Tag: Video Games

Periwinkle: Legend of the Purple Plunderer or something like that.

POSTCARDS FROM PARADISE

My eyes shot open.

I hear gravel cracking under tires outside my hut. I look at my alarm clock. Three thirty in the morning. I see the red glow of brake lights through my window shades. I hear a car door open up.

*Quack Quack* *Quack Quack*

I know whose Jeep this is. Only one person on this island drives a custom Duck Jeep. Complete with matching Duck Quacks as a keys-still-in-the-ignition-alarm.

I hear another door slam. Then palmate up the drive. I dress quickly. What could it be this late at night? Was it something I had done? Something I had said?

*Knock Knock* Two raps at the door.

Cookie sighs, rolling over on the couch trying to catch some ZzZz’s. Some Gaurd Seal he is.

I open the door somewhat guessing what this late night meeting could be about.

“Princess?

Princess Pinkie hands me a shovel and strolls back to the jeep. I examine the shovel and she turns around at the Duck Jeep. “Well? Are you ready?”

Not soon after we’re driving through the sandy roads of Paradise in the dead of night. We pass by occasional bonfires and coconuts enjoying their night. I, blink twice as I see Sunny hanging upside down from a tree. I, shake my head. I have to lay off the drink.

“So if this is about..” I start

“It’s not about anything. Granted you haven’t been showing up for your duties but Paradise is accommodating. The only reason I’m calling upon you now is because I may have found something that would interest you.”

With my interest peaked I gaze over towards the driver side as Princess Pinkie holds up what looks like a dirty old map. She keeps her eyes on the road ahead as I take the map from her hands.

“What is it?”

“I think it’s a treasure map.”

“Here? Treasure? On the island??”

“If that map is true. We should be approaching the spot soon” As we pull up to a secluded beach across the island. The sun not yet risen painting the sky a lighter shade of blue. We exit the vehicle and see that there is already a red “X” painted on the sand. We look at one another and shrug. I throw the shovel into the sand and only have to scoop one shovelful of sand up to uncover what lies beneath. It is a copy of the PlayStation 2 game, Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer…

We both look at it on the ground. “Do you think that’s it?” I ask. Pinkie seems just as disappointed. “I mean.. shit. I don’t know.”

“I’ll try digging a little further”

“Yeah do that” she says as I scoop Pirates out of the way and continue digging.

The nine o’ clock sun is beating down on both of us collapsed on the beach. Hours of digging. No dice. The treasure is unfortunately the PlayStation 2 game, Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer. Defeated we both rise and walk over to the Jeep. Arriving at my hut only a short time later Pinkie tosses the game on the seat after I get out.

“Maybe you were meant to play this game.”

Looking down at it. “Yeah…sure.”

I close the door.

So this game arguably has the longest trailer I have ever seen. Especially considering the average completion time on Howlongtobeat.com is around four hours. Which four hours really doesn’t seem like a long period of time. It’s only 1/6th of a day. 1/2 of a good night’s sleep (does anyone ever get a full eight?) no, four hours doesn’t seem long at all.

BUT THIS FOUR HOURS IS A VERY LONG TIME

So.. arguably part of this is my fault but mostly it’s not. Let me explain.

Back some time ago in my early 20’s I used to work at a Gas Station/Pizzeria type place. I don’t know how most of Europe works but I’m pretty sure you guys have the same idea – in Dublin I ate at some Irish McDonald’s knock off that was way better at a Petrol station. So people liked the pizza at this place and every summer – it was right down the road from where they held the county fair.

Now this county fair is a big deal. Every year. People really dig it and every year it’d usually be the same touring carnival staff that really dug our food. So working there while the fair was operating afforded you the chance to meet a lot of colorful personalities. But there was one particular person I’ll never forget because there was a part of me that envied him. I think.

This was at the height of the Pirates of the Caribbean craze and there was a man that would adorn himself in full Jack Sparrow attire and make up and well… he was quite a hit. Twenty year old me would watch as people surrounded him for photos as I pushed out pizza dough or made subs. Watching quietly from afar thinking things like:

“Wow… that guy probably gets a lot of tail.”

And

“Pirates of the Caribbean was the best thing that’s ever happened to this dude.”

What the hell does this have to do with anything? Well… it does sort of help explain my misconceptions of pirates and piracy in general. I, a relatively unpopular and lowly pizza boy saw this Johnny Depp look-a-like crushing it. And I should add a fun loving and mischievous, Jack Sparrow cosplayer that was melting the hearts of moms the world over while everyone else swooned.

As I sat there changing our fryer baskets I glared at the local star. As people gathered around I thought to myself:

“Probably never sailed a day in your life, you fraud!”

But neither had I AND there is absolutely no sailing going on in the deceptively titled, Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer.

In fact, if you missed the five minute video at the beginning of the game you probably would have no clue this is a game based on pirates at all. There is no sailing, or drinking rum or singing songs. All you do is shoot monkeys in the face and fall to your death.

The story’s premise is sort of cool, if not a bit confusing. During the height of the slave trade – there was a slave ship on its way to a Spanish Outpost that found itself ravaged in the storms of the Bermuda Triangle. Where as legend will have it the legendary slave, La Borgne commanded a slave army that waged war on the nearby Spanish Outpost. They destroyed all that was in their way because well.. they were understandably pissed off. The Outpost was deserted and in nautical lore the island was considered cursed and dangerous but also of course, a terminal for lost treasures and riches beyond your wildest dreams.

At last, hearing nothing from the outpost for quite a while the Spanish Crown sends its most decorated captain out to learn the fate of the doomed ship. The revered explorer, Dominic Roberto De La Cruz (shout out to my friend, Filipa 🤗) As legend would have it De La Cruz would land on the island and battle La Borgne and her army of slaves but the outcome of this struggle is lost to the sands of time and De La Cruz was never heard from again.

Here is where you enter – as Francis Blade. A nobody rogue who finds himself as the sole survivor of a ship wreck marooned on La Borgne Island. It is here where apes and orangutans attack you for no reason whatsoever and you’ll spend hours upon hours swearing at your television as the game’s inconsistent and slippery controls fail you over and over again.

IGN.com

There is an interesting element (one that I don’t like and I don’t really think it makes a ton of sense) but after a little bit of gameplay you come across an Amulet. An amulet that gives you the power to morph into the “Black Buccaneer”. Whom confusingly looks like a mix between Baron Samedi and the Hulk. The artwork on the old screens are very heavy with the Baron Samedi aesthetic as well without any real mention of Haiti or Voodoo culture whatsoever.

One could argue that it’s not necessarily the developer and writer’s jobs to spoon feed the gamer every single detail but it sort of seems like a missed opportunity when you’re dealing with subject matter as fascinating as Baron Samedi and Haitian culture as a whole.

I like the idea of an escaped slave raging against her colonial captors through the use of brute force and black magic but why not run with it? It feels like a decent idea that was never fully realized. Which is basically the entire story of this game.

If they would have just tightened up the controls and upped the story a little bit you could have had a memorable adventure but instead they ended up with confusing plot accompanied by infuriating controls.

SHOP TIL YOU DROP

I mean .. yeah .. it’s bad but it’s still worth more than one cent. Buy it if you see it for one cent.

DESERT ISLAND SONGS

I mean will any other song written about a pirate ever compare?

PERIWINKLE’S LOW HANGING FRUIT PUNCH VERSION 2.0

1.) Vin Diesel Skull Cap

2.) Shameless Voodoo Face Paint

Test Drive

Long before I had the luxurious job of emptying out hot tubs and scrubbing them by hand on Paradise Island, I grew up in a small town. One of those one stoplight towns – the type of place you read about in Stephen King novels and such. But no killer clowns stalked us as children and we didn’t form some sort of killing cult in the cornfields surrounding the hamlet.

No, we did basically what all the other city kids did and still do. Be discontent, listen to punk rock, drink, do drugs and walk around at night like the little miscreants we were. But there were a few perks to rural life – at least in the absolutely forgotten (but not forgettable) Upstate New York.

Small race tracks permeate upstate – from the western frontier to the mountain ranges of central and north east New York. While never being thought of as anything more than “NYC” – the state of New York is gigantic. Sprawling woods, The Catskills and Adirondack mountain ranges. Even Appalachia runs up through the southern part of the state.

Weaving in between all of this ski country are little towns and villages and many of them have their own little hometown arena of sorts: A racetrack. Usually dirt, some times pavement. Growing up in rural New York the races are just sort of rite of the land. Even if you’re not into them you’re well aware of them.

While easy to dismiss as just a muddy oval with a bunch of hicks driving around in circles (which it is) I challenge the most disinterested to not feel the rise in heartbeat and rush of adrenaline when the roar of thirty cars greets a green flag. The tension and white knuckle competition of dozens of men and women just going for it. That drive is intoxicating and in a small way still apart of me.

FANCY INTRODUCTION VIDEO

Now don’t get me wrong. I am about as far away from a country boy as you can get. Immediately moving to a city weeks before barely stumbling across the high school graduation stage. Fifteen years ago you would have seen me vehemently deny any such upbringing. But times change.

And in the gaming world nothing has changed more than my feeling towards the Test Drive series. A series I loved growing up with, enjoyed immensely and played regularly.

A month or so ago I received a big bulk package of games I purchased from Goodwill. There were a few titles I was very excited about adding to my collection (X Files: Resist or Serve being one of them) As I was going through doing inventory of repeat games and checking discs I saw Test Drive. I was overjoyed with seeing an old favorite. Sure that it’d be an enjoyable arcade racer that I could waste hours on.

