A Green Mushroom

I really like Super Mario Run.  It's a great first real game for Nintendo to put on iOS.  It really feels like a Mario game even though it's kind of an infinite runner.  But it's not an infinite runner.  It's Mario. It was definitely worth the $10 price to open up the whole game.  One playthrough to the end of the levels doesn't take too long but the added value comes from the challenge of going back through the levels to gather colored coins.  If you manage to grab all 5 pink coins in one run you get a chance to try for the purples.  If you get the purples you can go for the black ones and those even remix the levels. There's also a Toad Rally if you feel like competing for style points against other people on the internet.  I did a bit of that one, but Mario for me has always been about the single player platforming.  That platforming definitely finds a good home on iPhones and iPads. Now I'm just really excited for the Fire Emble...

Merry Christmas!  Or Happy Holidays!  Or whatever applies to you! Today I'm curious about everyone's holiday gaming traditions. What do you guys do for the holidays?  Does the holiday season inspire you to play a certain type of game or is there a specific group of people that you play with?  What are your holiday gaming traditions? For me, I just try to find some time to play Mario.  I got an SNES with Super Mario World one Christmas when I was younger and it's one of my strongest holiday memories.  So now I always try to make some time for Mario on Christmas. Besides that, the fall into winter holiday season always gives me a craving for a good RPG.  This year I spent a ton of time in Fallout 4 for the first week or two that it was out and I'll probably revisit it again.  But I'm also eyeing Persona 4 because I really want to get back to it and one of these days I'll revisit Final Fantasy X-2 since I haven't played it since it origin...

In my household we've been having a lot of fun making Mario levels in Super Mario Maker.  My daughter has been making levels based on whatever her 5-year-old mind desires.  I've been trying to make themed levels.  My wife is having a lot of fun making super challenging levels and then making me play test them... and when I eventually figure out a way to finish the level she just makes it harder.  The other day my brother stopped by and made a level too. It's been so much fun! If you have Mario Maker come check out our levels! My levels: 36C6-0000-004B-BEBF 7563-0000-004D-E3F3 5E55-0000-0031-5D85 My 5-year-old's level: E7CC-0000-0059-A20D My wife's levels: 027C-0000-0031-D43D 8943-0000-0048-D0C3 My brother's level: 2B0A-0000-0072-B6BA If you've been making Mario levels please share them in the comments below.  I'd love to check them out! Also... Nintendo really needs to find a better way of sharing and linking...

After having a crazy busy September all the way until now I thought it would be a good time to check in on my gaming to-do list that I started for Blaugust last month.  Let's see how progress is going: Persona 4 Golden - I really need to make time for this game.  I loved playing it.  It's just been on hold.  I must make time for it! Hearthstone - Still doing my dailies and playing enough to get weekly/monthly rewards . Fire Emblem Awakening - I want to get back to this eventually, but with new Fall releases coming out I don't know when that will be. FFX-2 - This is right up there with Persona 4 Golden.  I need to start carving out time for RPGs before all the Fall game releases drop! Super Mario Maker  - Almost all my gaming time (which has been very limited) has gone into this game lately.  I don't regret it at all.  This might be my game of the year! [adding to list] Star Wars Uprising  - This mobile Star Wars game came out e...

My kids and I have been playing a ton of Mario Maker since it released earlier this month.  I love this game. It has immediately jumped up to my number one evergreen game.  Whenever I'm not sure what to play I jump into Mario Maker and I have yet to walk away disappointed. I still haven't mastered the level making, and I don't think that part will hold appeal for me long term.  But, I'm been playing Mario since I was 3.  As a 28 year old I'm really good at it by now.  I've beaten every Mario platformer.  Now, for the first time in years, I can find levels that are actually challenging for me. You see, you can sort the levels by difficultly.  The system looks at the percentage of people who were able to finish a level and assign it a difficulty of easy, normal, or expert.  Whenever I sit down to play alone I play expert levels and I have an amazing experience. The flip side of this is that easy levels are actually easier than levels in ...

There are so many great announcements coming out of E3 this year.  Here are the games I'm most excited for so far: Mario Maker The footage from the Nintendo World Championship really sold me on this game.  It's my most anticipated game right now.  If it has good sharing and community capabilities it could become one of my favorite games of all time. Star Wars Battlefront Star Wars is my weakness and this is the first real Star Wars game that we're getting under the new management of the franchise.  It looks gorgeous and the gameplay should be a ton of fun.  There's no question this is a day one purchase for me. Fire Emblem Fates I love a good strategy RPG and Fire Emblem was always on my radar, but when Fire Emblem Awakening came out it finally clicked with me.  I loved Fire Emblem Awakening and it was my game of the year for the year it came out.  Fire Emblem Fates looks like the next step in the same direction f...

