Additional Replays As I Tested Things
May. 26th, 2023 03:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroKirby Squeak Squad (DS, Replayed on Retroid Pocket 3) - This was a solid Kirby game. (So solid that I actually played through the full game twice when I first got it!) Eight areas, 120 hidden treasures, the “bubble” gimmick for storing items and powers for later use, a great selection of copy abilities, and nothing so difficult that it caused distress (though I did use save states for a couple of the stages because I got frustrated having to re-do areas). I hope Nintendo eventually finds a way to port this to current systems so that people who missed the DS era can enjoy it.
Zelda: Link Awakening DX (GBC, Replayed in RG35XX) – I tried this with the LADXR Randomizer, which I’ll admit is a bit buggy. (VisualBoyAdvance won’t even run its output; Gambatte tends to randomly replace sprites with other sprites or glitchy messes. Also, in my first attempted run I got Marin from the beach too early and couldn’t use the Trendy Game because she froze it.) It was entertaining, though! I got a shovel first, and dug up the bow in Bowwow’s doghouse, which I could use to get to the beach and get bombs, then bomb open the beach cave and get handed the boomerang (which destroys bushes, allowing me to proceed). Then I got some powder from the Trendy Game, and that loadout let me get through the forest to retrieve the Roc’s Feather and the Tail Key. I could retrieve the hookshot from the first dungeon, but couldn’t beat Moldorm without a sword. The second dungeon was similar, giving me the bracelet but stopping me at the boss. So I went exploring the world and found four heart containers in random places, plus the flippers under a rock. (I still somehow missed three heart containers by the end.) The trading game items are all disconnected from the sequence, so I could give the letter to Mr. Write for a heart container and put the scale back in the statue for a seashell. I dipped the fourth and fifth dungeons but couldn’t progress. I eventually found the Face key in the moat of the castle, and the sixth dungeon had everything else I needed to blow the game wide open…including a ribbon I could trade for my sword. (Seriously, everything was in the sixth dungeon. I had to go back twice because I kept missing stuff that was there!) I had to do the color dungeon (which I had to look up how to enter and do blind because the RG35XX wasn’t displaying the colors) to get the Yoshi Doll to trade for the Slime Key so I could enter the third dungeon. But by this point I had almost all of the items, so I was able to actually beat most of the dungeons really fast and out of order (because I already had their key items). This is the sort of randomizer hack that absolutely requires thoroughness, because spots that might be unnecessary collectables in the original might be critical items here. Credit to them for managing to break the severe linearity of Link’s Awakening, too.
Super Metroid (SNES, Replayed on Miyoo Mini+) – Another case of “I haven’t played this since the 90s, that I can remember”. And replaying it reminded me why I liked Metroidvanias much more after the rpg elements started getting added—this game is hard! I’m reasonably certain I beat it “honestly” (well, with Nintendo Power maps and such) back in the day, but nowadays I’m more interested in taking advantage of invincibility cheats and just exploring at my leisure. (And still periodically getting frustrated, because wall-jumping in this game is needlessly picayune.) I ended up finishing with 69% completion (nice!) in about four hours, which I think isn’t bad. But it’s a good reminder of why I have so many more logged hours of Castlevania games than Metroid games.
Super Mario World: A Plumber For All Seasons (SNES, Played on RG35XX) – A SMW romhack recommended to me because it’s both clever and not insanely difficult. (It starts on par with the later levels of the vanilla game, but gets close to NES-hard as it goes on.) The four areas are themed as seasons and there are lots of new graphics and enemies. Each level has five big coins and marks whether you’ve collected them all. This adds the Leaf power-up starting in the second world, and though you can store a power-up in the top box, a single hit drops you to small Mario no matter which power-ups you have. The levels are often very long; often longer than vanilla levels by a fair stretch. I made it halfway through the second season before my patience ran out. Recommended as a challenge to Mario players who aren’t quite up for Kaizo levels; and everyone else should watch a video because it is a gorgeous hack.
I’m also going to note that I played about an hour and a half of 7th Saga – Easier 7th Saga with Magic Fix and Extended Item Names Hack (SNES) on my RG35XX; that’s using both the Easier 7th Saga magic fix hack that I actually played over a decade ago; and a new Extended Item Names hack that re-translates the names of all the items and equipment and expands them to 14 characters so they can use real words. So no more “Brill” sword or “M Water”. Both of these are great hacks that improve the playability and readability of the game! But I was frustrated that the RG35XX doesn’t save sram for SNES games so I can’t transfer the saves to another device with fast-forward or cheat capability. So at some point I’ll likely start a fresh game, but for now I’ll note that you should totally use those patches.
