Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack: N64 & SEGA Mega Drive (& GBA!!)

[Glen-i]

2 hours ago, EEVILMURRAY said:

Waddaya mean?

That would be telling... I'd rather show with vids. So, look forward to Thursday.

But let's just say the glitch that you use to skip Mia is called the Retreat Glitch, and it still works in The Lost Age. To hilarious effect.

EDIT: Actually, wait. Screw it. Can't wait. This is the kind of silliness I mean, @EEVILMURRAY.

 

Edited January 22 by Glen-i

[Glen-i]

@darksnowman and @S.C.G. Would you be up for some N64 stuff at 8pm tonight with @BowserBasher and I?

I'm thinking, start with a friendly Mario Party 3 game and then other games afterwards if Mario Party doesn't end up making us hate each other.

[BowserBasher]

1 hour ago, Glen-i said:

if Mario Party doesn't end up making us hate each other.

That sentence makes it sound like you've never played a Mario Party with us. Doesn't it always?

Anyway, yeah I'm up for some games later.

[darksnowman]

End up?

Go on then, I'll sub in for a board. Don't think I'll stay on for the rest of the festivities so I'll bow out after that. Whenever you're finished playing that game with knock-off art from another established game series we'll get down to it.

[Glen-i]

Cool, hopefully @S.C.G can make it then.

[darksnowman]

11 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

Cool, hopefully @S.C.G can make it then.

Put the CPU on easy if he doesn't and it'll be all the same.  

[Glen-i]

2 minutes ago, darksnowman said:

Put the CPU on easy if he doesn't and it'll be all the same.  

Yeah, no. Normal at least. You don't wanna be the person lumped with an Easy CPU in 2 V 2 games.

[Glen-i]

I'll give it 5 minutes, then we'll start

[S.C.G]

Nah, I'm not in this week, enjoy CPU Luigi... he might even win, just don't expect him to respeatedly laugh about it.

Anyway, have fun.

[Glen-i]

Uhhh. Well. That game was certainly... Interesting.

[BowserBasher]

Interesting is one way to describe it. No stream for people to see but 5 extra turns, 3 stars in one turn, @Glen-i constantly having coins stolen, 1 turn having 3 battle games (I think).

 

[Glen-i]

You have to understand that @BowserBasher got a Wacky Watch on the first turn, (I nicked it about halfway through the game). followed immediately by CPU Luigi getting a star from a hidden block.

And then nothing of note happened for 15 turns. And then all hell broke loose!

Yes, we did 3 battle games in one turn. Yes, BowserBasher got 3 stars in one turn.
And I wasn't having that. So my fury of a million suns made us play an extra 5 turns, and...

It made all the difference!

S.C.G there, almost jinxing Luigi into second place. He never realised how right he was!

1 hour ago, S.C.G said:

enjoy CPU Luigi... he might even win, just don't expect him to respeatedly laugh about it.

Anyway, here's another moment.

Anyway, good game! Despicable behaviour throughout, but good game!

@darksnowman, we noticed you trying to get on the Switch App voice chat, but my phone doesn't play nice with that, literally can't hear anything on it.
We normally use the N-E Voice Chat Room on Discord for when we play together. I'm sure I'd be able to invite you on to that for any future sessions.

Edited January 26 by Glen-i

[darksnowman]

Luigi (COM) being awarded a random star on the first turn set the tone until Mario later picked up three stars (legit, stolen, random) in a single turn. Looked like Mario Party was for the Mario Bros. Still don't know how Yoshi eked out the win.

Hectic. I spent the first while online trying to find out what the items do—forgot it was so item-heavy. How easy these things slip your mind in the intervening decades. Totally missed why there was another five turns after it said last turn.

2 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

we noticed you trying to get on the Switch App voice chat, but my phone doesn't play nice with that, literally can't hear anything on it.
We normally use the N-E Voice chat room on Discord for when we play together. I'm sure I'd be able to invite you on to that for any future sessions.

Thought I'd check but it said 0 people were in the room. Just wanted to say bear with me if I was grinding it to a halt too much checking descriptions.

[Glen-i]

OK. Early Sol Blade not impressive enough for you? How about I up the ante?

Spoiler

Spoiler

Yes, that's Isaac. Yes, he's a fully functional party member. Yes, he has all the swag from my password save from the first game!

If you remember, he's not supposed to be in the party for another 15 hours. Suffice to say, this is OP as hell!

