108 in 2008 Completion: Part 2

April is a good month. My wife and I were married in April, spring comes in April, and of course with spring comes spring break, which gives me lots of time for cool games. And, as you will see, some crappy games, too. Again, click on the picture to view in full-size.

The first game that was beaten this quarter was Commander Keen for Game Boy Color. I love the Game Boy Color. It had some incredible and amazing games, present company excluded. Commander Keen for DOS was amazing. This one… not so much. I say steer clear! Luckily for me, it was cheap.

Anyways, following that unfortunate disaster, I got the chance to play Warioware Twisted for GBA. Ho. Ly. Crap. This. Game. Rules. Seriously. As you may know, Warioware involves a rapid succession of microgames, each lasting only a few seconds, or less. This version has a tilt sensor built-in to the cartridge, which lets you turn and twist the GBA to make things happen. Turn an old man upside down and make his hat fall off. Twist the knob on a quarter machine and make a prize come out. Drive a car around. All without using any buttons. Purely hilarious.

The next game on my list was Megaman Battle Network 4. I enjoy the Megaman Battle Network games, I really do. It's just that so little changes in each one (besides the story), it starts to become monotonous. Hooray for cheat codes!

Following that, I obtained a copy of Worms Open Warfare 2 for the DS. It's worms! For the DS! Awesome! And it's done really well! Also awesome! Then I played through Starfox Command. It's pretty fun. It lacks the 'punch' most Starfox games have, but it's still pretty entertaining. A few weeks after that, I also played through Starfox 64 for the first time. While the graphics are better on the new version, the 64 game is clearly better, even though it's quite a bit harder. Both fun games, tho!

And then… something amazing happened. Super Smash Bros. Brawl came out. To be perfectly frank, there has yet to be released a better game for the Wii. It is purely amazing. (Nearly) everything in the game is polished to perfection. I can't in good conscience give it a perfect 10, mainly because Captain Falcon is still the only character from F-Zero in the game. The Samurai Goroh assist trophy doesn't count. I'm not afraid to give the next Smash Bros. a 9/10 or less if Nintendo doesn't wise up! Come on! Where's the F-Zero love?! Apart from that, it's an incredible game. Hooray!

Anyways, next on the list is True Swing Golf, a fairly simply, but quite entertaining golf game. The physics are good, the courses are fun, and the best part? You can golf in the snow. That just plain rules. After that, I got a hold of a cheap copy of Bust a Move DS. Bust a Move is fun. The puzzle mode on this game is ridiculously hard sometimes. But it's fun.

Wow. We're only now getting into May. Let's speed it up a bit, eh? The first game in May was Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck. Its premise? Drive Daffy Duck insane. Put dynamite under the piano keys. Paint him like Duck Dodgers and then use a disintegration ray on him. Or just konk him on the head. Cool! Then I played TMNT 3 for the DS. It's funny how the portable versions of games like TMNT are superior to their much-more-expensive-to-make console brethren. That's why I've always said that gameplay will ALWAYS trump everything else, especially graphics.

This quarter, I beat 2 Mariokart games: Mariokart Double Dash (which I had played a lot, but didn't actually own until a few months prior) and Mariokart Wii. Both of them are loads of fun. I'm not sure which is better, because they are both amazing. IGN gave Double Dash a 7.9 out of 10. Even though it was the second-best selling GCN title (right behind Smash Bros. Melee). Did they even play the game? In any case, it's just more proof that IGN is willing to give ratings based on who pays them more.

But I digress. Next on the list is Kirby Super Star for SNES. It's like a bunch of short Kirby games rolled into one. It's a lot of fun, but it's descendant (which shall be talked about later in the week) is more fun in my opinion.

Now comes some more crap. I bought a Game Gear for cheap and the games that came with it are stupid and dumb and ridiculous. Jurassic Park. Ooh, running from scary 8-bit dinosaurs. And then there's Evander Holyfield's Real Deal boxing. I think by Real Deal, he actually meant Total Load. Seriously. The game sucks.

Fortunately, the next few games take that stinky bad taste out of my video game playing mouth. First off is Chibi-Robo. I love Chibi-Robo! This time it's the DS version. It's similar to the GCN game, but this time you're cleaning a park instead of a house. You plant flowers, build sidewalks, etc, etc. I will say that there is a distinct "green" message in the game. But to be honest, I don't care. Cause the game is loads of fun. Definitely worth playing multiple times.

Then came Super Paper Mario. It's a mix of the classic Mario platforming we all know and love, and the fun Mario RPG elements. While it's not quite as compelling as the original Paper Mario games, it still has a lot of fun packed in there.

And now for another innovative DS title. Drawn to Life lets you draw your own character, your own weapons, your own platforms… the list goes on and on. The game itself is quite easy, and it's not very hard to beat all the bosses, but the fact that you can customize almost everything makes it worthwhile.

Another great DS title follows: Castlevania Portrait of Ruin. This game's predecessor was incredible. It was very hard, but it was amazingly fun. This one follows the same type of run-around-and-destroy-monsters type gameplay, but it also lets you switch between two different characters at any time. It makes for some good strategy. While I say it's not as good as the first one, mainly because it's the same type of thing, it's still a lot of fun.

Ok, so now we're nearing the bottom. Don't give up yet! First of all, I beat the third Phoenix Wright game, the second this year. Cool! It's as fun as the second one, and maybe even more fun. The stories are very exciting and tense. I like it! I hope they make another Phoenix Wright game, to be honest. I love Apollo Justice as much as anyone, but Phoenix Wright just has a certain charm to it.

Anyways, the next game was Pokemon Red. I'm not a fan of the Pokemon games, but this one was actually surprisingly fun. Then I played Sonic Rush Adventure. It's actually very well done. There are missions to complete, and you can reach the same level of insane speed as the original games. It's definitely underrated.

Then I decided it was time for a little retro action. Or lack thereof. I played Slalom for NES first. It's actually pretty fun. You ski down a hill and try not to run over snowmen and babies. I kid you not. Then I played Mario is Missing, also for the NES. And I will admit that this is by far the worst Mario game I have ever played. It is extremely confusing, it's extremely retarded, and it's extremely weird that Nintendo would let someone else make a game with Mario without their help. Cause it sucks. To be honest, I didn't actually beat it. But after 5 minutes, I felt like I'd rather glue my butt cheeks together.

Alright, so rounding out Q2 are Sonic the Hedgehog 2 for the Genesis (which is pretty good, not as good as 3), and Viewtiful Joe Double Trouble for DS. Viewtiful Joe is just plain cool. And while some of the puzzles are really hard to figure out, the game packs so much style and pizzazz, it's worth taking the time. A good game to mark the half-way point!

Ok, so if you're still awake, let me just say that this has been fun. Half way there! Yahoo! What could be in store for the rest of the year's games?... Stay tuned to find out!*

-benjamines

Currently Playing: Polarium Advance, Metroid Prime 2, Megaman 9

* That means come back tomorrow and read what crap I write.