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The Twisted Metal series began on the PS1 in 1995 and was an immediate smash hit, popularizing the short-lived vehicular combat genre by telling the tale of an annual murder contest whose winner is granted one wish. The first game was a disaster behind the scenes but succeeded despite itself, so its developers quickly put together a vastly improved sequel to be released the following year. Two more PS1 games followed, developed by a completely different studio, but the creators of the series were unhappy with these installments. When they got the chance to make Twisted Metal themselves once more, they started with Black, which takes place in an alternate setting sometimes called the "dark world," then followed with Twisted Metal: Head On, a direct sequel to the second game, removing the third and fourth games from canon and establishing Twisted Metal 1, 2, and Head On as the "colorful world" of Twisted Metal. Twisted Metal 1 This is the game that started it all, and it has not aged well. 1995 was still early in 3D gaming and everyone was struggling to make it work, and Twisted Metal in particular was subject to considerable executive meddling, leading to huge last-minute changes including the very name of the titular competition. It's also light on content, with only six levels that are mostly very short, so while I will cover one story per video, I won't be playing most of the dozen available vehicles and will instead provide links to their stories. With these videos, I'll try to restore as much of the original vision for the game as possible by going through what remains of the cut content... for better or worse. Stories (Playlist) All endings - I have collected transcriptions of all this game's canon text endings, as well as links to videos of both the text endings and FMV endings. Intermission Before moving on to the next game, I'd like to provide some supplementary material as closure for the first game and an appetizer for the second. First a few corrections, Oheao pointed out that contrary to what I've said, Twisted Metal was released five days before Warhawk, making it the first SingleTrac game on shelves, and it predated the first Carmageddon by nearly two years. Additional live-action videos were shot for TM1 and later unearthed by a fan site called Twisted Metal Alliance, likely leaked to them by the developers themselves (thanks to Mr.Flibble for that information): Intro - A reporter scores an interview with Calypso, who blows off all his questions and instead has a conversation with Black. Minion origin - The same reporter also talks to the inventor of the tank that became Minion. You can pretty much sum up this one with the line, "Women's panties, huh?" Apocalypse 9 intro - The gang that drives Minion introduce themselves. Apocalypse 9 alternate intro - Literally the same video as above, but with an Apocalypse 9 logo over half of it. Apocalypse 9 goes on a rampage - This one is viscerally upsetting and I sincerely advise against watching it. It's just the members of the gang screaming at the camera, brandishing weapons and assaulting people. Finally, back in 1996 as a promotion for Twisted Metal 2, DC Comics printed 100 copies of a single-issue prequel comic to be given away to winners of a contest, which only 50 people won. It explains everything that made Calypso what he is, and I can't overstate how dark this story is, so read at your own risk. Rare TM2 comic - Content Warnings: animal death, child death, general murder, self harm, suicide, racism, inadvertent 9/11 imagery, intense edginess Twisted Metal 2 Now that the developers have a bit more experience and a ton more confidence behind their work, they've been able to refine their concept into what they always wanted it to be, creating what is reputed to be the best Twisted Metal game ever. Every level will get its own video this time, but this will still leave five characters I won't get to show off so I will again be providing links to their endings. Stories (Playlist) Sweet Tooth in Los Angeles / Mr. Grimm's ending Mr. Slam in Moscow / Thumper's ending Grasshopper in Paris / Hammerhead's ending Shadow in Amazonia + Minion in Moscow Axel in New York Twister in Antarctica / Warthog's ending Outlaw 2 in Holland / Spectre's ending Roadkill in Hong Kong Intermission The developers of the first two TM games wouldn't get another shot at the series for nearly five years after TM2, but they came back strong with Twisted Metal: Black, a side story for the characters that ties in to the canon they'd established. If you missed my Let's Play of Black, this is the best time to catch up, but be aware that this is the "darker and edgier" installment that sometimes goes too far for some people's tastes, so be sure to heed the content warnings before proceeding. Let's Play Twisted Metal: Black - Content Warnings: Extreme violence and gore, child death, self harm, suicide, mutilation, cannibalism If that seems unappealing for any reason, I've also made a short video showing