I was honestly baffled by this
I went expecting cheap fun, but this is a great experience all around

The gameplay is polished and have some deegree of technicality, the characters play out a little different, large roster and each different court actually plays different. Also one of the earliest mario sport stuff. The game also have multiple unique game modes.

I think this is underapreciated for being a sports game that is not a simulator, but the game genuinely got me engaged. And there's a lot of challenging and understanding to be have here. Solid all around

Aesthetics aside, this game is a mess. There are a number of reasons

1. The enemies never stop coming in a single room
2. There's too many enemies in a single room too often (a problem some of the later Zelda Dungeons face)
3. The game punish you too hardly for dying. Differently from Zelda, you can't afford to die, you gain nothing from it
4. There's no benefit in killing a lot of the enemies. You neither can explore the room later, because they never cease nor win anything relevant for killing them

The result is that the most efficient way of playing the game is just to run. The only situation where you need to kill an enemy is when the enemy is blocking a path or when you need to open a door.

There are some nice mechanics to the game too, but are just lost in this mess.

I would love to see Nintendo reviving the franchise (although i don't think it will happen)

The game could've been interested. The Panel de Pon puzzle mode move limit applied to Bejeweld. They already did this with Bubble Witch Saga witch was a Puzzle Bobble with move limit. The move limit is a cool idea and could work. The problem is that this whole game is a scam. There's little strategy, most of the game play by itself and is random, which mean there's excessive dopamine with explosive little effects and also that you can't consistently win. When i win i don't felt is my fault, neither when i loose. Is just a dopamine fest.

This is a marvelous RPG, with creative sense of aesthetics, charm and tone, a very original concept and fun story

The map design is overall well built, with intuitive navigation and a system of tips which allow you to wander with direction but without telling what you have to do

The combat system is really in-depth, with all sort of different mechanics you can do. I think Lloyd can be a little too much one dimensional when compared to the rest of the characters and some of the PSI Bonus are not as interesting in terms of affecting the battle (rarely Quick Up made any difference). The lack of longer boss battles also made the usage of tactics a little more limited.

The main issue with this game is the classic NES/Famicom Bullshit of creating random "challenge" to make the game seem longer that it is.

This game is very dependent on NRG, less than some other JRPGs of the time such as the first two Dragon Quest, but still is a game where you more often than not you win or lose based merely on luck (most of the time you will lose). I think particularly the way the game is abuses the "avoid" and the "boom" (the critical damage), which will be seem at least once in most matches. And since the game is decided, for both you and the enemies, in a few rounds, a single bad round of turns can ruin your battle.

It often puts bullshit to drain your health points and magic points just to stall you. The most notorious bullshits are

-A considerate amount of enemies with instakill attacks
-the freeze gamma which will almost deplete your health
-enemies that explode when you defeat
-an obnoxiously high encounter rate for random encounter

I think since most of this can be synthesized in the same problem is not a myriad of problems

But the overall experience is superb and I really enjoyed playing it. Is the first game in the series I play and I am super excited to play Mother 2/Earthbound and Mother 3, considering that almost everybody considers them to be masterpieces and big improvements upon the formula of the first one.

I really don't understand so much love for this game. I know that a lot of people start playing Civ with this game (i've started with Civ III and also played IV prior to V), and this create and emotional attachment to the game, but this game is one of the worst Civ games.

Apart from the traditional flaws from every Civ game, like some systems being either over simplified or a broken mess, or both (a good example in every single Civilization is Economy. Lacks depth in every game, while not being intuitive and is really weird. And every time, once you got the gimmick, is extremely easy to exploit with barely no thought put into), this game also have an awful slow pace, that don't seem to quite work with the simple design of Civilization games. Early game is heavily stalled, while Civ IV have a excellent and dynamic pace for comparison sake.

Most of the great additions were made by DLCs, and at the time the base game came in The Sims style, lacking a ton of content that should've come with the game.

Overall is not an bad exeperience (as you noticed by my grade) and you can definitely have the traditional civilization fun. The fact that now the civs feel way more different from each other was a extremely helpful to add some variation to the game (one of the few problems of Civ IV was the fact that every single gameplay felt like another one after a while), but definitely an hindered Civilization experience.

