Dragon Quest IV: The Guided Ones (Feb 11, 1990)
Platform played: NES emulator (no romhacks this time)
Date beaten: Feb 2, 2024
I did something a little different here and attempted to follow the speedrun route: https://cowness.net/DW4Guide/ Which is, in all honesty, probably not the best way to experience the game lol. It was fun though! Got to exploit some weird glitches like making Repel overpowered and purposefully keeping some party members dead to shield the ones in the back. I didn't do it all in one sitting and I'm sure my overall time was fairly bad for a speedrun, but a normal guide would tell you to go out of your way to collect every single treasure, even those that are basically useless, so I felt this made my playthrough a little more efficient (especially in the Taloon the Merchant chapter). I don't think I skipped over too much content either, since there still isn't too much in the way of "sidequests" to worry about in these NES RPGs (other than the casino, which I don't care much for anyway).
As for the game itself... It is one I tried to play a while ago, but I wasn't as serious then about trying to beat a lot of games the way I am now, so I ended up giving up. I thought I got stuck somewhere in Taloon's chapter, but upon playing it this time, I realized the chapter with the sisters felt familiar, so I think I did get that far, but I didn't get all the way to the final chapter where you assemble all the heroes. This game has a unique structure compared to the previous three entries in the series. In the story, there's a prophecy about a hero who will defeat the villain, Necrosaro, but you don't play as the hero right away. Instead, you have four chapters following different sets of characters. In the fifth and final chapter, you play as the hero, and you get access to all the different characters which you can swap in and out of your party at will. This gives you a level of customizability to how you play the game, although it lacks a job system like DQ3, so each individual character isn't as customizable.
The specifics of the story are a bit bizarre. The legendary chosen hero turns out to be one of the Zenithians, so he's half human and half dragon? I think? And you are trying to stop the villain from utilizing the forbidden "Secret of Evolution" to do... something bad? I'm not sure if this is a result of an awkward translation or what. It's probably not supposed to be the same thing as the Darwinian theory of evolution, but it does make the game off a bit like some sort of weird creationist fable attacking a strawman of evolution. Seems like the big bad is supposed to be sympathetic though, since he wants to use the Secret of Evolution to get revenge on humanity and help out non-humans; and he can become your ally in the remakes apparently.
Also, this game is the first appearance of Small Medals in the series.
Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei II (Apr 6, 1990)
Platform played: SNES emulator (Kyuuyaku Megami Tensei) (on DS)
Date beaten: July 6, 2024
I originally attempted to play this one without consulting a guide at all, and up until getting stuck at a certain point, I quite enjoyed it. The game is very open-ended with only a few broken bridges that block your progress across the world map. The game doesn't hold your hand excessively, but there are still enough hints to figure out where to go without a guide if you just talk to all the NPCs and pay attention to what they say. This made it pretty satisfying to figure out what to do and where to go. The first half of the game is all about collecting the seven Pillars (one for each of the seven classical planets). After getting stuck, I ended up taking a break for a while, then coming back and restarting the game, this time using a guide, but also taking more detailed notes on my experience with the game.
You can clearly see in this game a lot of the things that would end up becoming staples in the Shin Megami Tensei series. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic Tokyo (unilke the first game which took place entirely inside the dungeon), and the rest of the series would go on to have a similar aesthetic - SMT3:Nocturne looks a lot like this game, just in 3 dimensions. There are multiple choices and different endings. Triple fusion is introduced (at least I don't think MT1 had triple fusion?) although fusion is still not as deep and complex here as it will be in later games (there's no skill inheritance for example). Unfortunately, you can only fuse "Good"-aligned demons together, which limits your options. You've also got the terminals that let you save and teleport between them, an essential feature for getting around the larger world map of MT2, and again, sticks around in all the later games in the series.
The game starts off with you in a shelter, playing a game called Devil Buster. Devil Buster is a throwback to the original MegaTen game, in which you explore Daedelus Tower and defeat the Minotaur. But it's in a third-person top-down perspective instead of the first-person perspective of the original game. The Minotaur gives you the Orb of Silence which you use on a statue to win the game of Devil Buster. This is basically a little tutorial where you talk to people and get info about how the demon summoning system works, you recruit demons in the tower, and so on. After you beat it, Pazuzu appears and gives you the Demon Summoning Program in the real world. Any demon allies you recruited in Devil Buster get transferred over to you in real life too. Pazuzu tells you and your friend that you are the messiahs chosen to save the world from the coming demon invasion. In addition to giving you the Demon Summoning Program, he gives your friend the spells Mappara and Dia, saying he has an aptitude for magic.
