Game Quicky: WarioWare Gold (3DS) ~ Minigame Short

Nintendo microsite

For those who don’t know, I live in Belgium. Around late November – beginning December, we have a special holiday.  Depending on the region you are in, you either celebrate Sinterklaas or Sint Maarten. Both days are basically the same thing, but Sint Maarten takes place in late November and Sinterklaas in early December. Now, what is this? Sinterklaas or Saint Nicholas Day is a sort of 2nd Christmas day/Santa Claus celebration. I could explain the whole celebration, but I think I’m just going to link to a Wikipedia page that explains it better than I can: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas. Now, why am I mentioning this? Well, during this celebration I usually give my godchild a gift and I get a special gift from my godmother. This year she gave me WarioWare Gold for the Nintendo 3DS. Now that I have finished the game, what did I think about it? Let’s take a look at it! Oh, and before you say: “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth!” Well, I just want to review this game… Anyways, feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your opinion on the game and/or the content of this article. 

The good

While the story isn’t anything special, the voice acting is just amazing. It’s one of the best performances that Charles Martinet as Wario. The voice acting actually gives the story the charm it needs.

The theming of the minigames is perfect. This game is sort of a compilation game of all the previous WarioWare games, the 300 mini-games it has are a blast to play. Especially since you have games where you need to use the microphone, gyrosensors and the touch screen.

There are quite interesting extras in this game like recording your own voice in the cutscenes and the mini-games. There is also a lot of Nintendo history in this game that made me quite nostalgic.

So, the gameplay is amazing. If you played WarioWare games in the past, you’ll feel right at home with this game. If you have never played a WarioWare game, the game works like this. You get challenged by a character that sets the theme of the mini-games. In these mini-games, you have to quickly perform one action to complete a goal. For example; shave three hairs for a chin or blow, blow out a candle, raise a bridge on time… All of this with a simple action or button press. It doesn’t matter if you win or lose, you go to the next round. The consequence is if you lose, you lose one of your 4 lives. Logically, you need to restart the whole chapter when your 4 lives are lost. The mini-games speed up at a certain point and after a couple of rounds, you’ll face the final challenge of that character.

The visuals of this game are amazing. The game looks colorful and vibrant. The artwork is sublime. There are a lot of amazing references to other Nintendo games and to earlier WarioWare series. I especially loved the nods to WarioWare D.I.Y. with some mini-games having crudely drawn visuals like a casual player would create on the Nintendo DS.

I had a really hard time deciding where to place the soundtrack of this game. I’m personally a bit mixed on it. While the soundtrack has a lot of great tracks, there are a few that didn’t click with me. Now, when I replayed these sections, I noticed that the tracks didn’t click with me outside of the game. So, I can’t fault the game too much for that. So, that’s why I decided to mention the soundtrack in the good section.

The bad

So, let’s talk about the story in this game. While the voice acting is amazing and adds a lot of charm, it doesn’t fix the mediocre story of this game. The story just feels incomplete, storylines that go too quickly to their conclusion. There is barely any arc.

I can totally understand that the story needs to be short and bite-sized for the WarioWare games, but I feel that there is a lot of wasted potentials here and that this story could have been more interesting if it was more fleshed out for a Wario platformer.

While collecting the collectibles is a fun distraction and a nice post-game objective, most of them are just useless. In previous games, most of the unlockables had some sort of interesting function but in this game, a lot of them are just images of previous Nintendo products with a little bit of explanation. That’s a major let down.

Conclusion

This game is an interesting one. While I highly enjoyed my time with the game, I felt that there were a few things lacking. I felt that a bit more polish might have improved this game to be even better. But, on the other hand, there are a lot of things that this game does right and nails in the process. Like the voice acting and the visuals.

Personally, I highly recommend this game to everybody who enjoys playing mini-game collections, puzzle games, Nintendo games, and other WarioWare games. Personally, I wouldn’t pay full price for this game and wait for a discount. But, I wouldn’t skip this game at all. I think it’s worthy to be in your 3DS collection or library.

Since this game is one of the only games that use almost all the features of the 3DS and I think that’s just great. Thankfully, they didn’t use the 3D feature or I would be in trouble because I use a 2DS XL.

With that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game. And yes, I have left a few things out for you to discover… I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 75/100

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Review: The Legend Of Zelda – Minish Cap (GBA) ~ Easiest Zelda Game?

Zelda wiki entry

Ah man, I have a ton of memories of this game. I played this game when I didn’t have enough money to buy games myself. I was quite young. If I remember correctly, I was just getting into high school. So, I was 11 – 12 years old when I rented this game from the video game store. I almost finished the game before my rent time was over. So, after I returned it, I rented it the next weekend. As it turned out, somebody else rented it and saved over my save file. I was so let down, I actually didn’t play the game that much. After a year or two, my local game store stopped renting out games. They sold them all second hand. Then I bought this game and I finished it in a week. But how was my experience? Well, let’s take a look at it! And as usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the content of this article and/or the game. 

Easy?

So, I claim in my title that this is the easiest Zelda game in the series. And I stand by that claim. This game is rather on the easy side. Not only that, it’s quite short. But more on that, later.

