Favorite Game Music: Volume IV

A fourth volume of some of my favorite video game music is here! Out of the ten choices below I like “War Like Requiem” and “Nova theme” the most with “Main menu theme” being a more off-beat choice.

* Main menu theme from EA Los Angeles’ GoldenEye: Rogue Agent
* Storm Eagle theme from Capcom’s Mega Man X (SNES)
* Jungle from WayForward Technologies’ Contra 4 (DS)
* Stages 1 & 6 from Sunsoft’s Batman: Return of the Joker (NES)
* Metal Squad from Technosoft’s Thunder Force IV/Lightening Force: Quest for the Darkstar (GEN)
* War Like Requiem from Technosoft’s Thunder Force IV/Lightening Force: Quest for the Darkstar (GEN)
* Captain America theme from Capcom’s Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds
* She-Hulk theme from Capcom’s Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds
* Iron Fist theme from Capcom’s Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3
* Nova theme from Capcom’s Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3

Previous volumes: I | II | III

Now Playing: June 2010

Surprisingly enough I don’t have a whole lot to say about my past month of gaming. Most of what I would say for Prince of Persia: The Fallen King and Kamen Rider: Dragon Knight can be read in these two previous posts (both link to my online archive). One addition I do have for the latter game is a video of five matches that I recorded not too long ago. Check that out here.

I also got in some pinball action in the form of the Genesis version of Devil’s Crush called Dragon’s Fury. The game tends to play faster than the original TG-16 version and it’s very easy to lose a ball. Despite all of that working against me I somehow managed to get an impressive score of 50,791,000! Best my top score if you can. Muhahaha! :P

Because of my E3 excitement for the Criterion Games developed Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit being released this mid-Novemeber, I started playing the 2002 release of Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit 2. Well, I didn’t start playing it as much as I’m continuing on.

The game still looks great especially the car models. The music which makes up the soundtrack is quite dated, though.

My progress on this fairly difficult game is Event 25 in Championship and Event 19 in Ultimate Racer. I’ve noticed while playing that you can’t just be a good driver. You also have to watch for those gaining on you in the mirror and cut them off. It’s a skill all on it’s own and is the sole reason I keep the lead many times.

I’ll leave you with this trivia question and see if you can answer it. Which of these games on my wish list for PS3 did I order yesterday from Gamefly? This time I haven’t mentioned it anywhere so good luck on your guess.

God of War II Progress

In the last four days since I started playing God of War II, I’ve been able to not only finish the game making it the fifth game for 2010, but I’m also one Challenge of the Titans mission away from getting my fourth platinum trophy.

This final mission that I speak of is a dozy. It requires the player to never take a hit. That’s not something I’m very good at. Hopefully I’ll get past it soon. I found this video that helps a bit, but makes it look slightly easier than it really is.

Total runtime was 8 hours and 38 minutes.
Trophies: 33 / 35 (94%)

INTERGALACTIC SHMUPPRECIATION MONTH
I had played two more shoot-’em-ups that I didn’t previously mention before I started God of War II.

*Lightening Force: Quest for the Darkstar (GEN)
Also properly known to the rest of the world as Thunder Force IV. My score was a not-so-great 133,610.

*Phalanx (GBA)
Known better for the SNES version’s banjo cover, the GBA game actually had much more suitable box art. It also saves your progress for which mine is currently Mission 7 with 2,931,500.

Of the six titles played so far, Phalanx slightly beats out Gekrindan has my preferred shmup. None of the others come close.

That’s it for today’s update. Thanks for reading and make today a great one!

Gifts of X-mas 2008

Here’s the gifts that I received for Christmas this year!

I got a total of eight games, one downloadable game and seven retail games.

Lightening Force: Quest For the Darkstar (GEN)
Die Hard Trilogy 2: Viva Las Vegas (PS)
Syphon Filter: Logan’s Shadow (PSP)
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3)
Bujingai: The Forsaken City (PS2)
The King of Fighters Collection – The Orochi Saga (PS2)
Manhunt 2 (PS2)
Castlevania Chronicles (PSN)

Every year my family puts up two trees. Take a look at the pictures of those trees below.

Christmas Tree (Family Room)
Christmas Tree (Living Room)

Have a happy holiday season!

Now Playing: November ’07

This past month had a few games that I didn’t get excited about enough to keep playing. Just to make it obvious what games I’m talking about, here’s a quick list.

Timesplitters 2 (PS2)
Dragon’s Revenge (GEN)
Sonic Heroes (PS2)

Timesplitters 2 was odd in that it was fun at first, but soon it was a little boring because it didn’t have much variety. Dragon’s Revenge is a decent pinball game, but it doesn’t have the excitement of crazy high scores like some others of the same genre. Oh and don’t get me started on Sonic Heroes. The control and overall problems with that game make it an unrecoverable mess.

I played some Guitar Hero at one point while figuring out what game I’d like to tackle next. I decided on Super Street Fighter II: Turbo Revival which I’m still playing because it’s just that damn good! I also went for the superior pinball game Dragon’s Fury where the scores really do get pretty crazy.

