Media Videogame Thread

[CryoGyro]

Cryo's Mega Man: Dual Override Robot Master Design Contest Review

We're looking for designs of a Robot Master who has a right arm with immense suction powers!

Twenty finalists are in, and as a classic Mega Man superfan with a small audience, I have thoughts to share on all of them in a place more permanent than Discord. View the designs here.

Hide

A: Sanitize Man
He's not much to look at from a distance, but that humble orange and ivory color scheme calls to mind classic electronics like the Famicom and NES Zapper, fitting a more tired-looking and utilitarian guy. The supplemental sketches show a lot of thought into making him a workable boss fight, and little 'breaks' from the Robot Master template in the feet scrubbers and head light give him identity that fits modern Mega Man design.

B: Vortex Man
DemNikoArt is a masterful 3D artist I already knew from YouTube, and Vortex Man exemplifies that mastery. The main render exudes aura without forgetting that classic Mega Man needs to be comical or charming, thanks to the huge torso and thin limbs. The black and yellow is a fairy unique scheme that, alongside the tubes, calls to mind older Lego Technic and Blacktron. My only complaint is that making the feet smaller than the standard boot design makes little sense for such a big guy.

C: Battle Man
I'm a big fan of when Robot Masters combine concepts that don't necessarily mesh in the abstract. Burst Man combines bubbles and bombs, Clown Man combines electricity and grappling, and Nitro Man combines motorcycles and saws, all of them making for some of the more memorable cast members in their respective games. So I'm all for a hardened warrior type who inexplicably leverages a vacuum. However, I'm not seeing much of a vision beyond the 'suck em in and bop em' described in the text. Some more sketches conceptualizing the actual fight would have done wonders.

D: Spiral Woman
Mega Man isn't beating the misogyny allegations with these Woman contestants, though Spiral here is easily the least offensive. The color scheme and pattern motifs are very respectable; the skirt and visible hair, less so. The idea that a female Robot Master has to scream feminine is holding us back.

E: Osoji Man
Yellow and purple make Osoji leap off the webpage compared to his rivals, but the design doesn't quite follow through on grabbing your attention. He's big, and he's clean, but he's not much more than that.

F: Dredge Man
The upper arm tank and design flourishes are a bit excessive, but I love the core idea and colors here. We could use another shot at a wood-based design, and a more aquatic angle is a great excuse for it.

G: Flex Man
This art sheet is rather difficult to parse, and Flex is a bit too faithful to the contest template for my tastes, but I love the idea of a gentlemanly scrap thief, if I'm interpreting this right.

H: "Tube Man"
I'm glad to see a 'visor eyes' design get represented. However, too many details are concentrated on the upper body, and the inflation gimmick feels like retreading Block and Bounce from the last game.

I: Vacuum Man
It's easy to tune out after hearing that name, but I really like this one for feeling closest to pre-11 design conventions. The color scheme and roomba angle give identity without feeling too high-concept.

J: Cleaner Man
Meanwhile, this one absolutely nails 11's style. He could use a bolder concept and a color scheme that isn't literally Block Man's, but I'd sign off on putting him into a game the fastest.

K: Vac Woman
Vac should have gone the Design C route and fully leaned into the punk rock angle, leaving the embarrassing maid stuff behind and making the suction a point of intrigue. What's with the feet!? If you aren't doing something radical and the focal point of your design, you gotta have those boots! Are we so afraid of women with substance? Alongside the eye rolling lore on the right, this was clearly a waifu first, good Robot Master second.

L: Cleanser Man
I see the vision, and I respect it. However, I think Mega Man needs to keep flamboyance on a tight leash. I favor classic Mega Man for its chunkier, humbler robot designs. Stuff like this is more the realm of X and Zero series. Tundra Man has taken up that budget for at least another game.

M: Maestro Man
Easily the most creative take on the suction arm, and he gets huge points for that. He's just a bit hard to look at, unfortunately. The head has too much going on between the mustache, note flourish, stripe of keys, and neon eyeliner.

N: Sweeper Woman
Only the face feels particularly 'Mega Man', and even then it's just another Splash Woman. The rest is a mix of unsightly technogreeble and the most basic 'maid' interpretation imaginable. Another Woman who seems designed with less-than-pure intentions; don't think I don't see Mega Man's ass getting grabbed there!

O: Recycle Man
I like the colors, but you can't get away with mostly just making another Dust Man by making him Recycle's brother. This feels self indulgent in a way I'm surprised made it to the finalists. Recycling is such a broad concept, surely we can be bolder.

