The 2023 Backlog Challenge

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

Prey

Bioshock in space!  I'm kidding, don't @ me.

Another Arkane winner.  Had a really good time with it, even if the combat is a bit rough early on before you have any capabilities.  Did most of the side stuff too because I'm a sucker for clearing games like this. 

But after playing this and Deathloop in the same year, I'm giving myself a year or two before I start Dishonored 2.

1. Elden Ring (10/10)
2. Hades (9.5/10)
3. Baba Is You (9/10)
4. Deathloop (9/10)
5. Doom Eternal (9/10)
6. Jamestown+ (9/10)
7. The Last of Us Part II (9/10)
8. Gradius V (8.5/10)
9. Control (8.5/10)
10. Super Mario 3D World/Bowser's Fury (with the kids) (8.5/10)
11. God of War (8.5/10)
12. MGS: The Twin Snakes (8.5/10)
13. Resident Evil 2 (8.5/10)
14. Ori & the Will of the Wisps (8.5)
15. Ghost of Tsushima (8/10)
16. Sin & Punishment (8/10)
17. Nier Automata (8/10)
18. Dusk (8/10)
19. Into the Breach (8/10)
20. Prey (8/10)
21. Nioh (8/10)
22. Danganronpa (7.5/10)
23. Deus Ex (7.5/10)
24. Hellblade (7.5/10)
25. Dark Souls II (7.5/10)
26. Ace Attorney 2 (7.5/10)
27. Trails in the Sky (7.5/10)
28. Uncharted 4 (7.5/10)
29. Eternal Darkness (7/10)
30. Xenoblade (7/10)
31. Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold (7/10)
32. Yakuza Kiwami (7/10)
33. Dicey Dungeons (7/10)
34. Resident Evil 3 (7/10)
35. Onimusha (7/10)
36. What Remains of Edith Finch (6.5/10)
37. Paper Mario (6.5/10)
38. Everblue 2 (6.5/10)
39. Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order (6.5/10)
40. Yoku's Island Express (6.5/10)
41. Dear Esther (6/10)
42. Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II (6/10)
43. Crash Bandicoot 4 (6/10)
44. Pilotwings 64 (6/10)
45. Contra Shattered Soldier (6/10)
46. Strife (6/10)
47. A Short Hike (6/10)
48. Ion Fury (6/10)
49. Mischief Makers (6/10)
50. La Pucelle (5.5/10)
51. Buck Bumble (5.5/10)
52. Indigo Prophecy (5.5/10)
53. Shadowgate (5/10)
54. Yoshi's Story (4.5/10)
55. Winback (4/10)

TBD:

1. Shenmue (crap)
2. House of Fata Morgana (good)

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

Huge Nobunaga 2 update.  I'm up to 25/38 fiefs, have cleared my northern flank, and made massive progress on the western front by threatening every single-fief opponent.  On the eastern front I have reduced the Hojo to one fief, and have a ~1000 troop army on Uesugi's doorstep.  This will likely be in the bag by the weekend...possibly even as soon as tomorrow.

[Sumez | 2,988]

Metroid - Beaten 13/12

Of all the games on my list for this year, Metroid is clearly the one I was already the most familiar with, having played it many times in the past - but I don't think I ever actually beat it legit. Maybe using savestates on an emulator 25 years ago, but if so that's been completely obliterated from my mind since.

Of course, the right way to play Metroid is to go in as blind as possible, and map out everything manually. Of Nintendo's early classics, this one is probably the most divisive, many people feeling that it's too obscure, or simply poorly designed. One particularly shitty common take is that Metroid was the rough prototype for Super Metroid. These points aren't just something I disagree with, it's something I would argue it straight up false. Like many classics trying out unique approaches for their time, Metroid is a game you must enjoy embracing it for what it does well, rather than fight it, bemoaning what it doesn't do.

