Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

March 31st

Today's challenge is: Favorite Sports Game.

This theme was suggested by thesunfan.

Here we are, FINAL DAY OF THE CHALLENGE! And this another obvious one, so no need to think about it too hard. It's also pretty funny, since both Evascythe and T-Force wanted to give me a sports game theme, but they both had second thoughts. Greg is a little bit of a major tool for being the one to suggest the theme since he asked me about it a few months ago, unless he wanted me to talk about it some more. I do not mind that one bit however, since today, I'm talking about Windjammers. And Windjammers kicks ass.



Before getting into it, I have to explain an additional rule I made for myself when I got this suggestion. It wouldn't have changed anything since I love Windjammers, but I wasn't going to include non “ball” sports games. It's unfair to compare a football game with a racing or fighting game, so I don't want anyone thinking “Herp Derp, you didn't even think about F-Zero GX, woooooooooooow what a gamer”. Besides, when people mention sports games, they're not talking about games like that, but instead whatever FIFA, NHL or NBA 2K whatever game is out.

While planning for this challenge, I tried to at least have one game representing every major player in the video game industry. There's been games for Nintendo, SEGA, Sony, even one each for Microsoft, NEC and Atari. I feel like this list is missing one more company, which mostly left its mark in the arcade market, but who still released what was once hailed as the Rolls-Royce of home consoles, the Neo Geo (AES or MVS, but I'm not going into that, nor am I qualified to). And that's what Windjammers is on.



I've known about Windjammers ever since LimitedRun announced they would release it for Vita and PS4, but I had never actually played it. My first time having a crack at it was while I was in Montreal. I was wearing a Hatsune Miku wig that a friend gave to me because he found it uncomfortable to wear, then we went to an arcade bar. When I saw that they had this game there, having at least seen how it works, I immediately asked Felix to play it with me. We did just that, and I was really impressed at how fast it went, how the power moves worked, and how you could just slide all across the field. I sucked big time at it, but I thought it was awesome.

Shortly after that, a friend of mine who works in an independent game store messaged me and asked me if I was interested in a collector's edition of Windjammers for the PS Vita. Naturally, I said I was, and picked it up not long after. I immediately started grinding for it, and even borrowed someone else's console (and bought him the game too) to grind away at that online multiplayer trophy on my own. Getting the platinum trophy was actually really hard, as the arcade mode is no joke, but I enjoyed every second of it.



That's it for my experience with the title, now about the game itself. The game is actually a Frisbee game, and is known in Asia as “Flying Power Disc”. There aren't any differences between the Asian and western versions other than one of the characters (who represented korea) was palette swapped to represent the UK instead. Your goal is to either shoot the disc in the opponent's goal (sort of like how you play air hockey) or have it land on the ground with your opponent unable to catch it in time. There are some bumpers in between the fields for an element of randomness as well. A game is won by winning 2 sets, and a set is won by getting 12 points. Goals either give 3 or 5 points depending on where the disc goes through, and throwing it on the ground on your opponent's field is worth 2 points.

You should also know that this is to Frisbee what the Prince of Tennis anime is to Tennis, meaning you can expect all sorts of fireball launching and physics breaking moves in this game, complete with attack names typical of a Japanese anime. There are also 6 playable characters. They each represent a country, and all come from a different sport. There are guys from Germany, Spain, the USA, Italy or the UK/South Korea (depending on which version of the game you are playing, as mentionned before), and also a Japanese girl. They all throw, receive and move differently depending on their builds, but the real difference lies in their special attacks. The Japanese girl throws can throw it in a snaking pattern reminiscent of an Asian dragon, the UK/Korea guy can throw it against the wall which makes it go forward like an electric buzzsaw, and so on. Some characters are also more likely to be thrown in the goal along with the disc if it's thrown hard enough at them, and you can reverse special attacks against their original users.



Graphics wise, like most of what is on Neo Geo, there is absolutely nothing to complain about. It looks perfect, and I also love the referee making the calls. I wouldn't listen to the soundtrack on its own, but coupled with the sound effects, I can almost feel the arcade excitement as though I was playing in an actual arcade, much like the way I felt the first time I played it. One more thing to say about this is that there is a sequel to Windjammers that was announced 2 years ago and that is supposed to come out sometime soon on the Switch, which, like Cuphead, was also a title that factored in heavily in me buying the Switch earlier that I otherwise would have. It doesn't look all that great in comparison, but since I haven't had my fill of the original game, I'm looking forward to that one as well.

In between some of the matches on arcade made, you also had some minigames. One involved throwing a disc with a dog by your feet, and you'd control the dog as he ran for the frisbee while dodging and jumping over various obstacles. The other one was a bowling minigame, and you'd just throw the disc at some bowling pins.



The modern console version of the original game is quite faithful to the old school version, and you should feel obligated to watch the trailer for it, as it ranks among the greatest game trailers of all time in my opinion, and I'd say it is tied for my favorite trailer along with Ace of Seafood.