just the one relevant moment that ties Black into the greater Twisted Metal plot, Minion's ending, and I'll be spoiling this plot point in the first video of Head On anyway. Twisted Metal: Head On After burning through two development studios and waiting nearly a decade, the original creators of Twisted Metal finally wrapped up the story of the series with Head On, the sequel to TM2. They also addressed the plot twist of Black and explored how it affects the mainline games... kinda. This is an often overlooked game with lots of new ideas, lots of missteps, and lots of just stuff. It's crammed to the gills with things to do and see, and the Extra Twisted Edition we're playing adds even more, so we'll get to see the gameplay and stories of all eighteen vehicles, plus we'll take a look at some of the differences between this version and the one on the PSP. It's one last giant hurrah for Twisted Metal. Stories (Playlist) Sweet Tooth in Big Blue Stadium Mr. Slam in Los Angeles Thumper in Paris Grasshopper in Egypt Shadow vs Cousin Eddy ATV in Roman Ruins Axel in Russia Twister in Greece Crimson Fury in Monaco Warthog in Minigames 1 (Big Blue, LA, Paris, Greece, Monaco) Mr. Grimm in Transylvania Outlaw in Tokyo Streets Hammerhead in Tokyo Rooftops Spectre in Minigames 2 (Egypt, Roman Ruins, Russia, Transylvania, Tokyo Streets & Rooftops) Roadkill vs Dark Tooth Tower Tooth Challenge + Sweet Tour Bonus materials: Twisted Metal: The Dark Past documentary Sweet Tour Factoids Part 1: Asylum (1-14) Sweet Tour Factoids Part 2: Impound Lot (15-29) Fiendly fucked around with this message at 01:24 on Mar 17, 2020 |
# ? May 23, 2019 15:12 |
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# ? May 4, 2024 23:10 |
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Part 1: The ill-conceived idea begins here! If you find this thing to be not to your liking, I don't blame you, I really wasn't into this game myself when I first saw it, so just know that an LP of an actually good game in the series is coming shortly and if you skip this one, you'll miss very little of importance. If you do make it through this thing, the following video is highly recommended supplementary viewing: Yellow Jacket's ending EDIT: forgot to mention, a Twisted Metal TV series was just announced two days ago, making this gross old game even more relevant than I expected. Be the coolest person you know by getting the obscure references the impending show will probably make! Fiendly fucked around with this message at 16:07 on May 23, 2019 |
# ? May 23, 2019 15:13 |
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Wow, that Yellow Jacket video was good stuff. Tasted like Argh. Two lives per run? Rough, especially with all the cars made out of paper mache.
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# ? May 23, 2019 16:09 |
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The Twisted Metal games are fun, yet I found them hard as hell. I still have the TM1 theme memorized in my brain.
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# ? May 23, 2019 16:29 |
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I remember playing hours of TM1 and TM2, both co-op and vs, huddled in front of my buddy's giant tube TV in middle school. He had the habit of running down the random pedestrians and turning to lock eyes with me and whisper "you."
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# ? May 23, 2019 17:04 |
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Oheao posted:The Twisted Metal games are fun, yet I found them hard as hell. I still have the TM1 theme memorized in my brain. SoylentG posted:I remember playing hours of TM1 and TM2, both co-op and vs, huddled in front of my buddy's giant tube TV in middle school. He had the habit of running down the random pedestrians and turning to lock eyes with me and whisper "you." Part 2: Wasn't joking about getting this game out of the way fast. Additional endings: Pit Viper's ending: https://youtu.be/Zz5Ff-NgxDc Roadkill's ending: https://youtu.be/FbJ2sEEz9j4 Spectre's ending: https://youtu.be/az1tqEEIQuc Warthog's ending: https://youtu.be/bt8T9BWRR_o
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# ? May 24, 2019 05:20 |
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I forgot how... rudimentary Twisted Metal 1 was. It must have gotten mashed up in my memories with Twisted Metal 2 because this is just a rounding error of a game.
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# ? May 24, 2019 05:55 |
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Oh, you're done with TM1 already? I guess there is only so much diversity with each character.
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# ? May 24, 2019 10:04 |
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I have a lot of fond memories of Twisted Metal 2, most of them from playing multiplayer back when I was still in school.
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# ? May 24, 2019 12:19 |
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No Small Brawl?
