Ninja Gaiden [NES] + R2RKMF: Scrolling Action Monogatari

[__SKYe]

I get the impression that metroidvanias sell better. Indie developers these days already have to deal with an oversaturated market, it makes sense that so many of them would play it conservative.

I'm of the same opinion, mainly because I believe longer playtime and RPG/progression mechanics are perceived to have more value than a straight up action game.
Agree with Sumez as well; in a classic action game any deficiencies in the gameplay will be amplified become readily apparent, since you can't mask them with the abovementioned length & RPG stuff.

[Marc]

I'd hoped to get 100% on Rondo last night, but ugh..... ST5'. The lower route kicks my ass, the upper is OK up until those two black knights corner me.

[Blinge]

Smack the one on the right as he comes in for free damage. Take him out first for wall chickans.
maybe my replay will help. Item crashes will help also!

https://youtu.be/ZUvLWOhkDCo?t=1598

[Stevens]

Isn't it the Oniken devs though? :\

That was a few years back though. A seemingly competent dev should be able to refine their business in that time frame.

I've no experience with it, but a few guys here have good opinions of their other game Odallus.

We shall see:D

[Despatche]

Turns out that August date for Shovel Knight is wrong. Dang.

Oniken and Odallus are pretty great for what they are, so we might finally see the game that exceeds Contra 4 with Blazing Chrome.

[kitten]

not really side-scrolling, but i figured i should plug the drive for the new, upgraded version of tobu tobu girl - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/fi ... =user_menu

it's a physical release for a brand new game boy game (well, okay, the original rom is a year or so old) that appears to be admirably authentic to classic game boy design sensibilities. i'm really hoping the stretch goal for super game boy support gets hit, i love that thing.

[Vanguard]

I've got a new recording setup that's easy to use and works really well. I figure I should post it in case anyone's interested.

Spoiler

I've been using the retroarch front-end for emulators and its built-in recording feature. It's very easy to use, works on a wide variety of emulator cores, and produces lossless quality videos. One flaw is that not all of its emulator cores support the recording function - for example, last I checked you can't use it to record mega drive games. For systems retroarch's recording doesn't work on, I recommend using OBS instead. Another flaw in retroarch is that it has a bit of a problem with audio desync. More on that later.

In retroarch's recording options, choose lossless quality. In directory options, set where you want the video file to go, and in input options set up a button to toggle recording. Record the game at its native resolution - you can play the game upscaled and still record at native resolution. Upscaling the recording in retroarch works well but is very resource-intensive and we can upscale it ourselves later. Start the game, press the record hotkey once and then press it again when you're done. I recommend starting your recording early and ending it late since it's easy to cut out unwanted parts later.

This next part was recommended to me by Perikles. Grab virtualdub, a freeware video editor. Use its rescale video filter to increase your resolution to whatever you want it to be. Nearest neighbor scaling is generally best for upscaling pixel art so go with that. I always upscale by an integer amount (eg 200%, 300%, 400%...). Select which frame rate you want to use, by default it should be the same as your recording, which is generally what you want. If you want to trim part of your video, select the first frame you want to keep and press home, then click the last frame you want and press end. If your video has gradual audio desync, which sometimes happens with retroarch, we can fix that in virtualdub. Select audio->full processing mode, then audio->use advanced filtering, and then audio->filters. Make sure auto-connect is checked and then add an input, time stretch, and output filter in that order. Edit the time stretch filter to fix the audio desync. Use a higher value if audio plays early and a lower value if the audio plays late. My experience is that going from 1 to 1.0001 fixes retroarch's desync perfectly but it's possible that different cores or different games will have different amounts of desync. Once you've done all that, save the avi. Note that if you're saving in lossless quality, the resulting video file will probably be huge, on the order of hundreds of gigabytes.

Now that we've got a good upscaled and synced recording, we need to do something about that absurd file size. For the final step, we'll download handbrake, another freeware program. Open your avi, choose which format you want to save as, what framerate you want, what resolution you want, and what video quality you want. You can downscale here if you want a specific resolution. Higher quality will mean a bigger file size, of course, the default looks plenty good to me. I recommend turning off handbrake's various filters. Once everything's set up, save your video. The resulting file should be fairly small, maybe 2 GB per hour with high quality settings.

