Episode #9 - RF Generation Playcast

[singlebanana]

Coming to you at midnight server time!

[Fleach]

This was a fun episode. Hope everyone enjoys it and Shares their favorite games of last year.

I've accumulated a bunch of unredeemed games from Humble Bundles, so the first three people to post their favourite playthroughs will get a free Steam game.

[Disposed Hero]

Great episode guys.  It was very interesting to hear everybody's take on their favorite and least favorite playthroughs of the year, and some of your picks surprised me.

Anyway, I was made aware that you guys were planning on doing a 'best of 2014' podcast a while back, so it's something I've given some thought over the last couple of months.  I was originally going to make a ranked list of all the playthroughs I participated in this year (all 16 of them!), but it was getting way too long winded, so I capped it at five.  Interestingly, this changed up my list a bit to allow for more games that I had never played before, or had at least been a very long time since I played them.

My criteria for my ranking was basically the games that I had the overall best experience playing during the community playthrough (not necessarily my favorite games of the bunch), and I also excluded playthroughs that I didn't participate in (so Super Metroid and SoTN are excluded from my list, despite being two of my all time favorites).

So without further ado, my list, starting at number 5 and ending with my top favorite:

5.

Spoiler (hover to show)

Phantasy Star

Phantasy Star is a series that I had no experience with prior to the community playthrough.  When I started the game up, I was greeted with a very old-school dungeon crawler RPG where the very first enemies in the game kicked my butt.  After doing some leveling and upgrading my equipment, the game started to feel a bit easier.  After this point, I didn’t feel like the combat was too terribly difficult for the rest of the game, but this game is very much an 8-bit RPG, so you’re left wandering what to do and where to go most of the time.  I’m a bit ashamed to admit, but even after all the urging of some forum members, I still resorted to using a walkthrough for most of the game, and maps for the later dungeons.  I can see how this was a great game for its time, but it’s showing its age, and to be honest, I still prefer Final Fantasy to Phantasy Star.

4.

Spoiler (hover to show)

System Shock 2

Now I was surprised by how much I got into this game.  System Shock 2 is one of the big PC games I missed back in the day, and it’s one that I’ve always wanted to play.  So when this one came out of left field and was the November Modern playthrough, it was a no brainer for me.  After I spent about an hour or so with it…. I really didn’t like it.  It was extremely difficult and overly complicated to the point that I was just about to give up on it.  But I figured I’d give the game another chance and read a couple FAQs and watch some walkthroughs on Youtube to try to get a better understanding of the game before starting over.  And it’s a good thing I did.  Once I had a better grasp of the game, I restarted it, and lo and behold, I couldn’t put the game down.  I became so engrossed by this game, that most of my free time was spent either playing the game or watching Youtube videos of it.  And I will say that despite being released in 1999, this is still probably one of the scariest games I have ever played, and I’ve played most of the big survival horror titles out there.  System Shock 2 has an atmosphere that very few games ever match, and the constant feeling of tension and dread really got to me after a while.  As much as I loved this game, I was really glad when it was over, which may sound like an insult, but it’s really just a testament to how well designed this game is to instill those feelings in the player.  A hidden gem.

3.

Spoiler (hover to show)

Suikoden

Another game I played back in the PS1 heyday, for some reason my lasting impression of Suikoden wasn’t that great.  I didn’t think it was a bad game, I just thought it was pretty average and not what I would consider a classic gem of the 32-bit era.  So when we played this for the June community playthrough, my expectations weren’t very high.  After spending some time with this game, I was pleasantly surprised by just how much I was enjoying it.  I couldn’t put it down.  All of a sudden, I recognized just how great this game really is.  From the great 2D artwork, interesting battle mechanics, and the myriad of characters that are available to recruit, Suikoden is indeed a classic RPG.  But wait a minute.  Suikoden II improves on this classic in pretty much every conceivable way?  Well I have to play that then, right?  Well, unfortunately by the time September rolled around and we were set to play the sequel, I was all RPG-ed out, and I didn’t want to hinder my enjoyment of one of the greatest RPGs of all time by forcing my way through it.  However, I will play it someday!    

2.

Spoiler (hover to show)

Parasite Eve

I played Parasite Eve when it was first released and immediately recognized what a gem this game is.  From the unique combat system, the awesome soundtrack, and just the overall atmosphere that this game has, this has always been one of my favorites for the PS1.  I had actually suggested this game back when we had a poll for a PS1 game to play in February, and was pleasantly surprised when it won the vote, beating out other classics like Symphony of the Night.  It had been ages since I played this game, and I was itching to play through it again.  Well, it makes me glad to say that this game still holds up well and is just as great today as it was 15 years ago.

1.