It only got discovered in 2022 as well!

This also has a weird quirk in which if you reorder your lineup with Isaac around, then you end up duplicating one of your party members. While it's impossible to have 2 Felix's in a fight, the second version of him still gets the experience, so Felix (or whatever character you duplicate) gets 50% more experience. That is also OP.

This does fix itself when you're forced to ditch Jenna and Sheba at Jupiter Lighthouse, mind.

Another weird quirk is that because Isaac is in the party early, the Colosso Warriors fight is triggered the first time you go into Shaman Village Cave. This wouldn't be that big a deal, but by utilising another glitch (Trial Road Artifact Duplication), you can get a Golden Shirt for all 8 party members!

Lots of fun "Good Bad Bugs"!

 

 

[EEVILMURRAY]

On 22/01/2024 at 12:16 PM, Glen-i said:

That would be telling... I'd rather show with vids. So, look forward to Thursday.

But let's just say the glitch that you use to skip Mia is called the Retreat Glitch, and it still works in The Lost Age. To hilarious effect.

EDIT: Actually, wait. Screw it. Can't wait. This is the kind of silliness I mean, @EEVILMURRAY.

 

I fucked up my Lost Age journey to a degree I didn't think possible. I was waiting to get the Lash Psynergy, but was swearing to myself that it was coming soon... Turns out I missed it completely. I was at Alhafra and had to backtrack all the way back to other continent for the temple there, I've done Airs Rock and everything. I'm fuckin' level 15, I gonna tear these enemies a whole new one.

[Glen-i]

2 hours ago, EEVILMURRAY said:

I was waiting to get the Lash Psynergy, but was swearing to myself that it was coming soon... Turns out I missed it completely. I was at Alhafra and had to backtrack all the way back to other continent for the temple there, I've done Airs Rock and everything.

Uhhh... You don't actually need Lash until after you've done all you can on that continent. Once you've beaten Briggs, and completed Air's Rock, you have to go back to the first continent anyway. Then you'll need Lash. So you don't actually have to backtrack too far.

For god's sake though, don't forget Tremor Psynergy! It's in the caves underneath the second town. It's very easy to miss!

Edited February 6 by Glen-i

[Hero-of-Time]

Have all of the announced N64 and GBA games now been released? Just wondering if the next Direct could feature the next wave of titles. I would love either DK64 or DKR to make an appearance on the service.  

[Dcubed]

13 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Have all of the announced N64 and GBA games now been released? Just wondering if the next Direct could feature the next wave of titles. I would love either DK64 or DKR to make an appearance on the service.  

N64 is all caught up now, GBA only has F-Zero Maximum Velocity left to go out of the previously announced games.

They seemed to stop following their specified order of releases a good few months back though, so they’re just releasing whatever they feel like at this point really.

[darksnowman]

Subscription renewal will be coming up so it's time for me to get some decent use out of the NSO suite again. Operation Winback has made a suspend pointer of me. The ignominy. Despicable. Degrading. Pity they didn't go the extra mile and build in virtual controller pak compatibility for these scenarios. 

Even if I'd no problems with it at the time, there's no two ways about it: the GBA sound quality is rough when you hear it through the big screen. But the Mario 3 eReader levels are a great bonus to have so it's swings and roundabouts. Just what I needed. 

I have The Sacred Stones so might give the Fire Emblem that's on there a look.

Surprised there's still not too many games on the GBA app, tbh. Mario 3 and Kuru Kuru Kururin were about the only things I've had a go on on there, but I'm glad of the drip feed at the same time since it means a backlog hasn't amassed on the sly. 

[Hero-of-Time]

1 minute ago, darksnowman said:

Subscription renewal will be coming up...

Yeah, I just renewed on Monday (thanks again to @RedShell for pointing out the price on Shopto) and need to start digging into the GBA stuff. 

I'm still hoping for some more Mega Drive titles to show up. Annoys me that Shining in the Darkness has yet to hit the service. I still need to get around to playing Soleil/Crusader of Centy as well.

[EEVILMURRAY]

8 hours ago, Glen-i said:

Uhhh... You don't actually need Lash until after you've done all you can on that continent. Once you've beaten Briggs, and completed Air's Rock, you have to go back to the first continent anyway. Then you'll need Lash. So you don't actually have to backtrack too far.

For god's sake though, don't forget Tremor Psynergy! It's in the caves underneath the second town. It's very easy to miss!