You can't progress in the story until after you beat Devil Buster, but you can temporarily quit out of DB and explore the shelter a little bit if you want. One NPC tells you "This is the real world, don't treat it like a video game." After the demons start invading he says, "Demons have invaded the shelter? Well, you still shouldn't treat it like a game."
After clearing the Devil Buster part, you then have to defeat Nebiros in the shelter. You can leave the shelter to recruit more demons in the surrounding area and reach the first Save Terminal, but there is a broken bridge preventing you from proceeding further. Defeating Nebiros will reward you with the Fire Seal, which you give to the sea creature Mora and it will take you across the broken bridge. The next destination is Tokyo Tower, where you are told there is a "witch," as well as the demon Orthrus. On the way there you defeat the Jabberwocky and get Solomon's Ring as proof that you are the "Messiahs." In Tokyo Tower, you recruit Orthrus and then find out that the "witch" is your female friend from Devil Buster. Like the main hero, she inherits her stats and equipment from DB. She convinces the hero that Pazuzu shouldn't be trusted, but the male friend disagrees, gets angry and leaves with half the Macca and the Solomon Ring. This scene can go differently depending on your choices, but according to the guide, you will eventually have to give up the male friend in favor of the heroine regardless.
In Shibuya, you get the Earth Seal from an old man after the heroine rubs his back, and after defeating Vile Balaam, you get the Moon Pillar. Both items are necessary to proceed in the game. Everyone at Shibuya is going on about how great "Lord Balaam" is, including a square room full of nine identical NPCs, who all say the same thing (something along the lines of "Are you here to see Lord Balaam? He's wonderful!"). You are also charged 300 macca for going to see him. Apparently they were all brainwashed or something, because after defeating him, they all come to their senses and wonder how they could have been tricked. You also get a hint in Shibuya about walking around the Hachiko statue counterclockwise. If you do so, you are teleported to an island in some kind of alternate reality (I think it may be Hell, where the second part of the game takes place) and you find a sword, but you will need to come back for it later when your stats are higher.
In the tunnels leading to the Shinjuku area, I recruited Jirae Atlas by curing his petrification. Then got to Kourakuen where the Demon Arena is, as well as more gambling. I got a bunch more money then entered Ikebukuro where the Mercury Pillar is. To get it, you have to stick your hand in a stone face that bites your arm off, but you can get a new Cybernetic Arm made by the Cyber Labs in Ginza for 5000 macca. But you have to hurry back there, since you will gradually lose HP with every step after your arm is bit off. Not only that, but losing an arm renders the hero unable to use the Comp, including the map. I had the heroine cast Mappara (which shows the minimap), used an Emergency Exit to leave the dungeon, used an Exorcism Herb to repel low-level demons, and used the terminal to teleport to Ginza. So I was able to get it all done pretty quickly. Also the new arm increases the capacity of your Comp so you can carry more demons (somehow). I also got the Earth Seal from a guy in Kourakuen who gives it to you if you beat up his demon, Ghost Vetala.
I forgot until checking the guide, after all that, you still don't HAVE the Mercury Pillar. You have to go back up to Ikebukuro 5F and take it again, this time with the cyber arm. Also at Ikebukuro, I defeated Night Apollyon which gives you the Inverted Cross, which is then used to enter the Witches' Sabbath at Ueno on the Full Moon. Defeating the leader Leonard gives you the Jupiter Pillar. Finally I returned to Ikebukuro one more time to get the Wind Seal from the nurse on 5F. Then I went to the Gate of Mammon. If you agree to bring back Pazuzu's head, Mammon gives you the Bael's Claw, which can be used to break through the barrier blocking off Shinjuku and enter the Shinjuku dungeon. Next stop: Killing Pazuzu!
