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By using the gauntlet, I managed to get to a semi-flooded area in the northeast, filled with those fireball spitting enemies that live in the water. As it turns out, these are the Zoras. Their king was there and he offered me swimming flippers for 500 rupies. Obviously, I wanted those, so I gave him the money. I was at 999 rupies for a while now anyway.

A Link to the Past, Flippers

I’d say something like “costly, but worth it”, but really, you HAVE to buy the flippers.

It was time to get to the third dungeon now. The map was clearly showing it as the tower to the north, so that’s where I went. My gauntlets allowed me to lift a stone and clear the way to a dark cave. Exploring it, I soon met an old man who asked me to guide him through it. It seemed more like he was guiding me, since he told me which direction to go to on several occasions. Eventually, we got out of the cave and to his house, which is now one of my “bases”, allowing me to start the game there upon loading.Using the flippers, I’ve found a couple of heart pieces, bringing me to 8 total (I believe) as well as a hidden cave with a pond. Throwing my boomerang in the pond caused a fairy to appear who then gave me an upgraded version of it. This one can travel a distance equal to the width of the entire screen. Hoping to get something else, I threw various items in and it worked. I got my shield upgraded to and I filled an empty bottle as well, getting a green potion this way.

I explored around his house and found a couple more heart pieces. I also found a magical platform which transported me to a dark version of the mountain and turned me into a bunny. In this dark dimension, I’ve found two other creatures and one of them told me I need the magical pearl from the tower to retain my original form upon teleporting to the dark dimension.

A Link to the Past, Dark Dimension

The dark dimension, and a bunny.

It took me a while, but eventually I figured out I could use the mirror the old man gave me to go back to my original dimension and my original shape. I used this feature to get another heart piece and then to get access to the tower, our third dungeon.

A Link to the Past, Third Dungeon Entrance

The entrance to the third dungeon.

This dungeon was relatively small in area, but had several floors I needed to explore. I didn’t get any new weapons or tools, sadly, but I did get the magical pearl I’ll need for the dark world. The boss of the dungeon was extremely annoying. He moves randomly and the only way to damage it is to hit its tail. The hard part is that the battle takes place on a platform you can fall off of and the boss pushes you around when you get hit, so it’s extremely easy to fall. Of course, if you do fall, he gets back to full health, so you have to start all over. Eventually, I somehow managed to beat it and got the third medallion, as well as my ninth heart container.

A Link to the Past, the Master Sword

The Master Sword

I now had everything I needed to get the Master Sword, so I went directly to the Lost Woods. The sword was where I’ve seen it before and now it was mine. As soon as I pulled it out of the stone, though, I got a message from Zelda, saying the Sanctuary is under attack.

Time to go rescue Zelda again.

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Remember my “Complete every Zelda game” challenge? The one I “started” months ago, but only got through the first game. Well, a person on reddit said they’re considering the same thing, so this made me think about continuing my own. I’ll be skipping Zelda 2 for now and going straight for “A Link to the Past”. Zelda 2 is not really like other Zelda games, so I’m not that eager to play it yet.

Compared to the original, there has been a lot of improvements in playability and user friendliness in the SNES sequel. You now have a proper, usable in game map as well as something akin to an objective tracker. There are also ways of learning where you should go next by spending rupies and hints on where the hidden rooms and items are. Overall, it’s much more polished and really allows you to focus on the game, instead of going around hardware and software limitations.

At the start, Link wakes up in his house in the middle of the night, with his uncle going somewhere. He hears the voice of princess Zelda in his head, asking for help, so he listens. The castle has been attacked and the castle mage is behind it. The game leads you to the castle and teaches you how to find your very first hidden passage, a hole beneath a bush.

A Link to the Past, Castle Door

The door to the castle was locked, and it will probably stay locked for a while.

Once Link jumps through, he finds his uncle injured and takes his sword. The area beneath the castle then serves as an intro dungeon. You learn some of the mechanics, find your first map and finally fight something of a mini-boss guarding Zelda’s cell. Link frees her and she follows him to the ground floor where they uncover a hidden passage. After some more dungeoneering, they finally reach the Sanctuary, where she will be safe. At this point, Link earns his first extra heart container.

