We don't always like being nonplussed

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Five Things Pokemon Does Better Than Dragon Quest

First up, glad tidings: our copy of Pokemon Black is here! That Guy will be working on that Epic Flail as soon as he finishes with Jump Superstars- possibly sooner, I dunno.

But for now, Pokemon Weekends. I've been playing a lot of Dragon Quest IX once again, and while I do enjoy it, there are bits here and there that are still clunky and old-fashioned. And a lot of them are things Pokemon has a better handle on. That- and the fact that Pokemon Black and White actually outsold Dragon Quest IX's opening weekend -inspired this weekend's list, a followup to the Five Ideas Pokemon Got From Dragon Quest.

5. Cashing Out

This actually started out as another idea Pokemon got from Dragon Quest- probably a stronger link than the footstep thing but I'd never done a YouTube video before and wanted to try it out. When you suffer Total Party Kill in Dragon Quest, you lose half of your money. If you're saving for something specific this is the most obnoxious thing in the world. The earlier Pokemon games did this as well, but the latest games have introduced a much better system: instead, you just lose whatever amount of money you would have won as your prize for this trainer battle.

There's a good reason for the disparity of these systems, though: getting money is a lot easier in Dragon Quest since everything you fight drops gold. Pokemon's introduced a lot more ways to get money since it was first introduced, but I still pad-reset every time I get wiped out. And I'd still like to be able to get a few bucks for every Pidgey I have to grind. (Of course that's probably why you can't: since Pokemon, as I said before, is Level Grinding: The Game, you'd never run short of money if you got it from every Pokemon you beat. It also just makes more sense that random Pokemon wouldn't have cash on them, so it's win-win.)

4. Bring a Friend


Dragon Quest IX is the first game in the series to have serious multiplayer options, but there's a catch: it only uses local wifi, so you and your fellow adventurers have to be in the same physical location. This was a great solution for downtown Tokyo. Guess where I don't live? I'm the only person I know in my area with the game, and so this is a total drag. Bring on the Friend Codes!

3. The Seamless World

From the beginning, this was one of the things about Pokemon that I really enjoyed. In Dragon Quest, like in most JRPGs, there's a World Map- all your wandering from point to point is done on the World Map, and then when you reach a landmark of some sort the perspective shifts- suddenly that town that was two sprites wide is huge. Once CD-ROMs and DVD-ROMs got involved, this meant load times any time you went anywhere significant as well.

Pokemon does not do this. You can look at it as there being no World Map, or that everything takes place on the World Map. Either way, the fact that the transition is no less jarring than town music fading out and route music fading in is a stroke of genius. (Though I do miss Pokemon on Super Game Boy where the color pallette would suddenly shift once you hit a town. That was neat.)

2. Party Management: The Impersonal Touch.

Because Dragon Quest is set in a fantasy world with only touches of technology, it tends to present its menu options in fantasy terms. To save your game, you go confess to a priest or inform a king of your heroic deeds. To switch party members, you go to a tavern and change your roster. All the menus are very conversational, and more time-consuming than they need to be. Every time I use the bank in Dragon Quest IX I have to click through three screens of text to deposit or withdraw gold- so I don't lose half of it to a TPK -and it is getting OLD.

Pokemon is set in a version of the present day, or maybe the future. Or someplace else entirely with a bunch of neat technology. So there are computers, one of which your trainer is carrying around at all times. Save? Bring up a menu and save anywhere. Change party members? You still have to go to specific locations, but there's one in every town and the newer generations have interfaces that make it quick and simple to change out a bunch of party members at once. Comparatively, Dragon Quest is still in the Dark Ages. Not just in terms of setting, but even the most modern installments still creak in places under the weight of a menu system whose roots lie in 1986.

