Call it a new year's resolution, call it an epiphany, call it whatever you want, but I decided I wanted to do things a little differently this year. It seems like every year I say to myself "life is busy, I didn't play as much as I wanted." But rather than ape that sentiment yet again, I figured it would be better to turn it into an opportunity. The games industry is more than just the games themselves. I feel that most people who love video games naturally share an interest in the ancillary aspects of the business. And so, in that spirit, these are the most notable things about the games industry to me in 2019. The good, the bad, the ugly, and sometimes, the infuriating. I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below, so feel free to let me know what you thought about any of the items listed here, or if there was something else about the year in games you felt was particularly worthy of attention.
To get straight to the point, we did not make our goal of beating every North American licensed NES game in the year 2019. Is that a disappointing outcome? Heck no! We ended up conquering 514 of the 669 game list in a single year. We had 30 members participate throughout the year! Some of which I havn't really had a good opportunity to interact with before and it gave me a chance to get to know them better. Beyond those 30 players we had several other members offer advice and support and simply cheer us on. Even though we fell short at the end we had an incredible time exploring new worlds, gritting our teeth over challenging areas, mashing buttons faster than ever before and most importantly, sharing our accomplishments with our peers.
It was quite heartwarming to see people scratch games off their backlog, overcome childhood hurtles and discover new favorites. Every game is not a winner, but I do feel there is something valuable to learn even from playing a stinker. I hope that every player feels that the time they invested in this community challenge was as worthwhile as I did. Whether you joined us for 1 game or 100 I'm incredibly thankful for your participation.
With 2019 coming to a close, we can expect to see all the obligatory GOTY lists rolling in. Rather than do the usual Top 10 GOTY list myself, I wanted to reflect on all the games I played instead of just the new releases. 2019 turned out to be a very productive year for me gaming-wise, as my number of games beaten for the entire year sits at 125 games, so I wanted to do more of a stream-of-consciousness reflection of the highlights from my year.
In 2010, one of the fastest rising games in terms of popularity on the planet was Minecraft. Ten years later and one of the biggest games on Earth is... still Minecraft. An insane number of people have bought and played this game since its days in early alpha, and now its had well over a decade of continuous development. Minecraft continues to get some major updates long after its official 1.0 release that brought it out of its beta. So, what are some of the changes that have come over the years? And how have these updates and continuous development kept both a large number of long time players interested, and continued to bring in new players?
The first Final Fantasy game I completed was the Playstation version of the first game in 2012. I hated it. I've written about the insanely high encounter rate in that version of the game before, but it bears repeating because I never see anyone else mentioning it. Last year I played the PSP version of Final Fantasy IV on one of my Vitas and I enjoyed it quite a bit. I knew the series deserved a second chance and I'm glad I gave it one. With those two completed, I've been thinking for a long time about which game in the series would be next for me. All of the games seem interesting to me, and each title (except for IV and VI maybe) has its fans as well as its major haters. Although I thought I might skip to the Playstation era of the franchise, I decided to go to the Playstation 2. I remember the time I was a guest on the Collectorcast, Chris spoke highly of Final Fantasy XII but Bil was very persuasive making his case for the tenth game in the series. So a few weeks ago I decided once again to play through a Final Fantasy title, once again on the Playstation Vita. This is not a review, as I am not finished with the game, and I don't think I'd want to review this game even if I was. Rather, I feel a desire to share some thoughts on this very strange game.
It's been quite a year for retro game remakes, ports, and compilations, during which I have played well over one hundred different games, many for the first time. Now, I have to admit that I am burnt out a bit and in need of some gaming R&R, but before I do so there is one more title that I need to play, one which has garnered a reputation for pushing the envelope on port quality. That game is Sega AGES: Phantasy Star on the Nintendo Switch.
2019 has been an excellent year for great game releases. Death Stranding, Control, A Plague Tale, Bloodstained, Super Mario Maker 2, Tetris Effect, The Ninja Saviors: Return of the Warriors, Gears 5, River City Girls, and lots of other titles made their way into our collection this year and were greatly enjoyed. But as the title gives away, the game I give highest kudos too this year is definitely Tetris 99.