P: Vacuum Man
I only just realized there are two Vacuum Men. Oh well. I love the 'brainiac' angle and the CWU-01P looking device in his head, but there aren't any supplements showing WHY the suction should be going to his head over anywhere else, if that's indeed the intent. A design this simple needs to do more work to sell me.

Q: Cactus Man
I'd love to see a Cactus Man someday, but this is way too involved. It reminds me of modern Pokemon design, where Pokemon look busy or strange in still images in service of a very narrow, game context sensitive payoff. The imposing body and transformation mechanics would make him a standout fortress boss, but it's too much for a Robot Master.

R: Veldt Man
Now here's how you do a context sensitive design. The default body still has a standalone 'point' to it, as an elephant abstraction that may take a few moments to parse, but the capacity to expand solves the minor mystery of those cracks on his torso. It enhances, rather than compromises. Holy yap on the lore, though.

S: Juggle Man
Juggle Man is very creative and well considered for gameplay. So why don't I like him more? I think it's the fairly generic body combined with the disembodied head. The package ends up feeling incomplete, insubstantial, in a way most Robot Masters are not.

T: Valve Man
Did they know they were saving the best for last? Valve Man has it all: a resonant concept, thorough gameplay consideration, and the perfect amount of detail. My only nitpick is that he's cheating a bit on the 'suction' concept, focusing on expelling water.

With all the comments out of the way, here are my design power rankings:
Capcom, Hire This Man: Vortex, Valve
One Step from Greatness: Sanitize, Dredge, Flex, Vacuum (I), Cleaner, Vacuum (P), Veldt, Juggle
Needs Another Pass: Battle, Spiral, Osoji, "Tube," Cleanser, Maestro, Recycle, Cactus
Get Outta Here: Vac, Sweeper

 

[AnimeGeekTM]

Well, now the new tomodachi life's release date is revealed and let me tell you, it looks awesome! I have some friends on Twitter who, like me, are excited as heck for this game. It will be... absolute cinema and peak fiction at the same time.
(On another note btw, I found this funny ahh meme template). :)

 

[Ironmage]

View attachment 804613
Cryo's Mega Man: Dual Override Robot Master Design Contest Review

We're looking for designs of a Robot Master who has a right arm with immense suction powers!

Twenty finalists are in, and as a classic Mega Man superfan with a small audience, I have thoughts to share on all of them in a place more permanent than Discord. View the designs here.

Hide

A: Sanitize Man
He's not much to look at from a distance, but that humble orange and ivory color scheme calls to mind classic electronics like the Famicom and NES Zapper, fitting a more tired-looking and utilitarian guy. The supplemental sketches show a lot of thought into making him a workable boss fight, and little 'breaks' from the Robot Master template in the feet scrubbers and head light give him identity that fits modern Mega Man design.

B: Vortex Man
DemNikoArt is a masterful 3D artist I already knew from YouTube, and Vortex Man exemplifies that mastery. The main render exudes aura without forgetting that classic Mega Man needs to be comical or charming, thanks to the huge torso and thin limbs. The black and yellow is a fairy unique scheme that, alongside the tubes, calls to mind older Lego Technic and Blacktron. My only complaint is that making the feet smaller than the standard boot design makes little sense for such a big guy.

C: Battle Man
I'm a big fan of when Robot Masters combine concepts that don't necessarily mesh in the abstract. Burst Man combines bubbles and bombs, Clown Man combines electricity and grappling, and Nitro Man combines motorcycles and saws, all of them making for some of the more memorable cast members in their respective games. So I'm all for a hardened warrior type who inexplicably leverages a vacuum. However, I'm not seeing much of a vision beyond the 'suck em in and bop em' described in the text. Some more sketches conceptualizing the actual fight would have done wonders.

D: Spiral Woman
Mega Man isn't beating the misogyny allegations with these Woman contestants, though Spiral here is easily the least offensive. The color scheme and pattern motifs are very respectable; the skirt and visible hair, less so. The idea that a female Robot Master has to scream feminine is holding us back.

E: Osoji Man
Yellow and purple make Osoji leap off the webpage compared to his rivals, but the design doesn't quite follow through on grabbing your attention. He's big, and he's clean, but he's not much more than that.

F: Dredge Man
The upper arm tank and design flourishes are a bit excessive, but I love the core idea and colors here. We could use another shot at a wood-based design, and a more aquatic angle is a great excuse for it.

G: Flex Man
This art sheet is rather difficult to parse, and Flex is a bit too faithful to the contest template for my tastes, but I love the idea of a gentlemanly scrap thief, if I'm interpreting this right.