After killing Pazuzu, I got to Nakano and got the ID code to enter the Intelligent Building in Shibuya. At the top floor is a computer where you can play Devil Buster again. Inside Devil Busters, you can recruit Cerberus (he will automatically join as long as you have a free space in your party, and it isn't the Full Moon), and solve a logic puzzle to get the Devil Analyzer. I'm sure I complained about this in other old-school RPGs before, but you really don't need to have tons of random encounters that stop you nearly every step inside of a dungeon while you're also trying to solve a logic puzzle; it's really annoying. I also took Cerberus to the arena in Kourakuen and won 5 rounds to get the Sun Pillar. After all that it's finally time to bring Pazuzu's Head to Mammon and pass through the Gate of Mammon to the next area (but not without defeating Mammon in battle). Past the Gate of Mammon, I crossed the desert to reach a temple. The priest asked me to pass his challenge, which involved simply teleporting me to a small one-floor dungeon. After beating the boss, Kaiju Vritra, I earned the Venus Pillar, then continued on south past the poison swamp to reach the next Save Terminal.
Next I tried to cross the ocean and got swallowed by the sea monster, Zaratan. The Saturn Pillar is found in his belly. Once you find the exit and pay the old man half your macca, you reappear on the overworld next to Bael's Castle. I reached the 4th floor of Bael's Castle where I encountered my friend who had sided with Pazuzu. I beat up his demons and then Bael himself. With his dying breath, the friend gave me the Orb of Sorrow and told me to go to Ground Zero to enter the demons' world. That puts me very near where I quit my previous playthrough, in only a few days.
Finally on July 6, I beat the game, and was able to see both endings by following the guide. I'm really glad I followed the guide on restarting to cut down on the amount of tedious backtracking. While this game had some frustrating momenets and I had to shelve it a few times along the way, I ultimately really enjoyed it. As said above, this is the start of many trends in the series, including the whole "you fight God at the end" thing, and multiple endings (with sometimes obscure requirements (although it doesn't really have the fully-fledged alignment system of the later games)). The second part of this game takes place in Hell (though once you get there, you can teleport back to Tokyo at any point if you need to), where you will meet, fight and recruit many powerful demons such as Baal, Belphegor, and Lucifer himself. You need Undine and Gnome to progress, and you can also recruit a powerful demon called Death Knight if you have Sylph (I didn't bother to do this, which is maybe the only optional thing I skipped, aside from fully mapping a few of the late-game dungeons). Hell is divided into different areas such as "Forest of Confusion" or "Mountains of Dread." Each one has an associated Orb (Orb of Confusion, Orb of Fear, etc). When you collect all five they fuse into an Orb of Hope which will allow you to enter Lucifer's Temple and recruit him (if you have the right demons in your party and have made the right choices). Lucifer explains that the One True God, YHVH, split him in two, which I think is referring to Satan being his other half. You then have to return to Tokyo and find Suzuki, the CEO of the Suzuki Company, who turns out to be Satan in disguise. After beating him you can access a corridor where YHVH is. As long as you meet all the requirements for the Good Ending you can choose at the last second to get the Good or Bad ending. YHVH asks Lucifer to fuse back with him and if you choose "Obey God" then you get the Bad Ending. If you instead choose to "Fight God," beating him will get you the Good Ending where all the demons disappear from the world and the humans return to the surface.
I really enjoyed the experience and would recommend it to people who like old-school dungeon-crawling RPGs like Wizardry. It's kind of sad how much discussion online about the first two Megami Tensei games is solely negative. But the lack of some modern conveniences like the Compendium does hurt the experience a bit IMO. And of course, I have to consider that I abused save states a lot, and a purist playing it the "legit" may find its mechanics much more frustrating. And compared to the later entries in the franchise, the combat really is nothing to write home about. I defeated God with mostly physical attacks which feels a bit strange (though it was rewarding to level up my Intelligence enough to be able to equip Lucifer's Armor and Lucifer's Sword for the final boss fight). So it is a bit rough around the edges. I'd give it a solid 9/10.
