Well, *normally* the week of that darkest of days, Black Friday, has a bit of a thin lineup of new games, as stores lower their prices on existing stock in order to appease the grim spirits that make their place in American homes on Thanksgiving and bring back the sun. But this year... this year there's a boatload of stuff so I can't just take a day off and sit on my butt and play video games and watch cartoons all day. Friggin' travesty, I call it.
So we're going to kick off with something that snuck in last week, and it's something that feels like it should be tailor made for me, but.... I'unno. GI Joe The Wrath of Cobra. It's a brand new GI Joe game, and you KNOW I love me some GI Joe. And it's more specifically based on the Sunbow cartoon, and you *know* I love me that in particular. And it's a beat-em-up, and DAG NABBIT, that's among my favorite genres of video style entertainment game.
And yet... why is GI Joe getting a brawler? Moreover, a brawler where most of the "Guys Who Punch Stuff Instead of Shoot Stuff" are absent? All you have to do for a perfect GI Joe game is take Metal Gear and have someone add "Eyes" to whenever Snakes name gets mentioned! Or just play XCom and pretend the aliens are from Cobra-La.
Anyway, break Cobra Commanders entire skeleton with two knuckles worth of Apple Pie.
Speaking of revivals of things I love-loved-loved since I was naught but a tiny child, and which also constitutes half the threads title, we have Snow Bros Wonderland! Snow Bros, of course, was the chilly-themed Bubble Bobble knock-off that Tiny Octo rented all the dang time from the video store. And now it's back for a NEW GENERATION! And that means polygons and a camera fixed at a weird angle where it's really hard to tell where anything is! But also, four player co-op!
The eShop description mentioned how weird it was that it took this long for there to be a third Snow Bros game, and I'd agree, but I also didn't know there was a second one until just now, so everyone is learning something new today!
Travel to scenic "Somewhere with snow" and then murder everything that lives there with controlled avalanches.
Speaking of things I have familiarized affection for, but guarded optimism regarding, next up is Riviera: The Promised Land, which I would normally describe as being "gussied up", as one would hope that would be the case when moving to modern hardware from the GBA, but... I can not say that is quantifiably true in this case; every screen in the eShop has had a heap of sprite smoothing and smearing that makes it look... just... just absolutely hideous and there's no mention of it being optional. I sure as heck hope so because I love me some Riviera. As per usual for most of STINGs games it's really hard to describe simply, but it's a dungeon crawly RPG that kiiiiiiinda works more like a TWINE style text adventure and with a lot of resource management.
Travel to scenic "A place that's about to get blowed up" because your boss wants you to blow it up and then decide "Well... maybe we solve the problems instead of explode everyone?" and then date any one of several romantically available women because this is also one of those kinds of RPGs.
Far less reserved opinions and guarded optimism about Nine Sols, as it's on my list of "Oh Boy Oh Boy, Can't Wait" games that Santa Law prevents me from enjoying even though I downloaded it as soona s I started writing this thread. This here is a Troid-em-up where you're a l'il fox guy in Future Samurai Times. Bit more Samurai Pizza Cats by way of Usagi Yojimbo with a big ol' spoonfull of Hollow Knight for flavour. And that there is a tasty gumbo.
Visit scenic "Technopunk Feudal Asian Critter-Guy Fantasy World" and decide to bring down, say, between 8 and 10 local deities.
Heck, let's keep going with things I'm predisposed to liking with Dungeons of Dreadrock: The Dead Kings Secret! I played the first game and deemed it "An unexpectedly grand ol' time!" You may look at it and immediately determine it's a Zeld-em-up. And you'd have been made an UTTER FOOL for thinking that since it's actually a Lolo! But a way more involved, Lolo! Like a fancy point and clicky adventure game combined with brick-shoving and monster dodging. This is a direct story sequel as the middle part of what is apparently planned as a trilogy, so... I guess play the first one first. But luckily, the first one goes on deep discount a LOT and that came out a couple of years ago so you've got plenty of time before that FOMO sets in.
Travel to scenic "A monster infested puzzle hole" and try to find where the rest of your family went. Presumably "Nowhere great" since there's a dead king with a secret involved and that's not, like... super inviting
Speaking of fantasy lands where the local governing body is probably doesn't have your best interests at heart, we have Crown Wars: The Black Prince, which appears to be XCOM, but with Evil Kings instead of Evil Aliens. And set back in Wizard Times.
