AtomicPurple

The version I’ve always heard isn’t that the expansion pack “randomly fixed it”, but rather that the issue was a memory leak that would cause the game to run out of RAM and crash after a couple hours. The extra memory of the expansion pack would just delay the crash for an additional 6-7 hours. I’m curious how true this is actually is now, as it seems like it would be easy enough to test.

No, it was inaccurate, even at the time. The Famicom was built to cost and and mainly used cheap off-the-shelf components that were already obsolete when the system first released in 1983. The NES released in North America the same year as the Commodore Amiga, a system that actually was cutting edge, and represented a big leap forward in what home computers could do graphically. By the time Mega Man released, the Amiga was on it’s second revision and other home computers were rapidly catching up to it’s capabilities.
While Mega Man was one of the best games on the NES, it ran at the same resolution as every other game on the system, and was stuck working within the same limited color palette and low sprite limit that were more than five years behind the curve when it released.

I’m pretty sure all the edutainment titles predate Charles Martinet as the voice of Mario, and I don’t think Nintendo would ever make a game like that these days.

Because you’re my 5 year old god daughter who always wants to play as “Uwiigi”.

Do they even need to replace him though? There’s a 25-year back catalog of recorded voice lines to recycle, and most of those consist of “Let’s-a-go” and “Yahoooo!” I think the most complex sentace I’ve ever heard Mario speak in game is “Thank-a-you so much for playing my game”. Combine that with AI voice recreation, and there’s literally no reason to ever hire a replacement. Just cut Martinet a big-ass check for perpetual use of his voice, and they’re golden.

I’m surprised that Gran Turismo was number one is 2005. I remember Star Wars Battlefront II being the hot new game everyone was playing at the time, and Star Wars being huge in general due to Episode III releasing that year. Just the fact that a PS2 exclusive driving sim, beat out a multi-platform Star Wars game that was one of the most hyped releases at the time is insane to me.

I like it, but it’s not as good as the original Soul Reaver or Defiance.
The biggest issue this game has is the save system. In the first game where you could save pretty much anywhere and just had to navigate back to the last area you were in after loading. In Soul Reaver 2 you can only save at preset points which can be few and far between. There are sections of the game that take multiple hours to complete on a first playthrough, where you don’t have access to a save point and quitting means losing your progress.
The world design has also been downgraded somewhat IMO. The environments look much nicer and there’s a wider variety of them, but the world as a whole is much less interconnected. The first game was a pseudo metroidvania, where completing an area would unlock shortcuts and everything linked back to a central hub. Soul Reaver 2 is much more linear, and the parts where you do have to backtrack are more tedious as a result.

That would have been the original Soul Reaver. Soul Reaver 2 was a PS2 exclusive

I’m the exact opposite. I love metroidvainas, and will usually tear through them in a few sittings.
A well designed metroidvaina world acts like a single interconnected puzzle box, and unrevealing them is majorly addicting. I go out of my way to backtrack through previous areas whenever I can in order to get every item and find every secret. I very rarely get lost in these games and when I do, figuring out where to go next is usually a simple process of elimination. The real challenge / frustration tends to be figuring out where the last few secrets are hidden after already exploring the whole map map multiple times over.

I absolutely hated Metriod Dread for how linear and hand-holdy is was, and was shocked to find that people actually enjoyed it. Outside of the combat, I had a terrible time with that game. I felt like I was fighting against the level design up until the last 15% or so when it finally opens up and becomes an actual Metroidvaina, albeit not a very good one due to the aggressively linear map structure. Personally, I want to see more games like Dark Souls and Hollow Knight, who’s worlds are so massive and convoluted that I can’t easily intuit exactly where to go and have huge areas that I managed to completely miss on my first play-through.

Personally, I’m interested in the GEX remasters. I’m kind of unclear on how this compares to bog standard emulation, but If they can fix the framerate issues and collision bugs in the 3D games I’ll be sold.

So can this thing actually duplicate the GameCube’s video output? If so, this man’s just created the best worst way to play Kirby Tilt 'n Tumble.

To be fair Nintendo kind of brought that one on themselves by making the cartridges taste bad.