Episode 12 discussion thread: http://www.rfgeneration.c...rum/index.php?topic=11496
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With RFGeneration's 2013 successful donation drive being done and over, this episode is dedicated to the generous donors that helped keep the site afloat. The small scores section will be dominated by the finds from our benevolent donors that gave through the end of the drive (Feb. 1). Feeling left out this time around? Too bad you should have given us money!!!
In addition to the sites donation drive us podcasters held a little auction to raise some extra RFGen fundage for a guest spot on the show. Our lucky (that's debatable) winner was Nupoile!! His fearless and charitable spirit saw him talking with the 3 of us about what drives him to collect, how he goes about it, and why the Odyssey 2 is so amazing.
Thanks so much to everyone who chipped in in any way (not just financially) to keep improving the best gaming database on the net. This year's donation drive was successful because of the amazing community that supports RFGeneration and keeps it growing and thriving. I know were not alone in looking forward to many more years to come of sharing our fascinating hobby through the medium of RFGeneration!!
Sites mentioned in the show:
Arcade Gear: http://www.arcade-gear.com/
Music: The Guardian Legend (NES)
2:04 Intro
8:18 Small Scores
4:02:03 Interview with Nupoile
5:27:09 Outro
The 2013 Donation Drive has now concluded. Our goal was to raise $1000 in just over a month's time. But were we successful? Well, yes, but not quite technically. In the time frame of the donation drive, we received $995.78. But, we also received an additional $40.75 from the auction of the guest interview spot on the Collectorcast. And another $6.00 from some Atari games I donated to the cause. And then we received an additional $60 donation just after the deadline. So we did receive enough to keep the site alive for another year! But since we didn't reach the goal within in the time frame of the donation drive, there won't be an all-expense paid trip to Hawaii for the donors like I was planning. Oh well, guess there's always next year.
Seriously though, I'd like to thank everyone who helped us out this year, it really is greatly appreciated. Just like we rely on members for our DB information, we also rely on our member donations to pay for our server. We really mean it when we say we wouldn't be here without our devoted members.
So thanks to all these people who donated this year:
- Sack
- Engel 762
- OatBob
- Bildtstar
- Razor Knuckles
- nupoile
- Techie413
- slackur
- moonraker_fats
- bum-man
- CoinCollector
- singlebanana
- Wempster
- RetroRage
- Sauza12
- ryanflucas
- ericeskapade
- Johnny Nintendo
- fatken53
- monkees19
- Barracuda
- DaveMMR
- Silver80
- pwpcody
You 24 may now proudly tell everyone that you helped support THE Classic and Modern Video Game Databases financially.
And of course, there are the matter of some prizes to be handed out. First off, if you've been listening to the Collectorcast, you've been hearing all about the donors as they donated, and there's still plenty more to come in the next episode.
If you've been keeping up on the Podcast section on the forum, you've probably already heard that nupoile won the auction to be on a future episode, so we've all got that conversation to look forward to.
And the biggest donor we had this year was Sack who donated an astounding $200! This awesome donation entitles him to have his choice of any two items from the RFGeneration Store.
Again, thanks to all who donated this year, and in past years. If you wanted to donate but didn't have the extra funds to do so, don't worry, you can donate at any time. Just click on the little "Donate" toward the top of the forum page. Or you can shop at our store, each sale price includes a percentage that goes back to us.
There was a time when I thought that the shoot-em-up was the dullest video game genre out there. I'm serious. I'm not afraid to admit my ignorance. It's totally true. But there was a chain of events that led me to discover three very important games (at least to my own gamer development). Games that caused me to fall deeply in love with the genre. Not surprisingly all three games were very different from each other -- but those differences caused me to realize that shmups were not the boring "everything is just Space Invaders with different sprites" that I had originally thought.
The first game that led me to this conclusion was Galaga and I was introduced to it as part of Racketboy.com's Together Retro game club back in early 2009. I remember dreading the thought of playing such a game for a full month, but then getting completely sucked into it for 30 days. To this day I consider Galaga one of my favorite games of all time. It's the one game that I seek out the second I find myself inside an arcade. I love the rare chance to get to play this masterpiece on original hardware. And I've since purchased way more Namco Museum collections than I care to admit.