A Link to the Past, The Sanctuary

This is the Sanctuary.

She asks Link to find a way to defeat the wizard called Agahnim. Apparently, he’s trying to open something called “The Seven Wise Men Seal”, which he shouldn’t do. To stop him, I’ll need the master sword and the people of the nearby village should know something about that. This is how the game leads you around throughout, so there’s no guessing, no map drawing, you just play.

I got to the village and was told their elder is in a place to the east. Before I went there, I explored everything and found a bunch of items. I got a total of four heart pieces, which gave me my fifth container, some bombs, some arrows, a bottle which allows me to store fairies in it and a net which allows me to catch faeries. Back in the dungeon, I already got the boomerang and back at home, I got the red lamp. All in all, I already have a nice assortment of items.

Once I was done exploring, I went to the east and spoke to the elder. He said he knows how to get the Master Sword, but Link needs to prove himself worthy first, which means he needs to find three magical medallions. The first is the medallion of Courage and it’s located in a dungeon nearby. Now, at this point, I’ve already found the Master Sword at the Lost Woods north of the village, but I couldn’t pull it out of the stone. I guess that’s why I need the medallions.

A Link to the Past, The First Dungeon

The first dungeon.

I got to the first dungeon fast enough and started exploring it. It wasn’t to difficult, but it takes time to get used to the game, so I had to restart at the first room several times. Thankfully, the mechanics work in such a way that the important part of your progress isn’t lost when you die, so eventually, I got the map, the compass, the big key and eventually, the Bow, which is the primary reward of the first dungeon. I used the bow to kill the first boss and got another heart container for it, as well as the Medallion of Courage. I returned to the elder and got information on where to find the next two medallions.

He also gave me Pegasus shoes, which allow me to charge enemies and knock things down. I immediately remembered a book on top of a shelf in the village library, so i went straight there to get it. The book allows me to read the ancient language inscribed, among other places, on the stone the Master Sword is stuck in.

I’m guessing I have to go to the next dungeon now, but before that, I’ll be doing some exploring, to see if my new shoes can get me anything else.

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Though they were not ready for the final showdown, after several days of training and preparation, the team decided to go ahead and scout the area of the northern cave, in order to be better prepared for the final push. The area was filled with dangerous enemies, but with some difficulty, they managed to push forward, all the way to a fork in the path.

At this place, Cloud decided to take a smaller group in one direction, while the rest of the team went in the other. It was an uneasy separation, as everyone feared they would not see each other again. Luckily, there was no reason to fear. The two paths met up again soon enough and the group was back together.

Final Fantasy VII, Northern Crater Cave, Top View

The crater is deep, very deep.

The path closed behind them and there was no other way to go, but forward. A brief moment of desperation and fear hit them, as they were realizing the battle would be now, not later. Having no choice, though, they summoned up all the courage they had and continued forward.After an extremely long way down, the group finally reached the core, where their final foe was waiting. The area was fully explored and mapped, so there would be nothing to surprise them when they are finally ready. Little did they know, they were forced to be ready now.

I’m trying my hardest to describe what happened “in role”, but I’m not sure I’m doing it well. To put it more directly, I completed the game by pure accident. I wanted to enter the cave and get to the point of no return, so I could create a save point there and train, since the area gave good experience and AP. What happened was that I triggered the “do you wish to continue” part and accidentally answered yes without creating the save point first, or saving the game.

Since it took me quite a while to get there, I decided “to hell with it” and went for the kill. Luckily, I did some training over the last two days, so my party wasn’t that weak. I just wasn’t ready to go yet and wanted to get all the side quests first. Apparently, I did good anyway.

The core was surrounded by floating debris, forcing them to jump from platform to platform, fighting dangerous monsters nearly every step of the way. Finally, they reached the core, where Sephiroth was waiting. The first to attack was another form of Jenova – Rebirth. This one was relatively simple to dispose of, mostly in thanks to some of the new skills the party learned by observing various creatures of the world.

