I've been making a list of games I want to play this year. I write down games coming only a month ahead because release dates are usually solid by then. After that I rate them by how much I want to play them. The highest rated go to my Gamefly que. Two months in and I don't have a five star, or "must-play", game yet, until now.
I've put 26 hours into Hitman 2016. That would be a healthy amount of time for any action/stealth game. But I've spent that just on the first episode. And there are 7 or 8 of them. Needless to say, I like this game. I've always liked Hitman, since I was introduced to the series with Hitman: Silent Assassin, the second game in the series. On PS2, in an age when games like this (aimed at the PC puzzle solving and immersive sim crowds) were not that common on consoles. But back to the new game: 26 hours playing the same level over and over again. Not only can you spend a lot of that time figuring out your own way to pull off assassinations and mastering the lay of the land, item placement, NPC schedules and behavior, etc. but there are a host of developer assigned challenges to complete. You'd think after 26 hours and dozens of mission restarts I'd have everything figured out, and I mostly do, but some of these challenges throw you real curveballs and have you going back to pay attention to things you completely overlooked.
It’s hard to believe that it’s already been over five years since I helped PixlBit ring in Final Fantasy’s 25th anniversary with an exhaustive retrospective series, but here we are. Even though I missed the actual 30th anniversary of my favorite game franchise, I couldn’t let that milestone pass without doing something to show my love for this epic saga. To that end, I submit to you, our dear readers, my ordered ranking of the fifteen main games in the series. Naturally, this excludes spinoffs like Final Fantasy Tactics and direct sequels like Lightning Returns, and this is very much my list and in no way is PixlBit’s definitive order. But hey, everyone loves a good list, right? Each game features a quick paragraph reprising some of the information from the FF Retrospective, and a more personal take on each entry. I hope you enjoy!
I ended up with these when a Gamestop didn't have enough Skylanders to fill out the 5-for-2 sale. I'd like to try that Chibi-Robo game sometime.
Well, it looks like Nerds Without Pants is reaching the end of Chrono Crossing. I didn't consistently participate in it, and I regret that. But I enjoyed talking about my favorite games of every year. Brought back a lot of memories.
Last year, Nintendo released the NES Classic Edition, a smaller sized 8-bit NES shaped console with 30 classic games. It’s been notoriously hard to find, and I’ve been a bit bummed that I haven’t been able to get one. But I wasn’t TOO upset because most of the games I played on the NES were from Capcom, not Nintendo (Mega Man and Disney games). But the 16-bit Super Nintendo is my all-time favorite console ever. It was the gaming console that really cemented my preference for console games, and the system just clicked for me for some reason. So when Nintendo released the SNES Classic Edition in the same vein this year, I REALLY wanted to get it. Luckily, my family got it for me for my birthday! Nintendo DID say they were making more of the SNES Classic Edition, and I don’t know if that’s really true or not, or if we were just more prepared this time. But not only was I able to get one, but three of my brothers got one, too! So to celebrate me getting a SNES Classic Edition, here’s a blog about all the games on it!
10 Years of Super Mario Galaxy!
BOO! Happy Halloween! I’ve got a few spooky themed game reviews I’ve recently posted at GamerDad.com! And some not so spooky ones as well. Please click on the links and read as many as you can, and maybe even post a like or comment or two. I’d really appreciate it. Read on…if you dare!
Egad, hope you’re ready for this hellacious edition of Nerds Without Pants: Halloween Havoc style! We are joined by Blake to talk about characters that spook us, movies that chill us, and podcast lengths that make us quake with fear. If you all get to the end of this, well…you’ll see.
My hype for E3 is OVER 9000!!!
These are in order of release date, earliest to latest. Click the hyperlinks to go to the official pages.
Recently I reviewed The Disney Afternoon Collection. It’s a compilation of Capcom’s NES titles that were based on shows on The Disney Afternoon, a block of Disney cartoons that aired back in the late 80’s and early 90’s. I really loved watching The Disney Afternoon as a kid, and I also enjoyed the NES games a lot, too. In fact, many of the games on this collection are more memorable to me than titles like Mario! They could’ve called this the Cary’s Childhood Collection! So I thought I’d go into more detail and share my memories of each of the NES games on this collection, and the cartoons they’re based on.
Netflix announced yesterday that an animated Castlevania series will be coming to the streaming service this year. It will apparently be a very violent, adult-aimed series based Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse and written by Warren Ellis. I am certainly intrigued. We haven't had anything Castlevania for several years now. Maybe Konami will leave the doldrums of pachinko behind and come back to making awesome games! But I'd settle for them licensing out their many great properties for other to work on at least. And hey, we're getting a Bomberman game on the Switch. I never thought he'd be getting a new game.
My friend Mark just told me about this remaster of Bulletstorm coming in April. It's being published by Gearbox and will have new modes and levels. Best of all, if you preorder it, you'll get to play as Duke Nukem! They recorded all new dialog for the campaign with the voice actor John St. John, the original voice of Duke Nukem. This feature puts this in the must-play category for me and I'll be preordering it sometime closer to the release date.
Well another E3 has come and gone, and this was the first year in a long time that I wasn’t quite as interested in it as I usually am. But there was still enough stuff that I could write a blog about, so here it is!
I missed Sony's E3 press conference livestream due to work, but was able to catch the highlights. Looks like they have a pretty great lineup:
I think it’s safe to say that the unveiling of the Xbox One a few years ago was one of the most tone-deaf, poorly received debuts of a video game console since, well, Sony commented that people would get a second job to afford their $599 PlayStation 3 all those years ago. Since then, Microsoft has been doing everything in its power to right those wrongs and bring their console up to the user base that the PS4 currently enjoys. This E3 continues that trend and, while there were very few surprises, the Microsoft press conference put the emphasis squarely on exclusive games and community.