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# ? May 24, 2019 18:06 |
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Oheao posted:Oh, you're done with TM1 already? I guess there is only so much diversity with each character. There's one more level in the game, the video for it will be posted tomorrow. Rocket Baby Dolls posted:I have a lot of fond memories of Twisted Metal 2, most of them from playing multiplayer back when I was still in school. I also played a bit of TM2 at a friend's house back when it was new, but we all sucked at it because it's too hard and just died a bunch. I still went right for Mr. Grimm every time though. Mr.Flibble posted:No Small Brawl? I'm sticking to the "canon" of the series for now, if it's not a horrible humiliating failure then future LPs of Small Brawl, the 2012 remake, and even TM3&4 are on the table. I will say that I already have thread titles planned for all those possibilities.
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# ? May 24, 2019 19:52 |
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Part 3: Twisted Metal is done. Possibly the worst game in the entire series, but not without its charms, it grew on me and nothing beats these FMV endings: Mr. Grimm's ending Thumper's ending Crimson Fury's ending Hammerhead's ending All FMV endings playlist The next Twisted Metal tournament will be coming soon.
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# ? May 25, 2019 05:20 |
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If nothing else I learned about that crate in the rooftop level, don't think I ever knew about it.
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# ? May 25, 2019 05:48 |
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OK, so watching it, I have some issues: 1. Twisted Metal came out in 1995, Carmageddon in 1997, so I would not call it a rip-off of Carmageddon 2. While the controls may be wonky now, it's important to note that it was indeed the first in the series, so at the time it had no direct comparison, especially considering Vigilante 8, Rogue Trip, Critical Depth, etc. didn't exist yet to compare to it 3. Maybe I'm more forgiving, but I do think that the graphics still look fine for its time 4. I can't find any info that this was SingleTrac's second game, it seems to me that it was first released 5 days before WarHawk, which would make it their first game I do think Los Angeles was a fitting choice for the first game, especially considering the 1992 LA Riots, which brought racial tensions and violent crime to the forefront.
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# ? May 25, 2019 17:15 |
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I always thought Carmageddon came first, but looks like that's the rip off. And yeah, Twisted Metal did apparently come out nearly a week before Warhawk, which means either could have been developed first, but also that TM was an even more fledgling effort than I thought. Considering that, it's a much more impressive game, which doesn't make it look or play any better but great job to those devs in 95
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# ? May 25, 2019 17:52 |
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Well, I wouldn't necessarily call Carmageddon a rip-off of Twisted Metal either, in fact it was heavily based on the 1976 movie Death Race 2000, and I believe it was even meant to be a licensed game until they decided to make it its own IP.
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# ? May 26, 2019 04:34 |
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We all know the best Twisted Metal is the one with Dragula in the soundtrack
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# ? May 26, 2019 05:08 |
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I think by that you mean the one with Dragula as a playable vehicle (i'm not lping that one [yet {but probably never}])
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# ? May 26, 2019 05:35 |
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Even though their similar in premise I'd say the gameplay for both Twisted Metal and Carmageddeon are different enough that they aren't really copying each other - in TW you're focusing more on the offensive and gunning down your opponents in a fight to the death whereas in Carma you're your primary method of dealing with opponents is to ram them to death or lay traps for them (so you can better ram them to death). It also gave you other options for winning a level if you wanted to bore yourself to death instead. If anything I'd say it was a happy coincidence that they were released so close together; there was a brief period in the late 90's where this genre truly shined before almost vanishing. I'd say games like Vigilante 8 and Interstate '76 were more copycat games, even if they (IMO) did do things better. Then you had games like Wipeout and Demolition Derby which certainly weren't copies but were likely piggybacking on the car combat craze. But before all of them you had games like Spy Hunter, Outrun (in it's various iterations), Cruis'n USA, and I vaguely remember some game called Chase H.Q. or something along those lines. Hitting someone with a car is hardly a unique gameplay concept. Still, as primitive as it was I played the hell out of the first Twisted Metal; it was one of the first Playstation games I had and back when I only got 3-4 new games a year you had to make things last. Wouldn't say I had fond memories of it but they're at least happy ones. Enjoyed the second game way more though, it was a much more polished game.
