Belated Shameless Gaming Month 2012 Final Roundup

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So, shameless gaming month for 2012 has well and truly gone. The question for me, though, is how did I go in the end?

Overall I think I did well, and certainly a lot better than last year! I managed to complete Explodemon, platinum/100% Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection, finished Phantasy Star 2 on the Sega Ages 2500 release in Easy mode and had a crack at finishing Monster World 4 on the PS3. I ended up getting a quarter of the way through the latter before the end of the month, so unfortunately I didn’t manage to finish everything in July, but I did 100% Monster World 4 by the end of the first week in August, so I think that’s pretty good by my standards ๐Ÿ™‚

Not sure what I’ll be working on next year, but I found this was a great excuse to funnel my time into some gaming and get me back into the groove of making time to play games, rather than just write about them ๐Ÿ™‚

Shameless Gaming Month, July 2012 โ€“ update 3

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Time for more updates as we get closer to the end of the month!

I managed to finish Phantasy Star 2 and at the same time exceeded my original grind on the game that saw me hitting level 35 or 36 with Rolf (to get Megid!) and topping out there. The promised hyperbolic post is coming with lots of happy snaps, but I’ll be getting onto writing it up in August.

In terms of the Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection, I got my platinum for it last night, so I managed to 100% it which is what I was aiming for! There were some tricky ones in there (Columns and Dr Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine in particular caused some strife, the former of which is surprising because I used to be really good at it when I was a kid), but I managed to get it done. It’s such a shame that the emulation on the collection was so rough, but then again the price of entry was super-cheap, so it’s probably not worth complaining too much about now that Sega has started using M2 as their emulation developer.

… which leaves Monster World 4 – so I’m going to finish up this post so I can go and sink some time into it and see how far I can get before the month ends in a few days!

Shameless Gaming Month, July 2012 โ€“ update 2

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So, time for another update!

I haven’t spent much time hammering away at Monster World 4 or the Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection – I have been sinking all my gaming time into Phantasy Star 2 though, and it is proving to be an unbelievable experience going back and playing this amazing, seminal JRPG from my childhood. For those who have played through the game, I’ve just finished the dungeons on Dezo and am about to pick up the Neisword to grind my party levels up a bit on Noah, then it’ll be time to take a crack at the double-whammy of end game bosses. I reckon I’ll be able to tidy it up this week, which then leaves a couple of weeks to get stuck into the other titles I’ve picked out for this month.

I’ve actually been documenting my playthrough of Phantasy Star 2 in photos as I’ve played through important plot points or found other bit of trivia, including some hand-written notes by my brother and I had written in the official Phantasy Star 2 hint book that came with our original copy of the game on the SMD back in 1993. I have some ideas on a piece I want to write on the experience for the blog, so be prepared for a lengthy post about reliving one of the pivotal points in my gaming history. I promise it will include hyperbolic overtones (like “pivotal”, “juxtaposition” and “ahead of its time”), because any regular reader of Retro Otaku has probably got the hint that I am prone to suffering the occasional moment of hyperbolic-induced hysteria over something trivial ๐Ÿ™‚

Shameless Gaming Month, July 2012 – update

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In an amazing turn of events, I finished off Explodemon this week as part of Shameless Gaming Month ๐Ÿ˜€

While the last boss was cheap and mean, it was a delightful end to an otherwise excellent retro-inspired platformer. The razor-sharp 1080p goodness, unbelievable chiptune-inspired soundtrack and variety of homages to Capcom, Konami and Treasure platformers (as well as a bit of Yoshi’s Island in there too!) made it worth the collective headbutt on the final encounter.

I’ve talked about the game previously, but dug up a couple of interesting bits on the game others might find interesting – there’s an amazing blow-by-blow account of the game’s development at one bit beyond, and an excellent interview and review at PlayStationLifeStyle.net. Oh, and there’s also the official website too.

Shamless Gaming Month, July 2012

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Well, Kotaku have started it again, so let’s play Shameless Gaming Month for July 2012. Last year I put in a wussy effort by finishing Wonder Boy in Monster World on the Mega Drive, so for this year I’m going to try to be a bit more ambitious.

How ambitious? This ambitious:

  • Finally finish (the amazing) Explodemon on the PS3,
  • In honour of last year’s entry, finish the recently released Monster World IV on PS3 (and as an aside, expect a review for the Sega Vintage Collection releases soon)
  • Finally get all the trophies on the Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection (aka Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection for those in the US), and
  • Play through Phantasy Star 2 in Easy Mode on the Sega Ages Phantasy Star Collection on the PS2.

๐Ÿ™‚

Admittedly I put the last point on the to-do list back in February, and I’m not sure if I’ll have the stamina to trophy my way through the Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection given how terrible the emulation is, especially compared to M2’s recent (and benchmark-setting) efforts for the Sega Vintage Collection releases.

And as an aside, apologies for the brief hiatus of the blog – June was absolutely mad between commitments at work and home, but things have started settling down again, which is nice ๐Ÿ™‚