It must be a huge weight off the collective shoulders of everyone at Bloober Team to see the remake of Silent Hill 2 is doing pretty well for itself. Steam shows the game ?as "Overwhelmingly Positive" for all reviews, so it definit?ely proves the wait was worth it in the end.

As a survival horror game, Silent Hill 2 is dripping with mood, atmosphere, anguish, sorrow, and grotesque denizens. What it's not dripping with, however, is a potassium-based snack. This is where Nexus Mods user Stevebg23 comes to the rescue with a mod that changes the pistol James fin????ds into a large banana.

As if that wasn't enough, you'll also find that the lead pipe �a classic of the ??original 2001 release, many would say �has also been changed. Now, the player will find themselves beating the snot out of monsters with a giant spoon.

Because of reasons, I guess

The reason? for the "Banana Gun and Spoon Pipe" mod is simple: the creato??r "always wanted to have a silly mod," and this is the result. They also reassure us you can reload the skin of the gun, and that the spoon is "shiny and silvery and nice to handle against the hordes of evil coming your way." Comforting to know.

Despite its seriousness, anyone who's played the original Silent Hill 2 knows the developer was not afraid to get a little silly. The infamous dog ending showed a kind?? of light-hearted irreverence for this drab horror experience that many of us were absolutely not expecting the first time around.

Of course, the game is still the same, even if you do swap out the pistol for a healthy-looking, half-peeled banana. It's nice to know J??ames is getting h??is vitamins while battling the inner demons of his guilty conscience.

The post Here’s a Silent Hill 2 mod that turns the weapons into a banana and a large spoon appeared first on Destructoid.

It’s been a real “Will they, won’t they?�dynamic between Vampire Survivors and Castlevania. It’s the crossover that makes the most sense, but it’s because it makes ??the most sense ??that I believed it wouldn’t happen. Time makes fools of us all.

Ode to Castlevania is funny because Vampire Survivors is already an ode to Castlevania. Nowhere is this more evident than with the new weapons that don’t have?? a lot to do with Castlevania. That’s because all the weapons most associated with the game were already in it originally, from throwing crosses to holy water.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. By default, a Castlevania crossover is going to be the best expansion for the game because I love Castlevania. However, it’s also the best expansion so far for other reasons.

Ode to Castlevania can be summed up as a lot of whips, a lot of music, a lot of Belmonts, and one big map. Unlike the previous two expansions, there is no new Adventure mode here; that one big map is the central focus. And it is big. It’s dominantly Dracula’s castle, filled with bosses and broken into sections via locked doors. It’s not exactly Vampire Survivors m??etroidvania, but that sounds like it would be a hassle anyway.

The castle is laid out in a more-or-less linear fashion. You kick down the door and march your way up to Dracula’s bedroom to put him back to sleep. Is he actually there? Does Vampire Survivors actually have a vampir??e in it now? I’m n??ot telling because that would be lame.

Much like the last two crossover expansions, this is still Vampire Survivors, but it’s wearing Castlevania’s clothes. But unlike those games, Castlevania fits Vampire Survivors a lot better. The enemies, all torn from various games in the series, look as though they belong here, and the castle could ??easily be compi?led from various stages already in the game. Unsurprisingly, it isn’t much of a stretch.

The one big ?level is easily the best that the game has seen. It’s large enough that it’s extremely difficult to make your way through it, from start to finish, in a single round. Instea?d, after beating specific bosses, a nearby teleporter will be activated that you can transport yourself to from the start. This allows you to essentially continue from close to where you left off without having to wade through everything again.

There are a tonne of bosses torn from the series�history, and while many of them are just the sort that you keep your distance from while bashing on them, a few have some unique attacks that make them interesting. There are also moments within ??the castle where things turn into a sidescroller, which can be disorienting but feels appropriate.

If there’s one place that the Castlevania conformity actually hurts the game, it’s wi?th the whips. Most of the Belmonts come packing one, and while they’re all different, most of them kind of suck. They’re often short-range and only attack in specific directions. The whips that were already in the game are far better; it’s just sort of a drag that you can spend time turning yourself into a whip machine for less reward than you’d usually find from holding a whip.

Sonia Belmont has the Sonic Whip, however, which absolutely wrecks house. It’s not all bad, but when you’re shoveling more junk weapons on an already threatening pile of them, it can become difficult to effectively create your desired build. There are other much more useful weapons that were added, fortunately. Although, as I mentioned before, some of them don't have much to do with Castlevania and feel like they were added because they needed to add something aside from whi?ps a?nd spellbooks.

This is all backed by an extremely impressive list of songs and remixes from the Castlevania series. The composers working with Poncle did a great job with Contra in Operation Guns, and the same is t?rue here with tracks torn from all over the series. There are even some tunes that I wouldn’t have thought to include that are made irresistible through their loving remixes. Easily, one of the best parts of this expansion is the soundtrack.

Overall, It’s a loving tribute from a developer who is a clear fan of the Castlevania series. So much of a fan that there isn’t a Gabriel Belmont in sight, but there is a Sonia. That’s how you really know.

It’s also only $3.99, which is a buck-and-a-half more expensive than something like Operation Guns, but I think the remix soundtrack is worth the value alone. In a world with horse armor, it??’s a great value.

As a fan myself, this is easily the most fun I’ve had with the game since diving into the base version. The big map adds a lot more playtime than you might expect, and being able to unleash hell on various foes from the series while a frantic remix of Bloody Tears plays is, as one would expect, rather arousing. The way that Vampire Survivors has matured over the years almost feels like it was preparing to wear the Castlevania dress. And it fits so well. It’s almo?st like it? was made for it. ;

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Oh, wow. I didn’t think they would do it, but Vampire Survivors is coming in hot with the Ode to Castlevania exp??ansion. It’s almost here, releasi??ng on October 31, 2024.

It was a pretty great misdirection when Poncle announced that their big Konami crossover was with Contra for Operation Guns earlier this year. I thought they might really play up its “featuring no vampires�jest and release everything adjacent to Castlevania without actually crossing over with Castlevania. Doing the crossover just seems too obvious. But, I guess when Konami has their portf??olio open, you should grab all you can.

I mean, Vampire Survivors already has a lot of legally distinct homages to Castlevania, and now it’s going to have actual characters from the games in it. Over 20 characters, apparently. That’s a real Belmont family reunion. One must assume that Dracula won’t be able to attend. There are also going to be 40 (plus) weapons to the game, 30 music tracks, and the biggest level yet featured in the game. I’ll give ??you the whole bullet-pointed list I was sent in a moment, because it’s a lot.

I’ve been digging the expansions getting piled into Vampire Survivors, but I’m a bit afraid that the central, non-adventure gameplay mode is going to get buried under a glut of weapons. But I don’t know, excess is sort of Vampire Survivor’s thing. Asking it to take the foot off the pe?dal isn’t going to do much. Anyway, here’s the bulleted list. I added an Oxford comma??:

• 20+ New characters: What a horrible night to have a curse, especially if you are:

  • The Belmonts, your favorite whip-obsessed family of vampire hunters, including Simon, Richter, Trevor, and even Sonia.
  • The Belnades, Sypha, Yoko, and a myriad of legendary witches from throughout the history of the occult clan. Even the likes of Charlotte Aulin and Maria Renard have their spellbooks ready.
  • Other Heroes, not just Jonathan and Charlotte, but Jonathan Morris AND John Morris?! Amazing allies abound, from Shanoa to Eric Lecarde.

• 40+ New weapons, fighting the forces of evil is hard as hell:

  • Whips - Whole lot of whips. More whips than we can count (it's eight).
  • Spells: elemental magic has finally made its way in Vampire Survivors, offering a wide array of spells inspired by games such as Portrait of Ruin and Harmony of Dissonance.
  • Magic weapons: not any sword, but Alucard's Sword. And Alucard's Spear. Also Alucard's Shield, Alucard’s etc.
  • Projectiles: do you remember that time the Morris' were throwing javelins and iron balls?
  • Glyphs: Confodere, Vol Confodere, Melio Confodere, but also plenty of non-Confodere, we swear.

• A monstrously large Stage

  • Enchanting mysteries and danger await those who enter:
  • The largest map Vampire Survivors has ever seen, stacked with sinister secrets and a bunch of baneful bosses.

• 30+ New Music Tracks

  • A ridiculous amount of remixes of Castlevania tracks from Vampire Survivors historic composers Daniele Zandara and Filippo Vicarelli, but also from fan-favourite Evelyn Lark and Keygen Church!
  • Vampire Killer, Bloody Tears, Simon's Theme, Leon's Theme, a lot of themes.
  • Moonlight Nocturne, Lost Paintings, Dance of Pearls, but like you've never heard them before.
  • Aquarius, The Beginning, Divine Bloodlines, everything that screams "this is Castlevania".
  • An Empty Tome, Invitation of a Crazed Moon, Pitch Black Intrusion, so many hits from the more recent entries in the series.
  • Amber Scenery, Sarabande of Healing, Jaws of a Scorched Earth, and many others you didn't know the title of!
  • On top of that we have borrowed several dozen original tracks from Castlevania games. There is so much music we revamped the music selection panel for the occasion.

Vampire Survivors: Ode to Castlevania is out on?? October 31, 2024 and will run you $3.99.

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No one is more relieved to see that the remake of Silent Hill 2 has been nothing short of a major triumph. Well, I suppose developer Bloober Team could be classed as being somewhat more reassured, especially now the game has sold a?n impressive amount already.

Maybe it's not too surprising, but it certainly vindicates any doubts people may have had prior to launch to see that Silent Hill 2 has sold more than a million copies worldwide. According to a post on the game's Japanese X account, it actually exceeds this figure, and the post itself comes with a "thank-you" message to those who'??ve bought and played it so far.

In fact, these numbers are based on research dating October 11. Not only does this mean that SH2 sold a whopping am?ount in just ??a few days (it launched on October 8), but given we're now on the 17th, no doubt it's sold even more.

Take that, doubters

Bloober seemed very much up against it, particularly with its past reputation of not exactly treating themes of mental illness with great sensitivity. Now, though, any concerns about whether the studio could handle a reimagining of one of the industry's most influential psychological horror games can surely be put to rest.

Currently, the remake of Silent Hill 2 is sitting pretty on Steam, with a review score of "very positive," complete with some pretty glowing reviews from fans. Our own Zoey had some optimistic things to say about the game in her review, calling it "solid" though with some flaws.

Either way, as one user on Steam said: "SILENT ??HILL IS BACK BABY!" I'm just sad I have to wait until the Xbox vers??ion comes out before I can join in on all this merriment.

The post Silent Hill 2 has ‘exceeded’ one million sales, Konami says appeared first on Destructoid.

The remake of Silent Hill 2 launched yesterday and judging from the current review scores on Steam, it's going down a mighty treat. Bloober Team seems to have done the original a great service with its reimagining of the iconic 2001 survival horror game. However, it's?? not perfect.

