So, this old news .. but not for me since I just got caught by it. In Bowsers Dark Matter Plant, during the boss battle at the end, there is a show-stopper glitch; sometimes Bowser can just float off into space … and nothing can be done except restart the level.
I ignored most news about Super Mario Galaxy when I was first released (except for the overall ratings), so as to avoid spoiling the surprise elements of the game … well, this certainly is a surprise … a glitch in an otherwise pretty polished first-party Nintendo game. Don’t see that often.
This weeks releases on the Australian Virtual Console: Riot Zone (TurboGrafx-16/TurboDuo) and 1080° Snowboarding (Nintendo 64).
While I haven’t played it yet, 1080° Snowboarding looks like it really captures the feel of snowboarding. I guess we wouldn’t expect any less from the developers of Wave Rave 64, another game known for it’s great ‘feel’.
This weeks Australian Virtual Console releases: Alien Storm (Sega Megadrive) [think Golden Axe mashed up with the sprites from Contra] and StarTropics (NES) [like Zelda 1, but much better].
StarTropics (NES) - this is an RPG in the style of the original Legend of Zelda, but most players agree that StarTropics is much better. If you’ve been tempted to buy Zelda 1 from the NES, skip it and move straight to anything else in the Zelda series, or play StarTropics instead.
(this video is of an emulated version, not on the original SNES or Virtual Console … sorry, real Harvest Moon videos were as hard to find as the original cartridge. Enjoy the entertaining IRC-style chat by the players, as subtitles).
The English version of Harvest Moon for SNES is known to be extremely rare, so unlike many Virtual Console games, you probably won’t find the cartridge cheaper on Ebay. In this case 800 points (~AUD$12) is a bargain. It’s nice to see rarities like this being released, particularly when they are something fun and unusual like Harvest Moon … it might be worth picking up in preparation for the Wii version of Harvest Moon: Tree of Peace that is slated for release sometime early this year.
Jim Squires at The Bits Bytes Pixels and Sprites has reviewed Wrecking Crew, one of Mario and Luigi’s earliest outings. He makes a nice analysis of why Wrecking Crew was a significant game for its time, even if it doesn’t really match the quality of many of the ‘action puzzlers’ that came after it. My feelings playing it were similar to Jim’s … it doesn’t really play all that well, but it is clear that it sowed the seed for better games like Lode Runner to spring forth.
