Monday, August 30, 2010

All Your Memes Now Belong to Us

I grabbed this meme from Samuraifrog, and it seemed up my alley. It is all about video games.

1. My favorite genre of game
Beat em Up/Hack n Slash games. Loved them as a kid, and I love them now. Yes, I was seduced by the power of open world games, but that was an affair, not a marriage.

2. Favorite Games
God Hand, River City Ransom, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Super Dodge Ball, Disgaea, Urban Chaos: Riot Response, Guardian Heroes, Unreal Tournament

3. My hated game(s)
My disdain for Raiders of the Lost Ark for the 2600 is legendary at this point. Bring up E.T. for that same console, and I will launch into a diatribe about Raiders.

4. My favorite minion enemies
I always enjoyed killing slimes in the Dragon Warrior/Quest games... and nailing the ones that run away all the time was particularly satisfying. I also enjoyed shooting/tasing gang members in Urban Chaos: Riot Response.

5. My Most Hated enemies
When I read this question, a lot of the minor enemies in Odin Sphere came to mind, because you can hit them, and it doesn't stop them from moving, and there is a lot of them (and it is a game which slows down when there is a lot of enemies on screen), so while I may come up with a better response if I think about this, this seems like a good answer now.

6. My Favorite Enemies (Bosses)
Harvey Volodarski in No More Heroes, The End in Metal Gear Solid 3, Lavos in Chrono Trigger, Lucha Gorilla in God Hand.

7. My Most hated Enemies (Bosses)
Mizuchi and the other SNK-type bosses in fighting games. I hate this cheap douchebag SO much.

8. Most Loved Good Character
I've always been partial to Solid Snake and Sly Cooper, though Samus Aran is high on that list too... she's just awesome. The Prince from the Katamari games is pretty cool too.

9. Most hated good-character
I am taking this to mean protagonist. I was never very fond of Claude in Grand Theft Auto III, which might seem like a shocking pick based on my love of San Andreas.

10. Most Memorable Game
I rented Bubble Bobble once when I was kid... once. The theme song has been floating around my head since then. And there was an arcade game called Xain'd Sleena that I couldn't get enough of back then.

11. Least Memorable Game
There are a lot of Nintendo and Super Nintendo games that I know I played through, but for the life of me, I can't tell you anything about them.

12. Favorite segment of a game
You know when you are playing a game and you've encountered a challenging bit... and you have that moment where you have not yet beaten it, but you are at the point where a breakthrough has been made and you are going to finally beat it. That's elation right there.

13. Least favorite segment of a game
I hate grinding... hate it with a passion.

14. Most loved storyline
Well, I've always been partial to Final Fantasy II. San Andreas and Persona 3:FES rank highly as well.

15. Favorite secret/easter egg/cheat
Two of the classics: The Konami Code, and the warp pipes in Super Mario Brothers.

16. How many games you've think you've played in your life
With Arcade, PC and all the consoles I've had combined, it would easily top 1000.

17. How many games do you (think) you own?
I have around 600 games.

18. Favorite Weapon
Unreal Tournament's Redeemer.

19. Favorite spell/power
I love confusing/controlling enemies, so I tend to abuse those kinds of spells when they work.

20. Hardest boss you've ever beaten
This is a tough one, because I am sure there are some from my NES/SNES days which were brutal that I can't remember now. I beat a lot of games as a kid.

21. Easiest boss you've ever beaten
Oh, Bordin in Urban Reign. I mean, if you avoid getting shot, he goes down in 2-3 punches.

22. Favorite System
Playstation 2

23. Favorite gaming controller
Dual Shock 1/2

24. Best Level Design
There was an early level in the PS2 game Ghost Hunter which had you exploring an eerie mansion, which was just full of all this creepy imagery... and then there is a point where you encounter a painting which is a view of that same mansion... and to progress, you have to walk into it, and it is like walking into the past, while you can still see the room you were just in through it.

