Gaming off the Beaten Path

It's time once again for my year end review. I can't believe I'm doing this again, or that I've been doing this for two years. Not going to lie, I didn't anticipate this going longer than a few posts. What started as a new years resolution two years ago has become something I look forward to doing each week (and also my de facto excuse to play more video games).  But enough about that, it's time for the year end review. As I did last year, I will be calling out best game, worst game, most surprising and most disappointing. It goes without saying, but 10's games are ineligible and will not be factored into the scores. I will also not be counting my review of the "High Score" series, since comparing a video game to a documentary makes zero sense. Speaking of scores, here's a reminder of what I gave each game: Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne - 9.75/10 F-Zero GX - 9.75/10 Final Fantasy VII Remake - 9.5/10 Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millennium - 9.5/...

In case you couldn't tell, I've played a lot of video games in my lifetime. About 10 years ago, I actually listed out every title I'd ever played and it was already well into the thousands. And again, that was 10 years ago. I've seen good and bad, unique and formulaic, inspired and boring, violent and family friendly, and everything in between. My past two years of posts have been a pretty good microcosm of the industry really, there have been a few stinkers, mostly okay to good games and a few true standouts. I've discussed my love for games like Doom, Street Fighter, Madden and Final Fantasy VII and how they kept me hooked on the medium throughout my years. But as important as they were in my gaming journey, it all started with Mega Man 3. It wasn't the first game I ever played, I remember being as young as 4 and playing Super Mario Bros at a friend's house. My cousin had an NES and I remember us both getting very frustrated that we couldn't beat any o...

Time to check another console off the list. With the official launch of the new generation (I think this would be 9th Gen?), it's safe to assume a lot of folks out there will be getting new gaming consoles for the holidays this year. I know I did! So, did I pick up a PS5, or did I go with an XBox? Neither. I got a Sega Dreamcast for Christmas this year. I've been after one of these for a long time and thanks in no small part to my wife, I've finally got one. It even came with a bunch of games, running the gamut from console mainstays to obscure outliers. I should also mention that while I've never owned a Dreamcast before now, I do have a lot more familiarity with it than I do other Sega consoles. I've certainly played more of it than the Saturn and I would even say I put more time on it than I did the Genesis. I've played a lot of the heavy hitters here, Sonic Adventure, Soul Caliber, etc. A lot of these titles were also ported to other consoles, I covered Gran...

I know it's a bit of a stretch for the whole "obscure games" thing, but I've been playing a lot of Mario Kart recently. It wasn't necessarily by choice. You see, my son has recently become absolutely obsessed with this 2003 entry into the much loved franchise, so much so that he asks to play almost every day. He's played games with me before, but this was really the first one he played by himself. He's not going to set any records (he finishes a course in an average of about ten minutes, they're supposed to take, like, two.) he does do a pretty good job for his age. Honestly, I kind of messed up, I had at least three years I could have used the "unplugged controller" trick left, but now there's no way he'll ever go for that again. Still I'm happy he enjoys it and it's nice to have some common ground. Of course, he doesn't understand that there are other versions of Mario Kart out there. This one, for the GameCube, kind of ...

The late 80's/early 90's were a very, very interesting period in gaming history. I've briefly touched on this before, but the medium was very much evolving and found itself at a crossroads at this time. Better technology, better graphics and better storage led to more unique and ambitious games. The days of almost all games consisting of "shoot stuff, get points" were drawing to a close and developers were starting to try new and unique things with console games. A lot of this stuff, like deep storytelling and more adventure oriented gameplay, was more common on PCs, but for home consoles it was new ground. It's through this lens that we look at Fatal Labyrinth, released for the Genesis in late 1990 in Japan before making its way to the west in early 1991. It features elements of a lot of different genres, but would generally be classified as an RPG. But if it came out today, it would almost certainly be classified as a "roguelike." That term wasn...

Last week I gave my initial thoughts on the dark, brooding atmosphere of Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne. I feel like I struggled to adequately explain just how different this game is design wise from anything else I have ever played. While I'm not sure I did the atmosphere justice, I don't think I will have any such issues with the gameplay. Lets start with the combat. For as different as SMTN is aesthetically, the combat should feel right at home to any JRPG fan. You have a party of four, with each character outfitted with a set of magical or physical special moves. It's good, old fashioned turn based combat, with just enough twists to make it feel refreshing and unique. You get one action per turn for each character in your active party. However, you can increase the number of actions you can take in several ways. Land a critical hit or exploit an enemy weakness and you will get another action that turn. Don't have anything impactful to do with a particular character? Y...

Are video games art? It's a question that I think a lot of people that are really into gaming grapple with and have been grappling with for a long time now. Those of us that grew up in an era where video games were "just toys" or "only for kids" have certainly heard plenty of folks opine that they most certainly are not. But in recent years, as the industry becomes more popular and gaming becomes more mainstream, more and more people have been asked to, or forced to, view video games as a media format. I'm sure it happens with every new format, just as our parents were confused by the stupid video games, theirs were confused by the stupid television, and theirs by the stupid radio, and so on. But that isn't what we are here to talk about, it's a different topic for a different day. We are here to talk about my first foray into the Shin Megami Tensei, or Megaten, franchise. For years, I have avoided playing any of these things because their close atta...