1. Once Again, Capturing Monsters.

Like several other things I've talked about, Dragon Quest did it first. But Pokemon does it so much better. You're probably pretty familiar with how a monster is caught in Pokemon- weaken monster, Poke Ball, ???, profit. In Dragon Quest it goes like this:

First, there's a limited number of the game's monsters you can catch, assuming you're playing DQ V or VI which are the only mainline games so far that even let you catch monsters. (VIII sort of does, but you can't use them as regular party members, which means it's pretty useless in terms of Pokemon comparisons.) So when you find a catchable monster you want, you have to make sure it's the very last monster in a group defeated and then, after the battle, there's a certain percentage chance the monster will join you. The better the monster, the lower the chance.

The pinnacle of this is the Liquid Metal Slime, known in earlier translations as the Metal Babble or Metabble. You have a 1 in 255 chance of recruiting one of these. This is complicated by the nature of the LMS' existence as an XP booster: it's very hard to kill and it likes to run away. So if you can kill it before it bolts, there is a tiny fraction of a percent of a chance it might join you.

Personally, I'd prefer to just throw a ball at the damn thing and be done.

HONORABLE MENTION: Resurrections

This one just occurred to me as I was sitting here, but it's a pretty important one as well. In Dragon Quest, death carries a horrible price- half your money as I mentioned above. But even the death of one or two party members can be a horrible setback, as you have to take them back to a priest and pay to get them returned to life. Later in the game you get some resurrection spells that don't cost you anything but MP, and then things get easier- if the party member with the spell isn't the dead one. DQIX at least fixed one of the other problems with Total Party Kill- prior to that game (and possibly VIII, I really need to play that again) you lost half your money and had to pay to get everyone except the hero brought back to life. Absurd.

Meanwhile, Pokemon not only has free revival, but the Revive item is only moderately expensive for reasonably easy ressurection on the go. The Yggdrasil Leaf is the only thing other than a spell or a priest that revives characters in Dragon Quest, and they are hideously rare, can usually only be carried in limited numbers, and cannot be bought.

Friday, September 24, 2010

Flailthroughs - Jump Superstars! (Part 20)

Ok... so this next stage seems to be either a back to back K stage, or XX stage again... I think it was Hunter X Hunter? I guess we'll see, won't we?

Well that was a giant mess, but I think it's mostly because the stage was loaded with pits, the walls were weak, and the characters were all lightning fast... Me? No, I died like a lemming. I think that they started catching on to the pit trick by this point in time, so I guess the rest of the game could turn out to be fairly hard. The characters were... uhh... I know Kenshin was there... oh! And Sword Guy from One Piece! Then there was... umm... I don't know, they all kind of just attacked at once, so I spent most of the time looking at a pile of pixels. Luffy however proved to be my best option, and you have to love that stretchy little scamp. I only hope that once he retires from pirating, he gets the job in pornography that he deserves.

Ok, on the world map again we're on one of the stages that... umm... it's one of those hexagons again. Not sure what series that was from, so let's find out shall we?..

Ok, long story short, I have NO idea what series that was supposed to be, but apparently it's one where everyone turns into Super Saiyan Vegeta and violates your anus with energy attacks. The tear drop in the background I know I've seen before, though I can only assume it is magic/SCIENCE! and vitally important to the plot of whatever it's from. I did manage to beat it the first try, but I think that it's best to say that's entirely luck. These stages are getting tougher, and I don't think I mind that. Anyway, let's see what happens on the world map...

Another boss stage! Is it wrong of me that I'm starting to miss the boxes a little? Just a little bit, though... ok, I'm not actually missing the boxes, but you get my idea.

This stage seems to be a holy toothpick, so let's... clean... God's teeth?

Well, the answer there seems to be, "everyone from Dragonball Z, and characters from Shaman King." I didn't know there was such religous significance to those series, but I do tend to miss the obvious quite often, so I guess anything is possible. This time I was fighting Super Saiyan Vegeta, Super Saiyan Goku, and Vegeta... Yes, if you know anything about the series that does, in fact, sound like a very, very bad place to be. I'm just lucky that since I was playing normal Goku and the odds were against me, I won. Of course, since this is DBZ, that means that I can only win the first time, and next the others will go, train, and come back more powerful than me... Or I'll die and go train with God, and then end up becoming a tiny god myself. Either or.

