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[BlackDragonSlayer]

For the next couple of reviews, I will only be reviewing games released before the year 2000

Well, looks like that's going to happen, like, never!

VG Rankings and Top 10s (2)

Or, "The Worst Sprites of Pokemon Generation 1"

Pokemon Generation 1 has some great, and even iconic, sprites. Blastoise from the original Japanese Red and Green, Scyther from Red and Blue, Gengar from Yellow, and Charizard's back sprite if you were that kind of kid. And yet, at the same time, some of these sprites are... well, really awful. Like, really, really horrendous. So today, we're counting down the Top 10 worst Gen 1 front sprites, with some that didn't quite make the cut thrown in for good measure. Here goes nothing!

#10

Pidgeot - Red/Blue

This sprite had me thinking for the longest time that Pidgeot was originally designed to have no neck—just one giant body and head. If that's not a testament to how bad it is, then I don't know what is!

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#9

Exeggcute - Red/Blue

It's a quality sprite, except for the fact that someone decided, for whatever reason, to randomly make one of the eggs much larger than the others. Much, much larger. At least it's the one in the center.

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#8

Golem - Red/Blue

When I first saw this sprite, it was because of the MissingNo. glitch messing up my Hall of Fame. I thought I had messed my game up really badly, because there's no way a sprite like this could be real. Now known to me as "Balloon Shell Golem."

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#7

Ekans - Red/Green

no step on snek

except with a mouth like this you can't miss this snek

which looks like a generic nope rope instead of a pokemon

they could've at least put a stripe on it

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#6

Marowak - Red/Blue

Its head is supposed to be a skull? It looks more like its face is made out of rubber. Or like an overstretched tendon or something. I don't really know what to call it; it looks weird with or without an insulting name, though.

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#5

Chansey - Red/Blue

I would not let this thing get anywhere near me to try and heal me. Worst of all, I'd hate to see what it looks like when it's standing straight. Truly the stuff of nightmares. On the other hand, though, it kind of just looks like a balding old man.

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#4

Tangela - Red/Blue

beware

the spaghet monster is going to get you

beware the spaghet

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#3

/ /
Charizard, Dragonite, and Mew - Red/Green

For number three, it's actually a three-way tie between emaciated Charizard, emaciated Dragonite, and emaciated Mew! Because apparently one emaciated Pokemon isn't enough! wanna bet it was the same artist who did all of these

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#2

Gengar - Red/Green

Or as I like to call it, overweight middle-age Gengar. It's not scary at all (unless you're married to it) and look like all it's missing is a wife beater and some oversized jean shorts. Or maybe not even the pants. I don't think this Gengar has much class at all.

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Dishonorable Mentions

Metapod - Yellow
Aside from the fact that Metapod would probably be struggling to hold itself upright, it just looks like a weird shaped thing with a nose. This is such an awful perspective for Metapod. Dear Arceus.


Rattata - Yellow
Compared to Rattata's sprites from the other games, this one somehow manages to have less detail on it than the others. Just... how?!


Fearow - Red/Blue

While not a bad sprite in and of itself, it's nothing like how Fearow should actually look. Kind of makes you wonder if the art department had its stuff together at all.


Nidoran-F - Red/Blue

I don't know what they did to this Nidoran, but it's enough to make me want to speak out against animal testing. That face says it all.


Vulpix - Red/Green

Weird-lookin' eyes are a recurring theme here, as you'll quickly notice.


Jigglypuff - Red/Green
It's seen some things. Not good things.

/
Wigglytuff - Red/Green AND Red/Blue
When you see things for too long, you start to get a little... unwell in the head. Just look at those freaking eyes.

/
Golbat - Red/Green AND Red/Blue

Although I would personally consider Golbat's Red/Blue sprite something that's so bad it rolls over into iconic territory, Golbat's Red/Green sprite has no such saving grace. It's bad.


Mankey - Red/Blue

Devoid of any detail? Check. Looks almost nothing like its future incarnations? Check. Pulling... its own ears? Check...

