Grazza

Same here, if I like it as much as I hope. My intention is to play it on 3DS, then post my favourite moments to Miiverse via the Wii U. PS - Thanks for changing this thread (or Retro?) PPS - Sorry if I stepped on your toes, @Dcubed. It wasn't exactly the best manners, now I think about it!

Nera for me. I just couldn't get out of the Friend Zone with Bianca.

I'm excited, I just hope it's intact. By the way, it's cross-buy too: On a related note, @Ike or @Retro_Link would you delete "3DS eShop" from the title and add the "3DS + Wii U" icon at the side, please, if that's not too cheeky?

Not a great idea, in my opinion. I like having the distinction between emulated games from past consoles and games made specifically for eShop, or direct DSi Ware/Wii retail games. For one thing, if it said "Virtual Console" you knew it would have all the features like Restore Points.

I'm really starting to enjoy it now, actually. I don't know why, but I just didn't have my platforming skills when I started playing this. Now, though, I can land on platforms I had trouble with a few days ago, make difficult jumps etc. I'm going back and am able to get the Star Coins I missed. Not a bad thing when a game re-awakens your gaming skills, really.

I finally got round to playing this. I almost bought a Wii U at launch with this this game, but in the end waited for the Mario Kart + Wind Waker download bundle. Anyway, I'm halfway through the 5th World, Soda Jungle, and am surprised to find I'm not enjoying it very much. Positive points first: I do like the Ice Flower, and the graphics are nice. However, at the risk of sounding weak, I'm finding it too difficult. Even the 1st World isn't a pushover. Normally I like to collect all the Star Coins as I go, but I'm missing so many I have just given up. But games need challenge, right? Otherwise you might as well just watch them? Well yes, in a way, but I find this not at the optimum level. I like the early worlds to be easy, because I know later ones won't be. This, though, is giving me too much of a workout all the time. If the first half of the game has given me trouble, I'm not totally sure I'll be able to do the last. OK, I probably will, but this puts me off any attempt to 100% it. It's a strange combination of over-familiarity with how these games work (and the jump mechanics are perfect, there's no doubt) with the difficulty being ramped to counterbalance that. It doesn't quite work, in my opinion. I've been going back through this thread to see if anyone had similar experiences to me. Apologies to the following people for quoting old posts, but I agree with these points: This is exactly how I'm feeling right now. I just want to get to the end and trade it in. I'll try and complete it, but for me, New Super Mario Bros 2 was far more enjoyable. If this is meant to be the Wii U's "casual", broad-audience game (and I do realise the irony of me saying that), I can't help but think they misjudged it.

Yep, good pinball game, and I actually managed to beat the Metroid Prime in that before I did in its own game.

Am I being unadventurous for not buying Galaxy Force II and Thunder Blade? Part of me would like all the coin-op 3D Classics. So far, though, I've only bought the ones I have nostalgia for. Really? That is interesting. I always thought it was a shame that the Saturn didn't play host to all Sega's System 32 games - one of the most underappreciated arcade boards of all time! (Strange when you think how famous Sega were.)

So, Afterburner II! To fully understand the appeal of Afterburner, you have to go back to the '80s. Sega had developed its Super Scaler series of arcade boards, which offered the most advanced sprite-scaling around. And there was nothing quaint or whimsical about these - they succeeded in simulating 3D as well as it could possibly be done at the time. Many of the Super Scaler games offered a high degree of wish fulfilment - ride a sports bike in Super Hang-On, drive a Ferrari in OutRun or (in the case of Afterburner) fly an F-14 Tomcat, the coolest fighter plane at the time. When I encountered Afterburner in the arcades, it wasn't just a game - it was role play! I wanted to be good at it! I wanted my friends to see me as a fighter pilot! On a technical note, Sega made several "sequels" to these, which were really just improvements. Safe to say, Afterburner II is the definitive version of Afterburner, with nothing significant missing from its previous incarnation. Part of the appeal of the Sega 3D Classics range is pretending you have your own arcade - enhanced by the rotating coin-ops used as the games' icons. Here I have a very small nitpick - this game uses the deluxe sit-in cabinet as its icon, whereas I actually preferred the medium-sized ride-on unit. That said, many will prefer the largest unit (the one depicted), so I can't complain about that. I'll just have to "trade it in" when I see a fellow arcade owner with the medium unit. From the rotating spheres on the title screen, Afterburner II is a glorious nostalgia trip. The blistering music sounds brilliant through headphones, and the game is full of the nicest colour schemes this side of Wind Waker. It's also home to some of the most impressive sprite-scaling ever seen, with enemy planes re-scaling around you. Nostalgia only gets you so far though, so what of the gameplay? Well, like Super Hang-On, it's actually a good game. Although it may seem similar to Space Harrier, there are several improvements. The lock-on allows you to concentrate in dodging after you've fired. Speed is also adjustable, with heat-seeking missiles needing to be outrun, and tight, canyon sections requiring you to slow down. There are just enough additions to add variety without ever making it too complex, and perhaps this is why Afterburner still stands as the best of its type. Maybe I'm stuck in the past, but part of me remains in the '80s and '90s, when Sega was pushing its System 16, Super Scaler and System 32 arcade boards. After that, polygons took over and there was no going back. Although I appreciate the amazing game experiences polygons have allowed, to me, there was just so much artistry involved with using sprites. Thanks to M2, we can download these 3D Classics, hop in our F-14s and blast back to a different, superbly recreated time. :awesome: You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse

