deKay's Gaming Diary

I last played this, albeit in its GBA guise, almost 5 years ago. Which is long enough ago for me to not remember everything about it, but at the same time it’s a bit familiar. The Wii version is slightly different, what with the FMV bits, the voice acting (especially Nico’s hilarious there-it-is, now-it’s-not French accent) and the Wii Remote activated puzzles. The latter of these seemed to crop up a lot at the start of the game, then there were very few, and no – at 90% complete – there are a load of them again.

One of which I’m actually very badly stuck on. I have a wheel within a wheel, and each wheel has roman numerals on them. According to the instructions, my diary has made a note of the order of the numerals, so I can complete the puzzle. Only it hasn’t.

I know where the numerals came up in the game (in the tomb in the church in Paris), but my dairy didn’t record them for me. And, since I can’t leave Spain (where I am currently) until I’ve passed this puzzle, I can’t go back and check them. So I’m totally stumped. How annoying that I’m almost at the end (and nearly 10 hours in – it’s pretty much the only game I’ve played in a week) and can’t progress. Rubbish.

I started this last week, but for some reason Professor Layton took over and I didn’t play it for a few days. I was pretty sure I was nearing the end, but it seems that there’s at least one more set of levels after Blobolonia…

But I’m a bit ahead of myself. As a fan of the original game, I pre-ordered the DS remake of the game the moment it was announced. Which was in 2004 or something. But it never came out. I was surprised, then, when a different remake (or rather, reimagining) of the game was announced for the Wii a while ago. Even more surprised was I when it actually came out!

It’s better than the original in so many ways. Firstly, it’s less frustratingly difficult, with unlimited lives, frequent checkpoints, autosave, unlimited jellybeans, and better controls. But the soul of the game is the same, and the aim also remains unchanged: feed Blob jellybeans, each flavour giving him a different ability, and use it to navigate the puzzle-filled levels.

It’s also a beautiful game. Nothing short of a Ghibli production, in fact, with smooth animation and cute, detailed-but-simple characters and enemies. The puzzles are clever, and although there can be a little too much hand-holding (lots of signs showing which abilities to use – and where), it’s a well crafted, fun game.

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

Just three years and 9 days after buying it, I finally completed Downhill Jam!

Turns out I was just being rubbish last time, as today I sailed through the final Tier will no problems at all.

And breathe! That has to be one of the longest game titles ever!

It was new on WiiWare last night, so I downloaded it. Played it a little then, but mostly today – and completed it. I was the shortest of the chapters so far, taking me just two and a half hours to complete. All the other chapters have taken between 5 and 6. However, this was the first one I’d not got stuck on at any point.

I can’t really say much about the story, as it would be full of spoilers, but I can say it was at least as enjoyable as the previous episodes. And Stan is ace.

It seems that there’s another Tier after Tier 9. Yeah, Tier 10. Who knew?

And it’s very hard. In fact, I can only do the first event, and even that was a bronze (and I only just scraped through with that!). This must be the final Tier now though, I’m sure, as I no longer have a countdown to how many points I need before ranking up.

For reasons not entirely well known, I started playing this today. Well, started again. You see, I bought it with my launch Wii, but having only recently – at the time – hammered the “proper” Tony Hawk games (which I love) the different controls and mechanics just put me off. Odd, since they never bothered me in the DS version.

Anyway, I’m actually enjoying it. It’s not perfect, but it’s fun and surprisingly controllable. And so it came to pass that I’m already up to the final (I think) tier of events.

The level before the final boss was a real pain. Lots of sweeping lights, most of which need to be turned off as well as on, and many only just in reach (meaning a million accidental I-walked-too-far deaths). Needless to say, I was relieved when it was over.

And then the final boss. He was… reasonably easy. He’s the only boss where the entire fight requires pixel-perfect positioning and exact timing, all at speed. Thankfully, I realised you don’t have to go into over-the-shoulder view in order to throw cherry bombs – something which, if I’d known sooner, would have made a few other levels much easier.

