Activision for 2001 would very likely be Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2. A very faithful as you can in isometric view conversion of the original game, even was the first US launched 3D (partial) game as all the skaters are polygonal for more fluid animation.
THQ sucks but they did get one really solid game out developed by MTO in 2001 - GT Advance aka Advance GTA in Japan. Voxel looking for a launch game engine, very basic, but has a really good driving and handling model. The only fault in it, THQ cheaped and removed the battery and put a long password which isn't fun but the JP release has one and it's all in english. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_Advance_Championship_Racing
Activision for 2001 would very likely be Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2. A very faithful as you can in isometric view conversion of the original game, even was the first US launched 3D (partial) game as all the skaters are polygonal for more fluid animation.
THQ sucks but they did get one really solid game out developed by MTO in 2001 - GT Advance aka Advance GTA in Japan. Voxel looking for a launch game engine, very basic, but has a really good driving and handling model. The only fault in it, THQ cheaped and removed the battery and put a long password which isn't fun but the JP release has one and it's all in english. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_...
I already own Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, and it just isn't really for me. I don't really like skateboarding in general, and I think skateboard stunting may be one of the dumbest professional sports things out there.
I enjoy Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarding quite a bit more just because I enjoy watching extreme winter sports a lot.
What I'm leaning towards with Activision is Bomberman Tournament. Activision put that game out, and while it's obviously a Hudson game, I'm focusing on what the best game the Publisher put out was, not who developed it.
As for THQ, I'm currently leaning towards Tetris Worlds, or Hot Wheels Burnin' Rubber, as it's basically "GT Advance Deluxe".
I've also concluded that E.T The Extra Terrestrial is WAY better than Tom and Jerry the Magic Ring. I played it on emulator for way longer than I ever expected, and only took a break when I felt I had been playing too long rather than just wanting to stop playing.
Midway I have no clue yet as I haven't looked into any of their games.
Crave is basically a case of "pick your poison" as everything they put out sucks.
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
The "Exploration Castlevania" games are always a good time. I wouldn't say any of these games are outstandingly amazing, but you can be pretty sure that you'll have fun playing any of them. The first Castlevania game I ever decided to try out was Aria of Sorrow back when it came out in 2003, and it got me interested in Castlevania mostly as an onlooker. I played and finished Aria of Sorrow, Dawn of Sorrow, and Portrait of Ruin, but Portrait of Ruin was so easy to me that it made me lose interest in the Castlevania titles.
I've always wanted an excuse to go back and play the others in this style I never got around to, and so far I've been liking Circle of the Moon a lot. It's nice to play one of these games where the whip is still the weapon of choice. I started Castlevania at a point where swords were the king, and whips were garbage. I also enjoy that the heart and sub weapon feature is still in place in this game, which gives it a nicer blend with classic titles than Aria of Sorrow's radically different weapon and spell selection.
As for the thread as a whole, I've been thinking I may change my goal a little bit. While it would certainly be cool to have every GBA title from 2001 complete, I think for now I'm going to focus on a smaller set within the big picture.
At least for the time being I'm going to be aiming to get the best, or most significant title each publisher put out in 2001. From that point on, I'll decide if I'm going to continue this, but what will likely happen is that at that point I'll still collect every GBA title from 2001, but I'll be buying loose carts instead.
I still have to figure out exactly what this new list will look like, but here's the work in progress.
Namco: Pac-Man Collection (Sorry Klonoa fans)
Nintendo: Wario Land 4
Capcom: Mega Man Battle Network
Konami: Castlevania Circle of the Moon
Sega: Chu Chu Rocket
EA: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Majesco: Iridion 3D
Ubisoft: Rayman Advance
Kemco: Phalanx
Conspiricy Entertainment: Gadget Racers
Telegames: Back Track
TDK: Lady Sia
Take Two Interactive: Tang Tang
Dream Catcher: Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion
This will make the set a much more reasonable goal of 28 titles, and there are still some pretty tough ones to knock out from that set. I have to do a bit more looking into the gameplay of certain games to decide what fills the slot of the other publishers. NewKidCo only put out two games in 2001, and I already own a boxed Tom and Jerry The Magic Ring, but I still want to look more into E.T The Extra Terrestrial as it actually looks to be a better game. Stuff like that will take a little while to finalize.
We'll see where things go from here on out, but hopefully this will narrow my focus a little bit instead of buying absoultely everything all at once. Plus after last month where I bought a lot of obscure games, I'm about ready to buy some good stuff like Caslevania, Wario and Mega Man. Probably the most noteworthy franchise I bought from last month was Chu Chu Rocket. : /
I already own Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, and it just isn't really for me. I don't really like skateboarding in general, and I think skateboard stunting may be one of the dumbest professional sports things out there.
I enjoy Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarding quite a bit more just because I enjoy watching extreme winter sports a lot.
What I'm leaning towards with Activision is Bomberman Tournament. Activision put that game out, and while it's obviously a Hudson game, I'm focusing on what the best game the Publisher put out was, not who developed it.
As for THQ, I'm currently leaning towards Tetris Worlds, or Hot Wheels Burnin' Rubber, as it's basically "GT Advance Deluxe".
I agree about skateboarding I guess. But as a fantasy game it has a lot of meat to it and takes considerable skill and time to nail it and I was basing it on that.
Tetris Worlds is disgusting, probably the worst licensed Tetris game in 20 years, you can't be serious as it's broken, play and scoring. If you don't like the GT game with the good handling model, go with that Hot Wheels game. And I also agree with you on Bomberman for Activision.
