Okay, I discovered this by accident. It’s how to play the full Banjo game from the trial.

Step 1: Get into Spiral Mountain
Step 2: Go to the giant Ape and make him hit all 3 orange tiles. Make sure the one furtherest away from the tree stub with the monkey is hit LAST. DON’T GET THIS JIGGY YET.
Step 3: Get the orange from Ape’s tree, and give it to the monkey on the tree stub. GET THIS JIGGY.
Step 4: Go to the mole hill above the tree stump, learn how to egg attack, and beat the Ape. A Jiggy will fall.
Step 5: If done correctly, the 2 Jiggys will be right next to each other. Jump right in the middle of them. You should collect 2 Jiggys at the same time, extending the trial.

TRY IT OUT. The only thing you can’t do is save.

*Don't try and read the text, its in another language for some reason.

Ok so I was talking to a buddy of mine and he started talking about how easy and unimpressive twilight princess was. Ok, that’s the opinion of most long-term Zelda fans. Then I said “You know we need more games like Ocarina of Time” (and I might have mentioned Majora’s Mask but most people dislike that game, huh). So of course he then proceeded to ask the question that is the core of this article

“Wait, what’s so great about Ocarina of Time?”

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I’m not clever, that’s actually an achievement from Rare’s Banjo–Kazooie on the N64, and now the Xbox 360. In case you haven’t heard, yes Rare did re-release Banjo and his pal’s original game onto the Xbox Live Arcade selection. A few days ago I acquired an Xbox Live points card and I figured “I never beat Banjo–Kazooie on the N64, why not give it another shot for nostalgia sakes” and like that I downloaded it and “jumped right in”.

Banjo–Kazooie is still a hell of a lot of fun to play. It turns out that regardless of nostalgia, the game still retains it’s beautiful stature and it’s fun puzzles. There are some issues though.

One thing I distinctly remember is the underwater controls, god damn they pissed me off ’till no end.  When I started playing again, the frustration was still there. The fact of the matter is, the underwater controls of the game are terrible. There is a fast way to swim that’s inaccurate as hell, and there’s a slow way to swim which is very slow but very controlled. There is no middle ground between them and combining them is no easy task. The same applies to flying, when Kazooie gets in the air she becomes a real bitch to control, and it’s similar to the water difficulties except that controlling altitude is the ball-buster. If there’s a target you have to hit in the air you’ll no doubt have perform the task more than one because the angle is wrong or the altitude is wrong.

The controls on ground are easy and intuitive. There are many different moves that you acquire throughout the game that add an extra block to the gameplay, and also helps give the illusion of character growth, as Banjo and Kazooie go from lying around the house, to becoming witch busting badasses with their new skill sets.

One thing I really like, and I don’t see as much in newer games is characters with a real personality. Banjo and Kazooie both have distinct personalities that complement each other and those personalities never change and are always evident in they way they speak. Kazooie is a stubborn, arrogant, trash-talking tough bird. Banjo is a slow, dim-witted bear. You’ll always see that when you see them communicate to others. It adds a level of connection with the characters and makes the game more enjoyable. I know that every time Kazooie talks to something it’s very “put up or shut up” style and I often find myself saying “Hell yes Kazooie”.

Banjo–Kazooie was my first game on the N64, even before Super Mario 64, and when I was playing it when I was around 9 or 10, the puzzles seemed so frustrating and complex, the world seemed so expansive and huge, and threats in the game a lot more scary. Example? Remember that shark in the water at Treasure Cove? Yeah that fucker, he scared the living shit out of me whenever I fell into water in that level. Which brings me to the point that, the game has amazing atmosphere and ambience. The music especially is wonderful and festive toward it’s respectable level, but the whole game just seems to fit. Every piece of the puzzle is there (dohoh).

The long and the short is, Banjo–Kazooie is a wonderful game, one of many great games by Rare, sure there are some working issues underwater but it doesn’t break the game, just adds some challenge into it. In the future I’d love to see games like Banjo–Kazooie that have standout and deliver an excellent experience. However, the rate of things as they are now, I don’t see any gems like this coming for a while.

I haven’t gotten a chance to bust out Nuts and Bolts but I will shortly after Banjo–Kazooie.

There were a lot of amazing games on the N64, one of the greatest among them was Paper Mario. Paper Mario was one of the best RPGs released ever in my opinion, and that’s not nostalgia talking. A week ago I bought Paper Mario again for my N64 and replayed the bad boy, and it was more fun than  when I played it originally all those years ago because I understood the wit.

The story is the same as almost every Mario game, bad guy takes the girl, you’ve got to collect x amount of y to beat the bad guy. In Paper Mario’s case it’s Bowser (who else), but this time he’s got the Star Rod, you’re probably thinking “I’ma Mario, I’ma gonna win!”, the game lets you try to beat Bowser, but it’s impossible. So what do you do? Collect the 8 star spirits to gain the power to take him down.

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Badass.

