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Finished both of these games last night. Absolutely loved Tinykin. I'm not sure why people compare it to Pikmin. Sure, you have a little army of helpers following you but that's where the similarities really end. The game is pretty much a straight up 3D platforming game that has you collect a load of stuff. It actually reminded me more of Chibi Robo than it did Pikmin. I enjoyed it so much that I'm actually tempted to go through it again to earn the double platinum. Certainly one of my fav indies games I have played in recent times. I would give it a whirl, @drahkon. I know you said you wouldn't touch it due to it being like Pikmin but it plays nothing like it. Plus, it's a breezy affair, clocking in at around 7-8 hours and another 1-2 hours after that to mop things up, if going for the platinum. Cannon Dancer was decent, if a little short. The game is definitely a spiritual successor to Strider, which isn't a surprise given who made it. I still prefer Strider though but that could just be nostalgia talking. I wasn't too keen on some of the combat in the game, especially the suplex move. You would appreciate one of the trophies, @Julius There's an enemy that has armour on and flies around on a jetpack, just like a Mandalorian. You have to suplex this enemy to unlock the trophy...

You really don't.

Ah Turok, I had the game (wasn’t it 1 of the 3 release games here) and all I remember about it was that it was £70 when the other games where £50.

Turok is low-key, one of the most important games in the N64’s library (and one of the most important for western developed video games in general). It was the first ever fully 3D FPS game for a home console (and I believe second only to Quake in general, which launched on the PC about 8 months prior). It also codified the “standard” control scheme for FPS games on the N64 in general (which isn’t actually all that far off the modern FPS dual analog setup, just in reverse owing to the c-buttons being on the right side of the controller). But perhaps most notably of all? Turok 1 & 2 are the prototypes for Metroid Prime. I mean this in both a figurative and a literal sense. Turok 1 & 2 are not just first person shooters, they are straight up Metroidvania games. Now, Turok Dinosaur Hunter is not the first First-Person Metroidvania game, that title belongs to 1996’s Powerslave/Exhumed for the SEGA Saturn, but its ties to Metroid are a lot more explicit than you might realise… because the team at Iguana Studios behind the development of Turok 1 & 2 would split off after the completion of Turok 2’s multiplayer spinoff Turok Rage Wars, to found none other than… Retro Studios. Yes, the very same Retro Studios that made the Metroid Prime series. Though half of the staff at the studio would end up getting fired before Metroid Prime 1 really moved into full production (including studio head and founder, Jeff Spangenberg), around half of the people who worked on Metroid Prime 1 had previously worked on Turok 1 & 2 (including the Director, Mark Pachini). And when you go back and play Turok 1 & 2 after playing Metroid Prime? The influence is immediately obvious. Metroid Prime’s platforming is a direct evolution of what was first done with Turok Dinosaur Hunter; including the iconic downwards head bob that shows you where you’re going to land when you jump. Prime’s basic locomotion gameplay is built directly off of Turok 1 & 2, as are many of its gameplay subsystems; hell, you can even shoot birds out of the sky in Turok, just like in Metroid Prime! The non-linear, exploration focused level design also immediately reminds you of what was later done in Metroid Prime (albeit much more limited, owing to the N64’s hardware and cartridge space limitations). Without Turok Dinosaur Hunter? There is no Metroid Prime. Not a bad legacy for a game based on a comic book! You’re not far off, it came out just 3 days after the N64 launched in Europe (on the same day as the US release even). So it basically was a launch day title over here.

It was Mario, SotE and Pilotwings at launch with Turok shortly after. I was going to get it too (since everything else was sold out) but no way was I parting with seventy quid of hard saved dough. Put it back in the moneybox for Mario Kart.

Right, @Glen-i can’t make it tonight so party at mine…. I mean I’ll be hosting tonight’s races. 8pm sharp. Players choice.

@RedShell did you ever play Tinykin? Think it was on Game Pass at some point. Cute, chilled out, colourful platformer seems right up your street. I remember @Cube enjoying it when he played it a while back.

I was just thinking there's no way that you would need a year to play through those games why not just resubscribe for 1 month? Then I remembered that isn't actually an option for the Expansion Pack. So yeah, that does indeed suck. Anyway, if you do plan to subscribe again, ShopTo have it at a much better price than the eShop: https://www.shopto.net/en/ndo10009344-nintendo-switch-on-line-expansion-pack-365-p1179195/

Game has gone gold: Launch trailer dropped yesterday: The way things are going, I could easily see the review scores being posted bringing an end to this thread Absolutely. Especially when you consider it's also one of few first-party games with a date, you'd think it'd be getting pushed so much harder than it has been, for example previews and hands-on time with a game like this is the clear call to make...and yet we haven't had either? And no demo? I'd be lying if I said deep down I didn't hope that this was because of a pivot around GaaS now that Jim Ryan is leaving, because the double blow of sending this thing out to die and Naughty Dog not going ahead with Factions would then make so much more sense. It would be a shame though, a waste of talent to sink this much time into a project and not back it as much as you can. Time will tell, I guess feels like it's set up to be Destruction AllStars 2.0 – and didn't that also release in Feb? Weird.