/ /
Any of Machop's sprites; Yellow's looks the best though.


Tentacruel - Yellow
What's up with its eyes?


Gastly - Red/Green

Wanna bet how much effort this sprite took?


Kingler - Red/Blue
"Do you think they'll notice if we only do half the sprite?" - whoever made this sprite


Hitmonchan - Red/Green
Aah, the classic "Togekiss watching a Doduo take a dump" look. Never gets old.

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#1

Mr. Mime - Red/Blue

Was there really any surprise here? Even today, Mr. Mime is ugly as sin; way back when, it was straight-up nightmare fuel. I don't even know what's wrong with its face. I admittedly feel more pity than fear because it is obviously living an unhappy life with whatever deformity it's been plagued with. I don't want this thing in a trade! Hell, I'll give you some extra 'mons just to make sure you keep this ugly devil as far away from me as possible. Urruggh.

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So we're done. That's it. Go home. Or post below what Gen 1 sprites really drive you crazy because of their awfulness. Cheers.


Really, that's all for today.

[Deku Trombonist]

That was a fun read, some of those sure were scrappy.

And I loved your characterization of Gengar. Poor guy!

[swimswamit]

the way you described hitmonchan's sprite was spot-on, can't unsee that now

[BlackDragonSlayer]

That was a fun read, some of those sure were scrappy.

And I loved your characterization of Gengar. Poor guy!

Hahaha, thank you; glad you enjoyed!

the way you described hitmonchan's sprite was spot-on, can't unsee that now

Yep, that's actually a common joke on the internet. Lots of pictures depicting what it would actually look like with the respective Pokemon.

[E. Gadd Industries]

Discord reaction when

Also, that face you make when you’re hungry and smell your favorite food—and you’re about to eat it

[RichardMichel]

The only ones of those who found phenq reviews and results I've played are Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time. I'm sure I might get to those eventually.

Waiting to waste my time with your Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time reviews. By the way, your reviews are not silly.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

I'm glad that you joined the site to remind me about a four year old promise I made.

I probably should have done a review or two over the summer while I still had time, but I will promise to get one out by the end of November. Can't guarantee it will be either OoT or Super Mario 64, but it will be something.

[thehay95]

ep. Just juggling a few ideas around before I finish the review.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

RollerCoaster Tycoon (PC)

"I'm gonna get my engineers to invent a combustible lemon that burns your house down!" - Cave Johnson

RollerCoaster Tycoon is a game about building roller coasters. Well, it's a game about building amusement parks that kind of sort of features the option to build roller coasters. From the start, we've already got a bit of deception going on here, but I'll give them a pass.

Do'hohoho! This is such a happy, wholesome, feel-good game!

Having played Thrillville on PS2 in the past, I can say I have experience with what makes a good amusement park game or not, so I feel fairly qualified to review this game, having played it fairly extensively as well. The game starts out by presenting you with a list of scenarios you can play without much of an introduction or tutorial. Like a lot of older games, it falls into the trap of "presenting you with a lot of buttons without explaining what these buttons do," but fortunately the game isn't too complex and you should be able to figure out everything on your own.

Like I touched on just above, the principle point of the game is to build pre-set amusement park rides, a couple of which may include roller coasters. Most of them are pretty lame and just there because they're cheap to build and they attract customers. Depending on the scenario, most of the rides aren't available from the beginning, and you have to invest in R&D in order to unlock rides and stalls; even at maximum budget it takes a while to develop things. You'll be doing a lot of waiting in this game, which is kind of unfortunate, because I don't think there's any way to change the rate that time progresses, something that would really be helpful given how much this game involves sitting back and waiting for things to happen.

Oh, and sometimes your roller coasters can crash for no reason.

I... I... I take that... back.

Nothing to interrupt your nice, relaxing, mostly stress-free amusement park building game like people dying, am I right? It messes everything up, too.

Occasionally, there will be weather... or rain, I'm pretty sure it's just rain that's in the game... that pretty much just messes everything up and hopefully makes people buy your park's umbrellas.

