G'Day everyone its a sunny Saturday here...... Its been a very crap week weather wise…….. Was raining Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday……. Even had hail on Tuesday…….. So very few walks for the dog last week…….

So I have not done much…… Been a very quiet week…… besides mowing the lawn yesterday I have done nothing at all…. Besides playing games and going real work…… I need to keep the lights on somehow…….

I just finished bathing Maggie...... And I got a shower at the same time......… Speaking of showers…. I got inturrupted three times during my shower today…… Thanks to a spider a millipede and an earwig having a party behind the shampoo bottle in the corner……. So three times I had to turn off the shower and capture the critter and take them outside…… The joys of living in Australia…..

Last weekend the Denver Broncos some how flew over the pond to England played the Jacksonville Jaguars at Wembly Stadium and got the win 21-17……

And on Tuesday the NFL Trade Deadline came and went and Denver made a big move……. They traded Outside Linebacker Bradley Chubb to the Miami Dolphins….. for a 1st round draft pick and Running Back Chase Edmonds…… This is huge for the Broncos…… Chubbs contract is up at the end of the season and He wanted the money the Broncos just cant afford to pay him…… So trade him now and get something for him or keep him for the remianing 9 games of the season and he leaves and you get nothing in return…… So they traded him which ended up getting them a 1st round draft pick which is huge as the Broncos didnt have a 1st round pick due to trading it to the Seattle Seahawks for Quarterback Russell Wilson…….

Chubb went to the Dolphins and has already signed a new 5year $110Million ($68Million guaranteed) contract…….

Im in the wrong business…….

As for gaming it was a good week for that…… I finished the Halloween games and I will never do that again…… ended up completing 42 games in 31 days………. I will need to condence that list a lot for next year and there were a lot of bad games that be cut with ease……..

This week I played………..

Arcade

Night Slashers (1994 Data East) - Beat 'em up
Splatterhouse (1988 Namco) - Beat 'em up
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1989 Konami) - Beat 'em up
Zero Wing (1989 Toaplan) - Shoot 'em up


Console

Clock Tower (Deluxe English Patched) (1995 Human Entertainment) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Survival Horror
Die Hard Arcade (1997 Sega) - Sega Saturn - Beat 'em up
Haunting Starring Polterguy (1993 Electronic Arts) - Sega Mega Drive - Action
Kirby's Dream Land (1992 Nintendo) - Nintendo Game Boy - Platformer
NBA Jam Tournament Edition (1995 Acclaim) - Sega Mega Drive - Sports (Basketball)
NFL Blitz (1998 Midway) - Nintendo 64 - Sports (Football)
NFL Blitz 2023 (2022 NFL Blitz Resurrection) - Nintnedo 64 - Sports (Football)
Tecmo Super Bowl 2023 (2022 TecmoBowl.org) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Sports (Football)

The best two games I played this week were……….. Splatterhouse (1988 Namco)……. I adore this game…… Its so damn great…….. The gore is awesome the themes are great and the graphics are exceptional…… The sotryline is minimal…… Which was the style at the time……. This game is awesome……. If you havnt played it and your able to play MAME/FBN…… you need too……

The other one was……………. Night Slashers (1994 Data East)……. This game is another gem……. The gore is great…… Lots of blood and guts…….. The beat ‘em up action is good…. The Charaters are good…… Theres a total 90’s rocker with cyborg arms how can you beat that???……. The enemies are zombies, werewolves, dracula, mummies, frankenstein monsters…… Graphics are great as well…… This is another one that you must play anyway that you can…….

Now onto the two worst games I played this week…… first up is…………. Kirby's Dream Land (1992 Nintendo)…… This game sucks……. The graphics are so cute they make me puke…….. The music is awful and………. JUST KIDDING!!!!……. I just wanted to annoy Pengling……. In all seriousness this game is great and should be played by everyone…….. In fact every game I played this week was really good…… So there are no bad games this week…… Though Kirby does indeed suck (Ha)……..