Fighting games continued to flow during the month as well, especially with vs. mode action. Those games consisted of Street Fighter Alpha Anthology, Mortal Kombat Trilogy (N64), various versions of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, and the original Mortal Kombat on the Genesis with the blood code enabled, of course. :)

For single player purposes I got back into Need for Speed Most Wanted. I haven’t completed very much since the last time I played it, but it has still been fun as expected.

I’ve been somewhat interested to try out one of the Sam & Max episodes for awhile now. Telltale Games made that decision easy when they offered episode 4, Abe Lincoln Must Die!, for free on Valve’s Steam platform. I was pleasantly surprised by the type of humor that the game offered. It definitely was the highlight of the whole experience.

I”m sure that some of the fighting games that I mentioned will carry over to December because they’re just that much more fun with another player. What have you been playing as of recent? Hopefully it’s a fighting game too. :D

Bad Games by Good Developers: TechnoSoft

When trying think of what developer to use as the subject of another Bad Games by Good Developers article, TechnoSoft came to mind because of the great Genesis port of the pinball game Devil’s Crush called Dragon’s Fury on Sega’s system. While their list is relatively small it was still really hard to find a bad game that they’ve made. I had to settle for the Genesis shoot-’em-up Elemental Master.

I can’t really explain the game because it doesn’t have an entry on Wikipedia or much about it anywhere else. It still seems like a pretty decent game even though TechnoSoft had made much better shumps like Hyper Duel and the Thunder Force series. The most unique thing about Elemental Master is the fact you play as a human instead of space ship.

Apparently, Elemental Master isn’t a bad game, just the worst of the bunch when only taking into consideration what TechnoSoft themselves developed. That sounds like a good dealt hand. That’s for sure!

Elemental Master gameplay videos:
Intro
Level 1
Ending

A Number of Quality Titles

Yesterday I went to the trusty local store, It’s About Games, and picked up the following four games.

Rush’n Attack (NES) – game only; fair
Super Mario Bros. 2 (NES) – game only; good
River City Ransom (NES) – game & sleeve; fair
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (GEN) – game & case; great

At the same time I also decided to get Bad Dudes and the 3-in-1 cart of Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt/World Class Track Meet. Unfortunately, neither game worked even after cleaning them. So instead I swapped them today for a very fine replacement in Super Punch-Out (SNES – game only; excellent).

After talking for awhile somehow we got onto the topic of pinball games. I mentioned that I liked the great TG-16 games Alien Crush and Devil’s Crush. The store owner immediately walked over and picked up a complete copy of Dragon’s Fury (GEN – excellent). I was like “OMFG!!” and added that to the buy list right then and there.

I ended up getting many high quality games and all of them were on my wish list, which is normally a rarity.

Front

Condition scale: Excellent, Great, Good, Fair, Bad, Poor

Now Playing: July ’07

This month saw me play a total of 13 games. A lot of the list grew because of multiplayer games so let’s get to those first.

The fighting games usually come out when Usagi704 wants to play something. The first game was Fuuun Super Combo were I owned him in five straight matches. Then we moved onto the much more enjoyable vs. mode in The King of Fighters 02/03. NeoGeo Battle Coliseum, Bloody Roar, Super Street Fighter II Turbo of Capcom Classics Collection Vol. 2, and Hyper Street Fighter II of Street Fighter Anniversary Collection were other fighting games that we played.

We also played a few co-op games as in Streets of Rage 2 and Super Stardust HD. I really liked the background music from both games, but Super Stardust HD didn’t play as well as it does in single player mode. Another friend and I also played a quick run though of Golden Axe.

In the solo territory I finished three games — God of War II, Ratchet & Clank, and Ultimate Spider-Man — with the third game being very short even for me.

Other games that I played to round out the month of July were Thunder Force II, solo in Streets of Rage 2, and finally Block Block and 1941: Counter Attack in Capcom Classics Collection Vol. 2.

Speaking of the Capcom Classics Collection series, I gave my copy of volume 1 to Usagi704 because, to be honest, most of the games either sucked or were games that I already had better versions of elsewhere. Oh well, at least I countered that with the arrival of my Sega CD system (if you didn’t already know). :D

Until next time!

Blast Processing

If you remember back in February I was excited for my order of five Super Nintendo games to arrive from eStarland. Well, in the comments, I noted something that I was interested in buying in the future.

Older games bring back childhood memories certainly is cool. I’m even thinking of getting a system that I never had growing up. Which one, you ask? None other than the Genesis!

eStarland currently has complete used model 1 and 2 systems in stock. Even better is that they also have new official six-button Sega controllers for it.

So cool!

It’s been about 2.5 months since then and I haven’t put much thought into getting a Sega Genesis. However, today that all changed when I walked into our local video game store, It’s About Games.

I didn’t go in planning to buy anything. As I looked around I noticed that one of the glass cases had a Genesis model 1 inside. I still wasn’t going to get anything, but then I saw the price. The system was in excellent condition and it came with a single controller and all of the hook-ups plus the manual. All for $27.99!

I also purchased a total of five games.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 – complete (case); $5.99
Sonic & Knuckles – complete (box); $5.99
Sonic 3D Blast – complete (box); $5.99
Raiden Trad – game only; $3.00
Thunder Force II – complete (case); FREE
An extra 3-button controller – $1.00

Now for a look at the goodies.