From Newsgroup: uk.games.video.misc


Hey look, it's a new king. That's a good excuse for another bank holiday
next week.

Play:
--=--

AfterImage (PS5/NSW) - It is... aggressively okay. It's a Metroidvania
that rewards exploration and has very consistent rules, and the
hand-drawn art is quite good without being overdesigned or fussy. But
the writing is terrible, full of made-up words that you can't suss out
the meaning of from context and (weirdly) too little exposition to tell
you what's going on or why you should care. I assume cheerfully that the
game was written in Chinese and then translated into other languages in
a somewhat rushed manner. If you have a choice of platform, skip the
Switch one because it does this stupid thing where the loading screen
doesn't tell you that it's loading anything, so you're sat staring at a beautiful animation that doesn't actually tell you if the game has
crashed or not. And because it's an Unreal game ported to Switch
somewhat haphazardly it will be prone to randomly crashing.

Lode Runner DS (DS) - Woo! It's got the level editor! This is literally
the best implementation of Lode Runner ever because there's touch screen support for the level editor. But every screen and every menu option is accompanied by row after row of Japanese language text. The actual game
itself is made from the Famicom/NES sprites and music, which is only a moderate shame because I was expecting the original 8-bit home computer rotoscoped sprites for some reason. It is a literal crime against
humanity that this was not localised for the west in ten different
languages.

Monaco GP (PS2) - A port of the 1979 arcade game, and not of the actual
proper Super Monaco GP as I deluded myself into thinking. No wonder it
was only $15. Still, it's a fascinating glimpse into the minds of game designers of that time who had grand visions about how to represent
little fractions of the real world in a system that only supported 16
colours and eight directions. There's barely anything of Formula 1 in
the game, as it's much more like the maze games of the time in that you collect little items on the track and only get derailed mometariliy by obstacles or opponents. I'm glad I've played it now, but I probably
won't return to it.

Virtua Fighter 2 and Virtua Fighter 10th Anniversary (PS2) - Let's get
this part out of the way first: the 10th Anniversary game is just the
VF4 engine with VF1 character models and no terrain or special rings.
It's nice to look at, but once you've seen that it is essentially Virtua Fighter 4 there's no reason that you really shouldn't be playing the
actual real game. VF2 on this platform is masterful though, a
one-for-one port of the arcade title that I don't even think the Yakuza
titles have included properly. I am going to play the hell out of this.

Want:
--=--

A new JPN-region PS2 (PS2) - My JPN-region Playstation 2 has bit the
dust finally. I'm playing all my new Sega Ages games through emulators,
but I'd really like to have the actual real hardware in hand again. It's
sort of weird how little of that hardware is available to buy now.

SaGa Scarlet Grace (NSW) - An English-language version of the SaGa game
from the Vita that was never localised before? Yes please. Oh, it's only
on the eShop in the States? Does the AS-region one support English? Yes
it does because Square Enix are particularly lazy about what code goes
in what region. Imma order dat.

Bin:
-==-

Nothing game-related

Expenditure:
-----=-----

Balance forward - $1,138

Playstation Vita Wifi (Vita) - $120
Lode Runner (DS) - $21
Shining Force Feather (DS) - $13
Shining Wind (PS2) - $10
Shining Hearts (PSP) - $10
Shining Blade (PSP) - $10
Virtua Fighter 10th Anniversary (PS2) - $30
Gunvari Collection (PSX/PS2) - $30
Sega Ages Vol 11 Fist of the North Star (PS2) - $12
Sega Ages Vol 16 Virtua Fighter 2 (PS2) - $33
Sega Ages Vol 2 Monaco GP (PS2) - $16
Sega Ages Vol 1 Phantasy Star Generation (PS2) - $22
Sega Ages Vol 27 Panzer Dragoon (PS2) - $29
Star Renegades (NSW) - $22
Ryu Ga Gotoku Zero (PS3) - $29
Saga Scarlet Grace Ambitions (NSW) - $47
Atelier Mysterious Trilogy Deluxe Pack (NSW) - $90
Kemco RPG Selection Vol 2 (NSW) - $35
Kemco RPG Selection Vol 3 (NWS) - $32
Sega Ages 2500 Vol 14 Alien Syndrome (PS2) - $32
Ryu Ga Gotoku Kiwami (PS3) - $16
Biohazard HD Remaster (PS3) - $23
Kurohyou Ryu Ga Gotoku Shinshou (PSP) - $13
Kurohyou 2 Ryu Ga Gotoku Ashura Hen (PSP) - $15
ASH Archaic Sealed Heat (DS) - $10
Sega Ages 2500 Vol 33 Fantasy Zone Complete (PS2) - $77
Phantasy Star Nova (Vita) - $10
Metal Max Xeno Reborn (PS4) - $30
R-type Final 3 Evolved Deluxe Edition (PS5) - $50

Total to date - $2,027
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From Newsgroup: uk.games.video.misc

Kendrick Kerwin Chua <kendrick@nospam.io-nyc> wrote:

Play:

Nethack (nethack.alt.org) - after repeated adventures in
character-killing, I finally ascended a Barbarian. The turn count was
a bit silly on this one, 71k makes it one of my longest goes ever in
that sense. Getting the right armour together was a particular
struggle, which wasn't exactly helped by a lich destroying my shield
of reflection at the castle due to my lack of magic resistance. It's
just as well I happened to find two magic markers (!) as otherwise I
really wouldn't have had enough wishes available to make anything
work. And of course, having then sensibly wished for speed boots, I
ended up finding two more pairs before the end of the game. As you do.

Virtua Fighter 2 and Virtua Fighter 10th Anniversary (PS2) - Let's get
this part out of the way first: the 10th Anniversary game is just the
VF4 engine with VF1 character models and no terrain or special rings.

I initially misinterpreted that as special ring stages, and had
visions of Akira running around like Sonic in VF4 proper.

Want:

To somehow include a joke about having had a max of 404 HP at the end
of that Nethack game. Alas, I've not found a way.

Bin:

Microsoft's rhetoric over the UK rejection of the Activision deal,
which I don't think will win them many fans over here. Also, it's hard
not to wonder if (though this is pure speculation) regulatory bodies
might quietly have some level of international collaboration precisely
to avoid this sort of obvious divide-and-conquer attempt.

The first part of Nethack's ascension message from your deity - surely
a 3.6.x change, but I don't remember noticing it before. IMHO it's a
weirdly gratuitous change, with the old version working better despite
arguably having a bit more of the character of a game ending rather
than sounding traditionally godlike.

-Rus.
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From Newsgroup: uk.games.video.misc

On 2 May 2023 14:58, Russell Marks wrote:

Microsoft's rhetoric over the UK rejection of the Activision deal,
which I don't think will win them many fans over here. Also, it's hard
not to wonder if (though this is pure speculation) regulatory bodies
might quietly have some level of international collaboration precisely
to avoid this sort of obvious divide-and-conquer attempt.

It's not quiet - they have open discussions about the work they've been
doing and comparing competition regimes. There are large-scale
conferences where they present case studies to each other and talk
about the intricacies of national and international merger decisions.

They are not the most exciting events but they do supply good wine in
the evenings.

Tim (tm)
--
Blog: xexyz.blogspot.com
Site: www.economic-truth.co.uk
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