... Where was I?...

Oh, look! A tornado! Let's see where it goes!

Back to the world with the Barbie-colored city! Oh JOY!

At least this doesn't seem to be Barbie-colored, so that's one blessing... It's a small island, that's not too bad either... huh... This stage is a... flute, stage? OH! I know where this is going! Obviously this is a Warp Whistle that will take me to world 8-8 where I can finally battle King Koopa!... Probably not, but I'm just wondering how many people here will get that refrence out there. Let's see who we're fighting this time, shall we?

Into the single most demented stage I have seen in this game so far.

Roll out that special head. This is our favorite one. Please don't try to leave. Don't leave the Hall of Heads.

I think I'm actually in love with this stage, it's so bizarre... I mean, look at the floor! The platforms! And is that a giant recorder in the background? Why yes, yes it is! I'm so thrilled with the insanity of this stage that after I beat it, I'm not entirely sure who I killed, I just know that there needs to be MORE stages like that, for the same of craziness. There was even a wooden cat with a recorder for a tail! I just.. I can't express how great it is, seriously... *sigh* Well, I guess it's time to move back to the world map, isn't it? Yeah...

Ok, golden pentagon this time. I damn sure can't remember this series, so I might as well jump in head first and see if it's interesting!

Yeah, the pentagon? It's another one of Generic Anime Construction Worker's stages, kind of a let down... though I did enjoy Yugi, and Blond Chick In The Bandanna from Shaman King being there, because it turned out to be a pretty big fight! I do really like it when this game provides a challenge, but I don't like the random, "lol, smack this crate with your butt three thousand times in thirty seconds!" stages, because that's... well, that's just rage-inducing right there. Not that I don't like a game with gimmicks! I love gimmicks, because I think creativity is something we're sorely missing in modern gaming... but you can take a gimmick too far, some times...

Boxes.

Ooooh! This next stage might be new! I don't believe that I've ever seen a hat stage before!... Well, this particular style of hat, I mean. This is a fedorah, as apposed to a baseball cap for Jojo's stages. Let's see what we get here!

Ok... I don't know what this stage is about, other than EVERY FEMALE IN ANIME IS TRYING TO KILL ME ALL AT ONCE!


Goku never did understand women, but they didn't usually all try to kill him at once.
This somehow reminds me of high school, and I'm not sure why... My guess is because of the explosion in the background, and all of the girls pissed off at me at the same time, and I don't know why. Also because much like high school, all of the females are united up until one of them accidentally hits the other one, then it all devolves into infighting... At which point, I send in Naruto and have him fart on them, (best move in the game) which gets them united in killing me again. The walls on this stage are pretty thin too, so that means that while they're running at me all I have to do is jump out of the way, and they all end up pregnant... Wait, sorry, I was stuck on the high school reference still. Anyway, they're pretty hard to be honest, but I do manage to pull myself together and take them out in the end.

That's it for this week, I guess that there's still more to the game, so stay tuned!

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Flailthroughs - Jump Superstars! (Part 19)

Well, I'm off in Barbie land now, and to be honest I'm kind of wondering if this game ever actually ends. I mean, I've actually seen the ending credits at this point, but I somehow think it just keeps going on forever, getting more and more insane.

Well, whatever happens, I'm still moving forward, and am doing so to a stage that should be fun, as even though he's a pain in the ass, I still enjoy fighting Jojo. Here we go...

No Jojo, not even a little Jojo, though there was a bad guy that I'm pretty sure is from his series, but I'm almost entirely sure that Sasuke isn't from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. At least there aren't any more pits it seems, and I'm kind of mildly pleased a little bit by that fact, because it means that stages are now not just me sitting and shoving retarded people down a hole in the world... I almost felt guilty about it, to be honest. Well, I guess we had best move on and see what transpires next.