I was wrong

Now to explain why I have to take you back in time a little. You see in the 90’s there were plenty of racing titles, arcade or simulation that featured American muscle, British luxury, German engineering marvels and Japanese speed. Typically these games were set in a few iconic places around the world where you would race beautiful rare cars against one another on lush English back country roads. Occasionally dodging livestock or a police car. It was sort of like some unspoken millionaire racers club.

This was just kind of the way it was. No one even questioned it. You just sort of assumed that anyone driving a Jaguar XJ-220 around was probably just some rich dickhead.

Until 2001 rolled around and the first of two hundred Fast and Furious films came out. Once that happened – arcade racing games would be changed forever.

Ha! This old thing? This is just my winter car.

“The Fast and Furious effect of 2001” or “FAFE 01”(as I would refer to it years later in my college thesis at Yale University) not only changed the landscape of racing games dramatically but the entire world around us.

First off, men the world over shaved their heads. If shears weren’t an option then men and women rushed to their nearest skull cap store. Donning the new Diesel look. Vin Diesel mania had kicked off.

Real time photo of him driving to my house to kick my ass.

By the winter of 2001 not only was most of the world bald but they were pumping iron as well and even more damning for the Test Drive series – the globe was demanding less luxury and pomp in their racing games and simply more Diesel.

So video games developers had to respond to the rapidly changing market and fast and here is where Test Drive screwed up. Instead of doing any sort of research whatsoever on street racing culture, the long storied history of street racing in iconic locations like SoCal and Tokyo (“The Midnight Club”) or I don’t know, even just watching a movie about racing they said the hell with it. We’ll figure it out as we go and it’s pretty damn obvious.

The plot is pretty simple. You are some guy named Dennis Black and you are contacted by some guy named Donald Clark. Clark is a rich idiot that reminds me of Elon Musk. He’s rude and mean and apparently wheelchair bound. I give the writers credit here for making a handicapped character a total dick. That’s all the credit they’re getting from me, though.

Basically Donald is injured and wants you to race for him. Never mind the fact that we’re assuming at this point he is some sort of ridiculous millionaire that is wasting his time street racing – which the prize is a measly $1000 per victory. I just feel like a guy that could afford to own Dodge Vipers and a Hemi Cuda would be interested in higher stakes money wise.

But what do I know about being a millionaire street racer? The answer? Absolutely nothing. I’ve never been a street racer and I’ll never be a millionaire so maybe these people do exist. Who knows?

So the story sucks but that’s of little consequence. The game ultimately is just not fun. The cars take no damage whatsoever – I hit a semi truck going 210 miles per hour and the semi truck flew backwards. The racers on the track are supposed to be these characters from cutscenes but they don’t drive with any personality. It’s a very dull, repetitive and lonely experience.

It’s sad to see what once was such a strong racing series fall from grace at the turn of the century.

SHOP TIL YOU DROP

Are you kidding me?

DESERT ISLAND SONGS

The soundtrack is probably the best thing about the game. But it’s not great. It’s a strange mix of Saliva, Ja Rule, Moby and DMX. Being an old lame ass dude my favorite of these artists is Moby. So, alas the Moby banger, “Bodyrock” is my favorite song on the game.

PERIWINKLE’S LOW HANGING FRUIT PUNCH INGREDIENTS V. 2.0

1.) Vin Diesel Skull Cap (Test Drive)

Feel free to follow my website for more random musings on games, music and more or stalk me on social media: https://linktr.ee/BuffaloRetro

Me the day before Fast and Furious
Me the day after.

Meeting God in Shattered Skies

POSTCARDS FROM PARADISE

Another week on Paradise – which means more pool cleaning, lawn mowing and preparation for coconut tourist season. But this week a different task led me down a dramatically different path than usual.

It all started with orders from the top (as it normally does). However, instead of a bad game frisbeed through my hut window like normal there was just a map of the island, a small note from Princess Pinkie and a pair of Power Bracelets left at the breakfast bar. I hadn’t even heard anyone come in. My guard Dog/Sea Lion, Cookie had spent the night at the reef somewhere off the coast with one of his girlfriends.

“HEAVY. ROCK. LIFT. MOVE. 🦆”

I sipped my coffee and held the note. The morning had started off rare as it was. I woke up in a green tunic. Which I chalked up to a combination of too much to drink the night before and laundry day.

Second, earlier that morning there was a bright large bug that kept yelling, “HEY” at me trying to wake me up. Eventually – completely irritated – I arose and squared up with the bug and boxed it. After punching it out of the air I tossed it’s strange, unconscious faerie body in the garbage can outside and laid back down.

Now there was this note. Rarely did I exchange much correspondence with the palace as is. I’ve always been the self motivated type. Wandering around the island looking for things to fix up. Generally assuming if I’m found busy my employers will almost always be happy. But a personal request – this was different. And the Power Bracelets looked badass. So equipped with my newly found gauntlets and tight-but-comfortable-green-tunic I set off towards the boulder that must be moved.

Upon arrival I saw the large rock that needed moving. There were some strange plants around it. They looked like cartoon bombs 💣 growing out of some weeds. I assumed they must be some sort of land mines left over from the war – Princess Diana did her best to have all land mines removed and eradicated from ex-war-zones but Paradise is a bit out of the way. They must have missed a few.

I, personally am not fucking with a bomb of an undetermined age sticking out of the ground. So I avoided them. Maybe I’ll put some caution tape around the area once I move around them and get this rock out of here. In other words: bomb disposal : outside my pay grade.

So removing the rock itself was extremely anticlimactic. I just lifted it over my head and tossed it. These gauntlets are excellent quality. The startling thing was this strange music I heard from everywhere around me as I lifted the rock. I quickly realized that by moving the rock I had exposed a hole. A seemingly bottomless pit.

Despite everything in my body telling me this was a mistake I decided to jump down the hole anyways because fuck it – why not. And I’m glad I did. I landed softly on a mirrored pad – where I heard a gorgeous harp – the sound of a running fountain and a relaxing, disarming ambience. I, was sure I was in the company of pure good.

As I approached I heard a powerful roar. A voice so beautiful and strong – easily the strength of a choir of people singing from the depths quickly approaching the fountains surface until completely breaking through the still water. A giant faerie? Or a giant god? Or the… unbelievably talented singer songwriter, Chris Cornell??

Chris Cornell emerged from the faerie fountain completely dry and all knowing. It wasn’t until now that I realized one of my favorite singers of all time sort of already had a Jesus look going on for awhile on his own.

His voice soft but firm.

Cornell: Periwinkle – I have been watching you from afar.

Me: Mr. Cornell – Why… I’m .. so… flattered.

Cornell: Of course you are. You have projected me. You wouldn’t pick someone you don’t like to be a faerie God…I mean.. think about it…

– Silence –

Me: Yeah. Yeah I s’pose you’re right.

Cornell: ANYWAYS… let’s see .. where was I – alright… As I was saying. *Clears Throat* Periwinkle – I have watched your self destruction from afar. It’s finally time, son.

Me: It’s time to move on? I can come with you? I have been waiting for thi-

Cornell: No! What’s the matter with you. You’re not going anywhere. It’s time for you to play a good game, finally.

Me: Oh. Well.. yeah, of course…

Cornell: Between back to back terrible titles like City Crisis and Trigger Man your heart meter is so low. Which is why I’m here. To provide comfort to weary travelers. Let me blow the life back into you.

Me: Wait.. wha – … like a ..sexual thing?

Cornell: No. Definitely not a sexual thing.

—- Neither makes eye contact for what seems like forever ——-

Cornell: I was going for like a game cartridge thing. Like when it wouldn’t work –

Me: Yeah, yeah I get it.

Cornell: But, anyways! You have suffered selflessly enough for the coconuts on Paradise. Trudging through horrible games to warn the visitors and retro enthusiasts on Paradise of the perils of bargain bin gaming. What games to avoid. Selflessly diving on grenades to save the masses. It’s time to treat yourself, son.

Me: This means so much… what game can make me love again? Can you, Grammy Award winning multi-instrumentalist, Chris Cornell show a guy like me how to live?

Cornell: Young Periwinkle – I can only steer you in the right direction. I can recharge your hearts and give you one single title to get you back on track. After that your destiny is in your own hands. Before I leave I suggest you take that bottle over there and make sure you bottle a little golden mini me as well. In case you ever find yourself dealing with Trigger Man level of incompetence in the future again.

I heard the flute noise and felt my energy being restored. *Flick flick flick flick* ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️

Golden Chris Cornell Faerie God also handed me a copy of Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies.

I grabbed the empty bottle and put a tiny Golden Chris Cornell inside it for later use. The floating Cornell smiled at the new lease on my gaming life.

With my arms out stretched over my head a floating bottle with a tiny golden statuette rest in it. You have acquired a Golden Cornell. Let him free to recharge your energy and soul.

Chris Cornell: Now before I go, son. Do you have any questions? About anything in the entire universe?

I thought hard.

Periwinkle: When is the McRib coming back?

Cornell looked extremely disappointed. Shook his head and floated back into the faerie fountain. Apparently it was such a good question he couldn’t even answer it! Or it was really bad. Eh, who cares?

I stood with my arms raised with a copy of Ace Combat 04 floating above my hands. YOU HAVE ACQUIRED A COPY OF A PLAYSTATION 2 MASTERPIECE, ACE COMBAT 04: SHATTERED SKIES.

FANCY INTRO VIDEO

Released: November 1 2001

Developed & Published: namco

I have such little experience writing about how much I enjoyed a video game that I am almost completely at a loss. I have messaged Pinkie nearly every day telling her how much I love this game. I have told my wife. I have told my friends. I have told the dog next door. Everyone after day two or so just eventually starts to roll their eyes.

I drove to New York City to profess my love to Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies while standing on the top of a skyscraper but there was already someone doing it. This game is a masterpiece. Beautiful, sad, fun, easy to learn but hard to master. All of the good stuff.