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
I recognize that copy
Did you trade it in? : O
MostlyMusic had boxed copies of Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance for a long while, but I missed out on both of them. About a month later they got in another boxed copy of Circle of the Moon, and I was able to pick that one up. They also were charging a bit less than the previous copy which was listed at 69.99, so I got this copy for 59.99. Was very happy how that all worked out.
The game has been great fun so far. I just got a spell card that lets me turn my whip into a sword, and I'll basically never be removing it. XD
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
I recognize that copy
Did you trade it in? : O
MostlyMusic had boxed copies of Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance for a long while, but I missed out on both of them. About a month later they got in another boxed copy of Circle of the Moon, and I was able to pick that one up. They also were charging a bit less than the previous copy which was listed at 69.99, so I got this copy for 59.99. Was very happy how that all worked out.
The game has been great fun so far. I just got a spell card that lets me turn my whip into a sword, and I'll basically never be removing it. XD
Yeah I had a dupe, so I traded it in. Once made a deal with a guy here for a big bundle of GBA stuff and Circle of the Moon happened to be in the pile, so Mostly Music got a few dupes from me that day.
Awesome! Well, it's a very lovely copy! I finished the game last night and it was really good. I'm still trying to beat the Battle Arena. The final boss was really tough, but it was really fun too.
Also I got money today, so I was able to order some big items. I wanted to knock out some heavy hitters this month, so the number of games I buy this month will be significantly smaller due to the cost of expensive titles. Looking forward to them after how awesome Castlevania Circle of the Moon was.
I mean, I owned Tetris Worlds as a kid and I liked it.
Wow my condolences.
Just for fun, it's not a 01 release, but I very very strongly suggest you research the Tetris Advance release in Japan. It's the only real Tetris game for the GBA (outside of Dr Mario/Tetris mash up.) It has a lot of really excellent modes, score saving, normal scoring for lines and points and it's an all around great package most aren't even aware exists sadly because of that disgusting THQ agreement on Worlds.
I mean, I owned Tetris Worlds as a kid and I liked it.
Wow my condolences.
Just for fun, it's not a 01 release, but I very very strongly suggest you research the Tetris Advance release in Japan. It's the only real Tetris game for the GBA (outside of Dr Mario/Tetris Puzzle League mash up.) It has a lot of really excellent modes, score saving, normal scoring for lines and points and it's an all around great package most aren't even aware exists sadly because of that disgusting THQ agreement on Worlds.
I think you're being a tad extreme here.
I looked into it a little bit, and Tetris Worlds on GBA looks just as great to me as it did back then. In fact, it got me excited to see it again and I went directly to ebay and ordered the copy I've been unsure about for a while now. All the videos online just play standard Tetris with the new music, but the more unique modes are where the fun really is. I remember really enjoying Fusion Tetris. Also the music in Tetris Worlds GBA is great. Unfortunately the only person who has ripped the music did a poor job and it sounds really grainy, but the Mode B remix in particular is fantastic, not to mention one of the only other Tetris games aside from Game Boy Tetris to even feature it.
I don't feel extreme. I wasted money on it making the mistake of not using an early GBA emulator to see if it was solid. It's everything wrong about Tetris that they did get right in the earlier games on GB/GBC. Trust me, look and see this (covers Endless and Time Attack):
Not run are Challenge Mode, vs Standard and vs Arrange. Saves the high scores too. Mostly in english, just a few easy to get around pause/sub menus are not. I got this years ago at a Book Off out west for under $5 and so worth it. I only wish I knew about it in the earlier 2000s.
Personally I just don't see what exactly they did "wrong" in Tetris Worlds, but I guess it doesn't really matter. I'm still excited for it to arrive, and I still think it's a solid game.
Whatever you like best works best. It's just generally a known thing if you go mining for reviews of it as it got panned hard for all sorts of stuff. If you were a kid or whatever and grew up with it and that was your like stater Tetris you have memories about it probably would be a really fun ride again. I just was pointing out there was a true to form version of Tetris that got locked out of the US by THQ because they had the rights to that one too for publishing in Japan, and kept it out of the NA/PAL regions so they could peddle their own creation which was a big shame.
After thinking it over for a few days, I think I'll continue with the overall larger scale project. I'm too far along, and I'm having too much fun to stop at this point. That being said, I do want to focus more towards high quality titles for the time being so I don't get discouraged again.
I have a number of games in the mail for me, so check back some time in early February when things start showing up!
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
Makes sense. There's a good many games, but you're talking just one year. No reason to back off it as most GBA stuff anyway isn't expensive as handheld tends to get blown off when compared to console stuff.
Two more games arrived in the mail for me. Got amazing deals on these two!
GT Advance I got from a Canadian seller on ebay for a measly 10 dollars with free shipping! I'm super happy about it for the price alone, but this is supposedly a really good game on top of that, so I'm excited to give it a whirl. It would have to be pretty impressive to top Gadget Racers though.
Tang Tang I got for $20.00 total after shipping, and I'm really happy about that as prices for this game are a little all over the place. It's based on an arcade game with the same name, but much like Elevator Action and Q*Bert for Game Boy, the game features entirely new level layouts. It's a tad confusing to play, but I'll be able to get the hang of it eventually I'm sure. Looks to be a solid game.
The standard mail hasn't shown up yet today, so there's a slim chance I could get something else today too.
Well there ya go, GT Advance (that's the Advance GTA game I brought up but they cheaped out and removed the save battery for a long password.) It's solid.
Well, I can't believe it, but something else showed up for me today. I kind of can't believe how quickly this got to me.
Notice how it's the proper first print box. This was the print of Tetris Worlds I had as an 11 year old kid, and I wasn't going to settle for any crummy re-print when it comes to my nostalgia.
