Pac-Mania: How dare ya!

Welcome again to the PookSpot. Its time for an arcade machine, home version arcade, phone arcade, whatever you'd call it, and maybe the most insane arcade game ever. Welcome to, Pac-Mania, friends.

I'll eat your boring Earth as well.

The game has more features than original Pacman. Lets say you're cornered by two ghosts. Press a button and you escape by jumping over them. Congrats, you saved yourself a 1-Up for later. The game gives you up to 5 pellets (the 5th being special and its effect lasts shortly, and not always appear) and gives you a speed pellet that will last till a collected power pellet's effect last. Namco now gives you a more beatable version of Pac-Man, so say thanks to them.. or so you think!

Unless you don't know that the three available Pac-Man World titles are made for people to beat it and unlock everything in it, this arcade machine is frustration. The levels are different in each version of the game, shall you get the home version and arcade version at once. Block Town is 2 levels at the home version instead of one level at the arcade version, so home version should be longer. Keep in mind that the home version has unlimited free credits, all by pressing the "Start" button after you're "Game Over"'d.

But in either versions, Pac-Man still drives like a mad man, and sometimes the ghosts are uber intelligent. Sometimes if you jump over them to another way, they'd follow the way you're taking, thus making you die if you didn't turn directions at the last moment. This is true for all Pac-Mans that has jumping in mazes enabled though, but its more insane when you talk about an arcade machine.

Look, look! Wait, run, run! Sue will sue you!

Enjoy the nasty trip to the final place, Jungly Steps. Among the way, hundreds of doom levels are awaiting. Enjoy as you see the cutscene of jumping ghosts. And oh boy when you go to Jungly Steps, as the very insane ghosts catch up with you. So when you think that the game is easy cause you can jump, you lied to yourself actually.

Ok, ok, I have beaten the game instead after spending many quarters. What do I get? Another round of frustration through the same worlds, more frustrating than last time. Or the game could be made endless it seems. Ok, I'll buy a Pac-Mania machine and set it to be free, or I could get it on MAME and get endless virtual quarters. Or hey, I can buy Pac-Man World 2 and get a whole arcade machine set in an arcade house in Pac-Man's village, assuming you get 180 Namco coins for the ultimate machine, umm, Ms. Pac's, with everything available.

Give up playing Pac-Mania and go play the original Pac-Man.

Summer Vacation 19' and more from Final Fantasy II

So here we are, reunited again. Pooka Mustard just got his Summer Vacation yesterday, the 19th of May, hence why I called it "Summer Vacation 19'". So for the millionth time I think, we are free from the jail of education, right after the revenge of the physics which took place that same day. Its time to get free again, and fill in spots in this blog.


Meanwhile, the midnight of that same day and 2 hours into the new day, it was the time I brought back Final Fantasy II into action. As we knew from the previous post, its the most insane RPG I ever caught. Limited inventory unlike the original and stuff like that. Still, the more you get deeper into the game, the more it gets insane. Let's see more.


Yesterday, its time we launched for the Mysidian Tower after we got it's main key. Surprise! You're swallowed by a large whale that swallows people for a very weird reason.

Yuck!!

Hopefully you got out, but then went to Altair and had a nap, or two, because it seems like you wanted to go to the Mysidian Tower with almost full HP. Also to restore your invaluable items, HP and MP. Then you launched to the tower. By the way, its the tower that holds the spell everybody you talked to, told you its vital for beating the emperor and its sealed heavily. I went yesterday and told to myself, "Hey this is a tower with a very important spell inside, it got to be as high as the castle in A Link to the Past". Only to see then that this tower is more insane than that castle.

There, I met Vampirettes and Imps which usually comes in 8s and 6s. Speaking about female vampires, they have their Entice, and Imps have Muddle, both spells do the same thing: confuse your party. Which means that anybody in your party having a chat bubble with a blue ring is a potential threat to your party. Worse if you're talking about a confused Maria with two awesomely powerful swords enough to take out a party member in one hit. Hopefully, whenever you meet them, scroll down to the "Flee" button and press it, rinse and repeat three more times, this is how you escape the confusers because they aren't really good at keeping you confined to the battle unlike others.

Female vampires suck love?!!!! I'm out of the battle!

You are going to meet the Hill Gigas again, but I'm assuming you already know how to handle them by now. No no, behind him, enjoy your "Bomb" day.

BOOOOOOOOOM!!!

