January Update
Main Post
This month I completed
10 games.
My progress for this challenge is
10/52.
1. Dragon Quest 1 (iOS) - Finished on January 1 - 7 hours
My annual Christmas/New Year's Eve week tradition continues! I find this game very relaxing to just fight monsters and explore and progress the game. Often times the holiday season for me is very stressful with work and family and other obligations. This game allows me to decompress while still enjoying some leisure time. I played this a little bit differently than normal by trying to grind as little as possible during the main game. I even tried unsuccessfully to win the fight to get Erdrick's Armor without having the better heal spell. In the end I was forced to fight my way up to level 17 to get it though. I enjoy the simplicity of the game mechanics, the simplicity of the story and all the tropes it has spawned (but thou must!). I enjoyed playing this so much that I am already playing Dragon Quest II on my phone again as well.
2. Pokemon Ultra Sun (3DS) - Finished on January 1 - 32 hours
I really struggled to get through this game again. I played both Sun in 2016 and Moon again in 2017 and having to play through basically the same story again for the third time in 12 months was awful. I finally just dove right in on the third island a few days ago and pushed on through until where the story changes. I enjoyed the game for the new content and really feel like if they reworked a few character elements from the original Sun/Moon and made them better in Ultra Sun, this could have been the first version we got. As it stands, it does ruin some character dynamics and completely craps all over Lusamine and her character from the original games. Necrozma is cool but the idea of an unstoppable pokemon when you have had the master ball since gen 1 is crazy to me. I feel like it has been preached throughout most of the series that there are no bad pokemon, only trainers who use them for bad things. But here we get this unstoppable pokemon that has to be penned in like an animal. I just don't really buy it. That said I love Alola and the characters for the most part. It's just too bad characters like Hau and Gladion and even Lillie do pretty much the exact same stuff this time around instead of developing at all. A little disappointing end to pokemon on the 3DS as far as I'm concerned.
3. NHL 94 (SNES) - Finished on January 2 - 6 hours
Unfortunately enough this game does not have a season mode. You can only choose between shootout, single game, playoffs, or a best of 7 playoff mode. I always love playing out the best of 7 just to get a lengthy experience with my favorite hockey game of all time. Of course I choose my beloved Pittsburgh Penguins. I turn line changes and penalties off so I get a full dose of Jaromir Jagr, Mario Lemieux, and Kevin Stevens scoring on opposing goalies. The first round was an absolute bloodbath against the hated New Jersey Devils. I won the series in six games but I easily could have lost about five of these games. Every game was close, low scoring, and many of them ended up in overtime. The conference semifinals saw the Penguins face off against the Washington Capitals. I won this series in five games mostly because Washington's goalie was on a cold streak so scoring was much easier in this series than the previous one against New Jersey. It seemed like just about every game Kevin Stevens was having a huge night. The conference finals saw the Quebec Nordiques roll into Pittsburgh for another tough series. I had forgotten how good Quebec was in this game but they still fell in six games to Mario and the boys. Tom Barrasso stood tall in this series with a couple shutouts while on a hot streak. The Stanley Cup Finals saw Pittsburgh traveling to British Columbia to face Pavel Bure and the dreaded Vancouver Canucks. With penalties turned off I was free to bash and trounce Vancouver's star wing as much as I wanted. Taking him out of the game proved to be a winning play as the Penguins went on to sweep Vancouver in four games, winning the franchises third Stanley Cup in four years and winning at home for the first championship clinched in Pittsburgh since Bill Mazeroski walked off the 1960 World Series. I did not actually track stats but Kevin Stevens was my Conn Smythe winner for always playing good two way hockey as well as probably leading my team in points in the playoffs.