For example, the developer has ensured that the cutscenes in Silent Hill 2 are locked to 30 frames per second. In this modern era of gaming, this can be something of a bugbear. Fortunately, as noted by DSO Gaming, som??eone has already fixed that. At ??least on the PC version.

Nexusmods user RoseTheFlower has created "Cutscene Improvements," a modification for the remake that unlocks the FPS during the cutscenes o??n PC. This means they can now be viewed in higher framerates. The mod also removes the "black bars from the cutscenes in anything other than 16:9."

Unlocking Silent Hill's full potential

?According to the report from DSO, it does work pretty well, though they've only tried it on a few of the earlier cutscenes, with the writer adding that they "did not spot any framepacing or speed issues." This potentially ra?ises the question of why the developer and/or publisher made the decision to lock the scenes to just 30fps.

Such a small detail may not be a huge issue ??for some gamers. However, those who want more bang for their buck are willing to play something that makes the most of their ??hardware. Bethesda raised similar concerns when it turned out that Starfield would be locked to 30fps on a console. At least the PC version still has it unlocked.

It seems there may not be any one reason why a modern studio would limit frame rates in this day and age, but it is far from me to speculate Bloober or Konami's rationale. In any case, if you are playing Silent Hill 2 on PC and you have a system with decen?t specs, "?Cutscene Improvements" seems to be one mod that's worth trying out.

The post Not happy about Silent Hill 2 cutscenes being locked? to 30fps? You need this mod, then appeared first on Destructoid.

Today is officially Silent Hill 2 Launch Day. That's not an actual holiday, admittedly, but it is a day that many of us have been waiting for. As we ?all wake up on this Tuesday, Bloober Team's long-awaited remake finally hits storefronts.

Praise for the game has already been doing the rounds, and one person in particular seems pleased with what Bloober has given us. As noted by VGC, Masashi Tsuboyama, the director behind the original Silent Hill 2 from 2001, had a few things to say about the game, ??as well as remakes in general.

In particular, Tsuboyama has lauded the remake for changing the perspective. I?n a series of posts on X, the director says the "change in playable camera has a significant impact on many aspects," adding that the new "over-the-shoulder view ?definitely adds to the sense of realism." They also admit they weren't happy with the camera angle in the original game, saying the "depth and angle were limited by the processing load."

Breaking the silence

In general, Tsuboyama seems very pleased with the way Bloober has handled Silent Hill 2, n?ot ??to mention stressing the value of it as a remake.

I think the value of the remake is that a ne??w generation can play it. As a creator, I'm very happy about it. It's been 23 years! Even if you don't know the original, you can just enjoy the remake as it is. Whether it's good or bad doesn't affect the original.

A quick look on the game's Steam page shows the reception is already pretty stellar. Okay, it's only just come out, but an immediate review sco?re of "overwhelmingly positive" is not to be sniffed at, even in these early ?stages.

There were obviously a few concerns about whether Bloober Team could successfully bring one of the most important horror games to life in the modern era. I must admit, even I wasn't sure it was going to be worth the wait. The developer has been subjected to criticism in the past for its somewhat insensitive portrayal of certain topics, such as mental health. Given that Silent Hill 2 is largely about some rather deep topics, it stood to reason that the remake might not be able to hit the subtle marks as well as its predecesso??r.

Plus, what we've seen of the Silent Hill revival up to this point has not exactly been filling a lot of fans and critics with confidence. However, it definitely seems like we're onto a winner here with the SH2 remake. Masashi Tsuboyama and others seem to think so, at? least.

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David Hayter, the original voi??ce actor for Solid Snake a??nd Naked Snake/Big Boss in the Metal Gear Solid franchise, has recently made a surprise announcement on his personal Twitter/X account that may have hinte??d at his return to his most iconic role.

After this cryptic revelation, he followed it up by posting a GIF of Naked Snake in Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater. While Hayter didn't give any explicit confirmation, this most likely means that he's back at portraying the character that would eventually become Big Boss in the upcoming Snake Eater remake.

This is an especially interesting new piece of information because Konami had previously announced that Metal Gear Solid Delta will reuse all the characters' voices from the original 2005 PS2 release. This means that, even though we technically knew that Hayter was ??????????????????????????going to return to ??the role for a while, his recent announcement indicates that he may have had to record entirely new voice lines.

For what project did Hayter record new voice lines?

Fans reacted to Hayter's post with a? lot of excitement, but they immediately began speculating about what these new recordings may be for. It's possible that he recorded lines for promotional material for Metal Gear Solid Delta, like a new trailer or some form of online content. Another? possibility is that, while Konami tried to reuse as many voice recordings as possible, Hayter still had t??o record a few new lines for brand-new sections of the game, like tutorials or additional cutscenes.

Of course, some fans believe that these recordings may be tied to a different project set within the Metal Gear universe, with some of the ideas floating around being a potential re-release of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots in Volume 2 of the MGS Master Collection or maybe even an entirely new entry. Even though series creator Hideo Kojima left the company in 2015, there is a precedent for Konami making Metal Gear games without his direct involvement, with one of the most prominent examples being Portable Ops, a game in which Hayter ??voiced Naked Snake as well.

Why Hayter's return is such a big deal for the Metal Gear Solid franchise

The community reacted positively to Hayter's potential return as Naked Snake because this would be his first time recording new voice lines for the character in a game since Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, which originally launched back in 2010. Even though he was the iconic voice actor who brought both Big Boss and his clone, Solid Snake, to life for over 16 years, H?ideo Kojima replaced him with Hollywood actor Kiefer Sutherland during the production of Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain.

Back in the day, most fans of the series responded negatively to this decision, so now they are ecstatic about the fact that they will not only get to hear him once again as Naked Snake in Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater but that he may have also recorded entirely n?e??w lines as this legendary character after more than a decade.

The post Iconic Me??tal Gear Solid voice actor h?ints that he recorded new lines as Big Boss appeared first on Destructoid.

Konami recently unveiled a lot of information about Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater during Tokyo Game Show 2024, including an exciting new trailer and a fascinating gameplay demo. Howe?ver, this remake still doesn't have an official release date y??et.

As reported by on @Genki_JPN Twitter/X, during Konami's presentation, the game's producer Noriaki Okamura apologized for this lack of information and clarified that he and his team don't want to make any promises that they can't keep. He also confirmed that they are working? hard on the game and asked fans to "please wait a little longer".

After all, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater is a remake of the original 2005 game, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, which is often considered to be one of the best and most accessible entries ??in the entire franchise. So there's definitely a lot of pressure on Okamura and his team to deliver a product that is of equal high quality as the original PS2 title. How??ever, based on all the recently released images and videos, it seems like the project is going in the right direction.

Will Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater even come out in 2024?

After it's initial announcement on May 2023, most fans speculated that Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater was most likely going to come out in 2024. On top of that, PlayStation later released a video that clearly labeled MGS Delta as one of its "Upcoming Games in 2024". However, 2024 only has 3 months left before it ends and, without a concrete release ?date set in stone, it's most likely that the company already h?as plans to delay it to 2025.

It's important to keep in mind that the most recent entry in the series, the spin-off Metal Gear Survive, came out more than 6 years ago, in February 2018. Not to mention that the last Hideo Kojima-directed Metal Gear game, The Phantom Pain, came out 9 years ago, in 2015. Based on their responses on social media websites like Reddit or Twitter/X, it is evident that fans can patiently wait a few m?ore months for the release of such a highly-anticipated remake.

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Up to 40% of a game's total sales occur in the first month, according to the SSRN Electronic Journal. Consequently, the best strategy for studios is to ensure their titles launch with a bang. Some strategic marketing is necessary to achieve this. Piling up good reviews from critics and gamers is also vital, meaning it's essentia?l for games to launch in a polished state.

Over the years, a few titles have missed the mark terribly, resulting in catastrophic launches. The following list contains some of the worst offenders in g?aming history.

2024 addendum

To borrow a common internet adage, it's like Concord read this list and said, "Hold my beer." As such, we felt it would be a good time to ?add to this list. It felt as though it would remain incomplete without what is currently the most talked about crash.

But rather than slotting in Concord and calling it a day, I'm going to also add a couple of my favorite launch f?ailures. Smangeliso already di??d a bang-up job on compiling some of the worst, so those are left untouched.

13. Trespasser - Jurassic Park

The move to 3D graphics was a painful one. Over-ambition was common, and nowhere was this more obvious than with Trespasser, a game based on the Jurassic Park franchise. The lead-up to the launch promised a game that used a real-time physics engine and artificial intelligence that would make dinosaurs flock together an?d act based on their specific needs.

Trespasser was technically impressive when it launched. However, the game was rushed so urgently that every promised feature was only technically implemented. Dinosaur AI, for example, wasn't ready for prime time, so the dinosaur's anger was cranked up to maximum, and that was it. The real-time physics and inverse kinematic animations resulted in the thunder lizards staggering around drunkenly. It's hilarious, it's easily one of my fav??orite terrible games.

12. SimCity (2013)

The first SimCity was released in 1989 and became one of the most influential games in the history of the industry. It practically created the city-builder genre and laid the groundwork for all kinds of management games. Makes sense that EA would be the ones to screw that up. The publisher decided that the once single-player city builder should have a multiplayer element, and that was enough to warrant an always-online requirement for SimCity (20??13). Previous botched attempts at always-online had soured the already mixed?? feelings on the requirement, and it proved to be warranted when many players had difficulty downloading, connecting, and staying connected to play the game.

It didn't stop at the online issues, however. Many changes to the SimCity formula were not well received, such as an almost microscopic map size to build on and mindless traffic that players would put through veritable mazes of streets to demonstrate their insistence on taking the most direct path, rather than an easily acceptable and better alt?ernative. Three years later, EA ?would remove the always-online requirement, but at that point, it was far too late.

11. WWE 2K20

The WWE franchise has had a long presence in the gaming scene, and titles like Smackdown! vs Raw 2006 and SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain are??? memorable games that successfully replicate the testosterone-flooded action of sports entertainment.

When WWE 2K20 launched in October 2019, day-one buyers ended up with a game sporting atrocious graphics that looked like they belonged on a PS3. The gameplay wasn't any better, and the numerous glitches made WWE 2K20 a pain to play. The game's terrible reception was one of the reasons WWE 2K21 was canceled. It was for the best, as when the franchise returned with WWE 2K22, it achieved double its predecessor's launch sales??.

10. New World

Amazon's New World hit stores in Septem??ber 2021, and the launch was nothing but chaos. Servers were flooded, resulting in players waiting for hours before they could start playing. When people were eventually able to play, they discovered that while the core game was good, it was also plagued with game-breaking glitches. Since release, plenty of updates have been?? pushed out, and the game is in a better state, but it failed to be the enduring classic that Amazon was likely aiming for.

