Zera

Ew, why would you play Magic the Gathering, that gross, icky gamble-pack game? Why not play Codex instead?

Does the aesthetic of this game remind anyone else of 3D Dot Game Heroes?

Oh man, I completely forgot that I speedran Shantae and the Pirate's Curse. I even wrote a little guide for it. I also forgot my speedrun time for Super Metroid was 2:45, not 1:45. I edited my post to fix that mistake. Still kinda impressive, right?

I love the concept of speedrunning, but most games are too long for me to have that level of investment where I know every nook and cranny. With that being said, I - Hold 9 out of 103 stage time records in Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury. Beat Super Metroid in 2:45. Beat Shantae and The Pirate's Curse 100% in 2:08. Beat Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment in 1:28:15. Fully S-rank every Sonic game I play (and Rodea the Sky Soldier). Completed F-Zero GX's story mode on Very Hard difficulty. I actually think Bangai-O HD is one of the best games for speedrunning. The levels are short, restarts are instant, controls are digital (so inputs are consistent), and playing fast requires nerves of steel - it's very exciting! I'm curious - what kinds of software/hardware are used for recording speedruns?

Hive with AI - A Chess-like strategy game. If you're not gonna buy the physical version, you may as well get it digitally for free. Great for two players! Uni Wars - Basically Advance Wars on your phone. There are some big differences, like hexes instead of a grid, but it's pretty good! Apparently, The World Ends With You has an Android port. Haven't played it though... Otherwise... http://lmgtfy.com/?q=rpgs+for+android

The 3DS has not "had it's run" until it stops getting good games. A new METROID was just released for it... With that being said, I'm certain that Mario Party: The Top 100 is only on 3DS to cut production costs (it does have a lot of minigames, after all).

Zera reacts to Nintendo Direct 9.13.2017 Pokémon Ultra Sun/Moon - As expected, GameFreak's insatiable greed prompts them to re-release the last generation of Pokemon. No number of Ultra Beasts will make it any better. Unless, of course, they made a game with nothing but Ultra Beasts; that'd be dope. Kirby: Battle Royale - A top-down Kirby Fighters with online multiplayer! (http://kirby.nintendo.com/battle-royale/#kirby-25th) - Vote for a copy ability you want to see in the game. Mirror FTW! Mario Party: The Top 100 - This is a cool idea, but I'm pretty sure there are at least 150-200 good minigames in the Mario Party series. Not only is Nintendo selling themselves short, but they missed an opportunity to let the fans themselves vote on minigames. ATLUS RPGs - I heard Radiant Historia was good. The rest look generic and boring. Snipperclips Plus - It's adorable. I need. Arena of Valor - Haha, I literally cannot tell this apart from LoL or DotA. DOOM & Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus - Unexpected, but welcome ports. Kirby Star Allies - *head explodes* Overall, it was an okay Nintendo Direct. Kirby saved it from being completely mediocre.

If Nintendo makes a N64 classic, they should put the original Sin & Punishment on it. It was originally intended to be released internationally, but fell victim to the N64's decline, only becoming available on the Wii VC in 2009. There are probably many who still haven't played it. It's not as good as the sequel, but it was definitely a spectacle for the N64.

If you are not wanting to play the video games you own, that either means A. You've played the s*** out of them and there is nothing left to experience or B. They simply aren't fun enough. Regardless, the easy solution is to play a game that sets the imagination on fire, like Sin & Punishment: Star Successor. Noo doubt, noooo doubt. Make sure you know what kinds of games you really like. If you don't, PM me. I am currently developing my own theory for different kinds of challenges in games, and I'm sure it won't explode in my face like an ill-advised science experiment. Good luck!

"Zones I wouldn't mind in a Sonic Mania sequel."

I heard Ben Yahtzee compare Hollow Knight (confirmed for Switch) to Dark Souls, but it looks more like a Metroidvania to me. Unless Dark Souls is like Metroidvania. (I haven't played Dark Souls.)

