Viewing topic Weekend Players' Club 12/17/22

Weekend Players' Club 12/17/22

StoneColdSpider Dec 18, 2022

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G'Day everyone……. Itscalledreality seems to be busy job hunting/furniture gathering/Christmas shopping and we all wish him the best of luck…... So I guess I will host the thread this week……

Its a sunny Sunday here but my week has again been rather crap…… On Friday my power supply died on my PC……. I have ordered a new one and I just have to hope that it gets here before Christmas and that it didnt take anything else out when it died…….

So no games for me the past few days…… I have stolen my parents PC so I can still watch youtube and annoy everyone on here…….

Besides that not much has happened…… Been a quiet week……. I took another dog for a walk this week…… The local Hairdresser has an English Pointer in the shop named Rufus……. And I was allowed to take him for a walk……. It was good to take a dog on a walk again…….

As for gaming….. The Gaming Advent Calendar was going till the power supply died…… Its a pity that happened because I was really enjoying the Advent Calendar…….

Anyway this week I played…….

Arcade

WWF Wrestlefest (1991 Technos) - Sports (wrestling)

Console

Disney Sports Basketball (2003 Konami) - Nintendo GameCube - Sports (Basketball)
Disney Sports Football (2002 Konami) - Nintendo GameCube - Sports (Football)
ESPN NFL 2K5 (2004 Sega) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Football)
ESPN NHL 2k5 (2004 Sega) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Hockey)
Madden NFL 2003 (2002 EA Sports) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Football)
NBA Live 98 (1997 EA Sports) - Sega Mega Drive - Sports (Basketball)
NFL 2K2 (2001 Sega) - Sega Dreamcast - Sports (Football)
NHL 06 (2005 EA Sports) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Hockey)
NHL 09 (2008 EA Sports) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Hockey)
NHL 2005 (2004 EA Sports) - Sony PlayStation 2 - Sports (Hockey)
Tecmo Super Bowl 2023 (2022 TecmoBowl.org) - Nintendo Entertainment System - Sports (Football)

The 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar continues……. As a reminder I gave my lovely assistant a list of 25 games for the 25 days of Christmas…….. And they have jumbled them all up and every day I will open the door and see what game I will play that day……... Of these 25 games I have not played 24 of them at all before….. And the one I have played before I just played for a few minutes to check the rom worked back in 2016 and never touched again…….. There are 23 sports games and 2 non sports games……

Day 11 of the 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar was……..
NFL 2K2 (2001 Sega) - Sega Dreamcast - Sports (Football)

The last NFL game on the Dreamcast….. This was also released on the Sony PlayStation 2 and the Microsoft Xbox…… The game itself is good and the gameplay is smooth and excellent….. The menu music…… That again is RUBBISH………. And the menu controls are just as bad…. The analogue stick is used like a mouse to move a cursor around the screen to highlight the menu option and then press A to select it……. The dpad does NOTHING!!!!!!………… I need to try the PS2 version……

Day 12 of the 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar was……..
NBA Live 98 (1997 EA Sports) - Sega Mega Drive - Sports (Basketball)

This was the last NBA game on the Mega Drive…… And it is a good game…. Its a “realistic” 5 on 5 basketball game…… And since its the late 90’s the Charlotte Hornets are actually good….. The graphics are nice for the Mega Drive and the gameplay is nice and smooth……. I had lots of fun playing this and would absolutely play this one again…...

Day 13 of the 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar was……..
WWF Wrestlefest (1991 Technos) - Sports (wrestling)

The sequel to WWF Superstars (1989 Technos)……. WWF WrestleFest is a really nice wrestling arcade game…… The graphics are really nice for 1991 and the game play is solid as well….. Only downside would be the music that is not very good….. The music was also a problem in WWF Superstars….. Controls are nice and simple and there is even a new game mode with a Royal Rumble mode added while still retaining the Tag Team storyline mode from WWF Superstars…...