The second game was Chaos Field -- introduced to me here on RFGeneration all those years back when Crabmaster2000 was still doing his "Unloved" series of blog posts. I remember him comparing it to Shadow of the Colossus in space -- a description so odd that I had to look into it. And really the game is odd, or rather unique in that it's basically just a boss rush with stunning music, incredible visuals and a solid dual-field mechanic that is addictive as all get-out.
But the third game I discovered totally on my own.
 
Shikigami No Shiro II (or Castle of Shikigami II as it's known in America) is a truly unique shmup. Rather than space ships you've got tiny little flying characters, all animated so impressively. The characters are definitely something that the developers Alfa Systems obviously cared a great deal about. Unlike most shmups which offer you three or so ships to choose from, Shikigami II gives you eight. And each character has an insane storyline to play through. Of course if you're playing the DC port it won't matter if you're an English speaker. But the translation (available on the PS2 port) proves that the story is so bat-poop insane that it doesn't even matter if you're following it or not. In fact, you have the option to turn off the dialogue which is often helpful as it can actually interrupt the flow of things.
What really matters is the game. And the game is just incredible to look at. Though the sprites are tiny they are well detailed. And the Dreamcast version does in fact offer a tate mode for those of you (like me) who are deranged enough to have monitors that you can rotate. And trust me it's totally worth it. This game looks incredible in its original vertical display mode. And audio-wise the game offers up one of my absolute favorite shmup soundtracks of all time.
 
The gameplay is incredible though, and that's why you're really reading this. You've got this tiny little character with an even tinier hit box. Each character (remember there's a lot of them) plays completely differently -- with different "Shikigami Attacks." Believe me when I say that each character can feel like you're playing completely different games. It's a very deep system. But what's even more intense is that you get far more points if you kill an enemy when grazing bullets. This alone adds an insanity to the game that is riveting. It's a truly unreal risk vs. rewards system where you must put yourself in constant danger in order to score higher. And this system alone means that once again, playing the game for score or playing the game for survival are two totally different games.
Though Shikigami No Shiro II is not the true bullet-hell that games (such as releases by Cave) would be later, they are also not quite as borderline old-school as say Psikyo's (Gunbird, etc.) would be. In this sense it's a similar bridge-game from old school and bullet hell though leaning far more toward the latter -- and of course you've got the crazy grazing dynamic to consider. This game is intense, and incredible and highly, highly recommended.
In Part 1 of my critique on video game categorization I posed the question "Can the Zelda games be considered RPGs?" My stance is that these games cannot be labeled as Role Playing games on the basis that they do not depict the character growth, statistic building, and depth of narrative required of games of the genre.
The Zelda series no doubt presents many enthralling story lines, but the characters are subject to the direction of the narrative. Consider these games to be akin to a Greek myth in which the hero is a victim of the fate determined by the gods. Like Odysseus, Link must take up arms, embark upon a journey of epic proportions and cope with an unalterable destiny. The characters of Adventure games are driven by the story. RPGs display the opposite. The characters push the narrative forward.
Despite this critical fact that separates Adventure and Role Playing games one cannot argue that both involve playing the role of a hero on an adventure. This is why I am not comfortable with the term "RPG." Modern video games, and even many retro titles, cannot be pigeon holed into just one genre category. A game such as Secret of Mana is rooted in the RPG basics and incorporates gameplay elements from the Adventure genre. Titles that merge these two genres are too conveniently labeled as Action RPG. This does provide insight on the game's play style, but does not accurately identify the game as a whole. My solution to this is to look at the adventure itself, the context in which it takes place, and whether characters grow as the game progresses.
Narrative Adventure
This is the typical RPG whether it is turn based or played out in real time. These games depict stories which are driven by the protagonist and his or her companions. Character development is illustrated via statistics, but more so in the dialogue or cut scenes. As the characters grow the story becomes deeper much like a film or novel. These games tend to be longer as more time is spent allowing the player to experience the characters and setting. The structure of the narrative often follows Joseph Campbell's Monomyth.
Fantasy Adventure/Action Adventure
The story is set in a fantastical world which has power over the hero. The protagonist's shortcomings do not impact the story; in this case the story predetermines his or her weaknesses. The focus of these games is directed more to the player having to adapt to and overcome challenges presenting by in game obstacles. These games also follow the Monomyth structure, but take the shortened path which is shown in the upper portion of the diagram.
I've enjoyed looking at what constitutes an "RPG" and like that there is no definitive answer. My solution for the categorization problem uses the characters and storyline of the games, as I feel they are integral to a great gaming experience. What are your thoughts on these labels? How do you identify what is and isn't a Role Playing game?
