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Here a question.
How long do people think the N64 has left to live?
With games like Perfect Dark, Zelda: The Continuing Sage, Turok 3, A Resident Evil game, Top Gear Rally 2, and a bunch of other wicked games this year. How long will the N64 live for? Specially with the PS2 and Dolphin on the horizon how much longer can the N64 last?
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How long do people think the N64 has left to live?
With games like Perfect Dark, Zelda: The Continuing Sage, Turok 3, A Resident Evil game, Top Gear Rally 2, and a bunch of other wicked games this year. How long will the N64 live for? Specially with the PS2 and Dolphin on the horizon how much longer can the N64 last?
Cooky
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What this actually has to do with my life is unclear. More importantly, what it has to do with the new game Mystical Ninja is equally unclear. However, it is only one of the many bizarre pieces of dialogue in this confusing, obtuse, ridiculous and very, very mediocre game.
Like it or not, Japanese animation, or anime, has been invading our video games for years. In fact, the role-playing games (RPG's) that have come out for video game consoles have been almost exclusively Japanese in origin and inspired by their style of animation. We have many Japanese game designers to thank for games from Legend of Zelda to Lunar to Final Fantasy VII. But while certain aspects of gaming - graphics, CPU power, and memory size - have improved over the years, other areas have become extremely irritating. Specifically, the plot.
The technology is now at a point where you can incorporate a full blown story into a game. Witness the epic scope of Final Fantasy VII. Unfortunately, this in no guarantee that the story will be any good. Witness the mockery of a plot in Final Fantasy VII.
However, Mystical Ninja is where I draw the line. Combine equal parts Super Mario 64, Japanese soap opera, Telly Tubbies, and LSD freakout. Shake (don't stir). And pour into your Nintendo. This will approximate the effect of Mystical Ninja, the most incomprehensible of incomprehensible anime games I have ever seen.
The protagonist is Goemon, a bizarre looking boy with a blue pineapple on his head. Life is happy in his medieval Japanese village until a spaceship files overhead and fires a ray that turns Oedo castle into 'European Castle'. Obviously some sort of nefarious plan... and a call to arms for Goemon and his friends!. Goemon's weapon of choice is, for unknown reasons, a pipe (the kind for smoking, not for plumbing). So first you must climb mount Fuji to get a new pipe. Along the way, you will fight little girls in pink dresses as well as little floating Chinese dragon heads. You should also collect silver fortune dolls. Later in the game, with no explanation or introduction, you blow on the Triton Conch Shell to summon the giant robot 'Impact' who looks like the Dutch boy from gallon paint cans and wears roller skates. Don't make me go on.
Leaving all that aside for the moment, the game itself is solid, but uninspired. It plays just like Super Mario 64: You run around in a 3D world jumping and hitting things. The 'follow-cam' is surprisingly slow and stupid.
Occasionally, you get to jump into your giant robot friend (Impact, remember?) and fight other giant robot meanies. This is done via a first person interface. While an interesting idea, it's not done well and acts more as a diversion than anything else.
The graphics are a bit disappointing. The characters are all freakish looking, especially Gaemon. While everything moves smoothly, it shows no improvement over Mario, which came out over a year ago. I would not be surprised if it used the exact same engine.
The sound effects are actually better than the cartridge-hindered Nintendo norm. There are actually a few fully digitized songs and the main characters have a number of little Japanese tidbits to say. The music, on the other hand, is pretty bad midi stuff, and (this is one of my chief complaints) there is no way to turn it off.
The game calls itself an 'Action-RPG', but has very few role-playing elements. Unlike King's Field or Castlevania, which truly mix the genres, Mystical Ninja allows only a couple of weapon upgrades and damage modifiers. The biggest RPG-like part of the game is having to 'talk' to everyone in town in order to advance the 'plot' or find out what to do next. Mystical Ninja is really just a 3D platform game with a baaaad plot.
Well, that's about it for Mystical Ninja. I can't really recommend it, although it will probably appeal more to young children than anyone else.