Zelda: Link Awakening DX (GBC, Replayed in RG35XX) – I tried this with the LADXR Randomizer, which I’ll admit is a bit buggy. (VisualBoyAdvance won’t even run its output; Gambatte tends to randomly replace sprites with other sprites or glitchy messes. Also, in my first attempted run I got Marin from the beach too early and couldn’t use the Trendy Game because she froze it.) It was entertaining, though! I got a shovel first, and dug up the bow in Bowwow’s doghouse, which I could use to get to the beach and get bombs, then bomb open the beach cave and get handed the boomerang (which destroys bushes, allowing me to proceed). Then I got some powder from the Trendy Game, and that loadout let me get through the forest to retrieve the Roc’s Feather and the Tail Key. I could retrieve the hookshot from the first dungeon, but couldn’t beat Moldorm without a sword. The second dungeon was similar, giving me the bracelet but stopping me at the boss. So I went exploring the world and found four heart containers in random places, plus the flippers under a rock. (I still somehow missed three heart containers by the end.) The trading game items are all disconnected from the sequence, so I could give the letter to Mr. Write for a heart container and put the scale back in the statue for a seashell. I dipped the fourth and fifth dungeons but couldn’t progress. I eventually found the Face key in the moat of the castle, and the sixth dungeon had everything else I needed to blow the game wide open…including a ribbon I could trade for my sword. (Seriously, everything was in the sixth dungeon. I had to go back twice because I kept missing stuff that was there!) I had to do the color dungeon (which I had to look up how to enter and do blind because the RG35XX wasn’t displaying the colors) to get the Yoshi Doll to trade for the Slime Key so I could enter the third dungeon. But by this point I had almost all of the items, so I was able to actually beat most of the dungeons really fast and out of order (because I already had their key items). This is the sort of randomizer hack that absolutely requires thoroughness, because spots that might be unnecessary collectables in the original might be critical items here. Credit to them for managing to break the severe linearity of Link’s Awakening, too.
Super Metroid (SNES, Replayed on Miyoo Mini+) – Another case of “I haven’t played this since the 90s, that I can remember”. And replaying it reminded me why I liked Metroidvanias much more after the rpg elements started getting added—this game is hard! I’m reasonably certain I beat it “honestly” (well, with Nintendo Power maps and such) back in the day, but nowadays I’m more interested in taking advantage of invincibility cheats and just exploring at my leisure. (And still periodically getting frustrated, because wall-jumping in this game is needlessly picayune.) I ended up finishing with 69% completion (nice!) in about four hours, which I think isn’t bad. But it’s a good reminder of why I have so many more logged hours of Castlevania games than Metroid games.
Super Mario World: A Plumber For All Seasons (SNES, Played on RG35XX) – A SMW romhack recommended to me because it’s both clever and not insanely difficult. (It starts on par with the later levels of the vanilla game, but gets close to NES-hard as it goes on.) The four areas are themed as seasons and there are lots of new graphics and enemies. Each level has five big coins and marks whether you’ve collected them all. This adds the Leaf power-up starting in the second world, and though you can store a power-up in the top box, a single hit drops you to small Mario no matter which power-ups you have. The levels are often very long; often longer than vanilla levels by a fair stretch. I made it halfway through the second season before my patience ran out. Recommended as a challenge to Mario players who aren’t quite up for Kaizo levels; and everyone else should watch a video because it is a gorgeous hack.
I’m also going to note that I played about an hour and a half of 7th Saga – Easier 7th Saga with Magic Fix and Extended Item Names Hack (SNES) on my RG35XX; that’s using both the Easier 7th Saga magic fix hack that I actually played over a decade ago; and a new Extended Item Names hack that re-translates the names of all the items and equipment and expands them to 14 characters so they can use real words. So no more “Brill” sword or “M Water”. Both of these are great hacks that improve the playability and readability of the game! But I was frustrated that the RG35XX doesn’t save sram for SNES games so I can’t transfer the saves to another device with fast-forward or cheat capability. So at some point I’ll likely start a fresh game, but for now I’ll note that you should totally use those patches.
