Daeval

1) Anti-winner's answer, but if it's the second switch the light will be ON. 2) B 3) Dead 4) Jimmy 5) Billy Ok, I cheated..

Excellent detail in this review. And you can't go wrong with Gunstar Heroes, it's a great game.

Yeah, it does look like zelda at first glance, and if that's what you're expecting it's pretty lame. That's kind of what I got out of your review. But, as one of few good action-oriented "traditional" RPGs it's really nice, so I thought it deserved a review in that category. It's also worth noting that there are a few different ways the early story can play out, depending on who you go get first (the girl or the sprite). It all comes back to the main plot arc, but this made it interesting when I had seen one story and my friend had seen something entirely different. I still can't believe you knocked the music though.

Ok, here's a counter-review from someone who played the game at the time, and who came in expecting an RPG, not "zelda" (which is an action/adventure game with a few items, NOT an RPG): This game is the first in what is one of the best "action rpg" series on the SNES that I can think of. It has the right amount of depth vs. action. There are non-dodgeable attacks, there is no "blocking," and there is a strategy to combat beyond "move, then swing." The unblockable attacks usually constitute magical attacks that can be resisted or otherwise thwarted. This is not the case in the first "boss" battle, which is really just to get you used to moving and swinging your sword. The pace is relatively quick, especially during boss battles, but strategy wins over brute force most of the time. The "circular menu" system is streamlined and sexy, even for mid-combat use. The AI pathing can be a problem, but it doesn't take long to realize that it's really only there to keep them around until you're ready to use them. That's why there are buttons specifically designated to use the abilities of the other characters. There is, however, a useful "matrix" for customizing your AI behavior whil you're not in control (defensive vs. offensive, melee vs. magic, if I remember correctly). With very little effort, it becomes second nature to utilize all three of your characters in combat, particularly where magic is concerned, and this adds a deeper strategic element to the already frantic boss battles. The magic system is interesting but not too complicated, consisting of a number of "schools" relating to diety-like characters that you earn throughout the game. Each type has an offensive and a defensive version for your two casters. There are also 8 (I think 8?) unique weapons that can be upgraded over time, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. Range, damage, earned and inherent special abilities, etc, all play a factor in which weapon you're going to use for each character, and the right combination can make all the difference. The colorful graphics are a step apart from the european "high fantasy" or Final Fantasy styles that made up basically every other rpg of the era. The enemies are wildly varied and equally colorful, if rather cute in most instances. Moogles make an appearance, with a slightly altered graphical style, but the game does not otherwise resemble the Final Fantasy world. The score is one of the best for any RPG on the SNES (particularly the opening and a few of the cities), and the sounds are all light and crisp. They help to lend a "this is not your moody RPG" feel to the scenes in-between the moody RPG scenes, creating a powerful contrast between "just walking around" and facing your characters' innermost fears. Speaking of the latter.. The story is mostly cliched, but is written colorfully and does a good job of reflecting the mostly lighter feel of the game.

Just why does everyone beat on eMule, out of curiosity?

A minor critisicm of this (and most of your reviews really): you don't go into enough detail. Like you mention that the game is unbalanced, but you don't really talk about how, except that jin is powerful and that the wall-bouncing makes for infinites (which I never really had a problem with, but I'm not all hardcore into Tekken either). If you think it's really broken, you should give some more examples so that people know, for example, if it's broken in terms of tournament play, or if it's so broken that they aren't going to be able to have fun with a few friends. I'm not trying to be insulting, just a constructive criticism, and I do mostly agree with your review. I thought of Tekken 4 as a reasonable "distilling" of the series. They took a bunch of characters whose movesets were ridiculously similar and condensed them into a smaller batch of more unique fighters. The graphics and things were good, but not up to VF4Evo standards. However, the real problem was the wall thing. They made it out to be this big feature and it was really kind of lame, amounting to a few extra hits once in a while. Other than that it was, at least as a casual fighter, as solid as any other Tekken.

That's what happened to me anyway, you might have better luck. You might also want to check this out: http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/ I have a friend who loves that thing, and it's free. He's the guy I go to for computer help too, and there aren't a lot of those, so his opinion is probably pretty valid. You may want to check reviews though just in case, I've been too lazy to.

Chances are it will work ok until you download the update that breaks it.

I have to admit, 1emulation.com is probably the last place I expected to get advice like this.

Something tells me you've been scammed by one of the net's most heinous Trolls.

My windows update kicked in and DLed it automagically a day or two ago, does anyone know what exactly I got? Tsukiyo - you should really look into configuring the open ports on your firewall rather than shutting it down entirely. Any decent program will be able to work properly with the firewall configured.

I haven't built this beast yet, it was just a plan I'd hatched just before I went bro- I meant went to school. There are really cheap adapters that make laptop optical and hard drives work with desktop IDE cables. They're all over ebay, or you can get them from more reliable sources for a little more. The mobo I was looking at is about 150 bucks by itself brand new, and you'd still need RAM. You might be able to get one with a little less power for slightly less. The plus side is that they have basically all the pain-in-the-butt parts built on, and you don't have to worry about cooling.

Teamfortress the original, NOT TFC for half life. Teamfortress for Quake/Quakeworld, and preferably an early version where the scout still had flash grenades and the spy's hallucinogen had a really trippy color-warping effect. Both of these effects were axed as GLQuake became more common. Back when GameSpy was still QSpy, and LPBs were a rare occurence. Ahhh, things were good.