The 2013 RFGeneration Donation Drive is nearly over! Have you donated yet? If you have, thank you, it is very much appreciated. Your money is hard at work keeping us online for everyone to enjoy the database and forum, ad free. If you haven't donated yet, you have until February 1st to get this year's extra special prizes, but you can still donate any time of the year. If you're not planning on donating, we may send our most dangerous Canadian, Crabmaster, after you. And we wouldn't want that to happen.
If you're on the fence about donating, here's some reasons why you should donate.
- This site is completely free for everyone to use, and its 100% ad free. Something I'm sure everyone knows is incredibly rare these days on the Internet. What other websites do you know of that don't have any ads?
- Our Database is huge and its expensive to host. It costs us about $1000 a year to pay for a host that keeps this site up and running at a good speed. It takes a lot of storage space to keep 80,000 DB entries, and 150,000 images.
- You don't need to donate a lot. Whatever you're comfortable donating is fine with us. Whether its $100 or $5, every little bit helps. If everyone who reads this donates just $5, we'd likely meet our goal by February 1st.
- If we meet our $1000 goal, you won't have to look at any more of these messages for another year. If we don't, expect another round of these we start running low on funds.
- You actually get something for your donation. Every donation will get you the coveted Donor rank on the forum which gives you access to a special forum board where you can read about upcoming features and just chat with fellow donors. And if you're the top donor this year, you'll get any two items from our Cafepress store. And thanks to the Collectorcast, you can donate $5 to have your name read on the podcast, donate $20 and have all your pickups read, or donate $30 to get access to the "pilot" episode of the Collectorcast.
- You can donate without actually donating. If you'd rather get something in return for helping us out, you can buy some merchandise from our CafePress store. You can buy some awesome products, spread the word of RFGen, and 10% of sales go back to us. If there's nothing there you can't live without (which I doubt, because that Beer Stein is amazing) you can also bid on our GameGavel auctions. You can win a guest interview spot on the Collectorcast, (next bid is only $38.50) or you can win a great starter collection of Atari 2600 cartridges (next bid is only $6.50).
And to show everyone who the cool kids are this year, these are the awesome members that have already participated in the 2013 Donation Drive. If you want to see all the people who have donated in past years, click here.
- Razor Knuckles
- pwpcody
- monkees19
- ericeskapade
- fatken53
- ryanflucas
- slackur
- Sauza12
- Techie413
- Engel762
- Silver80
- moonraker_fats
- Barracuda
- RetroRage
- Wempster
- Bildtstar
Those 16 people have donated a total of $560.78, making the average donation about $35. I won't say you should try to match or exceed that amount, but if you did, it would be awesome.
And if you're looking to "win" this donation drive, there is currently a tie for the top donation of $100, so please exceed that so we don't have to decide who gets the prize package. If you've already donated, the prize goes to the top total donor during the drive, so you can donate more to add to what you've already donated.
The first article in my new RPG Analysis series sparked some great conversation about community members' thoughts of the pricing of Role Playing games. We discussed some of our favourite titles and touched upon the timelessness of the genre. One comment, however, stood out from the lot. Addicted cited The Legend of Zelda as the first RPG he had played to completion.
There is no doubt that Zelda series boasts many great games in its catalogue. The debates lies here: can the Zelda games, which commonly accepted as Action Adventure games, be considered RPGs?
Continue reading Categorization Caveat: Part 1, The Problem
To call myself a "fan" of Puzzle Fighter would be a huge understatement. Since I first picked up the GBA port some years ago to quench a thirst for a portable puzzler, I have ranked it as my favorite puzzle game of all time. And though the gameplay remains the same for each of its various ports, I've for some reason felt compelled to seek out (and beat) almost every version released to date. To this day the only versions I've yet to make it through have been on the PSP and PC. With all that said, I feel like I'm a pretty good judge of the various releases. So let's how the Sega Saturn edition came out, shall we?
 
For those of you unfortunate enough to have never played the game, Super Puzzle Fighter II (there was no part I) has an extremely interesting premise. It's a puzzle game that emphasis a Vs. Mode. You will play against a human opponent or the computer. Each player selects from a roster of super-deformed versions of characters from the Street Fighter and Darkstalkers universes. The goal is to match up colored gems that fall from above and build them up into bigger gems. Sporadically a glowing sphere will drop, and if it touches blocks of its own color it will destroy them -- sending junk blocks over to your opponent. The bigger the gems you create, the more junk you'll send over. This is where the real strategy of the game comes in however. Each character has a different pattern of junk blocks that they send over. Much like in a fighting game, it is just as important to know thy enemy as it is to learn to play well.
