What games do you enjoy, but just can't seem to get good at?

[Webhead123 | 683]

DuckTales. I like the game well enough. It's got all of that classic Capcom NES charm. But as a game that I didn't really grow up with, I've found it deceptively challenging for whatever reason. It's funny because I don't know if I've ever heard it described as difficult and from what I understand, most players can beat it in 20-30 minutes. Yet, I can only get through a couple of the stages before I just end up running out of lives and never finishing it. It doesn't seem to matter which stages I choose either. No particular stage seems all that hard...but I guess I just run out of resources before I make it to the end.

[Webhead123 | 683]

On 10/24/2022 at 1:41 PM, mbd39 said:

I've always sucked at Life Force. It's great, but I'm no good at it. My pb is level 4. Maybe one of these days.

Yeah, Life Force (and all the Gradius games) are incredibly fun...for about 10 minutes and then I just hit the wall of what I call the "Gradius loop" and just die over and over and over. I enjoy them immensely but my level of ineptitude is equally immense.

[Webhead123 | 683]

4 hours ago, G-type said:

I've always been fond of Punch-Out! but never made it past Mr. Sandman

I can reliably get to Super Macho Man...but I've never beaten him. I haven't made any kind of super serious effort to that end but I've played Punch-Out for enough decades that I can pretty confidently say I probably just suck.

[mbd39 | 2,026]

48 minutes ago, Webhead123 said:

Yeah, Life Force (and all the Gradius games) are incredibly fun...for about 10 minutes and then I just hit the wall of what I call the "Gradius loop" and just die over and over and over. I enjoy them immensely but my level of ineptitude is equally immense.

The good news is that I can beat Life Force now. I've even no-deathed it.

 

 

 

[CMR | 521]

3 hours ago, Webhead123 said:

Yeah, Life Force (and all the Gradius games) are incredibly fun...for about 10 minutes and then I just hit the wall of what I call the "Gradius loop" and just die over and over and over. I enjoy them immensely but my level of ineptitude is equally immense.

I prefer Salamander's power up system a lot more.

[Tulpa | 3,524]

4 hours ago, Webhead123 said:

Yeah, Life Force (and all the Gradius games) are incredibly fun...for about 10 minutes and then I just hit the wall of what I call the "Gradius loop" and just die over and over and over. I enjoy them immensely but my level of ineptitude is equally immense.

The key to that series is to upgrade the ship quickly with a powerup path that you're comfortable with. In Life Force, I usually get both options first, to maximize firepower, then missiles, force field, and speed last, as the Vic Viper isn't too sluggish. Lasers, I usually wait until level 2.

Gradius and Gradius II, speed first (at least two levels), then I think options, with the other stuff falling in depending on what's going on. Parodius Da is similar.

Then it's just knowing the quirks of the games. Konami was horrible at dealing with slowdown, but with Life Force and Gradius II, there's spots you can use that to your advantage (asteroid field in Life Force, crystal level in Gradius II.) The OG Gradius and Parodius on NES/Fami hardware the slowdown is more annoying.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

For me, it was always Colonization.  My brother bought the game, couldn't really figure out how to get through it, pitched it aside.  I picked it up, rand into the same issues, but kept banging my head against it for a lot longer.  It's maddening to see people raving about it online and talking about "beating" it, and yet I always seem to get conquered/quelled no matter what course of action I take.  We bought the game and only ever played with a legitimate copy, so it just can't be some sort of BS copy protection kicking in, and yet even when I cheat, the enemy's single weakest unit will destroy literally every fortified military unit in any one of my towns in one hit, then move in and capture it.  I'd just love to know how a single regular militia unit kills/destroys 30 veteran militia units plus 30 cannons, and somehow the game isn't cheating.  I finally gave up on it a few years ago and decided it was one of those things that wasn't meant to be. 

[YOURTURN | 1,256]

Pretty much every Squaresoft RPG I got my hands on for the SNES. Games like the Persona series overwhelm me with the "dating" system, but these games have me wonder if there is a combination of things I am not doing correctly. 