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# ? May 26, 2019 05:39 |
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Psychotic Weasel posted:Even though their similar in premise I'd say the gameplay for both Twisted Metal and Carmageddeon are different enough that they aren't really copying each other - in TW you're focusing more on the offensive and gunning down your opponents in a fight to the death whereas in Carma you're your primary method of dealing with opponents is to ram them to death or lay traps for them (so you can better ram them to death). It also gave you other options for winning a level if you wanted to bore yourself to death instead. If anything I'd say it was a happy coincidence that they were released so close together; there was a brief period in the late 90's where this genre truly shined before almost vanishing. I also don't think it's fair to say that Destruction Derby and Wipeout were piggypacking on it, considering both of them were released before even the first Twisted Metal. Unless you meant they were piggybacking off of Spy Hunter, Outrun, etc.
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# ? May 26, 2019 06:21 |
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I don't have a video update prepared today, so instead I've got something of an effort post to bridge the gap between the first two games. A lot of this stuff I'll be drawing from in upcoming videos so I'll be talking about it when it's relevant, but this is your chance to see it for yourself. Intermission First a few corrections, Oheao points out that contrary to what I've said, Twisted Metal was released five days before Warhawk, making it the first SingleTrac game on shelves, and it predated the first Carmageddon by a full two years. I focused on the FMV endings of TM1 for the Let's Play, but I wanted to provide the opportunity to check out the in-game text endings so you can compare them and check out what "officially" happened to the characters. A funny thing I noticed is that most wishes that worked out well for the character were changed to work out poorly for them and vice versa for some reason. You can watch all the original endings or simply read the text of the endings. There were also other FMV cutscenes that were cut from the game which do not appear as Head On bonus material, but have surfaced on the internet anyway: Intro - A reporter scores an interview with Calypso, who blows off all his questions and instead has a conversation with Black. Minion origin - The same reporter also talks to the inventor of the tank that became Minion. You can pretty much sum up this one with the line, "Women's panties, huh?" Apocalypse 9 intro - The gang who drives Minion introduce themselves. Part 2 of this cutscene uses the same footage but cuts to an Apocalypse 9 logo halfway through, so you really only need to watch one of them. Apocalypse 9 goes on a rampage - This one is viscerally upsetting and I sincerely advise against watching it. It's just the members of the gang brandishing weapons, screaming at the camera, and assaulting people. Finally, back in 1996 as a promotion for Twisted Metal 2, DC Comics printed 100 copies of a prequel book for the game to be given away to winners of a contest, which only 50 people won. It explains everything that made Calypso what he is, and I can't overstate how dark this story is, so read at your own risk. Also it ends with the Twisted Metal contestants doing 9/11 and Calypso saying that's a good thing. Rare TM2 comic - Content Warnings: animal death, child death, self harm, suicide, inadvertent 9/11 imagery, intense edginess
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# ? May 26, 2019 14:47 |
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Oh that's awesome, I had never seen those other deleted videos before. It makes me wonder how they were even uncovered if they weren't on the game's disc or Head-On's bonus features.
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# ? May 26, 2019 14:56 |
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Oheao posted:Oh that's awesome, I had never seen those other deleted videos before. It makes me wonder how they were even uncovered if they weren't on the game's disc or Head-On's bonus features. There is this fan site called Twisted Metal Alliance that was close to the makers of the series (they'er in the special thanks credits for tm black) that got their hands on the fmv's back in the day(You can see the watermark in the videos Fiendly posted) and they spread from there. Sadly the original website died years ago but they live on here: http://temp.tmalliance.com/ Mr.Flibble fucked around with this message at 20:08 on May 26, 2019 |
# ? May 26, 2019 17:48 |
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Twisted Metal 2 Time to take our battles on the road for a world tour. Now that the developers have a bit more experience and a ton more confidence behind their work, they've been able to refine their concept into what they always wanted it to be. To this day, I often hear that Twisted Metal 2 is the best game in the series, so let's see for ourselves how well it lives up to its reputation. Part 1: Sweet Tooth in Los Angeles There are more levels this time, and each one deserves its own video, but there's still nearly twice as many cars as levels so I still gotta link some of the endings I won't get to show in the videos. Mr. Grimm's ending Updates might have to slow down for a while. I was hoping to continue with near-daily updates through the entirety of the first two games, but I don't have anywhere near the free time to comfortably keep up this pace and the video quality will suffer as a result. I'll try to keep the thread from slowing to a crawl just yet (but it definitely will when we get to Head On, those videos are gonna be a ton of work) Fiendly fucked around with this message at 02:54 on May 28, 2019 |
# ? May 27, 2019 13:55 |
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Glad I saw this, I remember your excellent series on Black. I agree with your criticisms of the first game, though there's some charm to the low budget grindhouse feel to it, and there's a progression to the levels as the maps become larger and more expansive, each one tying into the LA theme it had. Anyways my hot take on the franchise has always been that 3/4 are good, actually.
