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Messages - Thelo

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1
Site Discussion / Re: Language Selection
« on: July 18, 2000, 11:42:39 AM »
Umm... If I were you I wouldn't rely too much on Babelfish. Translating single words is fine, but it makes some truly weird constructed sentences from time to time, and under no circumstances would I recommend it to translate an entire site. It's okay if you want to have the general idea, though.

¤Thelo¤

2
Mario Chat / Re: Mario better than Luigi?
« on: July 13, 2000, 09:10:29 AM »
Yeah he was. Luigi had a green cap and shirt, and blue overalls.

And by the way, the Master at gaming, in SMB2 Mario wasn't faster per se, he just didn't slow down as much when he was carrying something. When unburdened, I believe they run at the same speed. And yes, Mario could be said to be stronger than Luigi in SMB2 cause he lifts stuff off the ground 2 times at fast as Luigi.

3
Site Discussion / Re: Age, Etc.
« on: July 09, 2000, 04:22:04 PM »
Using incredibly high-tech, scientific analysis methods to organize human data and determine the average TMK visitor as of today, I have arrived at the following conclusions:

Sex: Male
Age: About 16
Hair: Brown
Eyes: Blue
Living in: North America

Hey, that's me!

¤Thelo¤

Edited by - Thelo on 7/9/00 3:23:34 PM

4
Site Discussion / Re: Age, Etc.
« on: July 09, 2000, 04:05:58 PM »
A typical-user poll, eh? Well, here I go...

Birthdate: June 1st, 1984 (that makes me 16)
Sex: Male
Location: Boucherville (Montreal suburb), Québec
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Light brown
RL name: Louis Paquin

5
Yoshi's Story...

The redeeming aspect of Yoshi's Story, at least difficulty-wise, is that do-every-level-eating-only-melons way of playing it. I do agree that features like that increase the overall replayability and length of the game.

However...

It seems that Yoshi's Story's designers put too much emphasis on that aspect of the game. Sure, you can replay the game to play every level, but I feel that there really should be a minimum of difficulty to actually finish the game. Not the I've-done-it-all ending, but the "official" end-of-the-story ending. I personally think that it's more stimulating to strive for an actual ending than just to beat your previous score.

What I'm saying is that they put the ending too early in the game. If they required the gamer to pass more levels or attain minimum scores, then I think the game would have been more popular among gamers. I could say the same thing for a good couple of games out there, put the "official" ending later in the game. In Yoshi's Story's case you could see the ending after beating 1/4 of the levels. Raise that fraction to minimum 3/4, and you've got something to talk about.

Well these were my thoughts on the subject. Feel free to elaborate.

¤Thelo¤

6
Mario Chat / Re: What did everyone first call Bowser?
« on: July 01, 2000, 08:31:40 PM »
Actually, I've always called him Bowser, as did everyone my age in my piece of the world. Believe it or not, I actually had not heard about the name King Koopa until quite recently. I think the SMB instruction manual called him Bowser, so I've stuck with it.

¤Thelo¤

7
Site Discussion / Re: Language Selection
« on: July 01, 2000, 12:31:08 PM »
If you ever decide to do this multiple language thing and need help with French, you could always E-mail me at thelothegreat@hotmail.com . After all, French is my first language. I too think that having multiple languages is a mark of a high-quality site, it just makes so much more professional.

