phantom_leo said:

Wow... I remember when a new Mario game would be monumentous. You could feel the excitement and electricity in the air and would even have to be concerned that someone would snatch your copy out of your hands in desperation because they weren't fortunate to get one of their own...

...

...

Now...?

Let's all have a moment of silence in rememberance of the good times now gone.

Had your moment of silence? Good, I am going to play Devil's Advocate for a moment, in a moment...

First off: This is a milestone launch day for Nintendo... Can you tell? Can't blame you if you can't! People should be more excited though... Putting NSMB 2 aside for just a moment, the 3DSXL is out, and it is truly SPECTACULAR! It is thinner than the current 3DS, and the body of the system is about a half an inch wider... Crazy if you think about it: The screens are 90% BIGGER, but the system itself is not that much so! The top-screen is thin and rounded, rather than angled like the first, there's much less glossy blackness surrounding the top screen, the speakers are a little differently designed, you can almost not see them, but you can CERTAINLY HEAR them! The sound quality seems to have been enhanced a little bit. The bottom screen is bigger too (obviously) but it fits so much better into your hands and the rounded design lends itself soooo much more to comfort, it is not even funny! One thing to note though: Due to the size of the system itself now, it's a little tougher to press the shoulder buttons and keep your fingers on the buttons at the same time! It's nothing too disruptive, but playing Mario Kart 7 just got a tad tougher!

The 3D enhancement steals the spotlight though, and that is the very reason for the existance of the system in the first place! The difference in the 3D is kinda akin to playing a console game on a 25-inch TV versus a 60-inch TV... There's just so much more of a viewing area, you can focus more on the center of the screen, rather than seeing the black borders so prominently on the sides in your peripheral vision... because there's that LACK of constant, defining border where the 3D field begins and ends, the effects --REALLY-- pop out of the screen now! It's a MUCH more dramatic effect! As has been echoed by sooo many reviewers so far, THIS is how the system SHOULD HAVE been from the start! Playing games like Mario Kart 7, or just even seeing the floating boxes of the Option Screen... they look like they NEVER have before! The difference between the original and the XL is as dramatic a difference as the ORIGINAL Game Boy Advance to the Game Boy Advance SP! The longer stylus, the better battery life, the larger SD card, all just icing on a very TASTY cake!

If only there were games...

Oh, wait! A "new" game --DID-- come out today!  

I'm not hear to say anyone is "wrong" because they are not. I was just as UN-enthused this morning as the rest of you all are. It's not --AS-- bleak as you would expect though! Is it immediately familar? Yes. Do I want a REAL brand-new Mario? YES! HOWEVER... it's hard to play the game and not get a bit excited... The colors and the animation really POP now! There are extra frames to everything and they really show! The swaying of the background objects and enemies to the music is just as infectous as it always was. The sharpness of the 3DS screen versus what was possible on the Wii makes the game LOOK that much better... The gimmick of the game is what makes or breaks it now. If you play it as a Mario platformer, JUST to get from beginning to end, you'll probably be bored and uninspired --BUT-- if you take into account the 1,000,000 Coin angle, it adds something... It's undefinable at first, but the coins have taken on a slightly different meaning now... The game plays like a big-brother-console game when you are on the verge of earning an Achievement or Trophy... What was taken for granted before, now has whole new meaning, and you'll find your motivation for playing the game itself has shifted in the slightest... The game lets you know when you pass certain milestones for coin collection, and you are going to have that playing in the back of your mind as you grab more coins, grab more coins... It's not just reaching the flag now, it's reaching the flag having maixmized the number of coins you could have for that particular level! There's SOMETHING... a golden glimmer of hope in what appears to be another tired re-tread! Could it have been so much more? Yes. Should it be dismissed? No. I can easily see a few months from now, a Hobo Cup 2.0 where Iga and Vader are competing against each other in a Coin run in this game... Long story, short: Don't give up on the Plumber just yet!

This hair talk has been fascinating... I guess we know what to rent when we have the first VGPressCon at a Houston-area Sizzler (Flobies).

I kid, I kid... hair cutting is actually an interesting topic. I can think of many humorous anecdotes relating to haircuts I have received over the years, but I'll save that for the podcast (I'll use Cuts Both Ways as the theme).

