1993
You’re trying to tell me these are mechs? They look like potential rayman characters
One of the last games released for the famicom during the shift to the super famicom in Japan, joy mech fight was nintendo’s last attempt to create a fighting game for the famicom (like what they did with urban champion). This game was actually never brought to the west until Nintendo switch online a year ago so uhh…good job Nintendo. Good to see the game finally got a localisation! Oh wait-
So because I can’t read what’s going on, I’m currently going off of what it says on the Wikipedia page. Dr. Emon and Dr. Walnuts create these really cool robots until walnuts steals them and plans world domination. Thankfully, Emon brings a robot called sukapon and turns him into a military robot to fight back against Walnuts and all his robots. Pretty simple plot.
Gameplay is your typical fighting game, though it has quite a lot of charm to it. In the story mode, you eventually get 36 available fighters, each with their own abilities that you can use. These can also be played in the multiplayer modes, and some are extremely easy to master. The story mode consists of beating 7 fighters per level until having to face a boss at the end. After finishing the boss, you move onto the next level.
Overall, whilst not the best game on the famicom, I must admit that joy mech fight has a really nice charm to it. And as one of the last famicom games, it has a really nice presentation that I love and it doesn’t feel stiff at all. It is probably one of the best fighting games on the famicom, but whether it is on a similar level to that of street fighter 2 or tekken is possibly a very big stretch.
Fun gameplay, really nice presentation, neat music, rayman if it was a fighting game
One of the last games released for the famicom during the shift to the super famicom in Japan, joy mech fight was nintendo’s last attempt to create a fighting game for the famicom (like what they did with urban champion). This game was actually never brought to the west until Nintendo switch online a year ago so uhh…good job Nintendo. Good to see the game finally got a localisation! Oh wait-
So because I can’t read what’s going on, I’m currently going off of what it says on the Wikipedia page. Dr. Emon and Dr. Walnuts create these really cool robots until walnuts steals them and plans world domination. Thankfully, Emon brings a robot called sukapon and turns him into a military robot to fight back against Walnuts and all his robots. Pretty simple plot.
Gameplay is your typical fighting game, though it has quite a lot of charm to it. In the story mode, you eventually get 36 available fighters, each with their own abilities that you can use. These can also be played in the multiplayer modes, and some are extremely easy to master. The story mode consists of beating 7 fighters per level until having to face a boss at the end. After finishing the boss, you move onto the next level.
Overall, whilst not the best game on the famicom, I must admit that joy mech fight has a really nice charm to it. And as one of the last famicom games, it has a really nice presentation that I love and it doesn’t feel stiff at all. It is probably one of the best fighting games on the famicom, but whether it is on a similar level to that of street fighter 2 or tekken is possibly a very big stretch.
Fun gameplay, really nice presentation, neat music, rayman if it was a fighting game
2012
The year…is 2012. The London olympics have been hosted, Whitney Houston died, and West Ham beat Blackpool to return to the premier league. But I feel like we are missing something important, a small piece to this very large puzzle. A year ago to this year, Skylanders spyros adventure released. An experimental game to not only attempt to bring back spyro, but to also birth a new gaming trend: toys to life. And so, on 2012, that is when, I finally got my first toys to life game: Skylanders giants. To any onlooker of this series, they would simply assume giants is quite possibly the weakest and most cashgrab entry. But today, I’m here to disprove that, and hopefully give people a taste of what one of my favourite games as a kid was. So without further ado: let us begin.
The story is pretty simple, basically these Skylanders have been brought to earth and forced to just be these figures, which we the ‘portal masters’ have to save by spending actual currency to put them on a FLASHING LIGHTS portal and then they get brought back into the game. Simple right? Well we also have to stop this evil dude called kaos, who is just as evil as me when I leave the toilet seat up. He basically is trying to reawaken the arkeyan robots whom the giants stopped years ago. And that’s it in terms of plot.
Gameplay wise it’s VERY simple. You scan a Skylanders onto the FLASHING LIGHTS portal and then that Skylander is put into the game. You then go through really simple and basic levels. You beat the enemies, do a tiny bit of exploration, and you move on. At certain points you’ll find certain areas that can only be unlocked through having a skylander of a certain type (fire, water, etc) so you know what that means! Spending time! There are also little puzzles and also…the legend that is: skystones. Remember tetra master from final fantasy 9? It’s basically that but better in every way. It is the quintessential card game.
The music is also something I have to stop by and talk about. Lorne Balfe put his heart and soul into this soundtrack. Levels like the junkyard isles and wilikin village give me an instant hit of nostalgia that is unparalleled. The other tracks as well are also quite memorable and honestly he did a really great job of giving the game that cinematic feel to it.
To be perfectly honest, I do kinda miss this franchise. Not to sound like I’m 8 but man collecting the figures was a lot of fun. Fortunately I still have mine and I do look at them from time to time just because I can’t get rid of them. Even if I could I’d only get a penny from them and that’s the unfortunate downside of toys to life as a whole. But that’s a story for another day. Giants would also be the game to bring other competitors in, those being Disney and Warner bros. and oh man, this is gonna get real big and go down very quickly. But until then, I hope you enjoyed my thoughts on a classic childhood game of mine. Gone but certainly not forgotten.
…also for those who might ask, my favourite was jet-vac.
Ok story, simple gameplay, brilliant music, skystones is peak, also the drill-x rap lives in my head rent free
The story is pretty simple, basically these Skylanders have been brought to earth and forced to just be these figures, which we the ‘portal masters’ have to save by spending actual currency to put them on a FLASHING LIGHTS portal and then they get brought back into the game. Simple right? Well we also have to stop this evil dude called kaos, who is just as evil as me when I leave the toilet seat up. He basically is trying to reawaken the arkeyan robots whom the giants stopped years ago. And that’s it in terms of plot.
Gameplay wise it’s VERY simple. You scan a Skylanders onto the FLASHING LIGHTS portal and then that Skylander is put into the game. You then go through really simple and basic levels. You beat the enemies, do a tiny bit of exploration, and you move on. At certain points you’ll find certain areas that can only be unlocked through having a skylander of a certain type (fire, water, etc) so you know what that means! Spending time! There are also little puzzles and also…the legend that is: skystones. Remember tetra master from final fantasy 9? It’s basically that but better in every way. It is the quintessential card game.
The music is also something I have to stop by and talk about. Lorne Balfe put his heart and soul into this soundtrack. Levels like the junkyard isles and wilikin village give me an instant hit of nostalgia that is unparalleled. The other tracks as well are also quite memorable and honestly he did a really great job of giving the game that cinematic feel to it.
To be perfectly honest, I do kinda miss this franchise. Not to sound like I’m 8 but man collecting the figures was a lot of fun. Fortunately I still have mine and I do look at them from time to time just because I can’t get rid of them. Even if I could I’d only get a penny from them and that’s the unfortunate downside of toys to life as a whole. But that’s a story for another day. Giants would also be the game to bring other competitors in, those being Disney and Warner bros. and oh man, this is gonna get real big and go down very quickly. But until then, I hope you enjoyed my thoughts on a classic childhood game of mine. Gone but certainly not forgotten.
…also for those who might ask, my favourite was jet-vac.
Ok story, simple gameplay, brilliant music, skystones is peak, also the drill-x rap lives in my head rent free
1995
So, you’ve come hoping for a really in depth and detailed review? Unfortunately I’ve only ever played this game once and to be honest…it is a much MUCH more interesting story. In the future, I promise I will actually sit down and review this game. But for now: get a drink and a nice snack, sit back, and enjoy my glorious tale.
It was around about 8 years ago I’d say and me and a friend were in a random arcade. We were sort of browsing around, looking through all the different games they had to show. And that’s when…we saw it. Time crisis. For those that don’t know, time crisis is essentially a first person on rails shooter which were pretty popular in the arcades during the late-ish 90’s. The thing is here is that you have a small pedal which if pressed: will allow the player to duck down and reload their weapon. So when me and my friend saw this game, we decided to give it a go. How hard could it possibly be? We said to ourselves.
I’m sure this is the point where in your mind you’ll probably hear thinking ‘oh this is the part where he reveals how hard it actually is and then there is some funny moral to the story later’. Unfortunately, I’m gonna have to crush those expectations.
So my friend inserted 50p of British currency into the machine and started playing. We’d both agreed that he’d have the first go and later I’d have a go after he died. But after 10 minutes or so, we realised that he was better at time crisis than we thought. He was brilliant at it in fact. I just sat there watching him. He decimated every single enemy in his path. The villain laughed: thinking that he was some sort of joke. But, he was so, so wrong. My friend kept pushing the pedal like there was no tomorrow and landing every hit. After a while, I began to wonder if the machine was rigged. But those thoughts were soon put to sleep as finally: he beat the game.
So what is the moral to the story then? Just because you think a game is gonna be really hard doesn’t mean it always will.
Great gameplay, story happened, pedal was harmed, ACTION! RELOAD!
It was around about 8 years ago I’d say and me and a friend were in a random arcade. We were sort of browsing around, looking through all the different games they had to show. And that’s when…we saw it. Time crisis. For those that don’t know, time crisis is essentially a first person on rails shooter which were pretty popular in the arcades during the late-ish 90’s. The thing is here is that you have a small pedal which if pressed: will allow the player to duck down and reload their weapon. So when me and my friend saw this game, we decided to give it a go. How hard could it possibly be? We said to ourselves.