Microtransactions in a full priced retail game can do nothing but cheapen the quality of the game. That is why they are bad. For consumers, anyways, not so much the people selling the game. Back in the olden days (what, 15 years ago?), when you bought a console game you got The Whole Thing. And it was good. Support developers that love you, like PlatinumGames. I'm doing it, now you should too.

I don't have a PS4 or Vita. I guess it'll have to wait.

I only played one game from Falcom, namely Gurumin 3D. I thought it was pretty 6/10. If I wanted to become a Falcommie, what single game should I get my hands on?

I hope I can still keep my Miiverse screenshots... other than that, I'm not gonna miss Miiverse much. Barely used it.

There is only one F-Zero stage, and that is Port Town Aero Dive. Port Town has had some great music throughout the series... ...like this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5oXeWglbCE ...and this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Wati8Mkwf8 ...and this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfKL1nciq-o The stage is Port Town, so where is all the Port Town music? It was a strange omission in Brawl, but in Smash 4 as well? I swear they're trolling us...

Offense and defense are two sides of the same coin. If you lack one, you lack both.

Oh man, I have so much to say about Yugioh, the first (and currently last) TCG/CCG I have played. Here is the nutshell - Complexity creep is BAD. Tell someone "6+ years" old to play Yugioh, and they'll literally spend an entire day trying to parse its mechanics. Not even the individual cards, just the summoning rules and how chains work and all that junk. When you get to the cards, it's even worse. What. The. Heck. Power creep is EVEN WORSE. I reckon at least 80% of Yugioh cards in are unusable, and that's a conservative estimate. No matter how many cards you buy, you always have to buy more. I once almost had a competitive deck, and it cost me well over a full-price retail video game. F*** power creep! Cards that only come in high rarities are just another way to separate the haves and the have-nots. F*** rarity exclusive cards! So that's why I permanently quit Yugioh. It had a lot of potential to not suck. But then it sucked. Really hard. Meanwhile, David Sirlin, a professional competitive game designer (he did the Smash Bros Brawl tutorials), spent 10 years making Codex, a card game whose sole purpose was to savagely murder all the other CCGs. I don't know much else about it yet, but it looks awesome.

Taking a boss and using it late-game as a mini-boss is common in action games, as the benefit is two-fold. 1. You save dev money, yay! 2. The player has become so badass that a challenging boss is now a regular enemy. Making the player feel badass is a good thing, right? Of course, the game needs enough initial variety of enemies that the copied boss doesn't feel like a content cop-out, or padding, and I think Bayonetta does this pretty well. In fact, Platinum's budget-consciousness is pretty good - you no doubt noticed that only certain cutscenes are fully animated. I imagine another "AAA" developer would've made all the weapons and costumes paid DLC.

@Glennstavos You know, the forum has an actual poll function. If you edit your original post, you can add a poll right now. I think all the big Wii U games should be released as eShop titles on the Switch, but not at a deep discount unless you already own the Wii U version. If you're not gonna pay $50 for DKC: Tropical Freeze, then you don't deserve the luxurious privilege of playing DKC: Tropical Freeze.

If you couldn't finish Bayo 1 just because of QTEs and "atmosphere", you're probably even more petty than me. If you die on a QTE, you can hit "Continue" and immediately win the QTE. Sure, you lost a whole trophy rank, but you can otherwise continue as if nothing happened. I thought the atmosphere was very good. Everything is over the top and I really liked the music. When did you quit? Anyways, I have good news for you - Bayo 2 is both a sequel and prequel to Bayo 1. This means you can play it first and be no more confused than if you had played Bayo 1 first.

I've actually already beaten Bayonetta 2, and yes, I think it is the better game. However, I'm not sure if it's worth its own review, and if it is, I won't write it until I Collect All The Stuff on my second playthrough. Since I am currently taking college courses, that would be a while.