H: "Tube Man"
I'm glad to see a 'visor eyes' design get represented. However, too many details are concentrated on the upper body, and the inflation gimmick feels like retreading Block and Bounce from the last game.

I: Vacuum Man
It's easy to tune out after hearing that name, but I really like this one for feeling closest to pre-11 design conventions. The color scheme and roomba angle give identity without feeling too high-concept.

J: Cleaner Man
Meanwhile, this one absolutely nails 11's style. He could use a bolder concept and a color scheme that isn't literally Block Man's, but I'd sign off on putting him into a game the fastest.

K: Vac Woman
Vac should have gone the Design C route and fully leaned into the punk rock angle, leaving the embarrassing maid stuff behind and making the suction a point of intrigue. What's with the feet!? If you aren't doing something radical and the focal point of your design, you gotta have those boots! Are we so afraid of women with substance? Alongside the eye rolling lore on the right, this was clearly a waifu first, good Robot Master second.

L: Cleanser Man
I see the vision, and I respect it. However, I think Mega Man needs to keep flamboyance on a tight leash. I favor classic Mega Man for its chunkier, humbler robot designs. Stuff like this is more the realm of X and Zero series. Tundra Man has taken up that budget for at least another game.

M: Maestro Man
Easily the most creative take on the suction arm, and he gets huge points for that. He's just a bit hard to look at, unfortunately. The head has too much going on between the mustache, note flourish, stripe of keys, and neon eyeliner.

N: Sweeper Woman
Only the face feels particularly 'Mega Man', and even then it's just another Splash Woman. The rest is a mix of unsightly technogreeble and the most basic 'maid' interpretation imaginable. Another Woman who seems designed with less-than-pure intentions; don't think I don't see Mega Man's ass getting grabbed there!

O: Recycle Man
I like the colors, but you can't get away with mostly just making another Dust Man by making him Recycle's brother. This feels self indulgent in a way I'm surprised made it to the finalists. Recycling is such a broad concept, surely we can be bolder.

P: Vacuum Man
I only just realized there are two Vacuum Men. Oh well. I love the 'brainiac' angle and the CWU-01P looking device in his head, but there aren't any supplements showing WHY the suction should be going to his head over anywhere else, if that's indeed the intent. A design this simple needs to do more work to sell me.

Q: Cactus Man
I'd love to see a Cactus Man someday, but this is way too involved. It reminds me of modern Pokemon design, where Pokemon look busy or strange in still images in service of a very narrow, game context sensitive payoff. The imposing body and transformation mechanics would make him a standout fortress boss, but it's too much for a Robot Master.

R: Veldt Man
Now here's how you do a context sensitive design. The default body still has a standalone 'point' to it, as an elephant abstraction that may take a few moments to parse, but the capacity to expand solves the minor mystery of those cracks on his torso. It enhances, rather than compromises. Holy yap on the lore, though.

S: Juggle Man
Juggle Man is very creative and well considered for gameplay. So why don't I like him more? I think it's the fairly generic body combined with the disembodied head. The package ends up feeling incomplete, insubstantial, in a way most Robot Masters are not.

T: Valve Man
Did they know they were saving the best for last? Valve Man has it all: a resonant concept, thorough gameplay consideration, and the perfect amount of detail. My only nitpick is that he's cheating a bit on the 'suction' concept, focusing on expelling water.

With all the comments out of the way, here are my design power rankings:
Capcom, Hire This Man: Vortex, Valve
One Step from Greatness: Sanitize, Dredge, Flex, Vacuum (I), Cleaner, Vacuum (P), Veldt, Juggle
Needs Another Pass: Battle, Spiral, Osoji, "Tube," Cleanser, Maestro, Recycle, Cactus
Get Outta Here: Vac, Sweeper

My thoughts on the finalists:

Hide

A: Not really much to comment on, in either direction

B: I actually don't like how the art handles the airflow. It comes off as a bit messy with the current transparency, but I also don't think there's much room for a solid white on top of the existing colour set.

C: I never got interested in any of the elephant trunk designs. Probably just my usual biases.

D: I'm not sure how well the full concept comes together. I usually think of spirals in the context of suction/cleaning as rigid cyclone separators rather than brushes.

E: feels like it can't decide whether to go for a warrior or animal theme, ended up with a somewhat awkward mix. Particularly bad since I don't seem to like animal designs.

F: Not quite sure whether the design is supposed to be wood or pottery, but it works well for both.