I’m sure this is the point where in your mind you’ll probably hear thinking ‘oh this is the part where he reveals how hard it actually is and then there is some funny moral to the story later’. Unfortunately, I’m gonna have to crush those expectations.
So my friend inserted 50p of British currency into the machine and started playing. We’d both agreed that he’d have the first go and later I’d have a go after he died. But after 10 minutes or so, we realised that he was better at time crisis than we thought. He was brilliant at it in fact. I just sat there watching him. He decimated every single enemy in his path. The villain laughed: thinking that he was some sort of joke. But, he was so, so wrong. My friend kept pushing the pedal like there was no tomorrow and landing every hit. After a while, I began to wonder if the machine was rigged. But those thoughts were soon put to sleep as finally: he beat the game.
So what is the moral to the story then? Just because you think a game is gonna be really hard doesn’t mean it always will.
Great gameplay, story happened, pedal was harmed, ACTION! RELOAD!
2001
So…I’ve been putting off this review for a while, it’s mainly because I’ve been afraid, afraid that I’m gonna fuck this review up somehow. But it’s time I face my fears and finally returned to review this game and finish the 90’s sonic games. When it comes to Sonic Adventure 2, I’ve always preferred the original, however I’ve had a slight soft spot for this game and that’s why it has a similar score to SA1. So let’s get into it and see what I can say about a very loved sonic game.
We have quite a few new characters, mainly shadow and rouge. The story is split into the hero and dark sides though they all culminate with the same end. Basically eggman finds that his grandad left him a secret weapon named shadow, who is a hedgehog just like sonic. So him and eggman decide to find all the chaos emerald to conquer the world, with rouge joining later as she secretly works for the government. Later it all culminates in the ark where we find out shadow was doing all this naughty shit because of a girl he used to know, named Maria, told him to help mankind yet he interpreted it differently. Basically getting it completely confused and almost completely obliterating Maria’s wishes. So him and sonic defeat the finalhazard and that’s the end of that for now. And there was a lot of piss on the moon.
In terms of gameplay, it’s similar-ish to sonic adventure 1 with a few very clear differences. The structure is much more linear and follows a straight path. Instead of getting to choose characters, you’ll simply go from one level where you play as someone like sonic and then move onto another with playing as knuckles or someone. After every level as well you are forced to be into the chao garden which I’ll talk about a little bit later. The level types as well are mainly inspired by sa1 or at least the better level types. The sonic levels and knuckle levels made it over and the gamma levels somehow made it through though a little modified to make it fit with tails and eggman’s levels.
The chao garden also makes a return. We have 3 gardens actually: the neutral garden, the hero garden, and the dark garden with the latter two being unlocked after raising a hero and dark chao. you basically just raise the chao like you did in the last game. Raise the insufferable, puny, disgusting, cute, adorable, funny, little guys.
The music is also absolutely brilliant. Crush 40 return to do their work on the game and this is probably the only part of the game which I believe completely outshines the last. The music is phenomenal in every single way. I did like how sa1’s ost did have neat callbacks to the older sonic games, especially sonic cd, but this soundtrack is just absolutely exceptional. If anyone hates city escape then you clearly are just hating for the sake of it.
Unfortunately, after sonic adventure 2 released, it was soon announced that the Dreamcast would be discontinued and Sega would end up becoming a third party publisher. So sonic adventure 2 ended up being the end of an era, one full of lots and lots of creativity and experimentation. Even though later games would also experiment I felt that it was a lot more grounded through the Sega genesis (mega drive) era to the Dreamcast era. So with that, it ends my talk on some of the main sonic games for now. But who knows, maybe I will talk about 06…nah.
Great story, decent characters, excellent music, chao return, how do you like that Obama?
We have quite a few new characters, mainly shadow and rouge. The story is split into the hero and dark sides though they all culminate with the same end. Basically eggman finds that his grandad left him a secret weapon named shadow, who is a hedgehog just like sonic. So him and eggman decide to find all the chaos emerald to conquer the world, with rouge joining later as she secretly works for the government. Later it all culminates in the ark where we find out shadow was doing all this naughty shit because of a girl he used to know, named Maria, told him to help mankind yet he interpreted it differently. Basically getting it completely confused and almost completely obliterating Maria’s wishes. So him and sonic defeat the finalhazard and that’s the end of that for now. And there was a lot of piss on the moon.
In terms of gameplay, it’s similar-ish to sonic adventure 1 with a few very clear differences. The structure is much more linear and follows a straight path. Instead of getting to choose characters, you’ll simply go from one level where you play as someone like sonic and then move onto another with playing as knuckles or someone. After every level as well you are forced to be into the chao garden which I’ll talk about a little bit later. The level types as well are mainly inspired by sa1 or at least the better level types. The sonic levels and knuckle levels made it over and the gamma levels somehow made it through though a little modified to make it fit with tails and eggman’s levels.
The chao garden also makes a return. We have 3 gardens actually: the neutral garden, the hero garden, and the dark garden with the latter two being unlocked after raising a hero and dark chao. you basically just raise the chao like you did in the last game. Raise the insufferable, puny, disgusting, cute, adorable, funny, little guys.
The music is also absolutely brilliant. Crush 40 return to do their work on the game and this is probably the only part of the game which I believe completely outshines the last. The music is phenomenal in every single way. I did like how sa1’s ost did have neat callbacks to the older sonic games, especially sonic cd, but this soundtrack is just absolutely exceptional. If anyone hates city escape then you clearly are just hating for the sake of it.
Unfortunately, after sonic adventure 2 released, it was soon announced that the Dreamcast would be discontinued and Sega would end up becoming a third party publisher. So sonic adventure 2 ended up being the end of an era, one full of lots and lots of creativity and experimentation. Even though later games would also experiment I felt that it was a lot more grounded through the Sega genesis (mega drive) era to the Dreamcast era. So with that, it ends my talk on some of the main sonic games for now. But who knows, maybe I will talk about 06…nah.
Great story, decent characters, excellent music, chao return, how do you like that Obama?
This review contains spoilers
Foreword:
I’m back. I promised I’d return, and with that I promised I’d return with a review of a much newer game. I hope everyone had a wonderful (and late) Christmas and new year, and I hope that you all enjoy this review. I admit it’s odd for me to review the older game in a series and work backwards but I feel as though it’ll be much easier for me in this case. I hope you have a wonderful evening and I hope you enjoy my first review of the year. And now back to the review.
Intro:
So sandman was the reason New York had an orange sky back in June, that makes so much sense now.
Contrary to popular belief: I like superheroes. I’m not the expert on them nor am I gonna act like I am but I think I know a decent amount about them. And what’s one superhero series I like? Well it would have to be sp- fantastic four. I adore the fantastic four but Spider-Man is a close second, and it also happens to be the more popular of the two. Spider-man, the series about some random teenager called Peter Parker who gets bitten by a radioactive spider and then turns into Scott the woz…with superpowers. In terms of spider-man games, they’ve never really…been that brilliant. That was until insomniac came into the picture. But we can talk about the original later. Just the original. Just the original game on the PS4.
Story:
Alright so where are we. I’m not gonna go too in depth but to summarise, Harry Osborne, remember him? Yeah neither do we, is now finally out of treatment for his disease and can now see Peter again. What a romance! Harry sets up a foundation for them where they can help people and find a cure for everyone. But uhh then the 19 inches of venom come in and uhh…anyway what’s going on with miles?
Just an fyi: if there’s one complaint I have it’s probably miles’ side to the story. It’s not that interesting. It can be summed up with: it happened. Most of the ‘plot points’ are just set ups for side missions which I’ll get into later. But essentially he learns that revenge isn’t a great thing to seek and he ends up kinda making up with Martin li from the last game. Honestly that’s his whole story and it doesn’t interest me that much.
Back to Peter, the 19 inches of venom end up affecting him and kraven ends up believing that venom (or venom attacked to Peter) is his ‘final hunt’. Though eventually miles gets it off of him. But then it ends up joining with Harry again and uhh. Yeah them 19 inches go crazy. So then Peter and miles have to track him down and stop his mini inches from ‘curing’ New York. And that’s spider-man 2 In pretty much 2 minutes.
Combat:
Damn they really upped the combat here, huh? It’s pretty much kinda the same as the last few games, though Peter and miles have some cool new moves they can try out.
Peters symbiote abilities are really cool but they do not beat miles’s new abilities. They mainly come from li as that is one of miles’s big plot points yet the moves are actually pretty interesting and feel like a much needed breath of fresh air from his standalone game’s abilities (and they also make a return!) overall the gameplay isn’t changed too much but is a pretty cool step up.
Gameplay in general:
Swinging is back and is as great as ever and now we have a new thing to manoeuvre around New York with: the wingsuit. You know when people ask can pigs fly? What about spiders? Cause that’s just the thing I want to see happen when I try to get into bed and see a spider fly over me. I mean it’s definitely a new way of getting around New York and it helps in some areas.
How could I forget the side quests? These are definitely some of the best and worst parts of the game for me. The flame cultist side quest is actually really interesting, though it left me on a MAJOR cliffhanger. Which I won’t spoil for people but geez. I hope it does manifest into some form of dlc. The whole jazz side quest is ok as well. I only know miles davis so uhh, most of this unfortunately went over my head. The Brooklyn visions side quest is pretty dull but you get a nice suit. Don’t even talk to me about the spider bots side quest.