The story in this game tells the story how Link got his green hat. Once every 1000 years, there is a special festival for the Minish. A race that helped create the master sword. Link is the grandson of the blacksmith with the Princess Zelda as childhood friend.

You get asked to deliver a sword to the King. After you play a bit around on the festival, you see Vaati, the winner of the sword contest destroy the Master Sword and turn Zelda into stone.

That’s all I’m going to “spoil” from the story. (It are the first ten minutes of the game anyways.) The story is pretty well crafted. The characters are memorable and written pretty well. There is one thing that Nintendo implemented that I’m not a big fan off. That are the Kingstones.

These stones are pretty much the ways you open secrets in this game. You find them all over the world and your goal is to match your piece with somebody else. Then you open a cave or something along those lines. On paper, this can be interesting… But in theory, it isn’t. The two flaws here is that you see where the secret opens AND you have way and way to many Kingstones in the end. This gives the Kingstones less value and ruins the fun.

New items

Graphically, this game looks amazing. It gives off some Wind Waker vibes. The world is really colorful and bright. It’s really pleasant to look at.

The animations also give off this Wind Waker vibe. There isn’t anything I didn’t like about the visual presentation of this game.

What I really liked in this game was the world design. In this game, you can shrink down to a really small size, to the size of the Minish. This makes some locations that more memorable. When I replayed this game I often thought: “Oh hey, there are Minish living in this roof.” Oh, also, like in the Legend Of Zelda Link’s Awakening, this game also has references to the Mario games. Have fun looking for them!

In this game, you get some classical Zelda items like the boomerang and the bow and arrow. Yet, there are also some new items. The Mole Mitts you can use to dig your way in certain areas. A special cane that helps you flip over enemies and an upgraded Roc’s feather. You get a special cape to jump around. This cape also makes your jump longer. Oh yeah, and the vacuum cleaner… I mean the gust jar. This nifty item can suck up air and spit it back out. Guess what it’s used in a water puzzle.

The items are used very creatively. But one part that is introduced extremely well is the Four Swords. When you defeat a dungeon, you get a new element. With this element, you can create clones of Link in certain places. This makes the puzzles in some areas really well done.

Earlier in the review I said that this game was easy. To a seasoned Zelda player, this game can be easily beaten. When this is your first Zelda game, it will take you a bit longer. I felt that in some areas, the game could be a bit harder. It’s one of those games you play through because it’s a fun game. The atmosphere is there.

Music

 The music in this game is one of the strongest points in this game. When I listen to music from the GBA, I think that there aren’t that many soundtracks that sound as nice on the gameboy advance then this one. At least, as far that I played.

The soundtrack also has some remixed tracks from the previous games. This got a smile on my face.

The sound design is well done. There weren’t any sounds I thought were out of place.

The controls are responsive and spot on. I didn’t have much trouble controlling Link. Apart from some ice puzzles, I think the controls are perfect.

This game isn’t that long. Instead of the usual 8 dungeons and one final dungeon, this game has 6 dungeons. I wished there were a bit more dungeons then that.

In any case, I think I said everything I wanted to say about this game. It’s time for the conclusion! (Oh, for my new readers… Yes, I left some things out. Gameplay wise and such… Just because if you are interested I want that there things that you can discover.)

Conclusion

The bad:

 – Kingstones aren’t well implemented.

 – This game isn’t that difficult.

 – I wished this game was longer.

The good:

+ Solid gameplay.

+ Fun new story.

+ Nice visuals.

+ Great music and sound design.

+ Fun new items.

+ …

Final thoughts:

This game is quite well made. It came out near the end of the Gameboy advance’s life cycle… So, it’s a bit overlooked. While it’s not the best Zelda game out there, it’s a really good one. Apart from Zelda fans, I would recommend this game to any new Zelda player. This game is the perfect entry level Zelda game to start with the series.

While this game has some flaws, I think it doesn’t take much away from the experience. I didn’t find that much negative things to say about this game. That’s why I give it full marks. It’s one of the best games out on the GBA and it’s a must own!

Score: 100/100

Anyways, thank you for reading this review and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to welcome you in another article sometime, but until then… Have a great day and game on~

Gamer’s Thoughts – Game Nostalgia: The good old 3D-shooters

When I was younger, I found a website that allowed me to play demo versions of popular old DOS-games. From that website I got introduced to games like Heretic, Doom, Duke Nukem, and various other games. Somehow, Wolfenstein 3D was my favorite. I used to play the first few levels over and over again. Then I discovered Heretic, I fell even more in love with that game than Wolfenstein, since it started to speak to me on a personal level. I was always interested in a realistic-ish world with some (or a lot of) fantasy elements. Anyways, I’m rambling on, let’s talk about some old 3D shooter games and let’s get extremely nostalgic. I hope you guys and girls enjoy this read. And as always, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the games I covered and/or the content of this article.  

Wolfenstein 3D

So, most of the times DooM is considered to be the first “real” 3D shooter. Which isn’t true. Wolfenstein came earlier.

I actually finished this game on the GBA. The only two negatives off that version are a lack of a map and no music. For the rest, it’s a really nice port of the game to play on the go.

