nintendo

Ten Characters I Want in Super Smash Bros. – Part 2

/ Michael Beckwith / Leave a comment

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for the following games:

Tekken 7
The Wonderful 101
Xenoblade Chronicles 2

H2x1_NSwitch_SuperSmashBrosUltimate_02_image1600w

It’s been four years since my first “Ten Characters I Want in Super Smash Bros.” list and, boy, how things have changed since then. Back then, those choices were the whimsical wishes of a young dreamer, unlikely to ever come true. But now, thanks to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, it seems anything is possible. Hell, two of my picks have since been included, which is very vindicating, though one part of that list has aged horribly.

“… [Yu Narukami] does stand a better chance than Ridley.”

Oh, 21 year-old me, you were such a fool. But yes, between the likes of Ridley, King K. Rool, and Joker, I’ve found myself coming to accept that characters I would’ve initially scoffed at the mere suggestion of including could actually happen. Super Smash Bros. is no longer just a celebration of all things Nintendo, but of videogames as a whole.

So, with the current run of DLC nearing its conclusion and still more to come throughout 2020, how about I list off another ten characters I’d personally love to see get to join the roster, whether it be in Ultimate or in a possible sequel. Continue reading →

Favourite Moments in Fiction #25 – The Hooktail Boss Fight (Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door)

/ Michael Beckwith / Leave a comment

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door

SI_GCN_PaperMarioTheThousandDoor_enGB_image1600w

It’s such a shame that Nintendo doesn’t seem to know what to do with the Paper Mario series anymore. The first three entries are fantastic games that I could easily recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in RPGs or games with well-written stories and dialogue. Of those three, there’s no denying that the GameCube title, The Thousand-Year Door, is the best one. I could write several of these articles on that game alone with how many memorable moments it has, but for this instance, I’m going to focus on the game’s first major boss fight. Continue reading →

My VG Music Picks #85 – The Final Antasma Battle (Mario & Luigi: Dream Team)

/ Michael Beckwith / Leave a comment

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Mario & Luigi: Dream Team

It’s such a shame to hear about AlphaDream going bankrupt. They were the studio that brought us the imaginative, funny, and just enjoyable Mario & Luigi series of RPGs. And while we can argue about whether or not the quality of the games diminished over time, there’s no denying that all of them were at the very least decent and fun games to play. I had high hopes for the potential of the series when the Switch was released but, sadly, it is not to be.

There is quite a bit I love about this series; one primary aspect being its music. The legendary Yoko Shimomura lent her talents to all of the games and created such varied soundtracks, filled with pieces that fit right at home in Mario’s world, as well as ones that felt like they belonged in more “serious” RPGs. That’s not me complaining, by the way. I think that’s amazing, hearing these Final Fantasy-like dramatic scores in a game starring a short Italian plumber who jumps on turtles. One example being this track. Continue reading →

My VG Music Picks #84 – Night of the Ninja (Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order)

/ Michael Beckwith / Leave a comment

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3‘s soundtrack is certainly a bit of a mixed bag. As I mentioned in my review last week, a lot of it consists of rather generic orchestral tracks that aren’t particularly catchy or memorable. It’s especially disappointing since there are a quite a few tracks that manage to avoid this; tracks that are full of energy and excitement and sound… videogamey, if that makes sense. Tracks that make running down hallways while taking down the swarms of enemies that come at you all the more exciting. For example, this piece from the game’s third chapter. Continue reading →

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order – Marvellous Masterpiece or Boring Button-Masher?

/ Michael Beckwith / 1 Comment

H2x1_NSwitch_MarvelUltimateAlliance3TheBlackOrder_image1600w

One game that I used to play the crap out of during my childhood was Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2. A loose adaptation of the Civil War comic story-line, it was a top-down action-RPG/beat ’em up featuring a tonne of famous and not so famous heroes and villains from across the Marvel universe, enjoyable and addictive gameplay, cool character interactions, and some great replayability that had me coming back again and again, just so I could keep making all manner of different teams to play through the game as.

That game came out ten years ago and it very much seemed like a series that wasn’t going to get revived any time soon, especially with Disney now holding Marvel’s reigns. So I was pleasantly surprised to see a new, third title get announced out of nowhere. And if that wasn’t enough, Activision and Vicarious Visions were out and Nintendo and Team Ninja were in. Suddenly, everybody was getting excited to see how this game would turn out. Aside from those big names, the roster looked great (the presence of the X-Men alone helped tremendously) and the presentation was delightfully stylish, but does the game have the substance to match it, or should this series have been left back in the late 2000s? Continue reading →

Ten Things You Might’ve Not Known About Pokémon Red & Blue

/ Michael Beckwith / Leave a comment

pokemon_red_blue_main_169

How about we try something new this week? You may not know this but I love me some trivia. Whether it be early concepts, connections between actors or just neat, little easter eggs, I get a weird thrill from learning and memorising this kind of stuff from all kinds of media (which did not help me during my school years when I should’ve been memorising maths). But one thing I love more than discovering trivia is sharing it with others, so I figured why not try my hand at actually writing up some fun articles all about that?

So let’s start things off with ten things you may not have known from a classic set of games that defined a lot of peoples’ childhoods – the first generation of Pokémon games, Red & Blue – courtesy of Bulbapedia and Serebii (just so you know I’m not making all this up). Continue reading →