Before I bore you with more of that I’m gonna be real: all this stuff sort of happened. None of the side quests were really that interesting and most of the time kind of blew over my head. Not to say they were bad or anything, just not that interesting.
Characters:
“That’s like getting a shotgun for a haircut”
I really did want to like the characters in this game, and they aren’t necessarily that bad. I mean considering I gave the game 4 stars, I certainly didn’t find them insufferable. There were a good cast of characters and it’s best I get them out of the way first.
Kraven was a really good villain. Like if there was a way of giving me a really good first villain for the second game it’s kraven. He was hyped up well by insomniac as well and I found him to be a really interesting character. Whether he beats out li is another matter but I still really enjoyed what he did and what he signified in the game.
Speaking of whom, I quite liked li in this. He was sort of needing a redemption arc, or at least that’s how I felt, and I’m glad he got it. I shit on the miles story a little bit but li really did steal the show for that. I’m just so glad he realised what he needed to do and now looking to better himself.
Hell I’ll even make the argument Peter was a pretty good character. Like I was much more invested in his story. The symbiote slowly changing him made it seem really believable for his character and his slow dive into it controlling him. The same sort of goes for Harry, though he’s still a weak character if you ask me.
Wait, Harry Osborne, a weak character? How could you say such blasphemy! I don’t know he’s just not that interesting. His whole story arc just isn’t that interesting for me. I knew what was gonna happen and in the end it just annoyed me because of how predictable it was, well that is until the end. Venom takes him over yadayada. And then miles brings him back, because the last redeeming quality would’ve been to teach Peter a lesson but nope.
Miles uhh, yeah. He does shit to be honest. He mainly sets up side quests and only has a big plot with li which I’ve already discussed and I hate to sound like the 19 inches of venom is talking but all he really does is get in the way sometimes. Near the end he’s a hell of a lot more helpful but that’s the problem, he’s a little too helpful. Though I’m not gonna blame him for saving Harry as much as it is a little bullshit. And also who actually thought his new suit was good. ‘Miles morales original’. It’s funny cause I saw that exact same style in the Nike store 5 days ago
…man just fuck what they did with mj’s model.
Conclusion:
So we made it. Overall, it was certainly an experience which didn’t disappoint. Whilst it’s definitely better than miles morales, I feel the original still tops it, just because of its brilliant array of ideas. Whilst they are still here, the messages get a bit thrown around, couple that with a few weak stories and barely and gameplay tweaks and you should be setting up for a mid game. Yet I still enjoyed it. After all is said and done, I do hope spider-man 3 can explore more ideas and maybe that dlc can finally answer some questions. Like whether carnage knows who candice is?
Decent game, fine combat, good Peter story, fuck the spider bots, nice to see yuri again, 19 inches of venom
I’m back. I promised I’d return, and with that I promised I’d return with a review of a much newer game. I hope everyone had a wonderful (and late) Christmas and new year, and I hope that you all enjoy this review. I admit it’s odd for me to review the older game in a series and work backwards but I feel as though it’ll be much easier for me in this case. I hope you have a wonderful evening and I hope you enjoy my first review of the year. And now back to the review.
Intro:
So sandman was the reason New York had an orange sky back in June, that makes so much sense now.
Contrary to popular belief: I like superheroes. I’m not the expert on them nor am I gonna act like I am but I think I know a decent amount about them. And what’s one superhero series I like? Well it would have to be sp- fantastic four. I adore the fantastic four but Spider-Man is a close second, and it also happens to be the more popular of the two. Spider-man, the series about some random teenager called Peter Parker who gets bitten by a radioactive spider and then turns into Scott the woz…with superpowers. In terms of spider-man games, they’ve never really…been that brilliant. That was until insomniac came into the picture. But we can talk about the original later. Just the original. Just the original game on the PS4.
Story:
Alright so where are we. I’m not gonna go too in depth but to summarise, Harry Osborne, remember him? Yeah neither do we, is now finally out of treatment for his disease and can now see Peter again. What a romance! Harry sets up a foundation for them where they can help people and find a cure for everyone. But uhh then the 19 inches of venom come in and uhh…anyway what’s going on with miles?
Just an fyi: if there’s one complaint I have it’s probably miles’ side to the story. It’s not that interesting. It can be summed up with: it happened. Most of the ‘plot points’ are just set ups for side missions which I’ll get into later. But essentially he learns that revenge isn’t a great thing to seek and he ends up kinda making up with Martin li from the last game. Honestly that’s his whole story and it doesn’t interest me that much.
Back to Peter, the 19 inches of venom end up affecting him and kraven ends up believing that venom (or venom attacked to Peter) is his ‘final hunt’. Though eventually miles gets it off of him. But then it ends up joining with Harry again and uhh. Yeah them 19 inches go crazy. So then Peter and miles have to track him down and stop his mini inches from ‘curing’ New York. And that’s spider-man 2 In pretty much 2 minutes.
Combat:
Damn they really upped the combat here, huh? It’s pretty much kinda the same as the last few games, though Peter and miles have some cool new moves they can try out.
Peters symbiote abilities are really cool but they do not beat miles’s new abilities. They mainly come from li as that is one of miles’s big plot points yet the moves are actually pretty interesting and feel like a much needed breath of fresh air from his standalone game’s abilities (and they also make a return!) overall the gameplay isn’t changed too much but is a pretty cool step up.
Gameplay in general:
Swinging is back and is as great as ever and now we have a new thing to manoeuvre around New York with: the wingsuit. You know when people ask can pigs fly? What about spiders? Cause that’s just the thing I want to see happen when I try to get into bed and see a spider fly over me. I mean it’s definitely a new way of getting around New York and it helps in some areas.
How could I forget the side quests? These are definitely some of the best and worst parts of the game for me. The flame cultist side quest is actually really interesting, though it left me on a MAJOR cliffhanger. Which I won’t spoil for people but geez. I hope it does manifest into some form of dlc. The whole jazz side quest is ok as well. I only know miles davis so uhh, most of this unfortunately went over my head. The Brooklyn visions side quest is pretty dull but you get a nice suit. Don’t even talk to me about the spider bots side quest.
Before I bore you with more of that I’m gonna be real: all this stuff sort of happened. None of the side quests were really that interesting and most of the time kind of blew over my head. Not to say they were bad or anything, just not that interesting.
Characters:
“That’s like getting a shotgun for a haircut”
I really did want to like the characters in this game, and they aren’t necessarily that bad. I mean considering I gave the game 4 stars, I certainly didn’t find them insufferable. There were a good cast of characters and it’s best I get them out of the way first.
Kraven was a really good villain. Like if there was a way of giving me a really good first villain for the second game it’s kraven. He was hyped up well by insomniac as well and I found him to be a really interesting character. Whether he beats out li is another matter but I still really enjoyed what he did and what he signified in the game.
Speaking of whom, I quite liked li in this. He was sort of needing a redemption arc, or at least that’s how I felt, and I’m glad he got it. I shit on the miles story a little bit but li really did steal the show for that. I’m just so glad he realised what he needed to do and now looking to better himself.
Hell I’ll even make the argument Peter was a pretty good character. Like I was much more invested in his story. The symbiote slowly changing him made it seem really believable for his character and his slow dive into it controlling him. The same sort of goes for Harry, though he’s still a weak character if you ask me.
Wait, Harry Osborne, a weak character? How could you say such blasphemy! I don’t know he’s just not that interesting. His whole story arc just isn’t that interesting for me. I knew what was gonna happen and in the end it just annoyed me because of how predictable it was, well that is until the end. Venom takes him over yadayada. And then miles brings him back, because the last redeeming quality would’ve been to teach Peter a lesson but nope.
Miles uhh, yeah. He does shit to be honest. He mainly sets up side quests and only has a big plot with li which I’ve already discussed and I hate to sound like the 19 inches of venom is talking but all he really does is get in the way sometimes. Near the end he’s a hell of a lot more helpful but that’s the problem, he’s a little too helpful. Though I’m not gonna blame him for saving Harry as much as it is a little bullshit. And also who actually thought his new suit was good. ‘Miles morales original’. It’s funny cause I saw that exact same style in the Nike store 5 days ago
…man just fuck what they did with mj’s model.
Conclusion:
So we made it. Overall, it was certainly an experience which didn’t disappoint. Whilst it’s definitely better than miles morales, I feel the original still tops it, just because of its brilliant array of ideas. Whilst they are still here, the messages get a bit thrown around, couple that with a few weak stories and barely and gameplay tweaks and you should be setting up for a mid game. Yet I still enjoyed it. After all is said and done, I do hope spider-man 3 can explore more ideas and maybe that dlc can finally answer some questions. Like whether carnage knows who candice is?
Decent game, fine combat, good Peter story, fuck the spider bots, nice to see yuri again, 19 inches of venom
2002
Everyone has to start somewhere right? Every person had to start with something that inspired them. Whether that be an event, maybe a tv show or film, maybe even a book, or maybe a 3D platforming shooter on the ps2. Or for me at least.
Ratchet & clank was a game born from the gods. If people were destined to do stuff, then this was the game that saw me in that direction. After insomniac lost spyro they needed a new big platforming series, so they borrowed naughty dogs engine which they used for Jak and Daxter and were able to create what would become the first ratchet game. After the release, the game would spawn a PlayStation staple franchise and specifically for this review: a boy with a small dream. But that’s for later. Let’s get onto the actual game itself.