One guys got a bear! You don't want to mess with a guy who brings a bear to a wizard fight!
Speaking of wizards, and the truly outrageous level of destruction they leave in their wake; do you know what helps them do that? Their wands. And what if you could use the power of a magic wand all to yourself. Why, making that happen would be a real impressive project, a WAND Project that is! This here is a Bullet Heaven game (which I beleive means "Vampire Survivors knockoff) that does a few things that make me go "Oh... hmm...". Specifically it has some deckbuilding mechanics for how it handles dolling out upgrades and apparently a Magicka-style magic combo thing for mushing powers together.
Though I guess that is KIDN OF how VS works anyway, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. You're a Magical Girl, you've got a trigger finger that won't stop itching and you've got a MILLION BILLION space bugs to turn into craters.
And now for the Old Game Rereleases! And we're kicking off with, what else, but The Epyx Games Sports Collection, a collection of no fewer than 8 of Epyx' sports-em-up PC minigame compilations from the '80s! Most of which are VERY CAREFUL to avoid mentioning what kind of semi-biannual international sports events they may be trying to replicate. All in all, we've got Summer Games, Summer Games 2, Winter Games, World Games, Championship Wrestling, California Games, The Games Winter Edition and The Games, Summer Edition.
It looks like a pretty high budget retro compilation, and the Epyx games were pretty much the best in the biz as far as PC sports games of the mid 80s were concerned. And it's got Log Rolling in at least one of the games!
Speaking of PC ports of largely forgotten games, it's time for another Egg Console release: The Scheme. This one looks like a Metroid! And it came out on the PC88. I can't say how well it works with the general total lack of localization that Egg Console opte to stick with, but I know it's a treat for the ears since it's Yuzo Koshiros first official work as a composer!
And finally, the NSO updated twice! What better way to honor Donkey Kongs 30th anniversary than with the Gameboy releases of Donkey Kong Land and Donkey Kong Land 2. The attempt to replicate DKCs visuals on a Gameboy is... well... it doesn't really work great, but it's impressive as hell that it works as well as it does. If a dog is playing the piano, you're not going to complain if it messes up the song. The first game was largely original content, but the sequel is a remix of DKC2 and while that seems redundant since, if you can play DKL2 you already have access to Country 2, but you're forgetting something important;
Donkey Kong Land 2 is a game I had as a child and I loved it.
That means it's above reproach.
Okay, that's everything I know about. Go to bed.
So we're going to kick off with something that snuck in last week, and it's something that feels like it should be tailor made for me, but.... I'unno. GI Joe The Wrath of Cobra. It's a brand new GI Joe game, and you KNOW I love me some GI Joe. And it's more specifically based on the Sunbow cartoon, and you *know* I love me that in particular. And it's a beat-em-up, and DAG NABBIT, that's among my favorite genres of video style entertainment game.
And yet... why is GI Joe getting a brawler? Moreover, a brawler where most of the "Guys Who Punch Stuff Instead of Shoot Stuff" are absent? All you have to do for a perfect GI Joe game is take Metal Gear and have someone add "Eyes" to whenever Snakes name gets mentioned! Or just play XCom and pretend the aliens are from Cobra-La.
Anyway, break Cobra Commanders entire skeleton with two knuckles worth of Apple Pie.
Speaking of revivals of things I love-loved-loved since I was naught but a tiny child, and which also constitutes half the threads title, we have Snow Bros Wonderland! Snow Bros, of course, was the chilly-themed Bubble Bobble knock-off that Tiny Octo rented all the dang time from the video store. And now it's back for a NEW GENERATION! And that means polygons and a camera fixed at a weird angle where it's really hard to tell where anything is! But also, four player co-op!
The eShop description mentioned how weird it was that it took this long for there to be a third Snow Bros game, and I'd agree, but I also didn't know there was a second one until just now, so everyone is learning something new today!
Travel to scenic "Somewhere with snow" and then murder everything that lives there with controlled avalanches.
Speaking of things I have familiarized affection for, but guarded optimism regarding, next up is Riviera: The Promised Land, which I would normally describe as being "gussied up", as one would hope that would be the case when moving to modern hardware from the GBA, but... I can not say that is quantifiably true in this case; every screen in the eShop has had a heap of sprite smoothing and smearing that makes it look... just... just absolutely hideous and there's no mention of it being optional. I sure as heck hope so because I love me some Riviera. As per usual for most of STINGs games it's really hard to describe simply, but it's a dungeon crawly RPG that kiiiiiiinda works more like a TWINE style text adventure and with a lot of resource management.