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# ? May 28, 2019 08:04 |
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Mantis42 posted:Glad I saw this, I remember your excellent series on Black. I agree with your criticisms of the first game, though there's some charm to the low budget grindhouse feel to it, and there's a progression to the levels as the maps become larger and more expansive, each one tying into the LA theme it had. Twisted Metal 3's wishes make no sense, though I guess it's hilarious in retrospect thinking that they're willing to kill so many just for those.
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# ? May 28, 2019 13:09 |
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Mantis42 posted:I agree with your criticisms of the first game, though there's some charm to the low budget grindhouse feel to it Totally. I wanted to fully convey my first impression of the game when I first played it a year or two ago, which was, "What the hell am I looking at, what's even going on, how was this a released game?" But as I spent hours practicing, I realized it's my favorite kind of game to LP: a player-unfriendly mess with brilliant ideas buried somewhere, as well as bizarre vestigial ideas that go nowhere. TM2 is actually more of a weird choice for me because I don't usually do really good games unless I have a strong personal connection to them, we'll see how my style adapts. Mantis42 posted:Anyways my hot take on the franchise has always been that 3/4 are good, actually. When I did Black, all I knew about 3 & 4 was that they're terrible, but they had their fans in the thread treating them as guilty pleasures. Seems like they might just be perfectly fine games in their own right, even David Jaffe said they're good games, just not good Twisted Metal games. Also TM4 has my interest because it was directed by the guy who personally ruined the 2010 Splatterhouse remake. The endings all seem terrible, though.
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# ? May 28, 2019 15:36 |
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Oh the endings ARE terrible. The tone and humor is off in the cutscenes and 4 in particular replaces most of the cast with shittier versions of themselves (Mr. Grimm becomes Capt Grimm, a pirate). However, there are some great levels, the graphics were better, and the soundtracks were full of heavy metal music.
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# ? May 28, 2019 16:00 |
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I didn't play either TM3 or 4 and I haven't ever bothered to figure out which. Pit Viper and Crimson Fury may be gone but they do both have "equivalent" cars in Grasshopper and Twister but I figure they just went "Who cares about what regular people in Twisted Metal would do with Twisted Metal" and excised the characters but kept the cars.
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# ? May 28, 2019 20:44 |
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Kibayasu posted:Pit Viper and Crimson Fury may be gone but they do both have "equivalent" cars in Grasshopper and Twister but I figure they just went "Who cares about what regular people in Twisted Metal would do with Twisted Metal" and excised the characters but kept the cars. Pit Viper most definitely became Grasshopper, but I assume Crimson Fury was dropped for being too similar to Spectre since they're both just kinda generic sports cars. CF's driver was James Bond and he proved aliens exist, so I think there's a lot they coulda done with the character had he returned, but Spectre has the better theming as a vehicle and is thus a better choice to keep in if indeed that was the binary they were working with.
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# ? May 29, 2019 01:18 |
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Fiendly posted:Pit Viper most definitely became Grasshopper, but I assume Crimson Fury was dropped for being too similar to Spectre since they're both just kinda generic sports cars. CF's driver was James Bond and he proved aliens exist, so I think there's a lot they coulda done with the character had he returned, but Spectre has the better theming as a vehicle and is thus a better choice to keep in if indeed that was the binary they were working with. True, I guess what I meant was the concept of "fast car with no armor." Twister has a far better Special though.