G: The most obviously a costume over the template, but I do have to give it some credit for having one of the legs be wildly different to go with the asymmetric arms of the prompt

H: The interesting thing here is the valves, but they feel pushed aside in favour of the inflatable gimmick. Maybe he just needs to be left-handed so the big valve is facing forwards in the default position.

I: Design is pretty basic, seems pretty reliant on the companion being a prominent enemy in that stage.

J: Gasmask is nice, but it's obscured by the rest of the uniform. Not much else to talk about.

K: Probably should have stuck with one theme and committed to it. As-is, kind of reads as an existing design quickly refit for the prompt rather than something wholly designed around it.

L: Can't complain about the design being showy on its own, though. Seems like a decent continuity nod to have pink tubing, since Strike and Bounce both associate pink with rubber.

M: I think it missed the "fancy conductor" point on that mustache and kept going. Leave the cartoon villainy to Wily. Other than that, pretty good. I like the woodwind valves on the legs.

N: With how much I eye-rolled at the maid designs before this stage of the contest (including this one, to be honest), I'm surprised to be ranking this one relatively highly. I think the much heavier mechanical parts give the design something else to focus on besides the inherent horniness.

O: Continuity's a bit shaky here. Dude's a Cossack robot so he can be close to Dust Man, but then has Wily's emblem stamped on him when most Wily bots don't? Other than that, it's fine I guess.

P: While I appreciate switching to left-handed, the design does probably need more than that.

Q: It would definitely be funny to have, of all the later-game bosses, a prototype of Glacier Le Cactank running around. Not sure if Capcom would actually implement the multi-route stage concept, which a lot of the design hinges around.

R: Still not sold on the elephant trunk. At least has other aspects.

S: Particularly since it directly mentions Air Man, I wonder if a squatter design without a distinct head piece might have worked better. Probably still works better with a similar concept than any of the capsule machines I've seen.

T: hard to find anything to complain about.

My rankings:

Accept: T, L, F
Accept with Minor Revisions: B, H, M, S, N, G, Q
Accept with Major Revisions/ no comment: A, D, I, J, O, P, R
Reject: C, K, E

 

[ChaosNinjaGaming]

Earlier this week, my dad texted me and let me know that he found a whole bunch of old consoles that we had no clue where they had been.

These include: Sega Genesis, Sega Saturn, Dreamcast, NES, and SNES.

He's getting cords for some of the consoles. Hopefully they all still work (it has been years since I touched the NES and SNES, and I do not recall touching the Sega consoles)

 

[Karxrida]

Earlier this week, my dad texted me and let me know that he found a whole bunch of old consoles that we had no clue where they had been.

These include: Sega Genesis, Sega Saturn, Dreamcast, NES, and SNES.

He's getting cords for some of the consoles. Hopefully they all still work (it has been years since I touched the NES and SNES, and I do not recall touching the Sega consoles)

Did he also find any games or did you already have them? Regardless, lots of classics on each system to play.

 

[ChaosNinjaGaming]

Did he also find any games or did you already have them? Regardless, lots of classics on each system to play.

Well, we do have games somewhere, though we already knew where some of those were. For extra clarification, we live in the same house, I was just off at my college dorm for the weekdays.

The Dreamcast has Sonic Adventure 2, some wrestling games, and a demo disc, among other things. The Saturn has a good chunk of games, one being UMK3 (I can't remember everything we have). The Genesis tmk has no cartridges.

I have yet to manually review the NES and SNES stuff, but my dad did just tell me while we're riding home that apparently it's two NESes. Sweet.

 

[Yung Dramps]

If I could vote in the robot master contest and it was ranked-choice I'd go Sweeper Woman first, Vac Woman second and one of Battle or Valve Man third. I really do love Sweeper's sharp, battle armor-looking maid costume and the vacuum bag bun is peak, also the obvious "we need more female robot masters" angle. Vac Woman's similar, I just like the design less. Battle Man is the most out there interpretation of the prompt and hits my preferred aesthetic niche of Robot/Sci-Fi Armor Guy With A Cape. Valve Man just looks rad and a firefighter robot is a great way to tie back into the original idea of these robots being originally designed to help in day to day life. Vortex Man gets an honorable mention for putting in the effort to do a 3D render

Actually on second thought swap Battle Man and Vac Woman

 

[CryoGyro]

Cryo's Retro Games of the Month (Jan '26)

Final Fantasy Origins (PS1)
Week 1: [FF1] Defeat the dark elf Astos

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FF1 is one of few RPGs I jive with. Much like early Pokemon gens, it's mechanically fairly simple but with just enough interesting decision space to make the game your own. Forming a party that can be as lopsided as you want in a small-scope game makes it ripe for self-imposed challenges. Plot is minimal and easily ignored. The raw essence of turn-based RPG gameplay is good and does not need to be tied at the hip to delivering stories and aesthetics largely divorced from said gameplay. That's what other mediums are for, and consistently do better.

