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Episode 560: THE ETHOS OF BUTT-ROCK

by James Jones, Greg Leahy, Jon Lindemann, and Guillaume Veillette - February 25, 2018, 3:41 pm EST
Total comments: 4

*Screaming guitar sounds*

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This week we have a rather eclectic mix of games. Greg kicks-off New Business with impressions of Bayonetta 2 for Switch. Turns out "Witch Time is still a Good Time." Jon is playing Half-Life 2. In 2018. It's a seminal game that he's never played, so his thoughts come with over a decade of context. James had a new review game, and these things just keep getting weirder with Ace of Seafood. This icthyocentric dogfighting/submarine breeding game is terrible and surreal. Gui wraps up New Business with two new games. First off is Dandara, a salty platformer for Switch that isn't getting enough love. He then looks at The Darkside Detective, an adventure game that's killing time for more adventure games.

After the break, we take a look at our third WiiWare RetroActive game, Alien Crush Returns. It does not score well on the Jon Lindemann Value Scale™.

After that we find time for a listener mail question about an old friend: The Siren. You can sound the alarm yourself by sending us an email.

This episode was edited by Guillaume Veillette. The "Men of Leisure" theme song was produced exclusively for Radio Free Nintendo by Perry Burkum. Hear more at Perry's SoundCloud. The Radio Free Nintendo logo was produced by Connor Strickland. See more of his work at his website.

This episode's ending music is selected by James: Rosa's Theme, from Xenoblade Chronicles 2. All rights reserved by Nintendo Co., Ltd..

Talkback

MASBFebruary 26, 2018

Red Lobster and cheese biscuits. Jon knows what's up.

I think the long dark night of the Wii U ultimately helped the podcast. The seasons of no games made the crew forge their wit and humor in a fire that even Weapon Shop de Omasse couldn't handle. Now that the Switch motherload of games has arrived, the guys are just feasting. Good games, bad games, doesn't matter, they've got something to say you want to listen to. The banter, the banter! You guys are great.

These WiiWare Retroactives have been interesting, to say the least. Funny and insightful conversation seems to have resulted in spite of the games chosen, not due to them. Were there really not that many good, interesting WiiWare games or have they simply aged more badly  than most?

When these WiiWare Retroactives have finished, may I humbly suggest a palette cleanser? Jet Force Gemini. May have to make that one a two-parter due to its awesomeness.

Hmm. The Jon Lindemann Value Scale™. Is that done on range of 1-10? Does The Conduit still rate 8.5 on the JLVS?

Only on this podcast can we get a thorough breakdown of butt rock.

And kudos to Gui for his siren creativity! Can you imagine if there had been alarms during the days when you had to clean the fridge on Wii or waiting for the European release date for Super Smash Bros. Brawl? lol

ejamerFebruary 26, 2018

Quote from: MASB

... Were there really not that many good, interesting WiiWare games or have they simply aged more badly  than most?  ...

There were a handful of very good games, but most of the WiiWare service will be forgettable without much loss in my opinion. It's not always that they've aged poorly - many of these games were weird little experiments that didn't play particularly well when first released.


There were a handful of very solid titles, though, including some that still aren't playable elsewhere. Fluidity (or Hydroventure, depending on what region you come from) is a fantastic example. The problem is that pricing was consistently high, while actual quality of the games wasn't... after about a dozen games, it gets hard to list WiiWare titles that I'd actually be keen to revisit.

That answer was everything I had hoped for.  Thank you for taking my question with the extreme effort and seriousness it deserved.

KDR_11kFebruary 27, 2018

Some description of Ace of Seafood mentions that the ships are toys which is supposed to explain the scale. I don't think it's an asset flip, just a game from Japan.

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