I recently started to play it on PC, thanks to Steam. And with the music, I’m not really enjoying it that much honestly. The lack of music actually added to the creepy atmosphere. You are trying to escape a nazi prison.

On the other hand, I could see where people are coming from. A soundtrack like that could motivate you to finish the game and try to escape successfully.  It’s all up to your own preference.

The expansion pack/sequel were amazing as well. While I haven’t beaten those games, I’m really excited to see what it throws next at me.

Heretic

One of my most favorite shooters from the ’90. As I explained in my introduction, this game is one that I adore.

I’m not really sure what the story is behind this game, but to be frankly honest, I don’t really care. The concept is just extremely fun. While I adore stories in my games, to the extent that I sometimes don’t play games that lack a story, this game is a big exception.

I used to play the demo over and over again. Once I got caught in school since I slipped in a computer lab just to play this game and show it to some friends. Man, the teachers were pissed at me. Yet, it gave me great memories.

It was one of those games that my parents didn’t want to see me play, since I discovered it when I was around 10 years old. Shooters aren’t meant for those ages. So, yeah.

It’s also the game that introduced me to the interesting world of cheating. I was stuck in a level, and I looked up online what I should do next. When I read a walkthrough, I mostly read the part where I’m at, and I read a part of the solution. That way I still feel I have beaten the game on my own.

But at the bottom of the walkthrough, there was a section called “cheats”. My young mind couldn’t resist after reading it and trying it out in game. Now-a-days, I rarely cheat. Only when I have beaten a game to mess around with it.

Duke Nukem 3D

I heard rumors on the play ground about this game. We are in the late ’90 where computers barely got into the educational system. The rumor was that a kid saw a teacher play some Duke Nukem.

As a kid, I was into Pokémon. When they explained and tried to convince me that it was a shooter and it was really cool, I actually didn’t really care.

It was only later that I realized what I missed out on. An amazing shooter with, now outdated, one liners that still get a smile on my face. My favorite is one of the most famous ones. Finish the quote when you know how it ends.

“I’m here to kick ass and chew bubble gum, and…” I’m all out of gum.

Yet, the truth is that I haven’t finished any Duke game to date. I have played a lot of them, but I play it at those times when I’m waiting between two big releases. Never a great idea, is it not?

Conclusion

Alright, I might have picked out three of the more popular old-school 3D shooters. Yet, those are the ones I grew up with.

Old-school 3D schooters have such an amazing charm to them. With hidden passages and secrets, they are something different. Rarely, I see games copy the formula today. A game where not every wall is solid and where you get a score card if you killed all the enemies in a certain stage, if you found all the secrets and things like that.

I have played more 3D shooters than the three I talked about. It’s just that those three are the ones I have the most fond memories off. Maybe one day I might write a follow-up article to this one where I talk about some different old school 3D shooters.

The thing is, I would love to review these games, yet I feel that I’m not the right person for that. I focus more on adventure, puzzle and story driven games. And I haven’t seen a lot of story driven shooters. I do know they exist, but I haven’t played them.

In any case, I think I’m going to wrap up this article right here. I hope you enjoyed reading it and my apologies for not writing an article for two weeks. Thankfully a buddy of mine actually wrote some articles in my place to give you guys something to read. Thanks man, they were nice reads.

Before I ramble on, it might be possible that in the future you will see an article of one of these games where I take a more in-depth look in to these games. So stay tuned. ~

My top 10 GBA games. (Part 2/2)

Link to part 1.

After a crazy busy week, I finally found time to announce my top 5 GBA titles. The comments on the first part were exactly what I hoped them to be. Popular titles that everybody puts in their top 10 will be mostly absent in my top 10. Since I go for the more obscure titles, that deserve the spotlight. Games that are good, but never get a spot in any top 10 due to some flaws. Anyways, enough talking. Let’s take a look at my top 5 GBA games. As usual, feel free to leave a comment in the comment section about your top 10, the content of this article and things like that. 

#5: Tomb Raider Legend

I own both the PC version and the GBA version of this game. My young mind was blown when I saw how many similarities there are between the GBA version and the PC version. While the GBA version isn’t as much fun as the PC version, I did have quite a lot of fun with it.

This game gets also a special award from me, for the most easiest final boss ever. I can beat the final boss with my eyes closed, on hard difficulty. It’s just ridiculous.

One advice I should give is that the DS version is just a big mess. The GBA version is just a nice game that takes the portable Tomb Raider games to a new height. Give it a chance and remember that it’s a GBA game. Also, the final thank you in the credits is just amazing.

#4: Scooby Doo – Mystery Mayhem

A game about a TV-show, what can go wrong.. I mean, what can go right? Well, this is a great platformer/adventure game that is totally Scooby-Doo themed. The reason why I love this game is mostly because the nostalgic value to the show. This game is thankfully no cash-in.

When I discovered that one of my favorite bands at that time actually made one of the theme songs for the show, Simple Plan, my love for the game grew even more.

While I haven’t fully beaten this game, I can’t get passed the final boss, I did see a friend beat it and I saw the ending. The final boss is brutal. That’s one of the only remakes I can give at this game in my opinion. Maybe I should replay it to review it…?

