the_wizard_666

Solitaire Funpak is done. I always enjoy getting the chance to fire it up again, there's some great (and obscure) versions of solitaire that I can't find anywhere else. Another decent time waster.

Radar Mission is done. Another first time completion for me, and another one I could see myself playing through again. Game A is basically Battleship, but with a couple extra options that only work in a video game. Got a bunch of lucky shots in the final round, which helped hunt down all the 2-square enemies. Game B is a rudimentary submarine action game. It took a bit to wrap my head around what exactly was going on, but it was a fun game as well. And with only 3 stages on each game, it never overstays it's welcome! It's another game added to the list of games I'd recommend No worries, shit happens I figured it was a case of "oh shit, I thought I did it" I hope I haven't been narrowing your pile down though. I'm mostly just playing shit on a lark and have no real planning going into it

While I have no further updates at the moment pertaining to this thread, I figured I'd add that I've knocked off five more games from my personal backlog, including four more Game Boy games (Caesar's Palace, BreakThru, Monopoly and Ishido), as well as Centurion: Defender of Rome, which was not only a fantastic game, but one I would've had on this year's list if I had owned it at the time I had compiled it. So now I'm up to 47 games stricken from my backlog on the year, which is an absolutely insane number to me at this point in the year.

@Splain we need an update dude. We have like 20 or so new entries, and around a full page of updates since the last edit.

For the first Bases Loaded? There actually is. It's detailed in the guide on GameFAQs, but basically with specific pitchers, it's possible to perfectly pitch strikeouts. Using those particular pitchers, you use one pitch for the first 50 pitches (until strike two of the second batter of the sixth inning) and switch to another specific pitch. I only got about 18 games in back in 2022, because it's incredibly boring, but it's absolutely doable if you care to grind it out.

Centurion: Defender of Rome is done. Pretty simple strategy game, but with a ton of depth and nuances to it. I'll definitely play it again in the future, as I feel I've barely scratched the surface.

Spot: The Video Game is done. It's okay, but way better on the NES with 4 players. Solo on the GB is pretty meh.

That's honestly my favourite football game on the NES, but playing a full 7 games will never be on my radar again after doing it once. It really could've done with adjustable game length.

Watching a video of it, it seems kinda fun to be honest. But since I don't have a copy, I won't be playing it

I didn't realize it didn't have a save feature. That makes it far less likely they bothered to code an ending in. I think the only reason to even attempt going to level 99 would be to confirm whether or not it actually repeats stage 99 like the dude says, or if that was an artifact of hex editing (or a complete fabrication).

Have you attempted using the Quick Shot? Having a stick with buttons on it that you can press with one hand might be a viable solution.

It is random, but only to a point. It cycles first through all the unentered rooms, then starts hitting the ones you've entered before. So ideally, clear out rooms you've been in before touching the ones you haven't gone to at all. Once those are done it starts attacking the rooms you've entered before. Additionally, there is one room where it always has the same pattern regardless if you've entered or not (think it was one off the starting room IIRC, but it's been several years since I've been in it). So the ideal plan is to not clear it out until near the end (or when you get to a point that it's too far to backtrack to), as it can be cleared fairly quickly.

Ishido is done. Not bad, but could be a LOT better. Took a bit to figure out what I was doing but it's pretty simple once you figure it out.

I think for CP and Pirates, playing the game should be required. With CP, I would say the taxi ending isn't good enough because you can get it without playing, but the best ending shouldn't be required either, as that defeats the "get an ending" mindset. I think the $20K ending should be enough by that criteria. Pirates is a bit trickier based on the range of rankings available. Maybe what should happen is to have a few people play a single voyage (end game after dividing plunder) and figure out what the average rank would be. Or arbitrarily decide on something in the middle. Obviously some of us will strive for more, but it may incentivize people to play it if they don't feel they have to master it. There are certainly great points here. Snoopy is easy. It falls into the "any ending vs best ending" argument. Anything less than bronze and you don't get an ending, so bronze is the minimum to get an ending. The problem is with looping games and multi-quest games. Some, like Mystery Quest or Arkista's Ring, give an ending after multiple loops that you don't get. Those are easy - the goal is to see the end. I think with games like Gun.Smoke, where there's a finite number of loops but an ending is triggered after the first, those should be fine with one loop. Then there's stuff like Ghosts and Goblins and the Taxan multi quest games. I think with G&G, the "ending" of the first loop is more like an in game cutscene that tells you why you need to play the second loop, rather than an actual ending. With most of the Taxan games, after beating a quest, the story is completed. The story wraps up the same in each one, and the further quests are just challenges for the player rather than a true closing of the story. With those, any ending would work for the thread, as all of them are a completion of the story. That said, if someone wanted to do the third quest of GI Joe instead of the first, there's no reason they couldn't use the password for the start of the third quest, as long as they start from the beginning of whichever quest they want to play. I'm also thinking of softening my stance on something like Burai Fighter, as even though it hints at a better end as a reward for beating it on Ace difficulty, the story does still wrap up on lower difficulties. I think the difficulty shouldn't matter at all, save for instances like Double Dragon Ii where everything less than the highest difficulty would prevent the story from wrapping up, or cases like Little Samson, where it gives an ending, but locks off the back half of the game. So the criteria would be "playing the entire story" rather than getting the best possible ending. Ultimately, I think the focus should be to err on the side of fun. Ultimate mastery has never been the goal, and could potentially push some people away rather than enticing them to play.