9. Anthem

When Anthem was announced, the flashy marketing successfully caught the attention of the gaming world. Unfortunately, when Anthem launched in 2019, it was immediately critically panned. Critics and gamers alike complained about m??any elements, including boring missions, technical glitches, poor performance, and excessive grinding. The game failed to meet EA's expectations, and fut?ure developments for it were cut in 2021.

8. The Last of Us Part 1 (PC)

Though the PS5 version launched without any major issues, the PC port of The Last of Us Part 1 has been nothing short of a disaster. Players were greeted with technical issues and absurdly long loading times, making the game unplayable for some. Since launch, many have pointed the finger at Iron Galaxy, the studio Naughty Dog entrusted with the port. It won't be the last time the studio? appears on the list, so there may be so??me truth to the accusations.

7. Fallout 76

In 2018, Bethesda took Fallout online with Fallout 76. The game promised to allow players to explore dystopian settings with friends, which is an idea that has great potential. When Fallout 76 launched in November 2018, it was far from what gamers expected, resulting in the PC version scoring a measly 52 on Metacritic. Due to the bad press, many gamers stayed away, and as a result, Fallout 76 had lower launch sales numbers than Fallout 4 and Fallout New Vegas.

6. Batman: Arkham Knight (PC)

Arkham Knight's PS4 and Xbox One versions were developed by Rocksteady Studios, and the PC port was handed off to Iron Galaxy. This proved to be a mistake. When Arkham Knights launched on PC, it crashed constantly and featured technical i??ssues that rendered it unplayable for many.

The situation got so bad that Warn?er Bros. Interactive Entertainment suspended sales of the Windows version of the game in June 2015 while developers worked on patches to fix the game. Though the game has improved plenty, the historically disastrous launch won't be forgotten any time soon.

5. eFootball

The free-to-play sports game eFootball was released in September 2021. The concept wasn't a b?ad one, though the execution left a lot to be desired. Gamers were met with atrocious graphics, endless tec?hnical issues, and visual bugs that have made for some hilarious screenshots. With a score of 25 on Metacritic, it is one of the lowest-rated games of all time.

4. Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy - The Definitive Edition

When it was revealed that the GTA trilogy would receive a remake, excitement was high. Launch day arrived in November 2021, and gamers were less than satisfied. The trilogy was rife with technical issues, ugly character models, and visual errors, which should have been spotted during the QA phase of development. To placate f?ans, Rockstar offered the original trilogy to all customers who had purchased the remake via the Rockstar Store.

3. Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 is a title that has been a ubiquitous fixture in gaming for years, and not always for good reasons. When Cyberpunk 2077 launched in 2020, the experience was so bad droves of gamers demanded refunds, and Sony eventually pulled the game from the PS Store. Fortunately, the sto??ry doesn't end on a sour note, as developers have worked hard to improve the game, and after several patches and updates, t??he game is one of the most enjoyable open-world titles on current-gen consoles.

2. No Man's Sky

Like many other titles on the list, the developers made plenty of big promises before the game's release. When No Man's Sky launched, gamers realized that many of the promised features were missing, and the performance was poor. There was plenty of outrage, though Hello Games didn't abandon No Man's Sky. Instead, developers got to work releasing patches and updates that slowly but surely improved the game. Today, No Man's Sky is a bestseller available on almost all pl??????????????????????????atforms.

1. Concord

Concord's failed launch was so severe that it will probably be studied for years to come. It was enough to warrant an update on this list. It was reportedly the result of years of work and millions upon millions of dollars, and lasted two weeks before it was pulled from marketplaces with a refund being issued to those who had bought it. At least one report suggests that Sony dumped $400 million into the project and was betting on it being the future of the brand. Take that with a grain of salt; it hasn't yet been substantiated. However, the live service sector of the industry is packed to the gills with people hoping to be the next Fortnite, and simply dropping an expensive game in there is not enough to capture the crowd. Whether or not Concord reappears in some form in the ??fut??ure remains to be seen.

There's no shortage of games with failed launches, and the future will feature plenty more. From these cases, we learn that although delays may be frustrating, terrible launches are far worse. We also see that even the worst launches don't have to spell t??he end for a game so long as developers persevere.

The post Top? 13 worst game launches in gaming history, ra??nked appeared first on Destructoid.

Every so often, a game comes along which injects pure joy into the lives of those who play it. One such game, Super Crazy Rhythm Castle??, is curre??ntly available for free on Epic Games Store and I urge you to go and give it a try. 

Super Crazy Rhythm Castle might be, and I don’t say this lightly, the most fun I’ve had playing a video game in a very long time. I have laughed so hard I’ve been reduced to tears and been physically incapable of continuing before getting ????a grip, I’ve thrown a soccer ball at my fiancĂ©s head (in-game, of course, I’m not a total monster) in order to stop him from scoring more points than me, and I’ve raced along the river in a musically charged boat. 

Essentially, Rhythm Castle is Guitar Hero with the added side-problem of puzzles needing to be solved. While you’re trying to play the music in time with the moving colored blocks, you also need to stop some bizarre baby creatures from screaming by k?icking gems into their faces (seriously!), or use weed killer to ??prevent vines from covering the moving platform of notes. 

The â€�Super Crazyâ€?part is taken very literally in Rhythm Castle, and everywhere you go there’s something new, hilarious, and at times highly frustrating to overcome. For instance, at one point the king (who you’re trying to beat musically, at least I think that’s the end goal of the game) decides that simply throwing music challenges at you isn’t enough. To amuse himself, and make things harder on you??, he decides that the platform on which you stand needs to spin around in circles. 

Now, I know my left from my right. I’ve gone approxim??ately three decades knowing how to use my hands, and yet when the notes begin spinning around in circles, it’s hard to remember which side is which and whether I’m even the right way up. That level has a warning for those who suffer from motion sickness. If that doesn’t reflect the frustration you may feel while playing it, then nothing will. 

The music in Rhythm Castle is hugely varied, and there’s something for everyone. In the first six songs, I heard everything from Hippo and Frog (which is what reduced me to tears, and I’m still not quite sure why) to Heavy M??etal, which is exactly as it sounds. In between, you’re treated to ?this absolute earworm that is still stuck in my head days later and is now a permanent addition to my soundtrack of life:

There's even an area where you can take game cartridges, which are found through the rest of the game, to play old video game soundtra?cks. I won't spoil what's to come if you choose to play, but you're in for a wild ride of both nostalgia and mi?ld panic.

Anyway, like I said, Super Crazy Rhythm Castle is currently available for free on Epic Games Store. If you’ve got some friends who you want to dra?g on an absolutely bizarre ride through music, then you’ve got nothing to lose by downloading it. I’m not sure I would have ever played if it hadn’t co??me up for nothing, but I’m forever going to be thankful that I’ve experienced the crazy joy that it brings.

The post Super Crazy Rhythm Castle might just be the most fun I’ve had all year and it’s free now on Epic Games appeared first on Destructoid.

Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel became the center of controversy and debate at the Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championships this past weekend. The tournament started off with a shock for players of the 3v3 Master Duel form?at, when early on in Swiss rounds, the majority of their deck lists appeared online.

The decks appeared on the website MasterDuelMeta, a resource website for those trying to improve their play in the game. This immediately bristled against portions of the Yu-Gi-Oh! communit??y, including competitive players at the World Cha??mpionship.

The founder of MasterDuelMeta and its sister site DuelLinksMeta, content creator Dkayed, posted a Twitch clip to Twitter explaining his reason for posting the lists. He explained, "what happens at Worlds is [that] players at home, not at the even??t venue, they will scour through all the replays... they create spreadsheets. And then they link the spreadsheet to a few amount of players, only to their friends... that, in m??y opinion, is an unfair advantage."

His evidence for these claims were his own first-hand experience at the World Championships. Dkayed also explained that he had done the same thing on this website last year when covering the Master Duel championships, and that all of this information is accessible through the Master Duel client itself.

The deck lists were also compiled using the third party app Untapped.gg. Untapped tweeted on their Yu-Gi-Oh! account on September 8 saying the?y had fixed the issue that made this possible on their e?nd.

This situation rapidly became a subject of debate on the MasterDuelMeta website, Yu-Gi-Oh! subreddits, and X, formerly Twitter. The conversation on X took on another dimension when one player attending the World Championships, JudeuYGO, posted a comment on MasterDuelMeta e??xpressing distaste for this kind of coverage. In part, the comment reads, "You don't care about the competitive environment, you don't care about how your act??ions affects [sic] the players at worlds. You just want to grab as much money as possible."

This comment was addressed directly by Dkayed on his Twitch stream. After reading the comment on stream, Dkayed replied, in part, by saying: "JudeuYGO possibly, likely, is upset that his friends at home watching Worlds can't secretly give JudeuYGO the secret techs where no one else will have that... So, Judeu, I'm sorry you are now on an even playing field." These claims were clipped out of his Twitch stream and posted to social media, which quickly fed more debates and reactions leading "Dkayed" ?to trend on X for portions of the weekend.

Konami does not operate its competitive events under "open deck" ru?les, so this leak could possibly constitute a violation of t??heir tournament policy. At the time of reporting, Konami has made no public statements about the incident, and there have been no reports from the individuals involved of Konami taking action.

Despite the deck list leak, the Master Duel event at Worlds proceeded as s?cheduled through Saturday and concluded Sunday with a rematch between the 1st and 2nd place teams of last year's World Championship final.

The post Deck lists leak??ed during Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championships appeared first on Destructoid.

All good things must come to an end, and that's certainly true for Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow. While it's easily one of the best Castlevania games, getting to its conclus??ion can be bittersweet. Here's how you can get the best possible ending.

Getting the best ending can be kind o??f an obtuse process. But it's not just about getting the sweetest cutscene. It's also about those delicious unlocks! Whether you want to be sure you're on the right track or you're finding out what went wrong, we're here. A?nd don't worry about spoilers; we'll keep it as clean as possible.

How (not) to get the worst ending

Unless you're thorough, it's very easy to miss a key requirement for getting past the first ending. There's?? a boss named Dario, who you'll end up fighting twice throughout the game. The second time will be in a part of the map called The Pinnacle. When you get to him, you may notice something extremely suspicious about his fight. In the background is a giant mirror with a demon reflected in it.

If all you do is beat Dario, you're granted the?? worst ending in the game. This provides no rewards and is basically the same as a "Game Over." If you've noticed giant mirr??ors in other parts of the castle, you may have guessed that you need to interact with them somehow. This is the key to correctly defeating Dario.

You'll need a boss soul from a monster cal??led Paranoia. To find him, go ?west from The Pinnacle's lower reaches to enter a new part of the Demon Guest House. Simply move west through this new area, and you'll come across this boss. Defeat him, take his soul, and you can use it in any large mirror in the castle. That includes using it in Dario's boss room and fighting the demon inside. This will allow the story to progress correctly.