The 1000/1000 counter is there for what is required in the game (bubbles) but the next counter is for if you are just going for 100%. I think you can 100% all of the levels as you play them but it's far easier if you go back later and have more bubbles to float around with.

ISS isn't even the next football game in my list (but it's not long after that). Turok: Dinosaur Hunter PAL release: 4th March 1997 NA release: 4th March 1997 JP release: 30th May 1997 Developer: Iguana Publisher: Acclaim N64 Magazine Score: 91% The Nintendo 64’s first first person shooter is in some ways what you would expect from first person shooters in the early N64 days – something along the lines of Doom and Quake, but focusing a bit more on movement. I played this as a child but never got far, even using cheats I never quite understood what I was supposed to be doing. That’s because Turok isn’t just a shooter: it’s a platformer game where you have to find collectables. The version I’m playing is the remaster of the game – it still has the look and feel of the N64 game, but with a few improvements, the biggest one being fog. Due to the detail of the original game, the render distance was extremely low, so fog was added to hide the lack of level. The PC version moves the fog much further away – it doesn’t remove it completely as the levels were designed with the fog in mind, so you’d just see all the broken geometry the fog was removed completely. Even with the increased view, navigating the levels isn’t easy. They’re very maze-like and you get warped between different parts, with no reference point to help you get your bearings. It doesn’t help that the levels have little graphical variety within them. You’ll need to scour these levels in order to find keys to unlock later levels, so most of the game will be ambling around, fighting respawning enemies. The gunplay, at least, it a lot of fun, with a great variety of weapons and lots of different enemies. The story (which you’re not told at all in the game) involves an area of space where things from the past and future exist, so while you start killing tribesmen and dinosaurs, you’ll work up towards aliens, robots and dinosaurs with guns. Enemies to become more bullet sponges as you progress, though, so you need to use more ammo. Movement is an important part of Turok and it provides a great sense of speed. You run around and jump in a very fluid way. For navigating the main parts of the levels, it’s a lot of fun, but then you reach the many platforming segments of the game, and it all fall down (or you will at least, a lot). The movement feels great when there’s leeway, but it doesn’t feel precise enough for jumping on the many pillars the game requires you to jump on – and with the game’s checkpoint system, some of these jumps can be a good distance away from the last one. Turok was definitely great when it came out, but I can’t really recommend it now. but it is a game well worth remembering. It has a lot of flaws, but the flaws are also what make the game unique. Turok is very much a product of its time, but is also a piece of gaming history, especially with environments that are much more 3D than previous first person shooters. Remake or Remaster? The Nightdrive remaster is exactly what Turok needed. Official ways to get the game. The faithful remaster of Turok: Dinosaur Hunter is available on GOG, Steam, Switch, Xbox and PlayStation.

@Julius With how things are moving on Steam and Youtube...are you doing ok or suffering from all the excitement?

For me, it is. I'm not even talking about the digital/physical split. You can own a digital collection (even with the risk of certain games being pulled from digital stores). Plus, companies like GOG do care about consumers having a collection that's actually theirs (I can even give a friend a copy of a digital GOG game I purchased. It's like borrowing cartridges all over again). No, it's the subscription services that I distrust. Those are services you can't pick, choose, or curate. Imagine having your leisurely playthrough of Skyrim or BotW be rushed by the deadline in your subscriptions. Imagine purchasing a 6-month subscription of an hypothetical Square-Enix's GamePass, only to see them sell your favourite IPs the following week. Imagine having your yearly DKC3 playthrough be entirely dependent on purchasing a whole year of NSO. Imagine having P.T. or Mario 3D All-Stars be tied to a couple of months each on a service, and then they're gone forever, nobody keeps them. I look at the current state of streaming services and I get headaches. I'd rather that not happen to the medium I'm more passionate about.

Larian Studios founder also hits back at the comments Ubisoft have made.

Nah, you need the DLC to actually get it, and I ain't shelling out to play more of this game.

