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 On 01/03/2021 at 08:57 PM by Cary Woodham See More From This User » |
Happy New Year! I’m glad 2020 is over, but just because it’s a new year, that doesn’t mean the problems of last year are going away. We’ll still have to deal with COVID for the majority of this year, too, at least. Then there’s my mom’s breast cancer surgery this month (keep praying, please). There are other problems, too, but I won’t go into those because I stay away from talking about politics on this blog. But at least we made it through the year, so to celebrate, here’s some more game reviews I’ve written recently over at GamerDad.com. Please click on the links and read as many as you can, and maybe even post a ‘like’ or comment or two. I’d appreciate it. OK let’s begin!
What better way to celebrate the new year than with some blasts from the past? Specifically the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s. First is the 70’s. I love classic arcade games, and you can’t get much more classic than Space Invaders! So I was excited to review Space Invaders Forever. It’s a collection of three notable games in the Space Invaders series, and it’s great that they’re some of my favorite iterations of the franchise as well! The majority of which I’ve already reviewed in the past! Let’s take a look at the games on this compilation!
Professor Rubik’s Brain Fitness (PS4)
Next is the 80’s! I grew up as a kid then, and one of the things I remember being SUPER POPULAR for a while was the Rubik’s Cube puzzle toy. It was everywhere, and everyone had it. It was so big that at one point, there was a Saturday morning cartoon about it. I’m not kidding, go look it up after reading this review. It’s crazy! And now, 40 years later, you can play a video game and exercise your brain with puzzles based on the 80’s icon. I really liked this game, but I can’t help but think it would’ve been more popular in the 80’s, or when brain training games were all the rage on the DS. It would’ve worked better as a handheld game anyway.
Pinball FX3: Williams Pinball Volume 6 (PS4)
And last is a collection of Pinball FX3 tables from the Williams library from the late 80’s/early 90’s. Only one I remember on this collection is Funhouse, though. I think it would be neat if they made a volume with all three of the Pinbot games.
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit (Switch)
I already talked about this when I did my GOTY blog, but I’ll post it again here in case you missed it. Did you know there was a new Mario Kart game this past year? Yeah it kind of flew under the radar and was also kind of hard to get. So when I was a kid, sometimes for Christmas I’d get an RC car and really liked them. You know another thing that I like? Mario Kart! In fact, the original Super Mario Kart on the SNES is still one of my top five favorite games of all time. So what do you get when you combine the fun of driving real life RC cars with the wackiness of Mario Kart video games? You get Mario Kart Live Home Circuit. It’s an RC car of Mario or Luigi (I got the Luigi one because he’s way cooler than Mario). On the car there is a camera, and you control the car with the Switch and view the action in first person with the camera as you play a Mario Kart game with augmented reality. You can even design your own tracks! It’s a really cool idea, but is it practical and really worth the 100 bucks? Well you’ll just have to read on to find out!
The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening Loot Box
Link’s Awakening is my number one favorite Zelda game. In fact, I named the Switch remake my Game of the Year in 2019. So a couple of months ago on my birthday, I was happy to get a loot box with stuff from that game! Let’s take a look and see what’s in it!
Lowly minions in 2-D platformers don’t get much love, as they get stomped on constantly by overalled plumbers and other adventurers. But what if you got to PLAY as one of these downtrodden foes? Well that’s exactly what happens in Wunderling. The ‘heroic’ Carrot Man is on a quest to save Princess Pea in the Vegetable Kingdom. He’s stolen a magic stick that can make portals appear, and one of the first things he does is stomp a walking squash enemy flat. An evil witch comes along and brings the squashed squash underling back to life, but he really can’t do much since he can only walk back and forth. So the witch gives him the power to jump! Now you get to control the minion, who not only constantly walks forward until he hits a wall and changes direction, but can also jump over obstacles! It’s kind of like an endless runner except it has actual gameplay, and for such a challenging title, it’s pretty fun! Normally I don’t like these super hard challenging platformers, but the play control was so good in this one that I was able to see it all the way through!
There are countless TV game shows out there, but most don’t last very long. Sometimes you might get a remake of one, such as Press Your Luck (one of my guilty pleasures). But there are some game shows that seem to have been on TV forever! Or at least as long as I can remember. Some of these include Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, and The Price is Right. Another one is Family Feud, and any time it’s on, me and whoever I’m watching it with like to try and guess the survey answers. And now you can play a video game version of it! A lot of people would laugh at a game like this, but I think they can be pretty fun at times. I was really impressed with the stage graphics. I couldn’t tell the difference between them and the actual show. But the character models, eh, not so much!
Cook, Serve, Delicious 3?! (PS4)
The tough-as-nails cooking sim is back! In the last game I reviewed, you cooked food in restaurants inside a high rise building, from a lowly stall in a food court all the way up to a swanky establishment. And now you’re taking it on the road with food trucks in the sequel. This game actually has a story, but it’s REALLY dumb. You’ll just have to read the review to find out what it is!
In ancient China, Wei Cheng is a fisherman who uses martial arts with a staff to protect his village from pirates. One day the pirates get the better of him and his grandfather goes missing. Left for dead, Wei Cheng is found by monks who take him back to their temple and heal him. Now he must learn new skills from the monks so he can seek revenge on the pirates. 9 Monkeys of Shaolin is a classic styled side scrolling beat ‘em up with RPG and story elements. It’s OK, just way too hard and I’d rather just play Streets of Rage 4 anyway. I didn’t even ask to review this one, they just sent me a code so I was like, ‘ok.’ I swear the voice actor for the main character sounds just like Samurai Jack! Wonder if it’s the same guy?
