video games (was Re: UFCS for D)

[Nick Sabalausky]

"Adam D. Ruppe" <destructionator at gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:vxrvmmiapcbsemheabee at forum.dlang.org...
> On Saturday, 31 March 2012 at 23:01:32 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>> (Although I'll admit, I did enjoy Sewer Shark
>
> hahhahaha "relax, pretend it's a game... maybe it'll
> even be fun. SHOOT THE TUBES, DOGMEAT!"
>

Games don't have fantastic lines like that anymore ;(

Heh, and even the delivery of it is just priceless.

>
> It's kinda funny when you think about all the craziness
> that shapes quirks. At least in me. Every so often,
> I think of one of these stupid games and I laugh
> to myself, or slip it in to a conversation at random.
>
> But, it is just a random collection of, often, really
> bad things from fifteen years ago.
>

Heh, yea. I don't care if the whole Inter^H^H^H^H^Hcybertubes are tired of 
it: I *still* find "All your base"/"Set us up the bomb" to be hilarious.

>> - Sonic CD (One of the two best Sonic games ever made, the other being 
>> Sonic
>
> Have this one. That was a fine game; the good SCD
> games are the ones where they actually made a *game*
> that happened to use the sega cd, not a Sega CD thing
> that needs to pass for a game.
>

Exactly. Always felt that way.

> Another good one btw is Sol Feace - a pretty simple
> sidescrolling space shooter, but just again, a
> game that happened to be on the system.
>

Yea! I have that one too :)

> Oh, Mortal Kombat was scd too, and it had full blood
> and everything. My copy of this disappeared sometime
> in the 90's though, and we never did find it.
>

Oh, you were one of *those* people... ;) I was always more in the SF2 camp. 
MK's ultra-violence was great, and I liked "toasty!" and such, but I never 
much liked the controls.

But I'm absolutely rubbish at *all* 1-on-1 fighting games, though. Anybody 
has *always* been able to kick my ass unless I did cheap shit like choose 
Chun Li when my friend uses Ken, and constantly shout things like "You were 
out with that slut Barbie again, weren't you, Ken!!" Only way I could ever 
win :) Never worked against the CPU though...

>> I used to love that song, even
>> had...no...*have*...it memorized:
>
> I think I have the words to... 9 video game songs
> memorized.
>

That's actually a lot as most don't have lyrics ;)

> I actually listen to vg music more often than anything
> else.
>

There's definitely some good stuff. The 8/16-bit era capcom is ledgendary 
for great music. Like MegaMan 2/3, and Street Fighter 2. Guile's theme has 
always been is one of my all-time favorite songs. And probably the original 
reason I got into smooth jazz (although I guess it's not exactly smooth 
jazz, per se, but some sort of jazzy).

Actually, there's some really good stuff on OCRemix (a lot of crap, too, 
though). Some of the stuff by DJ Pretzel is absolutely fantastic.

And of course (here I am back with Castlevania again), Symphony of the Night 
has just the absolute most legendary soundtrack ever. Even the 
totally-different-style end theme works surpisingly well.

Doom 1+2's music, of course, is classic too. And a little-known EGA PC 
platformer called Space Chase (great game too BTW).

And Sonic CD (unlike many people, I actually like the US soundtrack better). 
I used to sit in study hall memorizing and reciting in my head "Sonic Boom".

I could probably go on and on.

But I tend to listen to non-game stuff more: I'm a total whore for Anime 
opening/closing themes. So Yoko Ishida is great. And then there's normal 
Industrial/Metal etc like TKK/KMFDM/Iron Maiden/Manson (esp. the stuff with 
Tim Skold - a fantastic musician). And Paul Hardcastle (ie smooth jazz), 
partly 'cause some of his stuff reminds me of Streets of Rage.

I've got strange music tastes ;)

>> Definitely a good game. It might have been the first...
>
> Yes, indeed, the first was on the sega master system.
> It was a little slow moving... lots of level grinding
> needed. It did that weird faux 3d dungeon thing
> that was popular for a bit in the 8 bit era!
>

Yea. But the whole thing is incredibly impressive for an SMS game.

> They set a nice foundation for the story there.
> Uniquely, in my experience, they actually have an
> ongoing story in those four games.
>

Really? I've played only the first few minutes of all of them and they all 
seemed very different from each other. But obviously a few minutes doesn't 
even scratch the surface.