Maybe not for essential stuff, but I'd passed lots of lil bits where I know I'd need the Lash eventually, such as the extra summon. But... I finally made it all the way there, took out the 3 Chestbeaters with one turn each. Went all the way back to Alhafra through the desert and did Lash stuff along the way, then checking the FAQs realised I needed to go back to the first continent, back through the desert I went 

I could've sworn I explored it all beforehand. Turns out there were 2 important bits I failed to register! Made it out the other side and saved. The journey continues.

[darksnowman]

10 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Yeah, I just renewed on Monday (thanks again to @RedShell for pointing out the price on Shopto) and need to start digging into the GBA stuff. 

I'm still hoping for some more Mega Drive titles to show up. Annoys me that Shining in the Darkness has yet to hit the service. I still need to get around to playing Soleil/Crusader of Centy as well.

I'm on a family membership with a bunch of randoms so I'll have to see if those are still on the go or perhaps people have moved on now. I feel like every year I barely look near NSO for eleven months, play some stuff, think I'll keep on it if I renew, barely touch it for eleven months...

I was kind of excited to see what was going to appear yesterday evening on the GBA app... language versions. Still haven't opened the Mega Drive app a single time. It'd be a shame to break the streak now.  

[darksnowman]

Must be because I'm so used to how Mario sounds it's easy to tell how off it is because Fire Emblem is grand. Surprised that I, the player, am a character in this FE. It's slowgoing and chatty in the opening chapters. Can't wait for the shackles to be off because I just want to hit enemy weaknesses and rout some boards.

Was timing out on some of the Mario 3 eReader levels. Fun to find yourself under pressure in Mario. These levels demonstrate Nintendo wasn't as creatively bankrupt as the sterile NSMB games went on to hoodwink us into believing. 

[darksnowman]

Chapter-wise, I'm into the mid-teens now in Fire Emblem and starting to get into it. There was the odd turn in previous chapters where I got let off the hook with enemies whiffing/ my characters evading, but in a recent skirmish against pirates, my luck ran dry. Must've restarted it six times before I got through the first two turns with no casualties. And I play cautiously as it is.

I've reached the point now where I'm leaving out characters I wouldn't mind using such are the character options that have become available. Like, I've dropped Marcus for the time being because he's a monster so he'll get trotted out again when the game catches up to his level. It's a nice dilemma because in the early going there were characters I couldn't wait to drop because:

Especially medieval battles. Hoping for better mages because the boy Erk seems like a twerp even if he's been able to hold his own so far. The light mage hasn't won me over either and I'm not sure about the flux dealer that's just joined.

I checked out an arena which might be a first for me in Fire Emblem. Had to bail with Lowen and Lyn (who are normally beasts for me) as they got rough opponents and I didn't want to find out if arena death is permadeath as I was all but ready to finish the map by that point. Hector got a lower-level mage and a win. Nice. Looked like I could have healed up and went again but it's pricey enough so I moved on. 

Got some stat-up items I'm not sure who to use them on yet and it looks like it won't be long before Lyn makes it up to lvl 20 for promotion. Can't wait. Eliwood needs some nurturing. Wondering if Merlinus will expand to become a shop between chapters because that was handy in Path of Radiance iirc. Had one support conversation between Eliwood and Hector but nothing else yet. Wouldn't mind more but maybe I'm not positioning the troops correctly. I thought the old hag that's travelling with us said she could give info on supports but maybe I misread that because I can't see it in the menu.

[Ike]

4 hours ago, darksnowman said:

Chapter-wise, I'm into the mid-teens now in Fire Emblem and starting to get into it.

Hope you didn't use Marcus too much as he's an exp sponge that would be better off going to other units. He's fine if you use him in a pinch, but you shouldn't be needing to add him back to your team later on.

Magic users are OP, especially Canas, who you should definitely use. He's one of the few characters who can do decent damage to the final boss (make sure to keep some Luna tome uses in reserve). You do get some stronger ones later, one of which needs babying but has high growth rates (better if you use Afa Drops on them). Erk should be fine to use unless he's been getting unlucky level ups.

Make sure to level Eliwood as he is forced to promote so ideally you want him to be level 20. He always ends up average at best for me though.

You need to have units stood near each other to gain supports, some pairs gain supports faster than others, they aren't as easy to get like in the newer games.

Arena's are perma death as well, they are very risk-reward.