How to get the bad ending

While still a bummer of an ending for our heroes, this one can at least unlock J??ulius Mode. This is a new gameplay mode where you take control of Julius, Yoko, and Alucard as you play through the entire game with unique powers. It's a fun bonus mode and well worth unlocking. But you should probably just move on to the next endin??g and get it later.

After you surpass the worst ending above, you'll be challenged to meet Celia in the locked room of the Garden of Madness. There's a key item that affects whether you get the bad ending here or if you open up the re??st of the game. If you want to unlock Julius Mode quickly or want to see what happens, enter the central chamber without Mina's Talisman equipped. A cutscene will play, and then ??the credits will roll. Technically, Julius Mode is a sort of "what if?" continuation of these events.

How to get the best ending

The real ending requires you to best Dario by defeating his mirror-verse demon and by confronting Celia with Mina's Talisman equipp??ed to your accessory slot. Once you do these two things, you'll open up a secret path in The Tower that goes down. Follow that path and finish the last portions of the game. You'll reach the final boss, defeat them, and finally get your best en?ding.

Defeating the game's best ending unlocks Julius mode, as well as a slew of new options. The most interesting is a New Game Plus mode. Above your save file is a "Clear" icon. Selecting it allows you to start the game over at level 1, but you keep all non-essential souls, equipment, and gold. You're also granted the ability to play the game in Hard Mode, giving you an extra challenge. If you beat the game's Hard Mode, your reward is a unique Hell Flame soul. This gives you Dracula's old "fireballs from the cape" maneuver he's used since the original Castlevania.

You'll also unlock a Sound Test and a Boss Rush Mode. Aside from being a fun challenge, Boss Rush also has some unique unlockables to send back to your main game. They are time-based requirements, and unfortunately, you can't unlock everything if you do it right the first time. You'll have to play through the mode at least five times, provided you can get the best score right away on each o??ccasion.

The post Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow Endings guide appeared first on Destructoid.

The Silent Hill 2 PC system requirements are pretty beefy, and f?or a seemingly gorgeous horror g??ame like this, it makes sense. Publisher Konami recommends that you have an SSD and at least 16GB of RAM for both minimum and recommended specs lists.

Silent Hill 2 PC minimum system requirements

Silent Hill 2 will be pushing some impressive current-gen visuals on your PC. This means you'll need the following specs to play the game on Low or Medium settings at 1080p, according to Silent Hill 2's Steam listing.

• OS: Windows 10 x64
• Processor: Intel Core i7-6700K | AMD Ryzen 5 3600
• Memory: 16 GB RAM
• Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1070 Ti or AMD Radeonâ„?RX 5700
• DirectX: Version 12
• Storage: 50 GB available space

These specs will also have you running Silent Hill 2 at 30 frames per second at Low or Medium. With this in mind, it may be time for you to upgrade your computer's specs before trying to play this horror remake. Is this spooking you to go to Best Buy or Amazon right now? Thankfully, you won't need as much storage as games like Starfield (125GB) and Horizon: Forbidden West (150GB).

Silent Hill 2 recommended specs

To play the game at 1080p (or up-rezzed 4K with DLSS) on Medium settings (with 60 FPS) or High settings (?with 30 FPS), you'll need the following:

• OS: Windows 10 x64
• Processor: Intel Core i7-8700K | AMD Ryzen 5 3600X
• Memory: 16 GB RAM
• Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce® 2080RTX or AMD Radeonâ„?6800XT
• DirectX: Version 12
• Storage: 50 GB available space

Hopefully, the way to play Silent Hill 2 on your PC won't be too foggy, but at least the high en?d settings aren't as b?ad as they could be, considering some of the demands of other current-gen games out there.

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Konami has revealed that it will be publishing Far Out Games�ludicrous �0s delivery game, Deliver At All Costs. It’s coming to PS5, Xbox Serie?s X|S, and PC. No launch dat??e has been announced.

There seem to be a lot of courier games on the horizon, but this is strangely a concept I really enjoy. The trailer starts off normally enough, highlighting the �0s theme (they strangely pin it specifically in 1959). There are slow pans, people doing stuff, and a car chase. Then it gets to the actual gameplay, and the player character has a? giant marlin in the back ??of his truck.

Delivery can be fun in a mundane setting, but it can be even better when it leans wackier. Crazy Taxi is just a delivery game when you get down to it. Deliver At All Costs certainly isn’t aiming for realism. The?? trailer makes a big show of its destruction physics as the truck plows through fences and even buildings. People hang from the sides of the truck in one scene, and in another, the player climbs a steep, treacherous road as boulders tumble? onto them.

It looks like a good time. While the high, tilted camera angle isn’t my favorite, it looks like it works for the approach. The trailer already shows off quite a bit of var?iety in its missions, and there seems to?? be an underlying narrative serving as a foundation for the chaos.

We’ll see how well Far Out Games can pull it off when Deliver At All Costs comes to P??S5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC sometime in the future.

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Although Silent Hill is finally back after a lengthy hiatus, the offerings we've had so far have not been wholly well received. The Short Message didn't exactly set the world on fire, and the interactive experience Ascension was a massive disappointment. As such, we're all waiting to se?e whether Bloober Tea??m's remake of the legendary second game can save the franchise's renewal.

Given that Silent Hill 2 previews suggest the full game is going to be worth the wait, it's tempting to, once again, get excited about the future of this iconic horror series. In anticipation of the upcoming remake �scheduled to release October 8 �I've put together a list of the best Silent Hill games as noted by their Metacritic scores. You can also check out similar articles I've done for Splinter Cell, Deus Ex, and Quake.

As always, this one will list the mainline Silent Hill entries only. When doing a bit of research, it seemed there was some debate about which games in the series would count as "main" ones. With that in-mind, I'll be using this Wiki page for? help, so anything that's classed as a port or spin-off according to the site won't be included. Now that that's out of the way, let's crack on.

Silent Hill: Downpour (2012) - 64%

Downpour forms the latter part of Silent Hill's original run. At this point, Konami's IP had been scaring the pants off us for about 13 years, give or take. The survival horror genre had been through peaks and troughs over the years, with the likes of Resident Evil gearing more towards action rather than scares in the later games. However, there was still plenty to enjoy, and the indie scene was making strides thanks in part to Frictional Games' terrifying Amnesia: The Dark Descent, which came out in 2010.

With horror offering so much, it sort of felt like Silent Hill: Downpour would always struggle to make an impact, despite it coming from such highly regarded stock. As a result, it ended with a 64% Metacritic score on PS3 (68% on Xbox 360), which? is not exactly terrible, but it perhaps showed that the series wasn't able to keep up with what was happening in modern horror.

Silent Hill: Homecoming (2008) - 70%

I have a pretty vivid memory of buying Homecoming when it first came out. Aside from it being a new Silent Hill installment, one of the big draws for me was the bundle pack, which came with the game itself and an Xbox 360 controller. A red one, as well. I absolutely loved that controller. I kept it for years to come, long after I finally gave up on Homecoming.

I don't know what it was about it, but it just didn't resonate with me the way the classics had previously. I couldn't tell you much about it. I think there was a Pyramid Head-esque monster in there. Although, according to Wikipedia, this version was known as the "Bogeyman." If memory serves me well, the game also didn't allow for an inverted control scheme. That's a big no-no for me, but it is probably not the main reason it got just an okay Metacritic score of 70% on the system. Some people probably liked it, but again, it felt like Silent Hill was on a downward trajectory at this point.

Silent Hill 4: The Room (2004) - 76%

Developing a fourth game in a beloved horror franchise is never an easy feat. The three games that had come before it have gone down as classics in the genre, inspiring others since. But The Room is still a solid entry, one that's able to dole out the scares with its twisted and psychologically creepy mood. A score of 76% on Xbox and PS2 means Silent Hill 4 stands firm with its predecessors.

Although I never completed the game, I have fond memories of it. While still capturing some of the elements that made the previous games instant hits, The Room's main bargaining chip was those moments in the apartment itself. The fact that these sections were entirel??y in first-person was quite the appeal for me back then, especially as it just wasn't someth??ing horror was doing at the time. I remember looking through the spyhole, peeping through the hole at the neighbor's place, and seeing the disembodied, ghostly head floating past my window. It definitely had an eeriness to it that was evidently missing from my gaming life.

Silent Hill: Origins (2007) - 78%

Beginning life on the long-defunct PlayStation Portable, Silent Hill: Origins is the first mainline entry in the series that wasn't developed by Team Silent. Instead, the project was helmed by Climax Studios, which would go on to do ports for the likes of Assassin's Creed Chronicles, as well as assist in the development of Returnal. So, not a bad career, overall.

However, because Origins only came to the PSP and eventually the PS2, it would have been easy to miss this one. As the name suggests, it's very much a prequel, beginning before the events of the first game. Everyone loves an origin story and this game is no different, putting us in the shoes of trucker Travis Grady as he comes face-to-face with some familiar characters. Earning a Metacritic score of 78% on PSP �just beating The Room �suggests this entry had a lot going for it. I'm sad that I m?issed out, truth be known.

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (2009) - 79%

Another one from Climax Studios, the developer obviously had something about it that meant it was more than capable of creating a high-quality Silent Hill game. I think I'm also right in saying that this is the first and only installment in the series that was released on the Wii. The hugely successful Nintendo system wasn't really known for boasting a lot of horror games, though it did get a port of Resident Evil 4, which may be what prompted Konami to release Shattered Memories on the console.

This is one of those entries I wasn't sure about, in terms of adding it to the list. You see, Shattered Memories is considered more of a reimagining. It retells the premise of the first Silent Hill entry, but with a twist in the narrative, as well as changing some of the characters. Having said that, the fact that it doe??s change the story somewhat means you could also consider it a new game. So, here it shall stay.

Silent Hill 3 (2003) - 85%

Now we're into what I would label the classic Silent Hill era, which means we'll be seeing some big scores. The third game is one that I was very much late to. I only managed to get around to playing it a few years ago, not for any reason other than I didn't have the system to play it at the time of its release. I bought it as part of the much-maligned Silent Hill HD Collection, but that didn't detract from my experience.

With its themes of birth and pregnancy, not to mention the fact that you literally get to fight a god (spoilers!), Silent Hill 3 hit almost as hard as the previous two games. The fact that it came out just two years after what many regard as one of the greatest survival horror releases of all time (more on that soon) means the studio was able to keep that momentum going. Although perhaps overshadowed by the previous installment, the third game was still a remarkable achievement for Team Silent, with a Metacritic score of 85%. Just don't compare it to the PC version.