I live life on the edge. I make my rides just barely safe enough to function. For the thrills.

See, they love me.

Quite ironically, building roller coaster in this game is awful and tedious. It costs so much money in-game that most of the times you'll only have one or two coasters or similar rides even in a park full of other rides (and as much as I'd like to have in-park transportation like monorails, they're expensive and unwieldy too); on top of that, even after you're doing building, there's a pretty good chance you'll make a ride that turns out to be way too intense for your pansy guests. As far as I can tell, there's nothing you can do to estimate the intensity ratings while you're in the middle of making the ride, and even if you make adjustments after you're done, there's a chance that you'll plummet the ride's rating to be way, way too low. There's no middle ground here. Either your coasters are super intense and nobody wants to ride them, or they're mild kiddie rides and you start feeling bad about yourself! When the title of the game specifically highlights roller coasters, you'd expect them to make things more accessible for people to actually build roller coasters without—or with very few, at least—limits!

This gets annoying real quick.

However, the scenarios in the game are pretty good. Some of them can get a bit intense or feel like things are out of control as to whether or not you'll complete the goal in time, but overall, they're fun. I think I'd like some of them to be a bit more vague with their guidelines and less restrictive, but overall, like I said, they're enjoyable. I still haven't finished all of them but there's not much to complain about the ones I have played.

Only wholesome thoughts here. S-see, look? Balloons? This isn't going to be a problem sometime later.

Pros:
+ I enjoy the "theme park management" genre. This is a fine example of the genre.
+ If you really engross yourself in the game you can have a lot of fun and find a lot of humor in the little things.

Cons:
- Building roller coasters is literally the worst part of the game.
- Unlike Thrillville, for example, there are no minigames or really any other part of the game—there's pretty much nothing else to do except build your theme park.
- "Your guests are complaining about all the litter" *looks around* *park is literally spotless* *hires more workers* *park rating goes down anyway*

Final Score: 7.2/10

Reviewer notes:

• rip to all the virtual people who died because of roller coaster crashes, thus scaring me shitless every single time
• Thrillville is better

[mikey]

Roller coaster tycoon is the bomb
If you put an ice cream stall right before the spinny rides you can make people throw up

[BlackDragonSlayer]

VG Rankings and Top 10s (3)

Or, "The Manufacturers of Borderlands"

The Borderlands series is all about guns, thousands and thousands of guns! So, you figure the fictional companies that make these guns would be pretty important! So I'm gonna rank those gun manufacturers from my favorite to least favorite, just because!

#1

Jakobs

The classic western gun. A manufacturer known for high damage and a general lack of elemental weapons. Consistent and fun to use, especially in TPS where the max level balancing is a bit better. Very reliable guns to use especially in your first playthrough.

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#2

Vladof

Basically Russian-themed bullet hoses. With massive fire rates and awesome designs, these guns may not be ammo efficiently, but dang if they ain't fun to use. The blue rarity weapons, especially the assault rifles, are some of the most awesome designs in the game.

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#3

Torgue

EXPLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSIONS! IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHY I LOVE TORGUE, THEN YOU'RE A SILLY BOZO WHO DOESN'T REALIZE THE SHEER AWESOMENESS OF EXPLOOOOOOSIONS!

(Torgue guns shoot explosions btw)

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#4

Hyperion

Hyperion isn't necessarily the choice that seems obvious for top weapon, given that their gimmick of reverse recoil upon sustained fire is a bit odd at first, but their legendaries, especially their shotguns, are some of the best weapons in the game, so it's hard to deny their appeal.

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#5

Dahl

Their burst fire when aiming down sights gimmick is awesome. I'm sad they don't manufacture shotguns, because that would be hilariously fun. Like Hyperion, they have a lot of great weapons, especially the Sand Hawk, which is perhaps THE best weapon in the game.