#3: Nicktoons – Battle For Volcano Island

Link to my review

The people who have read my review might have seen this entry coming. I truly think that this game is one of the best platformers besides Mario that the GBA has to offer. While I don’t own a copy anymore since I mostly remember this game from rentals, I still do hunt for it.

Every time when I go to a garage sale, I hope to find it. I would accept any copy, even without the box.

If you want to read more about my opinion, go check out the review.

#2: Pokémon Ruby – Sapphire.

This game is the black sheep in the series. The 3rd generation wasn’t very well received. Which is strange to me, since the pre-orders for the remake at the end of this month are quite high.

The only complaint I have with this game is that the soundtrack has a lot of trumpets. I know that this is going to get me some hate, but Ruby and Sapphire are actually my 2nd most favorite games in the series. Most has to do with the introduction of secret bases. The next entry, Diamond and Pearl, perfected that with making it multiplayer.

I’m quite curious what the remake has in store for us. I actually have high hopes. I try to avoid reading other content to not get spoiled. Sadly enough, it already happened. The hype grew even more for me. I just wish it doesn’t let me down…

Some honorable mentions.

Okay, before I talk about the obvious number one, let’s have some honorable mentions.

• Golden Sun: This game can’t go in my list since I haven’t beaten it. Sorry Q, it might be for another time.
• Avatar – The Burning Earth: Such a great game to play. I enjoy it quite a lot. The password system is just amazing.
• Crash – Mind over the mutant: If only I finished the final area before the time of the rental was over, then this game was allowed to be on my list.
• Pokémon Mystery Dungeon – Blue Rescue Team: The reason why this game didn’t make it on my list is because the DS versions already made it on the top 25 DS games list. Yeah.
• WarioLand 4: I still have to beat WarioLand 4. I enjoyed WarioLand I and II quite a lot. I never got a hold of the 3rd game, but I got the 4th game for free.
• Metroid Fusion: I still have to beat you.

#1: The Legend Of Zelda – Minish Cap

Yup, my fans might have seen this entry coming from miles away. Not the GBA remake of the very popular “A Link To The Past” but the Minish Cap.

This handheld title is quite a lot of fun. There are sadly enough some flaws. The game is quite short, easy and the Kingstones aren’t so much fun in practice.

I had beaten this game while I was renting it. My honest advice is that you rent it, unless you are a Zelda fan. No, I’m joking. Play this game, since it’s one of the best adventure games the GBA has to offer.

I think that this game is more meant for the younger, newer Zelda fans. To get new players hooked to an awesome series. That’s the reason why it’s so… well, easy.

Closing words

This list was a bit tougher to put together then my DS list. The main reason is because my memories of the GBA time are fading a bit since the DS was such a huge hit with me. And back in those days I also played a lot of other games. So, my connection was less strong the with the gameboy or the DS.

In any case, I hope that some games you didn’t know got your attention. Feel free to play them, since I recommend all the games that I talked about in this top 10. And with this article, I close my GBA month. Thank you for sticking with me, and I hope to see you next week for a new article. Take care~

Game Nostalgia #5: My Gameboy Retrospective

So, in the last article of this series, I talked about my history with the DS and 3DS. So, I think that it’s now time to talk about my memories with the gameboy series. While I’m supposed to talk only about the Gameboy Advance, since it’s this month’s theme, the article wouldn’t be as long as it should be. That’s why I decided to write a whole article about my memories of all the Gameboy’s I got. That way you have an idea of my journey through the world of gaming, since I mostly only played on the gameboy. That and my hobby of writing was my childhood. So, prepare yourself for a personal story. Feel free to leave yours in the comments or your opinions on my story.

Exploding start

The first gameboy I played on wasn’t actually mine. It was my aunt’s. She only had Pac-Man and Tetris. Somehow my young mind didn’t need anything more. It were my first real encounters with gaming, but I was hooked. I used to play games like DuckHunt or Mario Bros. at my nephew’s place, but those moments were then far and few between.

One day, I was at my aunt’s place and I stopped playing since the back of the gameboy started to feel hot. A few moments after I put it down, the batteries actually exploded, damaging the gameboy heavily. That was a big shocker. I didn’t know what to do. My aunt wasn’t even mad, since it wasn’t my fault. It turned out that there was a flaw with the batteries we used, and it leaked battery acid into the system. Yeah.

That story was my earliest memory with a gameboy. A bit later, my aunt started to take me to her babysitting job. At that place, they also had a gameboy and more then one game. I remember it well, it were two girls, two sisters. While they were doing their girl things, I was allowed to play on the gameboy. My love grew and grew even stronger.

I already talked about how awesome my family is. When they saw that I was so much in love with the Gameboy, they actually got me a gameboy. Not only was it the latest model, they got it in my favorite color! To this day, I still own that very silver gameboy pocket. I was so happy, I had my own gameboy. I did jobs around the house to be able to buy new batteries for the gameboy. Then they got me rechargeable batteries, and my life was complete.

Garage sales

I never showed my latest garage sale loot here on my blog. Whoops.

