Tero's Top 10 - PSX

Okay, it hasn't been long since the last one of these, but I've had a very busy weekend so it'll have to do.

The PSX, I would say, is a very solid choice for "best system of all time". In a lot of ways, it represents a continuation of what the SNES was (and what the N64 wasn't), but it also brings about a shift in the focus of gaming - rather than seeing it as a hobby for children and "geeks", the Playstation began to agressively target a mainstream teenage demographic, expanding the market beyond what it had ever been before. It sold ridiculously well, and with this, a gargantuan software library was produced, spanning over 4000 titles. That's more than 10 times more games than were produced for N64!

1 - Tales of Phantasia
2 - Choro Q2
3 - Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
4 - Chrono Cross
5 - Monster Rancher 2
6 - Final Fantasy Tactics
7 - Final Fantasy 7
8 - Suikoden 2
9 - Parappa the Rapper
10 - Snowboard Kids Plus

Obviously, with a system library like this, making this list isn't easy, it's basically a long process of "think of a game, see if I'd take it over any of the current games, shift down". I'm apparently reasonably consistent, though, because I later found another list I had posted for PSX and it contains roughly the same games (though in a different order).

One thing you'll immediately notice about this list is that it contains a fair number of imports, in particular, the top two slots, which are about the only ones I'm consistent on. Tales of Phantasia is very similar to Tales of Destiny (which is an awesome co-op RPG, compare to how I also rank Secret of Mana very high for SNES), except better in basically every respect. Choro Q2 is my favourite game in the Choro Q series, it's similar to Gran Turismo except it has more content and is more arcadey.

Positions 3-8 contain a lot of PS1 all-stars, and it's really just a matter of their placement in the list. Symphony being third isn't a big surprise, though I used to rate this a bit lower since it'd been a long time since I'd played it and I'd forgotten to some extent just how awesome it was.

Of all the games on this list, the one that moves by far the most is Chrono Cross. Most of the games here are extremely solid in all respects, but CC is more of an unbalanced game. In particular, the gameplay and story of CC are not spectacular, but it has fantastic presentation, in particular, I'd say it has the best soundtrack ever composed - it's powerful, it's artsy, it conveys the thematic differences between the two worlds brilliantly, and the game is easily worth playing for it alone. I would totally pick the theme from Home Arni Village for the first dance at my wedding (to the confusion of all present), it's that good. Where I place Chrono Cross on the list depends on my perception of the relative importance of Presentation vs Gameplay at any given time. I would, however, generally pick Chrono Trigger as the superior game.

Monster Rancher 2 is really the only other surprising pick in this group, and if you've played it, I don't think it's too much of a stretch. Of all the pokemon clones, this is definitely my favourite one, it's basically Pokemon + action RPG + simulation.

Parappa is a late addition to this list. It's kind of an odd choice, because it's such a short game, but to me at least, it's probably the funniest game of all time. When I think of all the enjoyment I've gotten out of freestyling on this game, I just can't leave it off the list.

I guess one other thing of note is that while my N64 list omits the "biggest name", my PSX list doesn't. I've always liked FF7 far more than Ocarina of Time, FF7 is one of my favourite FFs. The thing I like most about FF7 is the atmosphere, it combines artistic design and music in a way that I think makes it more immersive than any game to come beforehand, and it still holds up pretty well all this time later. It's kind of like Chrono Cross that way, except it trades some music quality for much better gameplay (as such, I waiver on which one I rate higher).

The final slot is definitely the biggest battle here, just like on the N64 list (and probably every list) there's a whole next stratum of games which battle for this slot. Snowboard Kids Plus is an upgrade to Snowboard Kids for the PS1 (you'll notice I said in the N64 list that SBK's absense has something to do with the PSX), which adds some very needed length to the game. I can't really give any justification for why this comes above the games listed below, they're all very even.

Once again, I can easily list 5 more games that I was considering for this list, Bishi Bashi Special 2, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, Star Ocean: The Second Story, Marvel vs Capcom, Megaman X4.

N64 Snowboard Kids

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Not long after Mario Kart 64, of course, comes another wacky N64 racing game, Snowboard Kids!

This game was constantly compared to Mario Kart 64 (well, it basically is Mario Kart on Snowboards), and usually unfavourably, but it does have something of a cult following and it and its sequel are frequently recommended by N64 enthusiasts. It also has great music.

This game is even more luck-based than Mario Kart ever could be, though, so making a video of it is a pretty imposing task. I actually got this run in one attempt, and it's remarkably close to perfect, except for the fifth part, which is pretty sad, but there's enough awesome moments in the first two to make it worth it.

SNES Yoshi's Cookie

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I admit, there are times when I'm tired or I haven't been playing much lately and I try to pick something easy to accomplish. However, this usually backfires spectacularly and an hour later I realize I've set myself some Herculean task that's going to take at least a full evening.

This is one of those times. I had apparently forgotten just how hard (and unbalanced) this game is after playing the Gamecube version a lot. I must have lost at least 10 times (and each attempt takes close to half an hour) before the planets aligned and I was able to win.

On the plus side, the extremely difficulty level of this game and how close it often is should at least keep this video interesting. I did smoke the computer pretty bad this time, though.

My capture card continues to be annoying on SNES games, but thankfully it stops wavering after the first match.

Power Struggle

For years, I've always known this day would come. I just never knew when. Or what it would be.

But then, lo and behold, I was greeted by this:

Can you tell what option should be in this picture?

A copy of Megaman Zero which I had recently picked up wasn't saving properly. At first, I assumed the cart must be damaged, or the Gameboy Player on the GC wasn't working right. This theory was supported when it did save okay a few times in my DS, but it lost the save later.