Silent Hill (1999) - 86%

During the mid-to-late 1990s, there was only really one word when it came to survival horror: Resident Evil. Okay, that's technically two words, but you know what I mean. Capcom's iconic franchise has been a huge part of the gaming world for almost 30 years. Just befor??e the new millennium �with a third entr??y about to hit shelves �it seemed nothing could stack up alongside it.

Then Silent Hill arrived, and we haven't felt the same since. Although to an outsider it looks like a Resident Evil clone, it offered so much more. Instead of zombies and biotech conspiracies, we had grotesque monstrosities, a creepy cult, and a foggy locale that, in itself, was part of the antagonism. The first game had its limits, sure, but it used those limits to full effect, such as the aforementioned fog which initially was a cover to make the game run smoother, but eventually became a staple of the series. It just wouldn't be a Silent Hill game without it.

Silent Hill 2 (2001) - 89%

I'm hoping many of you are familiar with Ben "Yahtzee" Crowshaw, the acerbic critic who brought us humorous (though serious) reviews via The Escapist on a weekly basis. I distinctly recall one of his videos in which he envisioned a world without video game sequels, forcing studios to be original every time they started a new project. A nice idea, for sure, but in this utopia of Croshaw's, we would have missed out on such important hits like Thief 2, Half-Life 2, and, of course, Silent Hill 2.

The second entry in the newly arrived Silent Hill series didn't just bring us more horror for the sake of it. Of course, it had plenty of scary moments, but its story was deep with symbolism; enemies that were representations of protagonist James Sunderland's anxieties and fears. It was mature enough to be taken seriously by critics and gamers alike. It's obviously aged at this point, but there's a very good reason it has an 89% score on Metacritic, typically sitting high on lists of the best horror games of all time. Team Silent w??asn't just banging rocks together when it made this one.

The post Ranki?ng the mainline Silent Hill games by Metacritic sco?re appeared first on Destructoid.

There are a lot of great Castlevania games, but if you’re a Metroidvania-style person, then you’ll be delighted to hear that the DS trilogy is being wrapped up in the Castlevania Dominus Collection. Better yet, it’s out today.

The DS had three great Castlevania games: Dawn of Sorrow, Portrait of Ruin, and Order of Ecclesia. Nowadays, they are quite expensive to obtain, especially the last one. So, it’s great to see them getting a re-release. If you’re wondering about the second screen, it’s getting crammed to the side, which is? a little weird, but what can you do?

On top of that, the arcade-exclusive Haunted Castle is being included alongside an upgraded “Revisited�versi??on. That's pretty cool, I guess.

I went deep into the Metroidvania-style Castlevania games about 10 years ago. During that time, I bought up all the DS versions - still wrapped -- for a decent price. Almost immediately, they shot up in value in the aftermarket. So, I guess you can blame me for that. I don't love the Metroidvania games as much as I enjoy the classic action-platformer formulate of the series, mainly because I find their integration of micro-progression to be rather shallow. They're still good, especially held up by the aesthetics, and the DS ones are the best (sorry Symphony of the Night), but I prefer ?dodging Medusa heads like my life depends ?on it.

The Castlevania Dominus Collection releases on Switch today.

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There have been quite a few doubts about Bloober Team's ability to remake Silent Hill 2 in a way that keeps the spirit of the original while breathing new life into the legendary horror game. I've been guilty of perpetuating some of this cynicism myself, but there's a chance the game could ac??tually turn out to be good.

A number of journalists have been treated to a preview of the Silent Hill 2 remake lately, and feedback suggests Bloober might actually have nailed it. With the release date just a few we??eks away, early opinions seem to be positive.

Eurogamer's Thomas Morgan says they're excited about what the full game will bring, praising the developer for daring to make a few changes. Jasmine Gould-Wilson, over on GamesRadar, said they went into the preview "cautiously," but was "pleasantly surprised," adding that they're "more than ready to give Silent Hill 2 Remake the chance it deserves," while the Metro refe??rs to the game as "f??ar better than we expected."

Silent no longer

From just these three opinions, it seems many of us may be able to breathe a sigh of relief. Bloober Team has often been criticized for its mishandling of delicate subjects in its games, such as mental health. Given that the original Silent Hill 2 is wholly a psychological game, concerns were raised over whether the same studio that made The Medium could do one of the most influential survival horro??r games any justice.

Alongside these early indications of its potential, we've also been treated to a new story trailer. The teaser gives us a good look at some of the titular f??oggy town's inhabit??ants, including Eddie, Laura, Angela, and, of course, Maria.

With a modern control scheme not too far removed from the remake of Resident Evil 2, new puzzles, fresh visuals, and, above all, respect for the source material, we could be looking at one hell of a return for Silent Hill 2.

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The team behind Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition, a mod that's widely regarded as the best way to play the original game on PC, has announced that it will launch the mod's final update on August 30, 2024, leaving plenty of time to play an??d prepare for the upcoming remake.

The final update for Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition is being touted as the biggest that it's ever received. While we don't have all the details on every change and upgrade it adds just yet; we do know that among them is improved water physics. It might sound trivial for a survival horror game, but water physics was the hallmark of a good video game back when Silent Hill 2 was initially released in 2001, so it's nice to see it finally catching up with its modern-day competiti?on.

The best survival horror experience forever preserved and infinitely replayable

The mod team announced the final upcoming update on Twitter, where fans thanked them profusely?? for the hard work they've put in over the years to ensure survival hor??ror fans can play this iconic title in the best way possible for as long as they have the game and mod installed.

Of course, you can pick up a physical copy of the original Silent Hill 2 for PS2 if you want to play it without using mods, but you'll likely have to spend $100+ to get it. Even the HD Collection goes for a pret??ty penny despite signage being wr?itten in Comic Sans and a few other issues fans have with changes from the original.

The Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition is the result of the efforts of many people working to make the original game compatible with as many modern PCs as possible. Game upgrades are one thing, but the group is also doing Konami's work for it b??y allowing anyone with any rig today to download the original game and enjoy it as Team Silent intended.

Bloober Team's Silent Hill 2 Remake launches on October 8, 2024, and is under a fair bit of pressure to succeed with fans and newcomers. After all, the original is regarded as one of the best survival horror games ever made, so the remake needs to at least live up to the same level of quality and defin??e itself sepa?rately from the original's legacy.

With the remake's release, Konami's focus will be on getting the game into as many players' hands as possible, meaning it'll want eyes off of the original. While that means Silent Hill 2: Enhanced Edition won't make a splash with new updates any longer, it's ready and waiting for when you want to experience the masterpiece and landmark release that's the reason so many of us love the Silent Hill franchise.

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Konami seems very eager to get the Metal Gear series back into the spotlight, as evidenced by it porting some of the classic titles to modern platforms (with seemingly more ports still to come) and the upcoming remake of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. This new era for Metal Gear, however, obviously lacks any involvement ??from series creator Hideo Kojima, though producer Noriaki Okamura has said it would "be a dream" if he got to work with Kojima again.

During a recent Metal Gear Production Hotline video to discuss the series (as spotted by VGC), Okamura, alongside promotions director Jiro Oishi and creative producer Yuji Korekado, answered fan submitted questions. The first one asked if any staff members from the original games could ever return to contribute to th?e series, even in a supervisory role, which Okamura described as a "tough one."

Okamura, who has served as a producer on titles like Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops and Metal Gear Survive, said it wasn't his place to speak on beh?alf of anyone outside of Konami, but he personally would "like nothing better than to work with Mr. Kojima and the rest of the team again. If that could happen, that would be the dream." Although he also acknowledged that such a dream isn't entirely feasible as "people have moved on to new things and commitments, and that's just our current reality."

Okamura's desire to collaborate with Kojima once more is a nice sentiment, and one many long-time fans would love to see come true. However, it's very difficult to imagine Kojima ever working with Konami again. As a reminder, his departure from the company in 2015 was far from amicable, and effectively turned Konami into the games industry's biggest villain for a long time. Not only did Konami remove Kojima's name from the cover of Metal Gear Solid V (the final Metal Gear game Kojima worked on), he was reportedly barred from attending The Game Awards that year (per IGN), meaning he couldn't accept the award for Best Action/Adventure game, which MGS V won. Let's also not forget that before he left, Kojima announced he was helming a new Silent Hill game with that incredible P.T. teaser, only for Konami to cancel the project and scrub P.T. from the PlayStation Store.

It's not as if Kojima has struggled to find new work in the following years either. He's enjoyed great success after founding his own studio and partnering with Sony to releasing Death Stranding. A sequel is now in the works, but Kojima is also working with Microsoft on an Xbox exclusive horror game called OD, and he's basically doing Metal Gear again with a new stealth espionage game, known only as Physint for the time being. Knowing all that, why would he ever return to Konami, even if it was for a partnership on a new Metal Gear?

While Kojima may have nothing to do with the Snake Eater remake, dubbed Metal Gear Solid Delta, Okamu??ra did stress that he and the rest of the original development team will be credited for their work. "They're a part of these games too, so absolutely, they're in," he stressed.

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I had never heard of Rocket Knight Adventures until I was starting to fill out my Genesis collection. This was back? in the �0s when that was actually an affordable thing to do. It quickly became (and remains) my favorite game on the console.

I didn’t understand why it wasn’t more talked about, but that was back when I thought that quality had a correlation with popularity. Oh, how naïve. Now that I’m older I realize that it’s al??l marketing and maybe sometimes people shouting, which is a form of marketing.

Now I’m going to shout at you about Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection. I’m going to tell you about the overall quality of the collection, but none of that matters. You should play Rocket Knight Adventures, and this is your chance.

Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection (PC, Switch, PS4, PS5)
Developer: Konami, Limited Run Games
Publisher: Konami
Released: June 11, 2024
MSRP: $29.99

The Rocket Knight series centers around an anthropomorphic opossum named Sparkster as he works to protect his kingdom, and usually its princess, from invasion. Each time, he faces off against his foil, Axel Gear, who seems motivated to just be a dick. That seems to be his only ambition. He partners up with the enemy each time and harrows Sparkster. There’s maybe an indication in the Genesis version of Sparkster that he just wants to test himself against the protagonist, but partnering with ??an invading f??orce seems like going a bit far.

I’m already off track. Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection, contains Rocket Knight Adventures, Sparkster, and Sparkster. The former Sparkster is Sparkster: Rocket Knight Adventures 2 for Genesis/Mega Drive, and the latter is Sparkster on the SNES.

Beyond that, the Re-Sparked collection has a music playe??r and an art viewer with production documents. There’s also a boss rush mode, which is appropriate for these games. Really, the most striking part of the package is the fully animated cartoons interpreting the gameplay. Aside from that, these are straight ports from their home consoles with few bells and whistles.

Of the games, the original Rocket Knight Adventures is the standout. If I hav?en’t oversold it enough, it’s one of the best 16-bit platformers. All three games have Konami royalty behind them, but, well, we’ll get to what drags the other two down.