Nice review. Now I know what Panel de Pon and Tetris Attack are. Although, I felt it necessary to skim the longplays of each game to see what they look like. The gameplay is seemingly simple enough that I think a video alone does it justice. The visuals and mode structure heavily remind me of other SNES puzzlers. Back in the day all the cool puzzle games were getting re-skins for international release. Compare - Panel de Pon VS Tetris Attack Puyo Puyo VS Dr. Eggman's Mean Bean Machine VS Kirby's Avalanche Wario's Woods VS - oh wait, that's not a re-skin. It's almost weird that it isn't!

I would say F-Zero GX has already aged better than Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. If I could only have one for the Switch, I would pick GX. Darn it, I just created another wish to be broken.

Greetings, folks. This is my review of Bayonetta on the Wii U. I bought this game for a number of reasons - I get a whole extra sequel for free! :D Bayonetta is top-tier in Super Smash Bros. 4, so her game must be top-tier as well. Logic! PlatinumGames is known for polished, over-the-top action games. Sounds a lot like Treasure, one of my favorite developers. My game collection is severely lacking in M-rated titles. If I didn't know any better, I'd say I like colorful, fun things more than brown, gritty things. My game collection is also lacking in beat 'em ups, aside from Guacamelee and Muramasa: The Demon Blade. Let's start with an Easter egg - each time you visit Bayonetta's title screen, you might hear a different character say her name. Without even playing the game, you can already sense Platinum's attention to detail, which extends to the rest of the presentation. The environments, characters, and enemies have fantastic visual design, the music is catchy, and the game runs very smoothly. Even the cutscenes are worth watching, as they often feature insane action and some comical dialogue. So Platinum nails the presentation, but what about the gameplay? One of the reasons I enjoyed Guacamelee (Super Turbo Championship Edition!) so much was that it was deep, but accessible. Guacamelee starts with only basic attacks and throws, and slowly doles out special moves over the adventure, giving you plenty of time to absorb each one and incorporate it into your combos. ...So Bayonetta is the complete opposite of that. Right off the bat, you have punch and kick buttons for nearly forty distinct moves and combos. The in-game shop unlocks even more moves, accessories that add new mechanics, and weapons that can be mixed and matched endlessly. If that sounds intimidating as hell, it is, but beating the game only requires the most basic combos. There's also a training room during loading screens where you can practice (And you can press the - button to stay indefinitely.) Bayonetta's 15+ chapters are divided into battles, or "verses", that are ranked with medals - Stone, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and the elusive Pure Platinum, which can only be obtained by earning Platinum in each category - Combo, Time, and Damage Taken. Likewise, your medals are averaged into a trophy award at the end of the chapter. In order to succeed, you'll want to use Bayonetta's secondary mechanics. Dodging an attack at the last instant triggers Witch Time, a slow-mo that lets you whale on enemies while their defenses are reduced (fire enemies can be attacked directly, large enemies lose launch resistance, etc.). Hitting enemies slowly fills the magic gauge, while taking damage empties it rapidly. With enough magic you can perform an extremely powerful Torture Attack on one enemy, like kicking it into an iron maiden. Most combos end in a Wicked Weave, a giant fist or heel to smash your enemies (You could say they're Bayonetta's "smash attacks"... get it?). The deeper into a combo a Wicked Weave is, the stronger it is. But how do you reach your Wicked Weaves if dodging breaks your combo? The answer is Dodge Offset - by dodging while holding the attack button, Bayonetta fires her guns while dodging. Then you can continue your combo as if you hadn't just interrupted it. Another interesting mechanic is Bullet Arts - by holding the attack button, you can extend any attack into a barrage of bullets for extra damage. These two mechanics go well together, enabling you to deal constant damage and reach powerful Wicked Weaves while still avoiding enemy attacks. However, since Dodge Offset is objectively superior to normal dodging, they should've made it automatic. The only remaining piece of combat is good enemy telegraphing, but this is where Bayonetta falters. With this being a fast-paced 3D action game where enemies are fought in groups and can be partially or wholly obscured by each other or the camera, you'd expect at least one full second