The only reason to why there's so much praise for this game is nostalgia. And i don't mean it neither in the salty nor in the bad spirited way. I just really can't see otherwise. And it is fair, this was my first pokemon back in the day (specifically Soul Silver, but i've replayed recently in Heart Gold), so i do have tons of nostalgia for this one, but is just impossible to ignore the blatant flaws on these games, even with the emotional attachment to them.

And to be fair, SS/HG are great remakes, is just that Pokemon Gold and Silver weren't very good pokemons to begin with. This is good remake in the sense is infinitely better than the original, but the original was not good, so this is just ok.

The good parts are obvious: this game looks gorgeous, the post game is way more fun to play, with increased time and some adjustements, battle frontier, the new Safari Zone is probably the best the series ever had and the mechanical adds introduced in gen 4 such as better balancement, depth in move pool and physical/special split made this game way way better. Also, since most of the broken systems and mechanics that existed in the two first gens were wiped away in 3rd gen this game is much more polished and functionable when compared to the originals. There are Pokemons that are simply not good to play in the original games, like Heracross for instance, that now worth playing with, and some of the evolutions added in 4th gen also make some lines like in the case of Mamoswine and Weavile, way more interesting. The game also heavily remakes some dungeons layouts and some Gym puzzles, with most of them if not all ending up a little bit more complicated and interesting when compared to its original game.

This game also have an AI better than most pokemon (particularly when compared with the 6th gen onwards, Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon being an exception)

Now the cons...

The most obvious and blatant one, the awful level curve. The early game requires some grinding, than from the 2nd gym to the 7th you just will be overleveled, and then the 8th gym will require grinding but now a ton of it and then the Pokemon League have also an considerable level spike and another for the pokemon champions (that one is manageable w/o grinding tho) and then another level spike before Kanto. This level curve is just insanity, and makes playing through game feeling like a chore. This was the one thing they DESPERATELY HAD to change in the remake, and simply adding adjustable levels for the gyms would already made it way way better. The whole idea of doing gyms in your prefered order is cool, but would need a better implementation and probably a massive rearragenement of the game's general progression.

Most dungeons in this game are wildly awful battle wise (even if now they are reasonable layout wise), with you playing the same matchup again and again. And pretty much every one of them are caves, with the noticeable exception of Sprout Tower and the the Bell Tower if you're playing Heart Gold. And in Sprout Tower case you will just play the same matchup of Bellsprout for a dozen of times in a row.

The rocket team is just confusing and messy. Goes from nowhere to nowhere and sincerely, just didn't need to be there.

The rival is just ok, one of the weaker of the franchise, and everything interesting to him can only be seen in an special event that you can only see if you got Celebi, a pokemon that you can only got in special limited events.

The gyms also drastically varies in quality, with some like Whitney, being great and others like Morty and Chuck not having any Johto pokemons, while also not being particularly memorable.

This is also the pokemon i've played with most bullshit. The quantity of times the enemy hits critical exactly when it needs to, or when you receive two criticals in a row is wild.

The games don't help itself much with going towards some of the most annoying tactics just to create cheap difficulty. Yeah, i've beaten Lt. Surge, Koga and Karen with ease, but it was extra annoying when most of their pokemon were based around evasiveness, and it wasn't satisfying to press magnitude 16x with my Donphan instead of pressing 3 or 4.

This game is overall an ok game, is a good remake, but it could've been so much more. I get the nostalgia for it, the Nintendo DS was also an console that my personality is indistinguishable from, but we have to come at ease with the reality that this game is not that good, and is way easier since Pokemon in Nintendo DS have some of the best in the franchise to fullfill that sentiment.

I started playing the game, and after the two initial sets of microgames I thought to myself "well, it's a fun usage of gyroscope, but the nature of the tech makes the gameplay limited in its possibility" and then almost immediately started eating my words. They take the overall structure of WarioWare and mess with both its initial mechanics and the gyroscope, while expanding considerably the variety and being wildly creative both in the microgames and the way they structure the microgames in sets. The game's also considerably more challenging than the first one.

This game suffers from the fact that if you played literally any other mainline The Elder Scrolls it just looks not that good.