Final Fantasy III (Apr 27, 1990)
Platform played: PC (Pixel Remaster)
Date beaten: 11/1/25
So Final Fantasy I was kind of an open-ended game, an attempt to convert AD&D to a console RPG, and then FFII kind of pivoted to trying to tell a more linear story with pre-defined characters. FFIII then sort of goes back to the roots an as such, feels like an improved FFI in many ways. The plot is roughly as simple as the first game, with the four Warriors of Light visiting the four elemental crystals. The NPCs are a little bit more fleshed out but the plot and characters still aren't as complex as the later games in the series. The original jobs from FFI return, but several new jobs are added, and you no longer have to pick a single job at the start and stick with it the whole game - instead, each character can switch jobs as many times as they want, and each time you visit a crystal and beat the boss there, you unlock a new set of jobs. Also, each character has a job level in addition to their character level, which determines how much damage they do as that job. It's "short for an RPG," so around 20 hours (especially since the QoL features of the Pixel Remaster, such as the autosave and the minimap, cut down somewhat on the amount of time you might otherwise have wasted replaying sections after getting a game over, getting lost, etc). The trend of JRPGs having a "fake-out" ending and then going "Surprise there's a whole other world/half of the game left" wasn't fully established yet when this came out I think, but it still has a bit of a twist in the late game - after beating the apparent final boss, you discover there's actually one more dungeon left, the World of Darkness, which has its own four DARK elemental crystals. After beating the boss associated with each crystal, you won't unlock any new jobs this time, but a "Warrior of Dark" appears to join you in the final battle - apparently the World of Darkness has their own chosen heroes. As was mentioned a few times by NPCs throughout the game, the issue isn't that "dark" is evil, but rather that the world needs a balance of light and dark, and if there is too much of one or the other, it could overwhelm everything and result in "nothingness." So the Warriors of Dark and a few other NPCs who you befriended throughout the game help you defeat the TRUE final boss, the Cloud of Darkness. Overall I enjoyed the game quite a lot, it's just a very charming and classic Final Fantasy romp with the Pixel Remaster's QoL improvements making it much more approachable. And of course, the original was never released in the US anyway (only the DS remake, which is significantly different), so the Pixel Remaster is the only way to play it officially in English.
Also, another thing that's cool about this game is there are parts when you have to use Mini to make your party small to go through little holes in the wall or find a secret village, or turn into toads to enter an underwater area. Basically forcing you to use the job-switching gimmick and it's a cool idea to be able to use those abilities in the overworld like this, although there's not that many places where it happens. In the original, switching jobs required "capacity points," but the Pixel Remaster does away with this and lets you switch jobs whenever you want. (This basically makes the Magic Keys useless - they open locked doors, but the thief can open any locked door, and nothing prevents you from switching one of your non-casters to a thief then immediately switching back) The ability to switch to any job is still slghtly balanced by the fact that if you switch to a mage-type job, you need to rest first to restore your spell slots before you can use any magic. (Or use an elixir, but there's a limited number of them in the game)
Madou Monogatari 1-2-3 (June 15, 1990)
aka: Sorcery Saga; Madou Monogatari I - Mittsu no Madoukyuu
Platform played: Sega Genesis Emulator (Sorcery Saga I - 1996 remake)
Date beaten: 11/8/25 (Sorcery Saga I)
Okay, the release history of this one confused me a bit. Unlike what you might expect, the "1-2-3" isn't a compilation rerelease. In fact, the original game was the three stories, and THEN each of the three episodes was remade separately later. And it really is a remake, not just a remaster, the maps and everything are different too.
As to what this game actually is - this is where the characters from Puyo Puyo originally come from. It's a first-person dungeon crawler, much like Wizardry, but with a cute, anime-esque art style and humorous tone. It also featured a lot of voice work which was unusual at the time. Another unique feature is the lack of numerical stats - instead, you must estimate how much health and magic you have by Arle's character portraits and battle messages.
The plot involves the young Arle taking an exam to graduate from magic kindergarten. As such, her main attacks are casting spells. In the original version, she doesn't seem to have any other way to attack (although her 2 default spells don't cost any magic), but in the Genesis version, instead of selecting spells from a menu, you have a sort of fighting-game style battle system where you input different combos to cast spells, and can also do a regular attack by pressing the right button.
Sorcery Saga II - Arle, Age 16
Platform played: Game Gear emulator (1994 remake)
Date beaten: 11/19/25
In terms of game mechanics, it plays very similarly to the first game, which isn't surprising since all three scenarios were one game originally. The Game Gear version is all menu-based combat like the PC original, not the combo input system that the Master System version had. Unlike the first game which was an exam Arle was taking, the plot this time is a real adventure in which Arle is searching a dungeon for a jewel called the Rubelcrack. The jewel turns out to be embedded in the forehead of Carbuncle, so Arle opts not to take it and instead befriends the creature. Also, Schezo pursues her the whole time as a recurring boss. The final boss of the game is Satan, who like Schezo, is romantically interested in Arle, but Arle isn't interested in either of them. You are given a choice of which man to pick, but if you refuse both, you get a bad ending as they team up to fight you, and if you pick either of them, you end up fighting Satan either way any way. Getting to Satan requires a full exploration of the dungeon, utilizing your map-making skills, the Warp spell, and solving puzzles.