Act 1:
Now I know I’ve reviewed this game in the past, but it certainly lacked the depth it needed, so why not give it that missing depth right now? The story sees you in control of a Lombax named ratchet. He’s alone on the desolate planet of veldin with the dream to escape and to explore other planes across the solar system. Meanwhile, there’s a malfunction in a robot making factory and the result of this is clank, a tiny robot. He finds out that an evil man named chairman drek is planning on destroying planets to create a planet for his own. Clank quickly begins to try and escape but is shot down by other bots and ends up landing in veldin. From there, he meets ratchet and clank helps him to escape the planet with the deal of finding captain qwark and putting a stop to chairman dreks plans. But before we continue the story: it’s time to go into gameplay.
Compared to future instalments, the first ratchet game isn’t as shooter heavy as its successors but it is still a core part of its gameplay. Considering the fact that before, insomniac’s only really major work were the spyro games, you can see that formula kind of applies to the first ratchet game. Even with this however, it still ends up sticking out on its own. You get a choice of 16 weapons all with different attributes. I’m not going to go too in depth about the weapons, because you can tell they were still trying to work out what works and what didn’t and believe me, the taunter is a big showcase of that. Some weapons include the decoy glove, whereby a small inflatable version of ratchet will stand and enemies will instead attack it instead of you. The suck cannon sucks up enemies and even crates which can then be launched back at enemies, this then brings me onto the next bit of gameplay.
The currency in the game is something that would still define its successors. These are bolts. These can be found by killing enemies or even finding them in smashable beige crates, or even surprisingly: bomb crates. Bolts are now explosive! There are different types of crates in the game. Those being the normal beige crates, bomb crates which explode in 3 seconds, metal crates which can only be opened through some form of explosion, and nanotech crates. Nanotech is essentially the health in the game and the crates can be found practically everywhere. Before I go in depth about the currency and its themes, let’s continue the story shall we?
Ratchet and clank end up crash landing on planet novalis but end up getting a ship from the planetary chairman (a very imaginative name) and end up finding…the plumber. The absolute legend. The crack of all jokes. But anyway. They end up going to different planets to try and find captain qwark. But just before I get onto that, I just want to take a minute and talk about another part of the gameplay.
Something that makes the first ratchet game certainly stand out is its non-linear progression. Essentially, in almost all levels you can take different paths to get to different things, these could be important items, important story beats, or just nice little bonuses. What I like about that is that, it encourages exploration and almost pushes it on the player to keep returning to places and just checking out everywhere they can. It’s a very nice bit of gameplay that I wish was continued and pushed a lot more in later ratchet games.
They end up arriving on planet kerwan whereby clank gets a heli pack upgrade and ratchet ends up getting a swingshot. To start off with, the swingshot is one of the gadgets that helps ratchet out with puzzles, these pop up all over the games and work differently to weapons as well…they don’t kill anyone. The heli pack is also an upgrade that helps give ratchet a lot more flexibility in terms of things like reaching hard to reach places. Clank ends up getting 2 other upgrades later on which help with similar things and can come in quite handy. I’ve never met anyone on this planet who hates the heli pack or thruster pack, and if someone does…do you really?
They eventually do end up finding qwark and he ends up taking them to his base on planet Umbris…however, he ends up turning out to be helping drek this entire time and leaves them to the slaughter, thankfully tho ratchet and clank make it out with their lives…but maybe not so much their friendship as clank fell for qwarks tricks. This then leads us into act 2 of the game! Oh wow!
Act 2:
So they end up getting a brand spanking new ship and end up having to try and track down qwark, however before they can…there’s a bunch of issues. For starters, they’re on the planet orxon and the air is very dangerous to breathe, so they are forced to try some form of gas mask to find the infobot and locate qwark. If you don’t know what it is, it’s essentially a small little robot that gives the coordinates of the next planet.
Also, just wanted to also talk about the themes of the game and I thought this would be an excellent time as any. So, if you’re following this I’m just wondering…have you noticed how expensive everything is? Well, you’ll never get what that is! Why it’s good old consumerism my favourite! The main theme of this game and the entire ps2 quadrilogy are obviously the satire and extreme push of consumerism. Stuff is advertised everywhere and practically nothing in the game doesn’t not come with a price. But that is the sort of genius of the writing. Everything has to come with a price and if you can’t pay it then tough shit. It gives the world an almost slightly depressing view. But I digress.
Eventually they get a gas mask from planet pokitaru and go to a bunch of other planets, including hoven where they thwart one of dreks plans…and clank hits on a girl??? This is until they eventually decide to confront qwark on the gemlick base. And oh man…this is where it gets good.
Come on, I had to mention the music at some point. The entire score was composed by David bergeaud and unfortunately he hasn’t returned to the series since quest for booty. His soundtracks in almost every ratchet game he did were excellent and fit with every planet they were inserted into. Whether it be the futuristic and busy landscape of planet kerwan or the desolate yet dangerous gemlick base, everything he composed for the game fits perfectly and encapsulates each world perfectly. It’s a shame later soundtracks wouldn’t encapsulate the same feeling the first few ratchet games did but, hey, we still have the work he did and it can still be appreciated today, if they put it in streaming services…
Act 3:
After attempting to confront qwark, they get into a fighter jet and he crashes onto the planet of oltanis. It’s at this moment when ratchet and clank decide to put aside their differences and actually defeat drek for the good of the galaxy. They try to get oltanis but clank can’t come out because of the lightning and dangerous conditions of the area. Ratchet is then forced to go on his own where he finds qwa- I mean Steve and gets the gagdetron pda…which I have to dedicate a paragraph to.
The gadgetron pda. What’s so good about this baby? It’s essentially the get yourself out of having no ammo card. You can use this thing absolutely anytime you want is essentially a portable vender. The only downside is the fact that the ammo costs more than it does at an actual vendor but who cares! If your loaded this is a perfect way of getting out of dangerous fights.
After getting an infobot, they travel to quartu, otherwise known as the robot factory from where clank was created. Clank ends up becoming giant in a pretty short section which I’m not going to go too in depth about. Essentially they end up getting another infobot for their trouble and end up making it to kalebo III to try and sneak into the robot factory in quartu. Kalebo III just happens to be the headquarters of none other than gadgetron, the company that has been selling you weapons and everything. They meet the chairman and end up having to participate in a hoverboard competition.
Hoverboarding is essentially a little racing game that you can be in. There’s only two tracks with those being in Rilgar and kalebo III. They aren’t that exciting but they certainly were for younger me, but nowadays they frustrate me as all hell. I also forgot to mention about some of the other important gadgets. Those being stuff like the grind rails which let you grind on railings (shocker), the magnet boots which let you walk on magnetic surfaces, the gas mask which I already touched upon. These not only help with puzzles but they also look really swag on ratchet.
After the competition, ratchet receives a remote that turns him into a robot. He decides to use this to his advantage and sneak into the robot factory on quartu. After doing so, they end up finding the exact place where clank was born. I’m not going to describe the scene because…I think it says everything perfectly. Afterwards however, it turns out that drek plans on destroying veldin as a sort of fuck you to ratchet. They decide to try and return to veldin immediately and stop drek in his tracks. Drek ends up revealing that he was the one that polluted his kinds homeworld and he was going to do it again on the new planet he was creating, just to make more money and repeat it over and over again. With this, ratchet and clank finally decide to take drek down once and for all.
The final battle is pretty excellent and cinematic. With the desperate attempt to try and stop drek at all costs from destroying veldin with his deplanetizer ray. Ratchet and clank end up succeeding and shoot drek to his own planet, destroying it in the process. The end shows ratchet and clank finally being really best buds and deciding to live with each other and just be…the best duo like come on.
Epilogue:
After everything…I still love this game. Of course it isn’t perfect but that’s ok. If it wasn’t for this game I probably wouldn’t reviewing different games at this very moment. This was the first game I ever played and I hold it really dear to my heart and hell even the entire franchise to my heart. The story of the first game and the themes it touches on are still perfect to this day. And whilst gameplay could’ve done with a few fixes, that’s what the other games would later help with. And even back then, I called it the game with the biggest heart, because that’s true. It was. It’s still well liked today and I honestly couldn’t thank it enough. And I can’t thank you guys enough either for sticking with me for so long!
Great gameplay, excellent story, breathtaking music, interesting selection of weapons and gadgets, and the plumber still has his cra-I mean back, thanks for the 100th review!
Ratchet & clank was a game born from the gods. If people were destined to do stuff, then this was the game that saw me in that direction. After insomniac lost spyro they needed a new big platforming series, so they borrowed naughty dogs engine which they used for Jak and Daxter and were able to create what would become the first ratchet game. After the release, the game would spawn a PlayStation staple franchise and specifically for this review: a boy with a small dream. But that’s for later. Let’s get onto the actual game itself.
Act 1:
Now I know I’ve reviewed this game in the past, but it certainly lacked the depth it needed, so why not give it that missing depth right now? The story sees you in control of a Lombax named ratchet. He’s alone on the desolate planet of veldin with the dream to escape and to explore other planes across the solar system. Meanwhile, there’s a malfunction in a robot making factory and the result of this is clank, a tiny robot. He finds out that an evil man named chairman drek is planning on destroying planets to create a planet for his own. Clank quickly begins to try and escape but is shot down by other bots and ends up landing in veldin. From there, he meets ratchet and clank helps him to escape the planet with the deal of finding captain qwark and putting a stop to chairman dreks plans. But before we continue the story: it’s time to go into gameplay.
