| Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes |
released March 2004, purchased March 2004
Years ago, I had a demo of Metal Gear Solid for the PS1. I didn't like it. I couldn't even get out of the first room without being spotted and whacked by the ! guards. But when MGS2 showed up as one of the first truly "next gen" offerings for the PS2, I took the chance on it and found it one of the most compelling and original games I had ever played. And I decided that I probably missed out on something cool by passing on the original MGS.
Against all odds, Nintendo got Silicon Knights (the Eternal Darkness team) to do a Metal Gear Solid remake for the GameCube, but with the look and feel of the PS2's MGS2. There is so much wrong with that sentence. It boggles the mind.
It seemed like a win-win: Silicon Knights gets to work with a gaming legend, Nintendo gets a new "mature" title that is kinda sorta exclusive. But I don't think many people bit. Despite early hopeful rumors, this obviously did not lead to a GameCube port of Sons of Liberty... and Silicon Knights now works for Microsoft. So, uh, I think we can chalk this up to the Nintendo M-rated curse.
For my part, I thought the game was great. Seeing Snake's Alaskan adventure, with the classically silly bad guys and the first encounter with Otacon... it underscored the "virtual mission" theme to Sons of Liberty. Seemed kinda short, though.
Memory Score: The WaveBird kinda took some of the fun out of the Psycho Mantis scene
| WarioWare, Inc: Mega Party Game$ |
released April 2004, purchased April 2004
This is that most bizarre of console games, the lateral port from a handheld. You don't see this all that often.
GBA WarioWare came out of nowhere (it was made largely in secret over a very short period of time) but became a monster hit in '03. A GameCube port was fast-tracked, but plussed up with plenty of multiplayer-centric game modes.
This is a fun party title, but it suffers from an unexpected New Player vs Old Player syndrome. WarioWare masters will rock the face of any newbies at the table, and the very nature of WarioWare's fast-paced, obtuse minigames will mean ugly frustration for those without prior exposure.
We actually ended up playing this one far less than anticipated, just because it felt like playing the GBA game all over again. It could have used a lot more new games, rather than relying so much on the bitmappy GBA offerings. I've enjoyed it more recently, two years later, after losing some of my finely honed WarioWare touch.
Memory Score: ...while ...saying ...something ...nice ...about ...Joe!
| The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures |
released June 2004, purchased June 2004
Speaking of bizarre GBA-inspired multiplayer GameCube games...
This, the lowest-selling Zelda game of all time, was the final and finest effort from Nintendo's panned-and-devoured GBA/GameCube connectivity push. It was a crappy time for the Big N. They were getting slammed over the eReader. They were getting slammed over the lack of online play. And they were getting slammed over the GBA/Cube connection. By the time Four Swords Adventures was released, everyone had officially given up on the concept of plugging your Game Boys into the Cube. Which is a shame, because this was a great game... and, come on, admit it, you already own a damn GBA anyway.
Like Mega Party Game$, FSA owes its creation to a handheld game: the Four Swords multiplayer add-on to the 2002 GBA re-release of A Link to the Past. There, Four Swords was a randomly generated dungeon crawl, stylized in homage to LttP. On the GameCube, it became more of a linear adventure (no random dungeons), with equal visual parentage to LttP and The Wind Waker. So, think a 2D game with sharp graphics and clean special effects. And four Links in different colored tunics.
The gimmick here is that levels will shift your character from the TV screen to the GBA screen. This never fails to impress me. The boss fights and level designs all relied on some amazing cooperation between players... but a fun competitive angle was introduced by collecting rupees for the "win."
FSA was a clever and intricate game, and it sucks that nobody bought it. You could even play it single-player, although we certainly didn't.
And I don't care what popular opinion says: I love that art style.
Memory Score: Who was the most helpful? Who was the most annoying?
Next time: Spidey does GTA! Pikmin does multiplayer! Pokemon does box!?!
