Floating Platforms

I'm considering Powerwash Simulator done. Normally I go for the platinum trophy if it's within my skill level, but that will have to wait. I beat the main story and apparently that specific trophy is glitched. If it gets patched, I'll revisit and do the challenges to finish it out. Anyway, the game is a nice, mindless relaxing experience that was a perfect way to wind down before bed. Really nothing challenging about it and that's okay. The levels had a nice variety of settings. Probably too many vehicles, but otherwise, they kept it interesting. There was a story throughout that went to sort of unexpected places but was far too sparse to be considered a selling point. The goal is to zone out, put on a stream or YouTube video on the background and spray the night away. I've been playing another sleepy-time game in Danganronpa (sleepy in that reading that much on the TV makes me fall asleep accidentally), so I'll probably spend my PS5 time going back to Assassin's Creed Valhalla and/or Yakuza 0 when I want to stay awake.

Paperboy is done Paperboy is not a bad game, and this plays well enough, but the zoomed in screen of the Game Boy makes this one of the worst versions you could try. Half the fun playing this as a kid is tossing papers into windows or other things to see the destruction effects, but that takes a backseat to surviving when trying to beat it. Save those papers to toss at enemies so they stop in their path. This took a while to learn. After some time, I found a sweet spot where most sidewalk things wouldn't touch me. Then it was a matter of managing speed. I thought slow was better, but it hurt me more than I knew until I tried speeding up. Still, there are possibly always unavoidable deaths depending on the RNG load-out as you could be hit with 3 or 4 obstacles in the same little section. I barely made it through by the skin of my teeth with a deathless run on Sunday with no lives remaining thanks to a brutal Saturday that took everything from me. I got some good practice on Itchy & Scratchy: Mini Golf Madness last night too, making it to level 8 of 9. I hope to beat that tonight. Next on the list are: 180 Platforming/Action Simpsons: Itchy & Scratchy in Miniature Golf Madness, The 181 Platforming/Action Amazing Spider-Man 2, The 182 Sports World Bowling 183 Platforming/Action Pac-In-Time 184 Platforming/Action TBD 185 Arcade Frogger Since World Bowling is potentially impossible, I will probably swap other games in between attempts.

Decided to do another pinball game on the couch. Revenge of the Gator is done after a lot of resets. I didn't accept a first ball score under 100,000. The ball physics in this are not great and there are tons of cheap losses.

Sorry, nevermind... I have an old spreadsheet that I work off of sometimes to compare times with other GB runners. There the goal is listed as beat the high score of 11,000. I see that it does say get through the week here. I also have a note about paperboy 2 where I put "get through 3 weeks?" but haven't looked into that at all and don't recall where I would have come across that

Maui Mallard in Cold Shadow is done Sadly, it's not good. The game has good ideas and intentions and a bit of variety in the levels and in the bosses but the controls and hit detection make this duck sink instead of swim. First we have some of the floatiest jumps I've encountered - on par with Toy Story and Pagemaster, and the movement is slippery as well. Everything must be made of ice. It's unclear what you can actually land on sometimes and it's unclear where your exits are. Some doors work, most don't. I found this manhole looking thing that took me to the next part of a level but it felt like a glitch. The powerup icons can be tough to read against the background and there are bug enemies and bug ammo, so be careful to avoid the moving ones. The ninja mechanic is slightly broken. You use your staff to swing on certain points and the hit detection to actually latch on is extremely finicky and inconsistent. You also need to swing at the bottom of the animation for some reason. There's supposed to be a thing where you use your staff to wedge between walls and climb, but that didn't work ever. Ropes were near impossible to grab as well. Of course there are blind jumps and limited continues. Thankfully I found a cheese spot for the final boss at least. Maybe the 16-bit versions are better but I had to fight against the character too much here. Also, Popeye 2 is done This would have been a lot more fun if my cartridge wasn't freezing so much. One time I got to the final boss, lost, and then had a freeze on my way back. Thankfully I was able to get it clean enough and thankfully the game is short enough when you know what to do, that I was able to power through. It's a fun, mostly easy, platformer that reminded me a bit of Super Mario Land, Batman, and a touch of Castlevania Adventure. Solid level layouts with only the very last one including a really devious part in the beginning. The boss fights ranged from mindless to I'm not totally sure what to do so I'll try ways to brute force it. The sprite work was solid and the music had it's moments. I wish you could use the people you rescue as one-time power-ups or for some function but at least I learned how to use the inventory as that was key to helping me win. I'm now working on Paperboy. Any reason why the goal isn't to get through Sunday on here? If it's just the high score, I got that on my second run, but I'm going to keep trying until I can do the full week.