Compared to future instalments, the first ratchet game isn’t as shooter heavy as its successors but it is still a core part of its gameplay. Considering the fact that before, insomniac’s only really major work were the spyro games, you can see that formula kind of applies to the first ratchet game. Even with this however, it still ends up sticking out on its own. You get a choice of 16 weapons all with different attributes. I’m not going to go too in depth about the weapons, because you can tell they were still trying to work out what works and what didn’t and believe me, the taunter is a big showcase of that. Some weapons include the decoy glove, whereby a small inflatable version of ratchet will stand and enemies will instead attack it instead of you. The suck cannon sucks up enemies and even crates which can then be launched back at enemies, this then brings me onto the next bit of gameplay.
The currency in the game is something that would still define its successors. These are bolts. These can be found by killing enemies or even finding them in smashable beige crates, or even surprisingly: bomb crates. Bolts are now explosive! There are different types of crates in the game. Those being the normal beige crates, bomb crates which explode in 3 seconds, metal crates which can only be opened through some form of explosion, and nanotech crates. Nanotech is essentially the health in the game and the crates can be found practically everywhere. Before I go in depth about the currency and its themes, let’s continue the story shall we?
Ratchet and clank end up crash landing on planet novalis but end up getting a ship from the planetary chairman (a very imaginative name) and end up finding…the plumber. The absolute legend. The crack of all jokes. But anyway. They end up going to different planets to try and find captain qwark. But just before I get onto that, I just want to take a minute and talk about another part of the gameplay.
Something that makes the first ratchet game certainly stand out is its non-linear progression. Essentially, in almost all levels you can take different paths to get to different things, these could be important items, important story beats, or just nice little bonuses. What I like about that is that, it encourages exploration and almost pushes it on the player to keep returning to places and just checking out everywhere they can. It’s a very nice bit of gameplay that I wish was continued and pushed a lot more in later ratchet games.
They end up arriving on planet kerwan whereby clank gets a heli pack upgrade and ratchet ends up getting a swingshot. To start off with, the swingshot is one of the gadgets that helps ratchet out with puzzles, these pop up all over the games and work differently to weapons as well…they don’t kill anyone. The heli pack is also an upgrade that helps give ratchet a lot more flexibility in terms of things like reaching hard to reach places. Clank ends up getting 2 other upgrades later on which help with similar things and can come in quite handy. I’ve never met anyone on this planet who hates the heli pack or thruster pack, and if someone does…do you really?
They eventually do end up finding qwark and he ends up taking them to his base on planet Umbris…however, he ends up turning out to be helping drek this entire time and leaves them to the slaughter, thankfully tho ratchet and clank make it out with their lives…but maybe not so much their friendship as clank fell for qwarks tricks. This then leads us into act 2 of the game! Oh wow!
Act 2:
So they end up getting a brand spanking new ship and end up having to try and track down qwark, however before they can…there’s a bunch of issues. For starters, they’re on the planet orxon and the air is very dangerous to breathe, so they are forced to try some form of gas mask to find the infobot and locate qwark. If you don’t know what it is, it’s essentially a small little robot that gives the coordinates of the next planet.
Also, just wanted to also talk about the themes of the game and I thought this would be an excellent time as any. So, if you’re following this I’m just wondering…have you noticed how expensive everything is? Well, you’ll never get what that is! Why it’s good old consumerism my favourite! The main theme of this game and the entire ps2 quadrilogy are obviously the satire and extreme push of consumerism. Stuff is advertised everywhere and practically nothing in the game doesn’t not come with a price. But that is the sort of genius of the writing. Everything has to come with a price and if you can’t pay it then tough shit. It gives the world an almost slightly depressing view. But I digress.
Eventually they get a gas mask from planet pokitaru and go to a bunch of other planets, including hoven where they thwart one of dreks plans…and clank hits on a girl??? This is until they eventually decide to confront qwark on the gemlick base. And oh man…this is where it gets good.
Come on, I had to mention the music at some point. The entire score was composed by David bergeaud and unfortunately he hasn’t returned to the series since quest for booty. His soundtracks in almost every ratchet game he did were excellent and fit with every planet they were inserted into. Whether it be the futuristic and busy landscape of planet kerwan or the desolate yet dangerous gemlick base, everything he composed for the game fits perfectly and encapsulates each world perfectly. It’s a shame later soundtracks wouldn’t encapsulate the same feeling the first few ratchet games did but, hey, we still have the work he did and it can still be appreciated today, if they put it in streaming services…
Act 3:
After attempting to confront qwark, they get into a fighter jet and he crashes onto the planet of oltanis. It’s at this moment when ratchet and clank decide to put aside their differences and actually defeat drek for the good of the galaxy. They try to get oltanis but clank can’t come out because of the lightning and dangerous conditions of the area. Ratchet is then forced to go on his own where he finds qwa- I mean Steve and gets the gagdetron pda…which I have to dedicate a paragraph to.
The gadgetron pda. What’s so good about this baby? It’s essentially the get yourself out of having no ammo card. You can use this thing absolutely anytime you want is essentially a portable vender. The only downside is the fact that the ammo costs more than it does at an actual vendor but who cares! If your loaded this is a perfect way of getting out of dangerous fights.
After getting an infobot, they travel to quartu, otherwise known as the robot factory from where clank was created. Clank ends up becoming giant in a pretty short section which I’m not going to go too in depth about. Essentially they end up getting another infobot for their trouble and end up making it to kalebo III to try and sneak into the robot factory in quartu. Kalebo III just happens to be the headquarters of none other than gadgetron, the company that has been selling you weapons and everything. They meet the chairman and end up having to participate in a hoverboard competition.
Hoverboarding is essentially a little racing game that you can be in. There’s only two tracks with those being in Rilgar and kalebo III. They aren’t that exciting but they certainly were for younger me, but nowadays they frustrate me as all hell. I also forgot to mention about some of the other important gadgets. Those being stuff like the grind rails which let you grind on railings (shocker), the magnet boots which let you walk on magnetic surfaces, the gas mask which I already touched upon. These not only help with puzzles but they also look really swag on ratchet.
After the competition, ratchet receives a remote that turns him into a robot. He decides to use this to his advantage and sneak into the robot factory on quartu. After doing so, they end up finding the exact place where clank was born. I’m not going to describe the scene because…I think it says everything perfectly. Afterwards however, it turns out that drek plans on destroying veldin as a sort of fuck you to ratchet. They decide to try and return to veldin immediately and stop drek in his tracks. Drek ends up revealing that he was the one that polluted his kinds homeworld and he was going to do it again on the new planet he was creating, just to make more money and repeat it over and over again. With this, ratchet and clank finally decide to take drek down once and for all.
The final battle is pretty excellent and cinematic. With the desperate attempt to try and stop drek at all costs from destroying veldin with his deplanetizer ray. Ratchet and clank end up succeeding and shoot drek to his own planet, destroying it in the process. The end shows ratchet and clank finally being really best buds and deciding to live with each other and just be…the best duo like come on.
Epilogue:
After everything…I still love this game. Of course it isn’t perfect but that’s ok. If it wasn’t for this game I probably wouldn’t reviewing different games at this very moment. This was the first game I ever played and I hold it really dear to my heart and hell even the entire franchise to my heart. The story of the first game and the themes it touches on are still perfect to this day. And whilst gameplay could’ve done with a few fixes, that’s what the other games would later help with. And even back then, I called it the game with the biggest heart, because that’s true. It was. It’s still well liked today and I honestly couldn’t thank it enough. And I can’t thank you guys enough either for sticking with me for so long!
Great gameplay, excellent story, breathtaking music, interesting selection of weapons and gadgets, and the plumber still has his cra-I mean back, thanks for the 100th review!
2012
Yes I cried to this game. A bunch of 2D shapes and I cried to that. I swear I’m not going insane.
Thomas was alone is a game I wasn’t expecting to particularly like. Granted, I had heard the acclaim it had almost 10 years ago but I never really saw it as a game I could really sink my teeth into. Yes I’ve played my fair share of platforming puzzle games and most of the time they never cease to not get on my nerves. Platformers can be difficult for me sometimes by themselves, couple that with some puzzle elements and I’m gonna be either throwing my controller out the window or simply trying to compose myself as I tackle the same level for 61st time. However, This game was…different. Yes I still struggled at quite a few levels and it did feel quite repetitive but, it had something not many puzzle platformers can say they have: a heart.
In Thomas was alone, you play as a set of Ai’s, which are being experimented on by some sort of research company, which take the form of different 2D shapes (mainly squares and rectangles). One of these rectangles is named Thomas, and he is almost like your main character in a sense. He is eventually joined by Chris, John, Claire, Laura, James, and Sarah.
Chris is essentially your grumpy, Scrooge like character when you first meet him. He tries to keep himself to himself and he’s someone that gets annoyed at people who try to help him. As the game goes on however, he begins to soften up more and more and when he meets Laura, he begins to genuinely feel something. It’s his lack of purpose that keeps him as this grumpy and fed up little square. Without something to live by, he just sees everything and everyone as a chore, but as soon as he meets Laura and gets used to everyone, he realises how important being with people is and how important you can be to other people.