Day 14 of the 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar was……..
Disney Sports Football (2002 Konami) - Nintendo GameCube - Sports (Football)

This game should be called “Disney Sports Incomplete Pass”….. I played an entire game and could not complete a pass…… I spent the entire last quarter running the ball…… The forever looping super generic guitar rift “music” in the background drove me nuts after the 1st quarter….. IT NEVER STOPS!!!!…… It might have all your “favourite” Disney characters…… But the gameplay is a crime against football…… This game is Officially Certified C for C.Rap Boys……..

Day 15 of the 2022 Gaming Advent Calendar was……..
Disney Sports Basketball (2003 Konami) - Nintendo GameCube - Sports (Basketball)

This is a 3 on 3 “basketball” game……. This is more a game of frustration…… Even on easy the opponents are basically the Harlem Globetrotters triple dunking on your candy arse for fun……. Swatting every shot out of the sky like Mr Miyagi swatting a fly…… And its got the same forever looping super generic guitar rift “music” in the background from Disney Sports Football….. I would must rather play the Space Jam video game on the Sony PlayStation…….. This game is Officially Certified C for C.Rap Boys…….

And that was the last Day before the PSU died….

As for this week I honestly dont know….. It will all depend on when the power supply turns up….. And if there was no other damage…….. If it comes Wednesday/Thursday and everything works fine I can catch up on the missed Advent Calendar days and get that back on track which im hoping to do……..

And the same goes with non gaming….. I need to stay home to make sure im here if it turns up…… So less walking and stuff…… I might try and get some stuff done around the house that needs doing like the usual yardwork and other odds and ends…...

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

Now for my bad joke of the week……
What did the penguin get from the genie lamp?
Three fishes
*ba dum.... tssssh*

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Pengling Dec 18, 2022

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Here we go again!

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First things first, I completed both the normal and hard modes of the original arcade version of Bubble Bobble during the week, finally laying to rest some long-unfinished business from my younger years! In the UK, thanks to its ubiquity across all of the popular home-microcomputers of the day (I grew up with the Commodore 64 conversion, myself, as well as very rarely getting to play on an arcade cabinet at a local fish & chip shop), Bubble Bobble occupies the same cultural space that Super Mario Bros. occupies in Japan and North America (and its spiritual successor The NewZealand Story occupies the same space in the UK as Super Mario Bros. 3 does elsewhere). The experience left me wanting to play another single-screen arcade platformer...

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... and I knew exactly which one to go with: The 1990 cult-classic by Toaplan (a developer more famous for shooters than for platform-games), Snow Bros.: Nick & Tom, which I first encountered in 1997 in an arcade in Westward Ho! ( https://www.visitdevon.co.uk/northdevon/explore/villages-and-towns/westward-ho ), sitting next to the first Bomberman arcade game.

Interestingly, this game is getting a remake for the Nintendo Switch this year, in the form of Snow Bros. Special - quite unexpected as it isn't the most famous game of that era, but very welcome, since it deserves more exposure!

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This one's not really a Christmassy pick, because aside from the twin snowman protagonists, it's not set in or around any festive locales - in fact, you start out in a circus and are fighting an army of monsters that look like they walked off the set of Gremlins!

The game is best described as inheriting some DNA from titles like Bubble Bobble and its kin, but in Snow Bros. you need to bury enemies in snow and then attack the resulting snowball in order to send it careening around the stage as a powerful weapon - often taking you with it, which is chaotic and fun. You also need to master the temporary invincibility that you're granted for leaping out of a moving snowball, as that will save your skin (or, rather, snow) as you progress through the game. At 50 stages it's half the length of Bubble Bobble, but that's really not a problem at all, because as much as I love Bubble Bobble it does drag on a bit in its later stages.

Anyway, Snow Bros. is good fun - give it a look if you like single-screen arcade platformers of this ilk!

Now, onto the usual Bomberman segment.

I've skipped a few remakes of the 1985 NES title, most of the non-maze-bombing side-games, and some installments in genres that I don't enjoy (the latter being most of the Nintendo 64 output), but, after all this time, I'm finally at the end of my Bomberman marathon!

