Blogging the experience of gameplayhttps://www.gamelog.cl/gamers/GamerPage.php?idgamer=179https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1402Part 2: After more playing I discovered the different VS modes. One can play for lives or for a time limit, both options with an optional team mode. With 4 players this game is really fun, capable of having 2v2 battles. There are a lot of maps which emphasize jumping a little too much. One map has rising lava periodically, in which only the top level is capable of staying afloat. Anyone caught in the lava will take a lot of damage, killing them if they already have a high probability of not being able to get back to the platform. Weapons are a major part of this game as well. There are a multitude of weapons that drop, from normal(ish) weapons such as fans, light sabers, and laser pistols to uncommon weapons like Pokemon balls and a hammer that makes one invincible (from Donkey Kong). I think I like the Yoshi character the most- he has a pacifying attack, which makes him gobble a character up and put him in a shell, useful for team games, a good aoe-attack, where he jumps up then slams down, and a long range attack where he throws eggshells at enemies. Any character played well is good, but the characters that seem the most troublesome are Pikachu and Link. Link has a really large aoe-attack, swirling his sword around and Pikachu launches a lighting bolt straight up in the air zapping all enemies close to it. Most other characters I can consistently beat with Yoshi but Link and Pikachu seem to be able to beat me relatively easily. The level design is fairly good but I wish there were more flat, long maps like the Star-Fox level and the Link level. This game is really fun but is very basic. Only one character can be unlocked, the graphics are typical of an N64 system but nowdays seems lacking, and the camera isn't the best. I think the game was dramatically improved in the gamecube version, with nicer graphics, a better feeling gameplay and easier to use controls. The gamecube version also has more unlockable characters and maps as well as a much larger variety of characters and maps. Overall this game gets a 5-star rating from me because it is really really fun in multiplayer and has a very innovative gameplay. Fri, 23 Feb 2007 08:22:49 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1402&iddiary=2965https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1402Super Smash Brothers is an interesting sort of game. It is not like any other game and has a very unique sort of gameplay. The maps are set up so it is a multitiered 2-d game with 3d graphics, enabling the players to jump between platforms and hit enemies. The map never changes inside the level, but the camera zooms in and out to fit all the players on the screen. I first tried playing the single player mode as Link. Some maps pit you against one or several enemies whereas others are bonus stages and involve jumping to platforms to tag them or hitting targets while jumping inside a maze-like structure. Jumping is a very important part of this game; everything revolves around it. To kill enemies you must make them fall off the platform. As enemies (or you) take damage they have an increased probability of not being able to get back onto the platform. Once hit off, you get two jumps to get back on. One jump is the 'c' up arrow, the other is moving the direction stick up and pressing B, a jumping attack. If you are unable to reach the platform with these two jumps, you lose a life. Sometimes you have such a high probability of not getting back on that anything that hits you hard will cause you to fly far off the screen without you being able to do anything about it. There are several types of characters in the game, making multiplayer battles entertaining. All the characters are from different nintendo games such as Donkey Kong, Mario, Kirby's Adventures and Zelda. The more tank-like character is Donkey Kong, a hard hitting but slow and not very agile character. He has two attacks that cause AOE (area of effect) damage, making him a good character if one likes to sit and wait for enemies to come to him. Samus from Metroid is a long range type, with a shooting attack that can be powered up. Kirby is a long-range sniper type with a dropping block attack, a character usually played by flying far up and dropping down upon unsuspecting enemies.Fri, 23 Feb 2007 08:09:40 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1402&iddiary=2964https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205There are several different types of tower defenses, from those you play by yourself, building towers along cliffs, to those you have to maze so units don't get by and play on a team. Green TD is an example of a team based game- however many people are playing determines how many spawns of creep there are that the players must kill each wave. In games like Element TD, however, a player is only responsible for him/herself, and any screw-ups the player undergoes affects only him/herself.Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:23:05 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205&iddiary=2721https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205Revisiting Warcraft 3: DOTA is a really fun, time consuming game, but unless you're already pretty good at playing people can be really unkind towards you. Since one player can really drag the team down (especially if the team has fewer than the full 5) individual player responsibility is really high. The games usually last an hour, and a banlist is in place to kick people who have left games from games that start up, making sure that nobody leaves a DOTA game unless they wish to risk getting added to a banlist. I started playing games that weren't so time consuming as DOTA like tower defenses. These are also UMS games that take advantage of the rpg capabilities of warcraft 3. The player must build and upgrade towers with money and kill creep walking by the towers to get more money.Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:20:46 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205&iddiary=2719https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205So I played more warcraft today. Warcraft is a really fun RTS that incorporates RPG elements. When building up an economy and an army inside your base, you must also train heroes that can level up and give bonuses to units around them. At level 6, heroes get a really big skill as well that dramatically enhances base destruction capabilities. A Night Elf hero, the Priestess of the Moon, gets 'starfall', which is a continuous cast to rain down death upon all buildings and units in a certain area around the hero. A human hero, the Archmage, gets the ability to teleport 24 units at once to anywhere on the map, perfect for a surprise back-door attack. Blizzard has been known to make really good map editors for its games, and this is no exception. When looking for custom games, nearly all one can find are UMS (user map scenario) games. One of the most popular games is DOTA, defense of the ancients, in which a player controls a single hero and is part of a team that tries to destroy the other team's base while defending their own. This game works perfectly within the framework of warcraft 3 because of the included RPG elements in the game.Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:16:29 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1205&iddiary=2717https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=923Gradius is still very frustrating. The reward structure is set up to give you weapons, but I find it too hard to continually shoot and dodge everything at the same time to be worried about what powerup I want and when I need to press b in order for me to select it. The level I'm on is nearly impossible- bubbles fly everywhere, and if they're in front of you you can shoot them down. If they're in back of you however, you are forced to dodge all of them, which can be extremely difficult. There are no cutscenes or bonus 'level complete' rewards, shields, extra lives... just weapons. There is no real reason for me to continue playing this game, it just gets me frustrated. If the game had a difficulty selection it would be nice. (This entry has been edited1 time. It was last edited on Sun, 28 Jan 2007 21:29:25.)Sun, 28 Jan 2007 21:27:44 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=923&iddiary=2043https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=923 Gradius is a really hard and frustrating side scroller space shooter. The game feels decent, without any 'ick', but doesn't feel solid- it just doesn't seem quite as polished as other games of its era like mario or feel as nice as later shmups. Compared to later shmups, it is really primitive and the weapons are lackluster. However, the gameplay is still incredibly hard. I'm playing on an emulator, so I am able to save the gamestate. I tried playing without saving states but I couldn't even make it past the first half of the first level. After saving the gamestate frequently, I was able to make it to level 4 in about an hour. Since it is a shmup, there is no real character development besides weapon upgrades. The story is non-existent and there is no narrative. Since it is the most basic of shmups, it is not terribly innovative- the games that follow build on it and add extra features, but the original Gradius is quite basic. The level design is decent, each level having different strategies needed to win. The first 'boss' battle is a battle to survive while two mountains are spewing rocks everywhere onto the screen. I found the easiest way to win was to hide in the corner and keep shooting, eliminating rocks that would kill me before they reached me. The second boss battle requires you to keep flying everywhere around the screen, however, because the big teal rocks that spawn all around the map start tracking you wherever you fly. (This entry has been edited2 times. It was last edited on Sat, 27 Jan 2007 22:29:01.)Sat, 27 Jan 2007 22:25:01 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=923&iddiary=2034https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=716Second session: game is getting sort of boring. While it is a fun game to play for 15-20 minutes, it loses its captivity after a while. Perhaps it is because there is no real reward system. Once every couple levels you unlock an extra room, such as a bonus level where you have to play a little grabber game- like they have at the front of Denny's. You have to control the grabber arm to pick up plush kirby's for 1ups. Other unlock rooms give you special monsters so you can absorb their powers and rooms where you kill a boss and are able to absorb his power and get a tomato to restore all your health. Health is a more complex issue than in mario too- Since Kirby has 6 bars of health, sometimes you have to sacrifice some health in order to drop a weapon so you can pick up a different one to overcome a certain puzzle, letting you pick up a 1up or larger health potion later. Weapon choice is important for some bosses or puzzles but not essential. The level design is good for this game as well, enabling you to choose whether to fly over some enemies or hop from cloud to cloud wiping out enemies. Overall, there is a larger variety of things one can do compared to a platformer like mario which enhances gameplay. I think this is a good game but fails to keep me interested for long periods of time. It is fun to play in small amounts, but long sessions get boring.Thu, 18 Jan 2007 22:24:19 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=716&iddiary=1649https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=716So the game starts out with a little splash screen of how to draw kirby. I thought this was pretty interesting. The screen after the save game slot is reminiscent of the mario 64's door selection (obviously this game came first but this is the first time I've played this game). Once you enter the door, you're faced with a mario-esque platformer. The first enemy I saw i tried to jump on like mario....there went one of my health bars. Kirby cannot make actual contact with enemies. I think that this is actually a better system than mario- sometimes when jumping around you jump a pixel too far to either side and die. In Kirby's adventure, however, you have to destroy enemies from afar. Kirby's basic attack is to suck up enemies and shoot them out at other enemies, eliminating two birds with one stone. Kirby can also fly. Ingenious! Simply pressing up will give Kirby a big breath of air, filling himself up like a balloon, enabling him to float above everything. After trying to save my game by pressing start, a tip came up instead of a save menu; Kirby can absorb the attacks of enemies if you press down after you suck them up. I started trying to absorb some enemies' skills then. Often they wouldn't have any special powers but occasionally I would get a sword to swipe around me, a whip to eliminate enemies in a circle around me, or 'fire', enabling me either to spit fire or turn my foot into a fiery mass and shoot fire out in a line a short distance. The fire has the most range out of any attack but is generally useless as I don't usually have problems killing things directly in front of me. The whip is the most useful as it has the longest aoe (area of effect) attack. The sword is sort of a combination of the above, as it can swipe in a small circle if you jump, but can only shoot forward if you stay stationary.Thu, 18 Jan 2007 17:28:17 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=716&iddiary=1607https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=394Started playing some more Soul Caliber III, the game is still fun but not as fun as it was before. I can beat most of the missions pretty easily now..the only challenge is when I play as a really weak/slow character. It's pretty disheartening when I'm playing one of my friends as a weak character when they have a slightly slower but much stronger hitting character and I hit them about 20 times and get them to about 50% health, they hit me twice in a row and I'm at the same health as they are. It's pretty fun to ring people out though, if you get a character that has a throw that tosses forward, you can either jump and slide tackle them off or grab them and toss them forward. If they block you can't slide tackle them off so you just have to time it correctly. I've also gotten really really tired with the final boss Abyss- he's either super easy to beat its like one of the first characters in the story or he's almost impossible to beat unless you ring out him. Usually me and two of my friends take turns grinding him down. It's just so infuriating when we're able to get him down to 5% health and he starts chaining stuns/grabs so we can't do anything. The game isn't very rewarding now, it's more either frustrating or neutral. Fri, 12 Jan 2007 02:45:16 CSThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=394&iddiary=1316