I'm back! The writing project I was involved in has concluded, and I have recently been feeling an urge to return to this blog and stretch my writing legs a bit. I did a 2019 reTROspective, and certainly played video games in 2020, but don't feel like going back through and tracking down all of the games I completed in that year, so I'm going to restart this blog with a reTROspective of the games I played in 2021. The following is a list of all of the games that I completed in that year:
Punch-out!! (Wii)
Hades
Metal Slug 3
Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch
X-Men 2: The Clone Wars
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond
Shantae: Half-Genie Hero
Contra
King of Dragons
Final Fight
Battle Circuit
Disney's Aladdin (Genesis)
Bastion
NBA 2K21
Final Fantasy Mystic Quest
Mario Golf: Super Rush
Enter the Gungeon
Rayman 2
Final Fantasy VII Remake
Dragon Ball Fighterz
Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales
Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon
Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist: Link Evolution
Madden 21
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood
Castlevania: Bloodlines
Super Castlevania IV
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
Castlevania II: Simon's Quest
Jet Force Gemini
Mario Golf (N64)
Card Guardians (Mobile)
Thirty-two new completions is pretty good! Far from my best year ever, but I also spent a lot of time replaying old favorites last year, including a mammoth run through of Final Fantasy X. The year was generally spent divided into three distinct periods that I can recall. First, I bought the Castlevania Anniversary Collection and Castlevania: Requiem on Playstation, and spent a ton of time trying to play through the Castlevania games that I was interested in that I had not yet beaten. I had such a great time with those games that I immediately pivoted to playing Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, which I also enjoyed immensely. From there, I got lucky enough to get a PS5, and spent some time playing big triple-A games or new games I'd acquired on there, including Miles Morales, Final Fantasy VII Remake, and Enter the Gungeon. The last period I can remember is when I got my Mega SG and Super NTs from Analogue, and used that as an excuse to play through some Genesis and Super Nintendo games that were either old favorites or games I'd been meaning to play for a while, like Disney's Aladdin, X-Men 2: The Clone Wars, and Final Fantasy Mystic Quest.
reTROview's Top Ten Games of 2021:
10. X-Men 2: The Clone Wars
Of all of the titles on this list, I feel the most guilty including this one. It probably, in terms of overall quality, doesn't quite surpass other games that I completed this year that won't appear on this list, including Dragon Ball Fighterz, Rayman 2, and Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. But this is my list, and X-Men 2 did some incredible things that were extremely impressive for the time it was released. Making superhero games is a tough thing. The instinct is that you can't just have heroes using an infinite amount of powers, or else it's extremely difficult to balance the game for difficulty. Too much reliance on powers, and the level leading up to the boss becomes too simple to keep the player's attention, much like the way that showdowns are frequently depicted in comic books - chew easily through the little dudes with guns before the big bad comes. That's an effective way to communicate a narrative, but for a game...not so much. As such, developers tended to give skills cooldowns or limited uses to force an engaging difficulty curve on players. This made non-supernatural heroes, or at least vulnerable heroes who need to get up close and personal, the most natural choices for games.
Enter X-Men 2. The team behind this game started with the premise that we are making this game with faithful reproductions of the mutants' powers, and that we're going to give you a wide range of mutants to play with. This sounds fraught with games design peril, but the developers absolutely NAILED the X-Men experience with their level, enemy, and character design. Every level feels increasingly challenging from the previous one. Every level is beatable by every mutant. But every level is also cleverly designed to make it easier to complete with certain of the mutants, giving you the incentive to play around with the cast in a way that other game play experiences would either default to forcing you to select a certain character for a level, or making one of the characters superior to all of the others so that you would need to select them for the vast majority of levels. On my playthrough, I literally use all of the characters at least once (Cyclops, Psylocke, Wolverine, Gambit, Magneto, Beast, and Nightcrawler are all playable).
The controls are not great. The music is bad, and the sound poor. If only we could have swapped sound and music from the otherwise dull Spider-Man and X-Men: Arcade's Revenge! Oh well. But the visuals are superb, and the core gameplay experience is as well. This is an excellent superhero game and deserves far more love and attention than it gets.
9. Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales
Speaking of games that have nailed the superhero experience, enter Miles. My faithful reader knows that I absolutely adored Marven's Spider-Man when it came out, and it should be no surprise that Miles was the PS5 title I was looking forward to more than any other. It's a new game that's using a nearly perfect gameplay engine, so I wasn't expecting a giant leap forward. It feels like something that was quickly patched together to give the PS5 a premium launch title, and I think that's accurate. It certainly doesn't have the length of the previous game. Controlling and fighting with Miles feels remarkably similar to controlling Peter, which is entirely appropriate, but I just wanted more to this game in the end. With all of that being said, the core engine is just too good to dock this game that much.
8. Final Fight
I had dabbled in beat 'em ups before, but I couldn't say I was particularly well-versed in the genre. My main experiences were playing Turtles in Time on my neighbor's SNES as well as Turtles in Time, X-Men, and The Simpsons at the arcade in our local Chuck E. Cheese. I enjoy those games, but Final Fight is superior to all of them. The weapons, graphics, sound, diversity of characters, and extremely well-balanced two player experience delivers one of the finest arcade experiences of the era.
7. Enter the Gungeon
This was also the year I dipped my toes into roguelikes, a genre I'm going to pay closer attention to in the future. The repetitive nature of the genre scratches my itch for grinding away just a bit farther in challenging situations, while the random nature of the genre also makes every iteration a unique experience. Roguelikes are also interesting in that the gameplay can vary wildly between titles, as the focus of the genre is on progression rather than battle or exploration mechanics themselves. Gungeon in particular is an extremely well-crafted twin-stick shooter, but the roguelike mechanics make every decent into the bowels of the Gungeon, combined with the lighthearted experience bursting at the seams with homage to classic video games and pop culture, a very unique experience that's not to be missed.
6. Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
I actually enjoyed all of the Castlevania games on the NES, but the progenitor of the series and its third iteration are head and shoulders above the second, which is a very interesting game with some deeply flawed mechanics and localization issues. It's hard to pick between this one and the first game, but both deliver an extremely thoughtfully designed, horrifically difficult experience that you'll remember for a long time after playing.
5. Final Fantasy VII Remake
Remaking classic games typically does little for me. I rarely view updated graphics as superior to classic ones, almost always prefer classic gameplay mechanics to the new, cut and paste combat and map mechanics that infect every last triple A game that gets released, and also love that classic games had real hardware limitations that forced developers to push the limits of their creativity. But, there are some titles that can definitely use a remake (Square Enix - you have a little game called Xenogears that might be well positioned for one!). One such title is Final Fantasy VII, a game with extraordinary impact that's tremendously fun today, but suffers from an unclear translation and visuals that, to put it lightly, look atrocious today, gorgeous cutscenes aside.
But VII is my favorite Final Fantasy game, and I was suspicious about this remake to say the least. I haven't loved Square Enix' newest titles, and this one looked like a reskin of Final Fantasy XV, a forgettable game to say the least. But it was free on Playstation Plus, so I decided it was time to give it a go. And it was really outstanding! It did everything a reboot should do, with high quality voice acting and visuals, updated combat that's fun and engaging throughout, and faithful expansion of a universe that had a ton of creative potential for growth. The original is still superior when considered in its historical context, but this was a great remake. I can't wait for part two!
4. Hades
My roguelike journey continued this year with the best roguelike I have ever played, Hades. Using the roguelike mechanics as a method of storytelling was absolutely genius, and the writing for this game was top notch. I don't generally care in the slightest about story in games, but I found myself actively seeking out new connections between the characters and additional details regarding their stories. Throw in Diablo-style ARPG combat that's nearly perfectly crafted, and fun interactions between the various upgrades to make each run feel distinctly different, and you have an all-time classic game.
3. Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch
I am very picky about JRPGs. I critique no genre more harshly, and demand exacting perfection from my role playing experiences. As a result, it had been a while since a JRPG truly charmed me. But lately, my cold, hard JRPG heart has been cracked open slightly by some excellent non-Final Fantasy titles that give me a tremendous amount of hope for the future. Xenoblade Chronicles, Bravely Default, and Final Fantasy VII Remake come to mind immediately, but none have captured my love more than Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch. This game was visually charming, had solid character development mechanics, a great story, and a soundtrack that was nearing on the greatness of classic Uematsu or Mitsuda efforts (seriously). It combines the charm of Ghibli's distinctive animation style together with the meticulous attention to gameplay that has consistently characterized Level-5's development work. It would be difficult for me to find a non-Square, non-Pokemon RPG that I enjoy more than this one. I'm saving Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom for just the right moment, and am very confident that it will deliver exactly what I want.
