Forums > Contributor Zone > RotW: Jan. 20-26, 2020 -- As a new year in RotWing begins, uh, well here it is!

My first RotW for the new year is here! YAY!!!

Or whatever. Looks like I have about 6 reviews for this week, half by Joe, who's been more productive during this "stepping back; have another kid" period than I am at peak production. WAY TO MAKE ME FEEL LIKE MORE OF A SLACKER THAN I USUALLY DO, DUDE!!!! And one by Marc that he submitted last week. Since this is Marc and not Gary, I feel compelled to not "forget" about it, so that makes it so submitting won't guarantee a placement, much like me starting up a session of Hollow Knight does not guarantee actual progress in it!

After that kickass segue from RotW to one of the games I'm currently playing (well, minus the fact that Marc's review makes it five people in the ring, so submission didn't guarantee placement regardless and I just said that to make it sound more dramatic and cool), here's me talking about your efforts, possibly profanely and in an insulting manner. Depends on my mood as the afternoon progresses, I guess…

Oh yeah, NEWS FOR JASON: My review for Witcher 3: Hearts of Stone was submitted in this week and therefore will be carrying over to your RotW. Since you have a review in this week, I know you'll be reading this topic, so NO EXCUSES!!!! We don't want another incident of me sulking for a month! And I'm one hell of a good sulker!

Of the honorable mentions, in no particular order.

Marc was victimized by The Great EmP Code Giveaway, getting something absolutely horrid. Fortunately, he did write an entertaining takedown of it, which was my favorite of the three reviews I got to judge that were obviously derived from EmP's ingenious "here, you guys review this shit because I can't be bothered to!" tactic. I mean, dude even got me sucked into this thing -- even if my game seems to still be an actual thing instead of some delisted crap. Anyway, I dug the tone and you did do a good job of concisely stating the many ways this game is utterly worthless to the degree that I really wanted to place it, but just couldn't quite move it up.

CRB has a short, picture-heavy review for Street Fighter Alpha 2 for the SNES. While it isn't overly detailed and has a few grammatical errors and awkward phrasings, I really did like your angle of discussing the game's worth considering a superior version was released for a more powerful system and this is a port of it on a lower power one. And little details like how, due to attempting to fit a PS game on a SNES cartridge, you actually have legit loading times is a really nice addition.

THIRD PLACE

Mariner's Bomb Chicken (Switch)

Mariner here proudly supporting Jason's pledge to make sure every bit of software reeled on the Switch gets coverage, regardless of what exactly it is. Fortunately for you, this bit of "whatever it is" wound up being a pretty fun experience. I liked a lot about this review. You did a good job mentioning how it's a short game, but reminds you of a classic NES one and made you want to replay it to do better at its levels. And I really liked the paragraph where you described the experience of playing a level for the first time and the ensuing deaths and retries as you gradually figured out the secret to getting through without those deaths. Good review of a game I likely never would have heard of if not for being on this site.

SECOND PLACE

Joe's Dragon Warrior (NES)

Man, Joe, you were WAY too serious and professional with those horrible EmP-given games. Those are the sort that deserve (or DEMAND) a gleefully over-the-top takedown. Although, I do agree with your stance on sliding tile puzzles. As I recall, there was one that you had to complete in Salazar's castle in Resident Evil 4. One of my best friends is a huge RE fan and LOVED that game. When I told him my immediate reaction to seeing that was to immediate go online and find the solution, he was completely in shock that I'd, for lack of a better word, demean such a great game by "cheating" and all I could say in response was, "Dude, it's a sliding tile puzzle…fuck that…" But on the other hand, I really dug this review. You did a great job of illustrating just how simplistic and grind-heavy this ancient RPG is, while also showing its influence on future games. Like you said, it's the sort of game that us players owe a lot to due to that influence, but it isn't exactly the most fun experience now that the genre has had 30 or so years to improve on the formula.

REVIEW OF THE WEEK (aka: Overdrive Place)

Jason's Sega Ages: Fantasy Zone (Switch)

Did I give you the win because you correctly called yourself a clown for not immediately getting the appeal of Fantasy Zone? Well, probably to a degree, but this was a really fun review that I enjoyed reading. Overall, I thought you had a great sense of progression in this. When talking about not getting it, you did a good job of describing why you didn't, as it didn't remind you of the shooters you liked. And now that you can appreciate it, you were able to give an even-handed look at it, discussing both its positives and negatives while maintaining an energetic tone. Probably due to being the site owner/webmaster guy, you tend to have arguably the most professional tone of anyone when it comes to writing reviews, so it was kind of fun seeing you kick back a bit and tossing in a bit of humor with the whole AOL intro. Which also brought back memories of how I got into that stuff for a bit towards the final year or two of a bunch of us AOL-ing. Ah, memories…such as chats between Blu and I deciding how we'd fix the Summer Tournament to provide us maximum entertainment at the expense of anything else! Huh, and now I'm wondering if I'm the clown who recommended it, as I did review it and gave it around the same 7/10 kind of score you gave this port. Regardless of whether it was me or not, I AM INSULTED BY YOUR COMMENTARY!!!


And now I'm off to decide if I'm staying in or going out tonight and, if I stay in, which game I'll decide gets to kick my ass tonight. Kingdom Hearts III is pretty easy, but I played that early this morning. Hollow Knight, the DLC bosses of Dark Souls II and Divinity Original Sin…well, things are a bit different with those three. UPDATE: It looks like the winner is actually…A SUPER SECRET PROJECT THAT ONLY I (and Jason, I guess, since he's the project-giver) KNOW ABOUT!!! I mean, I guess I also have an EmP-given project, but that seems more like 30-60 minutes of effort and then some typing…this one is far more effort-intensive.

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

Me looking through this topic is no guarantee that I will notice your reminder to include your holdover review in my own topic, overdrive, let alone that I will actually remember the matter when I sit down to compile my topic. But I'll try. That's better than nothing, right? RIGHT?!

Also, thanks for the kind words on my review, and a first-place finish for my first review of the year. Woo!

"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought." - John F. Kennedy on reality

"What if everything you see is more than what you see--the person next to you is a warrior and the space that appears empty is a secret door to another world? What if something appears that shouldn't? You either dismiss it, or you accept that there is much more to the world than you think. Perhaps it really is a doorway, and if you choose to go inside, you'll find many unexpected things." - Shigeru Miyamoto on secret doors to another world2

I totally read that as "rot wing." Sounds like a Final Fantasy enemy.

Thank you for the placement. Sorry about the lack of bashing in my bad reviews. They were so uninspired that I couldn't even dredge up good bash fodder for them.

The only thing my milkshake brings to the yard is a subpoena.