This is just the beginning, my fellow reader. How about facing three more kinds of Gigas instead, with one of them having a weakness point you didn't know about unless you battled him until he died or knew it from a FAQ? Sorry, but the Hill Gigas by now should be a kid's game. And if you're really really unlucky, you opened a chest which contained a very dangerous dragon. I'm assuming you're exhausted from whatever got hold of you as you go up the tower, then you face a dragon. Man.. By the time you reach that monster-in-a-box, chances are you went up around 8 floors of insane frustrations. Finally after trying to avoid the mighty hoax rooms, Mindu is ahead of your eyes. Then, you entered a room with 5 crystals, one of them is totally gold. If you ignored the silver crystals and went ahead for the gold, like me, because you were frustrated, congratulations. You missed something you'll thank the game for.

OK, I warped out of the tower, that made me forget what's the hardest level in Phantasy Star IV, and went back to Fynn to have another nap. Now if you were me, you'd go to the river near Fynn and park the ship there, going the rest of the way with the canoe. As you head into Fynn itself, you might meet these non-sense ba...- oh wait! Bombs, Hill Gigas, Sorcerers, Captains, etc, everywhere not just near Fynn, awaiting you!!

Now give up having a permanent home. For your information, some homes are now useless to go to. Fly to Mysidia in case you want spells, or a full fledged village.

And that's not until I beat the freaking game. The third part will talk about the end of the insanity, but it won't appear right away. Patience, frustrated Padawan.

Final Fantasy II: Insanity and frustration!

I remember that I got Final Fantasy Origins for PS, just for one thing, original Final Fantasy in a better look with many facelifts. I didn't care at these days for the other thing in that CD, called Final Fantasy II. I cared with it nowadays. And ended up on one of these RPGs, that are a lot different than usual RPGs. Yeah really. This is what I observed from the game...

Prepare to die!

You've got a story better than original Final Fantasy, and your party talks, something that didn't exist in the first. Your whole party could learn spells unlike the first, which needed a mage. You've got a canoe at the beginning, instead of the original's canoe at mid-game. Then...

It will give you insanity and frustration, then fits, the more you go deeper into this machine-o-doom! Let's see if Firion can say "Prepare to die!" as freely as he wants.

Nothing in Final Fantasy is called Experience Points, or XP. You wanna make Maria a powerful girl with dual swords? Go ahead, but let her attack with swords so she could be a great offender. Don't upgrade me her swords to level 9  then say "no, she should equip knives from now on", you will restart from zero, as you make Maria learn how to hold knives. You want to make Firion a mage? Don't just make him kill monsters with whatever he is holding, let him DO magic so he could be a mage. Don't make him fight monsters with your weapon so you could gain MP. Hey wait, are there spells like Cura? Never. Want to make Gus heal the most HP? Then make him heal a lot using the Cure 1 spell, then it will upgrade by time to Cure 2, Cure 3, etc.. Don't expect to find a Cure 6 scroll hidden somewhere, unless you're talking about a magical weapon.. That's for.. player status.. Oh, and you have 63 inventory slots only. You can't stack 99 potions like in original FF. Not to mention that Key (or important) items are going to fill 1/4 of the inventory. Be wise with your inventory! Enemies please?


The bosses were insane, assuming you had Mythril weapons of course. The next time you challenged a gaint blue turtle in the ice, unprepared... surprise! Only one guy got you out of this problem, or you went and figured out where's the weakness... maybe you don't have it yet.

ROAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!

Yeah... and roars in your face as well with his surprisingly powerful attacks and high defense. Now let's move on? What about the ogre from the original? Aww, his size now gives him the power to unleash an attack to execute a process that tries to delete your HP. Come the next day asking for the Ogre Chieftain, okay?

Then the famous repetitive mission of "rescue the damsel in distress" is on it's way. You expected to fight some goombas and that's how you do it? You expected the mission to be as easy as the original's Garland?? Wrong! Think again. Warlocks and Spiketoises await you.

Then you open a chest, just a chest... WOAH! A monster fills the whole screen, maybe two! That's what I just want to run away from his face... that's more powerful than the original's Hill Giga which seemed to be a hoax, be prepared for the real Hill Giga! Chances of me beating that fiend (is he more powerful than the original's first fiend?) were at this time, 50%, and it gets up the less Gigas I face. But I did say goodbye when two taken me out... And for your information, one guy couldn't take you out as safely as four guys could. Same for three guys.

Gordon: I just defeated the Hill Gigas! Ye.. FIRION? MARIA? GUY?

