u/Scnew1

Another Mega Man game complete!

This game in general is soooo much easier than 1-3, and still easier than 4 too. One of the things I appreciate about RA is that the achievements make a game I can finish in an afternoon into a more challenging experience. That said, it's still a lot easier than the earlier games even with the achievements, lol. I spent way more time on buster only Doc Robot Quick Man in 3 then I spent on the entire boss rush damageless in this game.

I played this game back in the day and I always loved it but playing it again after so long maaaan did I love it even more than I remembered. What an all timer. The combat's fairly average for the era but the world and the characters and the story are great. I may or may not have gotten a lil misty eyed at the ending.

The achievement set is pretty good, however there are a number of things that are very easy to miss if you don't talk to a certain person during a short window here and there, and all those missables kind of stressed me out a little to the point that I'm not sure anyone playing this for the first time should worry about getting all the achievements too. You're bound to catch a spoiler looking the guides/maps/etc. to get all the things.

It's a Mega Man game, so do I even need to tell you that it's great?

The set's pretty good too. Nothing made me absolutely tear my hair out like buster only Doc Robot Quick Man and Wood Man in 3, but I'd rather not talk about the ways my first two attempts at a deathless run ended.

I can finally stop living in fear that the line will end before finishing the Mega Man 1 bosses.

The Shining Force games were one of the first things I played when I discovered Retro Achievements... and before I realized hardcore mode was a thing. So I've been slowly going through them again.

This is a fun lil game. Like Shining Force CD it lacks the town exploration that 1, 2 and 3 have but the combat is the same Shining Force goodness you're used to. The story is fun if you're a big fan of the series, I love the way it directly connects Shining Force 1 and 2.

The set is pretty meh. Promote everybody, open all the chests, grab the two secret characters. It could definitely use some more interesting ideas, but hey, it was a pretty easy mastery to cross of my list.

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The buster only achievements for Doc Robot Wood Man and Doc Robot Quick Man are BRUTAL. Damageless Shadow Man is pretty brutal too seeing as you pretty much always take damage if you use his weakness against him. I'm not sure it's the hardest set I've done - Castlevania Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night were pretty tough too - but those three achievements I mentioned are some of the hardest I've done since finding RA. Soooo glad to have this badge on my wall now.

I was playing this dumb Floppy Fish game that was part of Retro Roulette last week and was about to badge it when I realized it was going to be mastery #40, and I didn’t want that game to be on my completion progress milestones as #40 forever so I stopped and played a better game first, haha.

MMPR the Movie for the Genesis is one I was only missing one achievement for from a while ago, so I went back and gave that another crack. The’s kind of lacking in enemy variety, outside of the bosses there’s only Lord Zedd’s putties and Ivan Ooze’s minions to beat up. But it’s a pretty smooth beat em up otherwise, and being a big OG MMPR fan I love that they used the show’s soundtrack. Having Genesis versions of every piece of music Ron Wasserman wrote for the show rules. The game and the set are both pretty easy, beating it on hard without dying is the only real challenge.

Floppy Fish mean while, uh, it exists. It’s not egregiously bad but there’s not really any reason to recommend it to anyone outside of it being an easy mastery if that’s your thing.

What a day. Mega Man 2 I've been sitting on for a while with all but two achievements, but I finally got 'em today. It's a great set. Double Dragon was quick but it was a good time too.

What a great fuckin game.

My only complaint with the set is the 20 hearts requirement for the damageless boss achievements - normally it's fine, but two of them don't have enough hearts in the pre-boss room, meaning even if you got there with 6 lives you only get one attempt before having to game over and redo the entire level.

Other than that, it's a good set. A lot of is it challenging but not impossibly so.

This is easily the best weird point and click adventure game/visual novel hybrid about vegetable people in the entire NES library.

It’s so unique. There wasn’t much else like it on the NES. I don’t know if I’d say it’s a great game, but it has a weird charm that’s hard to resist.

That said, I don’t know why a game like this needs a “beat the game in one sitting” achievement. There’s no challenge to playing it again once you know what to do, it’s just a lame time sink. Other than that the set was cool and rewards you for doing most of the optional stuff.

After all that time turning into mist and whipping monsters in Castlevania, what better palette cleanser could there be than an educational Apple II game that is barely a game at all???

Blame the Retro Roulette event for this one.

Catching up on some masteries I haven’t posted about…

#31: Mega Man 8! A lot of Mega Man fans really seem to hate on this one because of the jump jump! slide slide! sections, but they didn’t bother me at all. The voice acting is terrible of course but in a so bad it’s good sort of fun way. The set itself is pretty easy by Mega Man standards. I really enjoyed my time with this one. 8/10

#32: Spider-Man: Battle for New York. I only started playing this because of Retro Roulette, but the event achievement was so far into the game that kept going after I got it. It’s a pretty mediocre game. There’s nothing super wrong with it, but also nothing great about it either. The Spidey levels are definitely better than the Green Goblin ones though. The set is mostly just progression achievements and then a no damage achievement for each boss. 5/10

#33: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I ended up playing this because TheAndySocialNetwork streamed it on Twitch, and I guess I was in a TMNT sort of mood because I immediately wanted to play it too. I’d rank the game higher than Spider-Man, but not as good as Mega Man 8. Having to play through the final level on Very Hard was a nightmare lol, and so are those bonus Raphael races, but obviously I got it done. 7/10