With Rocket Knight Adventures, however, it’s j??ust a fun production. While the mechanics are straightforw??ard, they get stretched in every direction. Each level presents something new and different, and it’s rarely just a platformer. One moment you’ll be jetting across the surface of a lake, and the next, you’ll be judging your jumps off the reflection of undulating water.

One particularly fantastic level has Sparkster assaulting an enemy airship. He’s fired out of a cannon and punches right through the side of the craft, like Doomguy in Doom Eternal. You travel a short distance through the interior before heading to the top, where you battle against intense wind. You move to the front of the airship before dropping down to the railings beneath it. You then return to the interior and move to the front to finish the boss?? off.

It doesn’t let u??p. There are only a couple of issues. The first is that it’s really hard to gauge what kind of damage you’re doing. You can dash into enemies, hit them with your sword, or just hit them with a projectile that is fired when you swing your weapon. You can also spin in place, which sometimes just happens when you hit an enemy at the right angle. But what actually does?? more damage is hard to tell.

Likewise, it’s pretty vexing that touching an enemy does significa??ntly more damage to Sparkster than getting hit with a projectile. If your only option for getting out of t?he way of a projectile is to get danger-close to the enemy, it’s sometimes worth it to take the hit rather than risk getting brushed and taking twice the damage.

Lastly, there are limited cont??inues, and to actually play the entire game, you need to be on “normal�difficulty. This wouldn’t be so bad, but the default difficulty is easy, so you have to know to check. Also, North America’s “normal�corresponds to Japan’s “very hard.�It’s not impossible, but it is deceptive.

With the two Sparkster sequels, it looks like Konami’s marketing department or management got involved and gave the mandate “more like Sonic the Hedgehog.�It's rather obvious because Sparkster in Rocket Knight Adventures looks like a rat in a trash can, while in the Sparkster games, he’s all �tuded up. Stringy limbs, pointy ears, ??spikey hair; the works.

The artwork you can view in the collection really reinforces this. The sketches of Sparkster in Rocket Knight Adventures showed him snoozing or snacking on apples. There are early design documents for Sparkster that changed his design, but not in such an aggressive Sonic kind of way. I preferred him looking mor?e earnest th?an cool.

I would have loved to hear about how these changes came to be, but even if the Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection h?ad interviews (which it doesn't), I doubt they'd really include talks of corporate meddling.

The Sega Genesis version of Sparkster goes further to imitate Sonic. The levels are more open and have more exploration involved. One of the side goals is collecting seven swords scattered throughout the levels, and doing so powers up Sparkster and turns him gold. To be fair, Sonic just lifted that from Dragon Ball, but it’s more obvious wh??en an anthropomorphic rat wi??th spikey hair does it.

Speaking of which, Genesis Sparkster has a cold opening that involves fighting Axel Gear in a robot suit. It’s so easy to lose that you may think this is a scripted defeat to set up their rivalry, but you are actually supposed to win it in order to g?et the first sword. Pro tip.

As for SNES Sparkster, it’s mostly fine. You’re fi??ghting wolves, and if you hit them, they get knocked out of their armor and display their chiseled physique.

It follows the same �tuded up design as Genesis Sparkster, but the levels are more linear and there are no swords to collect. It’s an above-average platformer and does?? feature some variety and ambition, j?ust nowhere near as much as the original.

That’s kind of the issue with the two Sparksters. They're competent, but they on?ly have a fraction of the soul of the first game.? The changes in visual design just put a big spotlight on this.

As for Limited Run Games�Resparked collection, I once again have to wonder why I can’t rebind the controls. I understand that, on console, most people just use the stock controller configuration, but is it really that hard to allow the option to change it? I’d suspect not since the original versions of the games allow you to change the bindings which, for some reason, they removed from the versions in this release. I’m so frustra??ted, I just want to play with a Genesis-like controller.

Aside from that, these are basically just emulated versions of the game. I feel like the main point of these collections is to make the games available on a modern platform. Any changes made are rarely impactful. For example, updating the graphics on Gargoyles didn’t suddenly make it a better game. The rewind and save states a??re appreciated, and I found the included production art very intere??sting to look at.

There isn’t anything mindblowing here. I would have loved to see interviews with the staff or design documents beyond just concept art, but I guess that wasn’t in the cards. The only thing that really elevates the Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection beyond, say, the recent Felix the Cat collection is mainly the animated openings and the boss rush modes. The entire collection is rather pricy for three emulated games. It is, for comparison, $10 more than the Castlevania Anniversary Collection.

On the other hand, if you get anything from this review, it’s that Rocket Knight Adventures is an underappreciated classic, and you should definitely play it. The two Sparkster games are more Sparkster, but more disposable and with a feeling of cynicism. Whether you wait for a sale is your decision. Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked Collection is fine, just play Rocket Knight Adventures already.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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Konami showed off a brand new trailer for Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater during the Xbox Game Showcase 2024. It shows off some familiar-looking gameplay with a much-needed new coat of paint and confirms the return of Naked Snake's origi?nal voice actor, David Hayter.

While we've seen snippets of gameplay of the Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater remake before, we've never seen it in action like this. The trailer contains key moments from the gam?e with their fantastic upgraded graphics, but the gameplay seems to remain pre??tty true to the original. No matter how clunky it might have been. The most exciting part of the trailer is the voice acting, which confirms that David Hayter, the original and best voice for Solid and Naked Snake, is back at the helm as the protagonist for this game.

Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater shows off stunning new visuals that match the original gameplay

Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater is a full remaster/remake of the third Metal Gear Solid game. As you can see in the trailer above, it follows Naked Snake, the greatest soldier in the world, before he's proven himself, dropping into a hostile environment behind enemy? line?s. There, he must capture a Soviet scientist to help save the world, but his former mentor, who also looks great in this trailer, steps in to get in the way of those plans.

The only issue with this trailer is that it doesn't give us a release window. We still have no?? idea when we'll be getting our hands on it, so we'll have to sit tight and hope that Konami ble??sses us with one before the end of 2024.

David Hayter hasn't been the voice of a protagonist in a Metal Gear Solid game since Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. As a fan who has been playing these games since the fir?st one was released on PS1, it hasn't felt the same wi?thout him.

What made Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater feel so unique is that it takes the tactical espionage action we're used to ?seeing from the series and moved it into nature. For the first time in the franchise, you were forced to change your camo to match your environment, think and act to hide from enemies on the fly in tricky environments, and eat whatever crawls out of the tall grass to survive.

Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater appears to retain all of this and bring it up to a modern standard so it can compete with the best-looking games on the planet. It allows for dynamic gameplay, with random or unforeseen encounters emerging as you hold up one guard, get spotted, use a snake to kill another, and?? then rush into a building to hide.

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The long road to the launch of the anticipated Silent Hill 2 remake is coming to an end, as the official release date was finally revealed last week (with the title, p?robably predictably, set to come out just weeks before Halloween). But there's a bit of a stink in the air surrounding the game, and it seems like this modern take on one of the most influential horror releases ever is going to have to be pretty much perfect.

In the current era of remakes, remasters, and re-imaginings, it can be easy to feel a little bogged down by an industry that's too eager to tick the nostalgia box rather than deliver something fresh. However, a quick look at games like Resident Evil 4, Dead Space, Final Fantasy 7, and the work Nightdive Studios has been doing on classics like Quake 2 shows there's still r??oom for it in the market, it see??ms.

But despite the excitement that should be surrounding Bloober Team's Silent Hill 2 remake, there are a number of doubts that are putting the whole project u?nder a lot of pressure to succeed.

Reigniting the influence

There's an argument to be made about not fixing something that isn't broken. As one of the most influential horror games of all time, remaking it is surely a tall order. Silent Hill �especially the second one �h??as made its mark on the genre, preserved in the annals of gaming history as a staple of how to create something atmospheric with lash??ings of delicious psychological torment to go with it. To some, the second installment is the perfect horror game.

That's not to say it can't be done. You only have to look at Capcom's remake of Resident Evil 4 to see there's scope for revitalizing older games to give them another go in more modern eras. Much like Silent Hill 2, the original RE4 has been hugely influential, which renders a potential remake a dangerous line to tread, but we know it can be done. However, there's one thing that's probably crossed people's minds ??about it.

What's the connection between these remade franchises: Resident Evil, The Last of Us, and Dead Space? They were all done by the developer who created the original. Maybe not the exact same people, but certainly the studio itself. With Silent Hill 2, it's b??eing made by a different te??am entirely; one that, although it has a reputation in the horror sphere �as well as being influenced by Team Silent's work �was not even around when the original was released. Placing a remake of a beloved game into the hands of another is an exercise in trust.

What we've seen so far

The Silent Hill Transmission that took place in 2022 had a lot of people excited. Finally, after years of speculation and dormancy, Konami's horror series was getting new games, a new film, and more attention than ever before. Would this be th??e triumphant return many of us h??ad been hoping for?

But the outpouring since then has left much to be desired. The interactive Ascension has not stood as a bastion of achievement in terms of rejuvenating the Silent Hill name. Metacritic ?is currently showing a user score of 0.8 ??out of 67 reviews, with the likes of IGN giving it just 50 out of 100.

Perhaps less tragic �though still not really noteworthy �was this year's A Short Message. Although it's done better than Ascension, with a Metacritic review score of 53 and a user score of 6.3, it leaves the Silent Hill 2 remake with a lot of slack to pick up. SH2 is not a brand-new entry in the series, but it's se?emingly going to have to do more than coast on nosta?lgic reputation alone given what we've seen of the reemergence so far.

Bloober Team's track record

Whatever your thoughts on Bloober Team, the studio has managed to make a name for itself in the horror genre, despite going up against the likes of Naughty Dog, Capcom, and even Frictional Games of Amnesia fame. But this esteem is not without its criticism. Bloober has a knack for visual quality and a disturbing aesthetic that has pricked up a few ears, but there are some problem?atic things about the developer that people?? can't shake.

This TechRadar article from a couple of years ago laments the studio's inability to represent mental health in any agreeable way. The troubled artist from Layers of Fear, the protagonist in The Medium who was abused as a child; there's a sense that the developer uses these angles as a demonizing tactic, and it's unclear whether Bloober has learned from this. The writer of that article does not appear to be alone in such criticisms.

Given that Silent Hill 2 deals quite heavily with trauma and psychological issues, there's bound to be concern that a remake from the Layers of Fear studio could encounter similar backlash. However, if Bloober is aiming for a faithful recreation of the original, then such issues should not be a problem, right? But therein lies a further question: why remake something like-for-like (only with modern visuals and control schemes)? without an injection of new sensibilities, mechanics, techniques, the developer's own flavor, etc.? Answers on a postcard.

It's not P.T.

