deKay's Gaming Diary

It’s the first game I’ve played of the year, and Its also the first game I’ve completed this year.

Admittedly, I’ve only completed it on 50CC so far (although will be returning to do the rest), but I did come first in every race.

I think this is the best console Mario Kart since the SNES version too. It’s not that I didn’t like the N64 and GC versions, it’s just the N64 tracks seemed big and empty, and the two character mechanic of the GC Mario Kart was a bit superfluous. This one, however, has great tracks and the new “stunt gimmick” is actually pretty good.

Of course, I’ve merely defeated the end of game boss. And I even accidentally found a warp from World 5 to World 8, so haven’t even done 6 and 7 yet. Or got all the gold coins so far. Or rescued all the Toads. But I do have 42 lives and haven’t seen the Super Guide or the Game Over screen yet, so that’s all good, yes?

And, of course, I will go back. In fact, I’m going back now to finish World 5

Yes, after 15 and a bit months, I’m still working through this. And now, I have just FOUR puzzles remaining! So, almost there! Yay!

I’ve been playing quite a few different things on my Wii today:

Cubello
I’m up to level 6 (although I’ve not done all of the lettered variants on previous levels) now, and although I can get it down to just a few blocks each time, I can’t complete it. It gives me too few of each colour, and insists on giving me colours I’ve already removed all of, which is annoying. It seems I can only do it if I fluke it, or I get a Bonus Time or something.

Mayhem in Monsterland
The jumping is really annoying me now. Why can’t I map jump to a button instead of up? It just doesn’t work often enough, and as a result I died a lot from not jumping properly. Which is a shame, as it’s a pretty nice game otherwise.

Mario’s Super Picross
I’m onto Level 10 now. This game has kept me going for quite a while, hasn’t it? I’ve dipped in and out for months and months now. I have only 8 or so puzzles remaining now though.

Pit Crew Panic!
That’s it. I’ve had enough. As soon as I realised it isn’t a game, but a drag-and-drop simulator crossed with a Game and Watch, I stopped liking it. It’s quirky and sort of fun, but it’s not great really. So off onto the SD card it goes. Bye!

Just three more puzzles on Level 9 today. Um, that’s it really.

N64 on Wii, of course. Even though I have it on the N64 too. Tch.

But I completed it for the first time ever! I know it isn’t a hard game, and the main point is to use it as a sort of Score Attack thing, but still. It really was very good too. And I finished up with three non-dead Yoshis!

I haven’t played this in ages! I think I was a little put off last time as I thought I’d finally completed all the levels, only to find I’s opened up a million more.

Completed the rest of Level 8, and three puzzles in Level 9.

Having played this at my in-laws earlier in the week, my arm was twisted to buy it. And, having played it today, my arm was twisted some more. Literally.

The thing is, the events are either far too easy (Skeet Shooting, 100m) or far too hard (Swimming, Long Jump). The swimming in particular – I can do the first 50m easily (in first place), but then without changing rhythm, somehow get overtaken instantly and then come 8th. It makes no sense!

I’m at the in-laws at the moment, and they have this game. So we all played it for a while. It seems very good, but the games vary wildly from very easy (skeet shooting) to very hard (swimming) to seemingly random (long jump).

I was either very good, or absolutely terrible, as a result.

Had a go of this today with my wife, on the Shyguy Train board. Things got off to a bad start for me, as for the first four turns I couldn’t roll higher than a 3, and by turn 8 I was still starless while everyone else had two or three.

However, I somehow managed to turn it around, and on the final turn had three stars, beating everyone else. To further prove my superiority, I then won all three bonus stars, and the stats showed that regardless of which bonus stars had been randomly chosen, I’d have won the game anyway – even if I hadn’t picked any stars up on the board. Amazing!

Played through a bit more of this, nabbing about ten more stars. I only need about 12 now before I can face Bowser at the “end” of the game as Luigi.

I’m still convinced there are more baddies as Luigi. For example, when fighting King Kalicente (is that how you spell his name?) for the second time, he chucks one hell of a lot more of those blue flaming things at you.

Haven’t played this in a while, as I’ve had a lot of Team Fortress 2-ing to do, and Peggle and other stuff, so I felt a bit bad about neglecting it.

But no more! For I returned with Luigi and got him 7 more stars, taking his total to 35, and 155 overall. Just, erm, lots left to go!

Got my first green star with Luigi, and my first letter from Luigi to Luigi, which is all a bit strange. You’d have thought you swapped places with Mario on the second run through, but no. And why is it that the other Luigi is taller than me? Very odd.

I’ve opened up the Bedroom now, and have 28 Weegi stars to my name. I managed to get the wrong star in the Freezeflame Galaxy too, somehow, by going completely the wrong way. I’m pretty sure there were more flying ice blob things and ice bats than with Mario, though.

And I was right about Luigi sliding around on the ice more than Mario. It’s like he’s been greased up or something.

Four more stars, taking me to 18 Weegi-stars and 138 stars in total. I’ve also found out today that there isn’t 241 stars overall, but 242. Amazing!