[Brickman | 4,000]

23 minutes ago, FenrirZero said:

Pretty much every Squaresoft RPG I got my hands on for the SNES. Games like the Persona series overwhelm me with the "dating" system, but these games have me wonder if there is a combination of things I am not doing correctly. 

The social links are optional in Persona. They make you do them but if you mess them up there’s no real penalty for not getting them or maxing them out. If you do max them out you are rewarded for it.

I recommend using a social link walkthrough for your first play through so you can get a handle on what they’re all about. 

Persona is a great series so hopefully you can give it another go.

[Tanooki | 4,942]

13 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

For me, it was always Colonization.  My brother bought the game, couldn't really figure out how to get through it, pitched it aside.  I picked it up, rand into the same issues, but kept banging my head against it for a lot longer.  It's maddening to see people raving about it online and talking about "beating" it, and yet I always seem to get conquered/quelled no matter what course of action I take.  We bought the game and only ever played with a legitimate copy, so it just can't be some sort of BS copy protection kicking in, and yet even when I cheat, the enemy's single weakest unit will destroy literally every fortified military unit in any one of my towns in one hit, then move in and capture it.  I'd just love to know how a single regular militia unit kills/destroys 30 veteran militia units plus 30 cannons, and somehow the game isn't cheating.  I finally gave up on it a few years ago and decided it was one of those things that wasn't meant to be. 

Same here.  I still own it, one of the few odd bigboxes I have is The Explorers Pack, it's CIV1 and COL1 both the final DOS and Win 3.X releases.  I just can not figure out even with the manual figure out how to play that game properly and survive all that long, even on easy.  It's rare I hit this, but it's a game where I genuinely hate it because it makes me feel stupid because how it works makes no sense in the slightest to me.  I keep the box because Civ1 still is my favorite.

[AirVillain | 490]

Abadox. Fucking radical concept and graphics but I suck shit at the game. I recently read about an unlimited life code in Nintendo Power that I think I will use next time I play. 

 

On 2/21/2023 at 3:47 PM, Webhead123 said:

DuckTales. I like the game well enough. It's got all of that classic Capcom NES charm. But as a game that I didn't really grow up with, I've found it deceptively challenging for whatever reason. It's funny because I don't know if I've ever heard it described as difficult and from what I understand, most players can beat it in 20-30 minutes. Yet, I can only get through a couple of the stages before I just end up running out of lives and never finishing it. It doesn't seem to matter which stages I choose either. No particular stage seems all that hard...but I guess I just run out of resources before I make it to the end.

Ducktales....eh? You can do it! Ultra classic Capcom/Disney charm!! I would say it's more difficult than Little Mermaid but not as difficult as Mega Man. About the same as Chip & Dale... 

First of all, get a good handle on the pogo cane. Secondly, start with the Amazon. There's a free life in the first minute of the level. Go down the vine, get the shit on the left, but then go right and bounce on some spikes to get the free life. I always start there and get that confidence boost, haha. 

Amazon, Mines, Transylvania, Himalayas, Moon. That's my order. 

There's also a couple levels with 2 extra lives, each. African Mines and Himalayas, I believe. You can can use Launchpad to cheat to build up lives. 

Also, find the extra power. I can't think of where it is off the top of my head... (far to the right in Transylvania, through a wall????) so that you can take more hits. There's 5 total....? I think the other is in Himalayas, where you break a little cave-kid out of ice. But then I'm thinking there's one in a giant chest in the Mines.... so maybe there's 3 possible to get, total. 

You got this. 

[DarkTone | 987]

Metal slug. Love the series but I die way too often. 

[Kguillemette | 1,546]

Street Fighter 2. There's no logical reason why I struggle with it so much as I'm generally pretty good at fighting games, I just can't seem to get past the hump of average at best no matter what character I use.

[koifish | 556]

There are a lot of multiplayer games that I like but that I don't play, simply because they demand too much time to really get good, and I'm too competitive to be happy with not winning often at them

[Estil | 1,265]

I would like very much to get at least decent at the Castlevania/Ninja Gaiden games...but I guess it's my own fault for not putting in the practice necessary.