I was hoping to get it done last weekend, but 48 levels took a few nights. Anyway, Battleship is done. I also knocked out a quick one with Pinball Dreams That second board is dumb with so much empty space and plenty of rebounds that lead straight to the gutter. But jackpots are super easy overall so this didn't take tons of time.

Yes, definitely. I was hoping (but not expecting) that beating both would do something else, but oh well. I did not test the theory of just getting under par and not reaching #1, though. So, if someone later comes through and does get congratulations on a #2 score, we should probably adjust it again.

Golf is done The game has its charms, but hiding below the surface of the cute character sprite and the simplistic gameplay is a surprisingly difficult, demanding golf game. There are 2 courses: Japan (easier) and US (harder). Both offer hole layouts that are anything but straightforward most of the time. There is little to no opportunity to hit a par 4 green in one shot or a par 5 in two. They show little pockets of fairway in "alternate" routes, but those rely on perfect conditions and the random wind to be going the right direction (which it never does), so really they are fake outs. There are also several longer holes where your 1W is going to end up in the water or sand, so you have to scale back and set up a shot to get over the hazards. The ball physics are not good. If you are in deep rough, virtually every club is garbage. If the ball hits the green, it will almost always bounce or roll until it's in the rough (where your putter is garbage even though you're right on the edge). Basically friction doesn't exist on the green unless you're already on it and trying to put. The putting is also quite specific and demanding. Anyway, the "saving" grace of the game is that it saves your progress after every shot settles. The manual tells you that and tells you how to reset, so if you hit a bad shot, you can reset before it's done rolling and try again. That's pretty much the only way to get the 6 or 7 under par needed for the victory screen in Japan (12 or 13 under for the harder US course). Since I abused that feature, I went ahead and got both courses done but the endings are the same and there's nothing extra for doing both. I also started Maui Mallard last night. It's pretty bad but unless the last couple of levels are brutally hard, I think I'll get it done Monday.

well, I learned that trying to play even simple platformers like Yogi Bear is tough for me when just using keyboard as my controller. So I'm nearly half done with Battleship

And NFL Football is done This game is still trash. Took a few times and some quick resets when the CPU got touchdowns. Picking random teams. Anyway, don't pass the ball and hope you can intercept enough to get the win. I actually managed to run into the endzone for the first time and added more field goals that I expected. I'm not sure what's next. I'm thinking a simple platformer like Yogi Bear or maybe Battleship

Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle is done. Congraturations to me. I think I'll try to get NFL Football done next

Nice! You're playing Boxxle so I don't have to!

Ended the night with a PB of +2 on the Japan course without resets (not even trying the US course), also shot +6 a separate time. Slowly improving.

Last night, I was doing okay and was even par up to hole 12 but then it all kept falling apart. So naturally getting under par may not be out of the realm of possibility. But I think resetting the game on every bad shot (the game saves after every completed shot when the ball settles) is probably the only way to actually "beat" the game. Since the save system is mentioned in the manual, it doesn't really feel like cheating either (to me at least). I'll still try a couple more days to see how much I can improve, but there's no way I can do the US course "legit." Tougher layouts and nothing but strong winds on that one.

I was looking more into Golf and it does seem like in order to get the Congratulations screen, simply getting under par is not enough. It seems that you have to top the course leader board in order for the caddy to say something other than "Nice Game. Please Play Again." I say this because the NintendoComplete longplay gets under par but doesn't get 1st and the congrats message doesn't pop for them. If 1st is needed as I assume, then for Japan, that means a score of 66 or lower (possibly need 65 as I don't know if a tie of 66 will count), and for USA - the harder course - 60 or lower (possibly 59). There is almost no way I'm going to be able to do this without resetting every bad shot but I'll put a couple more days of tries into the Japan course. After my first day, my best round was +12. If I'm save scumming my way to victory (which I plan to do next Monday if I don't get it naturally beforehand), I'll simply cheese both courses to see if there is anything extra for landing 1st place on both. On the side, I worked on Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle during the Golden Globes and I'm nearly done with it.

Alright, I'm going to try to contribute a bit more besides what would happen from streaming new to me stuff. When I'm sitting on the couch watching TV with the wife, I can try to emulate some stuff I've already beaten for the personal challenge. Took a few tries getting accustomed to the keyboard controls but Baseball is done Been a while since I've played this and forgot how lackluster this was. Sadly, it's still the 3rd best baseball game on the system so far.