In my childhood, we had this tradition to go to the sea on holiday. Man, always to the same house. I used to look forward to it every single year. Sadly enough, the owners of the house sold it, and the tradition is over now.

But back then, they used to take me to garage sales. So, as a young kid, they asked me to wake up early in the morning in the summer holidays. I honestly didn’t care one bit. Since I was allowed to buy games.

My family didn’t want that I bought a lot of games, now-a-days that’s a very different story, since they were so expensive. A garage sale was such an easy solution. The best thing they did was that they let me roam the garage sales on my own with a notebook and a pen. They said that I could write down the games I wanted and then I had the difficult job to decide which one I wanted.

To this very day, I love to wake up early and go to a garage sale. Every year, I go to around 10 garage sales, if not more. I never go alone, since that would ruin part of the fun for me. The nostalgia of hunting down games, which were pretty rare on the garage sales I went too, is just amazing. The moment a family member bumped me in the arm and pointed to a game, I think they loved to see that sparkle in my eyes of happiness.

Typical me is typical

Garage sales memories are for another article. I was extremely attached to my games. I was always hard to pick games I had to sell. I had to sell a few games before I was allowed to buy new games. Now-a-days, I don’t have that restriction anymore.

One time I forgot my gameboy at a restaurant and I begged my mother to turn back and get it. I even begged that they called the restaurant so that nobody could pick up my gameboy and claim it.

Later, my gameboy pocket became my sister’s gameboy and I got a gameboy color. Then my sister got a purple gameboy advance and I got a silver gameboy advance SP, the one with the tattoo design on it.

To this very day, I still own most of the games I had back then. Of course, my library of games has grown quite a lot. If only I had the library I had back then, the nights I kept playing on my gameboy would be so much more fun. I remember that I had a lamp you needed to hit a button at the top in order to the lights go out. Since my room was at the end of a hallway, I could hear my parents and a simple slap on the lamp and putting the gameboy screen down, gave the illusion of my sleeping.

My parents knew that I was playing the gameboy under my sheets, but they were never able to catch my red handed. Okay, honestly, they were able a few times but usually, I was always able to dodge the bullet.

I could talk hours about my memories of the gameboy days, but I think I will end my article here. Since I have reached my usual length. I hope you enjoyed reading another special entry in the gameboy advance month. While it isn’t fully about the GBA, I hope you don’t mind that much.

Thanks again for reading and until another article. Also, don’t shit your pants but it’s Halloween.

Review: Nicktoons – SpongeBob And Friends – Battle For Volcano Island (GBA) ~ Again?

PS2 version article

Wait, what? I already talked about this game… True, but for the GBA month, I decided to review the GBA version of this game. The game that actually made me buy the PS2 version. I found out about this game when my local game store still had a renting system. I rented this game and I finished it after renting it three times. Surprisingly, nobody deleted my save files. Anyway, I wanted to buy myself a copy of this game, but I haven’t been able to. If somebody has a copy of this game lying around, please contact me. I would love to buy it. Since I really like it this game. But that isn’t what this article is about, isn’t it? This article is about how the game is. It’s a review. So, let’s take a look at Nicktoons – Battle For Volcano Island. How good or how bad is it? Keep in mind that I’m doing this review out of memory and the first few levels I was able to play through some alternative means. 

Different story?

So, I already to a look to the PS2 version of this game. Let me tell you, apart from some characters, the story is exactly the same. In the GBA version, there are fewer characters you can play with, but I think that is for the better in this version.

So, in this game you are summoned to free Volcano Island from an evil entity. It’s a story that will appeal to children, but it will be bad in the eyes of adults. I could start bashing the game for this, but I think that would be unfair.

The game is aimed at children and people who like a nice platforming game. Those games have in most cases no real deep story or character development. Most platformers add another genre to have a better story.

This game is at its core a platformer. So, the tutorial shouldn’t take long. Don’t worry, in this game the tutorial doesn’t take long at all. The first level isn’t challenging, but it’s a great way to learn the ropes of the game.

How does it play?

So, you play as one of 4 Nicktoons. Each character has their own special abilities. SpongeBob can go through dirt, Patrick can use his air pants to float through the air, Timmy can stretch his arms to … crazy lengths and Danny can use his ghost powers to a certain extent.

The game isn’t very long, but its length is quite decent. There are 4 worlds with each 4 levels. Then you have an additional final boss fight. Let me tell you, the final boss fight is a real test of your skills with this game.

Something that might have crossed your mind is that this game is easy. I urge you to think twice about that. The game isn’t as easy as you might think. That’s due to the amazing checkpoint system.

Each time you get hit, you lose a heart. Five hits, and it’s game over. Each hit sends you back to the last visited checkpoint. Each new checkpoint you visit gives you back one heart. So, if you aren’t careful, you have to redo a level over and over again.

There is some replay value in this game as well. In each level, there are several golden hearts. If you gather enough of them, you unlock a special level. But getting the golden hearts is the really tricky part. They are sometimes hidden but most of the time hidden in plain sight. The kicker is that they need pixel perfect reflexes. The golden hearts get added to your total heart count at the end. So, if you get hit, you lose your special golden heart. I promise you, it gets challenging in some places.