Last month, Rich (singlebanana) and Shawn (GrayGhost81) went to the "dark side" as they played a title that was both very thought-provoking and contraversial in Ninja Theory's Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. In this episode, the guys not only discuss the game's features and mode of play, but also dive deeper into the developer's concept and what they hoped to accomplish with this game. Did their efforts meet up to the guys' expectations and standards, or did it fall short of its mark? Get ready for another fun segment of the ConcertCast and hear our listeners' thoughtful and passionate answers to our Question of the Month. So tune in, give the show a listen, and ready yourself for the guys' dissection this beefy title in this month's episode of the RFG Playcast.
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on the game on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss the game more. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes and/or Podbean to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen, we hope you enjoy the show!
In Episode 018, Addicted and MetalFRO take on the legendary shmup development studio, Toaplan, and dissect their first shooting game effort, Tiger-Heli! We look at this classic both in the arcade, as well as the Famicom/NES port, and see what makes it tick, as well as exploring the early Toaplan DNA found within the game, that you see more fully explored in later games. Is this game still worth playing? Listen, and decide for yourself!
This is a bit of a departure from the normal "People of RF Generation" article. While I usually do a text survey of a member, I have gone a different direction. Since it was announced, I have been anticipating the release of the NBA Jam book in the Boss Fight Books series. Reyan Ali is the author of NBA Jam. He was nice enough to sit down for a chat about the book, his experience, and even a little Mortal Kombat...
Posted on Dec 13th 2019 at 01:00:00 PM by (Pam) Posted under video, review, fmv, PC
The 7th Guest was developed by Trilobyte and released for PC on April 1st 1993. It's an adventure game that focuses almost entirely on puzzles and uses live action video clips to tell the story as you progress. The game has an interesting development history and is notable for its place in pushing PC video game technology forward. This video takes a look at that history, the legacy of the game and how it holds up today.
We interrupt your regularly scheduled program to bring you the December 2019 edition of RF Generation's Site News! In this issue, we will announce our first Community Playtrough games of the new year, unveil the next game for our site shoot 'em up club, and of course, thank those members who sent in submissions to our site and registered approvals last month. Thanks for keeping it on Channel 3!
REMEMBER: If you have any news about upcoming events or topics that you think the site needs to hear about, please PM singlebanana and put "RFG Site News" in the subject line. Who knows, maybe your news will make our front page!
[img width=700 height=350]https://cdn02.nintendo-europe.com/media/images/10_share_images/games_15/nintendo_switch_4/H2x1_NSwitch_TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening_image1600w.jpg[/img] Image shamelessly linked from Nintendo UK. The new art style is a nice compromise between shiny, flashy graphics, & a respectful homage to the original.
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening is a landmark title in a series that is highly lauded by the gaming community. Not only did it manage to successfully take the formula established in the series' debut title, and solidified later in A Link To The Past, and shrink it down to a portable format, but it also told a unique story that deviated from the established canon quite a bit, and became its own experience. Despite the large number of entries in the series since its release, many of them on other Nintendo handheld devices, Link's Awakening is still often spoken of as being in the upper echelon of titles in the series, and, indeed, on the Game Boy itself. It's not unusual to see it in a top 5 list of Zelda games, and even occasionally sits atop a list at number 1. It's no surprise that Nintendo, having seen some success with remaking the Game Boy's only outing for Samus Aran, in Metroid II: Return of Samus for the 3DS, would return to the Game Boy well again, and give Link's first portable adventure a fresh coat of paint.
If you find yourself in Paris head to the 11th District. Walk down Voltaire Blvd and you'll be surrounded by shops catering to video games, manga and electronic devices. Here in the heart of this mini Akihabra you'll find Trader Games. Established in 2002 they sell video games of all eras and specialize in retro games. I recently visited Trader and brought my camera so let's take a look.
