Stuff I’ve been playing recently

It’s another lazy roundup! Yay! Nintendo Land (Wii U) I’ve completed the Pikmin Adventure game, which took a couple of hours (and unlocked some more, harder levels). It’s really very good, and has me itching for Pikmin 3. I also played Octopus Dance some more, but no matter how well I do, a controller calibration or disconnection problem happens and I lose. Bah. Mighty Switch Force HD (Wii U) Although the level called “Bonus 5” is seemingly the same as …

New Super Mario Bros 2 (3DS): COMPLETED!

The thing with New Super Mario Bros U is, that sadly, it doesn’t have an infinite number of levels and doesn’t carry on until the end of all time. That is pretty much its only failing, but nonetheless, it means I ran out of game. Which is why I bought NSMB2. As it’s sort of more of the same. In actuality, it’s not as good as NSMBU. It’s a lot easier. There’s no proper world map. There’s no Acorn power …

Art of Balance: Touch! (3DS): COMPLETED!

Of course, I haven’t completed every single level, but I have unlocked all the worlds, and completed a “route” on each world through from the start to the finish. So yeah – it’s “completed”. I’ve only actually got about another 40 (of 200-odd) levels left to finish, so I may still do that. It’s certainly a fun game to play for 10 minutes here and there so that’s quite likely!

Games I’ve Been Playing Recently

Yes! Another lazy round-up post 🙂 Skylanders (360) With my daughter. We’re up to world/level/mission/event/chapter 9-ish now. Whichever is the one just after the cyclopseseses. It’s a fun game, but play is disrupted when your co-pilot wants to change characters every 45 seconds. Art of Balance: Touch! (3DS) This was never really on my radar, but a demo was released last week which I really enjoyed. Then it was deal of the week on the eShop so I couldn’t resist. …

Rayman Origins (3DS): COMPLETED!

A delight from start to finish. I’ve never been a fan of Rayman games, really. I had the one on the Jaguar, a few of the 3D ones on various consoles, and have played several others. They just seemed more on the Bubsy/Gex level of platforming dullness than Sonic/Mario. Rayman Origins somehow won me over, though. Maybe it’s a combination of nostalgia, quirkiness, and inventiveness. Who knows. Today, I completed it. Like most games, completed isn’t the end, and Rayman …

Mad Dog McCree (3DS)

Well, why not? I loved it in the arcade 20 years ago. What could possibly go wrong with a 3DS conversion? Nothing! As it turns out, actually, surprisingly little went wrong. And it’s still a pretty good game. Unlike every other home version I’ve ever played, the full motion video is clear and good quality. Unfortunately, it’s a bit small and that did make one of the bits hard to play as it was virtually impossible to see a bandit …

Hana Samurai (3DS)

I’ve been looking forward to this for quite a while, and it seems to have been months – maybe even a year – since it’s release elsewhere in the world as Sakura Samurai. It was released last Thursday, and I eagerly downloaded it. Sadly, it’s not that great. Sure, it’s not terrible, but there’s not really very much to it. I’m only at the first boss, so things may yet change, but so far the whole game has been dodge-and-parry …

Liberation Maiden (3DS): COMPLETED!

It’s a short game, sure. The reviews all seem to centre on that fact. It doesn’t matter, as it’s utterly fantastic. Five levels (well, four as the fifth plays a bit differently) of Kid Icarus Uprising/Rez hybrid gameplay, with lovely graphics and nonsense plot: You’re a female president of Japan who must save the country from an unknown enemy by piloting a flying transformer whilst wearing a tight fitting catsuit. Obviously. Took me about two hours to complete, but I’ve …

Rayman Origins (3DS)

More of this sort of thing, please. I’m becoming increasingly bored with the way gaming is going. Grim first and third person shooters aren’t what I’m after anymore (or ever was, come to think of it), and games like those on the Megadrive and SNES are missed. Thankfully, there are a few game makers who seem to agree, and things like Rayman Origins happen. Happy fun blue skies platforming, with excellent up to date graphics. That’s what we need! Bizarrely, …

Stuff I’ve been playing recently

I’ve not just been completing things, you know… Johnny Kung Fu (3DS) I was really looking forward to this when it was announced. Reviews were not kind, but I thought – they’re wrong, right? They were not wrong. Sure, it’s not terrible. And, separately, each level is fine. The problem is the game is a confused mess of Game & Watch, Kung Fu Master, and Wario Ware and it doesn’t really gel properly. Oh well. Marvel Pinball 3D (3DS) It’s …

Kirby’s Pinball Land (3DS): COMPLETED!

Easiest pinball game ever! OK, so pinball games just go on for ever and ever, but there’s a definite target in this one – to beat the three table bosses and then defeat Dedede. So that’s what I did. And it didn’t take very long as it’s pretty easy, not least because when you lose the “ball” (i.e., Kirby) you get a chance to get it back. Every time. The physics are a bit shonky too, but other than that, …

Kirby’s Dream Land 2 (3DS): COMPLETED!

With all my now-playing games completed, it was time to start something new. So, instead of starting one of the games on my Pile of Shame, I bought Kirby’s Dream Land 2 on the 3DS Virtual Console. Because, y’know, I didn’t have enough games already. And then I completed it. It wasn’t especially short (especially for a kirby game), but it was pretty easy. It was also much closer to Kirby’s Adventure (for the NES) than the original Kirby’s Dream …

Super Pokémon Rumble (3DS): COMPLETED!

Blimey. This turned out to be a pretty tedious slog by the end. I didn’t really expect much depth from it, to be fair, but after 14 hours of pretty much just pressing A and sometimes B to slap other Pokémon about with no levelling system (you just swap to more powerful Pokémon), mostly useless money to collect (don’t think I ever spent any), and no real difficulty, the appeal did start to wane a bit. Playing in relatively short …

Rhythm Thief and the Emperor’s Treasure (3DS): COMPLETED!

Yay! Really plowing through these partially-started, not-quite finished games at the moment! Rhythm Thief was excellent. One part Layton, one part Sega Rhythm Game Compilation. Bonkers plot, twists, lots of nice pictures of Paris, clever rhythm games (some of which were somewhat hard!) and some OCD screen-tappage. What more could you want? Apart from the clearly planned sequel, of course. If you have a 3DS, you MUST buy this. If for no reason other than to tell Sega that this is …