With Jenova finally dead, it was time to deal with Sephiroth. His first form was a twisted mass of mutated parts, barely reminding of the original in appearance. The various parts of it acted separately, healing and reinforcing each other constantly, making for a very difficult battle. Eventually, Cloud managed to recognize the critical parts and focused the group’s attacks to those spots, finally destroying the creature. It wasn’t over, though.

Sephiroth transformed into his second form, a twisted parody of an angel. This one acted as one, but it was stronger than all the parts of the previous form combined. Most of its attacks were manageable, but before the end, it used something that nearly killed every single member of the group. Luckily, Cloud was ready to react, using a megaelixir to completely negate the damage done and refresh the group for the final push. A few moments later, Sephiroth was down.

Final Fantasy VII, Safer (Seraph) Sephiroth

Sephiroth’s most dangerous form.

It was just Sephiroth. No twisted form, nothing special, just flesh and blood. Cloud was done. His determination was absolute. He started swinging, cutting, without pause, but with complete control and his sight constantly on target. When he was done, it was finally over. Sephiroth gasped lone last time and then fell.The group did all they could. It was now up to the planet and Holy. They started climbing back to the surface, with Cloud being the last one. He paused for a second and listened. It wasn’t over. He could still hear him, screaming, mocking them, and refusing to die. Something pulled him down, towards the lifestream, towards the center of the planet. There, in the darkness, Sephiroth was waiting.

Tifa was calling for him, with everything collapsing around them and for a moment, it seemed too late. She fell down towards him, he snapped out of his trance, grabbed her and used his other arm to grab the edge of a cliff. They climbed up and rejoined the group.

The party was hurrying upwards with the cave-in in full effect. Something crashed above them and the Highwind came rushing down. Luckily, the backup plane stored on the airship managed to deploy in time to provide an escape route for the group.

In the meantime, Meteor was rapidly approaching. Holy activated, but it seemed it wasn’t in time. Then, the planet itself provided help, using the lifestream to reinforce Holy and destroy Meteor. It was over.

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Well, not really the Balkans. The first two battles involved liberating the Balkans, thus the name of the chapter. The rest of it, though, took place in Berlin. With Tommy dying in the last chapter, DeeDee was forced to go back to the British general she hated so much – McIntyre.

Berlin, though ruined, was not as grim as the previous chapter, probably because suddenly, there was a feeling of victory. Most of the missions were straightforward, with basically just destroying enemies as fast as possible or before time runs out. One of the missions involved captain Edwards, the young intelligence officer DeeDee met during the Neretva missions.

Air Conflicts: Secret Wars, Egypt Flashback

The last flashback mission took place in Egypt.

With this knowledge, I’ve completed the final mission and was then provided with a choice. McIntyre was under attack by a couple of Nazi fighters. I could run away, kill him or destroy the two fighters. I decided to help him, because I really can’t see any other option as the morally right one.The flashback gave us the big reveal – the allies considered using chemical warfare during world war one. Even worse, they would use it against civilians. During one such mission, DeeDee’s father decided he would not allow it and attacked his own squadron to try and stop them. Because of this, McIntyre shot him down.

With this, the game was completed.

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As expected, I was done with Rochard today.

We got through the temple, realized it’s all somehow connected and got all we needed to get to and deal with Maximilian. He was at the casino and he managed to snatch Skylar during all this so I also had to rescue her. Once that was done, there was a final battle, and that was it.

What an amazingly fun game!

It just does things right. The mechanics are fun to play with, it doesn’t get dull or repetitive and it’s constantly expanding on what you can do with the toys you have. The story is shallow, but interested enough to keep your attention, the style is pleasant and everything just works well together.

Rochard Game Won

YES! I DID IT!

It took me close to six hours to complete the game and I’m nowhere near being done with achievements, sadly, but this will need to wait, since my backlog is still huge.The only slight downside is that you get the funnest toy right before the game ends. In the final area, you get to upgrade your gravity gun so it’s able to grab living enemies. Of course, there’s a good reason you get this late in the game, since it’s extremely powerful, but it’s just so fun I wish I  had more time with it.

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I lied yesterday. I didn’t complete the extra, “DLC” worlds. After clearing Vanishing City and seeing the ending, I was already a bit tired of the mechanics and the same old, so I decided to call it there. I cleared one more level after that, but it’s just more of the same.