Like it or not, Japanese animation, or anime, has been invading our video games for years. In fact, the role-playing games (RPG's) that have come out for video game consoles have been almost exclusively Japanese in origin and inspired by their style of animation. We have many Japanese game designers to thank for games from Legend of Zelda to Lunar to Final Fantasy VII. But while certain aspects of gaming - graphics, CPU power, and memory size - have improved over the years, other areas have become extremely irritating. Specifically, the plot.
The technology is now at a point where you can incorporate a full blown story into a game. Witness the epic scope of Final Fantasy VII. Unfortunately, this in no guarantee that the story will be any good. Witness the mockery of a plot in Final Fantasy VII.
However, Mystical Ninja is where I draw the line. Combine equal parts Super Mario 64, Japanese soap opera, Telly Tubbies, and LSD freakout. Shake (don't stir). And pour into your Nintendo. This will approximate the effect of Mystical Ninja, the most incomprehensible of incomprehensible anime games I have ever seen.
The protagonist is Goemon, a bizarre looking boy with a blue pineapple on his head. Life is happy in his medieval Japanese village until a spaceship files overhead and fires a ray that turns Oedo castle into 'European Castle'. Obviously some sort of nefarious plan... and a call to arms for Goemon and his friends!. Goemon's weapon of choice is, for unknown reasons, a pipe (the kind for smoking, not for plumbing). So first you must climb mount Fuji to get a new pipe. Along the way, you will fight little girls in pink dresses as well as little floating Chinese dragon heads. You should also collect silver fortune dolls. Later in the game, with no explanation or introduction, you blow on the Triton Conch Shell to summon the giant robot 'Impact' who looks like the Dutch boy from gallon paint cans and wears roller skates. Don't make me go on.
Leaving all that aside for the moment, the game itself is solid, but uninspired. It plays just like Super Mario 64: You run around in a 3D world jumping and hitting things. The 'follow-cam' is surprisingly slow and stupid.
Occasionally, you get to jump into your giant robot friend (Impact, remember?) and fight other giant robot meanies. This is done via a first person interface. While an interesting idea, it's not done well and acts more as a diversion than anything else.
The graphics are a bit disappointing. The characters are all freakish looking, especially Gaemon. While everything moves smoothly, it shows no improvement over Mario, which came out over a year ago. I would not be surprised if it used the exact same engine.
The sound effects are actually better than the cartridge-hindered Nintendo norm. There are actually a few fully digitized songs and the main characters have a number of little Japanese tidbits to say. The music, on the other hand, is pretty bad midi stuff, and (this is one of my chief complaints) there is no way to turn it off.
The game calls itself an 'Action-RPG', but has very few role-playing elements. Unlike King's Field or Castlevania, which truly mix the genres, Mystical Ninja allows only a couple of weapon upgrades and damage modifiers. The biggest RPG-like part of the game is having to 'talk' to everyone in town in order to advance the 'plot' or find out what to do next. Mystical Ninja is really just a 3D platform game with a baaaad plot.
Well, that's about it for Mystical Ninja. I can't really recommend it, although it will probably appeal more to young children than anyone else.
Why do gigantic bugs always decide to make Earth their next meal? From Starship Troopers to the classic Them!, bugs have always had it in for us humans.
Armorines drudges up this theme once again, this time as a first-person shooter. I enjoyed playing this game and it answered a few questions for me, but in the end doesn't really do anything new.
Let's talk about those questions. One question I've been asking myself for a long time is this: When rapacious aliens invade the planet, why is it that they choose to sneak around in dark, creepy places, avoiding the light of day? If all they wanted was a dark hole, why not just grab an unpopulated rock somewhere? They couldn't possibly have run out of those.
The answer, of course, is that game designers seem to think their games are creepier if you can't see what the heck you're doing. They're wrong, of course. I think that statement is borne out by the fact that when I went looking for screenshots, all of them were from Armorines' fourth level, which takes place in the desert. Deserts are notoriously bright and shiny, and yet even in such a setting the giant space bugs are pretty darn gruesome. Especially when you get up close and personal with them.