Football transpires.

Aside from being completely sure that is the only time in history those words have been used together, I am also completely sure that I hate everything, EVERYTHING football-related now. I'm not sure there was any limit to the characters the two people I was fighting could turn into, but I do know that they liked Super Saiyan Vegeta, and that he is a tiny, angry little demon man from Hell, or possibly HFIL in the English translation. Anyway, after two resounding defeats, I manage to beat them by throwing things at them and then running away like a coward. Throwing what you may ask? Anything. Energy blasts, their teammates, barrels, crates, bento boxes... It doesn't matter, but it does let me get three out of five achievements for this stage, so that's good enough.

Looks like the next world is Prince of Tennis, so I guess that I'm going to have to get ready to... No, I can't do it, ball jokes would be too easy here, and I managed to avoid them through the football stage, so I'm going to take the high road here and be an adult... testicles.

Well, this stage told me something that I pretty much knew to start... women are deadly. We had Black-Haired Girl (still possibly from One Piece) and we have Blond-Haired Girl in Bandanna, from Shaman King... also, the leprechaun again, but I'm going to have to say he classifies as a woman since he's below the age of ten, and when you're below the age of ten there's really no distinguishing difference. It took me about three tries since this stage seems to be the perfect definition of the world "clusterfuck," and they have a number of moves that are like smacking your head into a wall... only the wall is smacking you, and it's not a wall, it's tiny fists.

Oh boy! A baseball manga stage! Yay!

I'd like to mention at this point in time that I don't hate sports. I used to love playing sports with my friends, or anyone we just randomly met and convinced to join the game. It was a blast! But at the same time, I have never found WATCHING sports to be in any way interesting. It's like watching someone else play a video game for you, and they're getting paid to do it. So a comic about someone playing baseball? That's... wow, that's like paying someone five dollars a month to drive your car for you, and then you hop on a bike and ride off.

Anyway, back to the game.

Luffy, Goten, Sephiroth-Knockoff, and Sword Guy from One Piece as an alternate... that was worse than the last stage! I mean seriously, they're all gathering around me and knocking me back and forth like a ping pong ball as I try desperately to gather enough energy to tag them out. I've got to be honest here and say that I really miss the pits, because these stages are getting brutal. Not really surprised, as I'm still certain I'm making my way toward the end of the game, but Jeebus this is insane.

Fucking tornado!

Yes, another tornado. The only plus side of this is that it seems to lead me back to world four, and the Clam-Dome, which it looks like I'm going to battle people from Death Note in. I somehow always knew it would come down to be having to punch Light in the face inside of a giant Clam full of macaroni, don't ask me why... some times you just know.

Is it Light Yagami that awaits within the Macaroni Clam?



Well I was wrong, what ended up happening is Sakura, Luffy and Piccolo beat the crap out of me inside of a giant clam, and laughed at me. I would like to mention at this point in time that somehow, Sakura always managed to kick my ass, but when I play her apparently even her strongest move can be knocked out of the way with a punch. I know I'm probably shooting in the dark here, but it seems to me that she's about as useful as buying shoes that come three to a set. Pretty much useless, only use her when you lose one of your others, and only until you find it.

Well, that's it for the moment gang. I'll have more for you tomorrow, and I think we might be about ready to wrap this game up!

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Flailthroughs - Jump Superstars! (Part 18)

Alright, so it looks like this might be the last world in the game, as it's a small island with... I'm going to guess maybe four stages, five at most. I could flesh this out with a pictorial of all of the panels that I've unlocked, or an in-depth article about the panel creation system, but I think that it would be pretty boring and drag things out, which isn't the goal of Flailthroughs. That fact in mind, I think it's best if we move on and see what exciting events await us on "The World That Might Have Been! But Probably Wasn't!... Part Of World One!... In The Original Designs!"