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# ? May 29, 2019 16:59 |
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So, good news: update Part 2: Mr. Slam in Moscow / Thumper's ending Bad news: I was hoping things just wouldn't get any worse for me and I could still manage a few updates a week, so ofc things got much worse and I no longer have any control over when I'll be able to make more videos. I don't even want to make an optimistic guess as to how things will go from here lest I incur further wrath for my hubris, so see ya when I see ya.
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# ? May 31, 2019 06:10 |
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Well, that doesn't sound too good, whatever is going on.
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# ? May 31, 2019 06:14 |
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Sorry to hear this. These days there's very few people who I enjoy watching solo-commentate on VLPs and you're one of'em. But whatever real life happenings are of course much more important, so take all the time you need to deal with them.
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# ? May 31, 2019 08:55 |
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Oheao posted:Well, I wouldn't necessarily call Carmageddon a rip-off of Twisted Metal either, in fact it was heavily based on the 1976 movie Death Race 2000, and I believe it was even meant to be a licensed game until they decided to make it its own IP. The difference between Carmageddon and Twisted Metal is the fact the former was always designed as a driving game first, with a huge emphasis on crashes and (relatively) realistic physics, and no weapons aside from temporary powerups. Twisted Metal is an arena shooter where you happen to be in control of a vehicle. Zanzibar Ham posted:But whatever real life happenings are of course much more important, so take all the time you need to deal with them.
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# ? May 31, 2019 11:27 |
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Boy I remember Mr Slam, or should I say Missing the Slam because holy poo poo hitting with that special. Though I remember it being pretty funny if you manage to slam Minion, given his size.
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# ? Jun 1, 2019 05:03 |
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Ah, the LP curse. The good news, I know this guy named Calypso who can remove it. The bad news, you have to compete in his crazy motor vehicle death contest and win.
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# ? Jun 1, 2019 06:53 |
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Hope things start going better for you. I'm always glad to see a Fiendly LP, especially if it is one of my favorites. I will add one thing that I noticed when you were playing Slamm. You could have been using your machine guns to continue doing damage while slamming. And possibly any of your front facing weapons. So while you have someone in your jaws and you are slamming them, you can add more damage. This is a little double edged as any trapped enemy can also us their weapons while being slammed. Not so bad for most foes as a lot of their weapons are also front facing, so unless you grab someone head on, you're pretty safe as Slamm. However, grab Axel or anyone else with an AOE special and you will be in for a world of hurt. I would also add that using the key combos, specifically the freeze, is a great way to cheese people as Slamm. Freeze > Slam > Repeat. All of the key combos are way OP, and really make the game much much easier. I won't go over all of them, but one of my other favorites is a rear attack, which will allow you to fire most weapons directly behind you, rather than in front. Very useful for anyone following too close. I say this right now, if there was some way to get an HD remake of TM2 without needing to buy a PS4, I'd buy it so drat fast.
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# ? Jun 2, 2019 02:27 |
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Thanks for the well wishes. I have a plan that could result in two updates a week starting next week, now let's see how many seconds it takes after posting this for that to cease to be true.PlasticAutomaton posted:Ah, the LP curse. The good news, I know this guy named Calypso who can remove it. The bad news, you have to compete in his crazy motor vehicle death contest and win. It only comes around every Christmas Eve though. I guess the contest from Black happened on June 18th, but I don't think I want to mess with that one. CzarChasm posted:energy move tips I'm definitely bad about underutilizing the energy bar, it was the same in TM:B and I still haven't worked it into my play style. I worked on using the freeze since it's the obvious solution to Mr. Slam's special being so hard to use, but it seems like this game doesn't actually count your inputs, rather it tracks the actual movement of your car to see if it should use an energy move. This means that if your wheels leave the ground, the moves don't work, and the slanted ground in the level made me go airborne constantly. I'll have to keep practicing, might make my life easier going forward.
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# ? Jun 3, 2019 00:21 |
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# ? May 4, 2024 23:10 |
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Fiendly posted:Thanks for the well wishes. I have a plan that could result in two updates a week starting next week, now let's see how many seconds it takes after posting this for that to cease to be true. Well, there's also the fact that Twisted Metal: Black takes place within Sweet Tooth's mind, which makes the June 18th date more sensible.
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# ? Jun 4, 2019 12:30 |