We all miss it. We all wonder what the final product would have been like, especially with Hideo Kojima and Guillermo del Toro's names attached. Although it's been ten years since P.T. came and went, it still hangs in the air to some extent, and it's likely the Silent Hill 2 remake will get compared to the canceled project. But maybe I'm doing Bloobe??r a bit of a disservice.

A game with s?uc?h recognition and high praise is going to be the subject of scrutiny when it comes to releasing an official remake of it. Taking a beloved franchise and handing the reigns over to a studio that's not without its fair share of detractors is likely going to draw a bit of ire regardless. Everyone's going to be watching Bloober Team on October 8, and I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibility that some may be scathing by default.

Personally, I think some of the current negativity surrounding the remake is a little unfair, likely down to a frustrated audience that wants to see this new era of Silent Hill succeed. But I think �judging by some of the YouTube comments posted on the video linked above �things are in danger of bordering on nasty, maybe even verbally aggressive, from a fan base?? that's hungry for blood.

Maybe there's some legitimate criticism of what we've seen in trailers and teasers so far. This article dives a little deeper into some of the design choices of the remake, with particular reference to how changing the clothes of Maria detracts from her significance as a duplicitous femme fatale who reminds James of his dead wife. How much of this is simply the wailing sound of "dudebros" u?pset that a female character has been modernized to look less sexual, as opposed to this new look missing the point of the original's intent, is not clear.

At any rate, Bloober is under a lot of pressure to make sure Silent Hill 2 is pure and flawless; not one iota less. If it strays too far from the original, it'll displease the older fans. Similarly, if it's a 100% retelling of the 2001 release, it'll feel a little pointless (see also: the 1998 shot-for-shot remake of Psycho). If it doesn't straddle the line between freshness and nostalgia, but with a fai?r representation of the game's themes, the backlash could be brutal. Honestly, it feels lose-lose at this point.

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As part of the PlayStation State of Play stream, Konami and Bloober Team have given us a deeper look at the remake of Silent Hill 2. It focuses mostly on Angela O?rosco, as well as some pretty familiar-looking scenes from the game. More importantly, we have a releas??e date of October 8, 2024.

I think it looks decent. What do you think? Here’s the trai?ler:

There’s a lot that’s really familiar being shown off. It looks to me like Bloober Team are trying very hard to keep it as close to the original as they can while making modern changes. ?However, it doesn’t really matter how careful they are; they’re working on an extremely beloved game, and not everyone is going to love it.

Frankly, I think Silent Hill 2 is a great game, but I’m not huge on it. Don’t get me wron??g, it’s fantastic, I’m just not totally enthusiastic. I don’t think a remake is really going to change that, but I’m open to the possibility.

Silent Hill 2 (the remake) is o?ut on October 8, 202?4 for PS5 and PC.

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It’s finally here, the Konami/Poncle crossover everyone dreamed of the moment they first picked up Vampire Survivors. Contra has f??inally arrived?? to mow down waves and waves of identical enemies.

Vampire Survivors just didn’t feel complete without Bill Rizer and Lance Whosits. And there is no game that can’t be made better with the inclusion of guns. Just go back and ask 8-year-old Zoey, she’d definitely tell you Mario would be better with a gun. Vampire Survivors already had guns, but its arsenal was missing one thing: lots of guns.

Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns is here to salve th??ose gaping, festering wounds and finally deliver to us the ??game we’ve always thirsted for.

Similar to the last DLC, which crossed it over with Among Us, Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns contains a new “one big map,�an adventure to add to the growing list, and a tonne of new unlocks. Operation Guns brings the heat with 22-ish new weapons, and 11-ish new characters from across the Contra series. There's a?lso an extra-special level that includes hoverbikes.

Poncle named the laser weapon upgrade the “C.U. Laser�and now that’s what I’m going to call it in Contra. Thanks a lot!

Most importantly (maybe) is that new music tracks have arrived to drill their way into your ears. There are six remixes and 13 new tracks. I have the Hard Corps remix stuck in my head right now. It won’t stop!

Personally, I’ve always put Contra on a much higher pedestal than Among Us. That’s probably because I’m old, don’t have any friends, and remember the good old days. However, as with the Emergency Meeting DLC, Operation Guns doesn’t really add much of Contra’s DNA into the mix. It’s still Vampire Survivors in a Contra T-Shirt.

Despite that, the references are very well interwoven. The “one big map�stretches from a jungle, to a ruined city, to an alien hive. There’s even a familiar boss ??that pops up in there. It bops to the music! I don’t know why it dances or whose decision it was to make it dance, but it is easily the best thing ever.

A number of the guns still behave as they do in the classic run-’n-gun shooter series: the spreader spreads, the C.U. Laser penetrates deep into enemy skulls. New to Operation Guns is an item specifically for evolving Contra weapons. While you sometimes still need a passive power-up to evolve Contra guns, they also require the Weapon Power-Up item, which doesn’t take a spot from your subweapons, but is a pretty finite resource. Mostly, they’re just found on maps. And they weren’t added to non-Contra maps.

Which is strange to the point where I think I’m missing something. I wouldn’t believe that you just can’t upgrade the Operation Guns guns on normal maps. That would make all the new weapons feel like needless clutter in an alrea?dy bloated selection.

I don’t feel like the new weapons are as overpowered as some of the ones I found in Emergency Meeting. But, as I said there, I think part of the appeal of Vampire Survivors is becoming?? so overpowered that it ??starts to feel like the game is about to break.

However, as with Emergency Meeting, I never hit the point in Adventure Mode where I felt like I was going to lose. I always hit the endpoint of a level, but having clocked so many hours into Vampire Survivors already, I’ve already built ski??lls to ?pay the bills.

So, it’s kind of hard to rate Operation Guns, which is why I’m not doing that. It’s another part of the growing, grotesquely mutating mass of Vampire Survivors. If you’re already in love with that mass, then you’re probably going to want to shovel more into it. And at $2.50, Poncle still remains hilariously bad at taking your money. If you think Vampire Survivors would be better if you could spend hours looking at Brad Fang’s hairy, shirtless torso (and why wouldn’t you?) then the question of whether or not you should purchase Operation Guns should be obvious.

Hopefully, this won’t be the last Konami crossover we see. There are many other great licenses that could be a great fit in the overstuffed bag of Vampire Survivors. For example, Rocket Knight Adventures. For another example, Ganbare Goemon. Those are all the Konami games I can think of.

The post Vampire Survi??vors: Operation Guns is better value than a laundr??omat wash cycle appeared first on Destructoid.

Limited Run Games and Konami have announced that the digital version of the Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked collection will be releasing on Switc??h, PS4, PS5, and PC on June 11.

Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked contains the three 16-bit games in the Rocket Knight series. This includes the original Rocket Knight Adventures, the Genesis Sparkster (subtitled Rocket Knight Adventures 2), and the SNES Sparkster (not subtitled). To be clear, Genesis Sparkster and SNES Sparkster are two completely different games featuring the series�protagonist. Of the included games, one of them is the very best Genesis/Mega Drive ever made, an?d the other two are games.

Okay, that’s not quite fair. SNES Sparkster and Genesis Sparkster are both decent �maybe even? above average �platformers, but they don’t even ho??ld a candle to the original.

Limited Run Games did a round of pre-orders for the physical version of Rocket Knight Adventures: Resparked back in January and promised a digital release for anyone not interested in material possessions, but previously had not announced a date. I scooped up the Ultimate Edition of it at the time. I don’t usually go for special editions because I have enough random game collectibles, but Rocket Knight Adventures is one of my favorite games.

The collection will not only include modern comforts such as save states and rewind, but also a new boss rush mode and a “franchise museum and music player.�/p>

Rocket Knight Adventures: Re-Sparked releases digitally on Switch, PS4, PS5,?? and PC on ??June 11.

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As part of the Triple-i Showcase stream, Poncle has announced that their mega-hit move-'em-up Vampire Survivors will be crossing over with Konami's classic run-and-gun Contra. Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns is releasing all current platforms o??n May 9th, with the PlayStation version? arriving this Summer.

"The President’s cousin’s sister’s dog has been kidnapped by Red Falcon. Are you bad enough to come to the rescue?" asks the presser. Yes, si??r, I am pretty bad. Sufficiently bad, I must claim.

Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns will supposedly encourage "min-maxing and stat manipulation" and will add a tonne of weapons, which is more specifically 20 including evolutions. Brad Fang from Contra: Hard Corps will be there. That's pretty cool. It doesn't mention any new levels, but having the game become more Contra-flavored should be enough. It's always n??ice to see Konami get?ting mixed in with a few stews after it spent decades burning all its goodwill.

Wait a minute, how is Vampire Survivors crossing over with Contra before Castlevania? Oh, that Poncle. Always zigging when you th??ink they should be zagging.

Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns infiltrates the main game via a patch on M??ay 9th on all current platformers. PlayStation version will be arriving ??this Summer.

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With Limited Run Games being granted the rights to re-release some old Konami games that the publisher previously kept buried in the backyard, I would not have expected Felix the Cat to be one of the first to come ou??t of the relationship.

Felix the Cat isn’t technically a Konami game. Released in 1992, it was published by Hudson and allegedly developed by the elusive Shimada Kikaku, which would explain why there are no credits to be found anywhere. It’s loo?sely based on the 1989 movie, which was an extension of an absolutely atrocious 1958 cartoon series. Thankfully, the game isn’t bad.

Most importantly, this is a re-release of a licensed Konami game. A lot of old games based on film and TV licenses feel as though they are lost to be confined in their original format, so anytime one makes it to modern platforms, it’s a win. Even if it’s just an okay game, like Felix the Cat.

Felix the Cat (PS4, PS5, Switch [Reviewed])
Developer: Shimada Kikaku, Limited Run Games
Publisher: Konami
Released: March 28, 2024
MSRP: $24.99

Limited Run Games�release bring the 1992 original release alongside the unreleased Japanese Famicom version and the 1993 Game Boy port. It’s technically just three flavors of one game, which is probably why it’s not called the Felix the Cat “Collection�or anything similar.

What you get is an action platfo??rmer, and while it’s a pretty boilerplate platformer, ??it’s at least a solid one. You play as the titular golden age cartoon star, and you’re trying to rescue you girlfriend, Kitty from the clutches of Professor�Oh, that’s his entire name. It’s just “Professor.�There are short vignettes every couple of levels where the professor threatens Felix, but that’s about all you get in terms of storyline.

I say that Felix the Cat is pretty standard, but it’s not without its own ideas. The core mechanics beyond jumping onto floating platforms is multiple levels of power-ups. You collect floating Felix tokens from the environment, and every tenth collected will throw a power-u?p. On a walking stage, this changes out Felix’s punching glove attack for a wave of stars that explode from him. Ten more, and he gets a car. Ten more, and he gets a tank. It’s rather ?satisfying.