 
The Arcade Mode of Puzzle Fighter plays well on the Saturn. The gem explosions are a bit more pixelated than in other ports, though this certainly doesn't take away from the gameplay at all. The music is excellent -- which is usual across the board as far as the various ports go. There is some loading between rounds, though they're not terrible.
If you're playing this without a friend, the real meat and bones of this game is the Street Puzzle Mode. In this mode you must play single rounds with each character to unlock various 'Goodies.' Each character has five Goodies to unlock. These range from pallet-swaps, hidden characters, background music tracks (both original and remixed), art galleries and so on. These are the sorts of extras (especially the hidden characters) that really makes this game a blast to play in single player, and ultimately opens the game up even more. It is not only one of the only games I've cared enough to "100%," but I've done in it multiple times with multiple versions.
Although this review is meant to be about the Saturn edition, I suppose that it's worth mentioning some pluses about other versions for those curious. It is worth noting that the PSN and XBLA versions do look really nice in HD but more importantly allow for online play. The XBLA version was eventually released physically as part of the 360 Capcom Digital Collection if you're not a fan of downloadable games. The Dreamcast version was only available in Japan, however it does support the VGA cable if you wish to import it. Sadly, its online play option is no longer available. And of course the GBA and PSP versions are worth grabbing if you're a fan of portable puzzlers. However the truth is that any version of Puzzle Fighter is going to be recommended by me. And really, any version will give you a great game to play.
Episode 11 discussion thread: http://www.rfgeneration.c...rum/index.php?topic=11204
How would YOU like to be a guest on an upcoming RFGeneration Collectorcast episode? The winner of this auction will get to join hosts Crabmaster2000, Duke.Togo, and Wildbil52 for an interview. http://www.gamegavel.com/....cgi?show_item=0000715716
This will be your chance to talk about your collection, share your passion for the hobby, and tell Crabby yourself why Super Metroid is great (or not, I suppose if you are one of THOSE people.)
All proceeds from this auction will go directly to support RFGeneration. RFGeneration is supported solely on donations, we have zero advertisements and everything on the site is completely free. Any and all donations go strictly to paying for our server costs. Well, what are you waiting for? GET BIDDING!
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We have talked at length in the past about many of the quirks involved with a collectors persona. Do those oddities manifest themselves into your gaming life also? The three of us reflect on our game playing to see if our collector mentality spills over. Apparently it hits some of us harder than others 
We also hope you enjoy the extended Small Score part of the podcast! Extended?!!? Thats correct. With a few generous RFGeneration members donating enough money to the site to reach our coveted featured on the collectorcast target, weve added their latest pickups to the podcast in great detail. So take the time to listen to their finds for the month and hopefully it encourages more people to donate in order to keep the site running smoothly!
Music: Revenge of Shinobi (Genesis/Mega Drive)
0:00 Auction Announcement
2:07 Intro
15:38 Small Scores
2:32:34 Gaming and Collecting Rituals
3:55:15 Closing
Of all the sports games out there, I doubt I've spent as much time on a single one as I have NHL '94. And really that's pretty impressive, as I've never been a hockey fan in real life. The only sport I've ever really followed is basketball. Though I've played many basketball games on various consoles, I can't even guess the hours I had sunk into NHL '94 before I even got to high school. Of course that was the Genesis version. By the time the Sega CD rolled around I actually did upgrade to the new disc-based port of '94, but by then I had sort of played my fair share of the game and wasn't as interested in sinking as much time into this new version. Which brings us to almost two decades later, as I have been building up my Sega collection pretty seriously with all of the focus on disc-based libraries. Though I've played a good handful of hockey games since (most notably NHL '06 on PlayStation 2 and NHL 2K on Dreamcast) it was a no-brainer that I should reacquire the Sega CD port of NHL '94 post-haste.
 
Mostly the Sega CD upgrade is the sort of shovelware that many gamers complain the console's library was full of. That is to say, it's basically the same game you already owned on Genesis with a few bells and whistles thrown in to justify it being re-released. That isn't entirely false. And it isn't entirely a bad thing either, at least now. Perhaps at the time it was disappointing to get what is pretty much just the same game again. But nowadays, there's no reason to not play this as it is still an excellent hockey game and the Sega CD version is still dirt cheap. In fact the only real negative I can come up with is that there are loading screens, although they're kept to a minimum and never really disrupt any of the games' flow.