John is the show off, or at least that’s how people see him. He likes to see himself as the superior ai and have quite the audience. He’s shown as being quite egocentric but hardly unlikeable as even throughout he still shows a respect to the others. As soon as Sarah shows up and shows that she can jump higher than even John, he learns to support her nonetheless instead of feeling jealous and aims to support others.
Claire is quite a childish yet very protecting character which goes along with her traits. She can swim through poisonous water which the rest of the cast cannot. As soon as she learns she can she gains a higher purpose and begins to show her true personality. She even declares herself as ‘super Claire’ sporting the whole world as her nemesis and spikes as her kryptonite. She is shown to be quite childish yet still wishes to protect her friends at all costs.
Laura is a character with a very low self-esteem. She feels as though she has been used by many different ai’s and especially the pixel cloud (an entity that appears through most levels and gobbles up the characters at points) as bait. Her ability is almost like a trampoline as when people land on top of her they bounce up, which fits in with the fact she feels used by others. That is until she meets Chris. At first she was quite wary that he would just leave her like the others, yet eventually learns to cling to him as they share a mutual love for each other. She is quite a depressive character who is only truly brought out by Chris and shown to be a much more happier character.
James is quite an introverted character and is meant to be the opposite to Thomas both mentally and physically (and coupled with the fact that he walks along the ceiling and jumps towards the floor). He is a green shape whilst Thomas is red, and whilst James is much more introverted, Thomas is shown to be more extroverted. However, James slowly learns that being himself isn’t too bad and that he does have a purpose. He shows that, both him and Thomas need each other and that they are the perfect yin and yang to each other, which also happens to reflect itself in the levels as well.
Sarah is…she’s kind of there to be honest. Granted, she has one of the best abilities in the game with the fact she can double jump, she talks about the ‘fountain of wisdom’ and leads them onto them helping others become sentient but other then that she doesn’t really have that polarising of a personality. She was part of the dlc known as ‘Benjamin’s flight’ but whether I’ll ever play that is slim to none. Yeah she’s kind of there.
After all of that you then have the ‘second generation Ai’s’ which are the Ai’s that the original gang decided to help. They have a mini plot where it turns out one of them, named Grey, was going to attempt to betray the others that were also trying to escape, but he got eaten by a pixel cloud and the only 2 that made it out were shapes names Jo and Sam.
The gameplay of Thomas was alone is pretty good to begin with but slowly starts to become very repetitive. Whilst it was fun to see what you could do with the different shapes and their abilities, eventually it did become quite simple and easy to get. I think if it didn’t have such a brilliant narrative, I probably would’ve given this game an even lower score but, that’s what’s so great about games. The gameplay does spice up a bit once you start playing as the ‘second generation ai’s’ but it still feels a tiny bit repetitive. But hey, I still really enjoyed it. The music was also brilliant and definitely worth mentioning. David Housden’s work on the game was brilliant, sounding like a mix between the band ‘explosions in the sky’ with a tiny bit of electronic inspiration behind it. The narrator as well, Danny Wallace. He isn’t your Stephen fry from littlebigplanet nor is he your Kevan Brighting from the Stanley parable but he’s certainly up there and does a very great job.
Overall, I really enjoyed my time with this game. It was short but also an absolute blast and I’m thrilled to have given it a try. I might give the dlc a go, however I haven’t heard the best things said about it so I might leave it off. This was an absolutely brilliant experience and I do encourage others to give it a try, even if it has been practically 10 years since it was first released. Mike Bithell, you have my respect.
Brilliant narrative, decent yet repetitive gameplay, excellent music, wonderful narration, shapes made me cry
Thomas was alone is a game I wasn’t expecting to particularly like. Granted, I had heard the acclaim it had almost 10 years ago but I never really saw it as a game I could really sink my teeth into. Yes I’ve played my fair share of platforming puzzle games and most of the time they never cease to not get on my nerves. Platformers can be difficult for me sometimes by themselves, couple that with some puzzle elements and I’m gonna be either throwing my controller out the window or simply trying to compose myself as I tackle the same level for 61st time. However, This game was…different. Yes I still struggled at quite a few levels and it did feel quite repetitive but, it had something not many puzzle platformers can say they have: a heart.
In Thomas was alone, you play as a set of Ai’s, which are being experimented on by some sort of research company, which take the form of different 2D shapes (mainly squares and rectangles). One of these rectangles is named Thomas, and he is almost like your main character in a sense. He is eventually joined by Chris, John, Claire, Laura, James, and Sarah.
Chris is essentially your grumpy, Scrooge like character when you first meet him. He tries to keep himself to himself and he’s someone that gets annoyed at people who try to help him. As the game goes on however, he begins to soften up more and more and when he meets Laura, he begins to genuinely feel something. It’s his lack of purpose that keeps him as this grumpy and fed up little square. Without something to live by, he just sees everything and everyone as a chore, but as soon as he meets Laura and gets used to everyone, he realises how important being with people is and how important you can be to other people.
John is the show off, or at least that’s how people see him. He likes to see himself as the superior ai and have quite the audience. He’s shown as being quite egocentric but hardly unlikeable as even throughout he still shows a respect to the others. As soon as Sarah shows up and shows that she can jump higher than even John, he learns to support her nonetheless instead of feeling jealous and aims to support others.
Claire is quite a childish yet very protecting character which goes along with her traits. She can swim through poisonous water which the rest of the cast cannot. As soon as she learns she can she gains a higher purpose and begins to show her true personality. She even declares herself as ‘super Claire’ sporting the whole world as her nemesis and spikes as her kryptonite. She is shown to be quite childish yet still wishes to protect her friends at all costs.
Laura is a character with a very low self-esteem. She feels as though she has been used by many different ai’s and especially the pixel cloud (an entity that appears through most levels and gobbles up the characters at points) as bait. Her ability is almost like a trampoline as when people land on top of her they bounce up, which fits in with the fact she feels used by others. That is until she meets Chris. At first she was quite wary that he would just leave her like the others, yet eventually learns to cling to him as they share a mutual love for each other. She is quite a depressive character who is only truly brought out by Chris and shown to be a much more happier character.
James is quite an introverted character and is meant to be the opposite to Thomas both mentally and physically (and coupled with the fact that he walks along the ceiling and jumps towards the floor). He is a green shape whilst Thomas is red, and whilst James is much more introverted, Thomas is shown to be more extroverted. However, James slowly learns that being himself isn’t too bad and that he does have a purpose. He shows that, both him and Thomas need each other and that they are the perfect yin and yang to each other, which also happens to reflect itself in the levels as well.
Sarah is…she’s kind of there to be honest. Granted, she has one of the best abilities in the game with the fact she can double jump, she talks about the ‘fountain of wisdom’ and leads them onto them helping others become sentient but other then that she doesn’t really have that polarising of a personality. She was part of the dlc known as ‘Benjamin’s flight’ but whether I’ll ever play that is slim to none. Yeah she’s kind of there.
After all of that you then have the ‘second generation Ai’s’ which are the Ai’s that the original gang decided to help. They have a mini plot where it turns out one of them, named Grey, was going to attempt to betray the others that were also trying to escape, but he got eaten by a pixel cloud and the only 2 that made it out were shapes names Jo and Sam.
The gameplay of Thomas was alone is pretty good to begin with but slowly starts to become very repetitive. Whilst it was fun to see what you could do with the different shapes and their abilities, eventually it did become quite simple and easy to get. I think if it didn’t have such a brilliant narrative, I probably would’ve given this game an even lower score but, that’s what’s so great about games. The gameplay does spice up a bit once you start playing as the ‘second generation ai’s’ but it still feels a tiny bit repetitive. But hey, I still really enjoyed it. The music was also brilliant and definitely worth mentioning. David Housden’s work on the game was brilliant, sounding like a mix between the band ‘explosions in the sky’ with a tiny bit of electronic inspiration behind it. The narrator as well, Danny Wallace. He isn’t your Stephen fry from littlebigplanet nor is he your Kevan Brighting from the Stanley parable but he’s certainly up there and does a very great job.
Overall, I really enjoyed my time with this game. It was short but also an absolute blast and I’m thrilled to have given it a try. I might give the dlc a go, however I haven’t heard the best things said about it so I might leave it off. This was an absolutely brilliant experience and I do encourage others to give it a try, even if it has been practically 10 years since it was first released. Mike Bithell, you have my respect.
Brilliant narrative, decent yet repetitive gameplay, excellent music, wonderful narration, shapes made me cry
1981
Arcade Week: Day #7
Darkness falls across the land, after we shot some aliens, helped some frogs cross a road, shot some asteroids, shot some more aliens (we love shooting huh), appeared in the olympics, and got chased around a maze we finally made it. We finally found the king of the arcade scene and we’re finally ready to meet him. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: Donkey Kong. He was created in 1981 by Shigeru Miyamoto in an attempt to copy the success of pac-man and it definitely worked. The game even got some legal issues thanks to universal and its similarity to King Kong but thankfully that all got cleared up and we can still enjoy Donkey Kong to this day. So let’s hop in shall we? Cause it’s on like…uhh…
In Donkey Kong, you play as jump man (a very imaginative name but he would later become Mario) on his mission to save his girlfriend Pauline. To do that however, he must Climb up the platforms and avoid the falling barrels to make it. The interesting thing about this game however is the fact that it has multiple differed stages which was quite groundbreaking for the time. These levels will bring in new ways to get points and even more obstacles to try and avoid at all costs or else well…maybe you’re gonna have to get a new girlfriend buddy.
