TDIRunner

46 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

Just imagine, in a parallel universe the two highest rated (and nostalgia-driven) games are Minecraft and Fortnite 

When my kinds are in their 40s, I'm sure they will have nostalgic feelings for Minecraft and Roblox and they will be complaining about the crappy games their kids are playing.  

40 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

It's also interesting that I'd imagine many of us were in high school in the 2000s, but many of the songs from that era actually underperform.

Does that speak to how that era is looked at?  Have I just somehow avoided the songs that people have strong feelings for?  Have the numbers and matchups just not worked in their favor?  All of the above?

I'm not sure why, but the music I listed to in the 2000s hasn't aged nearly as well as the music I listened to in the 80s and 90s.  I've thought about this before, but I can't pin point a reason.   

4 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I'm checking the previous brackets right now, and at a glance it appears that by the end of the third round every single song left standing has been from the 1980s or 1990s.

...with the sole exception of Change/Pump It, because that region had two songs from 2000 as their oldest entries.

It's almost like this forum is full of people who grew up during that era and enjoy that kind of music.......

With that said, our ages really show up in our poll results.  Just look at the Fortnite debate.

On 4/13/2024 at 10:55 AM, G-type said:

I also just watched The Godfather for the first time.  This is going to be mostly criticism 

You could have just said "it insists upon itself."  

1121

This one was pretty easy.  The first one was the only one I had to think about.  

Probably my second favorite Mario game, but I'm still going with a 10.  This was also the most excited I have ever been for a new Mario game (including the release of SMB3).  I remember being surprised and a little disappointed that it wasn't called SMB4, but I got over that soon (I didn't know about the Japanese name until many years later).  Despite being my second favorite Mario title, I probably have more hours in this game than anything else from the mainline Mario series.

Strange coincidence, but I just recently binged all three Naked Gun movies about a week ago.  He was in all three of them and played a pretty hilarious character.  While watching part 3, it got me wondering about when it was filmed in relation to the murders.  I looked it up and found that Naked Gun 33 1/3 was released the same year that the murders took place.  It's kind of strange to imagine those two events so close to each other.  

I used to be a runner, which is part of where I came up with my user name, but after more than 20 years and however many thousands of miles, I started to develop knee issues that have prevented me from continuing.  I eventually switched over to cycling as it gave me similar enjoyment without the impact on my knees.  I'm fortunate because the county I live in has hundreds of miles of bike trails all interconnected in a massive system that links me to all of the surrounding areas.  My county also has one of the oldest "rail to trail" bike trails in the entire country.    I've been pretty bad about riding the past few years, but I'm hoping to get back into it again this year.  I have a decent road bike.  Nothing too fancy.  

I live only a few hour drive from totality, so even though I was home, I got a pretty good view.  Skies were completely clear this time around compared to 7 years ago when it was super cloudy and I was lucky to see just a few seconds of the eclipse.  

I talked about this in another thread.  I hadn't played Rock Band or Guitar Hero in about 15 years, but I've kept all of my stuff all of this time.  About a week ago, I got the urge to get all of my old guitars, drums and microphones out of storage and try them out again.  I had forgotten how much fun those games could be.  As we all know, the market got saturated with new GH and RB releases, and everyone seems to burn out right about the same time and that style of game seemed to disappear overnight.  

With all of that said, my kids saw the guitars and drums and sure enough they wanted to try it out.  Despite owning some of this stuff for about 17 years, for the first time in my entire life, I had the chance to play Rock Band with three players at the same time.  We took turns playing guitar, drums and signing and it was a ton of fun.  My kids are pretty young.  My 10 year old was ok with the guitar if it was set to easy, but my 7 year old just doesn't have the coordination yet.  It was still a lot of fun, and if you have the equipment and the people, I highly recommend trying these games out again.  Unfortunately, the RB and GH instruments are fairly expensive today, which is a shame because there was a time when you could find a dozen guitars at Goodwill for $2 each.  

All versions of Rock Band can play up to 4 players.  Early versions of Guitar Hero were only two players with guitar only and later versions added drum and microphones for 4 player action.  However, all home console versions offer couch co-op playability.  

Side note:  The kick pedal on my PS3 Rock Band drum doesn't work and I'm looking for a replacement.  

Is it Minecraft by any chance?

Played it, but not enough to properly rate it.  

I finished the remaster of Tomb Raider II.  First time getting all secrets on a single playthrough for me.  I would like to also play through TR3, but I might need a break from the series before going through that entire game.  

My complaints with the remastered version of Tomb Raider II are few, and basically the same as TR1.  Overall, this set is well worth the price, especially if you are a big fan of the series.  

1111 for me as well.  All of the votes were pretty easy for me, but if the songs had been different while still using the same bands, the votes could have very easily gone the other way.  

The announcement was made on April 1st, so I had my doubts, but I'm still seeing several places listing it as coming soon.  

If it's real, the same company that did the Dark Forces Remaster is working on a remaster of PO'ed.  I was a big fan of this game, originally playing on a friend's 3DO and later getting it for my PS1.  I would love to play this game with modern FPS controls.  

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2697470/POed_Definitive_Edition/

Just now, Gloves said:

Jurassic Park on SMS.