There are actually a couple of other attempts in this game to get around the "Dammit, I can't see anything!" phenomenon. First off, you can find a pair of IR Goggles. Everything you see is bluish (hey... there's a thought... anybody tried to license a "Yellow Submarine" game yet?) except for the aliens, and your weapon no longer target locks, but at least you can see what's going on. This is actually a really important feature in a few areas.
Theres another visual trick as well: at the end of the first level, you are given a couple of cheat codes, one of which, called "Pen and Ink Mode," allows you to play the game without the graphic overlays. I find it kind of amusing to play as a line drawing - plus, it's definitely a good way to see everything that's going on.
This brings me to another question. Is it really a cheat code if the game GIVES it to you and there's a special menu for turning it on and off? I suppose it's probably some twisted form of reverse psychology. I mean, how many people would actually go out and buy a game that you were SUPPOSED to play without high-rez textured graphics. (Well, okay, I remember lots of them, but the industry has evolved.)
The sound is pretty decent. Good ambient noises, a soundtrack that I haven't yet disabled (rare, believe me), and I really appreciate the fact that the mercilessly rampaging aliens can't sneak up on you (even the invisible ones are audible). If you hear a rustling sound, check your radar - you're about to be lunch.
Hey, there's even a viable story line. And, for added kicks, if you find a dead body lying around, you can shoot it and watch the limbs go flying...
Of course, it's not all guts and glory. The humans you encounter are either scared out of their wits and running for cover (which isn't all bad, come to think of it) or they follow you around like a puppy dog and get in your way. Too many times I've wound up blowing away troopers who walked across my line of fire. Haven't these yahoos ever heard of firing from cover? Their shots wouldn't even put a dent in my metal-clad butt. Oh well.
The control system is fine. However, the weapon selection set-up could have used a little more thought. I'd have been happier with just using one button to flip through available choices.
One other thing I don't care for is the level exit mechanism. You can use the exit to a level as soon as you find it (and you frequently won't actually KNOW it's the exit until you step into it). Of course, if you get there before you've completed your objectives for the level, you must re-do the whole area. This is particularly annoying in the longer segments.
The multi-player is similar to that 'other' Acclaim shooter, Turok. You've got Co-op mode and Deathmatch levels for up to 4 players. One of the Deathmatch options is called "Brood Wars" and lets you play as the bugs. This isn't as fun as it sounds. For some bizarre reason, when you're a human controlled bug, you can't climb walls anymore. What you actually get is just a different graphics set (which only your opponents can see, anyway). Oh well.
Like I said at the beginning, I had fun playing Armorines. The graphics and sound are good, and the plausible plot is refreshing. Not an epic, to be sure, but fun anyway. Anybody want to tell me if it was worth turning into a comic book? I just couldn't bring myself to pick it up.
Armorines drudges up this theme once again, this time as a first-person shooter. I enjoyed playing this game and it answered a few questions for me, but in the end doesn't really do anything new.
Let's talk about those questions. One question I've been asking myself for a long time is this: When rapacious aliens invade the planet, why is it that they choose to sneak around in dark, creepy places, avoiding the light of day? If all they wanted was a dark hole, why not just grab an unpopulated rock somewhere? They couldn't possibly have run out of those.
The answer, of course, is that game designers seem to think their games are creepier if you can't see what the heck you're doing. They're wrong, of course. I think that statement is borne out by the fact that when I went looking for screenshots, all of them were from Armorines' fourth level, which takes place in the desert. Deserts are notoriously bright and shiny, and yet even in such a setting the giant space bugs are pretty darn gruesome. Especially when you get up close and personal with them.
There are actually a couple of other attempts in this game to get around the "Dammit, I can't see anything!" phenomenon. First off, you can find a pair of IR Goggles. Everything you see is bluish (hey... there's a thought... anybody tried to license a "Yellow Submarine" game yet?) except for the aliens, and your weapon no longer target locks, but at least you can see what's going on. This is actually a really important feature in a few areas.