To illustrate the modest but elegant party building, let's go over my process knowing I just have to reach Astos, the boss right after the infamous early-game hurdle, Swamp Cave. For my first slot, a Warrior. It's frankly an overpowered class, but that makes it an anchor from which you can play around with your other three slots, taking the brunt of attacks and dealing consistently huge melee damage. There's still progression fun to be had in seeing it multi-hit as soon as level 5. For my second and third, two Red Mages. The Red Mage shines early-game, offering competent melee and tanking on top of all the most important white and black magic. They can't match the late-game peaks of any other class, but that matters even less than usual here. Finally, a Black Mage. My plan was to focus on obtaining tier 3 magic, which offers huge spread damage, for the real boss of this stretch, the 2-4 Piscodemons guarding the critical Swamp Cave chest. While Black and White Mages get more spell casts faster than Reds, it turned out by the time I could afford the magic for all three, they were equally capable of casting it, so this should have been another Red. Either way, we love casting spells.

Preparing for and overcoming the Swamp Cave is like a game experience in itself. Your experience centers around Elfland, which is full of shops with expensive spells and equipment to strive for; gold is even more of a progress gate than XP. You'll spend enough time grinding in the vicinity that you'll gain an intimate understanding with all of the superficially generic enemies. Ogres are the prize you're after, having enough HP to be satisfying to beat on and dropping hundreds of gold when you usually get dozens. Other enemies take risk and time assessment; Cobras are flimsy but inflict expensive-to-cure poison, and Wolves are evasive and attack in huge packs, so they're best run from before tier 3 magic, just to name two. You might instead try your luck at sea, where you may run into even more lucrative pirates and flex your Lighting spells against all the watery enemies, but risk getting paralyzed by eye monsters. Or, you can go further west, where poison is more common but you may find Ogre Chiefs and loot the dwarf cave for even more gold. On this Origins version, the grind isn't even much of a grind so much as thoughtful gameplay centered around a small area. I'm soft on "grinds" in general coming off of so many Pokemon solo runs and Runescape gameplay; there is mastery in executing long-term plans with some degree of uncertainty.

While this Origins version makes battles better paced and improves menuing, it takes some measures to feel 'more like a real RPG' that I don't care for. Creating mandatory cutscenes for a very cut and dry setup and sequence of story events only highlights their shallowness, and town facilities cancel out the pacing improvements elsewhere. Instead of cutting right to cozy little shop menus upon entering buildings, you have to take one performative step toward the counter and speak to the keeper. 'Real' RPGs have designed interiors, so we must force the players to exist in them, however little they matter or better sell an abstraction. Staying at an inn similarly forces you to watch your party get in and out of bed between a slow prompt to save your game, hurting what was previously a snappy but potentially expensive game action that supported your grind. FF1 thrives on its gameplay-first approach, not the simple fact that it was the first in a franchise that would come to define its genre very differently, putting superficial flourishes and production value first. I still consider the NES version the preferable first exposure to this game for its rawness.

Metroid Fusion (GBA)
Week 2: Regain the Speed Booster power

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As a Metroid game, the only thing I think Fusion does outright wrong is subjecting you to so many slow, unskippable monologues followed by chains of three utility rooms with slow transitions. Fusion's perception is a demonstration of how framing matters so much more than reality of experience to a lot of gamers.

Prime 4's structure has a lot of people saying they turned Metroid into Zelda. Here's the brutal truth: Metroid was always Zelda. Even Super; Zelda's early games similarly flirted with openness that millennials yearn for. All Metroid does is more consistently sell the feeling of freedom and exploration. They're both built on offering large spaces full of things you can do, but only one thing you have to do at a given time. Zelda developers have framed this as puzzle box design. While game critique talking heads love to fetishize the idea of games putting player freedom first, you almost inevitably lose punch. The game can't estimate your capabilities with nearly as much accuracy, so challenges and setpieces become flatter. Super Metroid is flat. It only ever outright requires a few items at a given time, and the level design is that much less special for it. Enemies and bosses are present almost out of obligation for spectacle than because they thoughtfully interact with the player's abilities.

I say all this because Fusion is known as the 'linear' one. It puts you in a small area, 'shows you where to go', and you go. This is the 'opposite' of Metroid. While this is a more reasonable perspective when Super Metroid is your only point of reference, examining its sister release of the time, Prime 1, as well as every release after, shows that restricting possibility space was the way forward for Metroid. Fusion did not forget the 'Metroid essence'; it condensed it. It made it a little friendlier, a little more sensible for a handheld experience.