Ah!  The Nintendo conference is over and I only have 7 minutes before the Square Enix one starts.  Quick!  Thoughts! Nothing revolutionary announced.  They're holding off on talking about the new system until next year. Lot's of gameplay from games releasing later this year or early next year.  Things like Star Fox and Yoshi's Wooly World look to still be on track and fun. I'm super excited for the new Fire Emblem which now has an English name, Fire Emblem Fates.  I loved Fire Emblem Awakening, so I'll definitely be picking up this one.  That Fire Emblem cross over on the other hand... looks a little crazy.  I'm not sure what to think about it. A new multiplayer Metroid for 3DS just got announced.  I hope Metroid fans are happy.  It didn't look all that appealing to me, but that's ok, I'm not a huge Metroid fan. The new Triforce Heroes Zelda game for 3DS is more my speed.  I'm not sure if I'll have people to play it with v...

The Nintendo World Championship just happened and it totally lived up to the hype.  I watched the whole thing while talking to my brother over text and my Twitter friends over Twitter.  I had a great time. The main rounds were modern games played competitively and the "underground" rounds were classic Nintendo games done as speed runs or score challenges.  The variety and game selection were fantastic. Nintendo even revealed a new game in the middle of the event and then immediately had the competitors play it for the next round. The best part of the event was watching the final round with the competitors playing Mario Maker levels that Nintendo Treehouse employees had designed.  It was strangely captivating watching them figure out the levels in real time. The event just wrapped up but it looks like it's already posted on YouTube.  I highly recommend checking it out.  I'll even embed it below, for your convenience.

Although I hadn't played the Puzzle & Dragons Z version of the game on my trip, I have done so since then.  While I ended up liking the Mario Edition side of this game I didn't find Puzzle & Dragons Z quite as interesting. It's the same core gameplay but wrapped up with tons of unskippable story content set in a world similar to Pokemon... but less interesting. After getting familiar with the core puzzle gameplay I was really disappointed to see how much extra fluff there was in between actual gameplay in this version. If you really felt like Puzzle & Dragons was missing a story or if you're super obsessed with the Pokemon formula you might find something here.  For the rest of us it's probably better to stay on the Mario Edition side of this game.

I discussed the possibility of picking up this game the other week... and I did!  I probably wouldn't have grabbed it if I wasn't looking for something new to check out while I was traveling.  In the end I'm happy I got the game. The Mario Edition did such a better job of easing me into Puzzle and Dragons.  The demo and the iOS version that I tried last week did a horrible job of teaching me what to do when playing the game.  Everything from team composition to special abilities and powering up characters are taught in a friendly and easy-to-learn manner in the Mario Edition. At this point I actually feel like I would probably like the mobile version now that I understand the game better.  I would download it again on my phone if it weren't for those F2P mechanics.  Just having that stamina bar and being able to buy my way to victory bugs me. But the Mario Edition did away with the things I didn't like and did a great job of explaining the intere...

There was a free demo for the 3DS Mario version of Puzzle and Dragon on the eShop so I grabbed it to see what the game was about. I've never played Puzzle and Dragons before, but what I found was a game somewhere between a Bejeweled, Puzzle Quest, and Terra Battle.  If you're not familiar with those games, it's basically a game where you're trying to match 3 or more gems of the same color in a row or column.  Every time you start moving a gem it shifts all the others it travels through in order to get to it's final destination.  The game quickly becomes more about bumping other gems around rather than concentrating on the gem you're dragging.  Moving the gem around is timed, but you can freely move it as much as you want and as far as you want within the time limit. You end up trying to bump as many gems into combos as you can within the time limit to set up massive damage.  You have a team of characters sitting above the gems, and those team members...

The Wii U in my house has become a family console.  It started as mine, but now it's definitely ours as a family.  My kids play it more than I do, and I'm fine with that.  It's really cool to see my 2 year old and 4 year old playing Mario together. Because my daughter uses the Wii U often, she sees all the ads Nintendo distributes to the console.  She just had her first game that she was excited to wait for the release date.  If you couldn't already guess, it was Mario Party 10! As a parent, it was really fun for me to watch her get excited for a game release.  I know the feeling of being the one excited for the game, but it's really fun getting that enthusiasm by proxy through her excitement. We've been playing it almost every day.  Every member of the family has gotten involved.  Sometimes my kids sit on the couch and play together, sometimes it's one of them and one adult, sometimes it's all four of us.  It's so much fun to have ...

I'm really good at Mario games.  I'm talking about the platformers, not the spin-offs. I noticed it recently since my daughter has been asking me to play various Mario platformers with her on Wii U and 3DS.  I can jump into any level and typically beat it on the first try, often without being hit at all.  Even if it's right at the end of a game. This makes me wonder, have I gotten too  good at Mario games?  I still enjoy them, but they don't give me the same challenge they used to. If a new Mario platformer comes out I always pick it up.  Lately, I'll beat the game within the first week.  Sometimes it's even within the first couple days. I probably sound like an ass since I'm saying I'm too   good  at something.  But, when skill level and challenge level don't match up it can be frustrating.  It can go the opposite way too where the challenge is just so far above a player's skill level that it's frustrating. I would re...