One of the classic grievances is the fact that refilling your life requires time consuming mindless grinding of enemies. Though this is definitely the game's biggest weakness, but it's also something that doesn't have to be an issue!
On my first playthrough I would grind out a bit of health ever so often, but I never tried to fill it completely. The enemies that respawn from pipes in the ground are an unfortunate misdirection here, because they are a really slow way to get health back - you need to seek out the enemies that drop 20 energy rather than 5.
There are only three places in the game where you really need more than a small amount of health, which is the three boss fights, so honestly the full health refill that you do get for every E-tank you pick up is more than enough to cover all your needs for a single playthrough, even when playing blind.

Another thing that stands out to me, is that the game feels extremely restricted by technical limitations - not so much those of the NES, but its own programming - for both better and worse. Rooms are designed to be heavily reused to the point where every corridor feels like the same place, and for some reason you can never have multiple adjecent vertical rooms, which gives the world layout a very distinct feel, but also helps with navigation and figuring out where the secret passages are located.

I think there's a fun aspect to figuring out just where you are, which gets further obscured by the repeated rooms. Maintaining your map (possibly in your head, but ideally on paper) is essential for making sure you aren't missing the one path that leads to the upgrade you need. One silly thing is that hidden corridors are also repeated between identical rooms even when they don't lead anywhere - so once you have found it in one place, you know what to look for every time you find yourself at a similar one. This ultimately means that finding the game's hidden paths, which are really ubiquitous, never becomes particularly frustrating, while still making exploration a lot more involving than just walking down every corridor. When you find something important, it feels earned.

This brings us to the actual things you find - another appeal of this early "metroidvania" design is that it's yet uncompromised by decades of predictable conventions. There are very few "lock and key" items, and ultimately the only ones necessary to open your way forward are the missiles and the bombs, two of the first items you find in the game. Every item is extremely useful, however, and I think that's another massive strength of Metroid 1 - Pretty much every time you pick up a new upgrade, it massively affects how you play the game. The high jump makes forcing the terrain simpler, the screw attack gives you an incredible weapon against stronger foes (without just making you invincible like in later games), and so on. They all give you tools to improve exploration, but the fact that few of them are strictly necessary helps making them feel like rewarding treasures, rather than just the next step through the game's premeditated progression sequence.

As such, the game's world design is also completely open ended. As I already highlighted in my thoughts on Battle of Olympus and King Kong 2, this is an aspect that I treasure dearly, and while obviously common in these older games, it's just something that's rarely seen today in spite of how omnipresent new metroidvania games have become. It's very easy to take a wrong turn early in the game and find yourself in an area that feels much tougher than it should be, but once you have gotten all the most important upgrades, it's just a question of consulting your map to wipe up the remaining tasks, blow up the mother brain, and escape the planet!

And here's where one of the game's biggest qualities starts to shine! How often you you play through an exploration-heavy metroidvania game, and feel like diving right back into it immediately after clearing it? Metroid does this, and it does it extraordinarily well. After seeing the ending screen, I couldn't shake the thought that knowing where everything now, I could have cleaned out the game way more effeciently! So I went back into it, plotted out what I figured was the most effecient route through the map, and cleared it in about one and a half hour which was good enough to get the "bikini ending" on the Famicom Disk version of the game that I played.

I then tried out my US copy of the game, where the requirement has been tightened to just one hour. I was able to get to the final boss in just over an hour, which isn't good enough. Going back to reevaluate my route, I figured I didn't need much more missiles than what you get from beating the bosses, and exercising the wave beam entirely I was able to go through the game in less than 45 minutes! That's four full runs back-to-back, testifying the awesome replayability of this game.

 

I'm a massive fan of Super Metroid, and although that game is steeped in additional qualities not really contested by its predecessor, it also shares this same brilliant design which heavily rewards returning players making usage of their prior experiences to cut down on the resources they pick up, and creating a more effecient path through the game.
Metroidvanias need to stop enticing players to go for 100%, and instead rewarding them for a low percentage. Metroid recognizing the player getting through fast is the final icing on the cake, and I'd probably argue that the 1-hour limit in the western release makes it the superior version of the game, due to how it forced me to rethink my approach! The enemies generally pose a bigger challenge on the FDS release due to the RNG actually working as intended - but that difference is small enough that it doesn't matter much in an optimized run.