Overall, Donkey Kong is probably one of my favourites when it comes to the arcade scene. Sure, I’ve said it before that dig dug will always be my favourite but I can’t help but really get into this game because of just how imaginative it all is, you can tell how much work and effort they put into this and not just a mindless game to capitalise off the success of pac-man, this game is a lot more special then that. It would not only go on to inspire the Mario series, but other series like Kirby as well. Remember the legal action between Nintendo and universal? Well if it wasn’t for John Kirby, who knows what would’ve happened to the game. And that my friends, was our arcade week, thank you so much for reading.
Good gameplay, decent music, I have ptsd from barrels now, and springs in fact
Happy Halloween!
Darkness falls across the land, after we shot some aliens, helped some frogs cross a road, shot some asteroids, shot some more aliens (we love shooting huh), appeared in the olympics, and got chased around a maze we finally made it. We finally found the king of the arcade scene and we’re finally ready to meet him. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: Donkey Kong. He was created in 1981 by Shigeru Miyamoto in an attempt to copy the success of pac-man and it definitely worked. The game even got some legal issues thanks to universal and its similarity to King Kong but thankfully that all got cleared up and we can still enjoy Donkey Kong to this day. So let’s hop in shall we? Cause it’s on like…uhh…
In Donkey Kong, you play as jump man (a very imaginative name but he would later become Mario) on his mission to save his girlfriend Pauline. To do that however, he must Climb up the platforms and avoid the falling barrels to make it. The interesting thing about this game however is the fact that it has multiple differed stages which was quite groundbreaking for the time. These levels will bring in new ways to get points and even more obstacles to try and avoid at all costs or else well…maybe you’re gonna have to get a new girlfriend buddy.
Overall, Donkey Kong is probably one of my favourites when it comes to the arcade scene. Sure, I’ve said it before that dig dug will always be my favourite but I can’t help but really get into this game because of just how imaginative it all is, you can tell how much work and effort they put into this and not just a mindless game to capitalise off the success of pac-man, this game is a lot more special then that. It would not only go on to inspire the Mario series, but other series like Kirby as well. Remember the legal action between Nintendo and universal? Well if it wasn’t for John Kirby, who knows what would’ve happened to the game. And that my friends, was our arcade week, thank you so much for reading.
Good gameplay, decent music, I have ptsd from barrels now, and springs in fact
Happy Halloween!
1980
Arcade Week: Day #6
There’s a reason why people changed it from puck-man to fuck-man and trust me, it wasn’t to laugh…actually now that I think about it…
You’ve all heard of him, whether it be on a tv show, a song, a book, you have most likely heard of the video game icon that is: pac-man. Created by Toru Iwatani after having quite a few drinks and thinking a pizza with a slice missing…or at least that’s my head canon of the events. Nonetheless, he ended up creating a game that was groundbreaking and the next step towards getting girls into video games, or at least that’s what some people think. Anyway let’s get into the gameplay already or else it’s gonna make me hungry.
You play as a yellow pizza looking guy who has to eat tiny pellets to get to the next level and progress. However, there are 4 ghosts to try and stop you with the most adorable names: Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and the most imaginative of the names: Clyde. However to try and prevent these ghosts from potentially killing you, you can eat these big pellets known as power pellets. This turns the ghosts blue and makes them look like Charlie Brown. If you eat multiple blue ghosts in succession, you get more points! You can also get bonus items which increase your high score after eating a certain number of pellets, these include things such as fruit and a…key?
Overall, pac-man is a really fun arcade game which, like quite a few, has surprisingly stood the test of time. Pac-man is still widely known today with all sorts of sequels and spin-offs following after the originals success. Even a Ms. Pac- man but that’s a story for another day.
Fun little game, nice intermissions, Clyde, anyone fancy going out and having a key to eat?
There’s a reason why people changed it from puck-man to fuck-man and trust me, it wasn’t to laugh…actually now that I think about it…
You’ve all heard of him, whether it be on a tv show, a song, a book, you have most likely heard of the video game icon that is: pac-man. Created by Toru Iwatani after having quite a few drinks and thinking a pizza with a slice missing…or at least that’s my head canon of the events. Nonetheless, he ended up creating a game that was groundbreaking and the next step towards getting girls into video games, or at least that’s what some people think. Anyway let’s get into the gameplay already or else it’s gonna make me hungry.
You play as a yellow pizza looking guy who has to eat tiny pellets to get to the next level and progress. However, there are 4 ghosts to try and stop you with the most adorable names: Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and the most imaginative of the names: Clyde. However to try and prevent these ghosts from potentially killing you, you can eat these big pellets known as power pellets. This turns the ghosts blue and makes them look like Charlie Brown. If you eat multiple blue ghosts in succession, you get more points! You can also get bonus items which increase your high score after eating a certain number of pellets, these include things such as fruit and a…key?
Overall, pac-man is a really fun arcade game which, like quite a few, has surprisingly stood the test of time. Pac-man is still widely known today with all sorts of sequels and spin-offs following after the originals success. Even a Ms. Pac- man but that’s a story for another day.
Fun little game, nice intermissions, Clyde, anyone fancy going out and having a key to eat?
1983
Arcade Week: Day #5
Remember a while back when I said that paperboy was the biggest ‘dad game’ I ever played? Well now I retract that statement. I bamboozled you all. The actual biggest ‘dad game’ of all time is track & field. Konami’s forgotten money-making masterpiece.
So what do you do in track & field? I’m glad you asked. You have 2 buttons, run and action which helps you in 1 of 6 competitions: 100 meter dash (you alternate button presses to run as fast as you can), long jump (you run by pressing the button and then press jump at the right moment), javelin throw (similar to long jump but you throw a javelin), 110 meter hurdles (run by pressing the button and jumping at the correct time), hammer throw (you spin and then press the correct button at the right time), and the high jump (you run and then hold down the action button). In each even you have to get a qualifying time or or level so that player can get to the next competition. If you fail you lose a life, if you don’t have any lives left, you probably ain’t gonna be seeing another Olympics until you put in a few more quarters.
Overall, track & field is actually a pretty fun game all things considered. It has some pretty decent competitions and I find it really fun to get one of your friends to help you spam buttons whilst you focus on another. Sure, you both might be left with hurting hands but I’m sure it’ll all be worth it in the end.
Good selection of events, funny announcer, dad game, hurt my hand
Remember a while back when I said that paperboy was the biggest ‘dad game’ I ever played? Well now I retract that statement. I bamboozled you all. The actual biggest ‘dad game’ of all time is track & field. Konami’s forgotten money-making masterpiece.
So what do you do in track & field? I’m glad you asked. You have 2 buttons, run and action which helps you in 1 of 6 competitions: 100 meter dash (you alternate button presses to run as fast as you can), long jump (you run by pressing the button and then press jump at the right moment), javelin throw (similar to long jump but you throw a javelin), 110 meter hurdles (run by pressing the button and jumping at the correct time), hammer throw (you spin and then press the correct button at the right time), and the high jump (you run and then hold down the action button). In each even you have to get a qualifying time or or level so that player can get to the next competition. If you fail you lose a life, if you don’t have any lives left, you probably ain’t gonna be seeing another Olympics until you put in a few more quarters.
Overall, track & field is actually a pretty fun game all things considered. It has some pretty decent competitions and I find it really fun to get one of your friends to help you spam buttons whilst you focus on another. Sure, you both might be left with hurting hands but I’m sure it’ll all be worth it in the end.
Good selection of events, funny announcer, dad game, hurt my hand
1981
Arcade Week: Day #4
Not trying to go gen z on everyone right now but does anyone else remember the glow up memes? What if was to tell you they did one all the way back in 1981, and what was the one game they decided to glow up? Why space invaders of course!
In Galaga you play as a small ship at the bottom of the screen which must shoot down these ships at the top of the screen. The difference? They come down and try to kamikaze or shoot you a little closer, aww. As you play along the enemies get tougher and tougher. You can even get extra ships which attach onto yours and act as a ‘get out of crying cause you lost all those meaningless points card’. And…that’s basically Galaga. Overall, it’s a really fun game which has definitely become a certified hood classic and it has slowly become one of the most respected arcade games of all time, when I find it to be alright I guess.
Pretty decent, solid gameplay, them boss enemies can piss off
Not trying to go gen z on everyone right now but does anyone else remember the glow up memes? What if was to tell you they did one all the way back in 1981, and what was the one game they decided to glow up? Why space invaders of course!
In Galaga you play as a small ship at the bottom of the screen which must shoot down these ships at the top of the screen. The difference? They come down and try to kamikaze or shoot you a little closer, aww. As you play along the enemies get tougher and tougher. You can even get extra ships which attach onto yours and act as a ‘get out of crying cause you lost all those meaningless points card’. And…that’s basically Galaga. Overall, it’s a really fun game which has definitely become a certified hood classic and it has slowly become one of the most respected arcade games of all time, when I find it to be alright I guess.
Pretty decent, solid gameplay, them boss enemies can piss off
1979
Arcade Week: Day #3
Yeah it’s good and all but it doesn’t have any adorable alien names. Clearly space invaders is superior.