>> I wonder which one that was. Maybe Sonic Generations?
>
> Maybe... I was just helping his daughter through a
> couple levels. She's kinda terrible at games!
>

Like my sister. She likes Sonic and 2D Mario, but still tends to need help 
from her two brothers who have spent their lives playing the crap out of 
such games ;)

> But I think that does fit, since it had a time travel
> plot going with younger copies of sonic and tails and
> I did the chemical plant level for her.
>

Yea, that would definitely be it. The only other Sonic with time travel 
(AFAIK) is Sonic CD.

Actualy, IIRC, my brother told me that Silver from Sonic 2006 is from the 
future, but what you described does sound like Sonic Generations. I actually 
like Generations quite a bit, definitely one of the better 3D sonics, even 
if imperfect. And the cutscenes are skippable, so I've never had to watch 
them :P

>
>> - Sonic 4: I love this one, despite how short it is.
>
> Huh, I didn't even know there was a sonic 4. On the
> genesis, I had 1, 2, 3, sonic+knuckles, sonic cd,
> and one called sonic 3d.
>

It's a brand-new one. Just came out about a couple years ago, a downloadable 
title for Wii/PS3/360/iOS. "Sonic 4: Episode 1". Episode 2 should be out 
this year, but they're dropping Wii support (Dammit! It looks fantastic!)

> Oh and sonic spinball, a pinballish game.
>

Yea, that was surprisingly good. And really kinda clever.

> I guess I had a lot of them! Sonic 3 & Knuckles
> was one monster of a game. Huge.
>

Oh yea. It certainly was.

>> Really? I thought 7 was universally considered the best one.
>
> The internet nerds seem to be of two groups: the ones who
> say 7 is the greatest game ever made, and the ones who
> say 7 is an overrated piece of trash that has nothing
> on 6.
>
> A lot of people hate #1 and 8 though, which I don't get.
> Those are fine games.
>

Most people seem to hate the draw system in FF8. I can definitely see why, 
but for some reason it didn't bother me as much (don't know why).

>> I'm not sure I've even heard of that scene. Maybe I'll have to give it 
>> another chance and try to get to that.
>
> omg just youtube it too
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgZXiHfNt0M
>
> there's more to it than that, but that's the main piece.
>

Thanks.

Yea, 8/16-bit cutscenes were so much more artistic. The ones now are, at 
best, nothing more than normal, ordinary cinematography. And "impressive" 
ones just mean "flashy ways to move the camera around". *Yawn*

> I guess that's arguably a SNES cutscene... but this one rocks.
> They also did live versions of the song! Totally amazing.
>

8/16-bit cutscenes weren't bad. Actually I never minded them back then. It 
wasn't until much later that I got fed up with cutscenes.  Even as late as 
Quake 2 - I *loved* the Quake 2 opening cutscene. 'Course it *was* 
skippable, which helped to not piss me off.

>> Huh, really? I never new that. If I had, I probably would have finished 
>> it.
>> How do you do that?
>
> After the training thingy, the headmaster gives you
> a lamp. Use it as an item, and a demon pops out.
>
> If you beat him, you can use it as a GF and learn
> an ability Enc-Half. After that comes Enc-None.
>
> Equip the skill and boom, no random fights.
>

Neat, maybe I'll dig it out again sometime just to give that a try. (If I 
still have it...I might have sold it.)

>
> Since you can do this fairly early in the game, you
> can go through 80% of it with no random fights at all!
>

Smart move on Square's part.

> And since the stats mostly come from junctions, you
> can get away with near zero experience too - so
> missing the fights+experience isn't a dealbreaker.
>

Ahh, I was wondering about that.

>
>> I was always more a GameCube/XBox1 guy, but there's some good stuff on 
>> PS2:
>
> I haven't played any of those...

Really? Oh my god, you're really missing out. Let's see:

GameCube:

- Luigi's Mansion: Most people hated it just because it wasn't "Mario 64 2", 
but it's one of my all time favorite games.

- Pikmin 1+2: The only RTS I actually like, and I love it. Although the Wii 
versions are better.

- Resident Evil 4: Actually, this is another fantastic one where the Wii 
version was even better. *Very* different from all the earlier Resident 
Evil's though.