25. Console or PC
Console. You know that the game you are playing has at least been superficially tested and designed for that hardware in mind.

26. Scariest moment in gaming
Games don't really scare me. I get tense though. Though when I was a kid, the first time I saw the Giant Baby in Zombies Ate My Neighbors, I got freaked out.

27. Most suspenseful moment in gaming
I remember playing the original Driver, and there was a particular mission in Los Angeles where I ended up almost destroying the car I was driving, and then I had to drive all the way back home to my garage. The police also wanted to talk to me because of my wreckless driving, and if I got into a chase, well, I couldn't drive too fast with that busted up engine, and my car would most likely explode if I hit anything. So I drove that wreck as carefully as possible across the city, and I had to be careful not to be seen by the police. At one point, I ended up wedged into a small area between the sight lines of two cop cars, and I was fortunate that the one in front of me drove past before the one behind me saw my car. But I did make it back.

7 comments:

Lee Sargent said...

I would do this meme but I honestly can't remember half of these answers especially ones like 'easiest boss' but I challenge you on your most hated games, I'd like to hear your most hated recent/PS2 game.

Whilst the games you mentioned have no redeeming qualities there were a number of games from that era that were truly awful and the argument can be made that it was thanks to an emerging industry (like web design from 15 years ago - hard to fault them for star fields & animated gifs).

So for a new post, your most hated current era game.

SamuraiFrog said...

My hatred for Raiders equals my hatred for ET. I've never hated a game as much as those, that I just wanted to throw against a wall (except for Superman 64). I've played badly-designed games, lame games, etc, but those three were just angeringly awful. The only difference between ET and Raiders was that I owned Raiders and not ET. (It scared me when I was 6, so I wanted nothing to do with ET merchandise.) Raiders was an experience in frustration.

My Dad used to enjoy trying to make it work, though. To each their own, according to their various tolerance levels.

MC said...

Lee: But at the same time, there are a lot of Atari games from that era that are stick pretty good, and with a little polish, they would make good cell phone/flash games.

And the problem with making an entry like you have suggested is I have been careful when I buy games for the PS2. There are some bombs in my collection, it is true, like ATV vs MX Untamed, that Godzilla game I warned you about and I used to own a copy of Celebrity Deathmatch, but other than that, most of them are pretty good.

SF: See, I think part of the reason I don't rip on E.T. as much as a lot of other people is it was a winnable game which did not have any huge technical glitches and most of the things in it were identifiable on one level or another. The initial price point was horrible, and that is certainly a point that I totally get when talking about that game. I got my copy for 2 bucks after the crash, so that may also influence my opinion of the game (though I did get Raiders of the Lost Ark for that price too, so perhaps that argument is moot). It is a bad game... I will concede that, but there are so many other games that I think of first when I think of bad games.

I think if ET didn't exist, and someone made that game in Flash today, I don't think the reaction would be as vehemently negative as it is when discussing the Atari title, and I've noticed that a lot of people who roast the game haven't even played it (you are one of the exceptions).

Put it this way, if I was being forced to spend an afternoon playing a bad game, I'd rather it be ET than say Back to the Future or any number of other licenced games on the NES or SNES. *shudder*

I am glad we see eye to eye on Raiders however.

SamuraiFrog said...

You know what else pissed me off was The Empire Strikes Back for the Atari. There was no way to win! You just kept shooting AT-ATs until you ran out of ships. That was it. There was no possibility of a win. It was a textbook unwinnable game.

MC said...

I remember that game. Yes, it was indeed unwinnable.

Lee Sargent said...

Oh wow - I had Empire too!!! It was so frustrating and you think you're doing something wrong or that the next one will do the trick and then nothing!!!

Iron Man is possibly still one of my biggest let downs and it's interesting in that it hsares a lot of its shitty feel with that Superman game. Some of the game play is very similar.

MC said...

Lee, you notice that every game we've discussed has also been based on a movie or comic?