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Shadowgate beaten

Metal Gear is beat

My annual News Year playthrough of Castlevania 3 is done. This time I took a bold move and told Sypha to f off and completed it with Trevor solo!

Heads up, NES collectors in NYC. Bookoff on 45th St has an Ubisoft Last Crusade cart in their display case for $50. Since I already got my CIB cheap at another NYC store I'm paying it forward and hope somebody gets it before they fix the price. They also have Die Hard for $190, which I still need for my collection, but I'm not currently in a financial situation where I'm buying $190 NES games.

That ending screen looks like it was created in MSpaint.

I spent January 1 on a 16 hour shift at work, so I wasn't gonna be doing any gaming. I beat Super Pitfall again. A really simple run when the route is fresh in your head, takes maybe 15 minutes.

See this is why I don't jump in too early on this challenge anymore. Too many people snagging at the fast and easy games. I see someone already beat me to what used to be my yearly tradition of Castlevania 3 on New Years Day.

Getting myself onto the 2023 scoreboard with Shadowgate. FACT: this was the first game I ever speedran, going back to the early 90s. I was quite rusty tonight and after forgetting to get the wand from the lightning rod room when I visited the snake, I finished with an embarrassing 26:14.

Personally, I'm still a little miffed I didn't get any points for FF3j since that was one of the toughest Famicom games I've played, particularly the final dungeon where you HAVE to do it in one shot without dying and can't exit. Die against the final boss and you just wasted 90 minutes. Because of that, I will never replay the Famicom version again. The FF2j Famicom version is miserable too. At least FF1 only takes 15-20 minutes once you're ready to win. Will make a much better effort to play more games in 2023. My Everdrive Pro 8 and 8bitdo wireless controller have the best retro gaming setup I've ever had!

Took one for the team and beat Super Pitfall. Every time I beat this game I swear I'll never touch it again, but it always drags me back. Was one of the first NES games I ever owned. The only remaining game on the list that I have any confidence in beating is Ultima Exodus and I don't think I'm gonna have the free time to play through that in the next week. With none of the Bases Loadeds completed I think it's safe to say this project is a bust for 2022?

The trick with both Exodus and Avatar is to not level up any more than you have to, which means getting your character high enough to get the pirate ships to appear and then stopping. Avatar is actually easier to do solo except when doing the dungeons (which you can save until the latter half) since a smaller party also means fighting less enemies each battle but still getting the same gold. Also in Exodus don't level up at all until you have enough experience to go straight to 5 because all level 1 fights can be beaten with those free attack spells. I like playing Avatar with the Druid, since she has a good balance of magic and defence and being able to use the bows. For Exodus it's pretty boring but 3 wizards and a cleric will get you through the early grind to level 5 and then bring in a Knight and Ranger to deal with the meleeing. Neither of those games are that time consuming once you know what you're doing. I've beaten both for this challenge in previous years. Warriors of Destiny may be a great PC game, but the NES port is absolute garbage in every form and I don't know how they ever got Nintendo to approve it, or how the same people who ported Avatar so we'll could mess up Destiny so badly. It's such a miserable game to play on NES that it'll probably be one of the last games I ever try to beat for that system.

Legacy of the Wizard finally beaten. This game has been on my to-beat list longer than any other game, ever since I saw the preview for it in Nintendo Power in 1988. And it was a workout. On the surface,the game appears to be an action-RPG with metroidvania elements, but it's really an action-puzzler, somewhat like Castlequest or Milon. I never quite got the controls down for the block moving glove, and each time it slides the wrong way you have to leave the room to reset each puzzle. I don't know how anybody could beat this game without a guide. I used the one on the U Can Beat Video Games YouTube channel and it was still a struggle.

I'll give it a go in 2023. One of the few NES RPGs left I still haven't beaten. Gonna start on Legacy of the Wizard next. It's been on my to-beat list for about 30 years.

Final Fantasy IIIj beaten. I've now finished 1 through 9.

Considering how insanely they price their retro games ($124.99 for Mario Paint cart only) I'm amazed this one slipped past them. Pretty sure they priced that as Mega Man X1..... they also have X3 for $299 but I passed. How'd I do?