This is another ludicrously expensive game on the original system, costing a 4 digits figure, but honestly that's par for the course for the Neo Geo nowadays. Otherwise, you can get the rerelease on PS4, PS Vita and Switch.

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

April 1st

Today's challenge is: Recap and afterwords.

Wow, it's finally over. I've gotta admit, it was really fun to write these, though sadly, with my messed up, overloaded work schedule (I haven't had a day off since like halfway through February, with sometimes multiple shifts per day) it ended up being extremely strenuous to keep up in the second half of this challenge.

There are a few interesting things I'd like to point out. First of all, even though a lot of this was about my personal experiences with gaming in general, I haven't actually picked anything from the 5th and 6th generations, which are probably the most well represented in people of my age group, and I'm no exception to this. There are a lot Nintendo 64, Playstation 1 and 2, Xbox, Saturn and Gamecube games I could have talked about, but I guess that wasn't happening this time around (No, fuck the Dreamcast, retarded overrated console, that's it I said it, shots fired). I'll probably have to do another challenge like this with a similar set of rules, with an additional one being that I shouldn't be allowed to use any title I've used in this one, because it feels just wrong. I can tell myself that I've had a Neo Geo and a GBA game, which sort of counts for each of the missing generations, but that's not a very satisfying perspective. Plus, there isn't even a Mario game in this thing, and that was in consideration for favorite active franchise, lol. So yeah, sometime in the future, I might do this again.

Another thing that's strange to me is the genre representation in this challenge. Sure, ok, I was bound by the themes and rules and could not freely talk about everything, but it was still pretty bad. There isn't a single rhythm game in all of this, and it's my favorite genre of all time. I did have consideration for the Project Diva games for “Favorite Active Franchise”, and I would have loved to talk about the spinoff games as well, like Uta Kumi 575, IA/VT Colorful and Miracle Girls Festival, but the fact that I'm not a huge fan of Future Tone ruled it out, unfortunately. I also did mention that the game I was always coming back to could have been either Stepmania or FlashFlashRevolution, but my “no PC” rule killed those options. There are also 3 turn based RPGs (and fucking Heavy Rain), and that's just awful proportional representation of my personal interests. Finally, I also feel like I started leaning too deep into the anime games in the second half, and I know some people really dislike those, so a little more variety wouldn't have hurt.

Despite this, most of the games on this list are among my favorite games of all time, many of which were my #1 picks on whatever systems they were on, and I'm really curious to know if people who have kept up and read all of my entries have a better understanding of why I like video games and what I like in them. Speaking of this, I have gotten feedback that I was picking too many “obscure” titles from a few people, and I'm wondering if this is a problem. I don't think the majority of them are all that obscure, but very few are what you'd call “mainstream games”. I can see Cuphead and Breath of the Wild being that, with maybe Heavy Rain and Other M being slightly in that territory, and the rest being games that, say, my parents would have have never heard about. On the flipside, It's not like I only talked about unreleased prototypes and shit like that, and that's probably what some other people would have prefered reading about. At the end of the day, I was mostly putting myself through this for my own satisfaction, as it's yet another way to do something out of my general interest in video games. I still like to hear what people think, however, since that's also a super fun part of the hobby.

I also feel a little sorry that my approach to this challenge was rather inconsistent, but to be fair, I went in a little blindly. The only days I knew for sure what I was gonna write (or had anything else pre written for) were the final 5, the rest I just crammed in on a day-to-day basis. I also wanted to keep these short and easy to do daily, but that quickly went out the window. I also wish I started making gifs earlier on, since those are so much more fun to watch whenever they're appropriate, as they tell far more than still images without making people have to click links or anything. That sucks, because some of the earlier games I talked about, I would have gone far more in depth with (looking at you, Gravity Rush 2). That being said, I still feel satisfied with the end result.

Lastly, special thanks to Phil and Felix among others whose names came up many times through this challenge, and this really did put into perspective the influence you and a couple others have had in my gaming life. Most of you guys are friends I made through our shared interest in the field, and that too led me as a gamer and a human being. Y'all r0xx0r my b0xx0rz off. Can't wait to expand dong some more with you bromingos.

Again, I'm open for suggestions for whenever I decide to do something like this again, so please slide into my DMs if you have anything to suggest or if you simply wanna talk games, since that shit gets me fired up.

Hope y'all enjoyed!

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

Rest in pepperoni

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

if this is the case then oot must be your least favorite for being as on rails as it actually is

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

What? Oot is very traditional

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

wait is this thread broken, can't see next page

rly good thread, I have not played a vast majority of these; basically it's just the "big" ones I've played lol. share teh sentiment about star ocean too
ys music rips we need more charts for it

Re: March 2021: 31 days game review challenge
 

I dunno how that's the case honestly, it doesn't compare much at all with the previous titles. I'm not saying it's bad, in fact I think it's fantastic, but traditional is probably the last word I'd use to describe it. It was more "groundbreaking" than anything.

I dunno why it says there's another page, Haku thinks some posts were deleted or something.

We absolutely need more Ys music holy shit. I think there's like only one on FFR (god bless zagh)

What sentiment are you sharing from my Star Ocean post?