Or as I like to call it, TWTMHBBPWPOWOITOD!


Jump Superstars and Flailthroughs Present: TWTMHBBPWPOWOITOD!
The first stage (another green Pokeball stage) is a simple battle, the enemies are Nami/Blond Girl with Bandanna from Shaman King, and Naruto/Jojo. It's actually a fairly simple battle, if you take simple to mean I spend ninety percent of the stage running like a madman from Nami on a motorcycle, and Jojo's odd purple ghost thing. I can't really even come up with something to say about this stage, other than I'm not sure about the mix of cacti and trees that leads me to believe that the designers of this game know nothing about plant-life, weather patterns, or life outside of a major urban environment. Let's see what we have next, yes?

Ah, I can tell by the triangular Cheez-it that this is another Yu-gi-oh stage, and that's fine with me since I think I've fought just about everyone else to death...

Ahh, those famous Yu-gi-oh characters; Piccolo, Goten, Leprechaun, and Black-Haired Girl possibly from One Piece, thankfully this is another stage with a pit on it, and this time the characters seem so drunk, or possibly brain damaged, that they literally fall into it trying to get at me... I am not joking, this happened at least twenty times. I actually had to move to the edge of the pit and just start punching them as they fell, so that I would get some form of kill count. As a result, I also seem to have cleared every single objective on this stage in one go... I really should do more with those panels, but this close to the end, why fix what isn't broken?

I'm starting to see a trend now. All of the stages in this world are B-splosion stages, so this makes me think that soon enough I will be encountering the boss of the game... I wonder who it will be. I'm expecting the furniture thief, but I doubt it, as he is obviously drawn by Akira Toriyama, which means as a short fat man he can only exist for the purposes of comic relief, stealing something only to have it taken from him by a real bad guy, or hanging out with a minor character in order to take the hero somewhere else later. Also, he could in theory marry a girl way out of his league, but then he would either have to be a genius who is also comic relief, or a rich asshole. Anyway, moving on.

This next stage is another one where the symbol is either a black cat, or possibly a bird pooping out a worm that they didn't thoroughly chew. We'll have to see how this one pans out, as I can't come up with anything that witty to say about painful bowel movement bird stage just by looking at the world map.

Wow, who knew the combination of Yugi, Bobobo and Kenshin would prove so painful?... Well ok, I guess I can see it. Yugi can use his cards to create monstrous effects (pun intended) and Kenshin sure can do some powerful murdering with his reverse-bladed sword... though we kind of knew that already. Combine them with Bobobo and his mighty nose hairs and you've got a giant a stage where you're getting bounced around like a pachinko ball in a washing machine, only instead of a washing machine it's more like a pachinko machine... so, yeah... Anyway, moving on!

Well it looks like this next stage might be the last one!... Again! It would appear to be Naruto-themed, and I think at the time this came out it was their number one seller (and still is) so they would want to make the BBEG (Big Bad Evil Guy) someone from that series. I'm both intrigued, and pensive. I have been enjoying this game, but to be honest once I'm done I don't think I'll be trying it again. It's fun, and it's a neat gimmick, but... well, a lot of games have better gimmicks in my opinion.

Anyway, lets fight!

I really, really hope that wasn't the last stage. Yes, Naruto was in it, but there was no bad guy. Yugi was also in it, as well as Sakura and... someone else, I don't even remember.

Pits.

Just sat there and shoved the poor bastards into pits, over, and over, and over again. Half of the time when they would come at me, they would simply stop moving, standing between me and a pit. It was like they managed to forget where they were and what they were doing somewhere between rushing at me and hitting me, and they stopped to contemplate the possible choices they had in this situation. I am sorry to say, however, that they simply had one option. Get pushed down a pit by Goku. Well, I guess that wraps it up for...