Okay, some of you may remember hanging out with your friends playing a little game called ‘Army Men’. This mildly successful game led to a few more sequels, and eventually a subsidiary dev group came out with the Heroes Of Might And Magic series. This fledgling force was called 3D0; A company that initially got together to try to build a next-gen gaming system to compete with the then reigning champ, Playstation. At the time they’d released a few nothing games that were nothing really to call home about. This is a story of just before they filed for Chapter 11 and flushed what arguably could’ve been a game that brought them back up in the world. This game was titled ‘The Four Horsemen Of The Apocalypse’. From what I delved all the way back in 2003 they’d had a good part of the game done. There were even ingame animation videos that showed Abbadon (the main character who not only was the chosen Archangel but also a murderer and a chain smoker) fighting goat headed demons. Originally 4 Horsemen was planned to come out on the Xbox, PC, and PS2. But just about when the shiny light at the end of the tunnel was about to deliver us with what looked like a badass third person fighter/shooter 3D0 went under. Now personally, I couldn’t give two shits about the next Army Men game but I did trust that on the whole 3D0 knew how to make a decent game. Working with the N64 graphics must’ve been trying as hell. But the infinite power of the Xbox at the time promised many great deliveries of games that had a great amount of depth put into them.

The other thing that first sparked my brain the moment I’d started reading up on this game was the fact that Simon Bisley of LOBO and Heavy Metal fame was doing all the character and environment designs in the game. If any of you ever read the guns, broads, and gore themed Heavy Metal Magazine you’re probably very familiar with Simon Bisley. If there’s anyone that can take a simple concept of a typical dreg and turn it into a badass icon of punishment then it’s him. The pre-sketches were so true to what the in-game renders looked like as well as looking like the first game that really pushed the Xbox to it’s full potential in detailed environments.

The story went as follows; The seventh seal breaks and unleashes the dreaded Four Horsemen Of The Apocalypse. Abbadon is just sitting in a bar one day when 30 percent of the world population disappears. He ends up being the chosen one to redeem the awfulness of man. But first he has to find the other two mortals that are supposed to do battle with the forces of hell. One of them is a Psychopathic Serial Killer/Preacher named Jimmy Ray Flint. This guy you have to break out of a maximum security prison to have him help with the horsemen, he spouts religious babble nonstop and is pretty decent with the business end of a shotgun. One of the other awesome things about this game to be was the four horsemen were actual believable forces of evil. Famine was a beautiful woman who when you got close enough you could see the skeleton inside her, to glimpse this femme fatal was to take in pestilence. War was an actual war machine resembling a possessed medieval knight. This was the stuff of awesome we’re talking here. On top of this, the other mortal that was supposedly a chosen one for the redemption of the human race was a drug addicted prostitute. With such a subversive storyline I wondered what was taking it so long, it had the setup to be rushed to completion because everyone wanted it so bad. Remember when hype never determined how well a game would sell? *cough*Halo*cough*

This was because the initial showings at E3 had been a little rough around the edges. I guess the textures weren’t meshed exactly the best and some of the animations weren’t complete. But by and large it still looked promising in a way that games today don’t really bring us a view so creative. When’s the last time you wanted to play a video game based off the story alone? Metal Gear maybe, but dealing with the biblical prediction of the endtimes and turning it on it’s head; I get a little giddy. Perhaps it’s was just the utter subversiveness that the game seemed to want to offer me, but it could also be that around 2003 games started slipping into the generic FPS based around a Sci-Fi war or a historical re-enactment. This is definitely one that got away. However after 3D0 filed bankruptcy just about everyone that was looking forward to this game tried to find out who the property was sold to. It doesn’t look like anyone who would do a good rendition of it either.

Here’s the trailer.

It still saddens me to this day that we never got to experience this game and likely never will. As I understand it the same might happen to a beloved Ghostbusters game that was slated for earlier this month. But like so many of those games we’ve all watched pass by like Starcraft Ghost, Duke Nukem Forever and a faithful Soldier Of Fortune sequel; I’ll always hold out a bit of hope that this intellectual property gets picked up by someone and hopefully has the shine on it that caught me as being truly a game reaching above the static of cranked out EA games for a multitude of 12 year old mouth breathers to jerk off to their pals.

Halo: Jumping Evolved

-K

A need for quick opinions is upon us. Sometimes we’re tired of the mainstream and we just want a taste of the alternative. When one cares not to read or compare arbitrary numbers, one needs a blast of reviews:

• Beetle Adventure Racing (N64) – A licensed racer that takes the emphasis off the vehicles and places it on the tracks, which offer unique and diverse locales smattered with short-cut upon short-cut that feature more secrets and replayability than one could find even in multiple playthroughs. The inclusion of various multiplayer modes only add to the icing on this visually fast, heart-pounding, and rather delicious cake.
• Linger in the Shadows (PSN) – A “game” designed around the idea of “art” that somewhat confuses the notion but still manages to compel with it’s smooth visuals and ethereal sound design, whilst making vast use of the Sixaxis motion controls. With support for trophies, several hidden extras, and a price-point of only 3 USD, it’s worth a look.
• VICE: Project Doom (NES) – A platformer in the nostalgic sense that moonlights as a schmup and a point and shooter. Classic difficulty, superb visuals for an NES title, and varied, distinct enemies serve to make this title an old, forgotten gem.
• Sumotori Dreams (PC free title) – A game akin to a tech demo, this title uses AI and physics instead of prewritten animation to simulate Sumo wrestling and “staying on your feet.” Short and comical with a fun, little Easter egg, it’s a good time-waster by yourself or with a friend.
• Dementium: The Ward (NDS) – A FPS that makes exceptional use of the hardware, rendering a smooth frame rate and making excellent use of shadows to instill the player with fear. Although the puzzles are simplistic and the game is somewhat repetitive, it has enough staying power for a solid play-through.

Originally, there were to be some negatives, but the whole point of an alternative set is that these are what one would play instead of the usual tripe. So it goes.