Apparently this version of Tetris isn't well loved as can be found in almost any youtube comment section for the game, but having played a bunch of it already today, I still fail to see what's so offensive about this version that has everybody so uptight. I guess I can understand people being let down that the game is more objective based than high score driven, but honestly that doesn't really bother me at all. I owned Tetris on Game Boy as a kid, and even still I'd rather play this version over the original GB one any day. If you do want to play an older Tetris though, I'd recommend Tetris Plus on GB before I'd recommend the 1989 Nintendo version, and if you hate all of these options, just play Tetris DS, which is hands down undeniably the best portable version of Tetris that's ever come out.
Regardless of which version you play though, Tetris is always a good time, so just pick whatever version you like.
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
Woo-hoo, bet you can't wait to plunk down your hard-earned cash on these two gems.
Sticking to just the "good games" (aka not these) will probably keep your interest from waning for a good while. Loading up on filler is always a bummer, great way to burn out on any collection.
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
Woo-hoo, bet you can't wait to plunk down your hard-earned cash on these two gems.
Sticking to just the "good games" (aka not these) will probably keep your interest from waning for a good while. Loading up on filler is always a bummer, great way to burn out on any collection.
Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase will be a bummer for sure, but I'll still play through it. I have a fondness for playing through mediocre GBA games, to the point where I've probably completed more shovelware titles on GBA than high quality ones.
Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 looks to be a pretty good fishing game though, and I'm honestly kind of happy to see it added to the list. One of the first games I ever bought on ebay was Virtual Fishing back when I was super in love with the Virtual Boy in the mid 2000's. We bought a VB when it came out in 1995, and years later when I found out about all the Japanese exclusives, I wanted to play a bunch of them. I was surprised how much I really enjoyed Virtual Fishing, and I beat the whole game despite not being able to read it. It has one of the best soundtracks on the Virtual Boy, featuring a bunch of very lovely relaxing tunes, and along with the dark/quiet isolation of playing a Virtual Boy in the wee hours of the morning, Virtual Fishing was a wonderful game to fully immerse myself in and relax before bed.
Ever since then I've had a huge soft spot for fishing games even though a lot of them aren't so great. Always makes me think fondly of the chill world of Virtual Fishing.
The modern eye would look at this and immediately think "why on earth would a company ever release a game based on E.T after the Atari incident?"
This game and a few other E.T titles were released around the same time in honour of the movie's 20th anniversary, and was simply part of the cross media promotion for the re-release of the movie on DVD. There were also a number of original books released around the same time based on E.T, and a lot of the products available are advertised in the manual to this game.
So here we are with "E.T The Extra Terrestrial" on Game Boy Advance.
E.T on GBA hits all the right notes to be an enjoyable bad game. A solid first couple of levels, a really long tedious level, a long trial and error puzzle level, an okay, yet still poorly controling vehicle level, an autoscrolling level with a horribly concieved gimmick, and lastly copy all the level gimmicks a second time to make the game twice as long.
E.T is almost a competent game and plays pretty well for the most part, but every level gimmick has some laughably poor aspect to it that makes them an enjoyable frustration to get through. It's a bit of a slog to get through level three, four and five, but it's worth it to get to level six.
The most iconic part of the movie is Elliot and E.T riding the bicycle through the air, sillouetted against the light of the moon while the music swells. It's one of the only happy moments of the entire film, and fills your heart with that Spielberg movie magic.
Which makes the autoscrolling bicycle levels in the GBA game absolutely side-splitting as the bike crashes into trees, telephone poles, and water towers with comical stock metal crunching sounds, complete with the bike spinning around like an escaping hubcap off a car that just crashed. It's fuckin' histerical, and you WILL crash a ton, because the level has this atrocious gimmick where you have to shift between three plains into the foreground, middle and background to dodge all this shit coming at you. Of course the game makes no real effort to make this easy to comprehend, so you're bound to crash into absolutely everything, game over a bunch, and have E.T get captured during the only moment in the film where he has the upper hand.
I don't think I've ever laughed so hard playing a bad video game, and honestly a lot of it is just in the context of the scene the level is based on. It's one of THE most iconic scenes in any movie, and here's a game that's supposed to be cross promotion for it, and it makes a complete farce of it as if it were an episode of Tiny Toons.
Games like this are why I love GBA shovelware, because no other type of game can make me giggle so hard at the stupid shit I'm looking at. If you love poorly made games the same way you love poorly made movies, look no further than the original Playstation, the Dreamcast, and the bowels of the GBA library. There's some comedy gold to be found in those caves, and I had such a good time with this game that I'm more than happy to own a boxed copy to proudly display on my shelf. XD
Well, one of the big ones arrived for me today. I paid a decent wad of cash for this game, and even though it isn't what anyone would call a pristine copy, I'm incredibly excited to own it!
One of the big goals of this project was to discover other high quality games from my favourite year of the GBA. Dokapon Monster Hunter is one I had absolutely never heard of, and once I started looking into it I was super anxious to play it, to the point where I even played it on emulator a little bit before I was able to find a copy. It's not a common game to find with the box, and so I basically said to myself that I'd buy any copy that gets listed to not only play the game in a hurry, but to also knock it off the list earlier than later. The copy I bought isn't super crisp, but I'm still super happy about it, and I'll admit I even paid an inflated price for it. I paid $106 Canadian, with an absurd $38 dollar shipping cost from the netherlands, for a total of $144.00 Canadian for this one game. I was that pumped about owning/playing this game, and I don't regret it one bit. The game is absolutely great, and I'm excited to play an obscure, high quality GBA game I had never even heard of before.