The game itself is about a future world where some asteroids posed a major threat to the planet. Mankind built a gun to shoot the asteroids and it didn’t really work so now we all live on one shitty continent. Naturally because we’re human beings we begin a war over land and resources and the “bad dudes” highjack the massive asteroid gun and you have to stop them. Sounds simple and stupid but it isn’t. The storytelling is so well done, exploring the human condition in times of war.

I’d also go on record and say this game is a top ten ps2 game graphically. Some of the colors, graphics, picture-esque skies and backdrops are still breathtaking to this day. With 2021 eyes that is quite a feat.

It even has a beautiful replay mode that you can exploit and slam your jet into the ocean all cinematic like:

SHOP TIL YOU DROP

I understand that this was a big series back in the day but it passed me by twenty years ago. I have noticed that most of my fellow ps2 collectors are around my age. A lot around mid 30’s. So when these games were out we didn’t necessarily have the money or the time to buy these games on our minimum wage grocery store paychecks.

But here’s where the news gets even better! I picked this bad boy up for $2.99 at a flea market. On eStarland you can find it CiB for $9.

On EBay I’ve been finding it for about $3.99 which is a great deal.

But as usual – there are ridiculous price gougers that deserve to be shamed. Like this fuckface:

I’ll just buy my own jet, thanks.

Regardless – without paying this guy $599 – if you are a collector or just a fan of retro games this game is well, well, worth its budget price tag these days. And if you’re an emulator player – get on it! You don’t have to be a jet or a war enthusiast to enjoy this game. I recommend it so much – I had to create a new cocktail because I refuse to put it on the list with all the other bad games. So here is the good game cocktail ingredient list!

PERIWINKLE’S GIN AND GEM INGREDIENTS

1.) One liter of Jet Fuel (Ace Combat 04: Shattered Skies)

DESERT ISLAND SONG:

If nothing else – if you have skipped this entire article – which is fine – do yourself a favor and listen to this. I needed a harp version of a Soundgarden song to tie in Cornell w/ Zelda. And because the internet rules here we are:

Alright I think that’s it. I’m actually working on another surprisingly good game right now. I’ll see you guys next week. Have more ps2 gems it seems everyone missed out on? Let us know! Comment below or Hit me up on social media (Instagram has been popping lately!) Until next time, Coconuts.

Periwinkle – Triggered.

An infuriating mixture of nearly invincible enemies, next to nothing plot and ugly design.

POSTCARDS FROM PARADISE

Cookie and I have been renovating our hut in preparation for a lovely spring and summer – my first on the island. We decided to put the hut on stilts and move it closer to the shore for two reasons: We both enjoy the sounds of summer storms rolling over the ocean and it’s easier for him. You see, as of late Cookie has become quite the ladies man. He likes to bring his Sea Lion girlfriends over to watch movies as he has always really been quite the cinephile. I can’t tell you how many times he’s made me watch Life By A Whisker.

So, like a good roommate I retreat to my small room and put my headphones on. I don’t get very many guests, myself. Once a month the manager might kick open the door and throw my next batch of horrible, bargain bin games inside for me to suffer through. Other than that every full moon Sunny leaves me hand woven baskets with fruits and random bones on our small front porch. I think it’s a gesture of good will but it could also be a grave threat – it’s hard to tell with him.

This month I opened the front door to the see the game box of, “Trigger Man” stuck to my door with a combat knife. And I could just faintly see the Manager running back into the tree line. She’s not as innocent as she’d like you to believe. There are even rumors on the island of construction workers on her new Castle disappearing. But I keep my head down and keep quiet. I’m just here to do a job, sweet island citizens and guests and it begins now. Let us begin this mortal sin of a game!

NEW FANCY VIDEO INTRODUCTION

No.

Publisher: Point of View (They published the amazing NFL Blitz)

Developed by: Crave Entertainment (The creative genius behind, Baby Pals)

Crave Entertainment originally titled this game, “Baby Felons”

Trigger Man makes the impossible possible. It makes being a mobster incredibly lame. The story is so abhorrent that it would have literally been better with no story or context at all. That way the person playing the game could just nonchalantly make up their own plot line.

“What’s this guys deal?”

“Oh. He drank too many Mountain Dews. Now he’s taking everyone down.”

“Ah. Makes sense.”

That story? Those two sentences? More thought out then the entire game. Concept, design, story, all of it.

I read a blog post about eyeliner earlier today that is more badass than this game. The unnamed, idiot, blockhead main character you play as is so boring and uninspired I’ve come across pots of boiling water with more complexities.

The controls are so sad that just ducking is an achievement. Sneaking is impossible although an absolute requirement throughout the game. Cover is nearly impossible during shootouts although that too is paramount to even surviving the constant swarms of respawning enemies.

Speaking of enemies…The only actual badass thing in this entire game? The security guards you have to fight who are basically fucking indestructible. They should play footage of this game at every security guard convention across the country. Sure, they can’t shoot straight and they run directly into your line of fire but they sure are tough.

That is also assuming you can even hit them. If you aim the reticle at the enemies head you will shoot their body. Which takes at least ten shots to kill anyone (Oh, yeah and you can only carry like 30 bullets at a time with any gun so good luck with that). But a headshot grants an instant kill every time. So if you aim the reticle just above the enemies head – you still miss. You just shoot over their heads. It’s extremely difficult to even get a head shot. Skill has barely anything to do with it. It all boils down to luck.

Yeah, good luck idiot.

Which speaking of luck – upon playing this game you will find yourself unlucky A LOT. The missions themselves would honestly take about six minutes each to blow through if you didn’t die 150-200 times per round. It’s UNREAL.

Oh and this god forsaken blog post? Already like two thousand words longer than the game manual. Another sign of how bad the game is. They couldn’t even hire a writer to lie for a minute about how fun and cool the game is in its own instruction manual!

Here’s one last dumb analogy for you. Say video games were sea birds. Why? I don’t know. It’s the first thing that came to mind. Grand Theft Auto 3 (which came out three years before Trigger Man, mind you) was a great game. But far from perfect. Especially with its shooting and aiming controls. It was hard to handle. The lads and ladies at Rockstar had yet to perfect their combat system. So despite its insane fun it could be frustrating to play. Which would take it down from a beautiful majestic sea bird to maybe something cool but a little derpy like a Flamingo.

So if GTA 3 was a cute but derpy flamingo spending its days at an all you can eat Shrimp buffet than Trigger Man is a Sea Gull eating cigarette butts out of a trash can biting little kids that pass by.

Who hasn’t had a date end like this, amiright?

The game is turbo trash. Really can’t put it any other way. It’s literally the worst game I have ever played.

(DEFINITELY DON’T) PEE IN THE POOL

SHOP TIL YOU DROP

For the collectors out there – you can find this game on pretty much any site for next to nothing. But I must point out this idiot for trying to sell this piece of hot garbage for over $35

Just..stop.

DESERT ISLAND SONGS (Songs inspired by the games)

Periwinkle’s Lowing Hanging Fruit Punch Ingredients

1.) A small chunk of fur from Parka (Cold Winter)

2.) A thimble of Jack Bauer’s sweat (24: The Game)

3.) A can of Reservoir Dog Food (Reservoir Dogs)

4.) A handlebar mustache (American Chopper)

5.) Blood of a Backstreet Boy (American Idol)

6.) An impossible to control Q-Tip (CSI)

7.) The tooth of a terrorist (Fugitive Hunter)

8.) One Mona Lisa Smile (The Davinci Code)

9.) One Copy of, “Night Rocker” by The Hoff (City Crisis)

10.) One indestructible security guard (Trigger Man)

Follow me on stuff! I’ll follow you back literally forever !

City Crisis

Generally this is where I write a little segment about my life on the resort. How despite the fact I am relegated to bashing rats with hammers, clearing out asbestos from around the basement pipes and cleaning up the sidewalks after the tourists have had too much to drink it’s still pretty close to paradise. Somewhere in Southeast Asia the weather is beautiful and the food is even better. But this introduction is different because this City Crisis game – if that’s what you would call it – this “game” is as far from paradise as heaven is wide.

If you hate someone. Stop what you’re doing and search “City Crisis PS2” on Amazon. Then – buy one of the BILLIONS of copies available and send it to your enemies’ address. Upon arrival they may think it was an accident or maybe even a gift. Surely if they do make the mistake of playing the game it’ll be one of the last things they ever do. After an hour or so of gameplay they’ll be sure to leap from their high rise apartment window. Or maybe just start hitting their head against a wall until eventually they’ve lost so much blood it all fades to black.

It’s impossible to tell how many copies of City Crisis were actually unleashed on the public but thankfully not enough to actually create a real city crisis. I can only imagine that if hundreds of thousands of people raced to the store to buy this game the day it came out there would have been deadly riots in the streets only hours later.

Even if I have been told by reliable sources that Germans absolutely love helicopter and farming games. My father in-law is off the boat German and has never mentioned his love for either. But certainly if he loves this game than he is ashamed and would never want to show such poor judgement to his son-in-law. Any fans of City Crisis are surely too ashamed to come forward. As they should be.

Developed by Syscom Entertainment which has disappeared off the face of the Earth (probably due to overwhelming shame) and published by giants Take-Two Interactive.

The game was released on July 17th 2001. Meaning it also shares a birthday with someone inexplicably popular in Germany as well. Yes, you immediately know who I’m about to drag into this. The Hoff was born on July 17th. He single handily tore down the Berlin Wall brick by brick with songs of rescuing babes from maritime disaster and personally woo-ed the Soviets back into loving a capitalist system (kind of). That’s what they teach American school children at least!