The one thing that "bothers" me about that follow-up video is that it seems like he's considering the games that he simply decided not to play as part of completing his backlog. If you truly decided you never plan to touch that game, then that's one thing, but in some cases he rationalized it by saying something like he played a similar game/genre so it's being skipped. That kind of fudging the numbers to make the year end totals look better is strange since it really wouldn't have mattered if met that arbitrary goal. Those games would certainly still be on the backlog, and honestly probably still are for him, despite the presentation. There is a difference between trying a game and deciding early on that you don't like it versus never trying a game at all. In my personal eyes, the first counts as something to take off the backlog. The second isn't. Now, that's complicated a bit by digital vs. physical purchases. I have tons of digital steam games from humble bundles I have no interest in. I may never try them ever and that could be the case for some in that video that were retired. However, a physical game that you never plan to try should honestly just be sold/donated/traded to get it off the backlog officially. Anyway, long-winded response on something I actually don't care too much about as it's their own personal decision and I'll simply do my own thing with my own games, but still cared enough to give my two cents on the matter.

I just got to the part in Powerwash Simulator where the client texted me to say "you smell like a stinky butt butt" and then informed me when they had to poop and then again to confirm "i did it." Does that count?

I came very close to adding one more. I beat Gabriel Knight 1 at 2:00 am January 1st. I don't want to count it for 2024 either. Trying for 30 total next year and I think that's certainly possible

I should be able to get started pretty soon. Hopefully will be streaming tomorrow and while I originally planned to get some more CDi stuff done before going back to Game Boy, I want to help hit the ground running the best I can with the games chosen for me. Here's what's on my docket to start the year: Golf Maui Mallard in Cold Shadow Popeye 2 Paperboy Simpsons: Itchy & Scratchy in Miniature Golf Madness, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, The I'm going to try to do Golf legit, instead of doing the reset thing, so it may take a little bit of time if I stink at it. The rest I'm not too concerned about.

Hey all. Sorry I've been silent. I feel like I kind of lit a match in this thread and then walked away due to holidays/life stuff. It's great to see that others share the enthusiasm for the yearly threads generally. I agree that the amount of puzzle games can drag, and there are a couple that are rumored to be completely unbeatable (for example: World Bowling - although maybe that will help collectively understand what a win condition is if the coding is that broken), but I also agree that with some additional participation, we may have a real shot because the library size is in that sweet spot of not too long and most of the games are generally achievable and short on average. I'm looking forward to seeing what 2024 will bring overall!

Yeah, there are pros and cons to doing yearly as well as leaving it timeless. I don't think there's any "right" answer. Again, I'm honestly speaking from a relatively selfish perspective where I'd love to see more attention to the Game Boy and learn more about the games that are still largely undocumented. Either way, I'll still be contributing as much as I can since the vast majority of my retro gaming time is trying to personally beat all of them. I'm just really slow. From a site-wide perspective, I definitely like the idea of trying to rally everyone around a specific new console each year. I know I'd certainly try to help out if I can with my limited physical collection.

Yes, very true on all fronts. I've seen how no one really even touches the SNES, Genesis, Playstation threads because there's no timed aspect. I honestly would never expect the entire GB library to be finished in a year, but having the thread reset each year does seem to incentivize people to try out new games in a way that doesn't happen in the "beat it whenever" threads. There's still a lot about the system that's undocumented, so I'm selfishly hoping that more people would be enticed to help explore some of the lesser knowns.

It's a sad thought, but it does seem to make sense. If we broke the 200 game mark again, then it might be worth keeping as a yearly reset as it seems like some people still go after the high points or never finished titles. The non-yearly threads tend to usually be very, very slow burns or afterthoughts. But, I think this year was the lowest turnout in several years and I even got sidetracked at the end by my secondary challenge and then a dog surgery. I'll still plan to be good for 30-40 games each year, hopefully.

It took a bit longer than I expected but Super Mario Galaxy 2 is 100% done. I beat the main game's 120 stars years and years ago, and always meant to go back to do the back half. For some reason, I thought that the only extra challenge in this was to collect the Green Stars. Feel free to correct me I'm wrong, but in Galaxy 1, the post-game was only to get 120 with Luigi and then a freebie extra at the end. Well, here you can be either Mario or Luigi (I stayed as Mario) but after getting all 120 green stars, the final level appears. It's tough, but was manageable after quite a lot of attempts and learning. 241. All good, right? Nope. Do it again without getting hit a single time and no more checkpoints. This took hours across multiple nights, but I finally did it to earn that image above. My dog will be happy that there will be a little less swearing at the TV for a bit.