Another tornado... Damn it! This game has more false stops than a crossing guard on acid! It's not that I'm not fine with playing more, but for the love of anime, what the hell?! Now I'm back in the Barbium 90 radioactive world? How does that even make sense!? Oh, and there's another boss stage, and this time it's Jojo!


Once again in a Barbie World, but That Guy is not a Barbie Girl.
Ok, I think... I think that's it for me today, I need a good stiff drink of fish, and then I'll keep going. Thanks gang!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Flailthroughs - Jump Superstars! (Part 17) It's the Pits

Ok, looks like another M-Flag stage at the base of Kami's tower, and then I'll likely be heading south... that kind of sucks, because I wanted to see either... what's his name, the cat, or... the fat guy that stays with the cat. I love those guys! Ok, off to the stage to see what happens.

Ok, there's... two of the sun guys from Bobobo, and Vegeta! Hi Vegeta! Quit kicking my ass please!

That was a bit of a painful damn stage to say the least. The other two characters only seem to be there to get between me and Vegeta, and keep my powerful attacks from hitting him. That's a pain, but once I manage to take them down it's not too bad. I also accomplished four out of the five goals of this stage as well, so things are looking quite groovy. Quite groovy indeed.

Ahh! And on the world map, we have a stage with symbols that I can recognize! It's a yellow ball, with four red stars in it! Yu Yu Hakusho!... No, wait, I mean Dragonball Z! Five of the local currency (coins with a giant P on them) says that I don't see any DBZ characters on this stage.

Well, I lost that bet! It was a totally DBZ stage! Goku, Vegeta and Piccolo tried their damnedest to kick my ass all over the place, but I managed to find their Achilles Spleen, (like a heel, but harder to get at). I imagine you're all wondering what that is... Well, I guess this wouldn't be a very good walk through if I didn't tell you... come to think of it, this isn't a very good walk through at all, but I'll tell you anyway:

Pits.

With Piccolo already down, Naruto prepares to shove Vegeta into a pit.

Yes, you heard me, pits. It seems that in spite of their ability to, you know, fly, the people of Dragonball Z have a bad habit of letting people shove them down pits like a kid on a playground, (with pits) and let me beat the stage with very little real effort. Hell, some of them even fell into the pit regardless of anyone pushing or hitting them. They're just so damn thoughtful, aren't they? I always suspected that about Piccolo.

Uhh... this might be a bit anticlimactic, but I think I won... there was a closeup of Goku and those guys, and a few panels from DBZ, then it scrolled one by one through all of the manga that I've seen, showing me some of the characters, and now it's rolling the ending credits. That's... not an impressive ending at all.

Well, it's been fun guys, but I guess...

No, wait! I'm back at the world map, and there's a new tornado to jump into! It's not over yet gang!

And we're back in the first world again! This time it's labeling it as level 4-1, so I guess this is some sort of secret area, with a secret boss!... Luffy! $*#%&!!! Ok, ok, I'm fine, I just... Wow, the stage is a lot harder than it looks, since the people have a habit of turning into Super Saiyan Goku when they're going to use a super attack, and his attacks seem to blow through everything I do... Well, at least that's about right. Still, shoving turned out to be the answer again, so I'm glad that they're all maladroits.

Another boss stage right away? Neat! this one is Bobobo, and by the look of it I'll be fighting... Jojo, and Bobobo... I can only assume this is some sort of joke about their names, since they both use redundant syllables. Either way, it takes me about three tries to clear the stage, since apparently the combination of Bobobo's nose hair and Jojo's... ghost... snot, is hard to beat. Who knew?

One more stage, it seems to be on a little island all by itself, and it has the icon that's either a hot spring or a bowl of ramen noodles, which as I recall was Shaman King's symbol. Let's see.