4. God of War: Chains of Olympus (PSP) - Finished on January 2 - 3 hours
One of my favorite God of War games. I've beaten it a few times but never on a new game plus romp. The Zeus Gauntlet is really fun so I wanted to use it for the entire game. The PSP games are simpler with less of a focus on puzzles and platforming and fewer boss fights and more of a focus on action. They feel more like fun little side stories as opposed to a main entry in the series. It is often said that Kratos gradually loses his humanity over the course of the series but I feel in this game it shows his more human side as he is forced to leave his daughter in order to stop Persephone and save humanity. It is a noble sacrifice to have to make for someone still so tortured by what happened to his family. The PSP version of this game looks better than I thought it would when I first played it. I know the PS3 version is 60 fps but this still looks fine playing it on my Vita. The game is a little on the shorter side even though it is a handheld game. First time players can expect 6 or 7 hours, depending on how you fare in a few of the game's puzzle segments. The controls are pretty good for the limits of the PSP but it definitely controls better on the PS3. Having to hold both shoulder buttons to dodge roll felt a little clunky even as I'm romping through the game with a maxed out Kratos. God of War games are all linear but the extras and secrets really are not well hidden in this game. Most of them you can see just fine while going through the main sequence of the game. Others are really obvious. It makes maxing yourself out not so much of a chore though. The numerous kill rooms in the game and the focus more on combat in many areas means you will get plenty of red orbs to pump yourself up. Overall for fans of the series this is a must play one way or another. I'd recommend the PS3 version first but the PSP version on either a PSP or Vita is just fine as well.
5. The Walking Dead Season 1: Episode 1 (PS4) - Finished on January 3 - 2 hours, 30 minutes
I do not watch the show and I have never read the comic. All I knew coming in was very vaguely that Glenn and Clementine exist and that Clementine is a child and that is it. I am quite a fan of Telltale games and have been keeping my eyes peeled for sales for games I have not played. I really enjoyed the start of this one. I'm used to the normal Episode 1 fare of introducing character, hinting at relationships, but nothing major happening. This one was almost action and intensity from the word go. It even had me keeping my eyes peeled for jump scares or things in the background. In the opening sequence of the game when Lee sees Clementine for the first time it gave me the creeps how it took me a second to notice that she was there. I feel like for a first episode in a game world that now has three or four seasons going for it, a pretty good job is done of establishing how bleak the game world is without really overwhelming the player with a ton of information. Zombies are everywhere and for the moment no one knows why. They just know they will kill anything they can and that anyone bitten will turn. It also does a great job of making the player feel guilty for the choices made. Twice I had to choose between two people and twice I did what I myself thought was the right thing and later on in the episode I am made to feel guilty. This episode did a great job of getting me invested in the characters who survived and seeing what happens to them in future episodes.
6. Mortal Kombat (SNES) - Finished on January 4 - 1 hour
I had never played this game before so I can't really say much about it. I played the Tournament Mode exclusively as Sub-Zero. The controls felt stiff. The gameplay felt dated even from what I remember about Mortal Kombat 3. I had a lot of difficulty consistently getting my freeze attack off, to the point where I know I lost matches that came down to the wire because instead of executing my freeze, I simply did an uppercut that left me vulnerable to any attack in the game. I used some extremely cheap strategies to beat the likes of Kano, Rayden, and Goro. With Kano and Rayden, they have a dive attack that was really difficult for me to avoid. You can sort of bait the AI a little by doing a couple sweeps in a row and they would almost always respond with the dive attack. They both also have an easily spammable projectile attack that not only damages but also cancels my freeze in the air. Goro on the other hand I basically had to cheap out with jump attacks. Like an idiot he kept walking into them. He hits so hard and is so big that any other strategy I tried simply wouldn't work. Throws seem pretty overpowered as the AI would rely on them often to get distance on me. Overall I enjoyed the game for what it was: a 25 year old SNES port of a game clearly designed to be played on something other than an SNES controller. Looking forward to playing MK2 to see how the series progresses.
7. The Walking Dead Season 1: Episode 2 (PS4) - Finished on January 6 - 2 hours
Once again another fantastic job of creating a bleak and oppressive and hopeless atmosphere and mood. I get the feeling that behind every corner is something ready to kill one of the group or that no human left alive is trustworthy at all. Meeting the dairy farmer brothers I suspected them immediately. Everything was a little too perfect. Before it became obvious what was happening I had a little suspicion that that sort of thing was going on. Meeting the woman at the camp and finding Clementine's hat made me think there was some kind of lawless child pornography ring going on out there. Once one of the brothers told me dinner would be a good one, I knew something was way off. Mark was a character that was introduced with little fanfare other than having food. Even the random football player dudes in the woods got more backstory. This episode also did a great job of building and maintaining tension to the point where after the climax I almost felt a wave of relief wash over me that the creepy backwoods dairy farmers couldn't hurt us anymore. Clementine is going to be all kinds of messed up with the things she has seen though. In a game about human eating zombies I knew people would die. I was not prepared for the choices I had to make in episode one and I definitely was not prepared to deal with the consequences of trusting the wrong people in episode 2. I hated Larry but I almost felt like he deserved a little better than getting brained by a salt lick. Also Kenny moving down in my power rankings. I also find it cool that a seven year old girl is the moral compass of a group of adults in this apocalyptic wasteland.