Sorcery Saga III - The Ulimate Queen
Date beaten: 11/22/25
Platform played: Game Gear emulator
Pretty much more of the same, but with some tricky dungeons and teleport mazes and such. Also you are constantly getting stopped by messages because Carbuncle needs to eat veggies periodically and you are frequently getting messages warning you that an enemy is nearby, so it felt a bit slower than the previous games. But I still beat it in like two days.
Mega Man 3 | Rockman 3: Dr. Wily no Saigo?!
The Japanese subtitle translates to "The End of Dr. Wily?!"
Platform played: GameCube (Mega Man Anniversary Collection)
Date beaten: Feb 13, 2024
Beat it over 2 days. This time, I did NOT use the Anniversary Collection's "Easy Mode" feature (I did change the number of lives to 5 instead of 3, but tbh, this might have been more of a hindrance than a help - there are times when, after running out of weapon energy, it's easier to just lose all your lives and start the stage over with them refilled) and I found it very frustrating, swearing and shouting "Oh my god, how the hell are you supposed to do this?!" repeatedly. I'm kind of proud that I beat it, but almost more just relieved that it's over... I felt accomplished after finally beating Castlevania, and I felt accomplished after beating some of the specific challenges in Mega Man 3, but for some reason, beating Mega Man 3 as a whole didn't feel that satisfying. Maybe there's some more nebulous quality to what makes a game feel satisfying to beat, besides its difficulty alone, or maybe it has something to do with how much time I spent with each respective game? Hmmm... But the more I think about it, the more I think I enjoyed the game overall, in spite of its rough edges.
Tbh though, part of my problem was just a lack of adequate guides on the internet. Most guides I could find would explain in barebones terms what to do and what each boss's weaknesses are, but they don't really help you figure out how to dodge the boss's attacks and stuff like that. Maybe video guides are where at it's for this one? Maybe I should have turned the Anniversary Collection's "Navi Mode" back on? I turned it off because in Mega Man 1, it seemed to just give very obvious and pointless information, but here, there were a lot of places I actually didn't know what to do, so maybe it would have helped...
In gameplay terms, the biggest upgrade here is the inclusion of the slide ability (at least I don't think that was in Mega Man 2?). There are many places in the game that force you to use the slide ability to go under narrow gaps, but it can also be used to quickly dodge enemy attacks. Also, the "items" from MM2 return in this game, but now they are in the form of your robot dog Rush helping you with the Rush Coil, Rush Marine, and Rush Jet upgrades, as opposed to the previous game's generic "Item-1," "Item-2" and "Item-3" upgrades.
Otherwise, the gameplay is basically the same as the previous game, with Dr. Wily having made 8 new Robot Masters to menace the world with. However, he's also created the Doc Robot, which copies the powers of the 8 Robot Masters from the previous game. So in a way, there are 16 RMs in this game, but half of them are repeats. Also, the mysterious new character Proto Man (or Blues in the Japanese version) will occasionally appear and shoot at you, but in the end, it turns out he is on your side I guess.
There were two particular segments in this game that I found incredibly frustrating, to the point they almost made me give up:
1. The disappearing blocks in Magnet Man's stage. These are like the already-frustrating disappearing block segments in the first game, except now there is a magnet pulling you to one side as you try to navigate the blocks, making it even harder. "What sadist looked at the disappearing blocks and thought they had to be even harder?!" I thought. However, the first room where this appears has no magnet and no bottomless pit, giving you time to practice and get used to it. After dying several times and having to go through this stage over and over again, I eventually mastered this to the point that I could get through this segment fairly quickly with few difficulties. This gave a satisfying feeling of overcoming a challenge that once seemed impossible, which is one of the things I like about games like this. Yay! While frustrating at first, the really hard parts of this section aren't so long as to be odious.