2. Contra
I know, I know. How have I not seriously played this game before? That's what I was asking myself when I first got to the second level of Contra. This game is visually tremendous, with functionally zero slowdown on a console eternally known for it. The controls are the most perfect on the console, tied only with the greatness of Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, and Super Mario Bros. The music is incredibly crafted and delightful. The bosses are huge and intimidating. What's more, Contra's notorious difficulty was actually the most fair that I have ever seen in an NES game this side of Super Mario Bros., giving you every piece of information and practice necessary to conquer every challenge, if you're patient and skilled enough. If you think you need the Konami code for this one, you're dead wrong. Just grind a bit every day and you'll start to see the genius game design in every enemy placement, jump, power up location, and miniboss. My only real complaint with this game is that the last level is far too easy, which cheapens the payoff here just enough to make it a notch below perfect. If you're like me and haven't played Contra yet, take it from someone who knows...go buy it! Contra Anniversary Collection is perennially on sale on every platform known to man, so you have no excuse.
1. Castlevania: Rondo of Blood
This is a game that's not generally gotten the same level of recognition in the West as the NES Castlevanias or Symphony of the Night, due to the fact that it was buried exclusively in Japan on a remarkably unpopular system for over a decade. The recent years have been kind(er) to Rondo, with a North American release on the PSP that's still somewhat reasonably priced, along with a far more accessible collection for modern consoles, Castlevania Requiem. Both also include the superb Symphony of the Night, which is worth the purchase price on its own (especially when you look at how expensive Symphony is on the PS1)! When I bought Requiem, I thought that at worst, I'd get sending another signal to the fine, Pachinko-addicted folks at Konami that I'd like more Castlevania, please. After all, I already had Symphony on the Xbox 360. But Rondo absolutely blew me away. It is, in my opinion, the most visually beautiful video game that had ever been produced at the time of its release (1993). The audio is absolutely superb, and far ahead of the pack of its peers thanks to its CD format. The gameplay is flawless, forming the building blocks that would lead to the masterpiece that is Symphony of the Night. Konami started to flesh out some of the exploratory concepts that they had introduced in Simon's Quest and Dracula's Revenge here, with secret pathways and bosses galore. The bosses are great, the level design is superb, and the cherry on the top is that you can replay through any level you've already beaten at any time! This is THE best classic Castlevania game, period.
Usually I conclude these posts with my gaming goals for the year. So far my year has been filled a few long RPGs, and those take a significant amount of time to complete. It's hard for me to set up a goal for games completed when the ones I'm choosing take so long to complete, but I'll do my best.
2022 Goal #1: Complete Chrono Cross
Already done!
2022 Goal #2: Complete 25 games I've never finished before
We're in March, and I've completed seven games already this year:
Chrono Cross
Axiom Verge
Armored Warriors
Gunstar Heroes
Streets of Rage 4
Star Fox 64
Mystery game that's up next on my triumphant return to What I'm Playing
I'm right on track for 25 at that rate, but with some longer RPGs mixed in, I might need to sprinkle in a couple of hour long Metal Slug or beat 'em up completions to make the goal. There's no shame in that. Right?
2022 Goal #3: Complete Secret of Mana
It was my goal several years ago, I didn't finish it, and now I need to finally sit down and do it. With my fancy new Collection of Mana game sitting on my shelf, there's no reason not to.
2022 Goal #4: Abandon games that aren't fun or that I'm not enjoying
I have been very proud of my OCD self for being able to do this lately, and I'm looking to continue this trend. In the last few months, I've given up playing Spider-Man and X-Men: Arcade's Revenge, Daffy Duck: The Marvin Missions, and Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City because they stink and my gaming time is too precious to waste playing things I don't enjoy.
2022 Goal #5: Buy some pricey new physical games for my collection
Money is always tight and the market is high, so this might not work out. But I'm on the lookout for solid deals on a Lufia II or a Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, and open to being sold on others if they come into my local game shop and I've had a good night at poker recently.
That's all for the 2021 reTROspective. See you soon for the resurrection of What I'm Playing! Let's say this one may be more contemporary than most of my choices.
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