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to check out the lost games Bomberman: Disney Stitch Edition and Pac-Man x Bomberman (the latter of which sounds like an interesting gameplay mash-up - I'm a big maze-chase fan so I hope that this one gets revisited in some form in the future), as these were Japan-only mobile titles from 2010 and as such are now long-gone.

I went into the weekend with only two games left to tackle, and they happened to be the first and last of the monochrome Game Boy games, Bomber Boy and Bomberman GB 3 (the latter of which was Japan-only, though luckily there's a fan-translation for it) - this wasn't planned but it was fitting, since my first Bomberman game was Wario Blast Featuring Bomberman!, which, at least in the West, is the best-known of the Game Boy Bomberman titles.

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Bomber Boy was a charming and low-stress little entry in the series with several concepts that haven't been seen since, and Bomberman GB 3 has lots of fun ideas that I also don't remember seeing elsewhere as well, plus it expands upon the Motobomber - one of my favourite power-ups in the series, which debuted in Wario Blast.

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Image-source: MobyGames
As an aside, I really like the box-art used for Bomber Boy in Japan, the UK, and Europe.

I'm not so sure about the North American art, though - it's pretty ghastly! It's obviously not the fault of the artist - they just did what they were supposed to do and it's perfectly competent - it's just very of-its-time and unfitting for the game.

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Image-source: MobyGames
Meanwhile, Bomberman GB 3 came in a cool little tin!

I had an absolute whale of a time running through all of these Bomberman titles, and now all that's left to do is look forward to the upcoming Super Bomberman R 2!

And, y'know, maybe revisit some of my favourites while I'm waiting.

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Whew! That was a long post for this week! All of that said, even though StoneColdSpider stepped in to make the thread this week, I just want to say thanks to itscalledreality for creating the weekend threads in the first place - it's given me a lot of motivation to do multiple franchise-marathons (Bomberman, Donkey Kong Country/Land, and Zool, so far, all of which I've enjoyed every minute of), and it's really opened my eyes to just how many options we really have in terms of playing games on Linux, as well as allowed me to get chatting to some other GOL'ers outside of these threads. You've really lit up the forums with the Weekend Players' Club, ICR - thankyou so much for all of the fun that it's brought about.

Last edited by Pengling on 18 December 2022 at 6:47 am UTC

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itscalledreality Dec 19, 2022

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Thanks StoneColdSpider…………..

I actually had company arrive on Thursday then spent the next 3 days chaperoning them around. Didn’t get to play too many games this week, just Elden Ring and started chewing on some more backlog, Arkham Knight. It’s alright so far. Maybe a bit too grim or self-serious. Not really fighting crime in Gotham but on the very video-game-level-designed architecture on the outskirts if it. Okay even the villains has respect for the wealthy parts of the city. Enjoyable enough for an action game, hoping it picks up.

Last edited by itscalledreality on 19 December 2022 at 2:06 pm UTC

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BlackBloodRum Dec 19, 2022

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Alright.... here is the games that I played.... this weekend....

Finally got to try my Steam deck offline and away from home worked a charm!

New Super Lucky's Tale
.... okay stop laughing.... I can hear you from here

This game gives me serious Crash Bandicoot + Spyro vibes, very old school, was quite fun!

Race Driver: GRID (2008)
Went a bit retro with this one from GOG!

This game had a unique position, it's a CodeMasters racing game, that isn't a rally game.. it's actually fun once you get the hang of it!

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StoneColdSpider Dec 20, 2022

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Quoting: BlackBloodRumNew Super Lucky's Tale

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!
*breaths*
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!

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Pengling Dec 20, 2022

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Quoting: StoneColdSpider
Quoting: BlackBloodRumNew Super Lucky's Tale
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!
*breaths*
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!

You're not allowed to laugh - it's a fab game.

I picked up on echoes of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos and Rayman 2: The Great Escape from it, myself.

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Lucky on Linux

It got Steam Deck Verified recently, too. Fab pick for a 3D platformer if you happen to have a Deck!

Last edited by Pengling on 20 December 2022 at 1:42 am UTC

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