Probably easier with an XBox controller, but I STILL declare those things to be second only to the Dreamcast in terms of worst controller EVER. Yes, I give the Jaguar more credit. The only thing I've ever converted to PC was an old SNES controller. Are the analog sticks useable when a dual shock is converted?

I had a similar idea a while back, but I wasn't worried about the cost restraints so much. This was before I quit my full-time job to go back to school, of course. In exchange for the extra cost, we get extra functionality. I was shooting for a small system that would be powerful enough to run most everything but recent games, be able to network, and still be portable enough to carry to a friend's house in a backpack. Here's the plan: VIA Mini-ITX M10000 Nehemiah CPU/Mobo combo 512MB Ram DC to DC power adapter Small Hard Drive (About 10GB) DVD-Rom 4 Port USB HUB The mobo/cpu selected costs about 150 bucks (http://www.directron.com) and has integrated sound, video, and LAN, as well as onboard TV-Out. Reportedly, the video chipset even has decent decoders on it. A small adapter will split stereo audio to a pair of RCAs. This cable would be wound with the video cable for a simple connector. This setup would work perfectly for your system as well. I was considering using a gutted NES chassis as a case, and the power and reset buttons could even be rewired for the ITX board. However, size will be an issue. If I do this, the Hard Drive and DVD-Rom will have to be laptop parts, which increases cost and requires a few extra adapters. Whatever the case, the USB Hub would be gutted and the insides mounted frontside for easy four-player access to those few games that need them. Alternately, two ports could be used for mouse and keyboard. Gravis Gamepad Pro USBs are my controller of choice (comfortable like a dual-shock, but cheap as heck). For mouse and keyboard, a handheld trackball (used to be something called a RocketMouse, but I don't know how good they are) and a roll-up keyboard would be ideal for travel. Roms could be held on CD/DVD, while OS and Emulators would be on the Hard Disk. The 10GB drive should leave some room for MP3s and programs too. Alternately, just throw in a bigger HD and put everything on disk. The only problem with all this, so far as I can tell, is cost. At last estimate is was running about 400 bones. This isn't a ton, considering you're getting basically a portable pc, emulator machine, dvd player, etc. But, it's still 400 bucks.

What exactly is meant by SDM mode? It would have to be something good to lose LDM, Cancelling, Dash, AND Just Defend. Is there any art anywhere for the new chars? Who are these guys? Yay Hotaru! Boo Bao... Who are Soiree and Alba? They sound familiar but I can't place 'em... The pure shock value of pulling the Flying Power Climax on an unaware newbie was my favorite reason to play Hotaru. This sucks! An interesting lineup, but they do away with too much for me to be really happy with it. They are axing many of my favorite characters in exchange for their new ones, and so far I've been unimpressed with most of SNKP's designs. The Korea team should be particularly boring to play as or against. They would have been better off with Dong Hwan or May Lee in the lineup. The Women's team is going to rely on whether or not Kashmiur and Tania are decent. Again, bothers me that they replace two of three on a team. Bringing Fists of God in is lame from a gameplay standpoint (three power-cards on one team, bleh), in my opinion, but has interesting story potential. Outlaw team is cool because you've got Billy right along side Geese, but I could do without Gato. He was a novel addition for 2K3, but he just doesn't fit in with these two. Yamazaki would have been a better choice, but it could be argued that he is too counter-heavy to pair with Geese. Meh.. Millenium Team = "We need a place for these fan favorites..." Axing Whip and Maxima for this purpose disgusts me. The others are acceptable, though I would have liked to see Andy in this one, but oh well. It's interesting to note that there is no Mai, and the entire Ikari team isn't here (see the rest of this thread. hehe). There's no Malin or Choi, which leaves me wondering if one of the new characters will have a similar style.

Tight! Time to go rampant in the arcade! Found a bug already though! I kicked all ass on the "shoot the beans" one and it didn't save a score.. If you "beat" the game it tells you "congrats" (which is off the side of the screen) and just gives you the option to "give up," which doesn't save your score. I got WAY more than 870.

I guess I haven't been here long enough, but I don't get it. It's still midly amusing in its own right though.

You have good taste. If anyone mentions ANY VF you say they have good taste. That's 'cause they're all really good.

[Zombie Voice] We should find Dig Dug and Tapper clones... [/Zombie Voice]

Amen

The Seagate Barracuda line kicks ***. They're fast as heck and quiet too. I've had good luck with Samsung too, but a SATA Barracuda would be my top pick.

Right, I'm not saying I've never done it, but it's not right to try and justify it with false logic. I mean, don't try to lie to yourself and everyone else, when you do this, you are denying someone the compensation they deserve for their hard work. Now, the "try before you buy" mentality is not so bad, in my opinion. Yes, it's still legally wrong, and you're not really supposed to get to try it unless there's a demo available. However, if there's no demo and I'm actually willing to buy a game if I like it (BEFORE it's in the bargain bin), I don't feel as bad. Out of print titles are another fuzzy area, especially those which are still owned by someone, which is most of them. If the company is dead and the rights no longer exist, fine, no one is losing anything. However, if the company is still around, they could potentially still make money off of the title. Take the Midway's Arcade Treasures line, for example.

I think they just decided to pull the immediate retail support. They were kind of shutting down potential resellers, and at cost to themselves.

I never even saw BESM, but I found the Lain sourcebook at a "we don't support other companies anymore" sale at a Wizards of the Coast store and picked it up for like five bucks. It's a good read ifyou like the series.