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In order to prevent the market from being flooded with terrible video games (and make some money from 3rd parties), Nintendo came up with a lock-out chip called the 10NES on the original NES. Publishers would have to apply for a license in order to create games for the console. This is what that "Seal of Quality" meant, the game develops met the content requirements and paid a license fee. Tengen, a parent company of Atari, didn't really like the idea of paying a license fee. They managed to reverse engineer the 10NES chip and find a way to develop their own cartridges that would work on the NES. This is why some of the nintendo cartridges at your local video store were black instead of the usual grey (and didn't have that "seal of quality" thing).  It's also why we were able to play Atari's "Road Runner" on the NES, complete with a public domain soundtrack. And yes, Tengen was immediately sued after they pulled this off, resulting in many years of patent attorneys yelling at each other about video games. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYlpgH8Pdzk Wisdom Tree/Color Dreams also figured out a way around the 10NES lockout chip (by issuing a voltage spike to get around the lock, instead of reverse engineering the actual code). This is why those bible games you got from church events had so much trouble running on your NES. They also made a few non-bible games, like this one "Baby Boomer" where you used the Nintendo zapper to guide a crawling baby through the park, a graveyard, heaven, hell, and an abandoned mine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJqEWx9WtnY It's very terrible! But it did come in a neat powder blue cartridge 
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Aug 18, 2023 14:41
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| # ? May 26, 2024 22:50 |
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Ok, so I thought I knew about all of that, and kudos to you regardless for posting it, but I actually didn't know about the voltage spike.... Holy poo poo, that explains why, in one of the AVGN videos, he's reading a warning or specific instructions on how to get one of the bible games working. Huh.. Makes so much sense now.
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Aug 18, 2023 14:51
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Having to induce a voltage spike in your deck to bypass the corporate ice in order to run unauthorized religious software certainly sounds cyberpunk if you omit the NES part
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Aug 19, 2023 00:30
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Laughing my rear end off at the "Toobin'" game
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Aug 19, 2023 05:02
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Bogus Adventure posted:Laughing my rear end off at the "Toobin'" game This sounded real familiar and turns out I played this. Pretty sure it was arcade version and was fun. https://youtu.be/wnPNQ0ozsRk Watching it I think you had two buttons one to make either arm paddle.
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Aug 19, 2023 05:09
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Big rear end On Fire posted:This sounded real familiar and turns out I played this. Pretty sure it was arcade version and was fun. Oh poo poo, I played this before. And you're right, it was pretty fun. Lmao.
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Aug 19, 2023 05:20
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Bogus Adventure posted:Laughing my rear end off at the "Toobin'" game I had to think for a moment to realize you're not talking about a journalist or whatever jerkin' it on zoom.
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Aug 19, 2023 05:50
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Tarkus posted:I had to think for a moment to realize you're not talking about a journalist or whatever jerkin' it on zoom. That was part of the reason I was laughing. That would be a very different game.
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Aug 19, 2023 05:58
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Bogus Adventure posted:That was part of the reason I was laughing. That would be a very different game. One of those weird "try not to cum" games
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Aug 19, 2023 06:40
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bossy lady posted:One of those weird "try not to cum" games obligatory 
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Aug 19, 2023 07:03
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 An RPG so utterly bland and wonky that I think it fits here. The most interesting part is that it has 4 views/modes, all of which look and play entirely different from each other. I mean they clearly had no idea what they were doing, it's like 4 different bad games mashed into one incoherent mess.  This is birds eye view "town mode", where you have the standard Inn/Item/Weaponry/Church and the obligatory quest giver (a fetch and/or "kill the bad guy" quest) you have to seek out. Typical for 1989/1990, everybody walks in place and 90% of the dialogues are useless. Also your character looks like some blue haired beady eyed alien freak in a michelin man space suit for some reason.  This is POV "dungeon crawler mode". There are only three sceneries in the entire game: overworld woods (tree = wall), overworld mountain (orange column = wall), cave (grey column = wall). There are only a handful NPCs scattered around in this world, most of which are quest boss monsters in disguise. The only puzzle is the occasional "find the chest with the key to open the locked door/s" and you have to light a candle or lantern in the caves to see in the dark. The challenge is to not be bored out of your skull from slowly trodding through the endless samey looking mazes all the time.  