It's fine and cool as it is, but far from an masterpiece. Also, is a nice starter from someone wanting to get into Western RPGs, due to the extremely simple RPG system, limited number of builds and very intuitive mechanics, something that games like Morrowind, Baldur's Gate or Arcanum would much probably overwhelm newcommers to the genre (although all these games are way better than Skyrim)

I could comment more about the game, but i think a lot of what i said about Fallout 3, is also true here. The world is really cool, there's a lot of good side quests (love the Markarth Political side Quests for god sake) and the exploration is quite fun, even with its shortcomings. But the main campaign is underwhelming and here, much more than in Fallout 3, the combat system sucks (to be fair with this one, in all TES games it sucks to some extent).

If you already into Western RPGs, you probably already played this game, but if you never played a TES go play Morrowind. If you are wanting to get into WRPGs, this can be a nice introduction, altough The Witcher 3 may be a more well rounded and solid experience (The Witcher 3 is way lighter in RPG elements tho, so this game may be good to get used to some tropes of the genre)

If you have a great PC, you can literally make this game a good game with mods, so it's worth a try,

Mario Kart Review (3/8)

An underrated pick

I'll be quick with this one. This is indeed underrated, maybe because it didn't made comercial sucess at the time like other Mario Kart Games, but also, is not an extraordinary experience, although it had pretty much everything to be a great mario kart.

This one is pretty straight forward with its intentions. It is trying to be an reimagination of the first Mario Kart but more polished and well rounded, and in this sense, partially achieves its goal, and also do some interesting things, but is held back by some flaws.

The biggest of its flaws is the Handling. It always feels as the track is covered in ice, and you will be sliding in the track. Is not as bad if you know how to play, slowing down and getting right in the curves and the racing lines, but even when you do this, while the game feels way better to play, is not 100% good, and you will often loose total control even when you did not commit any mistake.

And this way of handling, reminiscent of the first game, ties into another flaw of the game, it lacks dynamism and speed. The game is already slow and you have to slow down in every turn, slowing down the game even more.

Aside from that the game is really tight. Is a gorgeous game, the art in the background was a great addition, the karts are all pretty and the racers models too. This was by far the most balanced Mario Kart at the release time, the items were changed and now do a little bit more a regulatory function, the rubber band AI is reasonable and the retro tracks are cool and the level design is superb. The layouts are far more complex than we've seen in both SMK and MK64, with a lot of interesting turns and possible speed boosts and fun stuff to do. "Ribbon Road" and "Sky Garden" are personal favorites and this game "Rainbow Road" is one of the best in the series, with all the improvisation spots and wild jumps you can do.

My polemic opinion is that this was, at the time of release, the best Mario Kart game. Although not the greatest of racing games, this was pointing out for a more well rounded MK experience and is often overlooked by the fans.

Mario Kart Reviews (2/8)

I would like to start saying that i never had played "Mario Kart 64" (1996) prior to this experience. Being a kid from the 2000s made me start playing with the DS and Wii Mario Kart games. I had the oportunity, already in the 00s to play "Mario Kart Double Dash" (2002) in an acquainted's house, and later i would also end up playing "Super Mario Kart" (1992) in SNES emulators. But i never tried the N64 one. I'm saying this because this is a game a lot of people have a ton of nostalgia for, an nostalgia that won't play a role in my review, because i can't simply relate to (wait for the DS review).

I know, as a huge Mario Kart series fan, that i had to play this one. Is regarded by many people as a classic and was a big hit back in the day. But also, that maybe i wouldn't like this one that much.

At the time, this game was somewhat criticized for being to much alike to its predecessor, in here lies most of its virtues, but also, most of its flaws. To be fair, i don't think this game play out exactly like SMK, that one feels like an standard racing game with battle elements, this one inaugurate the Kart racing genre in its totality, and honestly feels distinct from other forms of Arcade Racing. The great problem is that a lot of what hindered the original game, hinders this one also, altough, not in the same extent and definitely not in the same way. This game feels pretty much like what the SNES
iteration should've been since the beginning, but couldn't because of the atrocious track design and troll in-track hazards. This is, by every mean, an needed step up, but at the same time, is not an outstanding game by any means.