Anyway, he only took about 10 attempts, and on the successful attempt, only about 20 seconds to kill. And game over!

I don’t think I got the “good” ending though, as I don’t remember answering the phone in every room there was a phone in. Oops.

Spent most of today’s play trying to beat the Gym boss. It didn’t help that every time he threw a ball at me, all I could think of was “BOMBARDMENT!”.

And he was hard. I’m pretty sure the main reason I managed to beat him was by fluke.

I’ve been playing this quite a lot over the last week or so. I saw the (short and uninformative) trailer a while ago and thought it looked good, but didn’t really know what to expect in terms of gameplay.

Turns out it’s great! It’s sort of the opposite of my least favourite sort of game ever – stealth. Instead of staying hidden in the dark, you have to stay in the light, lighting areas of the room to reach the exit. Step into the dark, and evil nasties drag you too your death.

It reminds me a little of Adventures of Lolo for the NES, even though it isn’t really that similar. It’s just the same sort of thought processes and pace, I suppose.

You have to ultimately escape a school, one room at a time with a few bosses along the way. You start in room 100, and so far I’ve made it up to 120, including three or four bosses.

Started on Friday night, played over the weekend and completed today. Not much to say about it really, except it was another funny, well written episode. Roll on Chapter 4!

All six episodes too! All done! Hurrah!

It was very good. There were a few puzzles that didn’t seem to have logical solutions, and the “end boss” was a real pain and had me stuck for about an hour, but I figured it out eventually.

Over all, very funny, enjoyable, and I’m certainly looking forward to Season Two when it’s released in a couple of weeks.

This is pretty much all I’ve played all week (aside from some iPhone games and a bit of Shadow Complex), and I completed Episode 5 yesterday. That means there’s only one episode left.

It’s been really good so far. Marred ever so slightly by the reuse of a load of Strong Bad sound effects (in episode 5), but not really something game-breaking.

Hopefully the next Monkey Island game will be out before I finish the final episode here!

Started and completed the first episode of this today. It’s funny – very funny – but then I expected nothing else coming from the same people who did the Strong Bad and recent Monkey Island games.

I’d not played the original Sam & Max, so wasn’t really sure what to expect, and although I get the feeling I’m missing a few of the references to that game, I’m not bothered by it.

I got stuck a few times, mainly because I missed items I hadn’t seen, and also because I hadn’t realised the driving minigame was actually necessary. Sorted it out eventually though, and made a start on Episode Two.

I actually completed this earlier in the week, and then completed it again a few days later. But they weren’t the proper endings – and today’s was. I hope. I can’t see anything else I may have missed anywhere, at least.

And yes, it was one of the most frustrating games I’ve played in a long time. Some of the puzzles were just too hidden, trial and error, convoluted, or abstract. But it does feel rewarding having actually beaten it!

Well, it’s whole week really, not just a weekend. I have recently played these:

Guitar Hero World Tour (360)
Meh. It’s very Meh now. And Meh isn’t good. Some of the tracks are OK, but very few are excellent. And what’s with all the country and western? Pah.

Street Fighter IV (360)
I’m rubbish. Really rubbish. Even on Easy I’m having difficulty beating Seth. And El Fuerte is the most ridiculous to control character ever, Ever!

Scribblenauts (DS)
Still excellent and hilarious. Funny for mainly the wrong reasons when things don’t happen as expected. On World 8 now, I think.

And the return of my (well, someone else’s, it seems) repaired Wii meant a splurge and the purchase of three downloadable games:

Pilotwings (Wii)
It’s not actually great. In fact, it’s a bit pants. What a shame.

Solomon’s Key (Wii)
Fun platformy-puzzle thing. It’s getting very hard very quickly, though.

“Aha! I Got It!” Escape Game (Wii)
HARDEST POINT AND CLICK GAME EVER. FRUSTRATE.