Yeah, that's it.  I knew it was a JP game, but I didn't recognize the scene.  I was looking through so many different games and after your guess, I looked it up and found it immediately.  

Jurassic Park 2: The Chaos Continues

SNES

6 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

I’ve seen this option as well - which consolizer are you using and which MVS board variant? I do like having to buy cheaper MVS games over the more expensive AES versions but logically if that were the case I could just do the NGCD

I bought it so long ago, that I can't tell you much about it.  It was obviously a single cart board, but that is about all I know.

I won't argue that this is the best way.  This is just the way that worked out for me.  I own a consolized MVS that has component output and controller inputs for Neo Geo controllers and Saturn controllers.  For the most part, I just play the 151 in 1 cart because I don't want to put a lot of money into the games.  It's not perfect, but it allows me to scratch that Neo Geo itch whenever it comes up.  The controllers are setup with a "credit" button which functions as inserting a coin.  So you can push that button as often as needed to continue playing.  The console itself takes up about the same about of space as an SNES and the board sits inside a custom made case that gives it a clean look.  

46 minutes ago, Sumez said:

What is the difference?

I've heard lots of praise for the remaster, but haven't seen anyone mention this before.

The differences are extremely minor, but they are different regardless.  In general I am extremely happy with the remaster, but if there is something that bugs me, I'm going to point it out regardless of how minor it is.  There is absolutely no reason why the differences in controls should exist.  

Tomb Raider I

• The original controls allowed you to side step left and right using L2 and R2.  This was replaced in the remaster by pressing left or right while holding the walk button.  The L2 and R2 buttons have no use in the remaster.  In the original, if you pressed left or right while holding walk, you would turn the same as you would without holding walk.  In the remaster, you can no longer turn while holding walk. 

Tomb Raider II

• The original controls allowed you to side step left and right while holding R2 and pressing left or right.  This was changed from TR1 because an extra button was needed to pull out a flare.  Pulling out a flare was done by pressing L2.  In these remaster, the side stepping was again replaced by pressing left or right while holding the walk button.  Pulling out a flare was replaced by holding the touch pad and pressing walk.  As with TR1, you can no longer turn while holding walk.  Once again, the L2 and R2 buttons have no use.  Why not use them?  

Tomb Raider III

• Don't know yet.  I still have 6 levels to go in my TR2 playthrough.  

While all of this sounds minor, it can become an issue if you have muscle memory from playing these games every year for over 25 years.  Please note that I don't have an problem with the remaster having different control options.  Allow people to setup the button combinations however they want.  But there is no reason why the controls couldn't be exactly the same as the originals.  As mentioned before, when you go to set the controls manually, there is no option to change side stepping or flare, so it's impossible to set these functions to their original setting, at least not as of this writing.

I've always enjoyed participating in sports.  Growing up I played a lot of soccer, basketball and football.  I was also a runner for a lot of years running cross country and track & field in high school and Division II college.  I still enjoy playing sports today, although I don't get much chance to.

With that said, I have never been a fan of playing sports video games or even watching them on TV.  I never watch football or basketball on TV and I very rarely watch hockey or baseball even though I'm fans of our local teams (Blues & Cardinals).  I do enjoy the occasional watch of MLS since we have a new team here in St. Louis (St. Louis City).  I just don't care to spend much of my life watching or playing sports on TV.  

2 hours ago, Estil said:

You know, there is near unanimous consensus that the Simpsons is not as good as it used to be...but then try to ask exactly when the show jumped the shark!  Interesting thing about that...the show wasn't even half done when Fonzie jumped that shark in S05E3 (the show lasted 11 seasons)!

That's a good question.  It's difficult to say because the quality probably started dropping very slowly, and I loved The Simpsons so much, that I might have overlooked some of the bad episodes early on and just brushed them off as "less funny" episodes.  However, I somewhat remember the episode "The Computer Wore Menace Shoes" as one of the first episode that made me think the show just wasn't the same anymore.  

Edit.  As I think of it more, I want to say that the episode that revealed that Principal Skinner was a fake is probably a really good candidate for jumping the shark.  I just looked it up and was super surprised when I realized that was all the way back in season 9.  

On 4/1/2024 at 1:38 AM, Gloves said:

I didn't want to steer the discussion so I let others do the talking for a bit, and now I feel like it's been enough time to put this out there - IMO vote how you FEEL about the thing, as YOU experienced it. Seems people are doing that. 

I don't know The Simpsons of today, it's something else entirely in my mind. When I say The Simpsons, like many others here I'm envisioning the first let's say 10 seasons. Which let's be real, is a hell of a run for anything. It was an absolute phenomenon, and it'll stick with me for my whole life as something cherished which I could easily revisit any time (thanks, dvd collection!). 

Love it. 

This is how I tried to vote as well.

The Simpsons have been around long enough that you could almost split the debates into separate threads for groups of seasons or even decades.  I wouldn't want to do that with any other shows, but The Simpsons are a little different to the point that you could justify it.  

I voted "love it" even though I haven't watched a new episode in over a decade.  The good years were too good to not give it that vote.   I don't really care what they are doing today.  It doesn't change out good the early years were.