Indeed this is still the same great NHL '94 you remember. It still controls wonderfully with a Genesis controller. It still rewards you for playing dirty -- is it just me or do the refs totally look the other way when you beat the tar out of your opponent? I mean I seriously brutalized every team I came across with the ultimate intention of injuring as many members of opposing teams as possible. By the end of the Playoffs I had still not sat a minute in the Penalty Box. And there is something really satisfying about hitting those computer plays hard. But I digress... the game also still has the same AI you remember as well. In some aspects '94 is a game that you can break pretty easily, at least against the computer. You can pretty much always just go to the right of the net, then head to the front of the net and the goalie will drop leaving it wide open for a shot. Because of this many of my games ended with 20-2 victories.
 
The back of the box boasts "500 megs of new features," so let's take a look at those. The Authentic NHL Footage is there. It's grainy, but it's there. And it really doesn't add much to the game itself. The Digitized Speech is pretty cool though. It's not in-game, but you get some nice spoken commentary before the games rather than just text. The CD Sound Effects are... well, I'm not sure they're any better than the Genesis game's sound effects. And the Real Organ Music is of course the usual selling point for a Genesis game ported to Sega CD. Yes, it's CD quality music. But of course it's not exactly a huge selling point in a game where it's used so sparingly. So ultimately the upgrade to CD isn't exactly necessary, but as I stated earlier you still can't really go wrong with a game like NHL '94 so I'd still recommend it to anyone looking to beef up their Sega CD collections.
Well, we made it, the Mayans were wrong and we survived December 2012, we'll say it was because you guys were kicking butt in making submissions. Surely, the world couldn't end with so much being done to the DB, it just wouldn't have been fair. December was the fifth straight month of increasing total submissions. And this was our best December since we started keeping track of submissions in 2006. And it goes without saying that it was so much better than what happened last December.
So what were the 5175 submissions in December you ask? Most were actually images, over 1600 to be exact. And boy do we love getting images. So who made all those image submissions? Quite a few people actually, but the majority were submitted by ericeskapade.
But of course he wasn't alone in the war on empty DB entries, the other top 10 submitters in December were Paully3433 (1444), ericeskapade (619), Sirgin (493), Shadow Kisuragi (314), Bildtstar (260), thegreatska (170), aeroc (158), CoinCollector (157), ApolloBoy (126), and raffa1985 (123). Thanks guys, you did an awesome job!
And of course we have to give some recognition to our tireless staff that approves all those non-staff submissions. In December, with over 100 approvals we had Paully3433, Shadow Kisuragi, and Izret101.
So you're all pretty familiar with what can happen in a month's time here, but you ever think of how much gets done in an entire year? Well, its roughly 12 times as much  In 2012, there were 59,374 submissions! Over 27,000 of those were images, over 12,000 new DB entries were added.
The top 10 submitters for 2012 each had over 2,000 submissions, with the top spots having 2-3 times that many. The top 10 submitters for 2012 were, Crabmaster2000, aeroc, Paully3433, Shadow Kisuragi, Sirgin, Tynstar, NES_Rules, raffa1985, Bildtstar, and ApolloBoy.
And the top staff reviewers, each with over 6000 reviews, Shadow Kisuragi, Paully3433, NES_Rules, Tynstar. Thanks to all of you who have submitted in 2012, December, or any time in the past. Every submission, however minor or seemingly insignificant helps us out. And if you haven't made any submissions, then what are you waiting for? Its really easy to get started and we have a wonderful staff and members that will help you out with everything from the most basic questions to the incredibly advanced.
I have one more "thanks" to give before I end this. And that goes to Shadow Kisuragi for going through and fixing dozens of little errors that have been occurring on the site. Some of them have been around for as long as I can remember, and I'm sure most of the RFG veterans, like me, don't even notice them anymore. But once all these bugs are squashed, we'll be able to actually focus on bringing new features to the site!
And lastly, I'd like to remind everyone of the Donation Drive currently in progress. The official Drive will end on February 1st, so if you want to get in on the action, you have a couple weeks to help out. By donating, you not only help keep us alive, you'll also be eligible for some sweet prizes, click here for more information. As of this writing, we're about 42% of the way to our goal, so don't be shy and toss a few bucks our way, you'll feel good and we'll still be here!
