Links:
1MoreCastle.com
Paranerds.com
TheRetroLeague.com
Xi3 Steam Box
Dustin Struggles with Frogs
Music
Intro - Ben Landis - Through the Forest
Outro - DJYuzoboy - 2Pac vs Shinobi - Holla If Ya Hear Me
Follow Us! @ClassicL337
Like us on Facebook!
Episode 99 - Google Zerg Rush
Links:
1MoreCastle.com
Paranerds.com
TheRetroLeague.com
Xi3 Steam Box
Dustin Struggles with Frogs
Music
Intro - Ben Landis - Through the Forest
Outro - DJYuzoboy - 2Pac vs Shinobi - Holla If Ya Hear Me
Follow Us! @ClassicL337
Like us on Facebook!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
This was a great episode, well worth the wait! You guys should do more 2.5 hour casts.
ReplyDelete[Zelda rant]
However, my Zelda pride compels me to voice my dissent when it comes to Skyward Sword. It was a decent game if considered its own entity, but as part of a well-established franchise, I thought it was iterating in the wrong direction.
The gameplay mechanics were incredibly frustrating; the enemies' telegraphing of their weaknesses was very clear, but I repeatedly ran into an issue where I had to adjust my sword positioning, but in adjusting, it registered a swipe that triggered the enemy's counterattack. Also, the controller constantly fell out of synch and required recalibration at least every ten minutes. The only reason I continued playing through the frustration was the title. However, I've not heard other people voicing these issues, so it may have been an issue with my setup.
In terms of the flight exploration, it felt very much like sailing in Windwaker, which I also felt became monotonous over time. Traveling is very time consuming and I rarely feel threatened during it; in most Zelda games, traveling on foot or horseback feels more risky than in Skyward Sword, and the teleporting isn't very convenient, requiring repeated flights across the sky to transit between regions. By the time I finished assembling the map, I was pretty much done with the flight and had to endure it for the second half of the game. I think part of the issue is that in the sky, you can go pretty much anywhere from the get-go but can rarely do anything until later. In most other Zelda games, I feel the world is restricted at first and opens up as you progress, so as you explore the world, you're also coming across puzzles you can solve then instead of having to remember to come back to them.
I felt that while the upgrade system offered an interesting mechanic, farming for the various materials felt more like playing WoW than Zelda. Some sort of exchange to trade abundant resources for less abundant would have offered a nice improvement.
The sidequests reminded me a lot of Majora's Mask, which I really enjoyed, though I would have liked if it had a journal similar to the Majora's Mask feature for easier management, and I would have appreciated better leading to the sidequests to avoid repeatedly poking my head into every building after any major plot step to see if new quests were available.
That said, I think the story was good and felt like a Zelda story. I felt they did some of the puzzle mechanics really well (without being too spoilerific, the tadpole puzzle initially had me filled with dread but turned out to be really fun). The Beetle was a fun change to the boomerang of games past. Overall, however, I felt it was a B- game, falling short of the Zelda franchise standard.
[/Zelda rant]
Scott, you said you thought Skyward Sword was clearly a better Zelda game than Twilight Princess. Would you care to elaborate on what features in general you felt were improved in the latest iteration?
Josh, in terms of MMOs, I know you mentioned Elder Scrolls Online. Have you also been following Wildstar? I know some gaming sites have stated they're the two "contested" MMO's of 2013, similar to SWTOR and GW2 of 2012. While the studio is different from GW2, it's still an NCSoft title with some pretty interesting iterations on classic MMO systems.
SC2:HotS is an expansion that builds upon the zerg campaign and adds new units to the multiplayer; it should revolutionize the metagame and shake up the e-sports scene a bit.
I played a game against Sean "Day[9]" Plott. I lost horribly, but at least I didn't die nearly as quickly as if I played against a pro player instead of a shoutcaster.
Scott I got rid of my Shinobi cause it sucked. Just wanted to know what you thought of the gyroscope motions. Also for the team, can you name a few games that got ruined by crappy gimmicks?
ReplyDeleteLove the show, and i miss it!