2. The segment in one of the Doc Robot stages that REQUIRES the Rush Jet to get through. There are limited energy pickups that don't respawn when you die, so I felt you pretty much had to do this segment perfectly your first time through, or you're screwed. There is an energy pickup right at the beginning of the segment, but it doesn't actually help at all beacuse when you die, you respawn DIRECTLY ON TOP OF IT, giving you no time to switch your weapon to the Rush Jet. So I would just land on top of the energy pickup with no weapon selected, completing wasting it. Other than that, your only way to get more energy is to grind off a flying enemy that drops a TINY amount of energy. Trying to scroll it onto the screen and then get it to where you can kill it and pick up the energy is a huge pain and it's honestly faster to just restart the level than tediously grind for energy like this. This part, I just thought sucked and shouldn't have been included. If you're going to require the Rush Jet for a lengthy segment like this, least make it easier to refill your energy when you fail! But the upside is, by having to restart this level so many times, I got very good at the first half of it. But when I finally got through this part, then died to the miniboss right after, and had to go ALL THE WAY BACK TO THE BEGINNING OF THE RUSH JET SECTION... I almost cried, man. Maybe a few more generous checkpoints in the Doc Robot stages would have helped, too.
However, once you get through those tough Doc Robot stages, the Wily Castle stages are actually surprisingly easy, and very generous with the pickups. The very final boss was a little bit tricky, but there's an energy tank you can get right before it, that makes it quite easy to cheese (i.e. you can just let yourself get hit a few times and then heal, so you don't have to worry about dodging as much). Overall, much easier than 2's final boss.
The soundtrack rocks though, even if it's not as fondly remembered as Mega Man 2's.
Platform played: PC (Mega Man Legacy Collection)
Date beaten Feb 18, 2024
There was a much shorter gap between replaying this one on the Legacy Collection vs replaying the first two, so it was very noticeable how much easier it was going through it a second time. It also helped that I learned some strategies from watching the AGDQ speedrun, such as jumping continuously while on the Rush Jet to avoid draining its weapon energy (it only drains while you are actually standing on him). Again, I played the Japanese version on Legacy Collection, which doesn't seem to be too different. The main thing I noticed is that the game seems to be notorious for suffering lots of lag/slowdown when too many objects are on the screen, and the Gemini Laser is nigh-unusable because of it. The Legacy Collection is based on the NES version and definitely does seem to suffer this problem, which I don't think was nearly as bad in the Gamecube Anniversary Collection version.
Kid Dracula | Akumajou Special: Boku Dracula-kun! (Oct 19, 1990)
Platform played: NES Emulator (Japanese version with an imperfect translation patch)
Date beaten: December 5, 2024
I believe I beat it at some point in the past, but maybe I didn't finish it, and/or only played the Game Boy version. Anyway, it's a cutesy and fairly short spinoff of Castlevania starring "Kid Dracula." It basically plays like a kind of combination of a Classicvania and Mega Man. After each stage, you get a new power. Most are weapons but you also get the ability to turn into a bat, and reverse gravity. Both powers are necessary to use to complete the game. Like every Classicvania, the final boss is a bit annoying. Actually, there are three final bosses in a row with no checkpoints between them. The first one will vanish after being hit, then rematerialize where you were standing, much like Dracula in the Castlevania 1. The second is a giant robot head with a huge hurtbox that will do a lot of damage if you get hit, but moves very slowly. The FINAL final boss is an alien (reminiscent of the Wily alien from Mega Man) who shoots laser beams from his hands, then shoots a fireball from his mouth. To hit him, you have to shoot a fireball into his mouth while it's open, which means you have to stand in the exact right spot to avoid getting hit by the fireball coming down and the laser beams on either side of you. However, once I got the hang of where to stand, I found it fairly easy. Honestly the first of these three bosses was the hardest.
Not hard to see why it wasn't released in the US when bosses include a figure in a white robe with a manji/swastika on its head, and enemies include witches that appear to drop apples from between their pants-less legs... It's also somewhat known for the Statue of Liberty boss who, instead of fighting you, asks you trivia questions. Most of the text in the translation patch I played was garbled but at least the trivia segment was playable.
Super Mario World (Nov 21, 1990)
Platform played: SNES Emulator
Date beaten: Feb 24, 2024
This was, I believe, the first game I ever owned, on SNES. I was never able to beat it as a kid, but I believe I did beat it on emulator some time ago (I remember seeing the credits with all the enemy names), probably with very heavy abuse of save states. In this more recent playthrough, I did use save states to some extent, but not heavily. I don't feel bad about it since there are a lot of games I want to play, so I don't necessarily want to pad out the play time by having to redo sections over and over. :P (The game only saves after the "Castle" and "Ghost House" levels, so losing all your lives can send you several stages back)
Anyway, after playing so many NES titles, this SNES game feels like a huge jump in quality. Makes sense since it was a launch title for the SNES, so they probably developed it specifically to show off the power of the console. It follows a similar structure to Super Mario Bros. 3 where you travel along a world map, but the overall presentation is a lot more better and more refined. It's also less linear. I would say it's a fairly challenging platformer overall, but the ability to take different paths makes it easier for a novice to complete, with some of the more challenging content being in hidden areas or otherwise optional. When you consider all the secret levels and such, it's got a hefty amount of content for a 2D platformer. However, it shares the NES trilogy's problem of having repetitive bosses. Each of the Koopalings looks more distinct this time and has their name mentioned in-game, but among the 7 of them, there are only 3 unique boss patterns. And you fight the Reznor miniboss multiple times.