Alright, the cat is out of the bag. I guess the secret is out that everyone's secret match with their Secret Santa is no secret. Several people sent PMs letting me know that they had figured it out and asked if this was done by accident. It was not. Let me explain.
Last year (2011) I was late to sign up for the RFGen Secret Santa and was matched up with one of the only remaining members who didn't have a match, Techie413. I figured it out, as most of you did this year, when I saw a very familiar return address.
Fast forward to the middle of November just this past year (2012) when I asked Shadow if a Secret Santa was going to happen on RFGen this year. He told me that the staff was swamped with other work related to the site and I offered to organize the SS campaign. I made the decision to match members up 1-1 because of the RFGen buddy I gained in Techie by knowing that he was my Secret Santa.
A Secret Santa is a lot of fun, but this site is about collecting. I believe that collecting is as much about the relationships that we make with awesome people as it is about the awesome things that we acquire. I hope that by knowing who you were matched up with, you gained an RFGen buddy like I did a year ago.
Welcome to 2013! 2012 is now in the history books and what a year it was! A ton of new games, hardware, and images were added to the database. But more than that, we've added a lot of "behind the scenes" features and fixes that will help us out in 2013 and beyond. We've also learned a lot, like how important frequent backups are. So what else happened in 2012 you ask? Well, I'll remind you.
- Shadow Kisuragi took charge of fixing the regions in the European PS2 section of the DB, for the second time since his original work was lost in the outage.
- We added two new DB Contributors, Bildtstar and Raffa1985.
- TheGrue was added as a staff Programmer.
- We moved from a VPS with 1GB of RAM and 20GB of drive space. To a dedicated server with 4GB of RAM and dual 500GB drives.
- We switched the site to support only Android devices.
- We switched back to supporting other devices.
- We reached 80,000 scans in the database.
- The RFGeneration Collectorcast was introduced.
- Aeroc won the PAIN YOURSELF WITH SUBMISSIONS contest...again.
- Sirgin and Aeroc were added to staff as DB Contributors.
- We reached 70,000 titles in the DB.
- Shadow Kisuragi and his team finished fixing the regions on Euro PS2 and Xbox games.
I'd say that's a pretty good list, and it doesn't even mention the countless little things that have been tweaked or fixed over the year. So now that you've been reminded what's been happening around here. I'd like to take this time to remind how you can help the site you love. As always, you can help us become even better by simply making submissions to the DB, whether its an image or some information, it all helps. If you've already submitted everything you could and still want to help us out, you can help with the gift of a donation, as we are one week into our annual donation drive.
During the donation drive, we raise the money that is needed to keep the site online. This is the reason we have no ads on the site and can afford to have a server that can handle a database the size of ours. We're one week into the drive and have raised just over $100, or about 10% of our goal, so we've still got a ways to go. But don't worry, you know we love you, so we won't just take your money and not give anything back. Every donor gets the Donor rank on the forum and access to a special board on the forum. You also get your name forever immortalized on the Donors page. And thanks to the RFGeneration Collectorcast there are some extra special prizes. Everyone donating at least $5 will get their name mentioned on the Podcast, those donating $20 or more will have all of their scores mentioned in the next episode, and those donating $30 or more will get the download to the Episode 0 of the podcast. And best of all, the highest donor during the drive will receive an amazing prize pack including two items of their choice from the RFGeneration store, plus some other goodies that will be donated by staff members.
So please, donate to the cause if the thought of ads plastered on RFGeneration make you sick. Or if you just want to help out a friend that's always there for you.
There are shmups and there are shmups. DoDonPachi is a shmup. A very good shmup. Perhaps one of the best shmups ever made. And I spent most of last night playing it along with some buds over on the Racketboy forums.
DoDonPachi certainly has a reputation. In that sense I was maybe even a bit worried to finally get around to playing it. Y'know how sometimes people talk about a book or movie and by the time you see it you're just let down that it didn't live up to the hype? Not to mention that a recent sequel, DoDonPachi Resurrection was the first shmup I ever 1CC'd (on Novice Mode). So again I was mildly worried that going back further in the series might not be as enjoyable as a newer installment.
