The other day I was laying in bed after waking up, and kinda just started thinking about stuff, which normally isn't great since it tends to be things that put me in a massive depression pit that takes a while for me to climb out of. The usual "thinking too much" process I try to keep at bay with video games, drawing, and doing my best to keep myself around people despite having the charisma and charm of a clogged toilet. It just really bothered me for a while...

What if one day your hand just got bitten off by an alligator? Fuck, now I can't draw or game anymore, because the bastard ate it! No more hobbies for me! I'm a sad rabbit! Luckily Ayla Nonsense has me covered and has made a game that is friendly towards gator survivors. Only one hand? No problem!

JUST
BEAT
ONE
BOSS

One boss, one hand. That's all I need to bitchslap this shithead all the way from Kalamazoo to Timbuktu. I got your number ya underhanded magic mirror magician, you think you can get away with picking on me for my one-handedness?!?! Put that damn cigar out, this is a smoke-free home. I'll show you a card trick and it ain't gonna be pretty. I'm gonna brutalize ya, I'm gonna pulverize ya, I'm gonna smash you into the fucking ground ya smirkin' schnitzel. You're goin' down!!!! LET ME AT'EM!!!!

So I made a mistake. After reviewing The Kung Fu, I thought the next game was Victory Run and I proceeded to play and review that game last night. Turns out I was wrong, this was meant to be the next game so that was a mistake of mine. So this is certainly an odd one.

This game stars two actual Japanese comedians and I can't really say I'm familiar with them like at all but they are the stars of this game and I guess it makes sense, you gotta get some appeal to your console.

To my surprise this game is like a crude take on the first Wonder Boy game. It was made by Hudson Soft who would do the Adventure Island games. This game has a more arcadey feel due to it being based off that game. Now I have to confess I don't like the original Wonder Boy, I just find it obnoxious to play. But this game is actually decent.

First of all it was made easier since now your health bar is actually a health bar and not just a timer you need to keep up. You also got a few different combat actions but they don't have the best hitboxes unfortunately. The game's level design doesn't feel as unfair but it does have it's issues.

The game isn't perfect though as it starts to get too repetitive after a while and sometimes the enemy placement can be placed poorly in my opinion. There's also these keys you can find in the 3rd level of each field and if you don't get them you can't be the last level in the field and it'll take you back to that third level to get it. It doesn't help that the hitboxes you need to hit for platforms or items to show can be pretty small. Bosses are also not too hard if you're at full health and they're all the same which is lame.

The graphics are fairly basic as they probably focused more on the bigger sprites with a lot of personality in them. The music can be good but there's one song when you're in the clouds that I can't stand. Otherwise it's decent stuff. Also when the game was brought here, graphics had to be reworked because no one here would have knew who these two were.

I was surprised that this was a decent time. I always hear a lot of hate for this one but it's not that bad. I even liked it more then Wonder Boy 1 itself. Like I said it has issues and I'm not gonna ignore that but you could do worse and it's probably more entertaining for the people who know who these guys are. There's really no harm in playing either version but just don't go in expecting anything amazing.

we didn't have a lot of money growing up so it was always a treat to get a new video game so age 10 me was really excited to get this for my birthday. unfortunately my childhood gaming station consisted of a busted, lights-faded CRT strategically placed so that every single ounce of potential sunlight from a nearby window would assault the rounded glass. playing stuff with bright colors like Sonic and Mario wasn't much of an issue since I was always able to make out the bright colors but I completely fumbled through this game trying to make out anything through the dark palettes of Gotham City. my poor visibility was so tied to my experience that every memory I try to conjure of this game, continuously to this day, only comes out as a fuzzy, sunbleached, CRT-warped image in my mind.

can I remember this game well enough to even talk about it? nope. was it even a good game? I don't know, probably. 3 stars baby

this game, elite beat agents, and gitaroo man are all the proof i need to happily declare iNiS as the kings of rhythm games. a plethora of genres intertwined yet every song feels connected thematically. the note tapping is silky smooth and glides along to the beat naturally. all of this coated with a thick layer of inspirational emotional motivation and personal charm, presented strongly with a fun-filled artstyle. ends on such a gleeful note that erupts a certain fanfare inside all of us. transcends the boundaries of language with music as a device to communicate with the human spirit. reaches the zenith of the mountain and then shoots for the stars. bursting with overwhelming charisma. this is what video games are all about. goddamn.

Let's talk about sports.

I'm pretty sure Sports Talk Baseball and Road Rash 2 were both carts I got from my dad when he left his Sega Genesis with me. There was a good stretch where those were the only two games I had besides Sonic the Hedgehog 2, and between them Sports Talk got the most play. Why, you may ask? Oh, I'm sorry, I don't strike you as someone who's into sports?

You'd be correct. I played this so much because if you hit a homerun then you get to see a little picture of Sonic on the score board, and nothing made my adolescent mind more stupid than seeing a picture of Sonic.

As far as 16-bit baseball games go, Sports Talk is pretty alright mmmaybe(??), I don't know. It's not like I've played very many baseball games to compare it to, 16-bit or otherwise. The main gimmick here is that every game has commentary. Back in 92, having your games actually talk was incredibly novel, especially for a sports game that would otherwise be very dry. The voice samples are of course compressed, though they're also a lot cleaner than I'd expect from something like this, and there's quite a bit of soundbites crammed into the cart.

I bought this almost CIB for around ten bucks, it's missing a little leaflet that has a bunch of player stats on it. Stats are pretty important for these kinds of games, especially ones based on real players from real teams, but I never paid any attention to that shit. I throw the ball, I hit the ball. Sometimes I even catch the ball. I replayed this for the first time in nearly 30 years and shut it off the second I got a homerun. I saw Sonic. End of game.

What a lot of people either fail to realise or refuse to believe is that the best Sonic games are the flawed ones. The games that try to innovate with bold ideas unbecoming of a Sonic game, or any game. We've had 'perfect' Sonic games before like Sonic Mania or Sonic Generations and those games are great but they can't hold a candle to the way-too-serious tone of Sonic Adventure 2, the quaint but pointless Adventure Fields of Sonic Adventure, the audacity to make half the game a slow beat-em-up in Sonic Unleashed. People love Sonic for its ambition, not its accomplishments. People love games for their imperfections the same way they love people despite their flaws. Sonic Team has, for decades now, dared to do things that are new, bold, and weird. Sonic Frontiers is a continuation of that vision, and to reduce it to petty statements of "open world 🤓 sega hire this man 🤓 serious plot in cartoon rat game 🤓 the controls 🤓 but he's slow" is a pitch-perfect demonstration of how Sonic is doomed to fail. Look at your favourite games and try earnestly telling yourself they're flawless.

Credit to smaench for planting this seed in my brain, actual review when I'm done playing it and can let my thoughts digest rather than spewing unfiltered drivel onto your webzone.