It has a feature I absolutely love in RPGs. An absurdly, unfairly crippling punishment for death. The game also does something my brothers and I have only joked about, which is a game autosaving the instant you die so you can't save scum. We previously thought no game developer would be that uptight about making sure you play by their rules, but I'm filled with a somewhat masochistic glee that a game was devious enough to do it. Sure enough when I died, I tried to turn the power off to see if it worked, and when you boot the game back up it starts you in the death animation. What a bunch of delightfully fiendish bullshit.
When you die in this game, you lose all the items in your inventory, INCLUDING equipment, and you lose ALL of your money. Losing your equipment may not seem so bad since you can just re-enter areas and find new weapons and shields, but your weapons and shields gain bonus stats the more you use them, so losing a piece of equipment you've been using for a long time absolutely DESTROYS your stats since you not only lose the default equipment stats, but you lose ALL of your extra buffs attached to those specific pieces of equipment. However you can save items in the trunk in your house, and you can deposit cash in a bank, but it follows Revelations The Demon Slayer rules where you have to make a minimum deposit of 1000 "money", which isn't a small amount of cash in this game.
Death in an RPG should be absolutely heart wrenching, and this may be one of the most devastating RPGs to die in, as once it's happened, there's no going back. It's most certainly part of the experience, and it's absolutely going to happen when you play this game, so how you prepare for death is one of the core strategies when you play this game. You can never grind enough, and you can never have enough back up weapons and shields prepared for when it happens.
So far I've managed to make it through the first two levels, and even in level TWO they start throwing two end of area bosses at you, so like I said, you can never grind enough. I managed to beat the bosses of level two in one go, but even then it was close. This game doesn't fuck around, and if you love tough as nails RPGs, you'll fall in love with this game the same way you probably love the NES version of Dragon Warrior II you disturbed masochist.
I think I've made it quite clear I'm super happy about owning this game.
No going back? Why? Does it auto save your death just to screw you over entirely in the process? I would think if you know it's over you flip the game off and just pick up at the last save, and if it does do that, kill the game before the death blow is dropped. Best to lose a little progress than to destroy any will left to play the game losing hours of work on specific gear that will never come back.
I haven't tested turning it off before the final hit is delivered, but that goes against the spirit of the game. The idea is that death is harsh, and how you prepare for death is a core mechanic of the game. Save scumming in this game rips it of its most defining feature, to the point where the developers made extra effort to make sure you don't do it. If you're playing carefully, death will be less terrible than it could be, and it rewards meticulous players that don't go head first into a dungeon they aren't ready for. It may not be for everyone, but I really appreciate this game's harsh mentality.
The motherload of packages showed up today! Four parcels, eight GBA boxes! I took a picture of them all together, but figured I should put some blatant security on the image.
Mega Man Battle Network was expensive, but I'm super excited to play it. The only Battle Network game I played before was MMBN 5, so it will be fun to see the origins of this sub-series. One of the best things I'm getting this month.
Planet Monsters is the best looking game that Titus put out, so I wanted to snag a copy of it. Somehow found an absolutely gorgeous copy of something so obscure.
Rayman Advance is another great one, as I've been interested in playing it ever since watching the AGDQ speedruns of it. Looks like a fun game, and apparently they toned down some of the dumber parts of the game in this version.
the other five I got in a lot from coffewithmrsaturn. With the exception of No Rules Get Phat, all of these are either Box + manual only, or Box only. I know where I can pick up cheap cartridges of all of these games, and I already owned a cartridge + manual for the box only pitfall, so it won't be hard to fill these up. I'm particularly happy about No Rules Get Phat and Atlantis The Lost Empire, as they're more obscure than the other three, and could have taken a while to track down for a reasonable price if not for mrsaturn.
A huge boost to the collection in a single day. I still have some other games in the mail though, so it's not over quite yet for this month. Basically once everything shows up though, you won't hear much from me until late February at the earliest.
I got some of those pesky Kemco games marked off the list with the arrival of Phalanx and Top Gear GT Championship. In case you were wondering, yes Phalanx is a port of that SNES shoot 'em up with a banjo playing farmer on the front cover. I played a bit of it so far, and even on the GBA this game is such a Super Nintendo game it hurts. Explosions everywhere and kickass rock music all throughout.
Top Gear GT Championship is an okay racing game, but is very lacking compared the the Top Gear series Kemco put out on the SNES. The lack of music during races is a huge bummer considering the SNES games were oozing with style due to their soundtracks. A different developer was in charge of this game compared to the SNES games, so it's not anywhere near as good. At least the game does let you save your data, which isn't always a given in the early GBA days. As a side note, even though Phalanx was about 30 dollars more expensive, I'd argue this game is a way harder Kemco game to track down complete. Rarity doesn't always equal more money kids.
Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion was bought this month for the sub-set of "most noteworthy game from each publisher", as this is the best thing Dreamcatcher put out in 2001 for GBA. I'm actually pretty excited to play it, but I want to finish a few other games before I start it. I'm starting to fall massively far behind in completing these games, as Dokapon Monster Hunter has been hogging my GBA for over a week now.
Sports Illustrated for Kids Baseball is leftover filler from last month that finally showed up. Took forever for this to arrive for some reason. Every baseball video game ever made is collection filler, and I have yet to play a good one.
I have two more games in the mail, and then that will be it for me until the 21st. I'll have a lot of time to play catch up and try to finish playing some of these games.
Phalanx is a great game and that GBA conversion was done well, the antithesis of that rank ruined R-Type 3 release. I totally forgot that was a 2001 title.