But like every good balance in the universe – if David Hasselhoff is pure good born on July 17th then sack of shit Gavin McInnes is the flip side of the coin. If you don’t know who he is then you’re better off.

But where were we? Ah yes, back to City Crisis. You are immediately thrust into the cockpit of a helicopter named after incredibly lame animals to name a helicopter after.

Helicopters are named: Dolphin, Lobster and Goldfish.

“Sir! The skyscraper you’re in is burning! We’ve come to save you!!”

“Oh, thank God for you, heroes! Thank you so much!”

(*Begins to notice that the rescue helicopter is named LOBSTER and has the animal painted on the Helicopter tail*)

“Ya know what? It’s fine. I’m good! Go rescue someone else. I’ll just jump”

Not to mention there is something seriously wrong in this game world and the constant burning buildings is not nearly as big as an issue that needs to be addressed compared to whatever fictional country they have pissed off. In one flying/rescue segment it’s not unusual for seven to eight different buildings to just randomly explode on opposite ends of the city within a few minutes of one another. Are we at war? Is this The Blitz? Faulty gas lines? What the fuck is actually going on around here?

Or is it that the graphics of this fictional city are just so poor the citizens themselves have just had enough and are destroying their own city in a desperate cry for help? We may never know. But the Helicopter Rescue Budget for the city has to be through the roof. I’m not sure how they could afford much else.

Speaking of affording things you can find this game for like $2.50 on eBay. And some asshole is even trying to sell it for $71.00. Don’t pay either of those prices. Just don’t buy this game, sweet Germans. You deserve better helicopter games.

Periwinkle’s Lowing Hanging Fruit Punch Ingredients

1.) A small chunk of fur from Parka (Cold Winter)

2.) A thimble of Jack Bauer’s sweat (24: The Game)

3.) A can of Reservoir Dog Food (Reservoir Dogs)

4.) A handlebar mustache (American Chopper)

5.) Blood of a Backstreet Boy (American Idol)

6.) An impossible to control Q-Tip (CSI)

7.) The tooth of a terrorist (Fugitive Hunter)

8.) One Mona Lisa Smile (The Davinci Code)

9.) One Copy of, “Night Rocker” by The Hoff (City Crisis)

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Periwinkle’s Art of War (02): The Fogs and Forgotten Battles of Alaska

Recently playing the classic Metal Gear Solid for the PlayStation had me daydreaming and wondering about the history of the real Alaskan Peninsula Islands the game is said to take place on. Upon reading the Peninsula’s history I stumbled into a forgotten chapter in World War Two history and by re-examining the past I find new perspective of where we are in America today.

The fog never seems to end on the Aleutian Islands in the Alaskan peninsula but the low visibility has never seemed to slow nomads and explorers throughout history. Even at times acting as a strategic cloak or even a blanket burying the remains of soldiers long since forgotten.

Most of the islands themselves now belonging to the U.S. state of Alaska. While some farther west belong to the Far Eastern administrative district of Russia – known as Kamchatka Krai.

But hundreds of thousands of years before oil rigs, English colonists, Russian traders, merchants and Christian missionaries danced across the isolated piano teeth islands, the archipelago itself acted as Gaia’s horizontal ladder between worlds. The only land linking the continents of Asia and North America.

But it wouldn’t be the last time North Americans and Asians would find themselves co-occupying the territories for better or worse.

The “Alaskan Bush”

For gamers this setting would be most familiar with Metal Gear Solid fans. With the original PlayStation, writer Hideo Kojima realized that the 32-bit technology finally had caught up with his story telling and he aimed to redo and expand on his original MSX game, Metal Gear. He saw the updated technology the perfect platform to expand on the game’s lore and story in a more cinematic manner.

He wrote the entire game taking place on the fictional Shadow Moses Island. An island that is said to belong to a part of the real Fox Island Archipelago in the Alaskan Peninsula. Foggy year round, the adverse weather makes the destination extremely hard to navigate and naturally isolated.

But unlike Kojima’s fictional military conflict set in 2005 a real conflict unfolded between the United States and Japan in the same area sixty years before.

June 3rd 1942 began the Aleutian Island Campaign in the American and Pacific Theaters of World War Two. In only the second invasion of American soil ever, the campaign saw a small force of Japanese soldiers occupying two small islands on the archipelago.

Both Attu and Kiska islands, two of the westernmost islands in the territory of Alaska were occupied by Japanese forces. The Japanese reasoned that control of the Aleutian Islands would prevent the United States from an attack across the Northern Pacific.

Japanese troops raise the Imperial battle flag on Kiska Island in the Aleutians (6/6/42)

At first very little changed for the Unangans (the indigenous people living on the islands) under Japanese rule but that would soon change. Many Unangans would be captured by the Japanese and shipped to Hokkaido where they would be kept in internment camps in harsh conditions. Fearing the Japanese advance the American government forcibly evacuated the remaining Unangans into internment camps of their own where many would die due to exposure of Measles and Influenza. It would take nearly eighty years for the United States Government to formally apologize for the internment and treatment of their people.

Vehicles couldn’t maneuver across the island’s rugged terrain. United State’s soldiers here carry supplies by hand through Jarmin Pass

At the time the American and Canadian fears were growing to a fever pitch. They feared having most American troops already in engaged in the European and Pacific theaters of the war that there wasn’t a lot to stop the Japanese from moving up through the peninsula and overtaking Anchorage, moving south to Vancouver and ultimately settling in Seattle, Washington.

The Japanese opened up the aggressions with bombing Dutch Harbor in the city of Unalaska, Alaska. The aerial bombing which made use of the foggy weather conditions as cover lasted over two days – the second of the two days being much more effective – leaving a burning hospital, oil storage tanks and a breached barrack ship left burning in their wake.

140,000 American and Canadian troops were sent to the islands to meet the Japanese. Rugged terrain and ruthless weather would have devastating effects on both sides of the war effort. By March of 1943 a Japanese fleet was engaged in the naval battle of the Kormandorski Islands. One that would cut off Japanese supplies to the Imperial ground troops on the island indefinitely. Setting the stage for the largest forgotten battle on United States soil ever.

Operation Landcrab

On May 11th 1943 – “Operation Landcrab” began with the sole objective of recapturing Attu island from Japanese forces whose numbers only estimated around 8,000. Japanese forces despite being outnumbered and outgunned held the higher ground while Allied forces struggled with booby traps and frostbite.

Finally on May 29th following fierce entrenched combat the Japanese without warning led the largest banzai charge recorded in the Pacific theater. Led by Colonel Yamasaki the charge penetrated Allied forces so deep they wound up face to face with American rear-echelon support troops. The fighting that commenced there after was barbaric. Furious Hand to hand, face to face battle. Completely outnumbered, the Japanese troops were virtually exterminated.

Shortly thereafter Allied troops landed on Kiska island only to find it abandoned. Under the cover of fog the Japanese chose to remove their remaining troops from the area. Like ghost ships drifting back to the expanse of the sea the forgotten battles were now left to the mercy of time and history books which would bury them soon enough.

LEGACY

American military propaganda during WWII. (We’ve come a long way.)

In a foggy, frozen hell hole killing one another with their bare hands it would surely seem unthinkable to both American and Japanese soldiers that less than fifty years later both countries would be incredibly close military and economic allies.

But a theme Kojima constantly reminds his gamers of is that the enemies and politics constantly change yet the battlefield remains the same. Despite a time period’s politics and conflicts – despite yesterday’s rivals making todays greatest allies – despite what propaganda and claims of righteousness on either side of a battle may be – war is just as barbaric as it ever was.

After all of the decision makers and mouth pieces lay down and go to sleep at night it still all ultimately comes down to men and women – human beings – brutalizing and killing one another over an ever changing political landscape and societal policies that are bound to change soon enough on their own.

After the war the wounds began to heal and culturally the times changed as they always seem to do. With the increase in trade, the meteoric rise of the internet, video games, anime and more the love between our two cultures has never been stronger. I, like millions of other Americans LOVE everything about Japanese culture and Americans and American influence is met with an equally enthusiastic adoration in the Far East.

In a particularly heartbreaking week following the senseless murders of eight people in Atlanta – six of them women of Asian descent – it’s imperative for us as a melting pot to mourn the senseless loss of life together and to be angry on behalf of the victims together but most importantly use this time to embrace one another more than ever. To reach out to one another. To love ourselves and each other. To not let the despicable actions of not just this psycho but any racist shit head divide anyone.

To use our common loves as a constant reminder that we all are human beings and none of us are alone in this world. Sometimes the news cycle can make it look bleaker and darker than it is – but seeing the propaganda and history of the past one hundred years – even if we have a ways to go – we’re still heading in the right direction. Together.

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Pinkie’s Fantastic Five: Video Game Writers

Hello Little Lights, and Periwinkle in particular, today I got tagged in a top five by my pool guy. In Mallow spirit he tagged me in a regular post that isn’t really meant to be a blog tag I think?! But I am not sure.. so at least from me , I won’t be tagging people but I will encourage people to take on this challenge themselves. You see this is an interesting topic for me. Video Game Writers.. neither in anime or video games or even movies for that matter I worry too much about the back office.. I enjoy the bigger product.. as an experience of everyone…in most cases. But who are responsible for some of my favourite works? Today we find out!

