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Backlaugust 2022 - Backlog Legacy Collection
 
It's that time of year yet again! Now to copy over this post from ludist210...

Backlaugust: The Official Negative World Month for Decimating Backlogs!™ is back again for more action! So start looking through your backlog and get started! The idea is to finish games during the month of August.

Here are the "rules":

Games can be on any system, not just Nintendo systems. I know we're a Nintendo fan site, but most everyone here is a multi-console owner. So play a game on any system you want.

Let us know what you're playing. Mostly just so we can cheer each other on.

Play games you already own. A lot of people tend to buy a game then not play it, or play it for a significant amount of time and then put it down. This is what we're aiming for. Games that launch in August don't count.

Try to pick up games you aren't actively playing right now. Games you're currently playing can be allowed, but in the spirit of Backlaugust, let's try to make them games you aren't playing at the moment. Make it a game you haven't touched in a month or more if possible.

When is a game done? That's up to you! Mark a game off your backlog when you've seen the ending or end credits, or once you've seen enough of the game in a game without a "proper ending" (like an arcade-type game). You don't have to do or get everything unless you want to.

Finished games will be posted in the OP. Because everyone likes to see their accomplishments recognized. Just post when you're done and I'll try to update daily.

Last year, we finished a whopping 23 games. That might be a tough number to top, but if everyone pitches in, I think we can do it!

THE FINISHED PILE:
1. Katamari Damacy Reroll - Xbone - Mop it up
2. Mega Man X - SNES (NSwitch) - Mop it up
3. Banjo-Kazooie - N64 (Xbone) - TheBigG753
4. Mega Man X2 - SNES (NSwitch) - Mop it up
5. Mega Man X3 - SNES (NSwitch) - Mop it up
6. Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow - DS - Stan McStanly
7. NEO: The World Ends with You - NSwitch - Hero_Of_Hyrule
8. Castlevania: Bloodlines - Genesis (NSwitch) - TriforceBun
9. The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe - NSwitch - nate38
10. Mega Man X4 - PSX (NSwitch) - Mop it up
11. Castlevania: Circle of the Moon - GBA (NSwitch) - TheBigG753
12. Mega Man X5 - PSX (NSwitch) - Mop it up
13. The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles - NSwitch - Stan McStanly
14. Frog Fractions: Game of the Decade Edition: Hop's Iconic Hat - PC - pokepal148
15. Mega Man X6 - PSX (NSwitch) - Mop it up
16. Super Metroid - SNES (NSwitch) - Stan McStanly
17. Mega Man X7 - PS2 (NSwitch) - Mop it up
18. Lost Judgment - Xbox S|X- PogueSquadron
19. Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance - GBA (NSwitch) - TheBigG753
20. Mega Man X8 - PS2 (NSwitch) - Mop it up
21. Banjo-Tooie - N64 (Xbone) - TheBigG753
22. Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance - 3DS (PS4) - PogueSquadron
23. Chex Quest HD - NSwitch - Mop it up
24. Super Bomberman R -NSwitch - Mop it up
25. Pokkén Tournament DX - NSwitch - Mop it up
26. Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles - Wii - TriforceBun
27. Donkey Kong - Game Boy - GameDadGrant
28. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow - GBA (NSwitch) - TheBigG753
29. Halo 2 Anniversary - PC - Brick
30. Conker's Bad Fur Day - N64 (Xbone) - TheBigG753
31. Castlevania - NES (NSwitch) - Mop it up
32. Castlevania: The Adventure - Game Boy (NSwitch) - Mop it up
33. Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge - Game Boy (NSwitch) - Mop it up
34. Castlevania II: Simon's Quest - NES (NSwitch) - Mop it up
35. Hades - Xbox S|X - Mop it up

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07/29/22, 08:48    Edited: 09/02/22, 19:17
 
   
 
I got through about a third of Super Metroid and I can already say its one of my favorite games. My only complaint is that i keep accidentally using super missiles when i try to turn off the regular missiles.
08/12/22, 18:06   
Stan McStanly said:
I can already say its one of my favorite games.