Overall, I’ve completed all of the levels of the first four worlds, including the time attack levels, got all the upgrades and basically saw the campaign in its entirety. For me, that’s enough of Xotic for now. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fun enough game, but it has its bad sides.

Xotic Victory Screen

I won! Yay me!

Firstly, there are clipping issues in many of the levels. I get that a low budget game is hard to test properly, but I was getting stuck far too often for comfort. Secondly, while the old school mechanics are fine, I don’t like the fact that you have to start from scratch if you die. A single save per level, or even a checkpoint system would have been preferable. In the end, I’ve completed most of the worth world on the Easy difficulty, simply because I was getting to annoyed with constantly restarting. And lastly, the weapons really aren’t as imaginative or interesting as you would expect from an FPS.

Still, overall, it’s fun and good enough to go through. I just don’t think it’s good enough to go for all of the achievements. Right now, I’m at 26/46 and I’ll probably stay there.

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Ben There, Dan That is the first of a series of two adventure games made in Adventure Game Studio. They follow a comical duo of British guys on their journey through time in space.

I’m sorry to say this, but the game was barely playable for me. It has humor. It also has style. Nothing can take away from that. Sadly, it also has bad animations, painfully slow gameplay and an annoying set of controls and interface. These things made the game a pain to get through, so I’m glad it didn’t last long for me complete it.

Ben There, Dan That

It may have been worth the money, but certainly not the trouble.

That being said, there’s still the sequel to get through and, from what I hear, it’s longer than Ben There, Dan That. This means I won’t be playing it any time soon. I just don’t have the willpower to get through it, even with a guide.It took me 20 minutes of painful walking back and forth before I decided I’m done and used a guide to complete the rest of it. As I said, it’s a funny story, the style is OK, but the way it’s made just makes it an annoyance.

EDIT: I was told this is a horrible review, so let me do a short attempt to “fix” it.

In short, the game is great in almost every way, but for me, it’s ruined by bad and sluggish control. The humor is great, the story is silly as it should be and the puzzles are cool, but I can’t get past how badly and slowly it controls. Someone else might be able to, but I can’t.

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If I keep up at this pace, I might run out of games in a couple of years.

And Yet It Moves is a puzzle platformer, I’d say. It’s another game I got in an ancient bundle. Unlike the few others I’ve played recently, I actually already had some experience with this one. You see, one of the holiday sale achievements from a year ago, I think, required me to complete the first world of this game.

There’s three worlds total in the game, meaning I was already one third of the way there when I started today. The remaining two worlds were completed quickly enough, taking me around two hours total to complete the entire game.

And Yet It Moves Credits

You rarely get to play through the credits of the game.

It’s entertaining enough, but it’s obviously short. I can’t really hold that against the game, though, because I think the mechanics and the gameplay would have gotten old soon enough. This way, the game kept me entertained long enough for me to finish it, and no longer.

The mechanics are simple. Your character can walk and jump like in a regular platform game, but you can also rotate the entire world around him, allowing you to reach areas you couldn’t otherwise. The mechanic takes a bit of getting used to, but it’s not too complex and it doesn’t require too much mastery to get through the game. Every once in a while a new element is added to the game, such as parts of the level which respond differently to rotation, enemies, puzzles, etc., which keeps things going and stops the game from getting stale.

In short, And Yet It Moves is somewhat fun and definitely innovative, but it’s not something I’ll be returning to. It has a certain charm, but it’s not extremely memorable. I won’t be getting the achievements of this one any time soon. They aren’t to annoying to get, but do require repeating levels and getting through other game modes that I’m not interested in.

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Critical Mass is another bundle game I got ages ago. I’m a bit tired of adventure games, so I decided to give puzzles a chance and this was the one I picked to play through next.

I’m happy with my decision. Critical Mass is a very fun puzzle game. The goal is to combine cubes in 3D space in groups of four or more. The higher the amount you manage to combine, the more points you get. Cubes are dropped on a central shape with a certain amount of cubes already there. This central shape has a constantly increasing mass, which makes it grow and approach the screen as you progress. The destruction that happens after you combine cubes causes it to recede and gives you more time to destroy them all. If you’re too slow, the mass reaches critical levels and you lose, forced to start back at the beginning.