- Killer 7: Crazy awesomeness. Awesome craziness.

- Metroid Prime 1: Two was also pretty good, but three sucked (and so did 
"hunters"). This one I honestly like the GC version better. Normally I like 
IR pointing for FPSes, but I think they really botched it up for the Metroid 
Prime Games.

- Wind Waker: Best of the 3D Zeldas.

- Donkey Kong Jungle Beat: Briliant twist on platformers, provided that you 
use the bongo controllers, not the GC controller and not the horrid gesture 
controls from the Wii version. (I *hate* gesture recognition. Never 
responsive, never even works reliably.)

- Eternal Darkness: Who the hell says Nintendo systems are for kid's games? 
Kinda like Resident Evil meets H.P. Lovecraft.

- More: Alian Hominid, Ikaruga, MegaMan: Network Transmission.

XBox1:

- Tony Hawk 2X: By far the best in the series. Note: "2X" not "2". It has 
all the THPS1+2 levels, plus extra levels, plus the best graphics of any 
THPS2, plus a menu system that isn't ugly like the regular THPS2.

- Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay: Yea, a movie tie-in that 
actually doesn't suck, and is actually incredibly good. There's an annoying 
cutscene sequence early on, but it's worth putting up with to get to the 
rest of the game.

- Splinter Cell 1-4: Like I said before, one of my all-time favorite game 
series. Stealth gaming that puts MGS absolutely to shame. The best one is 3 
("Chaos Theory"), and then the first one. I've actually just been replaying 
the first and third lately (for probably the tenth time), and I'm *still* 
getting better at it and finding things I missed. The XBox1 versions of 
these are by far the best. GC/PS2 versions aren't quite as good looking, and 
the GC doesn't have enough buttons to really make it work. And the Wii one 
was just totally botched up in every way. I think they've ported them to PS3 
though, those versions might be good.

- Dead or Alive 3 and Ultimate, if you're into fighting games. I'm not as 
much as I used to be. But these are good ones.

- Beyond Good & Evil - Too much story and cutscenes, and too short, but 
still surprisingly good.

- Blowout: It's like an updated Abuse. Underrated, IMO.

- Battle Engine Aquila, Oddworld: Munch's Odysee, Prince of Persia: Sands of 
Time, Outrun 2, Forza Motorsport, SegaGT Online, Rallisport Challenge.

- Pretty much any cross platform game was always best on XBox1. Only 
exception is MegaMan b/c MS DPads are always shit.

Meh, and yea, I guess there's something-or-other called "Halo" or some such 
name which apperently was all the rage... ;)


> I did somewhat recently
> finally buy a used PS2 for myself, but barely played
> it so far. Got Gran Turismo 3 and Madden 2008 for it
> (for a dollar a piece, not bad!)
>

Good deal! I actually returned GT3 when I got it though because playing 
racing games without proper sholder triggers (for gas/break) sucks.

> I played Gran Turismo 5 on the PS3 too, and that was
> a fine game. A solid series they have there.
>

Haven't played that one, but I like PS3's "Split Second" quite a lot. 
Although I could do without the pretend-it's-an-extreeeeme-TV-show announcer 
and the over-designed menus.

>> Heh, well, that's more of an "extra little touch" easter egg kinda thing 
>> anyway.
>
> It looked really good though. My definition of
> "good graphics" is often "bright, lively colors".
>

Yea, Castlevania: SOTN is a brilliant game visualy. First of all, it played 
to the PS1's strengths by making it good-looking *2D* instead of 
shitty-looking 3D like all the other games of the era. And then they added 
just extra little 3D "touches" without overdoing it. And just the whole 
visual direction overall was very well done. Even the later Metroidvanias 
didn't pull it off quite as well as SOTN did.

> That's one reason I like FF1 - you have a good amount
> of bright green and blue. It makes me happy. FF Tactics
> too had a lot of cool bright thingies.
>

Heh, yea. That's probably part of why I have such a soft spot for EGA 
graphics and, yes, that exact "bright color tiles" aethetic used in NES FF's 
overworld.

> Too many new things are going with dull, boring colors.
> Gah. Newsflash people, the real world is pretty bright!
> You can be realistic and colorful, though the old
> drawn animation style looks nice for itself.
>

Dark is "hip and edgy".

But haven't you heard? Real is brown: 
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=222