[BlackVega | 583]

Finally beat Darkman for NES for the 1st time. Now this has been in my mind to beat just for the sake of it for over 10 years and I finally pulled this off but oh my gosh it was kinda terrible. Not enjoyable and the combat is super bad and too precise. Robocop 2 from the exact same 5 designers is better, way better and a little enjoyable but Darkman truly sucked (that movie is very dope and super ridiculous and absolutely insane so this is probably the only good part about it)

[Floating Platforms | 736]

Nancy Drew: Treasure in the Royal Tower is done

No screenshot as they would all be spoilers.  It's not the best one I've played. The characters are fun (possibly the best in that regard) but there are only 4 people to talk to and for a couple, the interactions are extremely limited. Navigation was quite clunky and the map got me turned around far too easily.  Long, long stretches of clicking through to the next screen as there's nothing of note along the way, and also I experienced a lot of backtracking through long stretches and re-doing a couple minor puzzles each time. Most of the progression was dialog based. Talk to the right person at the right time then bounce between things, don't forget the phone, etc. In terms of actual puzzles, it was backloaded, but still very light on the whole thing. Most were extremely simple and didn't require the research and note taking that many of the entries ask of the player.  I still had fun with it, but I know there are better ones still to come as I continue to go through the series chronologically next year.

I'm going to tackle Zac McKracken next and then figure out what my last steam game of the year should be.

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

Nobunaga's Ambition II is now done.  Going in I felt like the only worse Koei NES game was the first.  Having beaten it, I'd move it up past Gemfire to number 7.  I'd still rather play damn near every other Koei title, but it was a bit more engaging than I'd initially believed.

[Splain | 2,581]

I'm taking a break from DKC2. (like I wasn't already doing that) I haven't finished it, but I'm close-ish and I guess I'm not excited enough to finish it this year. I'll finish it next year sometime, since I won't be trying to play as much N64.

My hot take is that the game is great, but it's not better than DKC3. The two are equal. I can rehash the usual complaints about the game and the series, but those are googlable. I guess I just don't agree with all the nebulous arguments about how 2 is "just better" than 3. Each one has very tangible plusses over the other, and neither is better. Of course, I haven't finished DKC2 yet, so maybe there's some amazing boss fights or something in the late game. Final judgment pending.

That puts me at... still a solid 2 for the year lol.

[PII | 1,894]

1 hour ago, the_wizard_666 said:

Nobunaga's Ambition II is now done.  Going in I felt like the only worse Koei NES game was the first.  Having beaten it, I'd move it up past Gemfire to number 7.  I'd still rather play damn near every other Koei title, but it was a bit more engaging than I'd initially believed.

So what exactly is your ranking for these?  I've never really shaken the lingering urge to play these kind of games, but I rarely pop one in.  Someone said, relatively recently that Gemfire is by far the easiest one on the NES...

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

1 hour ago, PII said:

So what exactly is your ranking for these?  I've never really shaken the lingering urge to play these kind of games, but I rarely pop one in.  Someone said, relatively recently that Gemfire is by far the easiest one on the NES...

Gemfire is my recommendation for Koei noobs, for the same reason I don't particularly care for it - it's not as deep as the rest, so it gives you a chance to dip your toes in without being overwhelmed.

Anyway, for me personally, I'd go with this order:

1 - Romance of the Three Kingdoms II
2 - Uncharted Waters
3 - Genghis Khan
4 - Bandit Kings of Ancient China
5 - L'Empereur
6 - Romance of the Three Kingdoms
7 - Nobunaga's Ambition II
8 - Gemfire
9 - Nobunaga's Ambition

Romance of the Three Kingdoms II is also my pick for favourite NES game, so that's tough to beat.  Uncharted Waters is not a strategy game, but I can't in good conscience leave it off the list Romance of the Three Kingdoms was the first Koei game I ever played, and I absolutely loved it...right up until I played the sequel.  Sadly, it's incredibly archaic.