Critical Mass - Meditation Mode

Meditation is a no-pressure, strategic play mode.

This means there’s a decision you’re constantly making – just combine as fast as possible to push the blocks back a bit, or hold out to get bigger combos, which pushes the blocks back more and fills up your bonus abilities. I have to admit, it was a bit disorienting at first, hard to determine where exactly I’ll be dropping the block and what colour I’m currently dropping, but once you get used to the interface, you realize the game tries very hard to help you see everything clearly and then it becomes much easier. The bonus abilities are also there to help. There are three of those and they unlock progressively, as you accumulate more and more points. The next one is always the more powerful one, so that’s another decision you have to make – use the currently available ability, or take the risk and wait for the one that’s more powerful and more helpful.

There are four modes in the game. I’ve played through all of them, but the classical mode is where the level progression is at. As far as I can remember, there are nine or ten total levels, which I completed in much less than an hour. You earn points and based on the total amount you get, you are ranked, globally. There’s also Survival, where you have to stay afloat for as long as possible. For every group of blocks you destroy, more random blocks are added to the field, so you are eventually forced to create longer combos just as fast as you would usually create basic combos, just to stay alive. Every minute, the critical mass resets, which helps a bit, but eventually isn’t enough to keep you alive by itself.

The last two modes are Rush and Meditation. In Rush, you just have to clear a single level as fast as possible. You lose points for ever second spent, so the amount left is your final score. Mediation has not time pressure of any kind. You get a limited amount of blocks which you need to place around the central grey cube. You have to use these limited blocks to get as many points as you can by arranging them into the longest possible combos.

As I said, I’ve played through all of the modes and enjoyed all of them as well. The thing I like the most is the global ranking system, which is based on the skill points you accumulate. The thing is, the skill points aren’t something you just get more and more off. If you do worse in one of the modes, compared to how you did previously, you actually lose these points, meaning that, apart from playing against the world, you’re also sort of playing against yourself.

In short, Critical Mass is a pretty good puzzle game, with a system in place that makes you go back to it every once in a while. I’ve completed the Classic mode, which has levels, so I’m counting it as completed on my list. I’ve also completed all the other modes at least once, but as far as achievements go, they’re designed in a way that discourages a rush to get them, so I won’t aim for 100% completion any time soon. I’ll keep the game on my hard drive, though, just so I can return to it every now and then, and perhaps get an achievement or two that way.

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Gemini Rue is another adventure game by Wadjet, the same guys that made the Blackwell series. Since I greatly enjoyed the Blackwell games, and I had Gemini Rue in my library for just as long, I decided to give that one a shot to.

I started playing yesterday, soon after writing my last article, and completed it today. Sadly, I didn’t get all the achievements in my first playthrough, missing Space Cowboy, which requires me to find four cameo characters from Cowboy Bebop at random locations in the game, as well as Memento, which requires finding four hidden notes in one of the game’s areas, Center 7. Since I already knew how to go through the game, and I had fast movement enabled, I decided to go for these two achievements soon after I’ve seen the ending. I finally got these last two achievements in about half an hour after starting a new game. I’m not sure how I even missed these things on my first run.

Gemini Rue Screenshot

I should watch Blade Runner

There are a few annoying puzzles, but for the most part, it’s logical and straightforward, with very little pixel searching needed to complete the main story. There’s plenty of pixel searching for achievements, of course, but that shouldn’t matter, in my opinion. There are issues, though, mostly related to the engine the game uses. Adventure Game Studio is buggy on my system, extremely so. Every time I reload a save, the graphics get messed up, I can’t alt-tab properly and sometimes I get stuck in the escape menu for no apparent reason. I also had a couple of crashes during my sessions.The game is excellent, by the way. The story is deep, interesting and much more developed than in the Blackwell series. Since I already praised the story of Blackwell, this should say something about how good the story of Gemini Rue actually is.

Still, as flawed as the engine is, it’s a great game and one of the better adventure games I’ve played. However, after completing five adventure games in two days, I think I’ve got enough of them for now. My next game will be something different.