First thing, its handling. The first game of the series was an extremely heavy game to control, so they needed to change it, and they lost the tone completely while doing it. Now the kart feel extremely light, and hard to control by the exact opposite to why the last game was hard to control, although anyone would have to admit that the control on this game is better than its predecessor. A lot of times you try to make the curve and your Kart will go towards the open part of the curve and a lot of time will get outside of the track way easier than you would expect. The major problem is that is a pain in the ass to dodge from oncoming hazards, particularly at short range, a lot of times you will make the correct move in the joystick and the kart won't move. But also, if you lean to hard to the side, your kart will try a full turn. Either way, you have to eat a loss. Beside that the game feel miles better. Having an effective and manual drift helps a lot, although a little bit difficult to control (not in the good technical sense, but in the clunk sense), and the fact you barely don't have to slow down in this game, make it being so much more dynamic and allow much more options during the race.

The visuals are outstanding, the characters are full of charm and the tracks are in general nice to see too. The OST is cool too.

The items are mostly to 1 vs 1, like the last game, not being a particularly item heavy Mario Kart, although it does a little better in that department. The Thunder item and the Blue Shell helps a lot with position managing, particularly dealing with the higher standings, but still lacks items that help lower standing racers to catch up. An complaint would be that the speed boost, both the normal mushroom and the newly added gold mushroom, feel really weird, as it the boost is not that relevant at some times.

For god sake the game don't punish you so much with in game hazards as SMK. My only complaint is that clearly some of the hazards ignore Bots and go directly towards you, like the Thwomps in "Bowser's Castle" or the Chomp Chomps in "Rainbow Road". But differently from SMK that falling out of the track had a reasonable time to get back to the race, here, falling out of the track means that you probably start at the 8th position, even if you was in 1st place, is just too long, and in some cases, like "Yoshi Valley" is an eternity.

The roster is nice, altough they feel less different from each other compared with the last one.

Every single Mario Kart have some deegree of Balancing issues, in this one the heavy characters are way easier to play, since the handling is so light, while winning most of the phyisical matchups, that play a significant role in this game.

I know that in the N64 era, the fact that the console could put up to 4 controllers made Nintendo highly focus on multiplayer experiences. "Golden Eye 007" (1997), "Super Smash Bros." (1999), "Wave Race 64" (1996) and the entire Pokemon Stadium and Mario Party trilogies. "Mario Kart 64" is not only not an exception to this, as it is probably the premier multiplayer experience in N64. This multiplayer is decidely fun, the battle mode is amazing, way more dynamic than SMK one, an not as broken as the battle mode became from Wii onwards, also, the joy of playing Mario Kart split screen with 4 friends is unmatched. That being said, this game hardly lacks in single player content. Only 4 cups, no unlockable characters, and the only thing you unlock is the mirror mode. This is the kind of game you would own to play only when your friends were at your house.

The track design is mixed. Most of it is nice, having cool concepts, but in general, being really limited, restricting a lot the player creativity and being somewhat repetitive internally. A lot of them have a cool gimmick, but some of them like "Kalimari Desert" and "Yoshi Valley" altough cool in concept, are quite annoying in the race. There are not many that allow you to take shortcuts or use your skill and creativity to express yourself and do cool things, and a lot don't even have offroad and are just track lines with aesthetical themes.

Mushroom Cup Tracks

Luigi Raceway- The Bland generic first track that every single mario kart game have. It is a necessary evil, allows begginers to play without paying attention to gimmicks or distractions. Not bad, but nothing special, could have a better racing layout tho.

Moo Moo Farm- The concept is pretty cool and god bless this game don't have the annoying Mounty Mole like the last one. But the layout is not interesting and the lack of offroad or any interesting thing happening make it so limited and boring. Moo Moo Meadows shown us later on how to do an way better track with the exact same concept.

Koopa Tropa Beach- Your Standard beach track. While not being "Peach Beach" level, is quite cool, with some parting ways and some nice ways of using speed boost and shortcuts.

Kalimari Desert- The concept is cool, the execution not so much. The timing of the train in the first lap is bad, and you always have to stop and wait the train twice, and beside the train gimmick, there's not much more to be have.