The conceit of being shown 'where to go' gets subverted almost immediately; Sector 1 tells you there are five stabilizers to fix but not where they are. The path is pretty straightforward, but winding and full of side rooms with expansions to discover as well as introductory Metroid problem solving, mainly finding destructible or interactive blocks. Outside of briefings, your agency is fully intact. Sector 2 takes this a step further; the location of the Data Room is marked, but you must find the unmarked Security Room first to unlock it. Once you have, granting you Bombs, the way back is destroyed and you must use your Bombs to delve into a massive, unmapped basement and find your way to the next boss, which holds the Hi-Jump necessary to escape. This whole sequence feels more deliberate and tense than a majority of the Super Metroid experience. You can't tell a story through map design when the player knows they can wall jump up any surface they please. By making the Metroid essence episodic, you avoid stretching the experience too thin.

If you're interested in seeing Fusion with fresh eyes, I cannot recommend the Randovania randomizer enough. You'll notice that the game world is put together incredibly well when you get Screw Attack for shortcuts early, and moving efficiently is a nice balance of engaging and approachable. A run only takes one to two hours; it's the perfect balance of substance and convenience.

Dark Cloud (PS2)
Week 3: Get Xiao as an ally

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I was damn scared when I realized Dark Cloud's structure. Procedurally generated dungeon crawling to enable city building is a marriage of formats I broadly dislike. However, the game takes many appreciated steps to keep things approachable and stress-minimal without eliminating dungeon crawling's core, crucial tension, at least in this first stretch.

Most critically, progress is saved between floors. This keeps the scope of your resource management crystal clear: unlock the next floor. Resources are freely given aboveground but minimal to match, forcing the player to reckon with whether they can handle another floor so the next surface visit is more lucrative. Exploring each floor is more meaningful than the likes of Mystery Dungeon: you must find a key dropped by a random enemy, and to help with exploration you can find a map and a 'compass' stone that locates all objects and enemies, clearly inspired by Zelda. Combat doesn't feel amazing thanks to your sword's tiny reach, but enemies are respectably distinguishable: there are bats that evade with ease, skeletons that sidestep you, golems with super armor, and terrifyingly huge whales on legs that can attack in an area to match. 'Mildly terrifying' describes dungeon crawling well, with how enemies slowly stomp toward you out of the darkness or out of sight.

Town building is fueled by objects and characters you find in capsules in the dungeon. Thankfully, you don't have to SimCity it up; you just have to place a building and find the two-to-six things that belong to it for a reward. There is a specific capsule count on each floor, and you won't be completing a building with just one floor's capsules, encouraging you to push yourself much further than just finding the key and leaving for the surface every time.

I wouldn't have minded playing more; there were training wheels that had yet to come off, and I'm curious to see how the game escalates its difficulty.

Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing (DS)
Week 4: Earn 500,000 Lifetime Miles and achieve the amber license.

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Kart racing is one of those genres subject to 'monopolized incuriosity.' Mario Kart exists, and Mario Kart is amazing to good-enough for the vast majority of gamers, so every other kart racer is automatically framed as a 'Mario Kart knockoff,' and incredible mechanical space is consigned to living at the hip with cynical IP marketing. In the abstract, this is ridiculous, right? Imagine if Mario was the only platformer on the block for a decade, and games like Metroid, Kirby, and Sonic were lumped as 'Mariolikes' because they have a good number of similarities. Mechanical details matter so much, and kart racing is no different. If you need any evidence that games as an art form have decades yet to grow and be understood, especially divorced from profit incentives, just keep an eye out for genres whose discussion and offerings are stunted because someone got there first and proceeded to dominate the conversation.

So, as you are probably now assuming, S&SASR is superficially 'just a Mario Kart' but has enough going on under the hood to be well worth playing. It's a 2011 game compared to MKDS's 2005, and the technical advancements are loud and clear. Environments are rich, and it all runs perfectly. Item sets are a design space that I wish got more analysis, and this game does things interestingly different: your most reliable offense comes as missiles that are only a speed bump compared to a Red Shell but land unconditionally. First place is incentivized to keep laying hazard items, cycling through until they find the one shield item that can block missiles. In the process, they're contributing to track chaos in a way you wouldn't see from Mario Kart, where you're expected to hold on to your first substantial item for defensive purposes and just hope the unconditional Blue Shell doesn't show up. The last huge difference, and one that seems understated and emergent, is that drift boosts keep charging if you straighten out. This opens routing options way up, and is a mechanic I would have loved to further explore for time trialing if I had more time this week.