This is slightly different birds eye view "battle mode", where you awkwardly whack a single group of monsters with your blue toy sword until they go poof, also this is the only time where you can use attack magic (and only a single one you have to equip beforehand). Hit detection is very wonky and you are fairly slowly tiptoeing around the place compared to the enemies, it's easy to take cheap hits and get overwhelmed (no hit recovery btw), especially by the later recolors. Only two attack spells are really worth using (boomerang air spell and the late game earthquake screen-clearer), the rest are pretty worthless.  This is side view "boss mode", where you awkwardly golf swing your blue toy sword at a quest monster until they go poof - CAN'T USE magic here. This is arguably the most frustrating part of the game, as your movement is even more limited (can't even turn left) and some of the bosses are very much capable of moving around all over the place and CAN USE magic projectiles. It's more a matter of luck and trial-and-error to win these battles, very easy to get 4-5 hit combo'd and therefore insta-gibbed by the flying demon here - again no hit recovery to help you out here. Story-wise it's the usual, chosen one travels the world to collect the magic things to get stronger and fight the big bad guy at the end. I got the game as a young'un who couldn't understand a single word and still managed to bullshit myself through the game by choosing YES most of the time, or by choosing NO when YES did not result in item get jingle/progression (tbf most RPGs at the time were that mindless). By the way, the titular "Sword of Vermilion" is a completely optional/missable weapon that you can only get from some obscure nonsense event where you have to spend all your money on one of three useless items from a scammer. When you return to the shop at the end of the game it turns out the scammer is actually a master swordsmith and created the ultimate sword from all the money you have spent (ok??). It's only barely stronger than the second best sword in the game, so missing out on it is really no big deal. The actual plot device are the 8 rings of good, which you are supposed to collect before fighting the necromancer king, who has the 8 rings of evil, the typical bland fantasy stuff. The game also has two notable bugs/oversights, one being an underflow glitch by equipping the cursed weapons/armor (effectively makes you invulnerable/OHKO any enemy) and the name entry music spazzing out after playing for 20 minutes or so (the music infinitely rises until the sound chip runs out of notes and tries to play back random trash data).
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Aug 19, 2023 12:29
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This boss looks sweet though. I wonder if it was made specifically for promo screenshots.
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Aug 19, 2023 14:15
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That looks like it sucks for sure but I'm stumped why the sword is blue if the game is the sword of vermilion. E- oh you get it later I'd bet 5 bucks they ran out of time or money to code magic use against the bosses so they just added in "can't use" and moved on
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Aug 19, 2023 14:24
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Internet Old One posted:
Yeah the visual designs of all the boss monsters are quite nice although they all move like cardboard cutouts, barely any animation in these sprites. And they too reappear several times as stronger recolors (which was the style at the time). Also the music is decent for an old game on the MD. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzJ_5FI1ZI4&list=PLE350DBB7638FC5D3 Big rear end On Fire posted:That looks like it sucks for sure but I'm stumped why the sword is blue if the game is the sword of vermilion. E- oh you get it later No the sword doesn't change colors, it's always blue lol 
Grab Im Moor fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Aug 19, 2023 |
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Aug 19, 2023 14:37
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I did a positive effort post about that game some years back, lol. Look, in my heart of hearts I know it's bad, but it was my first "big" RPG that I could actually play. I had played Dragon Warrior III and Final Fantasy I on NES but I was too young to know what was going on. I remember being blown away that it came with a hintbook. I loved flipping through it. I really liked the music and the "exploration". I remember the story bit with the poison and the scammer taking all of your cash. Pretty formative experience. I ended up searching for RPGs to play after that, and ran into much better ones. Thanks SoV, you were bad but somehow convinced me RPGs were rad.
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Aug 19, 2023 15:04
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Grab Im Moor posted:
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Aug 19, 2023 15:44
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Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. Get a load of this drivel: https://i.imgur.com/C6Jjp4e.mp4
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Aug 19, 2023 15:47
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TheHoosier posted:I did a positive effort post about that game some years back, lol. Look, in my heart of hearts I know it's bad, but it was my first "big" RPG that I could actually play. I had played Dragon Warrior III and Final Fantasy I on NES but I was too young to know what was going on.  yeah I get it. The "first one I played through" nostalgia factor is high for me too, despite its massive flaws it will always hold a special place in my heart. Clicking through the music and I'm like  all over again.The hint book was a great bonus, I think the only other game for MD that came bundled with one like that was Landstalker (which is a good game and I wish the remake didn't get cancelled).