Each power level is on a timer that depletes as you use it. You can refill the gauge by either powering up to the next level or collecting milk that sprays out every fifth token you pick? up. It has the benefit of both keeping you moving and gives meaning to collecting ??tokens beyond just getting a higher score, which I don’t think anyone cares about these days.

Every so often, the game switches itself up from simple platforming. You get the odd leve??l where Felix is flying, ones where he’s traveling over water, and some in which he’s under it. Each one has its own set of power-ups to go along with it, but while they’re usually not as layered as the walking levels, it’s a nice ch??ange of pace.

More importantly, it gave the artist more chances to flex their muscle. Whoever they had handling the graphics for Felix the Cat outdid themselves (again, no credits). It’s not that it’s a game that pushes the graphical boundaries of the console, but the art and animations show a level of demonstrate a level of passion for the proje??ct. S?mall details like Felix falling asleep in an innertube kick the game’s personality an extra mile.

But, as I keep hammering on, the game itself is pretty standard. Combat is pretty straightforward, with you hitting enemies with whatever projectile you have at your disposal. You can take a lot of damage if you keep increasing your power-up level, which means that getting through the game is pretty easy. For that matter, bosses are rather disappointing as well, showing no interest in mechanical trickery or creative design. I w?ouldn’t say i??t’s boring, but it’s something you’ll probably complete quickly and move on from.

The Game Boy version is a (slightly) scaled-down port of the NES release. Some compromise??s were made for the smaller palette and screen size, but it plays pretty well. It would have been pretty cool to have on long car trips back in the �0s, but it’s overshadowed by the NES version being on the same cartridge.

As for the Famicom version, it’s sort of just here as a curiosity. As I mentioned, it was never actually released in Japan. But, on the other hand, it is, as far as I can tell, identical to the Western version, aside from the ??text. I guess they might as well include it, but it doesn’t really add value to the collection.

In terms of extra features, Limited Run Games�Car??bon Engine adds borders, CRT effects (or LCD on Game Boy), save states, rewind, and you can turn off sprite flicker. The sprite flicker and CRT options are perhaps less common in these sorts of re-releases, but they aren’t unheard of. Overall, it’s a decent presentation of a retro game.

If I have one complaint, you can’t rebind the controls. They also chose A and B to be, well, A and B. That may sound obvious, but on modern controllers, the tilt of those two buttons isn’t optimal. A better layout is bin?ding B to A and Y to B, making it easier on your thumb to jump and shoot. It’s not a dealbreaker, but it is an annoying oversight. On the other hand, if you have NSO NES or Famicom controllers, i??t works as it would on a normal controller. But then you can’t bring up the program menu because that is bound to ZR instead of just R. They should have just let you bind the controls yourself.

In terms of this release, I’m more excited to see a lesser-known Konami game get re-released than I am to actually play it. Let’s be fair here, I’ve happily played ports of less exciting games, but in terms of being able to recommend them to someone who isn’t already familiar with the game or someone who isn’t into retro games in general is a little more difficult. When I was a kid, Felix the Cat was one of my favorite games on the co??nsole, but I recognize it’s not going to be very exciting fo?r newcomers.

But even if you are just curious and want to try it out, Felix the Cat is a decent game. It’s rather routine. It's slightly above average. But it’s not a passionless title with no value. On top of that, it's a quality port. So, even if you come in with only an appr?eciation for the NES, the character, or Shimada Ki?kaku (for some reason), then you won’t be disappointed. Limited Run Games didn’t recover a hidden gem, but it gave an old cat another life.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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Konami and Stunlock Studios have announced that the vampire survival game V Rising will be getting an update that crosses the game over with Castlevania. The Legacy of Castlevania update will be free and is coming on May 8. 

The update will bring Simon Belmont to the game, with the teaser trailer suggesting that you’ll be fighting against him, which makes sense since you play as a vampire. The press release also describes the Vampire Killer ?whip will be added as a new weapon, which makes less sense because it’s consecrated.

On top of all the free additions of Simo??n and the whip, there will also be a paid “Premium Pack�that includes themed castle parts.

I played V Rising closer to its initial Early Access release and really enjoyed it. There were some places it needed to improve and tighten, but this was probably a year ago and those things? may have been both improved and tightened. That’s what Early Access is for, after all. It’s a crafting survival game like the many that are out there now but with an excellent focus on vampires. You build your castle, enthrall some followers, and make sure you’re well-fed.

One of the first things I thought of when creating my castle was how awesome it would be to make something like Dracula’s Castle from Castlevania with its impractical gothic towers.

Unfortunately, we only have the teaser trailer to go off of, which does??n’t show any of the added features in action. We’re just going to have to use our imaginations.

That is until the Legacy of Castlevania content ??pack arrives on May 8th. This is also? when V Rising leaves Early Access on PC and will be released on PS5.

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It’s been rough for Contra fans. The last new title in the series we had really seen was 2011’s Hard Corps: Uprising. That was it, I swear. Don’t look it up. Just believe me.

However, Konami seems to be waking up from its gambling-induced stupor and has been coaxing developers to bring back their most venerated franchises. For Contra, they went back to WayForward, who were also the developers behind 2007’s Contra 4 on the DS.

I can confirm that Contra Operation Galuga is, at the very least, a Contra game.

Contra: Operation Galuga (PC [reviewed], PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox SeriesX|S, Switch)
Developer: WayForward
Publisher: Konami
Released: March 12, 2024
MSRP: $39.99

It has been so long since the last Contra game (trust me) that WayForward has made the assumption that you have forgotten the thrilling storyline? of the original arcade/NES title, and are retelling it in an entirely new way.

That’s right, Contra: Operation Galuga has a story mode with cutscenes, and it retells the story of Bill Rizer and Lance “Mean�Bean as they visit Galuga island and shoot everything. The new approach also ties in an ancient artifact, and I kind of wish it didn’t. I wasn’t expecting a deep story, but Operation Galuga manages to tie in a few of my least favor??ite storytelling devices. If you look at it as though it’s trying to convey a Saturday morning? cartoon vibe, then it might work. I’m not sure that was the intention, however.

On the other hand, Steve Blum is terrific a?s Bill Rizer.

The story mode is only part of the overall equation, however. It will probably take you an hour or two to topple it. In terms of difficulty, Contra: Operation Galuga is flexible. Beyond just having an easy, normal, hard setup, ?there’s a life bar you can axe in favor of the c??lassic one-hit deaths and a variety of “perksâ€?you can slot to tailor your runs to your liking. 

I’m a simple girl, and tweaking my own difficulty always bugs me. Contra: Operation Galuga see?ms to intend that you play the Arcade mode repeatedly. The arcade mode has you attempt all of the levels to get as far as you can. It feels more like a typical run-and-gun, where memorization of the levels is key to pushing further into the game.

However, the difficulty seems set up with the lifebars in mind. There are sections of the game, and even boss attacks, th?at feel like avoidance requires more foresight and luck than is reasonable. Maybe. This genre requires multiple replays to really get down, and while I have certainly done multiple, I haven’t done “flow state�multi??ple.

But I don??’t really w??ant to, and that is a problem of its own.

For a game to demand that a player keeps practicing for the simple sake of enjoying it more, it has to be damned good. I’ve played Metal Slug more times than I can count, and that’s because it’s an incredible, well-designed game. There's satisfaction in reaching for the bar games like Metal Slug set. The same goes for the original NES port of Contra and Contra: Hard Corps. Contra: Operation Galuga is merely okay.

While the original Contra was somewhat grounded aside from the sudden appearance of aliens, the subsequent games began getting weirder and weirder. Contra 3 and Hard Corps were incredibly imaginative with their settings and challenges. Contra: Operation Galuga is comparatively more grounded, w?hich maybe fits its reboot intentions, but doesn’t do it any?? favors.

There are levels where you’re on a hoverbike, but you’re travel??ing through some bland areas. One of the levels takes place in a temple, and while it does a unique graphical effect to add some spice to its gameplay, I hate it so much. Every time I hit that level on a playthrough, my enthusiasm would just die. The enemies are annoying and boring, the hazards aren’t well placed, and the backgrounds are bland.

That one level kills the momentum of the game as it starts buildi??ng to a climax. What comes after it is a smidge more interesting, but becau?se it stumbles right before, I just can’t get excited.

Galuga's roster includes a bunch of playable characters, but I could only ever stand playing as Lance and Bill. Luc?ia has a grappling hook that is barely handy on the rare occasion that you’re climbing vertically, while Ariana has a slide kick that is useful only when the level is flat. Worse yet, playing as Lucia perverts the spread gun into a chargeable wave cannon that feels terrible in motion.

Completing the game unlocks more characters. The most exciting ones require y?ou to save up a massive number of in-game currency. I unlocked the one I was most interested in and found out that their moveset is based on Ariana, and she has the terrible Lucia spread gun. At that point, my disappointment had peaked, and I was done with the game.

I’m really trying to come up with some praise for Contra: Operation Galuga, but the best I can offer is that there’s an interesting end boss, there are multiple soundtracks, and St???eve Blum puts on a good performance. The challenge mode can be some decent fun, but the rewards you get are poor. Aside from that, it’s fine.

It’s slightly above par for a game in general and below it for Contra. Despite my complaints, I enjoyed swaths of the game when playing with Bill Rizer, but not enough to want to replay it endlessly. The Contra series has done much worse, but it’s also done much better. Contra: Operation Galuga manages only to be a run-and-shrug shooter.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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Limited Run Games has announced that they’re going to be re-releasing Hudson’s 2003 Game Boy Advance game, Ninja Five-O, both physically and digitall??y for Switch, PS4, and P??S5.

You might be thinking that Ninja Five-O is a quirky early-�0s localization title, but it was never released in Japan despite being developed by Hudson and published by Konami. That’s actually what it’s called, though it was released in Europe as Ninja Cop. It’s an extremely rare GBA game that now commands an impressive price tag on the collector’s market.

I was co??nsidering it for coverage as part of my Weekly Kusoge column, but then I found out that it’s actually a good game. Despite being rather obscure and having a small print run, the critics who reviewed it at the time gave it high mark?s.

Just look at that trailer. You can tell it’s fun to play. Featuring a ninja in the modern world, it resembles 1988’s Ninja Gaiden on NES, but Joe Osugi’s fancy footwork and flashy ninjutsu gives him a more impressive presence than Ryu Hayabusa of that series. According to the Blurb, Joe is out to “protect the city of Zipangu and take down the evil Mad Mask bosses.�/p>

Ninja Five-O is another in a lineup of games that are starting to come from Limited Run Game’s new partnership with Konami. Previously, the distributor announced Rocket Knight Adventure and Felix the Cat. Given Konami’s history of not respecting their back catalog, it’s nice to see that old library revisited. I still have my fingers crossed for some localized Ganbare Goemon games.

Ninja Five-O is coming to Switch, PS4, and PS??5 sometime in ??2024.

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