8. The Walking Dead Season 1: Episode 3 (PS4) - Finished on January 7 - 2 hours, 30 minutes
Duck reminds me of Sid from Toy Story. Something about him reminds me of Sid. I am making choices in this episode and wondering how the game would turn out differently. I start to warm up to characters and they reveal themselves to be terrible or they die. I have found as things go on they tend to escalate quickly. This episode was no different. Things escalated quickly and our group was forced to leave the motel. Things escalated quickly when Lilly decided to shoot Carley. Things escalated quickly when I told Kenny to stop the train. I always felt Kenny was sketchy as hell and twice he has decided to not help me out of a jam. I ended up fighting him and he kicked my ass. I try to play games like this as honest and straightforward as possible but there is very little leeway to call other characters out on their bullcrap. I would have called out Kenny two episodes ago. I really feel for the dynamic between Lee and Clementine. Clementine is sweet and innocent and all around her is just absolute carnage and death. I can already tell that the world and the necessities of self preservation are going to corrupt her. She's going to grow up and get older and turn cold and heartless because of all the stuff she has seen. It is horrible but probably unavoidable. I'm pretty sure she has watched someone get killed at least once in every single episode and sometimes more than once. Now Lee is teaching her how to shoot a gun. I try to do right by people in these games but I feel like I'm failing on so many levels. I feel like I could have saved so many people or stopped so many bad things from happening in this episode. Maybe it is the narrative and world building being so wonderful that does that to me. I'm pretty sure that the way these games work is that you cannot save the people who leave/die/whatever but damn I still get that feeling that if I had only done more things would be better.
9. Injustice 2 (PS4) - Finished on January 21 - 7 hours
I completed all chapters in story mode including all alternate scenes. I've opened up my boxes and messed around with single player fights a little bit. I enjoy the game but I'm not the competitive fighting game playing type. I really enjoyed the story again. I wish there was a Justice League or DC Universe action game in the same universe that Injustice takes place in. I think it is such a fresh take on the characters to have them fight and squabble. Even though I know Superman is a jerk I still have hope he will listen to reason. I still feel for him in the Batman ending of the game. I still want the family to stay together so to speak. I think a dynamic like that where there is an uneasy alliance between former friends and allies could really work in a game with similar style to the Batman Arkham games. I may continue to play offline and see how long it takes to raise characters to the max level just to equip some of this gear that I earned from playing the story. Some characters were fun to play as and I can definitely feel some good combos.
10. Pokemon Leaf Green (GBA) - Finished on January 27 - 23 hours, 30 minutes
I was in the mood for Gen 1 after finishing Ultra Sun and romping through Kanto in a Gen 2 game last year. My team consisted of Blastoise, Nidoking, Ninetales. Hypno, and Raichu. The Hypno was really bad. Low special attack throughout the game and couldn't OHKO Bruno's fighters during the E4. Blastoise and Raichu were the backbone of the team. I opted for only five main party members to challenge myself a little bit and alleviate the grinding that would come with having six. You are overleveled for much of the game but the final two gyms and the Elite Four catches things up fairly quickly. Lorelei is really the worst. Quite a few bulky and annoying pokemon that I can't dispatch quickly. Had my Hypno hurt itself in confusion three times in a row dying to a Lapras that was in critical health. Just super frustrating fight despite having multiple pokemon and moves that have the type advantage. I really like Gen 1 as a whole. I enjoy the region and how well paced things are for the most part. I feel like the EXP curve is bad in the mid game because there are many paths you can take that all lead to the same place. Also feel like in the latter part of the game a major dungeon should have been somewhere. After Silph Co you just have a few routes and that is it. It would have helped the EXP curve out a lot. These remakes are great and improve upon the failings of the original games in many ways. Better move pools, better looking and sounding, fixes for many infamous glitches and bugs, and still managing to keep all the cool and quirky things from the original script that everyone remembers. Still a fun experience almost fourteen years later.