08/12/22, 21:14   
We shoulld finish Turtles this month. Then we can both slap it on the list
08/13/22, 08:37   
I suppose so, though I feel like it doesn't really count as a backlog unless there was a point where you put it down for awhile first, whereas we just haven't really had a chance to play again yet.
08/13/22, 09:24   
I mean, it says games your playing count, but its better if its a put-down. I was actively playing Dawn of Sorrow but i could only do so when we were at Dave's, so there were huge gaps between playtimes
08/13/22, 18:44   
Its also a low priority on our lists anyways.
08/13/22, 18:45   
Mop it up said:
@nate38 On which system did you play The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe?
Switch.

I haven't gotten around to playing more backlog games, because I've been on yet another classic Sonic kick. Can't help it! I'll try to get to Strikers and DMC4SE at some point though.
08/13/22, 20:11   
Mega Man X5
I've always heard the series took a sharp drop downhill after X4, but I could never be sure if it were really true or not. So I've gotta say...

...Yup it's true, X5 is terrible. Stage design isn't just poor, a lot of it borrows ideas from past games in worse ways, particularly the final stages, and there's less variety. I guess they became creatively bankrupt after 4. This isn't the end of it though. The game is also timed in a way that decreases each time a stage is played, whether completed or not. This serves to discourage the usual exploration until all eight regular levels are finished. What's more, the lower this counter gets, the "higher level" the bosses become, gaining more health the longer it takes to beat stages. On top of all this, they learned nothing from complaints about Nintendo and added an annoying helper character who stops the action to point out mostly obvious stuff every couple of screens. Seriously, one of the help messages is literally "You should proceed by stepping on the platforms."

To say one positive thing, the idea of scaling bosses based on the player's completion kinda makes some sense for these games and the way upgrades and weaknesses work, which can make it easier to start things out before all that stuff is obtained and help prevent becoming too powerful. But X5 poorly implements it.

@Zero Looking at it another way, any game you don't complete would become part of your backlog, so this is like backlog prevention!
08/13/22, 21:31   
Hoping I can take it down before the end of the month but I dug back into our Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance save file (PS4). Maybe I can beat it this time!
08/13/22, 22:30   
I'm a little over halfway through Banjo-Tooie and like the first one, I'm really into it at this point. Initially I wasn't so sure, the game got off to a pretty slow start and I wasn't sure if I was going to like some of the changes. There's a lot more variety, but some of it (like the FPS segments) isn't great and at times I wondered if they were getting too far away from what these games are good at. It's quite a bit different of a game. I wonder if Rare was sick of hearing "oh they just made a re-skinned Mario 64" (which I think is a super reductive and inaccurate take on B-K, but it's a sentiment I've seen over the years) and decided to focus more on the adventuring side of things in B-T than the platforming and collecting. In any case, I appreciate that they didn't just make the same thing all over again.

The bigger, more complex levels were a bit daunting at first. Some of the level design has been confusing as a result, especially in worlds like Glitter Gulch Mine and Jolly Roger's Lagoon (where I got lost a few times). Not necessarily saying that's a fault of the game, but it's definitely more complicated than the first game. That said, I've loved all of the different ways that the various worlds connect to one another. In the first game, there were only a few occasions I can recall where I had to return to an earlier world with new knowledge/abilities in order to get a jiggie/etc. that I had missed. But that's happening all the time in this one, going back to earlier worlds and opening up new paths between some of them. In the first game most of this between-worlds backtracking for secrets happened in the Grunty's Lair hub, and in Tooie there's a lot of it throughout. And it's something I've really enjoyed doing after completing each new world and before moving onto the next one.

It's too early to say if I like Tooie more or less than Kazooie, but I am liking it a lot and am just as hooked as I was with the first game.