Special mention this week will go to………. Die Hard Arcade (1997 Sega)…….. I had to dig deep to bring out my inner Segata Sanshiro to handle the power of the Sega Saturn…….. And I even set up my Arcade Fight Stick so it would have true arcade feel that would make Johnny Turbo jealous…… And yes Die Hard Arcade is great……. A really good fast action beat 'em up arcade game…… Why didnt I play the arcade version???…… Well Die Hard Arcade does not work properly on MAME 2003 Plus……. No audio and no ground textures…….. So I had to go with the Saturn version which is practically arcade perfect anway…… Its a great dumb fun arcade beat ‘em up…...

For anyone interested in the games that I completed for the spooky Halloween season here is a list of them……...

Arcade

Chiller (1986 Exidy) - Gallery Shooter (Light Gun)
Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors (1994 Capcom) - Fighting
Haunted Castle (1988 Konami) - Platformer
Mutation Nation (1992 SNK) - Beat 'em up - Neo Geo
Night Slashers (1994 Data East) - Beat 'em up
Night Warriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge (1995 Capcom) - Fighting
Nightmare in the Dark (2000 Eleven) - Platformer - Neo Geo
Splatterhouse (1988 Namco) - Beat 'em up
The Real Ghostbusters (1987 Data East) - Run and Gun
Vampire Savior: The Lord of Vampire (1997 Capcom) - Fighting (Darkstalkers 3)
Vampire Savior 2: The Lord of Vampire (1997 Capcom) - Fighting (Darkstalkers 3 Update)
Zombie Raid (1995 Sammy) - Shooter (Light Gun)


Console

Castlevania Chronicles (2001 Konami) - Sony PlayStation - Platformer
Castlevania Legends (1998 Konami) - Nintendo Game Boy - Platformer
Castlevania: Bloodlines (1994 Konami) - Sega Mega Drive - Platformer
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood (1993 Konami) - NEC PC Engine Super CD-ROM² (Akumajou Dracula X - Chi no Rondo) - Platformer
Clock Tower (1995 Human Entertainment) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Survival Horror
Clock Tower (1997 ASCII Entertainment) - Sony PlayStation - Survival Horror
DEcapAttack (1991 Sega) - Sega Mega Drive - Platformer
Ghost House (1986 Sega) - Sega Master System - Platformer
Ghost Sweeper Mikami: Joreishi wa Nice Body (1993 Banalex) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Ghostbusters (1990 Sega) - Sega Mega Drive - Platformer
Hammerin' Harry: Ghost Building Company (1991 Irem) - Nintendo Game Boy - Platformer
Haunting Starring Polterguy (1993 Electronic Arts) - Sega Mega Drive - Action
Kid Dracula (1990 Konami) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Kid Dracula (1993 Konami) - Nintendo Game Boy - Platformer
Majuu Ou (1995 KSS) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Master of Darkness (1993 Sega) - Sega Master System - Platformer
Monster Party (1989 Bandai) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Mutant League Football (1993 Electronic Arts) - Sega Mega Drive - Sports (Football)
Mutant League Hockey (1994 Electronic Arts) - Sega Mega Drive - Sports (Hockey)
Nosferatu (1994 SETA) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Porky Pig's Haunted Holiday (1995 Acclaim) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Shadowgate (1989 Kemco) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Adventure
Silent Debuggers (1991 NEC) - NES PC Engine - Survival horror
Splatterhouse (1990 Namco) - PC Engine - Beat 'em up
Splatterhouse 2 (1992 Namco) - Sega Mega Drive - Beat 'em up
Splatterhouse 3 (1993 Namco) - Sega Mega Drive - Beat 'em up
Splatterhouse - Wanpaku Graffiti (1989 Namco) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
Super Castlevania IV (1991 Konami) - Super Nintendo Entertainment System - Platformer
The House of the Dead 2 (1999 Sega) - Sega Dreamcast - Shooter (Light Gun)
Zombie Revenge (1999 Sega) - Sega Dreamcast - Beat 'em up

And since Pengling asked for it last week……. My review of Haunting Starring Polterguy (1993 Electronic Arts)……. Its a great good game…… The animations and scares are excellent…… they are what sell the game overall and them being so good is what makes you want to keep playing to see more of the scares and the animations….. The game is very repedative……. And the underworld parts to refull your ectoplasm are not that great…… And the storyline is kinda weak and doesnt make a lot of sense……. Overall its well worth a playthrough at least once to see the excellent creative scares and top notice animation…….