Both virtualdub and handbrake can take an hour or more to do their processing, but the amount of time you the user have to spend on all of this is just a few minutes.

[Sumez]

not really side-scrolling, but i figured i should plug the drive for the new, upgraded version of tobu tobu girl - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/fi ... =user_menu

it's a physical release for a brand new game boy game (well, okay, the original rom is a year or so old) that appears to be admirably authentic to classic game boy design sensibilities. i'm really hoping the stretch goal for super game boy support gets hit, i love that thing.

Am I missing something about Tobu Tobu Girl?
As a homebrew dev, I'm all for supporting homebrew. And this is even made by someone from around here.
But as far as I can tell from screenshots and video, it's just one of those "jump forever" games you see all the time on mobile?

[Marc]

Smack the one on the right as he comes in for free damage. Take him out first for wall chickans.
maybe my replay will help. Item crashes will help also!

https://youtu.be/ZUvLWOhkDCo?t=1598

Certainly did, cheers man! Full upper, lower, and mixed all complete.
At 96% now but just realised I've never finished ST3 without having my sub weapon stolen, so I'm guessing there's an alternate boss if I take the lift up.

Went straight into playing some XX - From the first waves of Medusa Heads it's certainly up front about the fact that it intends to be a lot more mean (possibly occasionally unfair?) than Rondo. On previous occasions, I've made it as far as the Clock Tower by managing to stick to the upper route, but last night saw me getting knocked down on ST3 every time and having to face that floating magician boss on ST4. Seems to be a rhythm to it, but it all goes bananas if you get hit by one of his slow-down fireballs and get knocked off one of the platforms.
I know people compare them, but they're plainly different approaches to me - one's a more casual grab-bag of everything that makes Castlevania fun, one is more geared to NES-heads wanting a proper challenge. They seem more companion pieces than anything else.


It does however make me wish I could use the SNES mini pad when playing Rondo.

Played some IV afterwards to chill. Gonna have to make a save state from ST6 onwards, I want to 1CC it, but there's literally no threat for the first five stages.

[Vanguard]

Certainly did, cheers man! Full upper, lower, and mixed all complete.
At 96% now but just realised I've never finished ST3 without having my sub weapon stolen, so I'm guessing there's an alternate boss if I take the lift up.

Nice job! That same boss can also be accessed from a hidden area in 3' if you'd rather go that way.

Went straight into playing some XX - From the first waves of Medusa Heads it's certainly up front about the fact that it intends to be a lot more mean (possibly occasionally unfair?) than Rondo. On previous occasions, I've made it as far as the Clock Tower by managing to stick to the upper route, but last night saw me getting knocked down on ST3 every time and having to face that floating magician boss on ST4.

Moonwalk. Moonwalking is the solution to all of your pest problems in XX.

[kitten]

it's just one of those "jump forever" games you see all the time on mobile?

there were a fair amount of games in this vein on xbox live indie games, too, but a look at some play reveals it's got some actual stage design, enemy variety, etc. quite a few classic game boy puzzlers have comparably similar games on mobile these days, too.

you can watch how frantic some of the play gets, here, or watch how tight the requirements are for getting a highest rank clear on even the first stage, here. these things, along with the simple & modest but charming presentation, are enough for me to give it a fair shake.

[Marc]

XX's 4th stage music is AMAZING, possibly even better than the PCE rendition. Got the (lower) boss, first phase is just timing, second becomes immeasurably easier once you realise than you can pass through him if he's flashing from a previous hit. ST5 is an asshole - those bits with the spike platforms and red skellies / green hunchback men is pure evil. It's pretty east to rack up extra lives - not quite as easy as Rondo's lower route, but more so than a pure upper.

I got to the Mino boss, walked up to him to get in my three free hits Rondo-style, and get twatted by an attack that was barely telegraphed. That's where over confidence gets you

[Sumez]

XX has some of the best sounding music on the SNES.