Anyway, I'd recommend for someone who hasn't played them, as mentioned above, start with Gemfire.  If you dig it, I'd suggest the first two games they released (Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Nobunaga's Ambition).  They're so damn primitive that they're hard to enjoy if you've played the later games at all.  As mentioned above, Uncharted Waters is not a strategy game, so that can be played anywhere and not affect your ability to enjoy the rest.  Bandit Kings, L'Empereur, and Genghis Khan can be played in any order after those archaic beasts, as they all have similar mechanics and pacing.  You really can't go wrong with any of them. Anyway, save Romance II for last, as it's tough to go backward from perfection

Some game specific pointers:

L'Empereur -   I would also recommend starting on the first scenario when/if you play it.  You start at a lower rank, meaning you don't have access to some of the commands at the start.  What that does is it allows you to learn the game in pieces.  Once you get a few territories, you get promoted and get a few more abilities.  By the time you get to where the final scenario would be, you will know everything inside and out.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms - According to the manual, the earlier scenarios have shorter win conditions than clearing the whole map.  That is a lie.  Once you achieve those conditions, the game says "now go for the rest of them" or something along those lines.  So to get the ending, you have to conquer the entire map on any scenario (though the ending is the same regardless).

Nobunaga's Ambition - Assassinations are your friend.  Do as many as you can against your neighbours and just buy their territories.  Much easier than battling.  On the lowest difficulty, there's only a handful of daimyos that you actually have to fight - the rest can be assassinated relatively easily.  Even on higher difficulties you can assassinate some daimyos early on, though it gets much harder as the game progresses...but on easy, the ninja seem to have their numbers.

Bandit Kings of Ancient China - This is the only game where the goal is not to conquer the entire map.  You need to accumulate fame points.  Once your fame is high enough, you can then attack Evil Gao Qiu.  Once he's dead, you win.  This one I beat in a single day when playing it blind.  Definitely worth playing, but yeah, it's a lot simpler to win than the rest.  I don't even think I had half the map by the time I won.  Also, there's a time limit in the game - can't remember exactly, but apparently you have to win by a certain year.

Genghis Khan - While it extends the game significantly, play through the Mongol Conquest.  When you finish, you and a few of your generals graduate to the World Conquest mode.  The benefit here is that you will be in a significantly better position to begin than you would if you just started World Conquest, and will likely have better generals serving you as well (assuming you set them up correctly of course).  That said, if you want to be any other ruler besides Genghis Khan, you can skip right to World Conquest.

And a fun side note - Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Bandit Kings of Ancient China are based not only on history, but on ancient Chinese novels based on the historical events.  Romance shares the name with the book, while Bandit Kings is titled Water Margin.  Both are interesting reads, though with Ro3K, I'd get the Moss Roberts translation, as the nomenclature is different between the games and the Charles Henry Brewett-Taylor translation and can be confusing because of it.  Water Margin uses real names, while the game uses nicknames, so that also makes for some confusion in that regard.  Guess they figured Americans would have no real knowledge of the story, so the Chinese names would be meaningless to them, and decided the nicknames were just cooler.  And honestly, they probably aren't wrong there.

 

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

I'm just gonna say right now that if I wasn't so close to finishing my list, and I didn't want to see it through for reference, and some masochistic side of me wasn't so interested in eventually getting to parts 2 and 3... I would drop Shenmue so hard right now.  Jesus, this game...

[Webhead123 | 687]

Well, I'm throwing in the towel and admitting defeat with Snake Rattle 'n' Roll. Like most games developed by Rare, there's an undeniable charm and uniqueness to the game and I actually find it quite fun. It almost reminds me of Marble Madness meets Q-Bert (and I also love both of those games, although I'm not great at them). Then Level 5 happens and suddenly you realize you're playing an isometric NES game with moving/vanishing platforms. It's like dealing with those infamous Mega Man blocks but even more frustrating because you have to judge their position and pattern in three dimensions instead of just two. And since missing a jump means instant death, you can find yourself losing all of your continues in the span of 30 seconds. And the final stretch of Level 5 to reach the exit gate...yeah...fuck that.