Each world has a theme. Well, sort of. The nice thing is that you don’t have to beat every level in order. You have a hub world where you can go and play any level you have unlocked.

The music?

Some levels might have a bit of back tracking, but it’s done in such a way you don’t really notice if you don’t pay attention to it. Since in those levels you go back differently because you gained a new ability.

Visually, this game looks how it should. Bright and colorful. In my opinion it looks extremely pleasant on the Game Boy screen and made me play this game to the very end. Everything has that Nickelodeon vibe over it and all the art styles of the different series mixed without something that stands out.

In terms of the animation, well, it’s quite basic. Nothing really special but it gets the job done without a problem. I don’t have any complaints there.

The music is what it is. It isn’t too memorable, but it isn’t forgettable either. I had the tunes stuck in my head for a couple of days but as soon as I played some different games, I forgot about them. Honestly, I don’t think the game has bad music. No, it’s quite decent but not good. I have that feeling that there could have been done more with the music. The same goes for the sound effects or rather the lack of variety. There aren’t a lot of sound effects in this game. So, I sometimes felt that the action wasn’t… well, action-y.

Anyway, I think I’ll leave it here for my review. I talked about what I wanted to talk about. Let’s go straight on to my conclusion. For the people who are new here, I usually never talk about a game in-depth because I want to leave some things to surprise you when you decide to play this game.

Conclusion

The bad:

– The music is so-so.

– Weak story, but good enough for the kids.

– The placement of the golden hearts is just brutal.

The good:

+ Amazing visuals.

+ Great level design.

+ Addictive gameplay. (You truly have to use all characters)

Final thoughts:

Okay, I think it’s quite clear that I like this game. I think it’s one of the best games I played on the GBA. Like my last review, this game is an overlooked game because … It looks like a kids game. There are a lot of elements in there for more veteran gamers and there are elements in there for the younger gamers.

This game is a must-buy or must play if you are a big GBA fan or a big fan of platformers.

Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article, but until then… Have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 80/100

First Impression: The Legend Of Zelda – Skyward Sword (Wii) ~ Golden Remote

Official site

It has been so long since I wrote an article about a Wii game. So, since I planned an article about a Zelda game this month, I decided to switch it with this one. That way I avoid using last month’s theme. I wish I could call this a review, but I haven’t finished this game yet. It’s quite a big shame. But I’ll explain the reason why. It’s because I can’t seem to beat one boss. Levias. Man, he isn’t easy. Then I got distracted by other games and yeah, I kinda put this game down. Yesterday I picked it back up and after playing it for a while, I decided to write an article about it. So, here it is! This game was actually the reason why I wanted my first console. Yeah. Loyal readers know that my first console I ever owned was my Wii. I have more been a gameboy kid. (That’s why handheld gaming is such a big focus on my blog.) Anyways, enough talking in this introduction. It’s time to delve into my opinions of this game before I beat it. As usual, feel free to leave a comment with your opinion on the game and or the content of this article. 

Navi is back? 

In this game, they thankfully dared to change around the usual story of Zelda being kidnapped. In this game it’s actually your goal to defeat the evil trying to destroy the land, while Zelda is supporting you.

It’s quite clear how they tried to do something different with this game. Honestly, it works for me. The story is full of amazing moments that can please any Zelda fan. I even got emotional during one or two scenes due to the pure nostalgia bomb that was dropped.

But why did I choose this subtitle? Well, that’s because one of the main complaints with the game is that Fi has a similar level of annoyance to Navi from Ocarina Of Time. While I don’t think that’s true, I do see where people are coming from. In my opinion, I think that Fi could have benefited from a bit more development. The lack of development is the main reason why Fi gets compared to Navi, I think. Also, she warns you if your Wii Remote batteries are almost empty. That is rather annoying since it already displays a small symbol in the bottom right corner. I think that Fi is a character with a lot of unused potential.

25 years of joy

This game has been released for the 25th birthday of the series. To various people, it was a disappointment, but I honestly disagree. This isn’t the best Zelda game out there yet it does manage to be one of the best titles in my book.

The story does feel genuine. I already talked about that, so let’s move on to the presentation. This is where this game truly shines. This game is a combination of the shell shading of “Wind Waker” and the more realistic  visuals of “Twilight Princess”. It works perfectly.

Thanks to this style, the game can be serious or less serious when it needs to be. I got truly sucked into the game various times. The animation has a lot to do with that too. Everything behaves like it would in real life. Thanks to the presentation you start to walk that thin line of believing that the world is real and alive. You start to forget that this is a game world.

So, it’s clear that I think that the game looks like eye-candy. I don’t know if it pushes the Wii to it’s limits, but honestly that doesn’t really matter. It needs to be a fun game to play. More on that later.

I haven’t talked about everything of the presentation yet. The music and sounds of the game. That’s part of the presentation too. Let me tell you, this game has no voice acting, like we are used from the Zelda series, but it does have an amazing sound design. The sound effects give a nostalgic vibe yet they feel new and fresh as well. The music is one of the game strongest points. I never have heard a more melodic, touching to veteran players, enjoyable, memorable… soundtrack in a game! It gets you in the right mood every time. It never gets boring to listen to one tune.