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Many rooms in that wonder are nothing but hoaxes. You expect a room full of chests right? The room with that valuable thing that made you go into that killer dungeon for it? Once again, nope. These hoaxes are empty rooms with a higher monster spawning rate, that is, if you entered this room, you come up in the middle, and chances that the two steps you'll move to the door are full of monsters, that will punish you for taking this route. Millions of these rooms are spread in the game.

All that, were frustration and halfway insanity. Yeah it's still long, but I have one more thing! Let's make you go out frightened right? And here's the most insane thing to happen in the game, and the most creepiest!

For a poisoned Wind Drake, you go to talk to him and know what's the next thing you'll do. He gives you his valuable thing, but talk to him again. He tells you to bring that thing to the said place again..... before you press X, touch your iPhone screen or anything, lower your sound volume and prepare for the Wind Drake's roar... in your party's face. We expect a frightened and coward Maria and Guy (and YOU) as you all think that he will eat you now.

That's all what I got to say about Final Fantasy II. Yeah it should have given you fits and made you gave up, but for some reason I didn't give up... But I'm grinding, oh no....

Wake up, PookSpot!

Hola again guys! Pooka Mustard is back after a long gaming journey... Yet PookSpot is forgotten right?


Though I have exams a few days later, I will try to make a post before I start. Let's stop these reviews I was making in these days and start something else still par to gaming, righty?


Which takes me to the upcoming post... it is...

DJPimpDaddy plays Dragon Warrior - 1st episode

I highly suggest you select the button: "Watch on YouTube" and view in 1080, which is how NES was ment to be played. (kidding) - DJPimpDaddy

Christmas Flash Gaming: Super Mario Crossover

Let's celebrate Christmas, by writing the next Pookspot review, and introducing our new writer, DJPimpDaddy.. I may go low on activity the next days due to exams, so here we go... Let's talk about Super Mario Crossover, one of the best free online flash games available on the internet. It's the one which remade the original Super Mario Bros and added characters out of Super Mario's native environment. It can also be played as a PC version of Super Mario Bros, with the addition of being able to back track each level unlike the original NES version.

The story is the same as the original Super Mario Bros, the princess is kidnapped and you have to rescue her. With the help of more characters, Mario and others makes their way to saving her.


There are lots of music tastes here. You not only have the great Mario soundtrack, but you have the music from The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, CastleVania, Blaster Master and the others... You can turn any of these soundtracks on at any time given, so you can play as Link while the Super Mario soundtrack is on.


The graphics are the same 8-bit NES graphics you would expect, so here it gives some nostalgia taste :p. Of course, as long as it's NES graphics then you expect good retro game graphics in Super Mario Crossover.

The gameplay is how Super Mario Crossover shined..... You play in the same famous levels that Super Mario Bros hosted, and not only that, you can play with other character's out of the Super Mario, the same way they were controlled in their respective games. For example, Link moves, jumps, and can swing his sword and chuck his boomerang, as well as doing downwards and upwards thrusts, the same way he was controlled in Zelda 2 (chucking the boomerang from the original Legend of Zelda). If you are tired from their limited capabilities in the Mario worlds, you can use the cheats you find to make the trip easy and keep up with Mario. If you can't use a certain character in a stage because you couldn't do a jump well with your character, you should use Mario, because Nintendo built these stages for Mario to cross. There are many modes, one mode involves you playing with any character you want before the starting of a stage and before a game over (just like SNES Super Mario 2), another involves playing with only the chosen character, and there is a survival mode in which if a character died, he could be revived only by 1-ups. It's a cool remix of a cool classic game, huh? It includes saving data, which is also an addition to the whole game, and makes it easier for people who have real life to deal with, to continue the progress of their game. You save a text file and whenever you want to load the save, you press "Load Game" and pick up that text file, you have all your progress back.

And overall, the whole game is based on the classic 8-bit versions of graphics, music and gameplay. This means retro gameplay, glorious 8-bit graphics, and classic music. The list of playable characters includes (from left to right on the choose character screen): Ryu (Ninja Gaiden), Link (Legend of Zelda), Mario (Super Mario Bros), Bill Rizer (Contra), Simon Belmont (CastleVania), Megaman (Megaman), Samus Aran (Metroid), and finally, Sophia III (Blaster Master).