<Disclaimer>
This post is not an official top 5,  there is no ranking nor do I claim that these five are my absolute favourites. I do not like ranking people and telling one is better than the other, so these can be put in any order and in no way are meant to invalidate YOUR favourite writers!
<End of Disclaimer>

Jonas Kaerlev

So immediately I started with someone who was the subject of some online scrutiny.  However, whether those accusations are true or not does not reflect on his work. They say our guy Jonas stole the work of an artist and when they struck back he tried to defame them or something.  For some this may be a reason not to buy a game but for me this is something that happens anywhere in the world. It’s up to the people involved to resolve this. So him being a potential meanie-bo-beanie to his staff, doesn’t affect his skill. I would not be able to buy a lot of food if I had to boycott every dickish boss.  So.. by now you may wonder, who the heck is this Jonas Kaerlev person?! See I got you interested in him at least?! … Well he is the writer of A Hat in Time and Ceo of Gears for Breakfast.  As a lot of you may know:   I LOVE A HAT IN TIME SOOOOO MUCH!!!!  The writing is ON point.

Lil old Jonas , is a gamer and he has a love for cute cynismsn and that just oozes out of this game. Which gives it such a personality!  It is cute as buttons, but it has so much sas. Much like Kazooie from Banjo., but in Kaerlev’s work it feels much more genuine. It fits these characters so much and there is a crude irony that some of these characters discover about themselves near the finale or during the game that makes these things so incredibly fun. A Hat in Time’s characters feel so unique and vibrant and the mission structure tells a story while also keeping this video game whimsy about it.  The story is largely irrelevant yet you really get to know these characters and you know what is happening still, feeling both retro and modern and for this writing I adore it.

Yuji Horii

I could have easily fitted this list with just J-RPG writers, but that felt a bit cheap.  However mister Horii can not be omitted from this list. He started out as a journalist for something called “magazines” which are like very old fashioned blogs… but offline?! Weird huh!  (Yes I am writing this so people in the future may enjoy it as well).  A random contest issued by Enix led the man to develop the concept for a game called Love Match Tennis. He won the contest.. among others and this inspired him to start making video games.  His game Portopia Serial Murder Case is one of the games that is creditted by Hideo Kojima as the thigns that got HIM into making video games…. see now my post and Perwinkle’s are linked! Sugoi Sugoi!  Yuji Horii would then move on to be one of the creative aspirations behind a little franchise called. Dragon Quest…or Dragon Warrior if you are an old school American! 
WhileI absolutely adore Dragon Quest, especially part VIII ,  that is not the reason he is on this list. No Horii is on my list because he is the writer of Chrono Trigger.

When I did the powerful female tag, I put Celes Chere as a woman who has been trough a lot , mentioning she might be one of my favourite JRPG characters of all time.Yet there is one character that comes to mind even stronger and that is Frog from Chrono Trigger. And no his real name is not Frog and he is not just a frog.. there is a huge backstory to that featuring a powerful sword and evil mage and time travel, yet that is not even the main plot of the game, it’s a “side-story” integrated in the bigger picture. Chrono Trigger has so much story it is insane and it is perfectly interwoven into each other, the very monstrous Lavos as a villain is quite different from what we normally see. JRPG villains tend to be , what I like to call “Frieza Variations”. I know he wasn’t the first.. but he is well know. A charismatic ruler, of immense power that will transform a few times as you fight him. Usually very cold hearted and a megalomaniac.  Chrono Trigger went a very different route, and our journey was different from what we are used too! And while Horii was not solely responsible.. he started it all!

Tim Schafer

While making this list I wanted to make sure to include people throughout genres and throughout the world, so I was brainstorming on genres in which I really enjoy the story.  The idea of horror came up.. but I realised that was not completely true.  I wanna be scared. I’ll leave the Deus Ex writer for Indigo if he decides to do this tag so shooters were out and western RPGs are oftenly really generically written. Then it came to me.  Old school Point and Click adventures. I often care more about their funny stories than about the puzzles all that much. I love the genre and I love the characters. Yet which game should I pick.. my three favourite point and Click adventure stories are: Day of the Tentacle, the original Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle. So now.. I have to decide which one to pick.. oh nevermind they are all written by the same guy, Tim Schafer. 

I do want to Schafer a slap though for the HORRIBLE ending of Monkey Island 2…. seriously, that is one HORRIBLE video game ending, but his sense of humor is sensible in all of his games. Comedy is hard to put into a video game, it rarely worked in anything other than Point and Click adventures but Tim Schafer to me is the king of video game humor. He proved that it can be done outside of the point and click genre with Brütal Legends and Psychonauts (he also wrote the sequel)  but to me his greatest achievement will be Grim Fandango. The Film Noir and day of the dead inspired the world is so amazing. The adventures of Manny are beautiful.. and the threat of being killed by a flower never felt more real!  It has the perfect balance of comedy, suspense and puzzles that are challenging but feel logical to that world.  Also Tim probably imagined most of the concept for Guybrush freaking Threepwood. Praise Tim!

Hironobu Sakaguchi & Yoshinori  Kitase

Hironobu Sakaguchi

The penultimate slot of this list goes to two people.. and as you may expect by their names, yes they are responsible for a JRPG choice on this list.  So why do I chose two people?! Well because they are co-listed as writers of a few video game gems. Such as Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy VII and of course my all time favourite JRPG, Final Fantasy (ambiguous) VI. I can’t really choose between Sakaguchi and Kitase, because while stories of Final Fantasy games only began to get very good when Kitase showed up (I don’t really care for the story of I through IV) Sakaguchi was the scenario writer for Final Fantasy IX, which might be my second favourite Final Fantasy. So they both made this list. Regardless of what is your favourite Final Fantasy, these two have something to do with it.  Kitase himself says he loves VII the most and his favourite character is Cloud Strife. Now imagine how cool it is to say in their context. HIS favourite character is Cloud Strife. These are THEIR characters. Cloud Strife.. one of THE most Iconic video game characters of all time. It becomes even more epic if you think that unlike Mario, Sonic and even Solid Snake’s design.. who originally just ripped off Kyle Reese from Terminator,  his origins do not stem from just a cool design.. he was probably written first and designed after. Almost none of the other icons will have that feature.

Yoshinori Kitase

So  that already is a testament of their amazing writing prowess, but to me it is still best embodied in Final Fantasy VI. A SteamPunk game that again breaks with a lot of the video game storytelling traditions?!  It created an incredibly complex world with characters that would exist in a world, even if there was no story line. Cecil is an okay character..but without the game there is little to him. The first three games you literally play blank paper sheets or at least their abilities can be traded in. Terra.. without the crown incident would still be interesting, given her heritage. Celes would still feel conflicted about her job without the events  that really drive this game. Edgar would still have his conflict with Sabin. Final Fantasy VI is a great example on how to create a world for me.. the way characters get lost in the woods, do something stupid and end up in more trouble then they bargained for.. it was not just a story that was being told it had it’s characters interact with it. It felt dynamic and is to this day one of my favourite video game stories, and most likely it will be until the day I’d need a Phoenix Down!

Suda51

I know I don’t do rankings, but Suda51 is a top candidate for the number 1 spot on this list.. which is also why I made him my final entry. It is no secret that I like weirdness and randomness and Suda51 is the master of weird. So much so that it can feel convoluted at times, maybe weird for weirds sake. However you just need to see two minutes of a Suda51 game and you will know it is a Suda51 game. His style is on everything.  This can be said for his colleague David Cage, who was on Periwinkle’s list but I do not like David Cage games, they tend to feel a bit preachy at times, there is a heavy bias to certain plot-threads or ways things unfold. Suda51 doesn’t have that for me. Say a David Cage script gets mixed up with these semi-super drama’s like Izombie or the 100, I am not sure I would be able to pick it out of the pile as his work. If I throw Suda51’s writing into a pile of oddball scripts I would still be able to pick out Suda51.. I’d need to throw it into a creative writing course at an Asylum, not to notice it is him.. and even then.. I’d imagine I’d still be able to do it.

I think it is both Cage’s and Suda51’s strength that among games, you can recognise their work for miles. To each goes their own very specific audience and Suda51’s audience is me!  Killer7, Lollipop Chainsaw, Killer is Dead, these all just ooze with flavour and I adore these games. However they do not have Travis Touchdown. No More Heroes is such a unique and strange franchise that really feels like the artists creation. I do not like to do this whole back office thing and look at writers.. but with No More Heroes or Suda51 games, I do not have too.  I know. With all due respect to my four other entries you could tell me another name made them and I would believe it… I can not play No More Heroes and deny Gochi Suda had something to do with it. The way a girl commits suicide by biting down on a grenade.. for losing to Travis, the extremely over the top story that gives room for the strange visuals, the overly cool protagonist that still has to do menial jobs, there is a consistent inconsistency in these games. A way these characters talk to each other that feels larger than life. Larger than normal video games, it’s predictably unpredictable. It is goosebumps and a squee-sounds of joy all over. It’s Suda51!

Like I said I will not be tagging people but I do encourage people in the gaming blogosphere to pick this up and try it themselves.  I don’t think it’s an official tag post and more of a challenge… so I will keep it at that. Challenge yourself to find five other names that are important to you and let’s talk some more video games! Until then, Shine on Little Lights! Oyasumi!

Art by LiciaLurie

Kawaii Mini Blimp takes down Mean Trains 20x it’s size! Steel Empire Review

16-Geared Greetings for a 16-bit Game! My dear Island guests for SteamPunk month we are playing a few interesting Steampunk games. I am still working my way through Dishonored, as I am not very good at sneaking games! I lack the patience and  can’t exactly tell how not to be spotted. I am MUCH better at Retro games and I fairly quickly adapt to old timey side scrolling shooters. So when I found a Steampunk one I was pretty happy!  After I played this game I still was pretty happy!  Though I may have punched my table in anger as well.

One Blimp to Rule them all!