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Aug 19, 2023 16:11
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. Lol the wyvern is throwing knives at him?
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Aug 19, 2023 16:33
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. That perspective would be cool for, like, moving companies of men around. But it's an odd choice for an RPG with flat battle arenas. I'm the big controller image that enemies can hide behind.
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Aug 19, 2023 17:33
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Did anyone mention the worst game of all time? Daikatana. I tried watching an LP and gave up after the first level.
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Aug 20, 2023 02:13
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It's actually insane just how much went into that game for how little came out.
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Aug 20, 2023 02:16
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. Wyverns? It's Y-Burns 
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Aug 20, 2023 04:28
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This might just be my personal experience with the game, but I'm going to toss Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete into this thread See that cover? Looks loving badass. It was a 4-disc PSX RPG that had animated cutscenes, and I was a naive moron who let his imagination run wild with what the game might be like.  I wasn't expecting Final Fantasy level game, but maybe something a little more advanced than whatever the gently caress this was:  Looked and played like a third-rate SNES game. Check out this cub scout-looking dude  This guy sucked rear end  This was a pretty good burn, though: 
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Aug 20, 2023 04:31
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Lunar and Lunar 2 were Sega CD games, that's why they felt like Sega CD games
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Aug 20, 2023 04:36
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Ever consider most all Sega CD games now are suffering from cd-rom rot? Unusable. Thank you, internet archive, for such gems to have later generations witness.
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Aug 20, 2023 04:42
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Hyrax Attack! posted:Lol the wyvern is throwing knives at him? https://i.imgur.com/CIY2EAd.mp4 
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Aug 20, 2023 16:08
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Outpost22 posted:Did anyone mention the worst game of all time? Daikatana. I tried watching an LP and gave up after the first level. Hilariously the GBC game is pretty Alright
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Aug 20, 2023 19:24
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. Jesus. Naughty Dog has come a long way since then.
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Aug 20, 2023 19:49
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Two farmers fistfight Doctor Doom on the astral plane.
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Aug 20, 2023 20:09
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Outpost22 posted:Did anyone mention the worst game of all time? Daikatana. I tried watching an LP and gave up after the first level. The later game of Daikatana could have been a middling-decent FPS of the time if it weren't for the companions, but instead the entire thing was bad when it came out and aged like dogshit in the bonemeal food era. A chalky, dusty, desiccated white dog turd.
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Aug 20, 2023 20:18
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. This looks rad as hell.
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Aug 20, 2023 21:32
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:Rings of Power for the Mega Drive offers an exceptionally poor RPG experience. I would bet 100 bucks this was an Amiga game first. If only because it looks like they stole the UI from Populous.
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Aug 20, 2023 21:35
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emSparkly posted:I would bet 100 bucks this was an Amiga game first. If only because it looks like they stole the UI from Populous. Probably was, Naughty Dog's two prior titles were Apple II, DOS, Amiga and ST releases
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Aug 20, 2023 21:40
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emSparkly posted:I would bet 100 bucks this was an Amiga game first. If only because it looks like they stole the UI from Populous. MrQwerty posted:Probably was, Naughty Dog's two prior titles were Apple II, DOS, Amiga and ST releases It was going to be a game for both Amiga and PC, but then for some reason the devs said "nah gently caress that" and thought it would be a much better idea if they went along with EA and their shady MD/Gen devkit nonsense (  ) instead.It wasn't. EA soon shafted them and refused to make any more than the initial batch of cartridges due to unit costs and having to pay royalties.
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Aug 20, 2023 22:14
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loving Klax. Does anyone like that game? Is there someone who just says "Let's play some Klax, guys!" Get out here, so I can stuff you in a locker.
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Aug 20, 2023 22:19
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Putting a giant Sega Genesis controller on screen at all times was a courageous choice.
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Aug 20, 2023 22:20
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Klax?!? This here is Columns country!
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Aug 20, 2023 22:31
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ZogrimAteMyHamster posted:It was going to be a game for both Amiga and PC, but then for some reason the devs said "nah gently caress that" and thought it would be a much better idea if they went along with EA and their shady MD/Gen devkit nonsense ( lol Electronic Arts doing Electronic Arts strikes again
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Aug 20, 2023 22:33
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Beartaco posted:This looks rad as hell. 
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Aug 20, 2023 22:35
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