It's time to talk about what may be the clone-iest of the Street Fighter Clones.  Released by Data East in 1993 and ported to the SNES the next year, Fighter's History is the first in a series of games from the early 90's. I can't say I've ever played the others, the second game was only ever released on the Neo Geo CD and the third game never left Japan. Honestly, it would probably be easier and cheaper to fly to Japan to pick up a copy of the third game than it would to find a working Neo Geo CD and a copy of the second. But the first game was relatively easy to acquire and became infamous for taking fighting games to a place they'd never been before...the courtroom. You see, I'm not the only one that who considers Fighter's History to be the most egregious Street Fighter ripoff. Capcom thought so too. They sued Data East for copyright infringement, claiming they had ripped everything from their characters to their combat straight from their more popul...

I've decided to do something a little bit different this week. Rather than focus on one single game, I'm going to rope a few relatively similar licensed Street Fighter clones into one post. This was a very popular route to take back then and it makes sense. Fighting games were popular and so were these franchises, so, easy money right? These games are all certainly SFII clones, but do they have any similarities beyond that? Let's take a look. Double Dragon 5: The Shadow Falls So, let's start out with another member of the "Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game" club.  DD5 is based on the Double Dragon animated series, which was based on the series of beat'em up games for the NES. If you're still following, that makes it a video game based on a TV show based on a video game. Weird. They could have very easily just slapped characters from the show into another beat'em up and called it a day, but at least they tried something different...right? Yeah, Tr...

What? Killer Instinct? A Street Fighter Clone? No Way! Yeah I was confused too, but we aren't talking about Rare's much-loved fighter Killer Instinct. This is Power Instinct, a fighting game that I had never heard of up until about a week ago. Released in 1993, it was developed by Atlus, of all companies. It may not be one of their signature RPGs, but it certainly wears their influence on its sleeve. It's difficult to tell how serious its trying to be, it doesn't shy away from its Japanese roots, it's far more popular in its native country, etc. But do all of those quirks that make Atlus RPGs so endearing do the same for a 2D fighter? And what does any of this have to do with being a Street Fighter Clone? First, I think we need to back up and define just what constitutes a Street Fighter clone, or at least what I am defining as a Street Fighter Clone. It's a phrase that's thrown around quite a bit, but not one I've ever seen defined. After spending the l...

I'm going to start this 10's entry off with something I generally try to avoid: a controversial hot take.  So let's get right to it.  Street Fighter II Turbo/Champion Edition is, objectively, the greatest video game of all time. It isn't my favorite (though it's obviously up there). It isn't the most groundbreaking or revolutionary. It didn't push the boundaries of what video games could accomplish as a media or art form. Final Fantasy VI, VII and Chrono Trigger may have been more ambitious.  Madden and FIFA may be more universal. Halo and The Last of Us may have pushed the boundaries of technology more. But in terms of just straight up video games, I don't think it's ever been equaled or surpassed. Just for full disclosure, I played SFII Turbo for this review, I am a Nintendo kid at heart after all.  Champion Edition was the SFII game that Genesis owners got, actually released before it's SNES counterpart. The two games have a few marginally dif...

So I'm going to mix it up this week. I'm not really a big tv/movie person, but when I heard there was going to be a documentary miniseries about the history of video games, I had to check it out.  At this point, there are thousands of different pieces of media that chronicle the history of gaming. Video games are here to stay, a multi-billion dollar industry that has mainstream appeal and coverage. I don't think High Score breaks any new ground.  It does a lot of things well and in many ways, it does a good job of not trying to do too much.  The history of gaming as we know it today isn't particularly long, but it's very complicated.  There was no way they were going to cover it all in six episodes, they probably wouldn't have been able to do it in 12. A lot of that history isn't pretty, so covering some of that stuff would require proper handling and I understand why they elected to just skip over some of it.  But overall, I think they did a good job. First...

 After focusing on one of my son's latest obsession last week, it's time to talk about one from my own childhood. Let's be honest, I wasn't the only one.  Back in the early 90's, it seemed like everyone between the ages of 4 and 10 was in full blown love with the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.  This was much watch stuff every time it was on television for 90's kids.  Every time these five warriors, who were actually just five ordinary teenagers in glorified space suits, took on the diabolical Rita Repulsa and her intergalactic monsters, we had to watch. Everything about it was just so cool, the explosions, the giant, colorful monsters, the robots that turned into even bigger robots, it was tailor made for me and and every other 90's kid. This show put many a karate instructor's kids through college. It really is amazing when you think about it.  Who would have thought a teen drama written around repurposed footage from a random Japanese TV show (Supe...