Steel Empire came out early 1992 for Sega Genesis and has since seen several re-releases such as for Gameboy Advanced, Nintendo 3DS and even Steam. Created by Hot.B which at the time allegedly was a one man studio, and published by Flying Edge in the west, this game is a quite overlooked gem that still has a pretty loyal fanbase.  Steel Empire was published in Europe under the name Empire of Steel which from what I have seen has also a few minor colour variations when it comes to enemies.  Though that might be my imagination! This review is based on my own playthrough of Empire of Steel as well as a Let’s play of the American version of the game. I did this to get some insight in how to play this game, as I wanted to see as much content of the game as possible without having to study patterns for days on end. 

In this game you play a talented but nameless pilot of the Silverhead Empire in the age of 18XX which might tell a story about an alternate course of events… OR  is set more than 1800 years in the future where all resources have depleted. Sources are contradicting each other on that. The world is fully dependent on the power of steam.. except  for your Silverhead Empire which even has the power of coldfusion.  However you live an isolated life (Wakanda Forever) in the antarctic.  The rest of the world is dominated by the evil Sauron (yes.. that’s his official name)  who has vast armies as he marches on the Silverhead army to obtain their ultimate weapon, the Imamio Thunder.. also known as “The Lightning Bomb”. If Sauron gets his hand on this weapon he will surely dominate the world.. so you can board a tiny plane or a tiny blimp to stop him! But it will take you seven stages to do so. Now I must admit Sauron is the Japanese name of the guy.. because it kind of brought associations with them.. but let’s be honest.. I rather say I took lord Sauron down with a Blimp.. wouldn’t you?!  Plus calling him Styron in Europe and the USA is like having two Richards in the group.. so you call one of them Dick.. It’s still short for Richard.

Red Hot Action

This game, for the most part,  plays like a horizontal space shooter like Gradius, Pariodius and of course Chou Aniki (Something Something) plus like one third of the games on Action 52.  It does follow some classical genre tropes like harsh difficulty,  near bullet hell gameplay and upgrading your weapons and obtaining limited screen clearing attacks.  If you played Gradius or R-Type you know what to expect here!  Tiny ships about your size that blow up in a single hit on your way to a boss.. and then a boss that is like 1000x times your size and shoots from every of its many openings.  With spaceships this always kind of made sense to me.. you know.. there are always several classes of ships .. gradius is Just a story about an X-wing taking down dreadnoughts.  With the Steel Empire however.. everything is steampunk flavoured so we get a Blimp that is ..”regular  sprite sized”   fighting a train.. that doesn’t even fit in the screen. Not even half!   So  this is a train that is roughly three times high as a blimp.. and 40 x as long.. if not more!   That is one big train! But I kind of imagine it is just one really tiny blimp! Which is just a guy sitting in it.. and that’s all the space he has! Held afloat by some hydrogen just!. I always chuckle imagining that.

Where this game differs a bit from its peers is that you can shoot to the front and back. While Silver Surfer on NES also has this function for example this game  uses the Sega’s three button system to make it feel a lot more natural and a lot more effective.  We have one button to shoot forward, one to shoot backwards and one to release a screen clearing Lighting Bomb should we have them.  The arrows control which direction you go.. and that is all she wrote gameplay wise.. .or is it?! Steel Empire, like most other games, relies on killing enemies to drop weapon upgrades. However in this game it’s not just weapon upgrades. It’s an experience! By gathering 3  experience tokens your ship levels up, which might make weapons more powerful, it might make it a bit faster or it might give it more health. What is even cooler.. dying does not affect our weapon level (as long as you don’t play it on the GBA and for the love of all that is sacred .. do NOT play this on GBA). So as long as you have lives left.. you may be better equipped to fight the boss next time.. because you can level up.  Each of the seven stages is divided in two sections. At the end of section A you always fight a midboss and at the end of section B you fight the final boss of that stage.

Empire of Steel as I should call it has a fairly strong narrative. EAch is delivered through a flickering cutscene that looks as if you are watching one of those old war time movies. Maybe even before.. The missions you get are quite diverse and fun, with some stages more dependent on your fighting skills while others rely more on your flying skills.  As a rule use the blimp for the odd numbered stages which are more combat focussed and the plane for the even numbered stages. This isn’t a hardset rule and you can play this game as you like.. but it seems to work out the best. For example Stage 1 is a straight up clone of regular R-Type gameplay.. where you face a train at the end, while stage 2 is flying through a collapsing cave at high speeds. Stage 3 has you assault an enemy base.. while in Stage 4 you take on a flying fortress.. that means you have to maneuver in a lot of tight corners.  Stage 7 feels more like a double Boss Rush in space.. that’s right! In this game you do go into space.. and you can be a BLIMP in space! Just for that alone this game is worth playing! The action is fun and the patterns are challenging as so cheers to Hot.B

Red Hot Air

Unfortunately this game also falls in a LOT of pitfalls of the genre, which.. if you like this type of games may or may not be a problem to you. It happens in almost every single game in the genre.. so I can’t really blame it for doing the same.. but some things are quite annoying. The most obvious would be the bosses. While you face seven stages you expect to fight seven bosses.. and seven minibosses.. but in reality you face either more or less depending on how you look at this.  In stage one you fight a train as a final boss, and on stage 5 your fight another train.. sprite swapped.. with only slightly different attack patterns.. when I say slightly different attack patterns I mean it shouts either bigger pellets or faster .. or both..  In stage three and six or  you fight the same boss as well.. though one time the ship is green the other time it’s red!  To make it more annoying.. the second time you face it.. you don’t have to kill it once but you have to kill it twice.. and as such the game really feels padded out for gameplay time in places.. which isn’t needed because this game is kind of too long as it is. I would have preferred five stages with more diverse bosses. The minibosses also get repeated so in the end we only effectively fight 6 ish enemies in a grant total of 14 fights.  

However like I said that is super common, what is less common is the way boss fights work, which makes them both unique .. but also a bit weak at times.  Though this mostly applies to sub bosses. They work by having several hitboxes and you need to destroy them all. Which is fine.. it really makes utilizing the shooting back and forth function more viable and fun.  The issue however is that these bosses  most of the time don’t fit the screen and you are moved from front to back  at regular intervals.  Your aircraft can not move the edge of the screen that happens based on time… so say you are fighting a battlecruiser and have destroyed everything in the front.. you can only start moving to the back when the screen wants you too.. and if you don’t go fast enough from there it will send you back to the front again where you might not have anything left to destroy.. it basically just lowers your guard  and allows the game to sneak in a few cheap hits by killing your attention. One enemy is super frustrating because he can only be hit by your secondary weapon as you can never shoot straight down or up..so some fights can get a bit tedious.

This doesn’t really ruin the space shooty fun.. but does have a chance to ruin your fun is the continue system. You get relatively few continues and will never EVER be able to make it to the end in a single playthrough. Using all your continues gives you a game over and sends you back to the beginning. Classic arcade rules and another way to pad out time. There is however a level select code.. which unfortunately is useless.  If you need to start at stage 5, 6 or 7 again using level select codes brings your weapon power back to level 1 .. with that amount of health  and fire power there is no way to beat the game.. so the cheat code is pretty useless.. unless you also cheat in weapon upgrades.. and that requires a second genesis controller..which you won’t always have laying about playing single player games.  So cheating to skip levels.. doesn’t do anything. This is kind of annoying considering that some strategies you might not discover on your first playthrough because the game can change its own rules. For example in the final battle there are asteroids on the battlefield which just exist to hinder you.. the boss can shoot right through them.. however in his final phase he gets a huge powered solar sail and fire’s screen filling  fire eye at you.. wait how ISN”T this sauron?  The only way to stay safe is to hide behind the asteroids.. which goes against all previous rules so you will never guess it first try and will gameover here.

Solid as Steel

Like I said most of these things are gripes that come with the entire genre so I don’t think it is completely fair for me to judge the game on those.. it’s just elements of why I like  vertical space shooters a bit more.. They tend to be a tad more straightforward.  Stage 6 of this game however is super frustrating. You decent underground  dodging sky forts down in a small way. you have to blow up bridges fast enough or know   how a fort looks .. to dodge it properly.. thuus you need to have played it before.. When I game overed in this stage I nearly quit out of anger.. and I punched my table.. yet after taking a few breaths I realised I was having fun and I wanted to try again. That is where this game really shines. It is not fair, it is not easy and it is designed to make you at least fail one.. perhaps even twice. Yet that is how these things work.. it’s like a crane game where you push that Plushies closer and closer to the edge.. you can’t stop investing in it. 

So now that I decided not to weigh it’s genre errors against it .. is there anything left to critique ?  Yes there is! The music is incredibly inconsistent! Some tracks are absolute zingers and remind me of the classic Sega tracks while others are really bad and lack that Sega.. Grayish sound. With Gray sound I mean that metally.. industrial sound that Sega has compared to Nintendo.. if Nintendo makes a track for say .. F-Zero it would sound Blue.. Red and Potentially Gold.. If Sega would do it it would be Brown/Copper, Silver/Grey and Navy. That’s how it is supposed to be.. but here.. we get way to tranquil music.. almost pastel colour like at times which do not fit this game at all. There are a few very good tracks in the game that sound Sega.. but in a Steampunk game it should have been more.

Weirdly one of the biggest issues the game has.. to me kind of became a strength. This game has a lot of lag/slowdown when a lot of stuff is being shot at you. But because of the difficulty I welcomed it.. it allowed me to skillfully dodge these shots as the controller reacts perfectly in unison with the lag.. as it almost was a form of Bullet time. It wasn’t but trough this lag I could learn so many patterns.  There is a lot of stuff happening on screen.. but in a way we get at least a bit of time to analyse what is happening here!. The gameplay is simple enough and the sea of bullets is dense enough to look impressive but never as big to cause dispair.. due to the slowdown I kind of ended up feeling like a major badass perfectly steering trough.. even when the game did not lag as much those earlier moments training with it made me just so much better. This is finally a horizontal shooter I can beat, and it is one with a unique setting and nice mission structure too. 