Wrapped up my first game of the year last night... Chrono Trigger | 1995 I talked about Chrono Trigger extensively the last time I played it back at the start of 2020, and long story short, well, reading it back I agree with everything I wrote back then, so I guess if you want a long, thought out write-up from me on the game, it's already out there Instead, I want to spend this time highlighting the little things I picked up on that I didn't really speak to last time. This time around I played the game on TV for the first time via my docked Steam Deck, which was a transformative experience for the most part. Hearing those themes blast out of my TV and not needing to look down at a small DS or 3DS screen felt much more appropriate for a game of this scale and grandeur. There were a few minor hiccups throughout, with things like audio issues and getting stuck on the geometry of the pixel art happening one too many times to go unspoken about, but it in no way became an obstacle to my enjoyment. There are small tweaks to minor issues like those, though, which I'd like to see for an eventual - I hope - release on current platforms...perhaps in time for the 30th anniversary of the game next year? To dive right in, one of the crowning achievements of Chrono Trigger is its brevity - playing through to the normal ending with all sidequests completed took me a bit shy of 19 hours - in a genre known for getting carried away and stacking hour after hour to your playtime, and what really struck me on this playthrough is just how brief every type of interaction in the game is. Combat is fast and reactive, even on this playthrough using Wait rather than Active (just to see if it changed how I got on with it) it was going along at a much faster clip than many of its modern contemporaries; dungeons and the like are incredibly short and easy to navigate, just a few screens save for some late game areas, and you're often in and out in the course of 15-20 minutes, with a major story beat has typically playing out in that time; and it's very rare that you spend longer than 30 seconds at a time on the World Map screen between locales, which has you consistently moving from one beat to the next. Conversations and quick talks with random NPCs aren't long and meaningless button-mashing sessions, with such interactions kept lean and often to limited to three or less text boxes, but they often add so much value to the game, whether it be something to ponder over, chuckle about, or pointing you in the right direction - which is exactly what I want to talk about next. A whole lot of this game's brilliance is down to how much faith and trust it places in the player, but also how it balances with not being afraid of telling you the fastest route from A to B. One of the best examples of this is that there are numerous times throughout the game where an NPC will clue you in on an enemy or boss weakness or nuance ahead of going into their respective dungeon, with one of the best examples of this being an NPC in the Middle Ages hinting that the wooden hammer-wielding Ogan in the Denadoro Mountains are cowards without their weapons, a very direct and obvious suggestion to use a Fire-based attack. Fights against the hammer-wielding variants of Ogan could take a while without this knowledge, as their hammer offers extra resistance to attacks, and this information is gained simply by following the typical general advice in a JRPG - especially of the time - to talk to anyone and everyone you come across, and an additional hint in case you come across these enemies without talking to that NPC is that there are also Ogan you'll encounter without the hammer, clearly nudging you in the direction of needing to wanting to do something about their big and brutish splintered mallets. This in turn reinforces the need to talk to anyone and everyone - similar to Dragon Quest's excellent job of getting you to ransack every place you come across in the search for items, because valuable ones are out there to be found - which in turns leads to interesting side tangents, humourous moments, little details about the world, and you're usual NPC-talking affair, but the key difference being the efficiency with which it is conveyed. This level of trust but also direct communication throughout the game about what and when you need to do something shaves valuable time off the game, I think, saving players from dragged out sessions; I genuinely think this game would be 5-10 hours longer if they took a similar approach to other games of that period, which either wanted you to rely on a guide or to simply try things out in an aimless manner. This also carries through to boss fights, where there can often be a lot of moving parts, but weaknesses and what the game wants you to do often feels very clear even against the tougher bosses - and if you do find yourself trying things out, the game very quickly corrects your course in a fast and heavy-handed way, such as by having that part of a boss immediately counter or by hinting at the order you should take parts of the boss out in by clearly telegraphing that this hand heals, or that leaving both hands of the boss around can result in disaster. The developers clearly and simply didn't care if you found the game easy, because you'd earned the knowledge required to push ahead, and its in this way that they respect your time and that, in turn, Chrono Trigger gains your respect. There is a sense of humility on show by some of Japan's best and brightest creators of the 20th century which I think few other games and creatives dare to even consider matching. The side quests - the main ones of which are left to the end of the game, with each party member getting a sizeable focus - are absolutely brilliant, too. Why should you deviate from the main path so close to the end of the game to complete these quests? Why, for important character moments and progression, and some of the best gear in the game, of course! It's yet another way in which your time is being respected, and its in all of these little ways that there are these constant value-adds throughout the game: you're rewarded, in some form or another, by doing as much as you can, without it ever becoming a slog. And then, well, there's just the usual stuff to praise which I talked about last time. Awesome ensemble of characters. Arguably the greatest soundtrack ever composed for a game (and if not, it is firmly in the conversation, and spawned the career of a legendary composer still active in the industry today, nearly 30 years later). A combat system with appropriate depth should you want to dive in, but it's totally optional, as no particular trio of characters or set of gear feels like it's ever going to hold you back. A tear-jerking, chills-inducing story with an amazing message just as important today as it was back when the game launched, and will be decades from now when I'm on my 20th playthrough, and beyond when I'm long gone. There is simply a peace and tranquility offered to the handling of heavier topics in this game, such as the idea of death and the passing of time, which this game bestows that no other game, or film, or book I've ever come across has been able to communicate, in the kindest but most honest, communicative and understanding matter-of-fact way; almost as if a parent speaking to a child. I'm so glad I revisited Chrono Trigger to remind myself that, yes, everything that I remembered about it and more holds true: this game is a timeless, and always timely-to-experience, masterpiece - far and long ahead of its time - in every sense of the word.

Welp, just went to start this tonight seeing as I was going to go through the PS4 version, and my cloud save from completing the PS4 version of the game has failed me, with my most recent auto- and manual saves being 25 hours into my time with the game...6 hours behind where I finished, so a good Act and a fair chunk has gone missing. No NG+ options available because, well, apparently I never finished the game Oh well, bit of a shame but think I'll just wait until Friday to upgrade to Remastered, play through it for the first time again (maybe at a higher difficulty this time?), play No Return, and then see where I'm at and if I'm up for going for the Platinum and/or a Grounded playthrough after On the upside, it means I have some time to sort out my PS5's storage and to play a shorter game in the meantime