So… I have a copy of BioShock in hand. But I can’t play it — I have to finish up Phantom Hourglass this weekend. As far as tragedies go, this is easily among the least substantial ever experienced by a human. Sometimes I feel guilty about living such a spoiled life. But then I remember that I’m awesome and totally deserve it.
Yeeeeah. Anyway, please enjoy the following big-pixel eyesores. And by “enjoy” I mean “click on.” They’re links, you see.
As a sort of complement to the weekly Retro Roundup at 1UP, I’ve initiated a compendium of reader-created Virtual Console reviews. Proof that it’s going to be awesome: The first entry is a write-up of the abysmal Urban Champion. YESSSSS
The mad rush of Mega Man retrospectives continues with a look at another forgotten chapter of the series: the second Game Boy title.
And finally, a look at 3 in Three, a mid-’90s Mac game so obscure I’ve never even heard of it. And I spent most of the mid-’90s mucking around with obscure Mac games, so that’s saying something.
Anyway, I would have to say that our early experiments with reader-created content has been a smashing success — it’s actually turned out much better than I had hoped or expected. So! Hopefully this weekend I will have a chance to bring everyone who expressed interest in helping out into the fold. Please keep an eye on your Talking Time private message box over the next few days.
Dude, 3 In Three!
I didn’t play much 3 in Three, but I loved me some Fool’s Errand. Some of the puzzles were kind of dumb, but when it was good, it was good.
Oh, god. GO PLAY 3 IN THREE. Best puzzle game EVER.
The author is working on a sequel the fool’s errand, and you can download 3 in three 4 free!
http://www.fools-errand.com/
For some reason I love reading about the Evolution of a series. I feel that Hardcore Gaming 101 is written exclusively for me. I love how it is pointed out This game squashed the sprites, this game didn’t. If you guys keep up this level of quality output, I will feel the same about this site. Good stuff!
Also, Parish, please fix the link to HCG 101, it is much easier for me to type in gamespite.net that to remember their long url, or to google it and come up with porn sites. I was thinking about aplologizing earlier for praising another site on yours, but then I remember you had a link on your main page.
Also, congratulations on taking your personal site “to the next level”, what with the forums, game club, and whatever you call the classic gaming write-ups. Please don’t forget to write about prog rock. May I suggest making fun of Super Tramp? Or is that too easy / not prog?
3 in Three seems to be a brilliant excuse to get ol’ Basilisk II going again. It astonishes that a decent writer and game concept can breed a numeric 3 with more personality than 99% of videogame characters.
And God forbid I get cajoled into writing about prog here. Then I’ll have fully regressed back into high-school (sans the long hair). Mega Man is bad enough, but if I start writing about Rush or Radiohead or Marillion my useful life will be at an end.
Oh, snap!
Tomm, I can’t believe you snubbed an obscure vector graphic arcade game and a Commodore 64 game. I’m going to have to ask you to hand over your nerd-badge on the way out.
Dang it!
Yoinks, how long has that Hg101 link been bogus?
Behold one of my very favorite things on the internet: a GameFAQs Urban Champion Review where the author gives it a generous score for allowing him to imagine he is playing a better game.
http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/nes/review/R27399.html
I’ve never played 3 in Three but it’s always sounded really awesome (I’ve read Cliff Johnson’s home page quite a bit, especially when he was involved with the David Blaine puzzle).
You have your marching orders, Talking Time – track down this GameFAQs poster and end him. END HIM HARD!
M.Nicolai, and I say this in my finest Homer Simpson impression… What the hell are you talking about?
M. Nicolai-
Those first two games, whatever. I was talking about Karate Champ. Duh.
Apologies on the double post, but I just discovered my other post was either deleted or disappeared.
Tomm-
The missing comment was in reference to your Urban Champion article, where you suggested that Urban Champion was the daddy of modern fighting games. I posted a link to a HG 101 article on pre-SFII fighters, which was to point out that Karate Champ actually came first. It was also apparently quite influential to Street Fighter. Nicolai was referring to two games that came in the article before it that were totally unrelated to the point. However, given that this is the internet, I have to make things ridiculously clear in every respect to not have my point scoffed at/deleted.
I didn’t consider Karate Champ because I was under the impression it came out a year after Urban Champion, but now that I’m double-checking it seems they were both released the same year and I apologize for my confusion. However, your comments inferred that Karate Champ was more influential to the fighting genre than Urban Champion, a point of view I must respectfully disagree with.
They both came out in 1984, but Urban Champion came out in November of 1984 (11/14/04 according to GameFAQs), which would make sense given the Famicom launch window. Considering Karate Champ had not one, but two versions released in 1984, I find it hard to believe that Urban Champion came anywhere near first.
Now things are getting interesting! How the heck would you ever think Urban Champion is more influential? To Smash Brothers, sure, and the UC’s blocking system was way more modern than Karate Champ’s rudimentary blocking, but what else?
Pst! Hey guys… I just wanted to make the big bang joke. The fewer games actually influenced by UC, the better.
Now, is it widely known that Cliff Johnson made _3 In Three_ a free download a few years back? So there’s no longer an excuse to have never played or never gotten around to finishing it (unless the file format is weird or something; haven’t tried running it on a PC). But it (and other old Johnson titles) are available for Mac or Windows at http://www.thefoolsgold.com/downloads/index.htm