Posts Tagged ‘3D’

21 Jul

DK 64 in a Resurgent DK World

Posted by vagrantesque in Games, N64, Switch, Switch 2. Tagged: , , , , , , , .

I don’t know if this small-yet-immutable fact blows your mind like it did mine, but last week marked one year since the release of Donkey Kong Bananza on the Nintendo Switch 2. Oh, how much the videogame industry has changed in just twelve short months…

Bananza was once a pipe dream. Eleven years ago, when I lost over a week to the surprise Virtual Console re-release of Donkey Kong 64 on the struggling Wii U, I had very little hope of glimpsing a properly three-dimensional DK game anywhere near the horizon. The critically-acclaimed and commercially-ignored DK Country: Tropical Freeze was barely a year old at the time, and insofar as the once-prolific Nintendo mascot had any future prospects, they appeared to be strictly 2D (Little did I know the Kong was about to endure a considerable major release drought worse than I could have imagined).

And so I latched onto that 2015 shadow-drop hard: the murky legal waters of Microsoft-owned Rareware development assets had long made the concept of a retro Rare release on a modern Nintendo platform seem like a pipe dream, and even the general concept of a sudden “out-now” release was still pretty new to the videogame space. It was an exhilarating dive. I came out the other side of a 20-hour play time blur and landed at my PC, eager to write about the game from the angle of exploring its most widely-accepted criticisms.

At the time, the makings of a wave of nostalgia-powered “3D collect-a-thon” revivals were gathering momentum within the indie scene, and so it felt apt to ask “Did DK 64 Kill the 3D Collect-a-thon Platformer?” The short answer was, as you might expect, no; the game’s occasionally over-ambitious design shortcomings merely made it an excellent scapegoat during a time of turbulent transformation in the industry.

Yet there was a fair amount left unsaid about the game in that article, and much more has changed for Nintendo’s oldest mascot in the years since. We have just witnessed the second official re-release of the game on the Nintendo Switch / Switch 2 just over a month ago, and within the context of the mid-2020s, this curious former black sheep of both Rare’s platformer catalogue and Nintendo’s Kong plans suddenly seems like much less of an oddity. I’m also a decade older now, so there’s that too.

And so, for the second time this year, I have defied a core part of my personality by dropping all the 2026 games I’ve been trying to juggle in favour of a decades-old title I know extremely well, in the hope of gaining some new insights by experiencing it within a vastly different modern context. With Nintendo just weeks on from its second direct re-visitation of Starfox 64, and an even more significant third take on Ocarina of Time steadily approaching, I find myself revisiting a game to which I have already dedicated an entire article. I did not think I would be in this position, but life, much like Nintendo, will do weird shit.

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16 Apr

Why Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate is the Best One Yet

Posted by vagrantesque in 3DS, Games. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , .

This guest writing week begins with a returning blogger, the man who wrote that Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate beginner’s guide for this very site a couple of years ago. Returning to one of his favourite topics, its ZaonTheFirst.

—Written by ZaonTheFirst—

—Edited/formatted by Vagrantesque—

So I am back everyone, and I have got another Monster Hunter post for you all! It has been just over a month since the release of Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, and let me tell you, it is by far, my favourite Monster Hunter game in the series to date. Honestly, I am glad Capcom have managed to release a game worthy of taking the title of “The best Monster Hunter game” from its previous, long-time holder, Monster Hunter Freedom Unite on the PSP. These are just some of my thoughts on MH4U as a whole.
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1. Online multiplayer is always fantastic

I cannot stress how important online multiplayer is for a game like this. I say this because the whole concept is that you get into a party of 2-4 hunters (or solo if you want) and strategically take down a gigantic, hard-hitting, and yet majestic-looking beast. It’s so good to see that MH4U has included multiplayer, as opposed to its previous instalment, which to be honest is essentially redundant at this point. Just having the ability to hunt with not just random people all over the world, but your friends as well (Shout outs to all you!) has made the overall gaming experience of MH4U a lot more fulfilling, and I’ve been a lot more motivated to stick with it. To put things into perspective,
– Hours on MH3U on 3DS – 27 hours.
– Hours on MH4U on 3DS – 386 hours and still going
Online multiplayer is the main reason for such a huge difference in time spent on each game. I really think it’s a crucial feature for a Monster Hunter game, so I am glad that they incorporated it into MH4U.