Speaking of which, Vader has Darksiders 2 and Sound Shapes impressions this week.

=-=-

SO, it's time for WHAT. HAVE. YOU. BEEN. PLAYING?!

Me: Mass Effect 3 (again on the podcast, at the very end to avoid spoiling anything).

I am having a surprising amount of difficulty in combat with this game. Every other fire-fight I am dieing 15+ times. WTF?

I did play some Gran Turismo 2 and some Sammy Sosa Softball Slam, but all in all a quiet week for me after I beat Borderlands.

bugsonglass said:

I played tons of Outland.  I finished the game in, I think, just two sittings - but each one was several hours long.  It's not too short for a downloadable game and it innovates all the way through and it's over before it starts to get stale or boring or overstay its welcome in any way.

Thinking about starting to play Bayonetta tomorrow.  I'm worried about one thing ... difficulty.  Those of you who played it, how did you find it in that respect?  To give you some context ... I gave up on DMC3 on, like, the second level.  Even on "easy" I just couldn't play the game at all.  I found DMC4 very manageable for the most part.  And I find GodOW games a bit on the easy side and usually choose to play them on the "hard" setting.  How will I find Bayonetta?

Bayonetta is all about timing. It's definetely challenging.

phantom_leo said:

I never had the patience to finish even ONE Devil May Cry. I was VERY compelled to finish Bayonetta, and so I did! It will seem very tough at first, and the checkpoint system may frustrate you a bit, but stick with it, it is WELL worth it!

Thanks   I hope I will too.  Generally speaking I think I really like most things you express excitement towards.  So, the signs for this are very good.

Killerjuan77 said:

Bayonetta is all about timing. It's definetely challenging.

While, I'm not sure what you mean exactly ... I guess my sense of timing is at least adequate.  I'm decent or better at most rhythm games, and I stay within time when playing music.

Many of the attacks in Bayonetta depend on:

tap, tap, tap

tap, tap (pause) tap

tap (pause) tap, tap...

You'll see!

bugsonglass said:

Thanks   I hope I will too.  Generally speaking I think I really like most things you express excitement towards.  So, the signs for this are very good.

Check out the second game I write about after that link!  

phantom_leo said:

bugsonglass said:

Thanks   I hope I will too.  Generally speaking I think I really like most things you express excitement towards.  So, the signs for this are very good.

Check out the second game I write about after that link!  

Yep.  Totally spot on!!  A little over a year later I share those exact sentiments regarding that game!

bugsonglass said:

I really can't wait to get Deadlight.  The artstyle in the game reminds me of this painter whose work I greatly admire.  Geoffrey Johnson

Also for some strange reason the game since the first screenshots somehow made me reminisce about Green Beret, an arcade game from the 80ies which I loved insanely as a child.

The artstyle is very unique. The use of black and shadows brings Limbo to mind, but it uses the Unreal Engine, it's not sprite-based. The rag-doll like physics of the character model made possible by using that engine makes the MANY ways you can die look THAT much more painful! Crushed, impaled by spikes, tackled by hordes of Shadows (Zombies), drowning... very much like Another World or Out of this World! You get a few more weapons than you did in THAT game though: A fireman's axe, a slingshot, a .38 special Revolver... You use these to solve puzzles MORE THAN you use them to fight! You are typically against an overwhelming number of foes, so fighting should be the absolute LAST resort!

What you know as Green Beret, we in the US know as Rush 'n Attack. It's not like that, really, the perspective may make it look like that's so, but it's faaar less action and faaar more puzzles. It uses timed jumps and obstacle avoidance more than knife strikes and controlled jumping!

Thanks Leo, sounds really good.  Don't think I have played this type of game before.  At least not in 2D.  I mean, I've played puzzle platformers before like Mario vs Donkey Kong and Klonoa on the GBA, but this sounds like a different beast.  A couple of reviews I read said the game is really really short.  Is that so?  (Not that it really matters to me though as I value higher a short experience I will remember for a long time, over a long one I'd sooner forget)

My very faint recollection of Another World was playing it briefly on my friend's SNES and getting hopelessly stuck pretty early on.  Back then I only really had experience with more arcade style games, so I may be better suited for something in that vein nowadays.