Spoiler (hover to show)

Kingdom Hearts

And my top community playthrough of the year goes to…. Kingdom Hearts?  Well, if you guys knew how much I detested Kingdom Hearts when I first tried to play it on the PS2, you would understand just how surprising this is.  I think I tried on three separate occasions to play this game on the PS2, the first two attempts only making it to Traverse Town and then giving up.  The third and final attempt, I made it through a few of the worlds (I think I made it to Tarzan’s world if I’m not mistaken) but gave up on it due to the technical problems the game has (bad ally AI, terrible camera, etc.).  A close friend of mine was at the time absolutely in love with Kingdom Hearts, and we would have arguments over the game.  I told him that if they ever made an HD remaster for Kingdom Hearts, I would give the game another chance.  Well, the HD remaster was released, I bought it, and then it was chosen for the February community playthrough.  That left me little choice about playing it again.  I went into this game with expectations that I would still hate this game.  I WANTED to hate this game just out of spite and to prove a point to my friend.  A few worlds into the game, my opinion didn’t change a whole lot, but I kept slogging through.  Once I made it to Agrabah, something weird happened.  I started to …actually ENJOY this game!  How’d that happen?  I don’t know, but something just clicked and all of a sudden I was hooked on this game.  I got really into it, doing pretty much all of the side content except for the Gummi ship missions.  I spent hours grinding for synthesis materials to make all the Ultimate weapons.  I beat all of the optional bosses, including the infamous Sephiroth.  I did all of the coliseum tournaments, did all the sidequests, and spent more time in this game than I probably should have.  The flaws that I found with the game years before didn’t go away, they were still there, but for some reason I came away with the opinion that Kingdom Hearts is indeed a great game despite those flaws.

And there you have it guys!  Thanks to the community playthrough guys for hosting a year full of awesome games and giving me an excuse to replay some classic titles and experience some new ones.  Here's to another great year!  

[singlebanana]

Wow! A complete shocker there at the end, but really glad you enjoyed the playthroughs this year. I really enjoyed reading your list and about the experiences you had with the games. Looking forward to kicking ass and taking initials with you some more in the great games we have in store for 2015. Initials? That's right, we don't stop kicking ass long enough to take down full names! Thanks Beast.

[wildbil52]

I'm with Sean 100% on Gradius and similar games.  "Thinking about getting a high score too much", "You have to become a perfectionist [instead of just playing the game]"  "If you die you have to reset, that's not fun"  It's like he was reading my mind.

More thoughts to come, whether you want them or not..

[singlebanana]

Older games were all about high scores. You didn't put your initials in the arcade cab for finishing games back then. I think there's a lot more to these games than finishing them and that includes working out strategies to earn higher totals; it's a big part of what also makes these games special. It's too bad we've gotten away from the spirit of competition and having some fun with each other. If it's one complaint about modern gaming that I have is that it's too self-centered and individualistic. Community was what made older games great and it's a shame we've all but lost that. And that's the old guys 2 cents.

[Fleach]

I have to agree with Rich on this one. I think with the shift away from arcades the high score challenges aren't as popular. So many games still have leader boards, but who checks those?

On a related note, The Blue Flamingo looks amazing! Too bad it's PC only (and digital).

[techwizard]

really enjoyed reading your list Disposed! i think i was more surprised about system shock 2 than i was about kingdom hearts.

[Disposed Hero]

really enjoyed reading your list Disposed! i think i was more surprised about system shock 2 than i was about kingdom hearts.

Yeah, I wish System Shock 2 got more love than it did during the playthrough, but I can totally understand why some people just couldn't get into it.  I didn't even like it when I first started it.

[Fleach]

Nobody wants Steam games? Diposed Hero got something cool for posting his favourite playthrough games.

Regarding System Shock 2, it's not a bad game but it's certainly not for everyone. I enjoyed and thought that many design choices were fantastic, but the game just got the better of me. I couldn't finish it.

[bombatomba]

I liked System Shock 2, despite the numerous problems I had with it (pacing).  I fully agree with Disposed, it has a great atmosphere and really keeps you on your toes.  I think if I had played through it slowly I would have liked it more.

[shaggy]

Has there been a change as to how the podcast is "assembled" now?  I listen on my iPod Touch on the podcast app and the interface is different and as soon as you close the app the audio shuts off.  Your older podcasts didn't do this and the other podcasts I listen to do not do this.

[techwizard]

Has there been a change as to how the podcast is "assembled" now?  I listen on my iPod Touch on the podcast app and the interface is different and as soon as you close the app the audio shuts off.  Your older podcasts didn't do this and the other podcasts I listen to do not do this.

early on we had it setup with "chapters", which means you could hit next/previous to jump to the various segments of the show. we decided to remove those for a couple reasons:
1. it more than doubled the filesize of each episode for some reason, and Podomatic has very limited storage space.
2. it actually broke the download versions of the files for anyone not using Apple devices, as chapters are apparently only supported by Apple.

it's unfortunate for those who used the chapters feature, but our thought was that it was excluding other listeners from hearing the show easily, which isn't fair.

that's the only thing (to my knowledge) that changed since the early episodes, at least from our side of things. as for the app itself and it's interface, that would be on podomatic's end and i don't know if the chapters had any effect on that or not, it's possible but unlikely.

[Fleach]

Is episode 9 acting up for you? The problem could be that I accidentally uploaded an mp4 at first. It's since been replaced with an mp3 so everything should be OK now.

Let us know if you're still experiencing problems.

[MetalFRO]

I only participated in the December shmup-a-thon, so by default, I'll have to say that was my favorite.  I would say, had I been here to play through Parasite Eve (great game!) and SotN, it would have been hard to choose, because I love both of those games.