Finally redeemed my childhood!

Never beat this game as a kid and wanted to prove to myself that I don't suck too much at platformers (didn't succeed with that).

Decided to go for hardmode from the start which was quite a pain, but didn't want to play through the game three times.

After finishing it the speedrun was rather easy, the only achievements that gave me trouble were

Turquoise Tidbit Triumph because of the last few meters and Feathery Fellowship Forfeit because I had no idea how people did the first jump.

Glad to have revisited the game, still not a fan of plattformers :)

Took around 1200ish hours. Played quite a few of games from my childhood and a lot of new ones but still a lot more I want to play. i doubt ill get to 100k points but was a lot of fun. if you have any game recommendations worth checking out let me know :)

The accursed entity has been challenged and conquered... Ok, dramatics aside, this is the first mastery I've gotten for a game I had never played prior, but due to it's connection to a franchise I adore, and my desire to get the full franchise set eventually, thus begins hopefully one of many classics I can enjoy. Well... At least enjoy more than this...

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XII | Jak & Daxter: The Lost Frontier

PlayStation 2 | Platformer
High Impact Games (2009)

It's no secret that this game is lambasted in circles that still engage with the Jak franchise, mainly speedrunners and their twitch chats, and I have, as someone who enjoys watching speed content for those games, engaged in similar shenanigans, speaking as if this game were the antichrist, the worst sin gaming had ever birthed.

Of course, the truth of the matter is the fact the game is just, mundane and mediocre. From the far less refined movement, to the completely stunted platforming challenges, eco powers that should be cool and fun instead just reducing the game to a slog of "Use power in obvious context", and combat reduced to a slow, tedious slog with enemies that seem gluttons for pain, only made exponentially worse on subsequent playthroughs in hero mode. Eco upgrades on paper sound cool, until the fact their actual applicability is mediocre at best.

The ship flying gameplay that defines the games open traversal areas and honestly, the second half of the games runtime with combat sections fares a touch better. As a traversal method, the tight reactive zooming of Jak 2's haven or to a lesser extent the gallavants throughout the wasteland in 3 are far more enjoyable than the boring point to point traversal, and the aerial combat being at least somewhat engaging, if not ultimately a mess of aerial maenuours and struggling to shoot whatever needed shooting.

But, despite the average and honestly, boring gameplay loop, it's the lack of flourishes, and the polish the first three games exuded that kill this game and my enjoyment of it. The narritive is a trite mess that had me genuinely skipping cutscenes by halfway through playthrough one. The movement, one of the original trilogies crowning achievements, feels stiff and sluggish. The expressiveness of the world and character animations, gone. While one could argue that these are losses from being a portable game, it doesn't change the fact it makes for a worse gameplay experience.

But that's the rub, this review is all comparisons, to games far more polished, because that's what this is. This is the final legacy of those games. And in truth, were the three returning characters, the concept of eco and the precursors replaced with different original concepts, this game would be middle of the road fine. But it stands as a Jak game. And as a Jak game?

It sure ain't the anitchrist, but it's got horns, a pitchfork and a boiling pit of lava as it eggs you on about a nostalgia it'll never service.

Achievement Set

TeddyWestside
70 Cheevo's // 640 Points

Where my thoughts on the game itself are pretty middle of road, my thoughts on the set are far more explosively mixed. On one hand, with a game that seems alergic to tracking some of it's side activities, it's nice to have them properly looked after. On the other...

Three. Full. Playthroughs.

This is partially my fault, I went into the first run through of the game more casually that I probably should, missing a decent number of the games precursor orbs hidden behind backtracking, but EVEN then, having an achievement that requires players to do at least 2.5 playthroughs for mastery is painful. Even IF it is the total needed to buy all secrets, with the hero mode ones being untenable for mastery progression it feels like an aggregious waste of time and energy.

Otherwise, progression tracking is the name of the game, with the remainder mainly keeping atop your completion of side tasks. It's, passable. But the lack of anything substantial to sink your teeth into, no hitless boss challenges, no time attack on the timed missions, not even an actual all orbs in one run achievement which at least would have given some sense of value to the eggs, just progress and grinding.