So, I still like the game and I'll continue to play it off and on and maybe...just maybe...one of these days I'll get lucky and see the rest of the game. Until that day, I consider myself bested by it and won't be subjecting myself to more undue masochism.

[Floating Platforms | 736]

Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders is done

Imgur is fixed for now? This is a game I played with my brother on C64 a bunch as a kid but we never were able to beat it. In the days before online guides, all you had were paid hint lines or books and we weren't going to use those.  This is also the time where soft locks were still pretty common and they do exist here. We probably hit a couple of them back then. I know we got pretty far, when comparing my winning run here. Anyway, even with that experience under my belt, and remembering quite a few things (but forgetting others), this was quite difficult and I got stuck several times.  The very beginning is quite linear, but once you get past Seattle, there is basically no guidance as to what to do next or in what order. That would be fine except that you can run out of money to fly places. I save scummed some location exploration. I did end up looking up a couple things near the end as I hit a wall and learned from the walkthrough that I missed a key item that I really don't think I would have found. The game has that Lucasarts, Maniac Mansion charm. I do wish there was a bit more character interaction (a talk to/look at function would have been great for flavor text). I also wish there were fewer mazes. But the theme song is underrated and the whole experience was very nostalgic. I may try the enhanced edition some other time.

I'm also currently working on the green stars in Mario Galaxy 2 and just have one more world to go, but I know I'm not hitting my overall goal of 50 this year. I'll be damn close, though.

[RH | 4,955]

On 1/25/2023 at 3:31 PM, RH said:

My Back Log 2023

Inspired by my own comments on @Reed Rothchild's rating post for Final Fantasy III.

• Stop being a lazy joker and play and beat Final Fantasy III (US).  (I will allot myself any cheats I want to use.)

Well, I don't know if I will finish this in 2023, but I've started to play FF VI in earnest.  I'm going to do my best to knock this one out.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

15 minutes ago, RH said:

Well, I don't know if I will finish this in 2023, but I've started to play FF VI in earnest.  I'm going to do my best to knock this one out.

December.  January.  The important thing is sticking with it.

[RH | 4,955]

Just now, Reed Rothchild said:

December.  January.  The important thing is sticking with it.

Yeah, I think I will finish it this time, even if it does carry over into 2024.  That said, I'm not making a post in the 2024 Backlog thread with _any_ backlog unless I knock this out.  I literally chose one game and if I can't do that, then there's no hope.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

3 minutes ago, RH said:

Yeah, I think I will finish it this time, even if it does carry over into 2024.  That said, I'm not making a post in the 2024 Backlog thread with _any_ backlog unless I knock this out.  I literally chose one game and if I can't do that, then there's no hope.

You just have to be realistic with yourself.

If a 30 hour JRPG isn't gonna happen, but a 5 hour platformer will, make that your target.

I want to beat Metal Gear and Double Dragon III.  But I also know I'll be more gung-ho to play every game in my list.

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

2 hours ago, Reed Rothchild said:

You just have to be realistic with yourself.

If a 30 hour JRPG isn't gonna happen, but a 5 hour platformer will, make that your target.

I want to beat Metal Gear and Double Dragon III.  But I also know I'll be more gung-ho to play every game in my list.

When I did Metal Gear, it only took about a half day or so.  Its intimidating, but not terribly long or difficult. 

[Floating Platforms | 736]

22 hours ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I'm just gonna say right now that if I wasn't so close to finishing my list, and I didn't want to see it through for reference, and some masochistic side of me wasn't so interested in eventually getting to parts 2 and 3... I would drop Shenmue so hard right now.  Jesus, this game...

I'm in the camp of people that loves this series, mostly because it's...camp and probably unintentionally (at least the first one). It was great to wander around the town talking to people, laughing at all of their voice acting, and playing what is basically a 3D point and click with some distractions.  It will be interesting to hear your thoughts if/when you're done. I will say that if you don't like 1 at all, I do not think you'll like the other two.