CONCLUSION:

So what do we have here in short? A collection of characters placed into one glorious game, all of them are in the masterpieces of 8-bit graphics, retro gameplay and classic music, all of them are controlled the same way they were controlled in their respective games... With saving games, cheats, and lots of modes... You can relive Super Mario Bros on your PC, or play the fun crossover involved in Super Mario Crossover... And the best part: for free. This the best flash game on the whole internet, and if you want to relive Super Mario Bros, no other flash Super Mario game was as accurate as Super Mario Crossover was in reliving Super Mario Bros...

10/10: One of the best flash games on the whole internet!

Minecraft (PC)

As a celebration of Minecraft's 1.0 release, I'm going to review Minecraft, the game that brought attention of 4 million people around the world. An addictive game that sold a lot of copies and brought a lot of people into one game, thanks to Markuss Persson (or Notch), the creator of this brilliant game.

This game has no story, but here is my rendition of the story: You appear in a world made of blocks and pixels, and your goal here is to mine blocks in order to build houses and high top castles, as well as pixel art, while surviving hordes of monsters including the famous exploding Creeper, the mysterious Enderman and fighting the ultimate and the only boss in the game, the Enderdragon, where your non-building adventure ends.

There are music in the game. You can have them turned on or off depending on your mood, and occasional music will pop up when it's on. But there are also music discs gained by either dungeon chests or by making a skeleton kill a creeper, and they are worth chasing after because of their rarity and because they are better than the occasional music. The sounds are not that bad, but the new TNT sound is not that good and so is the Enderman's noises.

The graphics are like 16-bit pixels, but they aren't bad as 16-bit graphics brings back memories from the SNES and Genesis era ;). The best part is that you can customize them and make a "Texture Pack", and you can edit your player's skin so that you can log into servers with a special look, different than the look Notch gave you. If you have a powerful computer, you will enjoy how wonderful Minecraft looks with Far and Fancy graphics set.

The gameplay is the best part of Minecraft. It's the reason why it sold out over 4 million copies. The reason why it gained great popularity in the gaming world. You build, craft, mine, and survive through hordes of dangerous monsters. You got three modes to choose from: Survival, where you have to survive your first day in a new world by making a shelter, while crafting, mining and smelting the needed stuff until the shelter is built, then you have to hide in the shelter at the first night, and then continue expanding your world and fight monsters the next morning when most monsters disappear. There is Creative mode, where you've got most of the blocks used in Minecraft and some stuff to toy with, and build anything you'd think of using an unlimited supply of blocks and stuff. You can also fly in this mode by double pressing space quickly, which is useful in creating high end castles. There is the last mode, Hardcore, which is the hardest mode in Minecraft because it's locked on the hardest difficulty and you have one life, dying in a hardcore world will result in the world being deleted, which makes you think and fight carefully the whole way in that world. If Minecraft gets boring though, you can play it Multiplayer, where you can show your builds to people, chat with them, play with them, and showing off your cool self made skin. Minecraft has more secrets than just those, as I can't put them all into one article, but keep track of the updates Minecraft receives, as they increase replay value of Minecraft as well as add new stuff into the game.

TIP: Before you would buy Minecraft, you should check Minecraft.net and play the free Minecraft Classic, one of the older versions of Minecraft. It is basically just like the Creative mode in the full release, except with fewer blocks and no stuff. I'd try that version of Minecraft, and if I liked it, I would waste the 20 euros needed to buy the full version of Minecraft, from Minecraft.net (Minecraft is available as digital copies only). If you can't afford the full version but still want to play Minecraft, then Minecraft Classic is your only way to enjoy the great game (albeit without the survival and monsters), and you can play it multiplayer as well.

SERVERS

One great thing in Minecraft is the existence of Multiplayer Servers, this where you can play with other people and show them your builds, as well as not feeling bored or being alone in Minecraft. There are a lot of servers running Minecraft around the world, but ThisWeekInMinecraft has a pretty decent and well moderated server with multi worlds, and depends on the Bukkit server application which uses plugins including anti-grief plugins. Its available to Minecraft 1.0.0, so if you want a server to play on, then ThisWeekInMinecraft is one of the best Minecraft servers on the internet.

CONCLUSION

A simple story (or no story at all), good sounds and graphics, VERY GREAT gameplay, and many modes to choose from as well as many directions to take in the game, makes me rate this 10/10. This game is also available on iOS, iPod Touch, Xperia Play, and it's coming soon to the XBox 360, meaning a lot of ways to play this game albeit in creative mode on the portables. I recommend you to burn 20 euros on this great game..

RATING: 10/10: The Best PC Game choice!