Game #42 Abandoned after >2 Hours - Tales of Phantasia
Very generic feeling RPG which completely failed to hold my interest for any length of time. Awkward and clunky battle system, very generic plot and characters. Gave up on it after a bit.
Rating: 2/5
Game #43 Complete - Astro Boy: Omega Factor
Fantastic side scrolling platformer/beat em up. Great graphics (with occasional lag), big bosses, and a decent amount of content. Like a Mega Man game but with more bombast and a much less annoying continue system. One of the best games I've played on the GBA.
Rating: 5/5
Game #44 Abandoned after >2 Hours - Dokapon: Monster Hunter
RPG with some rogulike elements, in the "Mystery Dungeon" style (i.e. the same boring dungeon generation as other Japanese roguelikes). Weird rock/paper/scissors based battle system (literally RPS based). Very clunky interface. Again, failed to hold my interest beyond the beginning, so I gave up to avoid stalling.
Rating: 2/5
Game #45 Abandoned after >2 Hours - Tony Hawk's Underground
Yes, I was on a bad streak. But it gets better after this. Can be summarised as very similar to THPS4 which I played previously. Suffers from the same problems. Adds only a few new mechanics like the ability to get off your board. Seemingly lengthy career mode where you build up a custom skater from nothing. Fundamentally not a very good version of THPS/THUG compared to the home console versions, so I moved on.
Rating: 3/5
Game #46 Complete - Metroid: Zero Mission
Excellent Metroidvania style platformer. Remake of the original Metroid, with much improved graphics and some gameplay tweaks, plus a new area and boss. Controls are great, exploration is fun and rewarding, generally good. Weak point is probably the bosses, as there are only a few and they are not amazing (although they look very nicely rendered).
Rating: 5/5
Game #47 Complete - Drome Racers
Surprisingly good 3D racer, based on a Lego franchise. 3D graphics aren't amazing, but you can actually tell what's going on, unlike in some other GBA 3D titles. Gameplay is decent, you have a drag race warmup followed by a racetrack or offroad race. You can upgrade your cars in career mode. Computer racers seemed to be fairly uncompetetive though. Pretty decent fun actually. Tracks are a bit samey, and ice/frozen tracks are annoying. Seemingly no credits, but I did get a shot of my full trophy collection.
Rating: 3/5
Game #48 Complete - Pokemon LeafGreen Version
It's Pokemon. A remake of the original games, so a big nostalgia hit. Graphics much improved over the original, nice sprite work in general. Suffers from some of the same problems as the original, including a weird difficulty curve in the mid-game and some progression that would be obtuse if I didn't know the games (i.e. stuff with the Silph Scope/Pokeflute, getting Tea for the border guards, etc.). I also seemed to need to do some grinding to beat the Elite 4/Champion even though I had trained my team consistently, which was a little annoying.
Rating: 4/5
Game #49 Complete - Sword of Mana
Pretty decent action RPG, in the Mana series, most famous for Secret of Mana on the SNES. Core gameplay is hack and slash, does a decent job but suffers from lack of any block/dodge mechanic. Can get repetitious as there isn't really anything comparable to Zelda items to vary the dungeon crawling. Storytelling is a little odd in places, and can be confusing. Possibly some translation problems? Or just that you need the manual for backstory. A lot of side quests, which seemed boring fetch quests, complicated by the game's slightly annoying day/night and day of the week systems. Also seemed quite easy, I didn't grind or do side quests and had no problems beating the game.
Rating: 4/5
Game #50 Nearly Complete - Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2
Yet another THPS game. Much the same as the others, with the same issues again. More classic gameplay, just completing goals in a level rather than any pretence of story. Lack of the revert mechanic limits comboing somewhat compared to later titles. Actually got stuck and could not unlock the last level, and gave up.
Rating: 3/5
Welp, I'm caught up now. Should be back on proper reviews after this. Next up is Doom II.
No comments:
Post a Comment