As for elements to beware: voice clips are constant and repetitive, a lot of tracks are longer than they need to be, and I hear harder difficulties get unfair, though that may be skill issue on others' part, if the ignorance around Mario Kart strategy is any indication. Still, check it out if you're in the mood for a different flavor of pick-up-and-play racing.

Grand Theft Auto III (PS2)
January: Beat the "Sayonara Salvatore" mission

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It's a bit retrospectively silly to say, but GTA is a driving game. As part of the 2010s YouTube kid generation, my impression from GTAV content farm channels was that it sold itself as a general realistic sim for whatever minigames tickled the limited fancy of gaming's lowest common denominator audiences. I didn't know exactly what to expect from III, but I was mildly impressed at its stylized loading screen art, brisk introduction, and first block of missions, which focused on efficient driving. Controls are simple, physics are appropriately weighty, and vehicle types come with the advantages and disadvantages you'd expect. Weaving through traffic, managing sharp corners, and recovering when things inevitably go off the rails are where GTAIII feels most timeless.

Aiding the driving experience are a few bold design choices that could easily be dismissed as 'dated,' but fostered a greater connection than I would otherwise build with such an aesthetically and thematically cynical game. Firstly, your only navigation tool is your minimap. No map screen. Navigation icons are limited to north, your safehouse, and mission starts. During a mission, the latter two disappear and your critical objective is shown. If you're looking for any shop or useful pickup, your only resource most of the time is your own knowledge. Those features can be the difference between a mission being easy or impossible, so you're encouraged to scout out the streets and form a plan like an actual criminal. Liberty City is painfully drab and samey, but the zones are small enough that you start to get a feel for the layout, even without a bird's eye view. Landmarks and cues are subtle, but there. Being restricted to a minimap keeps your focus on the action and roads in your immediate surroundings. There's no room for autopilot on these streets.

Ultimately, though, I'm feeling mixed. Missions quickly become a first-timer's slog, mainly thanks to what happens when you fail. You have to go back to the mission giver to try again; they're usually way on the opposite side of the city. If you die to boot, you're dumped in front of the hospital, where jacking a car can be a pain thanks to the wide highway, fast taxis, and heavy cop presence. It's not like failing is difficult enough to justify the punishment factor either, between how easily mobs of thugs can shred you on foot and how fail conditions are seldom telegraphed or clearly communicated. I've been both too reckless and too cautious in response to what characters tell me. The game quickly became a loop of me spending several minutes on a mission setup, failing spectacularly, sighing heavily, and looking up a playthrough so I wouldn't have to waste another couple minutes of runback over and over. GTA's simulation sandbox nature means there are plenty of interesting emergent solutions, but the overwhelming best one was often one I wouldn't have thought of based on how my mind and the game framed the situation. If you get jumped by a gang in a back alley, you shouldn't shoot your way out with the clumsy camera and lock-on system, you should preemptively squeeze a taxi in there and run them all over. If you're set up for a car chase across the city, you should actually buy a sniper rifle from the next district over and cap the guy as he leaves a building. I wouldn't mind this so much if failure weren't so punishing. When I'm investing a meaningful chunk of time into each attempt, I'm not going to send harebrained experiments.

However, when you engage with old games, you have to accept some amount of learning curve. My understanding is that GTAIII is full of secrets and overpowered options, and my own experience with series like Pokemon and Mega Man has told me that to really stick with you and be worth revisiting over and over again, there needs to be some number of 'gotchas'. They encourage you to come back better and take pride in your ability to get through things faster and faster. So, I'm not going to hold my problems with GTA against it much. I get the feeling the experience gets way better once you've unlocked the full game world, and the missions are just the 'early-game' that vets can tear through. The demand for games to be totally smooth the first time is borne from modern context, where games need to compete for attention more than ever and players are coming in with internet-informed, shackling notions of what 'good game design' looks like.

 

[GatoDelFuego]

Fusion's perception is a demonstration of how framing matters so much more than reality of experience to a lot of gamers.

I really don't know what people think they want out of Metroid as a franchise. The base opinion by a majority of superfans seems to just be that super is a perfect game (or certainly the best game), and in that light every other game is just not good enough because it isn't super metroid.

But what is it that people are looking for? Is it an 'open' map structure where you can wander to your heart's content? Super metroid is praised for this 'open' structure but the game has a defined, ABCD path that you are intended to follow. And in fact one that the vast majority of players ARE going to follow. This is no different than...EVERY metroid game, ever. There is always an 'intended path' to progress the game though unlocking progress checkers.