Getting used to Luigi’s slippery movement now, but not looking forward to coping on the ice-based galaxies! Oh, and Cosmic Luigi is waaaaay faster than Cosmic Mario, and constantly long-jumps to go even faster. I couldn’t beat him on Honeyhive. Grr.

Not really much to say today, apart from that I’m still loving it, and managed to get up to 14 Luigi Stars, making 134 in total.

This time through, I’m trying to do as many later levels as possible, so I get left with the easier ones nearer the end of the game (if that makes sense). I know it’s not really possible, as you have to do early stars to unlock later galaxies, but once all the galaxies are open I’ll be doing the last ones first.

Or something.

Luigi slides all over the place, jumps higher (and seemingly further) than Mario, and says “Yoshi” every time he uses a launch star. He also makes a noise that sounds like it’s taken straight from Pretty Fly for a White Guy when he gets a power star. Oh, and he looks stupid in a bee suit.

Aside from all that, it’s the same so far. Well, except for one thing which I’m not sure if I’m imagining or not: the levels all seem to have extra baddies on. So far, they’ve mainly been those blue bouncing blob things, but I’m pretty sure they weren’t there as Mario. Oh, and Weegi gets 20 1Ups from Peach, not 5. I always knew Luigi was doing her on the side…

With the last of the stars collected yesterday, all that was left was to defeat Bowser again. For some reason, I had problems getting to him this time – losing several lives (all regained through mushroom collection) on the way.

He was just as easy as before (of course, he was exactly the same, that’s why), and then the end sequence with a bit extra.

And then! “You may now play as Luigi!” comes up on the screen, and Luigi says “Super Weegi Galaxy!”. AMAZING! Of course, it’s just the same game again, although Luigi can jump higher and slides all over the place like he’s got greased feet. Collected the first three stars as him too.

What a fantastic game. From start to finish I thought it was brilliant – well designed, varied, and even plenty of genius moments. Best game ever? Perhaps. Mario 64 was one of the best games ever – probably in my top 5 – and this beats it. Amazing.

120 STARS!

Amazing! I came to it today with just four stars remaining – all of which were actually comet stars, it turned out. First up was a Daredevil Comet on the Deep Dark Galaxy (killing the big Magikoopa without getting hit – easy!), and then I braved the Luigi’s Purple Coins star, which drained a good 8 or 9 lives before I nailed it. The last two (another purple coin one, and Fast Foe one) were both waaaaaay easier than Luigi’s coins.

So, 120 stars! Just have to kill Bowser again now, I think!

So close to the end now, with 116 stars complete. Just three more comet ones left, including what seems to be the hardest of all the stars by seven million miles – Luigi’s Purple Coins. Gah!

Oh, and I finally managed to find the hidden star on Deep Dark Galaxy. It turns out it was under the wreck of a boat (well, it wasn’t, but the route to get to it was), where I’m pretty sure I’d looked at least twice already.

113 Stars! Cleared out the last of the “normal” stars in the Garden and Engine Room, and now it’s just hidden and comet stars left. Also managed to find a couple of hidden stars, and one of the Speed Comet runs on Dreadnought Galaxy, the latter of which was much easier than I was expecting.

There’s a Purple Coin collecting star on Dreadnought that I’m not looking forward to doing. I had one go, and it’s not easy! I’m also unable to find the hidden star on the Dark Galaxy (Dark Dark? I forget the name). I’ve looked everywhere!

At the risk of these entries becoming little more than just updates into how many stars I now have, I’d just like to say “108 Stars!”.

Thing is, it’s hard to describe what levels I’ve done to get those stars for two reasons: the first being The Spoiler Problem, and the other is because when you play the game it all blends into one gooey fuzzy lovely experience, and I forget which planet was in which galaxy and stuff.

I’m running out of “normal” stars now though (that is, the first three for each galaxy). There’s a few left in the Engine Room and Garden, but pretty much everything else is a hidden or comet star.

I’m running out of game. That’s not right. Can’t we have 2,000 stars instead? As it stands, I’m up to 104 after today’s play (a couple more Purple Coin collecting levels taking up most of the game time), and I’m starting to think about it almost all being over.

And that makes me sad. Bah.

100 stars get! A couple of Purple Coin collecting ones today and then the hardest star I’ve had yet – Bouldergeist with the Daredevil Comet.

He’s the only boss I’d had difficulty with, and lost several lives to him even with full energy, so having to kill him again, only with no energy? Erk. He took 14 of my 15 lives before I beat him!

Also killed a giant mole on Gusty Garden, and completed some more stars on Freezeframe Galaxy.

Finished off Melty Molten Galaxy today (amongst other things) which included a Daredevil Comet Run (which was really hard) and a Purple Coin Collection “mission” which was also really hard, as some were floating over the top of the lava and those long crouch-jumps were required to get them else your bottom got burnt. A lot.

And it did.

But I’ve got 93 Stars now – only 27 left! Actually, that’s not quite true, apparently…

Got a few more stars, taking my total up to 83. That’s just 37 remaining now (although most of those done are the early ones, so it’s mainly tricky ones left). Found the final Green Power Star, which opened up a few more “odd” galaxies, like another Ray Surfing one, and a Monkey Ball type one.

And Melty Molten Galaxy is amazing.