Yesterday Nintendo updated their Club Nintendo rewards and finally, for the first time, put up a good selection of games and accessories.  As of writing this, the site is still down because it can't handle the traffic.  That's what happens when you offer more than 100 different game choices and new physical rewards to a group of people that have been given 4-6 really bad game options each month for years on end.  Here's a full list from Reddit of all the reward offerings. This has only come about because the Club Nintendo program has been canceled and that's the sad part.  I hate to see it go, but this is a nice parting gift. I just wish they had all of these games available the entire time the rewards program was open.  They would have had many more people using Club Nintendo and responding to their surveys. While I'm sad to see it go, for now I'll just be happy that I finally have some good games to spend my rewards points on.  Thanks Nintend...

I finally got around to trying out NES Remix 2 on my Wii U yesterday and I found it surprisingly fun. I bought and played NES Remix 1 when it released but was underwhelmed by the game.  This series takes small portions of various Nintendo Entertainment System games and samples them.  It gives a taste of each game while giving you minor challenges and teaching you the basic mechanics.  Then it gives bonus stages that remix everything you know about the games. While NES Remix 1 wasn't fantastic, it was an interesting format.  It's major failing was the games that it sampled from.  They were all very early NES games and the majority weren't great. NES Remix 2 solves this problem by pulling from later NES games.  I'm having so much more fun with this second entry in the series than I did with the first.  It's giving me a feel for a bunch of games that I never tried, which is really fun.  It's also a blast from the past since it gives me a cha...

I don't usually write about DLC.  It's not typically something worthy of writing about.  I think the Mario Kart DLC is a fantastic value for the money so it deserves some talk. There are two scheduled DLC packs for Mario Kart 8.  The first just released a few days ago.  It includes two new cups, which means eight new tracks.  Eight tracks in a cart racer is a huge amount of content.  Along with these come three new characters; Link, Tanooki Mario, and Cat Peach.  Not to mention four new vehicles. My daughter and I have been having a blast with it.  The new tracks are fantastic and they're getting me re-engaged with the game.  I don't know if I've ever had DLC pull me back into a game like this, but new tracks in Mario Kart is seriously awesome.  My daughter has been enjoying playing with the new characters and vehicles. She loves customizing her racer and changing it every race. This DLC has already convinced me to drop $7.99 ...

Once again I find myself between Final Fantasy games.  That means it's time for some evergreen games before I dive into the next entry in the series.  For me evergreen games are those that have self-contained play sessions and no real "end" to the game. First up is Mario Kart 8.   Even though it's not much of a change from Mario Kart 7 it's a lot of fun and I'm enjoying my time with it.  The biggest improvements are HD graphics and better online play.  It's Mario Kart.  If you like Mario Kart you will love Mario Kart 8.  If you don't like Mario Kart you should skip it.  You basically know what you're getting. Hearthstone has gotten a ton of my time.  Now that it's on iPad it's perfect to play while watching TV on the couch or laying in bed before falling asleep.  I love that the games usually run somewhere in the 5-15 minute range.  I know I can sit down and play without having to commit to long play sessions.  It's easily ...

I've mostly been gaming during my lunch hour or once my kids are in bed at night.  When I finally get a few free minutes to play a game I almost always turn to my 3DS.  It travels everywhere with me just in case I get an opportunity to bust it out for 5 minutes and play. It's really an awesome system.  The 3D effect is cool, but not required.  It has a great lineup of games that's constantly growing.  It has support for digital purchases.  It's finally a Nintendo console with decent online play.  It's easy to carry around.  But most importantly, it's fun! I've had a blast with Mario Kart 7, Fire Emblem: Awakening, Paper Mario Sticker Star, Donkey Kong Country Returns, New Super Mario Bros 2, and Super Mario 3D Land, Animal Crossing: New Leaf. Not to mention all the fantastic eShop and Virtual Console games I've been playing.  Nintendo has a lot to offer. They're even catering to our nostalgic impulses.  I had a few weeks wher...

I got an awesome combo NES/SNES system for Christmas!  It was totally unexpected, but I've been having a great time playing games on it.  I guess they could be considered old school, but really they're just the games I grew up with. I was born in 86', so the NES and SNES were the most popular systems in my early gaming days.  My brother and I owned both of them but we sold them we the shiny new N64 came out.  It was one of the biggest mistakes of our childhood.  He and I have talked about it over the years and this year he decided to do something about it. Not only did my awesome brother give me a duel retro system, he also picked up the original Legend of Zelda, Pilot Wings, Star Fox, and my favorite Mario game ever made, Super Mario World!  It was the best Christmas present that I've gotten since we got our original SNES years ago. The amazing thing I'm finding out is how well these games hold up today.  Graphics aside, the gameplay truly stands ...

I'm finally getting some time to write this weekend.  I'm working on a couple posts that I'm really excited about.  While I refine them, I present to you my backlog of gaming related videos I've been meaning to share.  Enjoy.