You once again fight Bowser at the end, and as usual, can't damage him by jumping directly on him. This time, he flies overhead in a flying vehicle, so you have to hop on the enemies he throws down, then pick them up and throw them at him. He has other attacks, so really, if he didn't throw these enemies at you, he'd be invincible. Makes u think...
I played the game a lot as a kid so I was pretty familiar with it, and I would say it's a pretty good and well-designed game that I enjoyed, but I don't feel a need to go for 100% completion or to revisit it again any time soon. It's probably worth mentioning that the game has quite a lot of fan-made hacks, though.
Also, this game is the first appearance of Yoshi. He lives in Dinosaur Land. Apparently, Mario, Luigi, and Peach went to Dinosaur Land for a vacation right after the events of Super Mario Bros. 3, upon which Peach was immediately kidnapped by Bowser again.
Startropics (Dec 1, 1990)
Platform played: NES Classic Mini
Date beaten: Mar 14, 2024
I knew almost nothing about this game going in, except that some people praise it as a great cult classic Zelda-like game that is often overlooked. I ended up enjoying it a lot, while also feeling like it was one of the most frustrating and infuriating games I've ever played. Like many NES games, I found myself yelling "What the fuck! This is impossible! How are you supposed to do this?!" many times near the end. However, I WAS able to beat it so of course it wasn't impossible, and it was very satisfying to finally complete it. I did make use of the save state feature on the NES Classic Mini, however. If you can beat this without save states, you are truly a hardcore gamer.
It is a bit like Zelda 2 or a JRPG like Dragon Quest, with an overworld you traverse to get to various dungeons. Once you enter the dungeons, they play a lot like Zelda 1. There are no enemies on the overworld. Also, you don't get to keep any of the special items you acquire in dungeons. Once you clear the dungeon, that's it. The nice thing about this design decision is that it encourages you to use your special items/ammo since there's no point in trying to hoard them, so you don't get that problem a lot of JRPGs have where you end the game with 99 elixirs because they're too good to use or whatever. However, what I really don't like is that your hearts reset to only 3 hearts every time you die or clear a dungeon/chapter, no matter how many health upgrades you acquired. This led to a really irritating moment where you get your health refilled to max right before the final chapter, just in time to face the big bad... only to start the next chapter and now you are back down to 3 hearts. What in the fuck was the point of that.
The combat in the dungeons feels a bit janky because of the way your movement is locked to a grid and how there is an input delay for each action. This makes combat way more difficult and frustrating than it should be. Ideally, you want your Nintendo games to feel like a fair challenge, and not to be difficult just because of stiff controls or bad design decisions. So I didn't enjoy the dungeons as much as I could have, although the grid-based movement does make the jumping puzzles easier. Other than that, though, the game has a really cool and unique vibe with its tropical island setting and charming sense of humor. It reminds me a lot of EarthBound, but with Zelda-style gameplay. It's also quite unique in that it was made by Japanese developers, but for an American audience, and was never intended to be released in Japan.
Another notorious thing about this game is that the manual came with a physical letter which is the letter Mike gets from his uncle in the game, and in order to solve one puzzle, you need to dip the letter in water, in real life, to make the solution appear. The NES Classic Mini does not contain a copy of this letter, making the puzzle impossible.... without a guide, at least. Luckily however, it was the same in every copy of the game, so you can just look up the solution online. I actually had a harder time with the piano puzzle because I didn't realize that if you mess it up, you have to exit and re-enter the building before you can try again.
Game of the year: Much like with Castlevania 1, I will have to give the title to Megami Tensei II thanks in large part to how long of a journey it was to actually complete it, making it feel very sastifying. It also brought a unique "cyberpunk" aesthetic to the dungeon-crawler RPG genre, which would contain into the future of the series for many years to come.