Anyone retroing?

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#1 Mon, 03/10/2014 - 04:27
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Anyone retroing?

Lately I've been playing through Final Fantasy 9. I'm about half way through and digging it. Haven't played it since it came out on PS1. It's much better than I remember which is pretty unusual for a retro game.

Fri, 03/14/2014 - 13:52
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Not really but also havent played anything super new either..Ive been playing a lot of MW3 thats about it 

Sun, 03/16/2014 - 19:15
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I'm replaying 7 now, haven't played since High School.  I'm not very far yet, the pillar was just blown up and collapsed on sector 7.  What I have already gathered though is I dont' understand why people say this game hasn't aged well and is overrated.  I'm enjoying it again, for sure.  I think I'll play 9 next.

Wed, 03/19/2014 - 11:43 (Reply to #3)
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I agree. I've played 5,6,7,8 and 9 in the last few years and enjoyed them all except 8.  The summons completely spoil the rhythm.  Looking forward to trying the new HD remake of 10 on vita.

Wed, 04/30/2014 - 12:41
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So I found a disk a friend of mine gave me with about 500 NES games on it might do some play throughs with that . 

Thu, 05/01/2014 - 02:49
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Keep the retro bus rockin!

I've been playing Bravely Default on 3ds. Great little game. Quite oldschool in the final fantasy vein, but with most of the annoying parts removed.

Sat, 05/03/2014 - 11:06 (Reply to #6)
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CiaranORian wrote:

Keep the retro bus rockin!

I've been playing Bravely Default on 3ds. Great little game. Quite oldschool in the final fantasy vein, but with most of the annoying parts removed.

 

Do you go to Flea Markets for retro games?

Tue, 05/06/2014 - 09:05
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They don't really exist in Ireland.  There are a few kind of pawn shops or used good shops which can be worth checking out but the prices are usually overpriced since the owners assume old games are valuable. I normally have to resort to websites.

Mon, 05/26/2014 - 14:57
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So I finally got my simulator and found that I have 855 nintendo games..lol Some Ive never heard of and of course the classics were in there , my only issue is I think I need to configure a controler or something cause its damn hard on the keyboard.. So I played some Zelda,SMB,Metroid, AD&D and there are more I haven't even touched 

Mon, 10/06/2014 - 19:51
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I dont do as much retro gaming as I used to, but lately I've been staring at Shenmue. I grabbed the Xbox sequel because it was one of those "had to have it" moments and I havent cracked that open either... good excuse to bust out my DC.

Wed, 10/08/2014 - 03:50
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I think I have both Shenmue games somewhere but I confess I havent played either of them. If you do get around to trying them let us know what you think.

Wed, 10/08/2014 - 05:43
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I'm afraid to look at my dreamcast collection at this point... If only because I know I have so many titles that I acquired (cough) that I haven't played for it yet... Grandia, Power Stone, Skies of Arcadia... 

Sun, 10/12/2014 - 17:03
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Fired up Shenmue. Here goes nothing! I may blog about it, if anything to keep me going, because I get a little ADD with games sometimes. But this is one I've been meaning to spin. I'm going to dangle The Enemy Within as a carrot - would be nice to finish something and replace it with a new game for once.

Tue, 10/14/2014 - 15:26
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I am still waiting for Shenmue to "start". The controls to move are horrible. I've spent the last 2 game "days" wandering around trying to find clues and getting into the occasional scripted fight. I dont have much more patience at this point. I'm going to give it a little more time but man this is a slow starter. I feel like a dummy putting off The Evil Within just for this.

 

Wed, 10/15/2014 - 07:33
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That's it, I'm done. What a disappointment.

My biggest issue with this game that is consistently rated among the best of all time on any console is the truly terrible pacing. It's a great concept, but the opening hours (the real time hours, not the game) are so badly constructed that it takes more patience than I have to get through to get to the "meat" (which at this point I don't know when that will happen).

Example - at one point you have to find the 3 Blades - 3 shops that have Chinese people who may have clues to what you are looking for. Your journal tells you to go to a barber shop. You get there, and you're told to go to a different barber shop. Fine, so you head there and get a different clue about going to a park, where you find a clue about finding sailors, with another clue about going to a bar.

The bars dont open until the evening so you try to visit the other 2 shops (the other 2 blades). Except one isn't open until 5 game time, and the other had no clues at all (even though your journal says they do). So your choice is to either stand and wait for game time to pass until the shop opens, wander around aimlessly talking to people who tell you they have no time for you, or play slots at the casino for hours until the game clock is ready for you to advance. 

You can't advance time (something I read that they fixed in Shenmue 2), so that's all you can do. It's like its on rails until the shop opens. You make progress, but then sit there and do nothing until the scripted events start.

Then when you do everything you can do for that day, you have to run fumbling all the way home (in the dark, the lighting at night is terrible and there is no mini-map except for the in-game map placed on a billboard at the entrance of each zone) to sleep, then wake up and start the day again.

There's a total of 4 events with any action other than pushing a button to advance dialog. These are scripted and require timed button pushes to complete, MAYBE 5 minutes of action in all, in the almost 3 hours I spent with it. The remaining 2 hours 55 minutes was nothing but running from house to house and person to person starting dialogs trying to find the RIGHT people to talk to in order to advance the story.

Not for me. 

Fri, 10/17/2014 - 03:26
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Thanks for sharing.

I guess some "classics" just don't age well. I just finished Persona 3 yesterday which was released in 2006. It gets a 9/10 from me but again the first 2-3 hours are very slow with NO action. Its probably closer to 4-5 hours at the start of Persona 4. I guess thats pretty typical of Japanese RPGs.

Next up for me is Persona 2!

Sun, 10/19/2014 - 18:18
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Well, the "slow" start doesn't bother me in Shenmue per se - its the artificial gate, particularly with the time, that I dont like at all. It makes no sense, especially when there is little else to do - not much for dialogue (everyone you talk to says they dont have time for you) or setting. It feels forced. I do love the Persona series.

Tue, 10/21/2014 - 04:13
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I guess theres a difference between Persona where you spend the first few hours pressing "A" and learning about the characters and setting and Shenmue where you just sit there looking at the screen with nothing at all to do.

Can't wait for Persona Q next month. Even have it preordered.

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