[Philosoraptor | 468]

It must be that time of year. I started playing Class of Heroes 2G because the Class of Heroes 1 and 2 Complete Edition is coming out soon. Mistake. I'm 50 hours in and it just pulled some major plot BS that significantly extended the story campaign. I thought I would put a bow on it over the weekend, but nope. It's soooooooooooooooooooooo blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand.

It's taking all of my willpower to sit down and turn on the PS3 instead of playing something more fun.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

2 hours ago, Floating Platforms said:

It will be interesting to hear your thoughts if/when you're done

I'm literally sitting here staring at my watch (in-game), waiting for the day to end so I can wait around tomorrow for another event.

edit:  Wait, that was lunch.  Now I get to do the forklift.  And then sit around (again) waiting for the day to end.

[G-type | 2,503]

5 hours ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I want to beat Metal Gear

do the MSX version. its better.

[Floating Platforms | 736]

26 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I'm literally sitting here staring at my watch (in-game), waiting for the day to end so I can wait around tomorrow for another event.

edit:  Wait, that was lunch.  Now I get to do the forklift.  And then sit around (again) waiting for the day to end.

It's been a couple of years, so I had to look up if time skip is possible in part 1 before responding.  I don't remember a lot of downtime in my playthrough, but maybe that was helped by chasing the platinum trophy and doing the random stuff, or maybe I'm simple minded enough to be entertained by talking to all the random NPCs to see what they had to say that day.

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

1 hour ago, Floating Platforms said:

It's been a couple of years, so I had to look up if time skip is possible in part 1 before responding.  I don't remember a lot of downtime in my playthrough, but maybe that was helped by chasing the platinum trophy and doing the random stuff, or maybe I'm simple minded enough to be entertained by talking to all the random NPCs to see what they had to say that day.

Yeah, I've only played it back in the day on the Dreamcast, but I don't remember much downtime either.  I actually found I didn't have enough time most days.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,572]

Sounds like you guys should go revisit it 

[Sumez | 2,988]

Jackie Chan's Action Kung Fu (PCE) - Beaten 16/12

Jackie Chan on NES is one of my favourite games on that platform. It's very much my kind of game - a fast and arcadey action platformer with a quick melee attack requiring well timed precision akin to Ninja Gaiden. The game just understands pace better than most of its kin, allowing you to always maintain a constant forward momentum even though it won't punish you for taking it slow.
Although generally loved by most who played it, I still think it remains one of the most unfairly overlooked gems on the NES. The only real strike against it is that it's a tad easy, but it's still challenging enough to demand your full attention.

 

Now i finally got around to trying the PC Engine version of the same game. Reports of the differences between the two games are kinda mixed and often conflicting. Though developed concurrently and released almost simultaneously, they are completely different games, merely following the same series of thematic locations and similar looking boss fights. It's a little weird they wouldn't reuse more actual stage designs or enemy behaviors between the two games, but I think ultimately it worked out better for both of them, because each feels solidly designed around the capabilities and limitations of each platform, never struggling to punch above their weight.

Obviously, the PC Engine game looks a lot better. In fact, it looks fantastic, and manages to give off a fun colorful and cartoony vibe that shines even better in motion than on screenshots, with especially the boss fights really going all in with amusing details and environmental effects. There are only five stages, but each of them is very long, constantly switching between wildly different setpieces that never manage to grow stale.

  

I don't think the PC Engine version ever manages to find quite the same brilliant momentum as the NES game, but on the other hand it has other qualities. Some come down to simply content present in this version that was cut on on the NES (notably several minibosses), but it also remains slightly more challenging.
I think, comparing the two games directly, you can tell that the PCE game was the primary target platform, with the NES one often featuring slightly amputated versions of the same ideas - but you really wouldn't be able to tell just looking at it on its own. Likewise, it's hard to really say which game I prefer, and overall I'd recommend anyone into fun platformers to play both - this is really top notch stuff!

Edited December 19, 2023 by Sumez