Really struggling with titles here. Oh well. Kind of a slow week too, but there were a few big highlights. I was occupied for some of the time with seeing friends and family, so that was nice. In terms of games it was more of the regulars such as Rayman and the same iOS distractions.
However, I did coax the SNES into life several times to play one of my all-time favourites, Yoshi’s Island. I think the supertitle is stupid and misleading so I never use it. It holds up. I do notice some slowdown now and then, some frames dropping that I’m sure I never did before. The level design and so forth is something that I’m also more aware of as a mature gamer with analytical skills, and it’s really good in those terms. (I’m also following along in my playthrough with Reed’s (or Rodanguirus’s) excellent analyses on nintendo3dsdaily.com.) References to other Mario games are also there, while as a child this was pretty much my first Mario game without that context. I still loved it then and I love it now. It’s a similar feeling to my BC Kid experience, my muscles remember everything. Playing the game for me is literally child’s play. It’s one of the reasons the DS sequel was fun for me, familiar mechanics but new levels and harder overall. And while that sequel was somewhat lacking in execution, this is very polished.
An amusing side effect of me playing this game is a large wedding invitation sticking out of my console. You see, the plastic is a bit loose on the old thing and the cartridge isn’t always in contact with the, er, contacts on the interior necessary for the thing to function. So it has to be wedged forward slightly to ensure it works, necessitating a physical card stuck behind the cart. I might try this for future games too, might not need so much blowing and reinserting.
So that’s fun and I’d really like for my wife to see why these games I loved are great. Perhaps nostalgia is too big a part, or maybe she’s not enough of a gamer, but she’s not too interested. Can’t blame her really. I’m not one of those people who gets annoyed if people don’t like the same things I like. But I do like to show her anyway.
Speaking of that, and something I forgot to mention last week, we did find a game that we love playing together. We regularly play Little Inferno and Royal Envoy 2 on her iPad, and also Puzzle Agent until we finished it. This week we were having a go at Botanicula, which has such a great atmosphere. From the makers of Samorost and Machinarium, which I think I played with her help. This time she initiated it and controlled it for the most part, with me looking on and making suggestions, etc. It’s really the way adventure games were meant to be played, or it seems like it. Many of the challenges are not skill-based, so it works. Often adventure games do seem to include arcadey segments, and this was no exception. That was my time to shine.
So the game looks and sounds fantastic. It’s chock full of unique, weird little characters that you briefly interact with. Some let you progress, some just do a weird thing and you move on. The sound design is adorable and really imaginative, with all sorts of quirky musical and sound effects. I’m coming up with lots of adjectives here to say that it’s a really imaginative indie game, basically. As for the game, it’s a point and click adventure game. Very similar to their previous ones I mentioned earlier, especially Samorost. Your character is a party of 5 little plant people, like a seed and a mushroom and stuff, each with their own skills. You just click around and stuff happens. It’s great! It’s got a rich world and a recognisable story which is told completely non-verbally. Anyway it’s very compelling and it was gratifying to be able to play it together.
What else… I started playing Spirit Tracks. The latest Zelda game, apart from that silly Wii one. Just kidding, I’m sure Skyward Sword is great! Spirit Tracks is… quite different to most Zelda games, which is a good thing. The DS games are like a totally different thing, not 2D Zelda, not 3D Zelda. Completely touchscreen controlled, which is well executed I think. The dungeons are quite short, and have a few large rooms instead of many small rooms. The enemies have started getting more interesting and the items are cool too, although I’m glad I have the boomerang now and don’t have to keep blowing all the time, it was making me dizzy. I thought the game itself would be short, but I had a peek at some stuff on the Internet and was excited to find there was more to the game than I thought, I think it will start opening out a lot more soon.
It’s just great to see the formula shaken up a bit. Zelda as a series is quite rigidly formulaic, so it’s the standout games I love the most, like Majora’s Mask. Twilight Princess is good too as I’m playing it, who knows what hindsight will bring though. Having said that, this game apparently closely follows the formula established by the other DS game, Phantom Hourglass. But I haven’t played that and there are only two, plus this one apparently does it a lot better. Anyway I really like being in that Zelda world but having a whole new way to interact with it, by tapping things and the trains and all that. The setting started out a little boring actually, with the empty-feeling castle and town, but I really warmed to it once I found the Anouki guys in the snow area, they were well written and I liked the forced interaction. I also look forward to meeting people in other lands, such as the Gorons, and fleshing out this world of New Hyrule in my mind.
Well that’ll do for this week. I seem to have followed my plans from last week pretty well, but I kinda forgot about Run That Town and I didn’t have my friend over, I met him somewhere else. Didn’t make any TP progress either but that’s life. Oh and I still haven’t given up on Rockman Xover completely. Oh well.