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#6

Tediore

Have you ever wanted to throw your gun and have it explode like a grenade when it hits an enemy? Because that's exactly what happens when you reload your Tediore weapon! It's hilarious, and whoever came up with that idea deserves a raise. While they don't have too many good weapons (the Avenger, IVF, and Laser Disker are probably the best, with the third being my absolute favorite weapon in TPS), the thought it still there.

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#7

Maliwan

Maliwan's gimmick is the exact opposite of Jakobs: they only do elemental weapons. I can't say I have any particular preference for Maliwan weapons, although they are helpful to have in early playthroughs when elemental weapons are pretty scarce. Their legendaries, with the exception of the Norfleet, are pretty underwhelming too.

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#8

Bandit/Scav

Bandit's gimmick is that they have higher magazine sizes but lower stats, and honestly, that's kind of lame! With all the skill boosts to reload speed and magazine capacity, most characters don't really benefit that much from the increase in magazine size that Bandit weapons offer. Their legendary weapons aren't bad, especially the Slagga and Badaboom, but aside from that, they don't really have much going for them.

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[mikey]

oh shoot I love the idea of ranking in-universe stuff like that
you should do some for splatoon

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Unfortunately, I have not played Splatoon.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

VG Rankings and Top 10s (4)

Or, "Borderlands DLC"

DLC is a significant part of any modern game, for better or for worse, but some franchises make better use of their DLC than others. I feel like the Borderlands franchise has always used their DLC as a vehicle for experimentation and adding new content that actually matters, as well as delivering entertaining—and sometimes emotionally investing—stories. However, there's no doubt that some of the games' DLCs are better than others. So here's to ranking them. This only includes main DLC campaigns, and not characters or any additional DLC like the Headhunter Packs or Digistruct Peak.

Amazing

#1

BL2 DLC4 - Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep

The final main DLC campaign from BL2 is also by far its best. Its story, led by the eccentric Tiny Tina, starts off lighthearted, but slowly works in aspects of grief over the loss of Roland. The way that this DLC deals with grief and loss is incredibly moving and well-done and makes you feel even more attached to the characters. In terms of gear and weapons, this DLC introduced a lot of good things, especially the Magic Missile and the Grog Nozzle, which is by far one of the most-used guns in the game for its healing and Slag attributes, and the raid boss, the Ancient Dragons of Destruction, is both challenging and rewarding at the same time.

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#2

TPS DLC1 - Claptastic Voyage

Unfortunately the only DLC campaign for TPS, but it's a good one. Not only did it have a fantastic storyline (and great side missions as well), but it introduced a ton of great weapons (the Flayer, Laser Disker, and Luck Cannon are three of my favorites) and gear, including the Glitch rarity weapons. Although the final bosses can seem a bit cheap it's overall a great experience that adds much-needed content to TPS. The only downside to this DLC is that there isn't a true raid boss.

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#3

BL1 DLC3 - The Secret Armory of General Knoxx

Perhaps the most fleshed-out of the DLCs, and definitely the best story. It actually makes the Crimson Lance feel like the villains, instead of just some force you have to fight through because the story requires it. Odd because most of the maps in the DLC are just really long roads. However, this DLC introduces not one, not two, but three brand new vehicles for you to make use of on these roads. This DLC introduced the first raid boss, Cramerax, and Pearlescent weapons. To top it all off, for completing the DLC, you get a loot room (the titular armory) to farm (albeit on a timer), which is technically farmable a total of three times, but you can easily use glitches to farm it over and over again (and fortunately, without the timer).

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Great

#4

BL2 DLC1 - Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate's Booty

The first DLC of Borderlands 2 is a real good one. It introduced some of the best weapons in the game, including the Sand Hawk and the Pimpernel, as well as introducing Seraph weapons, and the pirate theming and new enemies are really great. As a reward for completing the campaign, you get access to a loot room, which is unfortunately only farmable twice. It's kind of a shame that they didn't have some sort of perpetually-repeatable task or mission you could do in order to farm the room over and over again, but it's a fun reward nonetheless.