Wii Motion Plus

When you pre-ordered the game, you got a special disc of the concert of the Zelda music, a poster, a special box and a special golden Wii remote with the Wii Motion Plus. I honestly think that without the Wii Motion Plus controls the game wouldn’t have been as much fun as it is now.

I had moments where I felt that the Wii Remote was actually Link’s sword. Every little shake you did with the sword, Link actually did on screen.

The controls of this game are nearly perfect. While I feel that the controls for the bird rides could have been improved on, I have no other big complaints about the controls.

About the flying, you control the bird by the Wii Remote only. Now, for all other movement, you use the that other thingy… The nunchuck. This feels awkward from time to time. I can’t count on one hand how many times I tried to use the joystick of the nunchuck to try to move my bird. It might be my impression but I think that there is a lag between the moving of the controller and the bird.

Anyways, I think I’ll leave it here for my first impression. I realize that I haven’t talked about gameplay yet or more in depth about the presentation. But those things will be talked about more in depth in the review. (If I ever write it) I hope you enjoyed reading my first impressions of this game. I hope to beat it soon, so I can fully review this game. Thanks again for reading and until another article. Take care and game on!

First Impression: Nicktoons – Spongebob and Friends – Battle For Volcano Island (PS2) ~ Thou Are Summoned

(Little blog news: Sorry for not writing a lot. I’m extremely busy. Follow me on my Twitter for updates.)

Wikipedia entry

Back when the gameboy advance SP was the latest of the latest gameboy’s from Nintendo, I could rent out games from a local game store. The same one I buy most of my games at today. I love those guys. They are extremely friendly, talk with you about games, have an amazing helpdesk… Lot of advantages. For those who are interested in some Belgium culture while learning about my opinion of the games I play, here is the site of my game store. But be warned, it’s in Dutch. Game Mania is just awesome. I rented the latest Zelda game, which was the Minish Cap, and a few other games. The GBA version of this game was among them. Bummed out that I had to return the GBA version because it was so awesome I looked all over for this game. Sadly enough, I wasn’t able to find a copy for myself. Until one day I passed by and saw this in the 2nd hand PS2 games shelf. I was thrilled. Finally a copy of this game for myself. Not the one I wanted but hey, it’s a start. My expectations where high. I tried to set them really low to avoid a major disappointment but I was happily surprised. This game is pretty great. Why, I’ll explain in this article. But don’t let you get fooled by the fact it’s a kid’s game. Don’t judge a book on it’s cover, or a game on it’s box-art. Who knows, there might be a great gem inside. Anyways, let me know in the comments how I did in this article and your views on this game. Even when you didn’t play it. So, here we go. 

Open yet closed?

Expect it, I’ll make a lot of references and comparisions to the GBA version of this game. Something I really liked in the GBA version is the fact you could walk around and pick the order of the levels yourself. Of course, parts where locked away until you reached a certain point of the game, but you didn’t had to finish all the levels in one section before you could advance to the next section.

If this game works with the same idea, I can’t tell just yet. From what I see now, it’s a tad bit more linear. But there is a central hub. And here is the neat thing, you are free to explore the whole thing. The restrictions from the GBA version aren’t there.

But what I really like in this version of the game is how the story is presented to you. It’s a big improvement above the GBA version where the story was somewhat absent. Your goal in this game was a bit unclear, since it was only explained at the start and the end of the game. The cut-scenes in this game really aids to bring character to the story and really makes the game more fun.

Damage?

This game got a lot of marks from me. But one thing makes me doubt if this game is actually worth all my praise. The absence of a proper health display is worrying. You have to guess how many hits you can still take before you die. And the only thing that happens after a lot of hits is that your green behind the still image of the character changes into orange and then into red. In the GBA version you had a limit amount of hearts. And that provided a bit more challenge. With the actual amount of health you have in this game, it gets a whole lot easier.

Another thing where this game loses points is that the music is forgettable. Don’t get me wrong, it’s does it’s job but it’s actually not good enough to want to download the OST or get it stuck in your head. On the other hand, the voice work get a big thumbs up. I really like the sound effects and I think they add more then the music to the game. The voices really makes the funny story come to live. I also like the nods to previous games and to the series of the characters who are in the game.

Graphically this game is colorful and pretty. This helps a lot when you want to explore the world since it’s a blast to do. And here is where it gets even more interesting. Thanks to a whole ton of collect-ables and unlock-ables, this game’s replay value skyrockets. And then the possibility to take multiple paths helps a lot too. Exploring this colorful world is really fun to do. And this is backed up by a lovely short loading screen where great animations are displayed.

Speaking of which, the animation in this game is good. I really like the attention to detail in some parts. Patrick’s health display also changes the more hits you receive. I didn’t see it happening with the other characters though. I really like how this game all comes together.

Finish?

I think I might finish this game in order to review this one. I actually think they deserve it for this game.

The level design is extremely well done. They added in spawners that pop out more enemies for you to fight until you destroy the source. The combat works great for a kids game but isn’t more then mashing the attack button.