Phalanx is a great game and that GBA conversion was done well, the antithesis of that rank ruined R-Type 3 release. I totally forgot that was a 2001 title.
You can probably place a lot of the blame on the publisher for R-Type III. In the case of Earthworm Jim and Earthworm Jim 2, Majesco were super assholes about getting the games made, and hired development teams that consisted of two or three people to convert the games. The few people who worked on those versions are prevelent in youtube comment sections, and make sure people know it wasn't their fault as they were given a ridiculous deadline and barely any help.
DSI is even worse than both Majesco and THQ, as I can't think of a single good game they've published, where I can think of many good games THQ and Majesco put out. I wouldn't be surprised at all to find out DSI gave the dev team next to no money to convert R-Type III.
Two more GBA games from 2001 added to the list. Another bothersome Kemco title in the form of "Mech Platoon", and Electronic Arts' "Lego Bionicle".
I think I'm going to have to buy the other three issues of Nintendo Power Advance. I previously bought Issue #3 for my Golden Sun collection, but it's turned out to be a very valuable resource for figuring out what games came out in 2001.
Comments
THQ sucks but they did get one really solid game out developed by MTO in 2001 - GT Advance aka Advance GTA in Japan. Voxel looking for a launch game engine, very basic, but has a really good driving and handling model. The only fault in it, THQ cheaped and removed the battery and put a long password which isn't fun but the JP release has one and it's all in english. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_Advance_Championship_Racing
Activision for 2001 would very likely be Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2. A very faithful as you can in isometric view conversion of the original game, even was the first US launched 3D (partial) game as all the skaters are polygonal for more fluid animation.
THQ sucks but they did get one really solid game out developed by MTO in 2001 - GT Advance aka Advance GTA in Japan. Voxel looking for a launch game engine, very basic, but has a really good driving and handling model. The only fault in it, THQ cheaped and removed the battery and put a long password which isn't fun but the JP release has one and it's all in english. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GT_...
I already own Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, and it just isn't really for me. I don't really like skateboarding in general, and I think skateboard stunting may be one of the dumbest professional sports things out there.
I enjoy Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarding quite a bit more just because I enjoy watching extreme winter sports a lot.
What I'm leaning towards with Activision is Bomberman Tournament. Activision put that game out, and while it's obviously a Hudson game, I'm focusing on what the best game the Publisher put out was, not who developed it.
As for THQ, I'm currently leaning towards Tetris Worlds, or Hot Wheels Burnin' Rubber, as it's basically "GT Advance Deluxe".
I've also concluded that E.T The Extra Terrestrial is WAY better than Tom and Jerry the Magic Ring. I played it on emulator for way longer than I ever expected, and only took a break when I felt I had been playing too long rather than just wanting to stop playing.
Midway I have no clue yet as I haven't looked into any of their games.
Crave is basically a case of "pick your poison" as everything they put out sucks.
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
The "Exploration Castlevania" games are always a good time. I wouldn't say any of these games are outstandingly amazing, but you can be pretty sure that you'll have fun playing any of them. The first Castlevania game I ever decided to try out was Aria of Sorrow back when it came out in 2003, and it got me interested in Castlevania mostly as an onlooker. I played and finished Aria of Sorrow, Dawn of Sorrow, and Portrait of Ruin, but Portrait of Ruin was so easy to me that it made me lose interest in the Castlevania titles.
I've always wanted an excuse to go back and play the others in this style I never got around to, and so far I've been liking Circle of the Moon a lot. It's nice to play one of these games where the whip is still the weapon of choice. I started Castlevania at a point where swords were the king, and whips were garbage. I also enjoy that the heart and sub weapon feature is still in place in this game, which gives it a nicer blend with classic titles than Aria of Sorrow's radically different weapon and spell selection.
As for the thread as a whole, I've been thinking I may change my goal a little bit. While it would certainly be cool to have every GBA title from 2001 complete, I think for now I'm going to focus on a smaller set within the big picture.
At least for the time being I'm going to be aiming to get the best, or most significant title each publisher put out in 2001. From that point on, I'll decide if I'm going to continue this, but what will likely happen is that at that point I'll still collect every GBA title from 2001, but I'll be buying loose carts instead.
I still have to figure out exactly what this new list will look like, but here's the work in progress.
Namco: Pac-Man Collection (Sorry Klonoa fans)
Nintendo: Wario Land 4
Capcom: Mega Man Battle Network
Konami: Castlevania Circle of the Moon
Sega: Chu Chu Rocket
EA: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Majesco: Iridion 3D
Ubisoft: Rayman Advance
Kemco: Phalanx
Conspiricy Entertainment: Gadget Racers
Telegames: Back Track
TDK: Lady Sia
Take Two Interactive: Tang Tang
Dream Catcher: Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion
Asmik Ace: Dokapon Monster Hunter
Universal Interactive: Spyro Season of Ice
3DO: Army Men Advance
Atlus: Super Dodge Ball Advance
bam! Entertainment: Dexter's Laboratory: Deesaster Strikes
Destination Software: Snood
Lego: Lego Island 2: Brickster's Revenge
Titus: Planet Monsters
NewKidCo: E.T The Extra Terrestrial
THQ: ???
Activision: ???
Midway: ???
Crave: ???
Acclaim: ???
This will make the set a much more reasonable goal of 28 titles, and there are still some pretty tough ones to knock out from that set. I have to do a bit more looking into the gameplay of certain games to decide what fills the slot of the other publishers. NewKidCo only put out two games in 2001, and I already own a boxed Tom and Jerry The Magic Ring, but I still want to look more into E.T The Extra Terrestrial as it actually looks to be a better game. Stuff like that will take a little while to finalize.
