You've probably seen this floating around the internets lately. Yes, someone is taking Metroid II, the probably the single most disliked Metroid title, and is attempting to use the Zero Mission engine to make it into something the feels more like a traditional Metroid game. Why are people so excited about it, when Metroid II isn't well-regarded?
Well, aside from the prospect of a new Zero Mission-quality Metroid game, I think it has to do with why Metroid II didn't work. Getting the gameplay quality of the original Metroid out of a system with a 160 x 144 screen resolution and four shades of grey fro graphic display just wasn't happening. There's hope burning in every Metroid-loving gamer's heart that maybe Metroid II is actually an awesome game that just needed to be set free of the Game Boy.
Metroid II isn't the only sad story of developers trying to cram too much into a Game Boy game. The following seven titles are all potentially great, but they'd be tremendously better if they weren't Game Boy games. They deserve to be remade for modern hardware.
Since the last good game featuring Sonic the Hedgehog was Super Smash Bros. Brawl, I figure Sonic by default belongs to us now. That means it's time to talk about a more painful subject: why the core, console-release Sonic the Hedgehog games aren't good anymore.
The situation is so dire that Susan Arendt of Game|Life has issued a call Sonic's head on a platter. Her Sonic the Hedgehog Must Die simply states that Sonic's games are an embarrassment at this point, and Sega needs to stop making them entirely. It's an understandable viewpoint, but I don't agree.
Sonic is a popular enough character that it would only take one really good game to turn the series around and get people as excited again. Note that I don't mean a decent, playable game; I mean something really good, a must-play 4.5/5 masterpiece.
Sonic Team can still make that game, if they're willing to throw a lot of the current Sonic game formula out the window and start over scratch. Here's a list of the seven most important design principles I think our revolutionary, franchise-saving Sonic game would need to follow.
There's nothing I hate more than realizing that the children of today have it better than I did, and especially when it comes to video games. And not only do modern kids get to grow up playing the excellent Nintendo DS, some of the little jerks get to play it in school.
Right now a Scottish school is testing out a pilot program that gives every kid in math class a Nintendo DS and a copy of More Brain Training (a.k.a. Brain Age 2 in the US), which they're given twenty minutes to play every day when class starts. The results?
The performance of the class was compared with another which was taught normally and, given the common prejudice that computer games are a mindless waste of time, the results were surprising.
Teachers reported improved maths scores, better pupil behaviour and cooperation and a greater focus on the work at hand.
Geez, why stop there? If something like Brain Age 2 makes math bearable, I can offer school systems everywhere-- free of charge!-- a list of seven other curriculum-appropriate games that would surely have the same positive effect on students.
There are many articles about box art on the gaming internet. Some mock terrible box art, some praise the greats, many are just about that impressively terrible Mega Man box. Me, I want to take a look at a specific facet of box art's function in the process of convincing you to buy a game: its ability to lie.
A little bit of lying from box art isn't bad. The job of box art, after all, is to convince you that the game looks interesting and exciting. If the cover makes you want to flip the box over so you can read the little blurb on the back, then the box art has done its job. Unfortunately, some boxes try to achieve this by totally misrepresenting the game concealed inside the packaging. This can lead to the wrong people buying the game, or even worse, nobody buying it all.
This text originally ran in the Spring issue of the Wii Gamer's Guide, but because we like you internet folks so much, we're reproducing it here in its entirety. The text is by myself and Dave Rudden, and the subject is M-rated games on the Wii. It's one of the more interesting topics I've written about, since I don't ordinarily seek out games based on their gore factor alone. A lot of these games I had played, but hadn't thought much about before in terms of rating. Basically, this was interesting to write, and I hope it's also interesting for you guys to read. Jump behind the cut to get started.
So the guide I just finished writing is for Mana Khemia, a PS2 RPG of the Gust lineage. It's a series I basically like, but in a conflicted way. The games are really progressive and challenging in some respects, mindlessly easy and somewhat backwards in others. Playing it for the 100+ hours guidework demands left me with a lot of thoughts about what's right and wrong in RPGs. Yeah, this isn't too Nintendo-focused (outside of my examples, anyway), but it's just relevant enough that I felt like posting it! The list starts behind the cut.
Let's see. I've tackled doctors and pirates, so I think it's time for a look at Nintendo ninjas. Just in the interests of fairness, mind you! What follows is a completely arbitrary listing of the best Nintendo ninja characters and the games about them, based on the entirely biased criteria of what I have fun playing and writing about. Warning! Opinions and recollections that may be flawed by extreme old age lie ahead!
If you've snagged a Wii for someone you know, then check out this list if you want ideas for a game to go with it. As with its DS counterpart, this list assumes a situation where you don't know exactly what your gamer wants. That means the focus here is on easy-to-find titles with simple gameplay, stand-alone stories, and universal appeal.
Of course, universal appeal affects some potential players more than others. (In fact, there are games on this list I personally dislike.) To help make using this list a little easier, we've tagged each entry according to what kind of player is most likely to enjoy that game.
We divide players into three simple groups with slightly different needs and interests: Serious, Casual, and Kids. Serious games are tests of skill or strategy that require a significant investment of effort to play and enjoy. Casual games are easy for anyone to pick up and begin playing immediately. Kids games tend to be very imaginative and open-ended, usually emphasizing the ability to live out a fun fantasy life. If you want more details, please check out this post.
We've done a list of the best Nintendo doctors, but how do less distinguished professions fair on Nintendo hardware? How about, say... pirates? Everyone loves pirates these days, from Jack Sparrow to the Tales of the Black Freighter, but Nintendo loved pirates before loving pirates was cool. Also after. Because if the people want pirates, you give them pirates. In that spirit, here's a list of Nintendo's ten greatest pirates, along with a special honorable mention.
Feeling sick? Nintendo has the cure for what ails you... whether it's a runny nose, aching joints, or monstrous death robots. Good, bad, and just plain weird, here's an essential list of the twelve best and brightest men to carry a Ph.D. in Nintendo-land. These are men of SCIENCE!, their coats well-starched, their jaws square, and their theories insane.
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