Haven’t seen a post like this recently so I thought I’d start the conversation !
I’m close to finishing Wario Land 3 (emulated GBC), which was the game of my childhood, I’m surprised of how tricky some levels are.
I also started playing The Eternal Cylinder but it’s quite a demanding game so I’m thinking of playing it on PC instead
Right now I’m not playing too much games, just testing them here and there out on an emulator. And have neglected my Steam Deck as a whole too, since I purchased a new Gaming PC. So nothing recent to report playing on Deck. When I do, its mostly emulation; I’m big fan of emulation.
Steam Deck
- Wario Land 3: As a fan of 1 and 2, I never played this one on real hardware and was curious. Its basically like 2. But did not finish it yet (got very far though), maybe I’ll pick it up again soon. Didn’t play it in a while, just mention it as you remind me. There was a few tricky (in other words frustrating) places, but I overcome most of them. A big design flaw to me is, because you cannot die, they have to design the levels in another way to punish players. And that is often done by falling down and then playing those long segments again. There was one such moment where I had enough and put it away, but planned on playing next week again. Did not workout as planned. :D
PC
- Tears of the Kingdom: Just finished it a few days ago with Yuzu 112 hours playtime (+10 from Ryujinx) in roughly 4 to 5 weeks. 1440p + 60 fps = unstoppable. And that after a few months stop playing Breath of the Wild. So it was basically a back to back experience for me and I’m burned out. Especially because Totk was dragging everything to the extreme and it was a shore at times. The building mechanic is really goddamn cool and its one of the most beautiful games I have played in my entire life, and I mean it in an artistic way how everything looks. But the underworld was just not fun and lot of time was spent there. Overall good game, but BotW was more enjoyable to me. 9/10
Yeah the backtracking in Wario Land 3 sometimes feels too punishing, like being caught by a random water bubble and going back up to the very top of the lake, or being bumped by one of those zombies and being mega slow until you walk back to some lightpost, I do think in general this is a clever way to not have a game over state, but some areas aren’t well designed for that
Heh, the tree with the spiders, falling for 15+ seconds… Glorious. I miss the old game design, I feel like it’s a little more creative than tossing up a “You Died” and respawning from the last save point. They’re effectively the same, but there’s something special about showing you everything you completed, further and further each time you progress just to fall longer…
I miss the old game design, I feel like it’s a little more creative than tossing up a “You Died” and respawning from the last save point.
It’s not the same! Yes, if you die, its a similar thing. But usually with games you don’t get punished by instant dying. Take Super Mario as an example. You might get hit and still be at the same position, but lose your power up or get small. Or you lose some health or a live. The important part is you keep going. Take the boss as an example. In Wario Land 3, if you get hit you jump out of frame and have to play a certain part again to try the boss. At least for me, this feels frustrating.
But don’t get me wrong, its just a thing I don’t like. I still like these games and the overall game is creative and impressive what they did with the GB. Not without reason is Wario Land 2 one of my alltime handeld games, that could get released even today! (same or even more for WL3) I think after our discussion here, I will go back to the game (on my Steam Deck) and try to finish it. Now that I have some time for other games, after Zelda. Man Zelda took time!
Oh definitely, there’s downsides and frustrations for sure. It’s like a brick wall sometimes. The zombies, the soccer (my favorite tbh), the tree, the boss, the desert, the vines, it’s all designed so perfectly evilly that I just love it! I haven’t even played the game in 20 years. I remember it perfectly, nearly haha
