What Video Games Are You Playing?

[retrorussell]

RUSH 'N ATTACK
Silly manifestation of Cold War fears and American jingoism, but nonetheless a good side-scrolling action game as you, a Green Beret (and the game's alternate title), go through Russkie territory knifing and shooting (with optional weapons dropped by certain enemies) Russians on your way to save your comrades.

[cqmorrell]

Arcana Heart 3 Love Max!!!!! (yes, the exclamation points are part of the title)

2D fighting game with an all female cast featuring a half-devil juvenile delinquent on rollerblades, a girl who fights with a water-blob-thing she's halfway submerged in, a Naruto-esque ninja girl with shiba inu ears and tail, and more wacky characters.

[Olivia Bauer]

[Olivia Bauer]

I lost my 3DS with SSB in it.

I'm not the most careful of people with my belongings.

Found it.

[Olivia Bauer]

I like the main character's development a lot.

[Couchtr26]

Trying to beat Dark Souls now.  At Gwyn but don't have much time to play and having trouble finding an effective strategy.  Also, kicking myself in the ass for killing the blacksmiths. 

Has anyone seen GOG.com signed Disney/Lucas Arts?  Have been waiting for a digital release of X-Wing and TIE Fighter. 

Gwyn is easier if you summon someone to distract him. But yeah killing the Merchants is a stupid thing to do.

Yeah, finally summoned Solaire.  Went down fast. 

[Olivia Bauer]

Trying to beat Dark Souls now.  At Gwyn but don't have much time to play and having trouble finding an effective strategy.  Also, kicking myself in the ass for killing the blacksmiths. 

Has anyone seen GOG.com signed Disney/Lucas Arts?  Have been waiting for a digital release of X-Wing and TIE Fighter. 

Gwyn is easier if you summon someone to distract him. But yeah killing the Merchants is a stupid thing to do.

Yeah, finally summoned Solaire.  Went down fast. 

Yeah I ain't talkin' 'bout an AI partner. Solaire is retarded. Get another player.

[VenomX73]

[retrorussell]

PITFALL II- THE LOST CAVERNS
The arcade game by Sega, based on the classic Atari 2600 game (and the original in the series).  Better graphics, an (essentially) new world to explore, and cool hidden bonuses make this game a pretty cool arcade conversion.

[Olivia Bauer]

I must warn you, Russell. Stay away from "Super Pitfall" on NES.

You'll thank me.

[retrorussell]

I must warn you, Russell. Stay away from "Super Pitfall" on NES.

You'll thank me.

Oh, I KNOW it's awful.  Played it when it was new.  So, so very bad.

[cqmorrell]

I must warn you, Russell. Stay away from "Super Pitfall" on NES.

You'll thank me.

Oh, I KNOW it's awful.  Played it when it was new.  So, so very bad.

Rented that eons ago. Went down the first ladder, immediately died, then took the cartridge out of the NES and never touched it again.

[retrorussell]

Two good games from 1985:
NINJA (Sega)
Good scrolling shooter involving you as a kunoichi (female ninja) chucking knives and shurikens at ninja opponents.

MAT MANIA (Technos)
Good early wrestling game, but very difficult due to the litany of moves to remember and the annoying referee voice hurts gameplay.

[JoeTheDestroyer]

Of late, I've been pushing through a handful of projects. 

Geneforge 2- I don't know if any of you have played/know about Spiderweb Software's Geneforge pentalogy, but they're pretty fun indie RPGs similar to Fallout in terms of presentation and mechanics. The main differences are that Geneforge takes place in a fantasy-based world and it doesn't feature individual body part targeting like Fallout. Instead, Geneforge's core mechanism is the ability to create life forms that basically serve as party members. Depending on the kind of shaping (the ability to create life forms) you hone, you can shape creatures that specialize in melee combat, long-range combat, or "mental" combat (mostly through brain-related status afflictions, such as fear).  It's not a bad game so far, but my main complaint is that most of the territory you can explore feels like filler.  It wouldn't be so bad if exploration more consistently led to great discoveries as it did in the previous game, but so far GF2 has kind of dropped the ball there.  Then again, I'm not terribly far into it--perhaps about a third of the way through.

Rating thus far: 7/10



Assassin's Creed 2- I've been playing this one off and on.  It's been difficult to get any play time in because I don't want to play this one around my toddler. I think I dig this one better than its predecessor, and I'm glad I didn't give up on the series.  This entry eschews a lot of the required recon missions that build up to an assassination, but plus it cuts out the dull Desmond sequences.  Also, it feels like I've been doing more actual assassinating in this one.  Like GF2, I'm about a third of the way through this one. 

Rating thus far: 9/10



Saira- An exploration game available on Steam in which you travel to various planets and search for necessary equipment to rescue a friend who has been sent through a portal to the furthest reaches of space.  Pretty odd, but fun game so far.

Can't rate it just yet, as I haven't played enough of it.



720 Degrees (NES)- I'm playing this one for an upcoming review. It's a skateboarding game that, if I'm not mistaken, originated in arcades in either the late '80s or early '90s.  Honestly, I'm not impressed with it. The controls are a bit wonky and the events you compete in are quite dull.

Rating thus far: 5/10



Arc Rise Fantasia- A turn-based RPG on Wii that's quite enjoyable so far. It reminds me of some of the RPGs from the PlayStation/N64/Saturn era, except with more modern visuals.  My only complaint so far is that the voice acting is pretty cringe-worthy at times.  I also like the game's battle system, which gives you an certain amount of AP, which you can then use to input actions for any of your characters rather than having to use one action from each character.  So if you want one person to attack twice while the other sit back and remain cozy, you can, but it's not recommended.  Ideally, having each character act at least once per turn tends to be more efficient, but there are times when someone might be in peril and having them act could screw things up. 

Rating thus far: 7 or 8/10, depends on how the story develops.



Reus (pronounced "ROYCE")- A Dutch sim game where you attempt to develop a civilization. I haven't played much of it, but it seems to be a fairly simplified (in a good way) sim title. 

I also can't rate this one just yet.



Chrome- A Polish first-person shooter that hasn't aged well.  It's glitchy, enemies tend to be bullet sponges, and you usually have to hit them from very far away.  I can understand a game being difficult, but this one comes off as cheap more often than not. 

Rating thus far: 3/10



Tiki Tower- Basically a mobile World of Goo clone that was ported to the Wii.  It's difficult to control with the Wii Remote, but is so easy so far that it doesn't matter.  More than anything, the game has been quite boring.  Solving levels takes only a rudimentary understanding of trig, and every level is pretty much the same.  The game pales in comparison to World of Goo.

Rating thus far: 5/10

[retrorussell]

A kind of cool old fixed-screen shooter set in gangster-era 30s Chicago.  As an Elliot Ness-type cop, shoot down said gangsters in several different scenarios and avoid the innocent bystanders who (of course) wander right into the crossfire, and uncover little secret bonuses.
SHOOT OUT (Data East, 1985)