We'll see where things go from here on out, but hopefully this will narrow my focus a little bit instead of buying absoultely everything all at once. Plus after last month where I bought a lot of obscure games, I'm about ready to buy some good stuff like Caslevania, Wario and Mega Man. Probably the most noteworthy franchise I bought from last month was Chu Chu Rocket. : /
See you next post!
I recognize that copy
I already own Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, and it just isn't really for me. I don't really like skateboarding in general, and I think skateboard stunting may be one of the dumbest professional sports things out there.
I enjoy Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarding quite a bit more just because I enjoy watching extreme winter sports a lot.
What I'm leaning towards with Activision is Bomberman Tournament. Activision put that game out, and while it's obviously a Hudson game, I'm focusing on what the best game the Publisher put out was, not who developed it.
As for THQ, I'm currently leaning towards Tetris Worlds, or Hot Wheels Burnin' Rubber, as it's basically "GT Advance Deluxe".
I agree about skateboarding I guess. But as a fantasy game it has a lot of meat to it and takes considerable skill and time to nail it and I was basing it on that.
Tetris Worlds is disgusting, probably the worst licensed Tetris game in 20 years, you can't be serious as it's broken, play and scoring. If you don't like the GT game with the good handling model, go with that Hot Wheels game. And I also agree with you on Bomberman for Activision.
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
I recognize that copy
Did you trade it in? : O
MostlyMusic had boxed copies of Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance for a long while, but I missed out on both of them. About a month later they got in another boxed copy of Circle of the Moon, and I was able to pick that one up. They also were charging a bit less than the previous copy which was listed at 69.99, so I got this copy for 59.99. Was very happy how that all worked out.
The game has been great fun so far. I just got a spell card that lets me turn my whip into a sword, and I'll basically never be removing it. XD
Bought this with trade in credit at the game store yesterday.
I recognize that copy
Did you trade it in? : O
MostlyMusic had boxed copies of Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Dissonance for a long while, but I missed out on both of them. About a month later they got in another boxed copy of Circle of the Moon, and I was able to pick that one up. They also were charging a bit less than the previous copy which was listed at 69.99, so I got this copy for 59.99. Was very happy how that all worked out.
The game has been great fun so far. I just got a spell card that lets me turn my whip into a sword, and I'll basically never be removing it. XD
Yeah I had a dupe, so I traded it in. Once made a deal with a guy here for a big bundle of GBA stuff and Circle of the Moon happened to be in the pile, so Mostly Music got a few dupes from me that day.
Also I got money today, so I was able to order some big items. I wanted to knock out some heavy hitters this month, so the number of games I buy this month will be significantly smaller due to the cost of expensive titles. Looking forward to them after how awesome Castlevania Circle of the Moon was.
I mean, I owned Tetris Worlds as a kid and I liked it.
Wow my condolences.
Just for fun, it's not a 01 release, but I very very strongly suggest you research the Tetris Advance release in Japan. It's the only real Tetris game for the GBA (outside of Dr Mario/Tetris mash up.) It has a lot of really excellent modes, score saving, normal scoring for lines and points and it's an all around great package most aren't even aware exists sadly because of that disgusting THQ agreement on Worlds.
I mean, I owned Tetris Worlds as a kid and I liked it.
Wow my condolences.
Just for fun, it's not a 01 release, but I very very strongly suggest you research the Tetris Advance release in Japan. It's the only real Tetris game for the GBA (outside of Dr Mario/Tetris Puzzle League mash up.) It has a lot of really excellent modes, score saving, normal scoring for lines and points and it's an all around great package most aren't even aware exists sadly because of that disgusting THQ agreement on Worlds.
I think you're being a tad extreme here.
I looked into it a little bit, and Tetris Worlds on GBA looks just as great to me as it did back then. In fact, it got me excited to see it again and I went directly to ebay and ordered the copy I've been unsure about for a while now. All the videos online just play standard Tetris with the new music, but the more unique modes are where the fun really is. I remember really enjoying Fusion Tetris. Also the music in Tetris Worlds GBA is great. Unfortunately the only person who has ripped the music did a poor job and it sounds really grainy, but the Mode B remix in particular is fantastic, not to mention one of the only other Tetris games aside from Game Boy Tetris to even feature it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92JaG2s_QHk&index=4&list=PL715C2F3818A78C53
Also I'll be honest, I looked up that Japanese Tetris Advance and it doesn't look better than Tetris Worlds to me. Looks very bland in comparison.
Not run are Challenge Mode, vs Standard and vs Arrange. Saves the high scores too. Mostly in english, just a few easy to get around pause/sub menus are not. I got this years ago at a Book Off out west for under $5 and so worth it. I only wish I knew about it in the earlier 2000s.
I have a number of games in the mail for me, so check back some time in early February when things start showing up!
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
GT Advance I got from a Canadian seller on ebay for a measly 10 dollars with free shipping! I'm super happy about it for the price alone, but this is supposedly a really good game on top of that, so I'm excited to give it a whirl. It would have to be pretty impressive to top Gadget Racers though.
Tang Tang I got for $20.00 total after shipping, and I'm really happy about that as prices for this game are a little all over the place. It's based on an arcade game with the same name, but much like Elevator Action and Q*Bert for Game Boy, the game features entirely new level layouts. It's a tad confusing to play, but I'll be able to get the hang of it eventually I'm sure. Looks to be a solid game.
The standard mail hasn't shown up yet today, so there's a slim chance I could get something else today too.