Flower Cup Tracks

Mario Raceway- This one is very pleasant. While the concept being the standard Mario track, this one excels at it. The layout is very very cool, have a lot of interesting curves to drift, some places to use speed boost and overall a very good track.

Frapee Snowland- Boring. While not being atrocious as the snow tracks in SMK, is a quite boring track. You can't see where the offroad ends and is just bland and generic overall.

Choco Mountain- Nice track. Is ugly visually, but have some elements going for, the falling rocks and the fact you can fall and get into the other part of the track for instance.

Toad's Turnpike- Nice concept, awful execution. While it have to be 8 shaped? Really repetitive and boring, you pretty much do the same thing the whole track.

Star Cup Tracks

Wario Stadium- Fun concept, and have some things happening. Overstays its welcome a little bit. The problem is: a good design for a track, is not just the layout and the gimmicks, but how well it ties to the game handling. This game is not fit to extremely tight curves. In SMK you would hit the wall inside the curve, here you hit the wall outside the curve.

Sherbet Island- This a classic. Quite remarkable. There are two different stages, while having a fun layout and a lot of interesting things happening, one of the most fitting for handling.

Royal Raceway- There are better Peach tracks, but this one is not bad. But is nothing special either. At least have some offroad that you can speed boost through.

Bowser's Castle- This track is amazing, one of the best in the entire series. I normally always like Bowser's Castle tracks, even the SNES one if you ignore some atrocious design flaws. But this one is special. Have a lot of different levels with its differing challenges, a really cool layout, some fun drifting parts and a lot of fun you can have trying stuff here. But this face the same problem with Wario Stadium, 90o angles are ass to make in MK64, this is why this feels so much better to race in the Wii version. Also, the goddamn Thwomp that ignore other racers and follow you in GP Mode.

Special Cup

DK Jungle Parkway- Quite quite fun. Have some different levels, the bridge is really fun to trap other racers, the coconut being shot in the forest is interesting and the cave have a nice place to speed boost to. The only problem is that the big jump across the river is really poorly handled in this version and you loose all the momentum. Another track that is better at the Wii version.

Yoshi Valley- Cool concept, awful execution. The parting ways are nice, but the fact that you don't know in which position you are although fun at first, quickly become annoying. Not a fan of that one.

Banshee Boardwalk- I hate that one. Not the concept and overall execution, this is ok. Is literally an enhanced "Ghost Valley" concept. But the layout does not fit the 64 handling, but way worse than Wario Stadium and Bowsers's Castle. When even the AI on 50cc consistently hit the walls during the track you know that is not a fit. This is just not fun, while also not being the very best track in the world, but i can't stance how better it is to race this one in DS.

Rainbow Road- This track had everything to be amazing really. The layout is really fun, and feel fun to play, stancing the strong points of the game handling. But there are two major problems. 1- Goddamn the Chomp Chomps clearly follow the player in Single Player. Very cheap 2- Overstays its welcome. If it was shorter would be way more enjoyable.

So overall, the tracks are ok. Some bad ones, not many awful and some great, most of it just fine.

The last element that i want to talk about is the rubber band. Rubber Band difficulty is not bad itself, and to be fair, most games use it, but here is just too much of rubber band, in an EA Sports fashion, particularly when you're faring well, and the way they strecht the challenge, just as EA Sports, is really really cheap, mostly for giving an unfair speed boost to the other racers. That is why is almost impossible to gain separation from the 2nd place, even if you are able to pull up some really cool stuff with drifting and speed boosts, or take shortcuts. And is really annoying having the other racers pretty much in your back the entire race. It do create a challenge, but just feels overall cheal and lazy, and you feel that you don't have much control in the outcome of the race.

If "Super Mario Kart" was cheap fun just at times, and mostly a bad game, this one is great at times and mostly cheap fun. Is a nice game, and i don't think is fair to call it a bad game, but is far from being a great one. I know that most people that have this as its favorite Mario Kart, have out of nostalgia, but to me is outrageous to say this one is better than "...Double Dash", "Mario Kart DS" (2005) or "Mario Kart 8" (2014). If you can play that with friends, i would not pass the opportunity.