[Marc]

XX has some of the best sounding music on the SNES.

I didn't like it at first, but I'm coming round to it now. In a lot of ways, I actually prefer it over Rondo.

It's a shame it's so inconsistent visually though. For every jaw-dropping scene like the opening, there's an equally bland tiled corridor. Your first steps into the Castle on ST2 should look stunning, but the whole thing is undone by the complete lack of parallax.

[Squire Grooktook]

Not sure if this was posted here before, but The Ninja Warriors Again Again new characters unveiled:









heug boi

[Durandal]

a triple fucking grab

[Marc]

My word, that looks immense. Day one.

[Randorama]

As a kid, I really liked Wonder Boy in Monster Land, but I was only able to play it with the support of my dad, so to speak: we would play together, and he would take reins for stages 5-10. I could handle the final stage but not the final boss.

After, like 30 years, I spent a few week-ends to practice the game, figure out the best strategies in case I I don't get any "waggle" money, etc. I 1-cc'ed the game twice in a row just now, with the second run being horrible money-wise. Still, as long as I can get the blue boots ASAP (180 coins) I find the game (relatively) easy.

I am somehow happy that I am closing to the '40s (38 this September), but I can still clear games (around 8 in the last year/18 months or so). I think that my next target should be Tiger Road, another game I only 1-CC'ed in "co-op" mode (with a friend).

Maybe I should make a bucket list of games I want to complete before retirement

[__SKYe]

Nicely done. I'm still a fair bit away from 40, but I hope to be enjoying games long past that time.
Besides, people these days live in excess of 80 years, so, if all goes well, you still have a long time to continue your gaming endeavours.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Does anyone here have some experience with the Catwoman GBA game? I see a loose cart cheap enough to find it tempting, all of my gaming these days being done on a GBA anyway.

[soprano1]

Does anyone here have some experience with the Catwoman GBA game? I see a loose cart cheap enough to find it tempting, all of my gaming these days being done on a GBA anyway.

It's probably as good as the movie.

[mycophobia]

final boss Shredder in Turtles in Time SNES hard mode is a fucking asshole

[Marc]

final boss Shredder in Turtles in Time SNES hard mode is a fucking asshole

I haven't played that in many years, but I remember it being one of the only belt-scrollers I ever 'got', in that I had a decent enough grasp of the mechanics to complete it, on hard as well. No doubt whatsoever I'd get stomped if I tried now, though I was wondering what SNES game to play next so I'll fire it up on normal later.

[mycophobia]

it's not a terribly difficult game overall once you learn how to consistently do the slam attack and some basic boss strats, it's just that Donatello is really slow and Shredder in hard mode is really fast

[kitten]

w-what are you playing donatello on hard mode for??

[mycophobia]

i like donatello :D

but begrudgingly im probably switching to raph just cuz of shredder

[mycophobia]

you know what? no. I won't give up. sticking with Don. there's got to be a way to beat Hard Shredder as Donatello

[mycophobia]

did it! got the hard 1CC w/ donatello. the trick with Super Shredder appears to be to approach him from above when he's done attacking rather than from below. at least I had the most success doing that. No Death is certainly possible but I don't wanna. i've yelled at this game too much already

[kitten]

grats on your clear! i found 1cc hard on turtles in time to be a stroll (iirc i got it on my first go), but i was playing raph, whose speed definitely makes for a substantially easier run. i agree that nomiss is highly doable, but it seems to be a bit stressful and rely a lot on mastering boss fights that i simply don't find that enjoyable. i feel like turtles in time is a really good piece of fluff, but ultimately still fluff no matter how it's cut.

as far as sfc konami beat 'em ups go, i really feel like batman returns is a lot more fun to actually dig into and challenge yourself with, if you haven't played that one. did a play of that one a little while back. it seems to have a really middling reputation, which i don't understand - i think it's a lot better than either of the first two sfc final fight games (it frankly feels more like a capcom beat 'em up than a konami one) and a pretty good game.

[Stevens]

Holy shit this looks incredible -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrL3Qjv2jZI

Anyone playing it? Totally picking this up tonight.