Getting through a surprising amount this year. Completed Wind Waker HD Axelay Afterburner II Streets of Rage Playing New Super Mario Bros U Up Next Super Mario 3D World Downloaded and played through Axelay. I always thought it looked really good, with the upgradeable weapons and the way it alternated vertical- and side-scrolling stages. Plus, the spaceship just looks cool! Thing is, even Easy mode is quite difficult, and that's with Restore Points! Don't think I'd have got very far if I'd had the SNES cartridge. On Virtual Console, however, it's just right. You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse Then I downloaded an old favourite, Afterburner II, which I'll post more about in the Sega 3D Classics thread. Nothing stirs my nostalgia quite like a Sega game, though, and I can never play one without having a go of several others. Last night, after Afterburner II, I blasted through the entirety of Streets of Rage! This is also a cartridge I never owned at the time (just borrowed it from friends and played it round their houses). In truth, I always felt others were more fond of it than I was, but I enjoy it nowadays more than I used to. The music is great, especially Level 7, and it just makes me feel young again. You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse I love my Sega Nights.

Retro Studios should at least be working on something set in a 3D world - 2.5D is a waste of their talents. Metroid Prime 4, a new take on Kid Icarus, Raven Blade or even Ice Climber (as long as it's the @Retro_Link version), but not a hand drawn or 2.5D platformer like Wario Land.

LMAO! Never even noticed that!

Oof... Having to decide now whether I should get a New 3DS. Camera control in Majora's Mask is the only thing I want one for, but I can't really justify it for that.

Quite a nice game, if you don't mind the pointing and gesture controls (there are accelerometer-based movements that don't work very well unless you get the speed exactly right). Metroid Prime - Challenging, well-rounded. Echoes - Same quality as Prime, but one or two of the bosses were too frustrating (apparently fixed on the Wii version), it had limited ammo and yes, the Light World/Dark World mechanic was a bit much. Still my 2nd-favourite though. Corruption - A nice, smooth game if you don't mind the motion controls. So yes, considering what you didn't enjoy about Echoes, I think you'd prefer Corruption.

Majora's Mask, Axelay and Afterburner 2!

Come to think of it, I don't think there's one game shown that had impressive graphics (not that graphics are everything, but it's true). The Wii U games looked like they'd been downgraded a bit to get them running well. The 3DS, on the other hand, is really, really showing its age now. Overall, I thought it was quite an entertaining Direct, but one that tailed off. Nice to have a new Fire Emblem (Awakening was brilliant) and I'm looking forward to Majora's Mask, but that's about it for me. Wii games on Wii U would be good if they were HD and more of them had supported the Classic Controller. One thing that bothers me is that Nintendo has settled into a money-grabbing mode. Almost every announcement now is about DLC, amiibo or hardware revisions.

Ah, crap, I've accidentally been watching the US version!

That's what I thought, but it's actually just playing the Wii games directly, as if they were on disc. Hopefully genuine Wii VC games would be in HD (which apparently these aren't).

Called it.

Just the usual cut-and-paste hopes from me: * Shantae & the Pirate's Curse release date (FFS!) * Dragon Quest VII localisation * Proper 2D Metroid (sprites) ...But it'll probably just be Majora's Mask, New 3DS, amiibo and release dates for Wii U games that have already been announced. Gaaargh! Woohoo!!! Wait a minute? 2.5D...?

I'm not suggesting the games themselves are inferior. I'm saying it's rather low and base to go for the lowest common denominator.

F-Zero GX really is not technical. I only say this because I have tried to get into genuinely technical racing games, like Forza on the Xbox, and haven't been able to at all. GX was a pure arcade game - once you'd learnt which type of banking to use on which corners, you had a very good chance at mastering it. There's a middle ground though. Whilst I wouldn't want Nintendo to make violent, gory games (I think it'd be beneath them, frankly), there was a type of tone they used to be excellent at - Metroid Prime, Twilight Princess, F-Zero GX - that used to attract a broader crowd. Not violent, not gory, just something that allows a different feel. True gamers used to boast about those and feel proud to have them on their console. There's no point in chasing gamers who have always thought that Nintendo is "kiddy", but I still say there's an audience of more reasonable gamers out there who haven't really felt engaged with Nintendo since the N64/GameCube and the days of the consoles just having a traditional controller.

Might be good, but I did laugh at the Hulk touching hands with Black Widow.

My take on the list: Twilight Princess deserves to be there, although part of me will always resent it being considered a Wii game instead of GameCube. And whatever people think of it, I had more fun with Metroid: Other M than Skyward Sword. If Star 242 hadn't annoyed me so much, I'd have preferred Galaxy 2. It was more "to the point" about being a hub world + challenges, whereas the original Galaxy masqueraded as a full 3D Mario (and it was), but didn't take it to the same levels as 64 and Sunshine. Wise man.