¤Thelo¤

8
Video Game Chat / Re: Are games losing their quality?
« on: July 01, 2000, 11:23:28 AM »
Another important aspect to consider, especially in platform-action games, is the toughness factor. In the olden days, you had to be aware of every second you played, scanning the border of the screen for enemies, exactly calculating that long jump, or you had to restart all the way to the beginning.
Nowadays, it seems more like exploring or collecting games, where we search every nook and cranny of every level to find these darn stars, puzzle pieces, golden bananas or other collectibles. And for you game designers, searching can and does get boring rather quickly.
DK64 is a prime example: you cannot, under any circumstances, be Game Over. Never. You have unlimited lives. Not that it's that tough: enemies are few and far between, and easily disposed of. And the greatest danger to all platform players isn't there anymore: holes. There are NO holes in DK64! How do you get less platformy than that?
To increase the difficulty, game designers should just do the Mega Man trick: it's alright to have a strong hero with lots of powers, but put matching enemies with high intelligence and firepower (not a weak hero and even weaker enemies!). And with many modern 3D platformers, this is too often neglected. Ooh, we can't do the levels too tough, everybody must be able to easily finish the game, they think. And when you get bored, you just save and you can return later.
Which brings another aspect of the downfall of quality: the ability to save.
Now, before I get flooded with angry mobs of players, let me tell that I'm not 100% against saving the game, especially for long games. I'm just against the ability to save anywhere. When you can save anywhere, you never play the same level twice, and believe it or not, re-playing some levels over and over trying not to get killed is what creates nostalgia, more often than not. What there should be is a system where you can only save at critical points of the game. This would bring together the benefits of both saving-everywhere and never-saving games.
This was the system that was the most common among Super Nes RPGs, and it worked very well. Game designers should extend this concept not only to RPGs but to the other genres as well.
Before I start to sound a bit too 100% pure retro-gamer, let me tell that a 3D game can be fun, but it has to be more intense. Intensity is what separates, in the end, the fun games from the boring ones. When you will actually be afraid of some enemies, or be overwhelmed in sheer numbers, and finally triumph after many tries and deaths, only to discover that there's even tougher ones just waiting for you around the next corner, that will be when 3D action-platformers will really shine. I hope that designers abandon a bit their collect-em-all mentality and start thinking about what was fun in the old games.

Whew, that was long.

¤Thelo¤

9
Mario Chat / Re: Arrghh.... What is it?
« on: June 30, 2000, 09:03:17 PM »
My theory is that it doesn't mean anything at all. Yoshis don't speak a single word of English (or French, or Italian), they just know the word Yoshi. Perhaps they are just making sounds because they're happy, a bit like birds who sing when they feel like it.

¤Thelo¤

10
Mario Chat / Re: Mario better than Luigi?
« on: June 30, 2000, 08:51:31 PM »
About the Mario vs Luigi thing...

The problem when you compare the two is that there aren't that many facts separating them apart. In fact, I only remember SMB2, Lost Levels and Super Smash Bros as games in which Mario and Luigi had different abilities.

Super Mario Bros 2
Mario: Takes stuff more quickly off the ground, runs faster when carrying stuff, his jump is a pretty standard jump, although a bit quick.
Luigi: Takes stuff a bit slowly off the ground, runs slower when carrying stuff, his jump is a high, fluttering, longering jump.

Lost Levels
Mario: Jumps less high, but also skids less.
Luigi: Jumps higher, but skids much more.

Super Smash Bros
Mario: Jumps less high and runs more slowly. His fireball follows the ground.
Luigi: Jumps higher and runs faster, his fireball goes in a straight line. I highly suspect that Nintendo put Luigi better here because of all the people who complained on the net that he was neglected after SM64. (to all Luigi praisers out there: you actually did much to improve Luigi's standing in Nintendo's point of view)

¤Thelo¤

11
Site Discussion / Re: Recording WTMK on my cpu
« on: June 26, 2000, 09:32:36 AM »
Ok, never mind, I've found the way to do it. For those curious, it's called the Mp3 Stream Recorder (try http://199.217.92.26/details/musi/mp3stream.htm). Thanks anyway.

¤Thelo¤

12
Site Discussion / Recording WTMK on my cpu
« on: June 22, 2000, 01:34:27 PM »
Is there a way to record streaming audio like WTMK on my conputer? That would be useful when I feel like listening to Mario music but am not online. Any help would be appreciated.

¤Thelo¤

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