I was about to return the cart (I'd have to ship it back, at my own expense), when something occured to me. Is it possible this cart uses a battery?

It's always the one you least suspect

I would never have guessed, because battery-backed RAM was already almost totally phased out by 2000, and this game came out in 2002, but it turns out that a number of early GBA games actually do use batteries. And this one was totally drained, outputting a mere 0.3V instead of the 3V it's supposed to provide. And so, it was time for my first ever foray into battery changing.

First, I had to buy the battery. GBA games use CR1616s, which are a common type of watch battery, so buying one was no trouble (it cost me $6). The next step was to desolder the old battery, which is also not very difficult (though you want to go a bit easy on it, you don't want to fry the board).

Here's what the board looks like with no battery on it

(There are no more pictures because I was too busy soldering things)

The next step is to remove the leads from the battery. This requires some chiselling, but isn't too difficult. Then, the leads need to be hammered back into their original shape (thankfully, they're pretty malleable).

The next part is the really hard part, which is getting the leads on the new battery. Soldering to a battery is not easy in the first place (you put a little solder on the lead, a little on the battery, push the lead on top of the battery, then heat the lead), but in the case of a GBA game it's FAR harder than normal because the battery fits in the case only by the absolute slimmest of margins (see the photo of the open case above, there's a tiny slit cut in the top cover, that's for the lead, to give you an idea of how tight it is). If the leads aren't super tight to the battery, it's not going to fit.

There's a trick to this, which is to put a little piece of electrical tape over the rim of the battery where the top lead would touch the sides (you can't allow it to touch the sides, or you'll form a circuit between the top and bottom of the battery and it will short). With the tape there, there's no risk of the leads touching, and thus you can push the lead right to the edge rather than having to bend it up. I didn't realize this the first time and had to de-solder it, but you can learn from my experience.

Anyway, eventually the leads were on the new battery and it was ready to solder back to the board, this is comparatively easy. The case still didn't shut perfectly (it's still a touch too tall), but it does close and the game fits in the system, I consider that close enough.

If you were doing a game for a different system, you'd have more space, and you might be able to simply use electrical tape to put the leads on - GBA is not an easy one to start with. Also, apparently you can buy batteries that come with the leads on them, and this would cut out 75% of the work, just unsolder the old battery and solder in the new, easy as pie. I need to find out where you can get those from.

Anyway, so begins the moment of truth. The game starts up, and I'm able to complete the first level, that's a good sign.

But the real test is what happens after I turn it off

Success! My save is still there! And hopefully next time it will be easier!

And on the plus side, I played the first stage so much that I'm a total master of it now.

Does the S stand for Soldering?

Tero's Top 10 - N64

Well, it's been an exhausting week and I have nothing ready, so it's time for another filler post. I really went all out on this one, though, and I've actually gone back and made the previous top 10 posts longer (click on Channel 4 to find them).

The N64 is an interesting system. On one hand, it's often cited as the system where Nintendo went bad, this generation saw the birth of Playstation and a ton of Nintendo franchises left and never came back, on the other it has a number of absolute masterpieces on it. It also has an extremely small library, containing only 400 games total (most other systems have >1000), and yet naming 50 high-quality games would not be difficult.

1 - Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon
2 - Banjo-Kazooie
3 - Super Mario 64
4 - Pokemon Puzzle League
5 - Road Rash 64
6 - Super Smash Bros
7 - Mario Kart 64
8 - NBA Hangtime
9 - Mischief Makers
10 - Blast Corps

With the exception of the top 3 picks, this was agonizing. Obviously, the first thing that must be mentioned is that there's an obvious omission here - This list does not contain either of the Zelda games. I've never liked 3D Zelda, most particularly not on N64, I've always found Ocarina of Time boring, despite repeated attempts to like it. I think the fact that Link is so slow and effectively has his feet glued to the ground kills it for me, here you have this huge, expansive 3D world, and you're stuck exploring the very bottom of it at a snail's pace. There's also far too much dungeon crawling. I've always felt 3D Zelda would be much better if it was basically the same as Mystical Ninja.

Speaking of which, the top pick is, perhaps, the most obvious top pick ever. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon is probably the best game of all time by a fairly significant margin. Even if we ignore the fact that it came out in 1998, I still think it compares favourably to just about every other platform and adventure game ever. Even something like Okami still couldn't quite compare on even terms, and it came out almost a decade later. It's a timeless masterpiece in every sense of the word.

Mario 64 and BK are, I think, relatively obvious for slots 2 and 3. The ordering of them is definitely debatable, I think Banjo-Kazooie is a better game overall, but Mario 64 was first and it's definitely more iconic. In the end, you have to choose one or the other.

The other 7 games, as much as I agonized over the placement, are sorted near-randomly. Every time I alter the order, I feel it puts one of the games too low. You'll just have to accept that the difference in quality between slot 4 and slot 10 is extremely small.

Interestingly, some of my favourite obscure games for the N64 have actually been squeezed out of this ordering. Every time I hastily made a list of best N64 games, Flying Dragon, Penny Racers, and Snowboard Kids would tend to place in it. However, as much as I love them, the more I poured over the list of N64 games, the more obvious it became that there are some games that are a little better. Some of this also has to do with the PSX, you'll see how when I make that list.

Ironically, this actually took almost as long to write as it would take me to beat an easy game. Since I worked on it for so long, I might as well state that those 3 games in the previous paragraph, plus Diddy Kong Racing and Mario Golf would be my top 15.