But it turns out there was nothing to fear at all. DoDonPachi is actually one of the greatest shmups I've ever played. Visually, it looks excellent and far from dated. The sprites are all so well detailed, the color pallet is always appropriate and the backgrounds are stunning. The music is definitely fitting as well. But really what makes the game so incredible is the balance of it all. There's such a perfect ratio of risk to reward in DoDonPachi that it's easy to see why it's still such a fan-favorite.
Not only does the game offer up three ships in the old Goldie Locks manner of Type A being the "super fast but not the strongest" ship and Type C being the "wicked slow but so powerful" ship. No the balance goes so far beyond all that if you're seriously trying to play for score. For instance there's the whole risk/reward paradox of chaining. You have a small meter that runs out rapidly every moment you're not killing something. If the meter runs out, your chain resets. Big chains make for big bonuses. But of course this means really learning a level and timing every single kill. It also means that sometimes you'll be killing in a not-so-effective way just to keep a chain going. Similarly there are icons of Bees that you can pick up throughout levels (with many of them hidden). They give you bonus points that get higher and higher with each Bee you get. But again, this means probably giving up your chain to uncover them all. The game is loaded with these sorts of decisions on how to maximize your score -- fast rapid shot or slow laser? To bomb or not to bomb? And so on.
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Perhaps the greatest thing about DoDonPachi however is that it's the kind of game that makes you better at an entire genre. The more you practice, the more you're forced to think about strategy and how to increase your score. Not to mention it's a great workout for your mind and fingers to weave perilously throughout blankets of bright bullets. And all of these skills carry over to any other shmup, be it bullet hell or non. Throughout the month I managed to pull off a score of 11,446,730 which I felt really proud of. This was a lot of improvement from my first run. And I also found a new game that I just completely love and will surely revisit often.
Episode 10 discussion thread: http://www.rfgeneration.c...rum/index.php?topic=10938
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Do words like Reproduction, ROM Hack or Pirate Cart have any place in a collector's vocabulary? There are many fringe areas of collecting that may or may not find a home in your collection. How far removed from legitimate licensed releases are you comfortable with? If playing on the original hardware is important to you, is there a way to justify playing a back up of your games?
Where can you even get these things? Why would you want them? Are you still considered a collector if you partake?
Get our occasionally nonsensical take on such subjects as we explore the farthest reaches of physical media and collecting.
Interesting side note: If you listen to Episode 10 of the Collectorcast backwards, at full blast, and playing at half speed you might just hear the most sinister and unholy of words uttered straight from the depths of Hell... emulation!!
Show notes:
Music: Legacy of the Wizard (NES)
Small Scores: 11:12
Main Topic: 2:48:29
Outtro: 4:50:42
Show links:
Retrozone: http://www.retrousb.com/
Krikzz (Everdrive): http://krikzz.com/
SD2SNES: http://stoneagegamer.com/sd2snes_deluxe.aspx
Everybody thought the first announcement was a joke.
Then we read about the price and confirmed it.
<![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GIWsdUaAA2E&rel=0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/GIWsdUaAA2E&rel=0</a>]]>
The Neo Geo X, a new 'retro' portable, straddles the fence between so many sides it would walk bow-legged. It is a sleek, modern, savvy looking machine, designed to only play games from ten to twenty years ago. It is technically an official SNK (Playmore) product, yet its guts run an emulator and roms. The 20 pre-loaded games included are widely available in compilations and downloads, yet preorders include Ninja Master's on an SD card, a title known for rarity. It is a handheld that, once placed in a slick looking docking station, becomes a console with HDMI and full sized arcade sticks.
With as many people this sets out to please (and for as many reasons, drives people away or worse, be apathetic to its existence) you'd think the thing was running for public office.
It is a system that some of us here at RFG are undoubtedly curious over, and while I'm not the guy to ask about for the technical stuff, I can at least share my thoughts after tinkering with it over the first day.
The Good:
Its pretty.
Despite having a more square form factor than most modern portables, I enjoy the 'feel' of the NGX more than the Vita, PSP, or DS line. Completely subjective, of course, but between the face button placement and responsiveness, general heft and of course, trademark clicky digital 'stick,' I'd play just about anything on this. The screen quality is not as sharp and vibrant as the Vita, but these classic Neo Geo games look great on it.
