Gamer, as of this post we are nearly halfway to 2049 since the turn of the millennium.

What are you most excited for? Personally, I cannot wait to see jet-propelled cars ramping off the hillside roads in my neighborhood and sprouting wings to do somersault barrel rolls, all while at least one of them constantly hits their horn that plays a WAV file of Peppy Hare. Actually, that sounds abominable. My curmudgeon old ass while never get any sleep, what a bleak future. I'm investing in anti-air cannons as we speak for such a horrendous incoming potential situation.

I will not tolerate illegal street racing with a side of wings, consider me an enemy if you cannot wait for this most terrible disturbance of my peace.

This one's bullshit and I got bored and sadde and ditched it for now. 10-12 all have this really annoying shit with the continues where it's like, while they're infinite now, they always put you back at the start of the level instead of dropping you off where you were like in earlier games. There are frequently times where you'll be stuck in the same spot for a long ass time due to this and it's just not really as enjoyable. You also can't adjust your number of lives in the options anymore for some reason. 10 is still quite manageable despite this but 11 is a hassle and this is just outright not very fun.

During some point in stage 5 I clicked on "redo from beginning" from the pause menu, thinking it'd put me back at the start of the level, and it put me at stage 1. I'll probably be coming back to it later but for now ehh h no thanks

I'm of 2 minds with Another World. One mind that it's literally the pinnacle of the medium and a beautiful piece of art, and another that it's just a poorly made piece of shit.

FFS, it's one of the most legendary games of all time. A master class work in rotoscoping that along with Prince of Persia influenced countless rotoscoped games as well cinematic platformers in the vein of Flashback or Blackthorne.

There are no health bars, no maps, no scores, no equipment, nothing, it's like a real ass chadventure. One of the most immersive games of all time.

The alien buddy is really charming. "Mike Aruba" to you too, buddy.

But at the same time, this shit runs in single digit FPS with framedrops. There are pixel perfect jumps out the ass, especially in the cave which hard filtered me as a kid.

Once one knows what they're doing, the game is only like 20 minutes long and is pretty entertaining to speedrun if nothing else, though perhaps "Another World speedrun" is an oxymoron with how slow-paced the game is.

Also if I'm being truthful, vibes aside the game is rather shallow and there's nothing to its story.

Giving this game 3 stars doesn't feel right. Giving it 5 stars feels right. Giving it 0.5 stars feels right. I generally think the star system is a really good way to get across one's feelings and enjoy using it, but if this isn't an example of how trying to quantify a qualitative experience is silly sometimes, what is?

Anyway countless creators including the likes of Hideo Kojima, Shu Takumi, Suda51, Shinji Mikimi, and Fumito Ueda all took inspiration from this game. If you enjoy any of their works, you owe it to yourself to give this a try. Wouldn't even insist on trying it without save states lol.

GENTLEMEN, START YOUR ENGINES
For the past few months I’ve been obsessing over this game, while not actually sitting down to play through it. Not too long after I had dipped into Ridge Racer Type 4 I became interested in other racing games, and eventually learned about Daytona USA. An iconic arcade racer that- immediately took my interest. The aesthetics, soundtrack, and arcadey nature made me raise an eyebrow. I wanted to try this.
But only now have I actually gone through every track in the original game, after playing the first two levels on and off for about two months. Some of that is due to Daytona’s skill curve. I wouldn’t call it as easy to pick up and play as Ridge Racer. The way drifting works is significantly more difficult to pick up on, and overall this game has more emphasis on needing to learn all of its mechanical intricacies to play properly. That being said, you can still do okay-ish enough by knowing only the basics, even on automatic transmission.
Gameplay wasn’t the main factor for my interest in the game, though. I was much more curious about everything else. Daytona USA is absolutely seeping with SEGA’s energy from the 90’s. Bright blue skies loom over you, as head bopping tunes, some of Sega Sound Team’s pure finest, play in the background. Takenobu Mitsuyoshi’s fantastic vocals for every track elevated the score, and with the Saturn version, made his voice fully realized in the realm of CD quality audio. The soundtrack is mainly comprised of three songs, The King of Speed, Let’s Go Away, and Sky High, all of which are FANTASTIC. Both the arcade and Saturn versions of these tunes are some of my favorites in video games period, reminding me of similar Sega soundtracks like Sonic R and Sonic CD. Just music that is riding with both energy, creativity, and depth.
The 1994 Saturn port of the game isn’t well regarded, and while for good reason too, it’s still very solid. The technical aspects of the game are a bit annoying, such as the drop from 60fps to 20fps, and the limited draw distance being- very apparent. It still plays great, though, and it also introduces the arranged soundtrack. I think considering the crunch development cycle of the Saturn version in order for it to release on launch, alongside the limitations of Saturn hardware compared to Sega’s technical beast that is the Model 2, it’s a lot better than it could’ve been. Nowadays, if you have a PS3 or Xbox, you can just play a modern port of the arcade version for about ten bucks, which isn’t a bad price. There still is merit to trying older versions of the game, but if you had to pick one version… it’s probably that. I still adored the Saturn version, with it’s cute little limitations, shadows and other visual effects simply being a very obvious dithering effect, and overall comfiness. It is worse than the arcade version, but it still offers that core Daytona experience.
Little side tangent, can I just say that the box art for both of the Daytona USA ports on Saturn in Japan look fantastic? The 1994 one is oozing with color, while the Circuit Edition one has this amazing evening sky. The NTSC-U box arts by comparison are… fine, but a little generic.
Daytona USA is a special game to me. It’s not my favorite racing game (I still think RRT4 is), but it’s a game that reminds me of why I loved Sega in the 90’s and 2000’s, especially with those bright blue Sega skies. I don’t know if I’ll ever fully be able to explain what this game’s aesthetics mean to me, but it makes me happy and I guess that’s all that really matters. Please play this, if you can, it’s less than 30 minutes long if you play all the tracks, and it is really fun.

A skillful game for skillful gamers.

Such skill to get around the terrible and gimped crouching that doesn't register your thumb naturally rolling on the dpad to begin immediately moving so you can evade the erratic patterns of the enemies!

I can't believe you got the alignment of Saturn's rings just right so that the ghosts don't spawn directly on top of you! Yowie wowie! A leprechaun must've jaywalked near your house, because the big guys decided not to constantly take a massive shit on the ladders and camp your ass! WOAH WOAH WOAH! What a fantastic god-fearing moment you had saying your prayers so the Arremers wouldn't swoop at impossible angles! Deary me! The Unicorn bosses didn't decide to charge you constantly?! How much did you pay them?! YA-YA-YOWZA! I commend your ability at kindly asking the jarheaded zombies to not pickpocket your lance and replace it with a torch! GODDAMN! You already knew the dragon in stage 3 was immune to the lance and grabbed the torch prior?! SKILLFUL ARTHUR! CONGRATURATIONS TO YOU ON YOUR ABILITY TO POWER CYCLE THE CONSOLE CORRECTLY!

rolls three dice

YIPPIE YAY! I rolled three sixes! I just beat Ghosts n' Goblins on Nintendo! What a great classic for the system!

turns into bongo cat and slaps the end of the table for the next hour

Btw, the Famicom version doesn't have continues unless you cheat code, Transformers Convoy no Nazo moment. Good fuckin' game. Glad I played three days in a row with a different experience each time. sips chocolate milx of quality