The game has a lot of issues.. but it is also a game that keeps being fun despite of its issues and that is what makes a good game, at least in the retro department. Is it a classic? No.. but if you want a Steampunk game for an evening you can do a lot worse than this!  It’s charming to be a Zeppelin that takes down huge trains!  It has a unique and fun presentation, and the blimp is just cute! Especially in the later stages when everything is bigger than you.. but you have leveled up so much that you can decimate the screen easily. It’s super weird yet it’s also super iconic  and this retro game walks a good line between unique enough and classic enough to be fun in this day and age! A very solid game..maybe not the way Scott calls his games solid.. but 7 out of 10 solid!

Pinkie ignores the Master Race: My Top 5 Video Game Consoles

With a subpar laptop and a very big lack of competitive spirit .. PC gaming is oftenly not my thing! I use it for point and Click Adventures and I do enjoy some retro platformers on the medium but overall I must say I have always been more of a console and handheld girl! There is just something a bit more magical about these devices for me! They have a charm…but which ones are my favourites?! I see no way this can be taken the wrong way so here is my console top 5.

Console #5: Gamecube

The gamecube was a bit of an odd duck when it came out. It had less power than it’s rivals and it was so oddly shaped.  With Luigi’s Mansion being the only “name worthy”  Launch TItle Nintendo had to back it up.  Sure there was a new Wave Racer and Doshin the Giant but it would take this machine a while to get some steam. Yet what we did not know was how good Eternal Darkness was, we did not know how good this machine would end up being.  Yet the game-console that   featured a miniature disc to play it’s game had very poor third party support.  Almost all hits , with the exception of a very VERY few were all First Party titles.  Super Smash Bros on the Gamecube is hailed as THE Best version of the game.  The Wind Waker was amazing and many gamers have fond memories of Paper Mario and The Thousand year door.  I am STILL waiting for a sequel to the amazing F-Zero GX! Mario Kart Double Dash was a bright pinnacle in the series and nowadays most of us know what a Pikmin is!

Yet no one really played the Gamecube ports of Call of Duty, Prince of Persia or Fifa. We had Super Mario Super Strikers instead!  Resident Evil 4 , for a long time was a gamecube exclusive and it was amazing but if I had to think of a third party top 5.. I would struggle.  So it was a very static console.. that did offer us some amazing and innovative experiences.. such like Four Swords adventures .. by linking our handhelds to our console! It had two very nice Pokémon titles as well in the form of Pokémon Colosseum and Pokemon XD Gale of Darkness.. in these days the XD is kind of unfortunate but back then we did not juste that emoji yet! It was all about that 🙂  on MSN! The worst thing about the console.. and this is a genuine pet peeve of mine was the fact that it was really hard to get controllers if you did not have the purple variant!  I had to buy a black one back in the day because all the purple ones were sold out.. and I ended up with four different colours of controller.. I don’t like that clowney look! It as a console that had too many quirks but strictly based on its library it would easily be a few places higher.

Console #4: Playstation 2

The PlayStation 2 is the only PlayStation I ever liked. I prefered the N64’s soft but grey look over the edgy but more crisp graphics of the original PlayStation, I did not like Crash Bandicoot’s  jumping into the depth of the platforms.. I lacked the feedback that Mario 64 gave me!   Spyro I liked better.. but the collectables were a bit generic and lacked that level of satisfaction Mario’s one up sounds give you, or Donkey Kong’s soundtrack bestows upon you.  I missed out on LSD-Dream Emulator and the amazing Bubsy 3D but overall I never missed the Playstation. PS2 However, I did it right for me! The controls felt more robust, I liked the graphics a lot better and it had better platforming heroes in the form of Jak and Daxter and  Ratchet and Clank.  While I do not dislike Spyro these had that flavour I was looking for.  It also had the nicest controller and a very solid memory card. My gamecube ones kept breaking!

Playstation 2 had Final Fantasy X.. the last Final Fantasy game that I liked (excluding a realm Reborn) ..a game I have never finished.. not because I could not but because I refused. It also had the best Dragon Quest game off all time! In the form of the 8th installment. The cursed King. I really love that one! Yu-Gi-Oh Duelist of the Roses came out on that as well and I had way too much fun with that game.. even if it’s not all that good! There was this “ease” to Playstation 2 games, that kind of felt it was an evolution in some ways of  Nintendo.. say if Nintendo was a Pikachu, PlayStation 2 was it’s Raichu.. everything worked just that slight bit better over there.. I do like Pikachu over Raichu most of the  time in terms of design, cuteness and how Iconic it is .but Raichu just performs better. It became my defacto game for jRPGs and more mature platformers. I would play it until years after its expiration date.

Console #3: Xbox 360

When the next generation came along however I jumped off the PlayStation bandwagon. Xbox would get Oblivion Sooner, Xbox 360 got Kameo , elements of Power.. a collectable creature adventure Hybrid that really felt like a unique title and one I have always deeply enjoyed. This is the age where I did not really see a benefit in having a very specific console ..besides Nintendo for its titles.. because PlayStation and XBox became a bit more generic to me. If preferred Halo vastly over Killzone and since Microsoft now owned Rare .. I preferred that studio over Naughty Dog so  I was pretty confident about my choice.. and while I never got my amazing platformers on the system I never regretted it and to this day it is the console I own most games on. With well over 80 games.. this kind of was my STEAM. Just.. a bit more space consuming and not holding it’s value as much.


I got the red ring of death but I neatly got it replaced so while maybe not as durable I really liked it better in almost every department. I like a white Console over a black one.. I like the flat surface so I can put more stuff on it.. over the weird rounded one of the PS3. I like the controller better and I certain as heck preferred Xbox live over Playstation online. I still feel the difference between a PS3and a Xbox 360 is almost neglectable but Xbox had more exclusive features I liked. Fable, Alan Wake, Halo, Gears of War. Back in the day I also emulated a lot of SNES because and the Xbox 360 Wired USB was by then the best you can get. I could combine both my gaming passions with this device! Plus it was very fun to annoy my friends in Soul Calibur by playing Yoda! Darth Vader wasn’t nearly as broken and not nearly as fun! I never liked Kingdom Hearts..which to me is the stand out reason to buy a PS3. So since I did not feel that compulsion the 360 became my mass gaming device! .. it did help that it had actual video games unlike the Nintendo Wii…which is mostly a pile of shovelware with a few impressive tech demo’s.

Console #2: Nintendo Switch

Number 1 and number 2 are miles apart in terms of favouritism from the rest. I genuinely think the Switch is one of the best consoles of all times, and the handheld  to full on console format this device follows makes it unsurpassable.  During the N64 era I considered.. should I get a playstation.. There are some cool license games on there. During the next generation I owned all the consoles save for the Dreamcast.. but PS2, Gamecube and the OG Xbox I all played.  I always felt a call to the other consoles.. but not this generation. I have no pull yet towards the PS5 and the Series X..The Switch is all I need. It has the games I like more.. by factor a lot, it can be used as a handheld AND a console and it is more fun to play couch co-op. I do not care about the prettiest graphics, I do not care about the competitive online scene. I am here for the most complete and adorable singleplayer The Switch is a unique thing, with unique games and there is no real substitute. Spider-Man Miles Morales is just a very much shorter.. not even a full game.. version of that Other Spiderman game I own. I have A Call of Duty and I don’t like the 2000 extra mechanics they added in later on. Mario Odyssey though is a completely different game from Galaxy and I can play it in a different way. Pokémon might not be that different from previous generations yet the only real other way I get to play that is by playing clone games.

I like the menus on Switch , they are super easy.. I love that I can get Pink Joycons for it (even though I don’t have them because I just moved and they are super expensive)   I love that I see it played everywhere around me and it’s not a “I am the biggest COD player” kind of culture. It’s .. “hey do you want to visit my island” .. “Hi do you want to trade this Pokémon”.. There is no T-bagging there not that drive to over-achieve. Sure I occasionally play Super Mario 35..but it’s more a “how long can I last” kind of thing rather than.. let’s humiliate my opponents. There is no flexing like “prestige” or golden Pokéballs   if you win a lot in Pokémon online. Mario Party might kill friendships… which can be hilarious but it all feels so much less as measuring your online cyber fallus..  than I get from the other two.  It does it’s own little thing and because of it is such a sexy little beast.

My favourite Console: SNES

Little video game consoles have actually shaped me as a person, but I do think the SNES had an amazing impact on me as an individual. Arguably the NES did as well but I was a much more passive participant in that one. I just got games for the NES from my parents and played them and sure Ducktales had a big impact and I fell in love with Mario 3, Megaman 2  made me me a better gamer and all that.. but it all was stuff that was handed to me.  On the SNES I chose my games. I actively influenced what I wanted to play.  I was much more busy with solving problems in Goof Troop, or finding a way to pass that Moose chase level in Micky Mania then I had ever been with beating Rocksteady  in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2.. the Arcade Game. Getting my SNES is the point where I start to remember my entire life..  my conscious memories.. it is also in the time I started to slowly lose friends and be bullied. So in a way this console became my safe haven.. my escape from my bad reality!