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#5

BL2 DLC2 - Mr. Torgue's Campaign of Carnage

I started off not really liking this campaign much, but the more I play it, the more I enjoy it. More of Mr. Torgue and Tiny Tina are rarely bad things, and both of them are present in significant amounts in this DLC. This DLC fittingly has parallels to the Underdome, as they both feature missions that take place in an arena, but unlike the earlier DLC, this one doesn't make those missions a focal point of its story, as most of the missions take place outside the arena. The bosses are pretty fun, with maybe the exception of Badassasaurus, and although I can't recall any significant weapons this DLC added, it made the Unkempt Harold and other Torgue legendaries a lot more readily farmable at the Torgue Vending Machines. Pyro Pete is a fairly fun raid boss, although you could argue that it's lame that he's just a recycled boss from the DLC's main quest.

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#6

BL1 DLC1 - The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned

The first DLC of Borderlands 1 starts off on a really solid note. It adds the critical feature of having quest-giving NPCs actually talk to you while giving you their missions, which makes the game feel that much more alive. In addition, the zombie enemies feel unique and fitting, as their main tactics are to slowly swarm you and take you down by doing bits of damage, unlike any enemy in the main game. Unlike the other DLCs, you don't get either a skill point or a farmable location for beating it, so you're pretty much doing this DLC for the fun of it (although you do get a Jakobs vending machine from one of the side missions which is newly farmable in the remaster), which isn't entirely a bad thing.

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Ok

#7

BL1 DLC4 - Claptrap's New Robot Revolution

The first thing that struck me upon entering this DLC is how massive the maps are. It's definitely intimidating, and it feels like there's a lot of empty space and pointless running around you have to do in order to reach your objectives. The new Claptrap and Hyperion enemies are nice additions, although the excess of Claptrap-assimilated enemies that you've already fought (I'm pretty sure they're not any different than their main-game counterparts) makes things a bit stale. Having to fight bosses you've already fought before (with the exception of Steele, and the two final bosses) is a bit lazy, but it works, except for the fact that you have to fight each boss twice. Overall, this DLC is redeemed by the fact that you get a skill point from it in each playthrough (much less painful to achieve than the Underdome) and a farmable Hyperion Gift Shop which has a pretty good chance of spawning legendaries (to the point where legendaries feel a lot less special than in BL2, but I'll save that complaint for another time).

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#8

BL2 DLC3 - Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt

I'll start with the good. This DLC introduced some great weapons and gear, like the Interfacer and the Twister, which are two of the best shotguns in the game, and the oft-used Rough Rider shield. There's a giant loot room at the end of this DLC, which is unfortunately only farmable once. They introduce a new vehicle, the fan boat, which is always fun. The story is fairly funny and entertaining, but unfortunately, that's where the good ends. The story missions feel kind of tedious, and the enemies are repetitive and unfun to fight. The two raid bosses introduced in this DLC are very hit and miss, with one of them being perhaps by far the most difficult raid boss in the game, and the other one being very expensive to fight and not very worthwhile either.

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TRASH

#9

BL1 DLC2 - Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot

I talked about this a bit in Discord, but this DLC is absolutely miserable. For the main story mission, you have to withstand five rounds consisting of five waves each, in three different arenas. If you get defeated during a wave, you get sent not to the beginning of the current round, but to the beginning of the LAST round. There's a bit of random chance involved with certain modifiers popping up at random (some of which are genuinely fun an exciting, emphasis on "some"), but there's absolutely zero customisability to how any of the arenas work, unlike the future Mutator Arena in the Claptastic Voyage DLC (which, IMO, is the best execution of a "Circle of Slaughter" in a Borderlands game thus far). Beating the story mission unlocks arenas that have 20 rounds, but there's no reason to do any of those unless you like to torture yourself or you actually have friends. Aside from the 5 round and 20 round variants, there's nothing in-between, so you can't go in just for a single round to try our your gear, for example. The arena design is pretty spread out too, which works if you're cooperating/competing with friends, but makes things even more tedious if you're playing alone.

To make things short, if this DLC didn't hold not one, but two skill points hostage (one per playthrough), I would never touch it for my life.

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