Awards

Best Achievement - Massacre ^((Kill 5 enemies at once)) |
It seems simple, it is simple, it's a fun little puzzle that challenges you to set up enemies. Yes, this genuinely was my fave.

Worst Achievement - Orb Obsessive ^((515 Precursor Orbs)) |
Three. Full. Playthroughs.

The Grand Challenge - Orb Obsessive ^((515 Precursor Orbs)) |
Three*. Full. Playthroughs.
^(*2.5 if you're actually properly completing the game on run one.)

Game Score - Mediocre ^((3)) |
I was done enough with this game the first time around. And having done it thrice, I will never look at it again. Just barely worth it for the novelty if anything.

Set Score - Detrimental ^((3)) |
THREE. FULL. PL- Ok but in all seriousness, tacks on even more playtime to a game that honestly, at best deserves your first playthrough, and if merciful, a hero mode run.

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It's dead, and now I never have to interact with this game again. But it feels freeing to finally understand the mediocrity behind the hyperbole now at least. Maybe next time I'll just chuck up a longplay while grinding pokemon shiny sets...

Easier than I thought. The time trials were not that hard and the game is very fun to play

This was a unique experience. The metroid like game design was fun and refreshing for a kirby game. I have to say, happy that it's over, the last 3 days grinding bossrush took it from me.

Quite a long game to achieve a 100% compilation on one file with a minimum of three playthroughs, huh?

Anyway, this is my all-time favorite video game; Mastered the whole set.

Pretty neat and fun demake of Geometry Dash.
The controls can be lil bit unresponsive especially with the yellow and blue orbs.
It took me longer to master, because the game deleted my save file.
Getting all of the coins were bit annoying on the later levels like in XStep, but the most hardest annoying to complete in general is ClutterFunk, which is incredibly difficulty because of the 3 blue orb part, because it requires extremely strict timing and mentioned before lil bit unresponsive.
The 8-bit demakes of the songs are pretty cool to listen to

The next sets I’ve mastered includes:

LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game (GameCube)
LEGO Batman: The Video Game (DS)
LEGO Batman: The Video Game (PSP)

If anyone wants any insight on these sets, let me know in the comments.

I've never played any of the wonder boy series aside of playing a little bit of the first the wonder boy and adventure island, but i've heard great things about this game and they aren't lying.

Was a fun 2d platformer adventure game with small metroidvania elements, was an easy game and set to beat with only having to look up a few things and the final boss being really hard, since it felt like I was getting bounced around like a Pinball barley able to hit the boss.

I did have trouble with the sphynx since im bad at quizs, but luckily before I saved i made a copy of my save, and after I finished the game I went back and finished the quiz, the quiz only has a few questions so it was easy to remember what the answers I got correct/incorrect on my past attempt.

It was easy to grind in this game especially in the last area so the second gemstone was no problem, hell I was actually considering grinding some more to get an extra heart for the final boss, defently didn't expect an alien to be the final boss in this fantasy game, don't know if this is a common thing in this series, might play the other games later.

I guess the story is that you need to fix time somehow by defeating the bosses idk think the story is in the instruction manual.

You play as a duck android and work your way through levels of 3 types highspeed, athletic and labyrinth and ends with a boss fight.

Outside of normal play there is 3 challenges per level and they can be a pain no damage items, check point or bonus room time attack and point bonus for high HP/charge? The HP will drain over time and increase when you pick up lightning bolts so not sure what to call it? There is also no damage and 1 HP left boss fights

Finally there is an almost all check points and the big one complete the game with all bonus areas, no deaths, 300,000 points under 50 mins. Seems like a lot but it's pretty forgiving.

I wanna plug jotaroraido for the comments but also they do really pretty pixel art and I think I might make an account just to get a commission when it opens back up go take a peek you might like there work

bsky.app/profile/raido.moe

I was extremely exhausted grinding at the end, but anyway, it's complete.

Getting the Nice cards was boring until i found out i can change the clock of the emulator and a good guide to fish MarilL and Corsola

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.