After dread had been around for a few months, I found my own rhythm with the item order (involving a couple 'sequence breaks') that I know naturally and I use for my replays of the game. I've honestly forgot how I'm supposed to get the items in the 'intended order' in that game. With Super Metroid I also use a couple sequence breaks to speed up my playthroughs, but I still have the 'real' game memorized.

I swear, people discussing Dread talk about 'sequence breaks' like they're a BAD thing. Once news about them being built into the game design came to light, with the developers talking about how they designed the map with these ideas from the start, it's like people didn't think it was interesting any more. Fusion has the same "problem". The sole "sequence break" in the game has an acknowledged cutscene. It's also pretty difficult to pull off. People really enjoy FEELING like they outsmarted the game in some way. But if you go back and analyze super metroid, are you REALLY that smart for figuring out you can wall jump before the game teaches you? Every game is filled with gameplay nudges to teach you how to play. That's how basically every video game works.

I saw some critique from Dunkey on fusion that 'people' say fusion is too linear, but he can't figure out the map. And then talks about how fusion is filled with rooms where you have to puzzle solve to find the "one block that lets you out" or whatever, deeming these "metroid moments". The comments are full of people saying they despise metroid for the inclusion of these things.

So what is it that you want? I'm sure if super metroid came out today you'd have the same bunches of complaining. In fact we DID see complaining by a game reviewer getting stuck progressing through early dread, who served as an excellent target for gamers to feel like they accomplished a task said reviewer could not, thus making them very smart. But you can't have 'feel smart' moments without intentionally designing linear checkpoints into your puzzle game!

It's like people can't decide whether they want metroid to be a puzzle game or a platforming game. Fusion somehow manages to make both of these camps angry simultaneously. I think Fusion is probably my least favorite of the 'good' metroid games (I hate samus returns and metroid 1) but it's still phenomenal to play. It still has the needed metroid elements (exploration, isolation, equipment expansion). Come to think of it a couple of those elements are why I think I never got too much into zelda. But anyway my first metroid game was hunters on the DS, which has some pretty big differences from the rest of the metroid games. And yet still manages to incorporate metroid game design, in my opinion...? So again what is it that people are looking for?

Here's the brutal truth: Metroid was always Zelda

Until BOTW changed the zelda formula, right?

 

[GatoDelFuego]

I think I'm only supposed to vote for 1 so cleanser man takes my pick. One eye covered makes it seem not as flamboyant as others might think. I think they just look cool. I really like the color balances and making a "cleaning robot" have eye-catching bright colors lines up way better than having it be a grey / yellow generic hoseman design.

I think a lot of the designs are pretty solid after giving a good in-depth read through. I think dredgeman is the best use of a suction arm that isn't strictly "suck up trash". I think having some level of creativity is important at this point of mega man boss design. We just don't need designs that offer only one idea on first glance. Valve man is a likely top contender and it looks great.

I really hate Maestro Man; it feels like they had a design idea waiting and tried as hard as possible to make "suction arm" work with what they had. What the hell is "maestro spike". I also think the creator of Vac Woman needs to be placed in an asylum.

 

[CryoGyro]

I swear, people discussing Dread talk about 'sequence breaks' like they're a BAD thing. Once news about them being built into the game design came to light, with the developers talking about how they designed the map with these ideas from the start, it's like people didn't think it was interesting any more.

A lot of modern semicasual game critique comes down to this: players want to dominate a game. They care (or at least think they do) about what they can do to a game, and not what the game can do to them. Climbing up nearly any wall in the game with a very forgiving set of inputs trivializes things in a way that feels organic to the player, unlike 'we put a launcher here because we know you can get Bombs before Kraid, wink wink'. The game blatantly beat you to the punch on that one. Nominal resistance, maximum payoff. That's the standard of current mainstream game design.

It still has the needed metroid elements (exploration, isolation, equipment expansion).

I just wanna remark on 'isolation' because that's another talking point Prime 4 brought to the forefront that I think was always an ideal, not a reality. Metroid feeling lonely is the exception, not the rule. Even when you don't have a CO or an encyclopedia at your fingertips, you have lively worlds filled with creatures you build a relationship with over the game. They're your neighbors, and you learn to live with them or ignore them. The tension between Samus's preference for independence and the necessity of cooperation is even a core theme in multiple games. Lifelines are plenty. True danger is rare. Metroid is immersive, but a connection to the greater world is rarely far.