Atari were quite the force in the early 80’s. So it only made sense to milk that force and create as many games as possible, but remember when Atari genuinely had ideas? This is one of them. Asteroids was a game that took people by storm with its simple yet addicting gameplay. The game was conceived by Lyle rains and programmed by Ed Logg, two people who aren’t given enough respect for their work on this brilliant game. Well let’s dive in already and see their brilliant work!
You play as a triangular ship, shooting down asteroids (the name of the game) and ufo’s once they appear. You can move left and right and turn left and right (obviously) and if you try going off the map you’ll end up on the other side. You can also hyperspace which makes you disappear and then reappear (the strategy is a tiny bit risky however). You get 3-5 lives and the maximum amount of points you can get is 99,990 before the game just decides to turn you in. They can’t stand the fact that you’re a fighter (I said I wouldn’t bring space invaders and asteroids politics into this god dammit).
Overall, asteroids is still a pretty fun game. It’s simple and has aged pretty well. The programming team clearly had a blast (literally) making this and I respect what they tried to do…but space invaders is better I’m sorry!
Simple, very fun, quite addicting, space invaders is better
Yeah it’s good and all but it doesn’t have any adorable alien names. Clearly space invaders is superior.
Atari were quite the force in the early 80’s. So it only made sense to milk that force and create as many games as possible, but remember when Atari genuinely had ideas? This is one of them. Asteroids was a game that took people by storm with its simple yet addicting gameplay. The game was conceived by Lyle rains and programmed by Ed Logg, two people who aren’t given enough respect for their work on this brilliant game. Well let’s dive in already and see their brilliant work!
You play as a triangular ship, shooting down asteroids (the name of the game) and ufo’s once they appear. You can move left and right and turn left and right (obviously) and if you try going off the map you’ll end up on the other side. You can also hyperspace which makes you disappear and then reappear (the strategy is a tiny bit risky however). You get 3-5 lives and the maximum amount of points you can get is 99,990 before the game just decides to turn you in. They can’t stand the fact that you’re a fighter (I said I wouldn’t bring space invaders and asteroids politics into this god dammit).
Overall, asteroids is still a pretty fun game. It’s simple and has aged pretty well. The programming team clearly had a blast (literally) making this and I respect what they tried to do…but space invaders is better I’m sorry!
Simple, very fun, quite addicting, space invaders is better
1981
Arcade Week: Day #2
Why did the frog cross the road?
To get to the other side and make sure your quarters or whatever currency you had (I’m British and can’t remember for the life of me) is going to good use after accidentally getting run over by a car. Yeah I don’t get that joke either.
Frogger is a game about life kinda, if that life was just crossing a road and a river and hoping to god you can put yourself in a small portion of a bush. You get 3, 5, or 7 lives depending on the difficulty setting and you have to get at least 5 frogs into the different holes. However, if you fail and lose all your lives, or the time is up, it’s game over! It’s a pretty simple game all things considered and it’s one that is still enjoyed even today. However, Frogger hasn’t gone on to the best things after this game but oh well. At least people still want to play the original and not…Frogger’s adventure or whatever.
Good gameplay, sweet music, I hate alligators so much
Why did the frog cross the road?
To get to the other side and make sure your quarters or whatever currency you had (I’m British and can’t remember for the life of me) is going to good use after accidentally getting run over by a car. Yeah I don’t get that joke either.
Frogger is a game about life kinda, if that life was just crossing a road and a river and hoping to god you can put yourself in a small portion of a bush. You get 3, 5, or 7 lives depending on the difficulty setting and you have to get at least 5 frogs into the different holes. However, if you fail and lose all your lives, or the time is up, it’s game over! It’s a pretty simple game all things considered and it’s one that is still enjoyed even today. However, Frogger hasn’t gone on to the best things after this game but oh well. At least people still want to play the original and not…Frogger’s adventure or whatever.
Good gameplay, sweet music, I hate alligators so much
1978
Arcade Week: Day #1
So it turns out I’ve played quite a few arcade games during my lifetime, and I was just gonna review most of these separately. But then I thought: remember the NES week? So I’m bringing it back but this time for Arcade games, and what better game to start it off with then Space Invaders!
In the game you play as a laser cannon which can only move horizontally as you try to shoot 5 rows of aliens that are slowly moving down the screen also shooting at you. You also have 4 stationary ‘bunkers’ (they’re basically shields) which survive a certain amount of fire. You also only have 3 lives, with the game ending either if they run out or the aliens reach the bottom of the screen and take humanity, in a less dark way then it sounds. And…that’s Space Invaders. A game inspired by media like Star Wars and made a similar amount of money. People were obsessed with this game and it’s not hard to see why. Overall, for one of the biggest arcade classics, it still holds up. Maybe it doesn’t hold up greatly and it is clearly dated but its ideas are still classics and can be enjoyed by anyone.
Classic, noises, those alien names are adorable
So it turns out I’ve played quite a few arcade games during my lifetime, and I was just gonna review most of these separately. But then I thought: remember the NES week? So I’m bringing it back but this time for Arcade games, and what better game to start it off with then Space Invaders!
In the game you play as a laser cannon which can only move horizontally as you try to shoot 5 rows of aliens that are slowly moving down the screen also shooting at you. You also have 4 stationary ‘bunkers’ (they’re basically shields) which survive a certain amount of fire. You also only have 3 lives, with the game ending either if they run out or the aliens reach the bottom of the screen and take humanity, in a less dark way then it sounds. And…that’s Space Invaders. A game inspired by media like Star Wars and made a similar amount of money. People were obsessed with this game and it’s not hard to see why. Overall, for one of the biggest arcade classics, it still holds up. Maybe it doesn’t hold up greatly and it is clearly dated but its ideas are still classics and can be enjoyed by anyone.
Classic, noises, those alien names are adorable
2000
Yeah puzzle games are great and all, but nothing really keeps my att- OH MY GOD ARE THOSE FLASHING LIGHTS.
I’m back, yet again, to talk about puzzle games. And today, I happened to land on one made 23 years ago, and one I’ve never heard of. This is Fantavision. A game developed to show the capabilities of the PlayStation 2 for some reason. Come on, you know me. I can’t like a video game console if it hasn’t got one game which has FLASHING LIGHTS. Anyway, let’s get into the uniqueness of this game and why I kinda like it.
Your mission in Fantavision is simple: you control a circular cursor and quickly match up different firework colours (known as flares). You use a ray of light to gather up these flares by pressing the X button and then press circle to detonate them. You need to string together a minimum of 3 or 4 to be able to get any points out of them. You also have different types of flares which explode in different and mesmerising ways. If you also happen to get a multi-coloured flare, you have the chance to make chains which go on for a ridiculous amount. However, if you miss quite a few flares, it affects your play meter and if that goes down, it’s game over. You can also chain along different power ups which award extra points or help with your play meter. There is also starmine. When you chain together these certain stars, they create these letters which spell out starmine, which is essentially your bonus stage. In the stage you have to detonate as many flares as you can within the time limit. And that’s Fantavision! You can watch replays if you decided to save it and can also have the ability to unlock harder modes and extra stages, but other than that. That’s Fantavision!
So, what did I think? It’s a pretty good puzzle game all things considered. It definitely kept me invested at multiple points and the music is really nice and chill. I will say, the only problem is the replay value but it’s still a nice game to come back to every now and then. This game would later get a rerelease for the ps5 titled 202X. Whether I’ll play it or not we’ll see, as fun as it looks. Also uhh, it’s the American anniversary of this game in 2 days so uhh. Happy early birthday Fantavision!
FLASHING LIGHTS, chill music, good stages
I’m back, yet again, to talk about puzzle games. And today, I happened to land on one made 23 years ago, and one I’ve never heard of. This is Fantavision. A game developed to show the capabilities of the PlayStation 2 for some reason. Come on, you know me. I can’t like a video game console if it hasn’t got one game which has FLASHING LIGHTS. Anyway, let’s get into the uniqueness of this game and why I kinda like it.
Your mission in Fantavision is simple: you control a circular cursor and quickly match up different firework colours (known as flares). You use a ray of light to gather up these flares by pressing the X button and then press circle to detonate them. You need to string together a minimum of 3 or 4 to be able to get any points out of them. You also have different types of flares which explode in different and mesmerising ways. If you also happen to get a multi-coloured flare, you have the chance to make chains which go on for a ridiculous amount. However, if you miss quite a few flares, it affects your play meter and if that goes down, it’s game over. You can also chain along different power ups which award extra points or help with your play meter. There is also starmine. When you chain together these certain stars, they create these letters which spell out starmine, which is essentially your bonus stage. In the stage you have to detonate as many flares as you can within the time limit. And that’s Fantavision! You can watch replays if you decided to save it and can also have the ability to unlock harder modes and extra stages, but other than that. That’s Fantavision!
So, what did I think? It’s a pretty good puzzle game all things considered. It definitely kept me invested at multiple points and the music is really nice and chill. I will say, the only problem is the replay value but it’s still a nice game to come back to every now and then. This game would later get a rerelease for the ps5 titled 202X. Whether I’ll play it or not we’ll see, as fun as it looks. Also uhh, it’s the American anniversary of this game in 2 days so uhh. Happy early birthday Fantavision!
FLASHING LIGHTS, chill music, good stages