Theres another visual trick as well: at the end of the first level, you are given a couple of cheat codes, one of which, called "Pen and Ink Mode," allows you to play the game without the graphic overlays. I find it kind of amusing to play as a line drawing - plus, it's definitely a good way to see everything that's going on.
This brings me to another question. Is it really a cheat code if the game GIVES it to you and there's a special menu for turning it on and off? I suppose it's probably some twisted form of reverse psychology. I mean, how many people would actually go out and buy a game that you were SUPPOSED to play without high-rez textured graphics. (Well, okay, I remember lots of them, but the industry has evolved.)
The sound is pretty decent. Good ambient noises, a soundtrack that I haven't yet disabled (rare, believe me), and I really appreciate the fact that the mercilessly rampaging aliens can't sneak up on you (even the invisible ones are audible). If you hear a rustling sound, check your radar - you're about to be lunch.
Hey, there's even a viable story line. And, for added kicks, if you find a dead body lying around, you can shoot it and watch the limbs go flying...
Of course, it's not all guts and glory. The humans you encounter are either scared out of their wits and running for cover (which isn't all bad, come to think of it) or they follow you around like a puppy dog and get in your way. Too many times I've wound up blowing away troopers who walked across my line of fire. Haven't these yahoos ever heard of firing from cover? Their shots wouldn't even put a dent in my metal-clad butt. Oh well.
The control system is fine. However, the weapon selection set-up could have used a little more thought. I'd have been happier with just using one button to flip through available choices.
One other thing I don't care for is the level exit mechanism. You can use the exit to a level as soon as you find it (and you frequently won't actually KNOW it's the exit until you step into it). Of course, if you get there before you've completed your objectives for the level, you must re-do the whole area. This is particularly annoying in the longer segments.
The multi-player is similar to that 'other' Acclaim shooter, Turok. You've got Co-op mode and Deathmatch levels for up to 4 players. One of the Deathmatch options is called "Brood Wars" and lets you play as the bugs. This isn't as fun as it sounds. For some bizarre reason, when you're a human controlled bug, you can't climb walls anymore. What you actually get is just a different graphics set (which only your opponents can see, anyway). Oh well.
Like I said at the beginning, I had fun playing Armorines. The graphics and sound are good, and the plausible plot is refreshing. Not an epic, to be sure, but fun anyway. Anybody want to tell me if it was worth turning into a comic book? I just couldn't bring myself to pick it up.
if special reserve had put it on there it would have been the favorite, you knew that, they knew it, we all knew it.
It would have been a landslide of votes for PD, seeing as the magority of gameaday winners have chosen PD for their game it shows that this is the best game, and there is no competition!
It would have been a landslide of votes for PD, seeing as the magority of gameaday winners have chosen PD for their game it shows that this is the best game, and there is no competition!
Did anyone notice that when there was that opinion poll for 'what game are you most looking forward too' that Perfect Dark wasn't an option to vote for considering it is one of the most eagerly anticipated games of all time this seems slightly stupid to me. Perfect Dark is more than likely going to be the best console game ever and is blatantly going to be superior to some of the other titles listed.
when going to the opinion polls in the special reserve, you see a game for the N64 or Dolphin but it is about 2% lower than the crappy gaystation, just vote for the N64 vote, clear it, click back on your toolbar, then vote again, keep doing this until your vote is very high!!!
why does no one talk about this game??
it was a good laugh, the over all on the game was a bit crap, but the multiplayer was good!
it was a good laugh, the over all on the game was a bit crap, but the multiplayer was good!
I was thinking about this when I completed Zelda:Ocarina, and young link closes the temple of time, but I was wondering maybe he had to open it up again because of the whole saving the world thing! I really hate being a kid on that game, it really gets my that he can't rid the damn horse and as you say he only has his little dagger and a flammable sheild, not very clever huh? there has got to be something in the story, maybe the evil bloke in the parallell hyrule is link but his evil twin! or maybe not, maybe he meets up with zelda in the 2nd hyrule and they evolve into one super being!?
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