As for what ill play this week…….. I plan on playing TMNT Turtles In Time on the Arcade…… There will be another Kirby game……. And probably Dynamite Cop on the Dreamcast……. And the usual NFL stuff…….

As for non gaming….. I have no idea….. Depends on the weather and I have no clue what that is going do and neither does the weatherman……

Well thats it from me…… Have a good week everyone…...

Happy weekend, everybody! I have three picks this week, though one of them is extremely short so it shouldn't make a substantial amount of difference to the amount of gaming-time I have for this.


After being left disappointed by Bomberman World last week, this week I've chosen Mega Bomberman for the Mega Drive for the next part of my Bomberman marathon. This is actually a slightly-downgraded version of Bomberman '94 for the PC Engine, which is a superb game that I've played before; I picked this one because at the end of the day it's still a great game (though it would have been interesting to see what they would have done with the Mega Drive hardware if they'd made a Bomberman game specifically for it, rather than porting one from the TurboGrafx-16), and I'm curious to see the cuts and differences in this port, such as missing details and animations, the first two worlds having completely different music to the TG-16 version, and poor old Blue Bomberman callously being booted out entirely!

This one is also notable for featuring the first focussed effort to give Bomberman a family in the form of the (adoptive) Bomber Family - a group later replaced by the clearly Street Fighter II-inspired World Bombers, who themselves were later replaced by the current very charming approach of simply having Bomberman living together with his actual siblings (who pre-dated the other two groups anyway) as a combined family-unit/hero-team known as the Bomberman Bros..

Hopefully this game's known issues won't lead to the same sort of disappointment as last week's pick, but it seems fine so far aside from some inexplicable slowdown that wasn't present in the original release.


My second pick is a highly-influential game that, for whatever reason, ended up being little-known in the West - Heiyankyo Alien, a title that sees a Heian-era policeman fending off an alien invasion in the city that would eventually become modern-day Kyoto. Specifically, I'll be playing the "New" mode of the Game Boy conversion of that game, rather than the original 1979 game, as the Game Boy "New" mode is a short-but-sweet experience that has an actual ending.

Heiyankyo Alien has left its mark on many series, including my beloved Bomberman (in no less than two entirely different ways, by being connected to Lode Runner, the Famicom conversion of which resulted in the Famicom version of Bomberman being created as a tie-in, and by influencing the Bomberman series' core gameplay itself), as it was one of the earliest maze-chase games, and one that helped to codify the genre, resulting in games like Pac-Man, Bomberman (who, funnily enough, has crossed over with Pac-Man, and Kid no Hore Hore Daisakusen/Cratermaze/Doraemon Meikyuu Daisakusen.


And, last but not least, my third pick is a Donkey Kong Country ROM-hack called DKC Mania. This is one of those extensive "new game, old engine"-type hacks, and it's in the same very-high-quality ballpark as Kirby's Halloween Adventure from last week. It plays like the Donkey Kong Country sequel that was never officially made - which is good, because I never enjoyed the modern titles from Retro Studios, due to the fact that they don't actually play like DKC.

This one is best experienced if you already know the original Donkey Kong Country games well, as it's full of fun ideas that build upon the first SNES game and its two sequels - and, in its way, it serves to make up for the fact that Nintendo itself keeps neglecting the Donkey Kong franchise, even going as far as to completely ignore its 40th anniversary last year. I highly recommend this one - as with Kirby's Halloween Adventure it's not only an excellent ROM-hack, but also an excellent platformer in its own right.

Quoting: itscalledrealityI have been sick since Halloween evening. I have no idea how I got sick as I only went to the hardware store that day.

Yikes! I hope that you feel better soon! At least you didn't get sick due to candy, right?

Quoting: itscalledrealityToo bad the sequel was an Xbox 360 exclusive and the rights are trapped between people. I might end up like Pengling trying to emulate Bomberman Act Zero.

I suspect that both of us are going to have be very patient with that!