The games on the system are amazing. Genesis Does what Nintendon’t .. oh Bitcharizard please. The music on SNES was so more Vibrant.. the first Sonic game.. isn’t all that good meanwhile SNES had Super Mario World.. which was amazing.  Star Fox showed us what was possible on a console and showed us we could move beyond 2d.  Link to the Past is still one of the best Zelda games ever. Maybe it even IS the best Zelda game ever.. it’s a close one for me between that one and Ocarina.  When we get Retro Games these days.. they are almost all modeled after what they would have been on SNES. I still love the heck out of that classic controller and holds the best RPGs that ever released.  Final Fantasy VI (Or III)  Chrono Trigger, Lufia II  and Tales of Phantasia. It had some pretty sweet Sailor Moon games (though not available here) and other anime games. It had the Donkey Kong Games which to this day are some of my favourite games of all times.. and it let me feel pride for the first time in a long time. I might not be able to run properly.. I might suck a sports.. but I was the first in class to kill K.Rool!  I just want a different direction. On the SNES I became a geek and laid the foundation for the weird amalgamation I am today and that makes it my favourite console! SNES Is part of my soul!.. The european version.. not the american version!

And those are my favourite game consoles! I would have liked to bring you a review of a game instead but my laptop crashed and I lost all my progress in Deponia as I had to restore my laptop to factory defaults being unable to complete it! So this had to make due instead! If you want to help me get a pc instead of a Laptop .. this is my newest Kofi Project so if you want to convince me of the power of such a thing.. please consider some Kofi support! Or just be a pal and leave your favourite console in the comments below!

Top 5: Pokémon I Forget Exist

Now I bet this is a list very little people are waiting for! The top five Pokémon I keep forgetting are a thing! So I bet for most of you this will be a list of “these are pokémon?” But I have been recently been replaying Pokémon Reborn and hunting for shinies. Thus I encounter many pokémon and since the game kind of starts handing you Never Used tier pokémon at the start, I encounter a lot of these. There are a few rules in this list such as one entry per evolution line.. because obviously if I forgot one stage exists I barely know the other as well.

Forgotten Pokémon Number 5: Buizel

This is the strangest case of a pokémon I keep forgetting about.  Each time I see the sea weasel pokémon or it’s evolution it barely registers with me. Even though I really like the design of a weasel with flotation devices. I recently caught a shiny one in Pokémon Reborn and I was like… oh yeah that’s a pokemon!. When it was first released in Pokémon go (and that’s not even that long ago) I had the same experience. There is something so forgettable to me about this pokémon that It faded away in relevance within months. Which isn’t even the weirdest thing.

Buizel and it’s evolution Floatzel formed a important part of my playthrough of Pokémon  Pearl. It was of my core squad members. I know it was there… but that is all I can remember about it.  I know I started with Piplup that I nicknamed Scottie Pippin, I also had a Shinx/Luxio/Luxray that I named Star Boy. Even though I already had a water pokémon I know Floatzel came with me… but I can’t remember what it did, where I caught it, what I nicknamed it. It definitely existed but still I have no memories of it. I actively used it and was charmed by it’s design so much I kept it even with type redundancy.. yet in my mind there is nothing.

This  is very uncharacteristic for me. I know what table at which restaurant I sat in 27 years ago, I knew what I ordered and where it was on the menu… and yet a Pokémon that I carried with me for an entire game… I think…. is one of the pokémon that keeps slipping my mind. Even the Floatzel I have in Reborn I like forgot the next day! Oh right I have a Floatzel now?!

Forgotten Pokémon Number 4: Chingling

Another Pokémon that Reborn remembered me it existed. I think the shiny one in reborn is the first one I ever bought catching. It’s evolution Chimecho outdated it but I didn’t even know that. I  have ONE memory of Chimecho and that is seeing it in the anime going Chim-Chow.. and I was like.. that’s how you say it?! And it’s not! It’s pronounced as Chime and Echo strung together… so why do I remember this?! I can’t even find the episode anymore?! It’s baby form.. even more forgettable. It’s one of those breed with incense things and since Gen IV was a loaned game to me.. I never got into finding them all.

Chingling is a bell with a ribbon and a psychic type. It’s only known feat to me is that it appears on both this list and the next pokémon top five I have planned. It’s pokédex entries are bland and even when evolved it knows little good combat moves. I have known zero people who used Chingling or Chimecho and I have watched Pokémon Free for all Roulettes for years now (where people battle with randomly rolled pokémon)  and I don’t think I ever saw a chingling or Chimecho there. I can recognise it when a picture is shown to me, but it one of the ones that fils me with the greatest doubt.

Forgotten Pokemon Number 3: The Spiky Eared Pichu

Now it might be a bit unfair to put a special event pokémon on here…but  I know all the other ones!? In fact if a pokémon is more unique and rare should we not be able to remember it more?! It’s even an event in my favorite pokémon game! So I would count among those mystical pokémon or movie releases and the likes but I know all of those. For this list I was scrolling true a list of all the types to make sure there aren’t pokémon I forget.. you know kinda needed for this type of list. When I passed this one I knew it had to be included.

I know all the cosplay forms of Pikachu, I know all it’s cap forms and in general I am fairly up to date with  the line but to hear there is a special form.. was new to me… though I remember knowing it before. Like when I saw “Spikey Haired Pikachu” I was like “THats a thing?” then when I read how you are supposed to take the Pikachu Coloured Pichu (which I do remember.. although vaguely.. on account of lame it’s name is) to Ilex shrine I was like… wait I do know this! I also remember that Pichu..except I don’t.

The Spikey Eared Pichu can not be traded outside Heart Gold Games (not sure if that is fixed now or not) It can not evolve and so it’s not really anything you can do anything with. It isn’t even that special looking. It just has three little spikes and can only be female.  I often wonder why all those special pikachu forms exist , however when I am confronted with this Pichu.. I only wonder.. did It really exist?

Forgotten Pokémon Number 2: Deerling

Now I am fairly alone on this but I do not mind if Pokémon are depicted as objects. People really hate Vanilluxe and Klefki  and I really like them myself. I think it is cute that monsters can also take on the shape of objects and it helps distinguish them. What I dislike more is pokémon that are “just a <blank>” with the exception of Wooloo.. man do I love Wooloo. But you know the kind.. pictures of animals and you wonder.. am I looking at a pokémon or at an actual animal. Examples are Finneon, Sentret, Herdier, Pidove and Deerling. 

Now Deerling can be Pink and Green but also a orange or brown depending on what season you catch it in. If you get a fall or winter deerling it’s kinda like Bambi with a Ribbon. It is the only pokémon I keep forgetting it’s typing off.. and it has a unique typing! Why did fire hit me super effectively?! Oh wait it is a grass type. Unless you catch the green spring form.. it doesn’t feel like a grass type and if I use the green form.. I keep forgetting it’s a normal type.

There is something so aggressively forgettable about this pokémon to me that I can’t even  remember it while I use it. While Sawsbuck makes an occasional appearance in Pokémon Showdown I keep thinking it’s like an alternate evolution for Skiddo for some reason (probably because  they use the green one). The fact that I forget one of the pokémon that can be pink is speaking volumes on how forgettable this is to me. Me not remembering a pink pokémon?! There aren’t even that many deer pokémon, with other than them just Stantler being there and Xerneas of course. It’s moveset is very similar to Gogoats and it arguably might be better because it gets a boost on Normal Attacks so it deserves some love. Unfortunatly by the time that I post this I probably will already have forgotten it.

Forgotten Pokémon Number 1: Glameow

In the entire pokémon library there is only one pokémon  whose name I keep forgetting. Whose existence is only know to me because I casually like the evolution..thinking it is the evolution to Purrloin. A Pokémon I very much loved until it began to stand up straight.  Glameow evolves into Purugly, which sounds like it could come from the third loveliest cat pokémon in the game. With some slight recolouring I think the evolution would be better than Liepard as well. Glameow however.. means nothing to me. 

It’like a diva cat with a springy tail. The springy tail have seen on spoink already, the diva behaviour works better on Snivy, Misdreavus even Kirlia and Gardevoir to an extent.  It feels a bit like the Gen IV’s rendition Spearow to Pidgey.. this feels like edgier counterpart to Bidoof. At least bidoof became a meme. I love my bidoof pokemon cards. I am not even sure if Glameow cards exist. It doesn’t help that they made it grey. I even tried to imagine it’s design after looking at it and I still remember it wrong. I remember it with make up in the face and facing the other way around.. so my retention span for this pokemon is less than 15 minutes.

Maybe it is because I am not a cat person, I really like using Normal types.. so that can’t be it! This is the only pokemon whose name I keep forgetting. I keep forgetting what generation it is from and I know nothing about it’s moveset. It’s pokedex entry tells us how it plans to hook it’s claws in it’s trainers nose if it isn’t fed.. but it hides these fantasies so it’s a meanie bo beanie as well! It’s also described that when it is happy it purrs. So even the pokédex doesn’t really know anything about it! It literally just does stuff a normal cat can! Oh it also stares at an enemy before clawing at it… just like a cat and it’s prey again.Which is kind of a relief.. I haven’t been mean to a pokémon.. just to a cat..but less real.

Honorable Mentions

Finneon and Lumineon are pokémon people easily forget but I really like them. Mostly for their cries because state wise they are quite forgettable indeed. I do love both their designs though and I feel like they are a welcome addition to the plentiful fish pokémon the game has.  Clamperl is another pokémon that is quite forgettable due to it only existing under water on diving spots, and the strange methods to evolve it.

Yet Clamperl with Shell Smash a move it legally learns has the potential to have one of the highest attack stats possible in the game, which makes it memorable at least. Gorebyss wears Ariels Bra and it has slightly become a meme for that and Huntail.. is an okay-ish pokémon! THat honestly could have made this list but he is something I just don’t actively remember than something I forget.

What are some pokémon you keep forgetting?! Did you remember the pokémon on my personal list?  I have a feeling lots of people will mention Audino..but I have a weak spot for that one. Let me know in the comments!
Audino might feature in the next top 5 next to chingling.. so maybe you can already take a guess what we will be talking about next time?! Impress me!

XO
Pinkie