Notice how it's the proper first print box. This was the print of Tetris Worlds I had as an 11 year old kid, and I wasn't going to settle for any crummy re-print when it comes to my nostalgia.
Apparently this version of Tetris isn't well loved as can be found in almost any youtube comment section for the game, but having played a bunch of it already today, I still fail to see what's so offensive about this version that has everybody so uptight. I guess I can understand people being let down that the game is more objective based than high score driven, but honestly that doesn't really bother me at all. I owned Tetris on Game Boy as a kid, and even still I'd rather play this version over the original GB one any day. If you do want to play an older Tetris though, I'd recommend Tetris Plus on GB before I'd recommend the 1989 Nintendo version, and if you hate all of these options, just play Tetris DS, which is hands down undeniably the best portable version of Tetris that's ever come out.
Regardless of which version you play though, Tetris is always a good time, so just pick whatever version you like.
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
Woo-hoo, bet you can't wait to plunk down your hard-earned cash on these two gems.
Sticking to just the "good games" (aka not these) will probably keep your interest from waning for a good while. Loading up on filler is always a bummer, great way to burn out on any collection.
EDIT: I also added a couple games to the list that are from 2001. Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, as well as ESPN Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 have been added to the list.
Woo-hoo, bet you can't wait to plunk down your hard-earned cash on these two gems.
Sticking to just the "good games" (aka not these) will probably keep your interest from waning for a good while. Loading up on filler is always a bummer, great way to burn out on any collection.
Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase will be a bummer for sure, but I'll still play through it. I have a fondness for playing through mediocre GBA games, to the point where I've probably completed more shovelware titles on GBA than high quality ones.
Great Outdoor Games Bass 2002 looks to be a pretty good fishing game though, and I'm honestly kind of happy to see it added to the list. One of the first games I ever bought on ebay was Virtual Fishing back when I was super in love with the Virtual Boy in the mid 2000's. We bought a VB when it came out in 1995, and years later when I found out about all the Japanese exclusives, I wanted to play a bunch of them. I was surprised how much I really enjoyed Virtual Fishing, and I beat the whole game despite not being able to read it. It has one of the best soundtracks on the Virtual Boy, featuring a bunch of very lovely relaxing tunes, and along with the dark/quiet isolation of playing a Virtual Boy in the wee hours of the morning, Virtual Fishing was a wonderful game to fully immerse myself in and relax before bed.
Ever since then I've had a huge soft spot for fishing games even though a lot of them aren't so great. Always makes me think fondly of the chill world of Virtual Fishing.
The modern eye would look at this and immediately think "why on earth would a company ever release a game based on E.T after the Atari incident?"
This game and a few other E.T titles were released around the same time in honour of the movie's 20th anniversary, and was simply part of the cross media promotion for the re-release of the movie on DVD. There were also a number of original books released around the same time based on E.T, and a lot of the products available are advertised in the manual to this game.
So here we are with "E.T The Extra Terrestrial" on Game Boy Advance.
E.T on GBA hits all the right notes to be an enjoyable bad game. A solid first couple of levels, a really long tedious level, a long trial and error puzzle level, an okay, yet still poorly controling vehicle level, an autoscrolling level with a horribly concieved gimmick, and lastly copy all the level gimmicks a second time to make the game twice as long.
E.T is almost a competent game and plays pretty well for the most part, but every level gimmick has some laughably poor aspect to it that makes them an enjoyable frustration to get through. It's a bit of a slog to get through level three, four and five, but it's worth it to get to level six.
The most iconic part of the movie is Elliot and E.T riding the bicycle through the air, sillouetted against the light of the moon while the music swells. It's one of the only happy moments of the entire film, and fills your heart with that Spielberg movie magic.
Which makes the autoscrolling bicycle levels in the GBA game absolutely side-splitting as the bike crashes into trees, telephone poles, and water towers with comical stock metal crunching sounds, complete with the bike spinning around like an escaping hubcap off a car that just crashed. It's fuckin' histerical, and you WILL crash a ton, because the level has this atrocious gimmick where you have to shift between three plains into the foreground, middle and background to dodge all this shit coming at you. Of course the game makes no real effort to make this easy to comprehend, so you're bound to crash into absolutely everything, game over a bunch, and have E.T get captured during the only moment in the film where he has the upper hand.
I don't think I've ever laughed so hard playing a bad video game, and honestly a lot of it is just in the context of the scene the level is based on. It's one of THE most iconic scenes in any movie, and here's a game that's supposed to be cross promotion for it, and it makes a complete farce of it as if it were an episode of Tiny Toons.
Games like this are why I love GBA shovelware, because no other type of game can make me giggle so hard at the stupid shit I'm looking at. If you love poorly made games the same way you love poorly made movies, look no further than the original Playstation, the Dreamcast, and the bowels of the GBA library. There's some comedy gold to be found in those caves, and I had such a good time with this game that I'm more than happy to own a boxed copy to proudly display on my shelf. XD
One of the big goals of this project was to discover other high quality games from my favourite year of the GBA. Dokapon Monster Hunter is one I had absolutely never heard of, and once I started looking into it I was super anxious to play it, to the point where I even played it on emulator a little bit before I was able to find a copy. It's not a common game to find with the box, and so I basically said to myself that I'd buy any copy that gets listed to not only play the game in a hurry, but to also knock it off the list earlier than later. The copy I bought isn't super crisp, but I'm still super happy about it, and I'll admit I even paid an inflated price for it. I paid $106 Canadian, with an absurd $38 dollar shipping cost from the netherlands, for a total of $144.00 Canadian for this one game. I was that pumped about owning/playing this game, and I don't regret it one bit. The game is absolutely great, and I'm excited to play an obscure, high quality GBA game I had never even heard of before.