No idea why I started playing this today, but I did install it on my Wii’s hard drive. I was unable to play it for a long time as there wasn’t enough space on my Wii for the save file, although that problem has been resolved now.

Didn’t bother with the Subspace Emmisary missions, instead playing single player arcade mode (which I completed with Ike) and some of the challenges and minigames.

It is good, but I don’t feel like I have the controls nailed as well as on the Gamecube version, even using the Classic Controller.

Thankfully, having completed chapter 1 last weekend, I didn’t have to wait long for chapter 2 – it was out on WiiWare yesterday!

Played it a bit last night, than completed it this morning. Like chapter 1 it’s a bit short, but then it is a chapter, not a full game.

It was great, anyway. A little harder than the first one, as I got stuck a couple of times, but it was just as good.

I’ve had this for ages, but never really got round to playing it. However, I installed it on my Wii’s hard drive at the weekend so have played it a bit this week.

First of all, it’s violent. Very violent. But it’s so stylised and over the top that it doesn’t feel so bad when you play. It’s not exactly cartoon violence, but it’s certainly not realistic.

The gameplay didn’t gel with me at first. The controls felt clumsy, and the camera difficult to manage. I soon got into it, though, and I’m now past the second boss and it’s only occasional camera wonkiness that’s any sort of burden. Enjoying it!

I downloaded this WiiWare game a while ago, but only got round to playing it yesterday. And then completed it today. Yeah, it’s pretty short. But then, it’s by Telltale Games – who did the Strong Bad games I’d played previously – so I wasn’t really surprised.

It was pretty good too. Reports on the Wii version had it down as a horrible jerky mess with broken audio and crap graphics, mainly due to the compression necessary to squeeze it onto the Wii. I knew this before buying it, but since the thought of playing the PC version made me physically sick, I thought I’d risk it. Thankfully, there was nothing game-breaking – just a bit of pausing and stuttering when changing scene sometimes.

And it was pretty funny too. I especially liked the Wallace and Gromit reference – surprisingly subtle when you consider Telltale also do the Wallace and Gromit point-and-clickers…

FINALLY. After a billion attempts, culmonating in a couple of hours play (necessary, as from final save to boss is almost an hour), I finished it.

Overall, it’s an excellent Pikminy game, with just two annoying bits – a hard boss near the start, and a takes-too-long-to-reach and difficult boss at the end.

The last few times I’ve played this, I’ve managed to reach the end of game boss. The problem is, he’s almost an hour from the previous save point and although if you die, you can continue from the boss again, if you have to stop playing and turn off your Wii, you’re stuffed.

So I’ve been stuffed three times now. Bah.

Still working through this, a bit each day (well, most days), and I’m now just over 24 hours in. I’ve defeated the three kings in and around Skull Plains, and now have to make my assault on the New Island, which is full of really, really difficult baddies.

I also made the mistake earlier of walking into a zombie trap. They closed the way out behind me, I couldn’t warp back to the castle, and you can’t kill them all as they keep respawning. Argh!

King Omelet was a pain too – not because he was difficult to kill (you don’t kill him, actually), but the questions he asks are difficult. Not least the one where he asks who talks “like this”, in the voice of a character, but since you rarely hear the characters talk, it’s more than a bit difficult.

The retro game completeathon rolls ever onward, and today it slew Bubble Bobble Plus on Wii Ware. Previous attempts at finishing it were always stumped by Level 72, which is impossible (although there’s a video on YouTube that proves otherwise – I don’t believe it myself), but thankfully I nabbed EXTEND on Level 71 so skipped to 73. Phew!

Level 99 was a bit of a pain, until I figured out ways you could fall through walls, and then it was onto the final (and only) boss – Super Drunk. Who was very, very easy. Far easier than I recall, although the Master System version is the one I have played the most and it is somewhat different to the Arcade version this is based on.

So, completed then! Next!