. Also, the arcade version of this game was one of the best arcade cabinet games that I played and that was in a hotel in Ibiza when I was 8.

Peace out.

Links to emulators and roms:
http://www.emulator-zone.com/doc.php/snes/ I prefer Snes9x, personally, but whatever.
http://coolrom.com/roms/snes/967/King_of_Dragons.php

Cliff Notes: A truly excellent example of how Beat 'Em Ups are one of the most fun franchises around. And how nerds rule.
Rating: 9/10. That last one was taken off from the last boss and his stupid as fuck attack scheme.
Friend Recommend: Definitely. It's free. It's fun. No-one can dislike it. Download it now.

THE BEST GAME EVER: BALDUR'S GATE/BALDUR'S GATE 2

A workmate told me to do a retro review, so I am. Yeah, it's not Sonic or Mario or some other figurehead game, but it is the best game series that Bioware ever released AND it first appeared 14 years ago. That's before the games market became focussed on prepubescent kids playing the gaming equivalent of paintball on crack, and also before consoles even had the opportunity to go on the internet (apart from the Dreamcast. God bless you Sega).

If you think of RPGs nowadays, you'll no doubt think of games where overpowering is a familiar problem. Games where content is so deep that by the time you've explored for a while the storyline quests become these rediculously easy, offhand kind of occurences. This wasn't always the case. BG was one of the original cadre of point-and-click, "fine, go level up then, I'll still bust your balls" kind of games. This is mostly due to the fact that it's a direct port of the Dungeons and Dragons rule book and is set within it's universe. I know, at this point you're probably thinking it's a nerdy as shit game that involves 20 sided dice, elves, orcs, dwarves and bullshit like that. Not going to lie, it does. And you will fucking love it. If you like RPGs, then this is like the mother, father and cousin of all of them and without it you haven't lived. Can't juggle hitting an healing? autopause after every round of attcks. Not sure if you can hit an enemy? Click on it. Where are you going? Open up the detailed, excellently rendered map. What can you equip? CHECK THIS:

Arrows go to quivers. each type of armour gets put on each type of symbol. Weapons go on weapons. 16 slots in your inventory for items at the bottom and the current weight/weight limit is over/under the bag. EASY. (note: for old gamers: I am aware that Minsc should have Boo the miniature giant space hamster in his quick items, yes.)

This game laid down so many conventions that haven't been beaten in over 14 years. I for one have never played a game with an inventory system as easy to manage as this. Fuck, you can even quick change the colour scheme of your gear by clicking the brown/black squares on the right. It's just fucking glorious. None of this "just put a dot next to the item" that leads to you going: "Wait, so can I wear a robe AND trousers? And can I wear multiple rings/necklaces?" ONE SLOT, ONE ITEM. DEAL WITH IT. Each item has a description for you to read that includes everything you need to know, for those who don't know whether to equip a halberd or a flail.

Now, there is a nerdy, maths heavy area with equipping things too. You have an armour class that lowers depending on the equipped gear/class, and it also affects other things as well, but essentially: the lower number in the banner on the mid-right of the inventory the better. And once I got it to -27. When you've played this game you'll understand why that's a big thing. 

Enough about the decididly excellent user interface and more about the actual game. The story is good, not Oscar winning, but good. With your father murdered you have to leave home to get help from your father's friends and end up saving the world. Standard affair. But the it's as deep as you want it to be thanks to it being set in the DnD universe. Hell, for those of you geeky enough to have read the Dragonlance Chronicles, you get to meet a knight of Solamnia who was accidentally teleported from another dimension. There's just the right touch of humour as well, such as a character who whenever you meet him will scream in terror and dissapear in a puff of smoke and who's identity only becomes apparent in the final expansion pack (in a cruel and hilarious twist of fate). Or Biff the Understudy (look it up). Or the Big Metal Unit (again, look it up). On top of that they pile on suspense, engaging NPCs, perfect companions, romance options, a pretty decent reputation scheme that actually allows you to benefit from staying neutral and personal moral choices that will always cause someone to be upset. 

Obviously this game isn't perfect. The first time you play it you WILL spend a large amount of it going: "what's a critical miss? I spent hours to get one level up and that was all I got? How do you fail to copy a spell to your spellbook?" but it's just one of those things that you need to plug at. In the end they become a critical factor to this games success. If you play the core rules then checking speed factor against dice rolls becomes natural and the gambling system of "will the spell be memorised correctly" is tense. You don't have the money to spare to make mistakes, unlike modern games where you could buy the country you're playing in by the end.

An important thing about this game is how it rewards the gamer who plays the entire series. Items and people you meet in the first game will crop up in the second game and even the second game's expansion pack. Of course, it's not necessary to play the first game first, but once you have you start to appreciate the game for what it is worth and understand the characters and why they join with you, and it will have you coming back to play the game in a different way each time. It's this kind of thought out approach to the games that has cause Bioware to be one of the forerunners of RPGs today, and they even use a lot of the same story mechanics and multiple-game-spanning choices as they did back here in the nineties.

So yeah, it's not for beginners and it's probably not for very casual gamers, but if you want a genuinely rewarding game where completion is an achievement and levelling up never loses it's boredom then this is for you. Just get used to tapping Q to quick save otherwise you will regret it. Especially when you go into a vampire coven and your only Cleric gets level drained. Every. God. Damn. Time.

Cliff Notes: A true RPG that isn't rushed and can't be rushed through. Requires thought, practice and effort but is far more rewarding than a lot of modern Action RPGs.
Rating: 9/10
Would I recommend it to my friends: If you're my friend, then chances are I've already told you to play it. And you should.