It has a feature I absolutely love in RPGs. An absurdly, unfairly crippling punishment for death. The game also does something my brothers and I have only joked about, which is a game autosaving the instant you die so you can't save scum. We previously thought no game developer would be that uptight about making sure you play by their rules, but I'm filled with a somewhat masochistic glee that a game was devious enough to do it. Sure enough when I died, I tried to turn the power off to see if it worked, and when you boot the game back up it starts you in the death animation. What a bunch of delightfully fiendish bullshit.
When you die in this game, you lose all the items in your inventory, INCLUDING equipment, and you lose ALL of your money. Losing your equipment may not seem so bad since you can just re-enter areas and find new weapons and shields, but your weapons and shields gain bonus stats the more you use them, so losing a piece of equipment you've been using for a long time absolutely DESTROYS your stats since you not only lose the default equipment stats, but you lose ALL of your extra buffs attached to those specific pieces of equipment. However you can save items in the trunk in your house, and you can deposit cash in a bank, but it follows Revelations The Demon Slayer rules where you have to make a minimum deposit of 1000 "money", which isn't a small amount of cash in this game.
Death in an RPG should be absolutely heart wrenching, and this may be one of the most devastating RPGs to die in, as once it's happened, there's no going back. It's most certainly part of the experience, and it's absolutely going to happen when you play this game, so how you prepare for death is one of the core strategies when you play this game. You can never grind enough, and you can never have enough back up weapons and shields prepared for when it happens.
So far I've managed to make it through the first two levels, and even in level TWO they start throwing two end of area bosses at you, so like I said, you can never grind enough. I managed to beat the bosses of level two in one go, but even then it was close. This game doesn't fuck around, and if you love tough as nails RPGs, you'll fall in love with this game the same way you probably love the NES version of Dragon Warrior II you disturbed masochist.
I think I've made it quite clear I'm super happy about owning this game.
Mega Man Battle Network was expensive, but I'm super excited to play it. The only Battle Network game I played before was MMBN 5, so it will be fun to see the origins of this sub-series. One of the best things I'm getting this month.
Planet Monsters is the best looking game that Titus put out, so I wanted to snag a copy of it. Somehow found an absolutely gorgeous copy of something so obscure.
Rayman Advance is another great one, as I've been interested in playing it ever since watching the AGDQ speedruns of it. Looks like a fun game, and apparently they toned down some of the dumber parts of the game in this version.
the other five I got in a lot from coffewithmrsaturn. With the exception of No Rules Get Phat, all of these are either Box + manual only, or Box only. I know where I can pick up cheap cartridges of all of these games, and I already owned a cartridge + manual for the box only pitfall, so it won't be hard to fill these up. I'm particularly happy about No Rules Get Phat and Atlantis The Lost Empire, as they're more obscure than the other three, and could have taken a while to track down for a reasonable price if not for mrsaturn.
A huge boost to the collection in a single day. I still have some other games in the mail though, so it's not over quite yet for this month. Basically once everything shows up though, you won't hear much from me until late February at the earliest.
I got some of those pesky Kemco games marked off the list with the arrival of Phalanx and Top Gear GT Championship. In case you were wondering, yes Phalanx is a port of that SNES shoot 'em up with a banjo playing farmer on the front cover. I played a bit of it so far, and even on the GBA this game is such a Super Nintendo game it hurts. Explosions everywhere and kickass rock music all throughout.
Top Gear GT Championship is an okay racing game, but is very lacking compared the the Top Gear series Kemco put out on the SNES. The lack of music during races is a huge bummer considering the SNES games were oozing with style due to their soundtracks. A different developer was in charge of this game compared to the SNES games, so it's not anywhere near as good. At least the game does let you save your data, which isn't always a given in the early GBA days. As a side note, even though Phalanx was about 30 dollars more expensive, I'd argue this game is a way harder Kemco game to track down complete. Rarity doesn't always equal more money kids.
Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion was bought this month for the sub-set of "most noteworthy game from each publisher", as this is the best thing Dreamcatcher put out in 2001 for GBA. I'm actually pretty excited to play it, but I want to finish a few other games before I start it. I'm starting to fall massively far behind in completing these games, as Dokapon Monster Hunter has been hogging my GBA for over a week now.
Sports Illustrated for Kids Baseball is leftover filler from last month that finally showed up. Took forever for this to arrive for some reason. Every baseball video game ever made is collection filler, and I have yet to play a good one.
I have two more games in the mail, and then that will be it for me until the 21st. I'll have a lot of time to play catch up and try to finish playing some of these games.
Phalanx is a great game and that GBA conversion was done well, the antithesis of that rank ruined R-Type 3 release. I totally forgot that was a 2001 title.
You can probably place a lot of the blame on the publisher for R-Type III. In the case of Earthworm Jim and Earthworm Jim 2, Majesco were super assholes about getting the games made, and hired development teams that consisted of two or three people to convert the games. The few people who worked on those versions are prevelent in youtube comment sections, and make sure people know it wasn't their fault as they were given a ridiculous deadline and barely any help.
DSI is even worse than both Majesco and THQ, as I can't think of a single good game they've published, where I can think of many good games THQ and Majesco put out. I wouldn't be surprised at all to find out DSI gave the dev team next to no money to convert R-Type III.
I think I'm going to have to buy the other three issues of Nintendo Power Advance. I previously bought Issue #3 for my Golden Sun collection, but it's turned out to be a very valuable resource for figuring out what games came out in 2001.