Also, I'm a couple hours into Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance. It seems to be a more obvious follow-up to SotN than CotM was, and so far I think I like it more than CotM for that very reason.
08/15/22, 19:00   
@TheBigG753 I'm glad to see you're liking Banjo-Tooie! I'm one of those weirdos who enjoys minigames in games though I can understand why people think they interrupt the flow since they have different kinds of gameplay. One thing that I really like about Tooie as a sequel is that it didn't strip Banjo-Kazooie of all their moves from the first title and had them be regained again (or similar abilities), instead beginning with all the moves learned in the first one and further expanding things from there. Sure, due to this some of the new abilities are less than inspired, but even with that, after how many times I've rolled my eyes at Samus inexplicably forgetting all her gear back home, I'll gladly take this approach!
08/15/22, 23:10   
Mop it up said:
One thing that I really like about Tooie as a sequel is that it didn't strip Banjo-Kazooie of all their moves from the first title and had them be regained again (or similar abilities), instead beginning with all the moves learned in the first one and further expanding things from there.
Yup, this is a huge plus!
08/15/22, 23:23   
I should have the ace attorney cronicles done by today

And super metroid sometime this week
08/16/22, 16:34   
Edited: 08/16/22, 16:43
Yo ho I finished the great ace attorney
08/16/22, 18:49   
I hit credits on Frog Fractions: Hop's Iconic Cap a few days back. It's Frog Fractions but the frog is wearing a hat and anyone who has played Frog Fractions or knows what that game is should be able to figure out that I'm lying through my teeth.

My current game is Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition. I started it last Friday because I was unable to find a physical copy of Xenoblade 3, I was dead set on playing Xenoblade and having Xenoblade 3 probably be the last game I get physically, and so it was either that or try to force myself to get back into the absolute slog that is Xenoblade 2.

I've now reached Eryth Sea at a much quicker pace then I was expecting. Part of that is due to me using casual mode to make the game less grindy but I feel really confident that I can clear this comfortably before the end of the month.

My Switch decided to stab me on the back and have the SD card reader start failing on me but unlike the 3DS, the Switch shouldn't lose any functionality without an SD card outside of the added storage because you can use the internal storage to install patches and updates so I intend to continue playing regardless for now and get it repaired locally so I don't have to send it to Nintendo.

The other thing I'm working on is a Pokemon rom hack called Pokemon Volt White which is a difficulty/rebalancing hack of White 2. My current team for Elesa is as follows.

Lucario
Serperior
Braviary
Sealeo
Houndoom
Nidoking

Keep in mind that the level curve for this hack is pretty different from the base game so even if running around with a Serperior at the fourth gym makes it seem like I'm a bit overleveled, I'm not.

My first priority is absolutely Xenoblade but I would like to get through this too.
08/17/22, 06:55   
Edited: 08/17/22, 06:56
Mega Man X6
I was a little nervous moving on because if I recall correctly, the games only kept getting worse. And I've gotta say...

...Ow, it's painful! This game is so much worse than X5 it almost feels intentional. The level design isn't just bad, it's also really slow due to elements that slow down the player, such as slow auto-scroll; moving pieces of the stage; a repeating spongy miniboss; etc. Another issue with this is that messing up means a slow slog to get back to that point. Many upgrades are tied to rescuing Reploids, who can now be killed by enemies, some of which are set up for this to happen really quickly basically requiring memorizing the game, meaning that some upgrades are permanently missable without restarting the whole game.

Fortunately most of the bosses are pretty simple and easy by comparison, with the exception of Infinity Mijinion which is one of the worst bosses ever created in any game ever. The final stages are a hodgepodge of bad ideas including requiring certain upgrades to complete. One more thing that makes matters worse is how X can no longer fire through walls or platforms; this was also present in X5 (and maybe even X4, I can't recall), but it's a much more noticeable annoyance here with the way levels are set up and having to keep enemies away from the rescues.

I'm tempted to call this one of the worst games I've ever played, it was just a miserable experience. But I know that next in line is X7 which seems pretty infamous, so perhaps I should hold off for now on that designation. I shudder to think...
08/17/22, 22:33   
@Mop it up


But also this is enlightening, I heard the X games got bad after 4, but I didn't know exactly what was wrong with them...
08/17/22, 23:46   
Im almost determined not to play any game after X2. I randomly tried X6 one day and it was nasty
08/18/22, 03:53   
You should start with that last X game and backtrack so it keeps getting bettter
08/18/22, 03:53   
@Stan McStanly X3 is alright. Not great, but alright. X4 is also alright but the graphics and music aren't as good so I basically just think X1-3 are the ones worth playing.

Though X4 does have this total banger.

08/18/22, 04:01   
Edited: 08/18/22, 04:02
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