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15 Apr

Revisiting Donkey Kong 64: Did it Kill the 3D Collect-a-thon Platformer?

Posted by vagrantesque in Games, N64. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

 

At the beginning of this month, in its Nintendo Direct broadcast, Nintendo of Europe casually announced something I had been waiting for in forlorn hope ever since the original Wii hit the market – the (immediate) release of Donkey Kong 64 on the Wii U virtual console. I don’t know how, but Nintendo’s much-discussed rights conflict with famed British developer Rare that had previously prohibited the game’s re-release has now been sorted out, and you can download the famous ape’s 3D adventure if you so please for $13 AUD. So despite my ever-growing pile of other games to play, I blacked out somewhat that fateful day, and now I write this article having lost another 20 hours to what was once my first-ever home console videogame.

I downed King K.Rool just yesterday, in fact.

My sense of nostalgia may be strong with this one, but a lot has changed in 16 years, and the game isn’t quite as perfect as I may have remembered it. The game has quite a few flaws, actually. What’s more, over the last several years a new critical narrative has built up around the game, accusing it of killing the so-called “collect-a-thon” genre of 3D platformers (think Super Mario 64, Banjo Kazooie, Gex etc) with its needlessly over-the-top bounty of colour-coded things to collect. This line of thought has devolved for some into the act of labelling DK64 a bad game. Does it really deserve this moniker? As we appear to be on the cusp of a 3D collect-a-thon renaissance in gaming, with Conker’s Big Reunion beginning in a matter of days and the impending release of both Playtonic’s “Project Ukelele” and Gears for Breakfast’s A Hat in Time, now is as good a time as ever to try to answer that question.

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21 Mar

60 Changes in Zelda Majora’s Mask 3D From the N64 Original

Posted by vagrantesque in 3DS, Games, N64. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , .

I totally, completely underestimated how long it would take to write this. Blame Monster Hunter.

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So I finished The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D on 3DS a couple weeks back, and my oh my, it was quite an experience. This is a game I once called my favourite of all time, so I wanted to make sure I devoted the proper amount of time to revisiting the whole thing. After 36 hours of gameplay (according to the Activity Log app) I had completed the Bomber’s Notebook, collected all the heart pieces and beaten the final boss. As soon as the cartridge was out of my 3DS, what was the first thing that comes to mind about the game?

They sure did make a swag of changes to Majora’s Mask for this remake.

You see as it turns out, ever since Nintendo partnered with co-developer Grezzo to release the 3D remaster of Ocarina of Time in 2011, they were apparently working on this follow-up. Even as Zelda fans went back and forth on the idea that a remake of MM even existed, the developers were tweaking away, rebuilding the creepy, unique game piece by piece. But unlike with Ocarina of Time, which only received a sprinkling of non-visual changes, Eiji Aonuma and his team saw in Majora’s Mask a game with some issues, particularly with regards to a quest structure that may not have been friendly for the generation of gamers who missed out on the N64 original.

As a result, Majora’s Mask 3D is one of the most comprehensive remakes I’ve ever played. It’s still pretty much the same game, don’t get me wrong, but while playing I managed to jot down no less than sixty changes I think are worth mentioning, ranging from miniscule to massive, over the N64 original. And if you ask me, the vast majority of them are for the better. If you’ve played the game before and are tossing up whether to play it again in this new form, this list may help you decide on a purchase. If you’re new to MM, most of these probably won’t make any sense to you, and I may end up in spoiler territory. Regardless, here they are, in the rough order I discovered them.

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