Quoting: StoneColdSpiderNow onto the two worst games I played this week…… first up is…………. Kirby's Dream Land (1992 Nintendo)…… This game sucks……. The graphics are so cute they make me puke…….. The music is awful and………. JUST KIDDING!!!!……. I just wanted to annoy Pengling……. In all seriousness this game is great and should be played by everyone…….. In fact every game I played this week was really good…… So there are no bad games this week…… Though Kirby does indeed suck (Ha)……..

Hahahahaha! Though it doesn't have the Copy Ability feature that was added in the sequel, Kirby's Adventure for the NES, Kirby's Dream Land is one of my all-time favourite games - I ended up playing through both of its difficulty-modes during the week, too.

Quoting: StoneColdSpiderAnd I even set up my Arcade Fight Stick so it would have true arcade feel that would make Johnny Turbo jealous……

The legendary Johnny Turbo! Everybody needs to read these truly bizarre advertising comics - THEY'RE NOT EVEN HUMAN!

Though it was initially believed that the comics were a spoof, it was later discovered that NEC wanted Mr. Turbo (based on real-life employee Johnny Brandstetter) to be an American equivalent to Japanese gaming celebrity Takahashi Meijin - a Hudson Soft employee who was very popular with the public, who was famed for his gaming skills and his ability to press a fire-button 16 times per second.

Quoting: StoneColdSpiderAnd since Pengling asked for it last week……. My review of Haunting Starring Polterguy (1993 Electronic Arts)……. Its a great good game…… The animations and scares are excellent…… they are what sell the game overall and them being so good is what makes you want to keep playing to see more of the scares and the animations….. The game is very repedative……. And the underworld parts to refull your ectoplasm are not that great…… And the storyline is kinda weak and doesnt make a lot of sense……. Overall its well worth a playthrough at least once to see the excellent creative scares and top notice animation…….

Thanks for that, Spider - I always wondered about this one.

Last edited by Pengling on 5 November 2022 at 4:20 am UTC

Orion Trail has been a great game for me to rock for a few minutes after work. I've been doing a single run a day for the last week and a couple of days and I just completed the 3rd way point. I'm feeling this game a lot. Playing the itch.io version.

A few weeks ago my board gaming group has started Heroclix campaigns. It's 10 part story line in the vein of Crisis of Infinite Earths. Here is my current team:

* Judge Dredd (V)
* Aphrodite IX (V)
* The Darkness (V)
* Witchblade (U)
* Casey Jones - SR (U)
* Dire Werewolf (U)
* Avatar Of Cthulhu (U)
* Angelus (U)

I already have these from when I was collecting Indyclix and Horrorclix. I got the Casey Jones gifted to me. Currently we are wrapping up chapter 1 and most of my team is doing well and we have 1 of the items needed for the end game event. My family and friends have a much more in depth collection so I'm not sure how well I will be doing in the next chapters coming up but I do enjoy playing clix games.

My workweek this week is solidly the weekend. My new employer does an interesting 4 day work week, so my days off rotate. In to of that I'm rotating shifts due to shortages. So I work a shift, sleep for a few hours, then back to work.

I finished Metro 2033 and Last light. Both were excellent. The narrative was nice as was the action/stealth. I don't own Exodus, but I'll buy it on the next sale.

For Halloween, I've now started Soma. I think I've figured out the twist, but it's still good. It's not nearly as scary as penumbra (I've not played amnesia). But the atmosphere is really cool.

Quoting: denyasisMy workweek this week is solidly the weekend. My new employer does an interesting 4 day work week, so my days off rotate. In to of that I'm rotating shifts due to shortages. So I work a shift, sleep for a few hours, then back to work.

I finished Metro 2033 and Last light. Both were excellent. The narrative was nice as was the action/stealth. I don't own Exodus, but I'll buy it on the next sale.

For Halloween, I've now started Soma. I think I've figured out the twist, but it's still good. It's not nearly as scary as penumbra (I've not played amnesia). But the atmosphere is really cool.

Soma is one of my favorites. I would say it’s a good “think about it all afterwards” game. Psychologically unnerving not so much “scary”.

Last edited by itscalledreality on 5 November 2022 at 6:38 pm UTC

I just bought Soma (a game I've looked at before, meant to come back to and get some day, then forgot it existed). If you guys wouldn't have talked about it, it would have stayed forgotten. I did enjoy some of the Amnesia games (Machine for Pigs especially).

