twiztor

Wario: Master of Disguise (Nintendo DS) i didn't even know this game existed when i was playing the Wario Land games, or it also would have ended up on my backlog list. this takes a lot of cues from those games, with an emphasis on puzzle solving to progress. the gimmick here is that Wario can transform into different personas, each with their unique abilities. this made for a fairly varied playthrough. the drawback is that this game leans HEAVILY on the touch screen. it is extremely monotonous to draw a costume on Wario each time to transform. and the minigames are SO DAMN REPETITIVE! weighing the positives and negatives, i still liked this quite a bit. some synergy (?) in the final boss fight, as the villain takes on the form of a princess in pink. and then uses emotion-based offense, eerily reminiscent of Super Princess Peach (released 2 years earlier, also on the DS).

a couple little scores/quick stories: was on a forum when somebody offered a nearly complete run of Nintendo Power Flash and Fun Club News. Can't remember exact price, but something like $400. absolutely insane deal. worked something out with this dude from Germany. there would always be like a week between messages, so i'm constantly waiting for the news that the deal was off. Guy actually cancels completely at one point because "there was damage to some of the mags and he didn't feel comfortable selling them to me for that much". i assessed the damage, was still MORE than OK with the deal, and got it back on. He sends the package. Then messages me to let me know he found a bunch of duplicates and tossed them in the box too. i sold the duplicates and made WAY more than what i paid. Plus i still have a full run of both of those short lived newsletters. Fun Club #1 is worth a couple thousand by itself! i bought a copy of Contra Force off eBay (for $20! this was in like 2002ish) and it wasn't until it arrived at my house THE NEXT DAY that i realized the seller was a pawn shop in the same town i lived in. stopped in sporadically afterwards, but never found any good deals. don't know how the Contra Force slipped through the cracks. was working at a retail location and there was a different company located inside our store that took game trades. somebody brought in the Zelda Collector's Edition for Gamecube. they weren't able to take that game as a trade-in (not sure why) but the guy just.....left it there. so the worker offered it to me since he knew i was into video games. hell yeah! ordered Gauntlet: Dark Legacy for the PS2. seller sent the Gamecube version, which was like 3x the price. i immediately messaged, and the seller was just like "sorry about that. here's your money back. don't bother sending the game back". was awesome, because i wanted the GCN version but didn't have the money for it, so settled for the PS2 release.

i cannot stand the WindWaker style artwork. i love the Zelda series. i love cartoons. but this particular animation style just looks awful to me. i haven't played this game, and can't see myself ever giving it a go.

Mega Man 10 has been conquered! another retro style game from the Wii's eShop in the vein of MM9. this one is weird. the initial 8 stages all feel built around a new gimmick mechanic, making the game feel familiar yet different. some work better than others. these stages are relatively short, but the Robot bosses are a bit tougher. then you get to the Wily stages. man, the first two are BRUTAL. i considered giving up, and indeed had to set the controller down to cool off and focus. But then you face Wily and he is comparitively a cake walk. overall, this is on the low end of my favorite MM games due to that imbalance. still worth playing, but beating it is no small feat.

@Astro Bot thanks for reviving my 3 year old thread for some recs! I appreciate it. i have to pass on Green Lantern and TF: Beast Wars because i just can't do CGI. But Young Justice is awesome, and Clone Wars (traditionaly animation series) is pretty good. Never heard of Primal, will add it to my list. @TDIRunner i fucking love the Clerks cartoon. Great taste. To this day, any time i see a scene in a tv show or movie where people are walking up a building, Batman '66 style, i say "Why are we walking like this?"

the example in the OP is an extreme example. i would really have to love the company/characters/IP for me to buy a 1 hr game at a $30 price point. but the opposite swing of the pendulum is true, too. I know i'm never going to play a 100+ hour game, so anything marketed as such is one that i'm not going to buy. happy medium? price games by length. $10 for a game that's <10 hours of enjoyment. $60 for a 60 hour game. 100+ hours sets you back $100. (i'm not seriously advocating for this)

ok, i think i said it before, but i would 100% buy a Gimmick NES cart. Even LRG's overpriced versions. if that happens, i'll also grab a copy of Gimmick 2 on the Switch. i might anyway, but we'll have to see.

this gives me real "Billy Idol" vibes

anything over 80 is too hot for me. it's been above that for the last 3 weeks. And raining damn near every day. Wet Hot American Summer indeed! also, i clicked on this thread thinking it would be about hot sauce. Now i am disappointed.

i only really play the Diablo series where this is an option. my default character is the Amazon, which is how i most enjoy these games. Finesse? nah. brute force. but after i've completed the game, i like to experiment with secondary characters. The Necromancer is a great time if i'm more laid back and along for the ride. The Assassin if i want to take a slower play style. i had a lot of fun as the Demon Hunter in D3. and there's always the Paladin if i want to have a Barbarian-lite kind of experience. Could never get into wizard/mage characters. but really, my play style doesn't change too much. i don't spend a lot of time thinking about optimum builds, or finding/crafting the perfect armor/weapons, or even diving into the skills. I play all of them very basically. Find a weapon for close melee, a backup for range, and then a skill or two that correlates with the class (usually some sort of wide range attack or crowd control). Kill, Loot, Repeat.

Cuphead. i'm finished with it. i didn't beat the game, but for the purposes of this thread i'm considering it done. I beat all of the first two islands, earning all of the contracts. But i just wasn't enjoying the game- LOVE the animation, dislike boss fights. Anyway, i defeated all the enemies on Island #3, but on Easy mode. So i didn't earn the contracts and can't fight the final boss. But i'm considering it done.

i have not been motivated to play video games the last couple of months, so i am woefully behind on this year's list. but today we turn that around! Mega Man 9 is finished. this was tough, especially those Wily stages. lost many lives with some of those demanding situations. but finally was able to overcome all the spikes. fun game. this certainly builds on the skills you've accumulated over the previous games, so don't make this your first Mega Man game. But if you can't get enough of the Blue Bomber, this is a pretty great entry. cool moment at the end where MM shows Wily all his previous losses.

finished Super Bomberman R 2 last night. i beat the first one a few years ago (2018) so it pre-dates this thread. i didn't like this as much as the first one. the open world is a fun enough concept and plays fine, but you are regularly interrupted by these TERRIBLE castle defense/castle attack challenges that suck ass. the game itself, and the boss fights, are all pretty easy. i 100%ed story mode. obviously, this game is really all about the multiplayer. if you like Bomberman, this is exactly what you expect in that regard.

not owning a DK cartridge is the only one that caught my attention.

my preference would be for layout #1, but with the inverted colors of #2. seconded.