PixlBit

I do remember WinBack getting covered in Nintendo Power, though it didn't get a cover feature. I rented it back in the day. It was an interesting game and I might have bought it a year or two earlier. But after Ocarina of Time and Castlevania came out, I pretty much moved on from the N64.  I was all into the RPG library on PS1. 

I'm playing it on the Switch. Honestly, with Nintendo's close relationship with Koei Tecmo, and all the recent consolidation of the game industry lately (I'm not saying any more), Nintendo ought to consider reviving this series as its own in-house version of Metal Gear. 

Awesome to see you picked up Sakura Wars. Aside from the fact that it's a type of game I love from one of my favorite lineages of that genre, it was also the last new PS2 release I ever bought. It came out in March 2010, which was when Final Fantasy XIII came out on PS3 and 360.  Almost exactly a decade later I bought Sakura Wars on PS4. 

Scarface was a late 6th generation game. The only 7th generation console that got a port of it was, ironically, the Wii, probably because the Wii maxed out at 480p instead of 1080 like the PS3 and 360. A 360 port had been in development, but it got cancelled. 

I loved Virtua Fighter 4 myself. I never bought any Namco fighting games on PS2 because it was that good. I did get Soulcalibur 2 on Gamecube, of course, because Heihachi was kind of lame (how difficult would it have been for Namco to go to Square Enix and say hey, could we borrow Cloud or Sephiroth?)

Xenosaga was bizarre, and I don't mean in the way Xeno games are bizarre. Xenosaga is like they built an entire series around Xenogears Disc 2 - you know, the part of Xenogears that got truncated into a bunch of cut scenes and dungeons because Square needed the money and manpower to work on Final Fantasy VIII. It was supposed to get six parts originally. I think the only thing they ended up accomplishing was selling KOS-MOS models and body pillows. Even Takahashi had a lot of regrets over it. Xenoblade Chronicles was when Xenogears finally got a proper follow-up. 

Oh, yeah, Yugioh is still around. Konami probably makes more money on it than they ever did on Metal Gear. 

Wasnt Waffles the name of the cat on Goof Troop? I wondet what's with naming cats Waffle(s)? Even Goof Troop wasn't the first time I've seen a cat named that in a piece of media. 

I'm looking to get Rune Factpry 5 myself.  

Great music selections. Is Samm a one time thing or are you going to have her on future podcasts?

My most wanted game is definitely the next Zelda. Of these games, Rune Factory 5 appeals to me the most. I am kind of interested in Pokemon Legends. 

I'm also looking forward to Advance Wars. I've never played the GBA or DS games. The closest game in my experience was this NES game called Desert Commander that my cousin had. 

Capcom was really on a roll this year, what with Resident Evil Village, two Monster Hunter games, and all their other stuff like Ace Attorney. I think they were probably the best publisher/developer of the year.

I got the Space Invaders Invincible Collection, despite the fact that it was really too expensive, mostly because I wanted to be able to play Space Invaders along with Centipede and Galaga. Those were the "big three" shooters of the early 80s. I also played Lunar Rescue for the first time. I'd played a clone of Lunar Rescue that was made by Broderbund on the Atari 8-bit computers. I wish they had a comprehensive Taito collection, on Switch one that had games like Space Dungeon, Jungle King (yeah, I know it would be Jungle Hunt), Arkanoid, Bubble Bobble, Rastan, and Zoo Keeper.

My Switch sure got me through some rough times this year. 2021 wasn't a good year for me personally. Hopefully 2022 will be better.

1080 blew this game out of the water. It was a bit surprising that Shigeru Miyamoto would work on a realistic sports game.

My favorite 5th gen snowboarding game was probably "Snow Game", which was the name of the snowboarding minigame in Final Fantasy VII in the Gold Saucer. After awhile, you could have Tifa riding the snowboard instead of Cloud.

Nice. I love the Switch.

I remember the print ads for this game. Pretty sophisticated fighting mechanics for the mid 80s.

I've found a surprising number of used game stores in Phoenix. Fallout Games is the biggest one here, but there's also Gaming Zone, which has an arcade in it, Desert Sky Games, and Zia Records.