It's the first Linux Native game I've bought on GoG, what a treat. Run the installer (ignore GTK+ styling inconsistencies lol), point it to desired location, install and then just run ./start.sh and it worked out of the box on my LFS based system. I don't need Steam, Lutris or even my Manjaroo gaming setup for this.

Something that made me very happy to see, there's a "Safe" difficulty setting in this game, where the monsters won't kill you if you get caught. That mitigates what I dislike about survival games where you can't fight :-)

I think I'm going to enjoy this... I'm going to immerse myself in it tonight.

Quoting: GroganI just bought Soma (a game I've looked at before, meant to come back to and get some day, then forgot it existed). If you guys wouldn't have talked about it, it would have stayed forgotten. I did enjoy some of the Amnesia games (Machine for Pigs especially).

It's the first Linux Native game I've bought on GoG, what a treat. Run the installer (ignore GTK+ styling inconsistencies lol), point it to desired location, install and then just run ./start.sh and it worked out of the box on my LFS based system. I don't need Steam, Lutris or even my Manjaroo gaming setup for this.

Something that made me very happy to see, there's a "Safe" difficulty setting in this game, where the monsters won't kill you if you get caught. That mitigates what I dislike about survival games where you can't fight :-)

I think I'm going to enjoy this... I'm going to immerse myself in it tonight.

Fun fact: Machine for Pigs wasn’t developed by the Dark Descent/Soma devs ;)

Quoting: itscalledrealityFun fact: Machine for Pigs wasn’t developed by the Dark Descent/Soma devs ;)

I didn't notice that Frictional jobbed that one out. It was the only one of their games I ever finished :-)

Quoting: itscalledrealityI have been sick since Halloween evening. I have no idea how I got sick as I only went to the hardware store that day.

Hope your feeling better soon mate...... Probably got it from the walking disease factorys known as children during trick or treat night.......

My Halloween night was very quiet..... Living in OZ its not really celebrated here...... But I did get to yell at some kids to get off my lawn..... So that made me happy......

Quoting: Penglingthis week I've chosen Mega Bomberman for the Mega Drive for the next part of my Bomberman marathon.

A Bomberman game???? IM SHOCKED...... SHOCKED I YELLS YA!!! *drops monocle in wine glass from shock*

Quoting: PenglingHahahahaha!

Glad you liked the joke lol

Quoting: denyasisI finished Metro 2033

Its been a long time since I have played that but I remember it being so good I bought the book its based on and read it too...... Its a really good read...... I also bought the books sequel Metro 2034........ I am yet to start it though.......

I have not played Last Light yet but I do own it....... I should play that to be honest...... Did you play the originals or the reduxed versions???

Quoting: GroganSomething that made me very happy to see, there's a "Safe" difficulty setting in this game, where the monsters won't kill you if you get caught. That mitigates what I dislike about survival games where you can't fight :-)

I think I'm going to enjoy this... I'm going to immerse myself in it tonight

I'm enjoying it quite a lot. I'll note it does carry over the mechanic from Penumbra where looking at the monster too much alerts the monster to your presence.

It does make for a silly moment or two where you just stare at a wall while it walks by, I'm not sure if Amnesia did that.

Given it's mostly exploration, death really isn't that big of a deal (and is rare).

It does have amazing atmosphere. I know the underwater setting kinda hints at Bioshock, but the game actually gives off hardcore System Shock 2 vibes. Probably better as SS2 becomes more of a shooter as the game goes on.

Quoting: StoneColdSpiderI have not played Last Light yet but I do own it....... I should play that to be honest...... Did you play the originals or the reduxed versions???

I played the redux versions. I would 100% recommend Last Light of you like 2033 at all. It's much better in every way. I think 2033 may have been a bit more difficult/frustrating, especially the outdoor sequences. The story is much better and presented more cohesively in LL.

1) use Proton/wine if you can. It's superior to native in terms of frame rate and quality. It's a significant difference (or after it was for me).

Last edited by denyasis on 6 November 2022 at 4:35 am UTC