The control scheme is alright. To my knowledge, there are two different settings. But I didn’t had any complaints about it while playing this game.

I also found out that this game might be short. After finishing two levels, the save file said I completed 20% of the game. Hopefully this is a mistake since if the game is extremely short, the marks will fall in the review.

Thankfully, the game is multiplayer too. You can play this game with two players. Or that’s what I can gather with the empty not used space and the mention of “player 1”. So, I have to check on that.

Anyways, that’s all for this game. Thanks for reading and I hope to catch you at a next read. But I’m now going to continue playing games to make new articles for you guys. Cheers!

My gamer style ~ What’s your style?

So, this article is going to be something really different. I’m going to talk about how I game, how I select my games to review and play. Also, I’ll be talking about how important gaming is and was till this point of time. I might write several articles about this subject but that depends if I’m not lazy. This blog was started with these sort of articles in the back of my mind. I wanted to write more then just reviews. I wanted to share my adventures in the wonderful land of gaming with you. So, to explain this differently, I’ll be looking at how I roam the land of gaming. Feel free to share your gamer experiences here. I love to read them, so drop a comment. But without further ado, let’s dive into my gamers life.

Brief history.

Sometimes I think I was born with a Nintendo Gameboy. As soon as Pokémon came out, I got the blue version of the game and I couldn’t stop playing. But that wasn’t my very first game.

Before that, I played Pac-Man on my gameboy. That’s the very first game I remember owning. I also had games like Alleyway for my gameboy.

My gameboy & I couldn’t be separated. Man, I took that thing everywhere. On the bus, at school, on the toilet. I even remember playing at the egde of my bathtub. Okay, I might have not taken it with me in the shower and believe me, I’ll never try.

Although I have 3 consoles in my collection, my passion is still with handheld gaming. That’s because of how I grew up. My parents didn’t want a NES or SNES hooked up to their TV. They wanted to see their shows, you know. Parents are often that way. Well, expect modern parents then. Games like WarioWorld, Super Mario World 2, The Legend Of Zelda… kept me coming back over and over again.

I was always so jealous when I went over to my cousin’s place. He had a NES and DuckHunt. I remember on a birthday party that I played it nearly non-stop. I enjoyed the game so much I couldn’t put it down. And in addition to that, my love for Nintendo was already extremely big, so why continue?

Fast forward to June 2013, a year that flew by. I have a rather nice collection in my opinion. More then just Nintendo. And now I play games on many devices. I often start my gaming sessions by playing a bit on my laptop, then moving on to my consoles and then finishing with my handhelds.

My favorite style of games

Readers of my blog and people who know me in my real life will know that I play a big variety of games.

My most loved genres are visual novel, adventure, action, role-play, point & click, puzzle and RPG. The genres you see me play very often are shooters. Games I’ll never play are games like Fighting or Racing games.

I have nothing against the genres but I just don’t like them. In fighting games I don’t like the fact that you have to defeat one opponent and that’s all that there is to the game. It doesn’t do enough to keep me coming back. And racing games, I have a great friend who actually is way better then me. Plus, they require you to know a bit about cars, which I don’t know a thing about.

Games with a big open-world, a memorable adventure and great gameplay is the recipe for a game that I’ll rate extremely high. Perfect examples are Okami, Zelda and Tomb Raider.

But there are games with a deep story that I enjoy too. Examples of that are Ace Attorney and Corpse Party.

I admit that I developed a love for games that much that some manage to emotionally influence me. Those series can’t do anything wrong in my eyes and I sometimes forgive major gameplay flaws in game.

But how exactly do I play games? Well, I mostly lay on the sofa or sit on my bed. I find that rather comfy. On my nightstand I have my bottle of water or soda and some snacks. My tablet is also there. In case I need a walkthrough or when I want to post on my forum.

About walkthroughs, I prefer not reading them or looking them up. I can be rather stubborn and try over and over again until I got it. I might have rage-quit multiple games because of that, but which gamer doesn’t do that from time to time. But when I’m really stuck, I just look at a walkthrough and try to get a hint so I can continue.

All bottles of the nope!

There are things in games that actually can turn me away from a game. Broken menu’s I can forgive but when a game has a tutorial that is basically holding your hand, well I might put the game down faster.

Games that don’t have a story, I also won’t play often. Admitted, almost every game has a story but I don’t like them that much. Unless they are puzzle games like Magic Inlay that really got my attention.

I actually don’t like multiplayer. Yes, I’m a big loner in games. Unless you count playing survival in Minecraft with my friends. But the reason I don’t like multiplayer that much is because of games aren’t really meant for multiplayer.

The Call Of Duty series is a big wrongdo-er in the main reason I don’t like multiplayer. It makes the single player get weaker and weaker. And this disappoints me. Plus, you got the option to share and brag to your friends that “you are better then them”. Let the bullying commence. I like to stay away from multiplayer since I prefer to experience the game on my own and when I’m done with the game, I might test the multiplayer. But expect Halo for sometime, there isn’t really a multiplayer that made me come back.

Actually, this is going on for quite a while. I think I will abruptly end this article here. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for more gaming memories, personal opinions, reviews and first impressions. Keep it here.

NekoJonez signing out.