Swimsanity! is an underwater themed multiplayer twin stick shooter. Pick a diver and shoot robotic fish (and each other) in the deepest depths of the ocean. Would’ve been a better game fi it weren’t so hard.
And that’s all for now! Thanks for reading my reviews and posting ‘likes’ and comments. I do really appreciate it. Hopefully this year will be better than the last! --Cary
Space Invaders Forever sound interesting but my favorite from that time right now is Lunar Rescue. I wish they'd put that out again with an additional modern version.
Is Pinball FX3 doing simulation tables now? I just downloaded all my pinball games to play this month and I was going to save FX3 for last because it was all video game pinball tables.
Yeah Pinball FX3 has been doing Williams tables for the last couple of years. Before this volume, they even did my favorite pinball machine of all time: Cirquis Voltaire. I wish they'd do a collection of all three PinBot tables!
I've been away from it for a few years, I think. I can't wait to see that stuff. I love simulated tables.
Yeah I don't know if it's because they're established tables, but the Williams ones on Pinball FX3 seem to have better pinball physics to me, too.
Even though they're made up tables, I think the best pinball simulation games came from the Pro Pinball series. They were video pinball games that came out in the late 90's, and they were awesome. Some included TimeShock, Big Race USA, and Fantastic Journey. My favorite was Big Race USA.
One cool thing about the Pro Pinball tables is it felt like you owned a real pinball machine and could adjust things like the slope of the table and how well-maintained it was. You could play it like it was right out of the box, well-maintained, or un-maintained. If you played it un-maintained, there would be dust on the table that would affect how your ball rolled, and some of the lights would be burnt out!
That's cool. I always wanted to play the Pro Pinball games.
I got into video pinball with the Pinball Hall of Fame games that came out on Wii and Xbox 360. I still have them too.
I've always liked video pinball, even though I'm not very good at them. Even as a little kid, I was fascinated by the Atari 2600 pinball game for some reason!
I've started to read the rule sets for tables. Once I know the goals, I can try and meet them. I usually don't get very far but it makes it more fun when you know what the goals are.
Yeah if you really want to get a high score, you gotta read those rules so you know where to hit the ball. That was the neat thing about the Pro Pinball series is they explained the rules of the tables very well. Which is pretty amazing considering how complicated Big Race USA was! For some reason, I don't think the Pinball FX games explains the rules quite as well.
I found the list of rules in Pinball FX, but it was kind of hard to find and written in tiny text. Pinball Hall of Fame does a better job at that, which is now Pinball Arcade on current systems.
Another pinball game that does a good job explaining the rules is Crystal Caliburn. But that may be because it's a more simplistic game based on rules of early 80's pinball tables. Have you ever heard of Crystal Caliburn? It's a really old Windows pinball game (well, mid to late 90's old), and I played it a lot in college.
I didn't know about this game. I wish I could get it on consoles.
Me too!
Thought about getting Space Invaders Forever, but it doesn't include the original game, so that's a bit off-putting. There is a much larger Space Invaders collection being printed on cartridge from one of those limited-run companies, but it's a bit pricey. So to paraphrase the focus tester from "The Itchy and Scratchy and Poochie Show", I want a comprehensive deluxe Space Invaders collection that somehow won't break the bank. I'm sure somebody will get right on that.
I actually kind of want Mario Kart Live, and I say that as somebody who didn't ever really get into Labo.
Well Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit is really nothing like Labo. But I got it anyway because I really like Mario Kart and wanted to try it out! Heck, I know some may say it's weird, but the original Super Mario Kart is still one of my top five favorite games of all time.
I'll be thinking of your mom!
Boy, really hard games sure are popular these days....
Thanks for reading! You know, I don't know why developer think they have to make their games so hard. I don't read about too many people complaing about a game if it's too easy, as long as it's fun.
Mario Kart Live seems like a lot of fun especially if you race against another person. It kinda reminds me of the old slot cars except updated and you have the in car view. Nintendo really hit it out of the park with this concept.
Oh man, a version of Mario Kart Live using slot cars sounds like fun! You could still put little cameras on the cars, but you wouldn't have to worry as much about floor space and surfaces. I actually have a regular Mario Kart slot car set that I got a few years ago.
When I was a kid, I used to love slot cars. Not the big hobby shop ones, but the ones you could build the tracks in your house and everything. When I was little one of the things I wanted for my birthday one year was a Dukes of Hazzard slot car set. It had a ramp where the cars could jump over, just like on the TV show. Well how many times do you think those cars landed right back into the slots after the ramp? Never. I was so disappointed!
Haha I remember that track, and I always wondered how it would connect to the track after the jump. I had a choice between a slot car track and the GI Joe train (it was just a regular kids train set but the train was green and it came with mini green plastic soliders, and blue soliders for Cobra). I was deep into GI Joe as a kid.
I never was into G.I. Joe as a kid, but I can understand why you would want a G.I. Joe train set if you really liked G.I. Joe. Heck, if they had a train set based on something I liked as a kid, I would want it, too! Like a Transformers train set or a Pac-Man train set! I'd be all over that as a kid!
Oh they did. Transformers Train Set
Apparently Tyco made a Transformers, and A-Team train just like GI Joe. Who knew
Little Kid Cary would want that Transformers train!
Little Kid Cary wouldn't want the A-Team one, because Little Kid Cary was scared of Mr. T. and wouldn't watch the show because of that.
I liked Mr. T because of the mohawk. I thought it was cool, but when my dad gave me the chance to get one I chickened out.
No kids dared to get that mohawk where I lived.
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