of startup on any attack, to ensure a minimum degree of fairness. Right? So Platinum says "To hell with that!" and creates enemies like Grace and Glory, who attack so fast that the developers couldn't beat them without modifying their AI to make them not-broken. We're talking "literally-less-than-half-a-second" telegraphs. Some enemies even attack during cutscenes, so if you don't dodge the instant the cutscene ends, you take damage. It's unfortunate that Bayonetta's challenge is blatantly unfair sometimes, as I normally love it when a game isn't afraid to crank up the difficulty. Speaking of which, there are five difficulty settings. Normal is quite tough, especially if you want good ranks. Easy (Automatic) halves damage taken and doubles damage dealt, while the punch button becomes a "give me random combos" button. It's designed to be played with one hand, so if you're an amputee, you're in luck. Very Easy (Automatic) adds regenerating health (i.e. makes you invincible), at which point you must wonder why you're not just watching a Let's Play. Beating Normal unlocks Hard, which has different enemy layouts and makes the enemies and bosses even faster. Beating Hard unlocks "Non-Stop ∞ Climax", which removes Witch Time. Now, I'd like to discuss a large number of nitpicks/caveats. None of these issues are big, but I think they're worth mentioning. See that building flying toward Bayo - QUICK PUSH THE Y BUTTO - oh... sorry... Bayonetta's dead now. I hate QTEs. Finisher attacks require you to button mash with such ferocity that you'll punch a hole through your gamepad. I hate QTEs. Each time you die, your chapter award goes down a full rank. For me, most chapters ended like this - "Hey, look at all those silver, gold, and platinum medals you earned! Here, have a stone award." "Wait, what?" On my second playthrough, I got gold trophies instead. Although Bayonetta is a linear action game, there is a bit of exploration between battles to find treasure chests for upgrades. There are extra verses in the "Alfheim" with unique battle conditions. However, not only do these affect your chapter award, but to find them you have to backtrack through areas to find portals that weren't there before. It is the most pointless and forced backtracking I have ever encountered in a video game. Some combos require that you delay a button press(s). Push it too early or too late, and you'll get a different move or start a new combo. This is complicated by the fact that different attacks have different animation lengths. The timing is strict enough that I couldn't perform certain combos consistently in an empty room, let alone during a frantic battle. With so many weapon combinations and moves, you'd expect the game to provide a safe place to experiment with combos and damage outputs, but it doesn't. There are no enemies in the training room, and basic enemies don't even have health bars. You can't tell the player "Make your own salsa," and not provide a "kitchen" to test different recipes. Witch Time doesn't work on all attacks, particularly with bosses. This makes the mechanic feel inconsistent. Bayonetta is a very solid action game. PlatinumGames has impressed me with unique aesthetics and an extremely high level of polish on everything. While the combat is a bit too technical for my taste, I do enjoy the visceral satisfaction of beating the hell out of creepy angels and watching the fountains of blood. The story is pretty good, and the chapters are filled with interesting set pieces and epic bosses. Once you've cleared the game, there are awards, unlockables, and higher difficulty modes for replay value. However, the difficulty itself relies more on reflexes than anything else, and the game's design isn't always consistent. Overall, I think there's enough content, variety, and challenge that most people would enjoy Bayonetta. (As an aside, I should mention that the Wii U version of Bayonetta has some exclusive Nintendo-themed costumes. So I guess that makes it the best version.) 7.5 out of 10 (Very Good!) Is it better than... Sin & Punishment 2? No. S&P2 is a more tightly designed game, with far more bosses that are just as good, if not better than the ones in Bayonetta. Alas, the search for "an action game as good as Sin & Punishment 2" must go on... Guacamelee!: Super Turbo Championship Edition? Not quite. Guacamelee has far less style, but is cheaper, easier to play, and fairer. It also has co-op. Okami? This is another big game directed by Hideki Kamiya. Unless you dislike Zelda games, I'd say Okami is equally if not more worthwhile. Metroid: Other M? While both games have instant-death scenarios, Bayonetta at least puts a button prompt onscreen, for long enough that you almost don't miss it. Bayonetta wins. Some videos for those interested: