StarryCiel
1989
I never "got" Earthbound. I respect it, but I just couldn't really vibe with it how I wanted to. So when I tried its predecessor on a whim, I was expecting to bounce off it pretty quickly... But to my complete and utter surprise, I adored Mother. I don't think I've played a single NES game that resonated with me more.
On a purely presentation level, I love everything Mother is going for. The story manages to do so much with so little, using the NES's limited capabilities to tell a subtle but deceptively deep narrative that feels like a punch in the gut once you realize what it's all meant. The simple Peanuts-inspired artstyle is so cozy and charming, but can also feel haunting in how empty the game can feel at times. I love how Magicant starts off as this overwhelmingly surreal location, but as you return there more and more, it starts to become familiar and homely. I love the robust rock-influenced soundtrack, the existential dread of Youngtown, the abundance of weird and memorable setpieces like the desert tank and the early-game poltergeist, and the harrowingly desperate and personal final boss fight that had me more on edge than anything I've played in a while.
As for the gameplay, yeah, it's flawed. Its battle mechanics can feel archaic, its balancing can feel all over the place, and some of its puzzles can feel quite cryptic, but as someone who's played their fair share of NES RPGs, Mother is incredibly generous. The run button makes exploring Mother's massive open world an absolute treat, you get so many great grinding opportunities and immensely powerful PSI spells and are never really at a lack of options, and for all the complaints I've heard about the grinding in this game, I was stunned at how tightly-paced it is regardless. Even with the times I took stopped to grind up my party, Mother took me less time to beat than any of the Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy games on the NES yet still managed to cover far more ground. Like yeah, Mother is probably the grindiest Nintendo RPG, but that's not really saying much.
I honestly didn't expect Earthbound Beginnings, of all games, to be the one to help me understand the appeal of the Mother series, but it's funny how things work out sometimes. I think they're the kinds of games that may rub you the wrong way at first, but if you just give them a bit of your time, they'll make it worth your while. I gave Mother a chance and was immensely rewarded with one of the most sincere and affecting adventures the NES has to offer, and now I can say I'm excited to do the same with its sequels someday.
And if Mother's combat is still too much for you, play a mod. Literally any mod, there's so many out there. There is a version of Mother for everyone, and everyone should experience this one-of-a-kind game.
On a purely presentation level, I love everything Mother is going for. The story manages to do so much with so little, using the NES's limited capabilities to tell a subtle but deceptively deep narrative that feels like a punch in the gut once you realize what it's all meant. The simple Peanuts-inspired artstyle is so cozy and charming, but can also feel haunting in how empty the game can feel at times. I love how Magicant starts off as this overwhelmingly surreal location, but as you return there more and more, it starts to become familiar and homely. I love the robust rock-influenced soundtrack, the existential dread of Youngtown, the abundance of weird and memorable setpieces like the desert tank and the early-game poltergeist, and the harrowingly desperate and personal final boss fight that had me more on edge than anything I've played in a while.
As for the gameplay, yeah, it's flawed. Its battle mechanics can feel archaic, its balancing can feel all over the place, and some of its puzzles can feel quite cryptic, but as someone who's played their fair share of NES RPGs, Mother is incredibly generous. The run button makes exploring Mother's massive open world an absolute treat, you get so many great grinding opportunities and immensely powerful PSI spells and are never really at a lack of options, and for all the complaints I've heard about the grinding in this game, I was stunned at how tightly-paced it is regardless. Even with the times I took stopped to grind up my party, Mother took me less time to beat than any of the Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy games on the NES yet still managed to cover far more ground. Like yeah, Mother is probably the grindiest Nintendo RPG, but that's not really saying much.
I honestly didn't expect Earthbound Beginnings, of all games, to be the one to help me understand the appeal of the Mother series, but it's funny how things work out sometimes. I think they're the kinds of games that may rub you the wrong way at first, but if you just give them a bit of your time, they'll make it worth your while. I gave Mother a chance and was immensely rewarded with one of the most sincere and affecting adventures the NES has to offer, and now I can say I'm excited to do the same with its sequels someday.
And if Mother's combat is still too much for you, play a mod. Literally any mod, there's so many out there. There is a version of Mother for everyone, and everyone should experience this one-of-a-kind game.
2023
I'm not even able to play this game at least right now, but it's not hard to notice just how much love and passion was poured into Hi Fi Rush just from the trailers alone. Fuck Microsoft, the folks at Tango deserved better.
As someone who's played a bit of the OG SRB2 Kart but wasn't an avid player, I had no idea how I would feel about Dr Robotnik's Ring Racers. Frankly, I didn't even know I was gonna be able to play it but as it turns out there's a Mac port. If anything, that gets props from me. I'm seeing a lot of very polarized reviews on here, either 1s or 5s, but I don't think I've ever played more of a 2.5 Star game in my life.
Ring Racers can be best described as maximalist in every way, it does so much, too much even. Sometimes, this is a good thing. The presentation just exudes that Sega Saturn vibe, it's polished to a glowing sheen and looks incredible the whole way through. The song selection is a mix of original tracks and existing remixes and it's immaculate, special mention goes to that Tokyo Active NEETs cameo in the first cup. There's a lot of mechanics and a decent amount of them are fun, even if only in theory. Putting Advance 2's mid-air tricks into a racing game? A ring-based resource management system? There's some neat stuff here. There's also a lot of content, over 200 tracks reportedly, and the ones I've played so far are pretty solid and densely-packed with secret areas and branching paths. With how many unlockables there are, I could definitely see myself coming to Ring Racers every once in a while just to chip away at them.
That being said, for every good idea, moment of brilliance, or genuinely great element, Ring Racers also comes with a lot of bullshit. I know SRB2Kart already kinda felt like bumper cars at times, but man does the pacing of races in this game feel really start-and-stop a lot of the time. It either feels like you're moving too slowly or too fast with little in-between. There are so many mechanics that none of them have any room to breath. Half the stuff you learn in the tutorial are barely used, at least in the early game, and several functions being tied to the same button can make it very easy to misinput. And some of the mechanics are just baffling, why would you add a spin dash, which requires the player to stop in place, to a racing game? Speaking of the tutorial, I'm not the first to say it's way too long and overindulgent, and even after it, there's still a ridiculous amount of insignificant nuances the game never teaches you. Some of the tutorial missions could actually have been fun in a separate challenge mode, but not as a wall barring you from the rest of the game. So much of Ring Racers is locked behind doing other tasks, which feels like such a step-back compared to how SRB2 Kart was so easy to immediately jump into even when you just start playing.
I don't think Ring Racers is bad, it's an obvious labor of love, an impressive technical achievement, and has a decent amount going for it. But I wouldn't say it's good either, it's way too overstuffed and has too much holding it back. For any other fan developers working on a passion project, or really just developers in general, PLEASE try to be mindful of feature creep. Sometimes, it really is better to go simple than let your project balloon into an ginormous mess of good ideas.
Ring Racers can be best described as maximalist in every way, it does so much, too much even. Sometimes, this is a good thing. The presentation just exudes that Sega Saturn vibe, it's polished to a glowing sheen and looks incredible the whole way through. The song selection is a mix of original tracks and existing remixes and it's immaculate, special mention goes to that Tokyo Active NEETs cameo in the first cup. There's a lot of mechanics and a decent amount of them are fun, even if only in theory. Putting Advance 2's mid-air tricks into a racing game? A ring-based resource management system? There's some neat stuff here. There's also a lot of content, over 200 tracks reportedly, and the ones I've played so far are pretty solid and densely-packed with secret areas and branching paths. With how many unlockables there are, I could definitely see myself coming to Ring Racers every once in a while just to chip away at them.
That being said, for every good idea, moment of brilliance, or genuinely great element, Ring Racers also comes with a lot of bullshit. I know SRB2Kart already kinda felt like bumper cars at times, but man does the pacing of races in this game feel really start-and-stop a lot of the time. It either feels like you're moving too slowly or too fast with little in-between. There are so many mechanics that none of them have any room to breath. Half the stuff you learn in the tutorial are barely used, at least in the early game, and several functions being tied to the same button can make it very easy to misinput. And some of the mechanics are just baffling, why would you add a spin dash, which requires the player to stop in place, to a racing game? Speaking of the tutorial, I'm not the first to say it's way too long and overindulgent, and even after it, there's still a ridiculous amount of insignificant nuances the game never teaches you. Some of the tutorial missions could actually have been fun in a separate challenge mode, but not as a wall barring you from the rest of the game. So much of Ring Racers is locked behind doing other tasks, which feels like such a step-back compared to how SRB2 Kart was so easy to immediately jump into even when you just start playing.
I don't think Ring Racers is bad, it's an obvious labor of love, an impressive technical achievement, and has a decent amount going for it. But I wouldn't say it's good either, it's way too overstuffed and has too much holding it back. For any other fan developers working on a passion project, or really just developers in general, PLEASE try to be mindful of feature creep. Sometimes, it really is better to go simple than let your project balloon into an ginormous mess of good ideas.
2022
The lowly console owner that I am, I spent two years waiting to be able to play the sequel to one of my favorite games of all time. After all that, there's no way it could actually live up to the lofty expectations I had set for it, right?
Right?
Yeah, Freedom Planet 2 is freaking incredible, it's wild how much it blows its predecessor out of the water in terms of polish and scope. If FP1 was in my Top 20 favorite games, then FP2 is a Top 10, maybe even a Top 5. It pretty much checks every single box in terms of what I want from a game. Complex and fluid movement, satisfying combat with a high skill ceiling, level design that's consistently fun and inventive, bombastic boss fights, loads of side content, adorable character designs, an engaging character-driven story (seriously it's way better this time), utterly gorgeous and cartoonishly colorful visuals, and an incredible soundtrack. It elevates Freedom Planet from a lovely homage to the Genesis era to an all-timer platformer series that can stand on its own alongside some of my favorites in the genre.
Right?
Yeah, Freedom Planet 2 is freaking incredible, it's wild how much it blows its predecessor out of the water in terms of polish and scope. If FP1 was in my Top 20 favorite games, then FP2 is a Top 10, maybe even a Top 5. It pretty much checks every single box in terms of what I want from a game. Complex and fluid movement, satisfying combat with a high skill ceiling, level design that's consistently fun and inventive, bombastic boss fights, loads of side content, adorable character designs, an engaging character-driven story (seriously it's way better this time), utterly gorgeous and cartoonishly colorful visuals, and an incredible soundtrack. It elevates Freedom Planet from a lovely homage to the Genesis era to an all-timer platformer series that can stand on its own alongside some of my favorites in the genre.
2004
Probably could've been a 4.5 or more without all that missable content putting a damper on things, but I still respect the hell out of Pixel for what he managed to accomplish with Cave Story at the time, and we got one of my new favorite indie game casts in the process.
Gotta say, I'm a bit surprised by all the mixed reviews I've been seeing. Penny's Big Breakaway has been my most anticipated game this year, so I had some pretty lofty expectations, especially considering who was working on it. Thankfully, I think it really lived up to them, and I've been having an absolute blast with the game.
The movement is very momentum-based, focused around using your yo-yo tricks in succession to gain and maintain your speed. It's got a bit of a difficulty curve to it. Like in a Sonic game, you're probably gonna screw up a lot in the first world or so, but with time, there's such a strong sense of flow to navigating through these stages. You have so much freedom of expression, to the point where there's rarely one way to make it past an obstacle. You can swing to carefully position your jump, dash to keep the speed up, land on your yo-yo to keep your combo going, or chain them all together and maybe even skip a few platforms. It's so good, and the level design feels meticulously crafted to encourage you to go fast.
But beyond the core gameplay, PBB is just so fun. The visuals are bright and colorful, and each world has such unique and fresh theming, like an Italian-style restaraunt set in a volcano or a library floating in an endless void in space. The animation for Penny is so lively and expressive, the NPCs are so charmingly written, and I shouldn't have to say that the soundtrack by Tee Lopes and Sean Bialo goes incredibly hard. Outside The Eidophusikon is already a solid candidate for best vgm track of the year.
PBB isn't without its jank, but as a fan of 3D platformers from the early 2000s, it scratches an itch I haven't been able to scratch since probably A Hat In Time? In a lot of ways, it feels like this game was made for me.
The movement is very momentum-based, focused around using your yo-yo tricks in succession to gain and maintain your speed. It's got a bit of a difficulty curve to it. Like in a Sonic game, you're probably gonna screw up a lot in the first world or so, but with time, there's such a strong sense of flow to navigating through these stages. You have so much freedom of expression, to the point where there's rarely one way to make it past an obstacle. You can swing to carefully position your jump, dash to keep the speed up, land on your yo-yo to keep your combo going, or chain them all together and maybe even skip a few platforms. It's so good, and the level design feels meticulously crafted to encourage you to go fast.
But beyond the core gameplay, PBB is just so fun. The visuals are bright and colorful, and each world has such unique and fresh theming, like an Italian-style restaraunt set in a volcano or a library floating in an endless void in space. The animation for Penny is so lively and expressive, the NPCs are so charmingly written, and I shouldn't have to say that the soundtrack by Tee Lopes and Sean Bialo goes incredibly hard. Outside The Eidophusikon is already a solid candidate for best vgm track of the year.
PBB isn't without its jank, but as a fan of 3D platformers from the early 2000s, it scratches an itch I haven't been able to scratch since probably A Hat In Time? In a lot of ways, it feels like this game was made for me.
2000
This could've had the makings of a real cult classic with a bit more time in the oven. At least low-poly Cotton is adorable.
Hello Kitty Island Adventure is probably a better and more ambitious game overall, and I'm really not a fan of that energy meter mechanic, but this was fun. Polished, charming, surprisingly addictive, and I love the cel-shaded aesthetic that makes it feel like a long lost Gamecube game. We need more games going for that kind of sixth gen look.
It's hard to comprehend how inhumanly good Garou feels to control until you play it for yourself
1996
One of my favorite fighting games ever, it feels like it was made for me. Plays incredibly well, super easy to get into while still having a lot under the surface, a small but diverse cast that's all equally fun to play as, top-tier character designs, some of the prettiest spritework known to man, and all around immaculate vibes.
1994
This game sucks, but idk I kinda vibe with its weird, lonely, low-poly tech demo aesthetic. It's appalling to think this was an actual full price release, but discovering this through the Atari 50 collection years later, this might be one of my new favorite bad games.
1987
ATHENA'S NAME IS MAGIC
MYSTERY... IS WHAT YOU SEE
MYSTERY... IS WHAT YOU SEE
A masterclass in bridging together multiple genres and creating a satisfying gameplay loop that continuously feeds into itself. I want to explore so I can do better in tank battles, I want to participate in tank battles to save more Slimes and continue exploring, both gameplay styles are perfectly balanced and equally fun.
Sorry, but SNES OST >>>>>>>>>>> GBA OST
2007
Literally a bootleg. Midway took the sprites, engine, and even some of the level design from Shin'en's surprisingly solid EU-exclusive Maya The Bee games, stripped out all of the animation, made the controls worse, and dropped Manfred Linzner's great GAX music, just to sell an inferior product to America in the hopes of capitalizing off The Bee Movie. And on top of that, Midway released it on the DS too with zero changes, and it still looks worse than Shin'en's work on the GBA?
This game is so weird. I don't even care about Maya The Bee, but Shin'en deserved better than this, man.
This game is so weird. I don't even care about Maya The Bee, but Shin'en deserved better than this, man.