The games included:
...in a pleasant surprise, aren't all fighting games. No complaints about including Samurai Shodown II, KoF '95, Real Bout Fatal Fury, or of course Ninja Master's (more on that in a moment) but I was thrilled to have Puzzled, League Bowlijng, Last Resort, Nam-1975 and a variety of other genres represented. For being largely (and understandably) known as the '2D fighting machine', most Neo Geo games I enjoy aren't fighters. (Here's to hoping Nightmare in the Dark and Over Top show up in future SD cards.) Speaking of which:
SD card slot:
Could be what really pushes the worth of this system. New games are supposedly in the works to be released on cards, and the firmware could be updated with more features. Not to mention what hackers are already doing with it.
The arcade sticks:
Many hardcore NG fans are claiming these to be the best thing to come out of the NGX. They may be lightweight and not compatible with the older hardware, but the sticks feel solid, and the USB ports allow PC and PS3 compatibility. (of course, there are limits; trying to play the PS2 SNK compilation on a BC PS3 failed without the PS3 guide button.) Some folks are just ordering the sticks themselves.
Ninja Master's:
This helped the value of the package for me, since not only is the game tougher to track down than most AES games, but my brief time with it revealed one of my favorite old school fighters on a system known for old school fighters. The combat is fluid, animation better than average, move list decent, and it has enough originality that I want to keep at it. Its just really, really fun to play! I was impressed.
Bad:
Price. Obviously the first consideration, since many of us would drop a few bucks on this just for the novelty. True to its lineage, its one of the most expensive devices in its market for what you get. The $200 Gold LE package included the portable with a preset 20 games installed, the AES mockup docking station, one of those nifty arcade sticks, an AV composite cable and an HDMI cord (can't use a typical one, it has a small device adapter at one end.) The LE includes the SD card of Ninja Master's, which in my opinion greatly helps the value. Its a lot of stuff, and truth be told, if you never touch emulators and roms, it really is an impressive deal compared to other methods of playing some of these games. (Of course, if you don't mind downloading roms, especially on a PSP, this thing is about worthless to you.)
It comes with a lot, but there is no wifi/online capabilities, and the games are straight up roms of the AES versions (that's right, no changing most settings, adding credits, or rom tweaking. Good luck beating Nam-1975 on default credits. ) Considering what we're used to from previous SNK compilations, and the lack of online play, this definitely limits audience interests. The idea of keeping it retro is perhaps admirable, but if a gamer is hard core enough to want these limitations, chances are they already own real hardware and are less interested in a portable that plays locked roms.
Using it as a console:
Despite owning a, AES, CMVS, and NGCD, the idea that I could plug this puppy up to a big-screen via HDMI and use the new arcade sticks was a big selling point for me. That didn't work out very well. The HDMI out has no video options, and just looks terrible on the three HD TVs I tested. We're not talking about charming pixelation and low-res; we know what to expect there. No, the rampant screen tearing, washed out colors, and terrible, terrible lag means this is not the way to play these games. Big disappointment.
Using the composite cables on a SD TV yielded better results, with less (but still present) lag and screen tearing. Colors were better, but reds bled and the picture was overtly dark. Quick reads on forums proved others were finding the exact same issues. The tech-heads claim that these are from poor emulation and could be improved with a software update; lets hope. As it stands, don't buy the NGX as your method for playing these games on a TV.
The Ugly:
Its really tough to know how to feel about the NGX. As a portable, its fantastic, with a great feel, moderate (3-4 hour) battery life, nice screen, and some classics built right in. Using it as an HD console through the dock is an exercise in frustration and is not recommended, although playing on a SD TV was workable. As a gamer who rarely plays on downloaded roms, the NGX has me in mind, but since it is using roms itself but without the customization, it almost comes across as the worst of two worlds. The device takes about 30 seconds to boot up and a few seconds between loading games, a steadfast reminder of its Linux brains. The irony is that hackers are certainly going to blow this wide open with better firmware, customization, more games, and better features, but by then I could just hack my PSP and get similar results. I want to support the original hardware, but this is an interesting hybrid.
Am I glad I got this? Yeah! Not only am I a collector and Neo Geo fan, its just darn fun to play on. Getting it as a Christmas gift was perfect, as any buyer's remorse is negated, and I am very excited to see what games will be released in the future. As is, the twenty (one) games included mean even if I never get another game for it (or indeed, if no more are released) I still have a nice portable Neo Geo collection. And Ninja Master's is such an unexpected delight.
Should you get it?
...just know what you are getting into. Most can safely pass it by, some of us hardcore collectors will get a big kick out of it.
For what its worth, I already like it more than our Vita.
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