Well, another battle, this time with the people from Shaman King as the stage said, this seems to be a new emerging trend, so I'm happy to see that... Though they do have a habit of turning into Automail-Sephiroth when they're backed into a corner, and apparently he is made of awesome and win, so my best bet is once again to run away like I'm facing a playground bully. I cleared the stage...

And a new warp tornado! That means that yes, there is more to the game!

But I need a break for the time being, so I'll bring you all another update tomorrow!

 

Monday, September 20, 2010

Flailthroughs - Jump Superstars! (Part 16)

Ok, where was I?... Ah, yes, Mt.Fuji Mk2!

I guess it's best to enter the random stage and see what's up, so let's take a look together! Yaywe'refriends!!!!!11

Apparently this stage involves Naruto punching you and killing you instantly... that sounds like a really simple stage, at least in theory, but I'm afraid that it's not that simple. No, it seems to be another one of those stages where you can't. get. hit. a. single. time.

I don't know if the amount of bile that I've had for these stages has quite soaked through in my last few posts, but let me tell you quite clearly, there is a lot of it... oh my yes. I hate this more than "protect the important character," stages in other video games, because your P.D. (Primary Dumbass) has a very bad habit of running head first into combat. I hate them more because these stages are MY fault when I lose them, and it's just annoying to be reminded that you suck...

Ok... going to keep trying. Wish me luck.

Ok... he just sent a woman with an umbrella and a giant puppy after me, and it went right through all of my attacks... attempt number three now...

Ok, that finally managed to do it. I simply unloaded all of my power gauge on him as quickly as I could, (have I not mentioned the power gauge? Well, there's a power gauge) and killed him, then ran like a frightened hedgehog until the time ran out. Not only was it enough to finish the stage, but it got me three things! I don't know what they are, but yay things! That's the end of the Fuji experience it seems, and I'm making my way back to penis world. *shudder*

Once again, I find myself far closer to the penis blimp than I'm comfortable with, but I'm afraid it's the only way to get to the stage I need to be on... which, to my pleasure seems to be a very nice, very pretty forest. Oh! And I see our friend Naruto is back, (yes, I'm using his real name now, I'll explain the name I used early at the end) wanting to fight me yet again, obviously angry that I managed to beat him by running away like a little bitch. Ha! Well I'll show you! I'll keep running away like a little bitch, so there!

Uhhh... ok... you seem to launch frightening dog-bats that blind me for about ten seconds, but I kicked your ass!


Flight of the Frightening Dog-Bats in Jump Superstars
... But I still lost... No counter that I can see, so I don't need to hump chests or barrels across the stage, nor collect the leavings of the fruit pirates... Ring outs maybe? Well... let's give it a shot and see how that works, because I'd like to move far away from the penis ship soon.

Ok... ok, so that only took between five and six tries. It turns out the big goal was to destroy all of the walls on the stage... that's fine, though. Sure, we haven't had a stage with that goal since world one, but that's perfectly fine *twitch* because now we're moving on... It looks like one of the upcoming stages is probably Kami-sama's tower. I hope to get there soon, so let's check out the next stage!

Err... I can't really decide if that symbol is a directional pad from a Super Nintendo, or some sort of religious-themed toothpick, but at least that means a new group of enemies to fight! On we go!

Err... ok, I'm not sure what to say about this guy. He seems to be a knockoff Sephiroth with an automail arm, being followed by a Golden Snitch... who knew the one-winged angel liked Quidditch so much? Ah, who am I kidding, everyone loves Harry Potter!

That's it for today, though, as the penis ship is still looking at me, and it frightens me!

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Pokemon is Ruined FOREVER.

Short one today: As a Transformers fan, a lot of the more alarmist opinions about Pokemon Black and White put me in mind of the response to any change to Transformers, which is that they have been Ruined FOREVER. I know this isn't a TF-only thing - that's why TVTropes took this and ran with it - but it originates with Transformers fandom.

Don't even get me started on the irony of a certain percentage of Transformers fans being terrified of change.