Travel to scenic "A place that's about to get blowed up" because your boss wants you to blow it up and then decide "Well... maybe we solve the problems instead of explode everyone?" and then date any one of several romantically available women because this is also one of those kinds of RPGs.
Far less reserved opinions and guarded optimism about Nine Sols, as it's on my list of "Oh Boy Oh Boy, Can't Wait" games that Santa Law prevents me from enjoying even though I downloaded it as soona s I started writing this thread. This here is a Troid-em-up where you're a l'il fox guy in Future Samurai Times. Bit more Samurai Pizza Cats by way of Usagi Yojimbo with a big ol' spoonfull of Hollow Knight for flavour. And that there is a tasty gumbo.
Visit scenic "Technopunk Feudal Asian Critter-Guy Fantasy World" and decide to bring down, say, between 8 and 10 local deities.
Heck, let's keep going with things I'm predisposed to liking with Dungeons of Dreadrock: The Dead Kings Secret! I played the first game and deemed it "An unexpectedly grand ol' time!" You may look at it and immediately determine it's a Zeld-em-up. And you'd have been made an UTTER FOOL for thinking that since it's actually a Lolo! But a way more involved, Lolo! Like a fancy point and clicky adventure game combined with brick-shoving and monster dodging. This is a direct story sequel as the middle part of what is apparently planned as a trilogy, so... I guess play the first one first. But luckily, the first one goes on deep discount a LOT and that came out a couple of years ago so you've got plenty of time before that FOMO sets in.
Travel to scenic "A monster infested puzzle hole" and try to find where the rest of your family went. Presumably "Nowhere great" since there's a dead king with a secret involved and that's not, like... super inviting
Speaking of fantasy lands where the local governing body is probably doesn't have your best interests at heart, we have Crown Wars: The Black Prince, which appears to be XCOM, but with Evil Kings instead of Evil Aliens. And set back in Wizard Times.
One guys got a bear! You don't want to mess with a guy who brings a bear to a wizard fight!
Speaking of wizards, and the truly outrageous level of destruction they leave in their wake; do you know what helps them do that? Their wands. And what if you could use the power of a magic wand all to yourself. Why, making that happen would be a real impressive project, a WAND Project that is! This here is a Bullet Heaven game (which I beleive means "Vampire Survivors knockoff) that does a few things that make me go "Oh... hmm...". Specifically it has some deckbuilding mechanics for how it handles dolling out upgrades and apparently a Magicka-style magic combo thing for mushing powers together.
Though I guess that is KIDN OF how VS works anyway, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. You're a Magical Girl, you've got a trigger finger that won't stop itching and you've got a MILLION BILLION space bugs to turn into craters.
And now for the Old Game Rereleases! And we're kicking off with, what else, but The Epyx Games Sports Collection, a collection of no fewer than 8 of Epyx' sports-em-up PC minigame compilations from the '80s! Most of which are VERY CAREFUL to avoid mentioning what kind of semi-biannual international sports events they may be trying to replicate. All in all, we've got Summer Games, Summer Games 2, Winter Games, World Games, Championship Wrestling, California Games, The Games Winter Edition and The Games, Summer Edition.
It looks like a pretty high budget retro compilation, and the Epyx games were pretty much the best in the biz as far as PC sports games of the mid 80s were concerned. And it's got Log Rolling in at least one of the games!
Speaking of PC ports of largely forgotten games, it's time for another Egg Console release: The Scheme. This one looks like a Metroid! And it came out on the PC88. I can't say how well it works with the general total lack of localization that Egg Console opte to stick with, but I know it's a treat for the ears since it's Yuzo Koshiros first official work as a composer!
And finally, the NSO updated twice! What better way to honor Donkey Kongs 30th anniversary than with the Gameboy releases of Donkey Kong Land and Donkey Kong Land 2. The attempt to replicate DKCs visuals on a Gameboy is... well... it doesn't really work great, but it's impressive as hell that it works as well as it does. If a dog is playing the piano, you're not going to complain if it messes up the song. The first game was largely original content, but the sequel is a remix of DKC2 and while that seems redundant since, if you can play DKL2 you already have access to Country 2, but you're forgetting something important;
Donkey Kong Land 2 is a game I had as a child and I loved it.
That means it's above reproach.
Okay, that's everything I know about. Go to bed.