It sounds like he was doing hex editing. I know some things have shown up later on AdamL's NES ending list that he didn't know about because he hex edited things, so that in itself doesn't confirm anything...he may have skipped beyond where it would end, or the editing messes up other variables that he couldn't forsee. It's why I always advocate for playing through if at all possible. Anyway, there's all sorts of reasons why he might have 12 in his head...could be a mistake, especially if there was time between him playing it and posting about it. He could have also just not noticed the changes, or maybe he was counting new enemy appearances and not quantities. Regardless, I'd be more inclined to go with the opinion of the guy playing the game currently than someone likely padding their statistics by answering their own question. I'm thinking 16 is probably where it gets to the maximum based on the information you've provided, but yeah, I'd be curious how high it actually goes. Like I said, if you're enjoying the game, I'd go for 99 just to put it to rest, but that doesn't have to be done at the expense of anything else either. Maybe just if you're bored and feel up to it, you pound out a couple levels, until you get to that point. Again, only if you want to do it. On an unrelated note, I fired up Brainbender. It's an interesting puzzle game. I spent the last couple hours on it and knocked off the first 40 levels. There were maybe 3 or 4 total that required some tricky execution, but for the most part it's been straightforward. The hard part from this point is going to be starting again...retries are based on points - if you fail, you pay 1200 points to continue. By the time I shut it off, I had over 30K, which would've made it easy enough to finish...but upon using the password, you start at 0 points. As long as the puzzles remain relatively simple, it shouldn't be hard to build up the points again to have a safety net, but there's no guarantees. Still, considering when I fired it up I was underwhelmed, I'm surprised it grew on me so quickly. As long as I can knock off 10 levels at a time to get a new password, though, I shouldn't have too many issues knocking it off.

Fun thing to note in Mutant Virus - the alarm only sounds on incomplete rooms, and the rooms only get threatened if you're not in them. So when you're in the final room, the internal clock no longer matters. Having little health in the final room is no issue at all, as long as it's a room where you can safely hold the viruses at bay. Great job by the way...I've got 349 games on my personal list, and I count The Mutant Virus as the one I feel is the biggest completion on it. Anyway, no way in hell I'm gonna bother with Ikari Warriors, as I have zero desire to learn it enough to do a 1cc run. I wish we had @BeaIank back. It'd be a non issue if she could play again

Apparently a question was asked and answered about it on GameFAQs. Dude played through to mission 19 and said nothing seemed to change after mission 12. He also apparently edited his way to mission 99, and beating that just repeated mission 99 again. Basically sounds like an infinite looper, especially with the score maxed out. Given that you're playing it fresh, if you feel 16 is the actual end point for new content, that's probably good enough...though if you're enjoying it, it could be worth confirming that it does that without hex edits. The general rule with sports games is typically winning a championship. I would go with either Cup mode or any League. If you're willing, maybe try doing both so we can confirm whether there are endings, and whether they are the same or different between modes. Friendlies shouldn't count as they're literally exhibition games and won't count as an ending anyway.

I dunno, I'd call one loop enough. It took me hours to get through six, and felt it was a massive amount of overkill. I'd say getting to the second loop is fine.

No worries. I actually enjoyed it, so it was worth it to me. I figured it was a lack of knowledge that led to that, but was thinking maybe there was an ending after 6 loops, which led to the 6-4 distinction. I'm happy to do my part to help make next year easier

BreakThru is done. Spent several hours on it, looped it 6 times, and broke 1 million points (I thought it was gonna cap out, but it added a digit and kept going). Not a bad game, but when I went in blind and didn't have any trouble with it, I would say I'm probably not gonna play it again any time soon. By the way, the stages aren't numbered up to 6-4. The way it works is there are six cities, with four phases to complete before going to the next city. They will all be 1-1 to 1-4, until the full loop is completed. Additionally, it caps at 4, so after beating Beijing the fourth time, it just goes back to Berlin 4-1 instead of 5-1. I figured you meant to just have one loop completed, but just in case I powered through the full 6 loops Interestingly, the game is basically a more souped up version of Chunkout, a GBC homebrew by James Todd. I find it mildly amusing that he basically made it because he played a similar game and thought it'd be cool to have a Game Boy version of the game. Go figure that it already existed on some niche 1995 black and white release. I wonder if he would've made the game if he knew a flashier version already existed?

4 in 1 Fun Pak Vol. 2 is done. While a bit less interesting overall than the first, it is by no means a bad mix. Aside from Solitaire, I don't think any of the games can be played elsewhere on the system, and all of them are well programmed, with competent AI and everything. All told, I think both games are worth having around, as they'd make great time killers on a long flight or road trip. I could see myself playing it again for cribbage and Yahtzee in the future.

Well that settles that I figured you'd just dig up a video of it, but it's awesome that you managed to actually do it yourself

I just remember it being pretty damn tough to do. I'm pretty crap at the game

@RH I still have Cosmic Spacehead on eBay, photos are in the listing (link in my signature to the store, should be easy to find from there). For Dizzy, I accepted an offer in April for $4200 Canadian. It shows up on Pricecharting now, but it's listed with the list price, not the accepted offer.

All 4 loops? Damn dude!