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Dynamite Headdy Stats and Records
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Dynamite Headdy Review
Now this is definitely one of the most difficult video games that I’ve played in a minute. Certainly one of the toughest platformers and without the power of access points and rewinding I don’t see how anyone was able to beat the final boss of this game. It’s incredibly difficult with randomized movements and a whole lot of health. I died so many times in this fight but of course in the end all I had to do was win once to turn the tables and that’s exactly what I did! You just have to keep on fighting until you have made it to the end.
The basic plot involves the main guy getting suckered by girl who keeps stealing stuff. Yeah okay that’s not technically the focus of the plot even though it’s what happens. Someone is putting the entire world at risk and has powerful robotic menaces under his disposal. Headdy had to destroy them all and save puppetkind but does he have what it takes to defeat everyone? He has the power needed to be sure but the guy isn’t the smartest and is easily suckered so you really have to take that into account. Trust me, the guy makes me roll my eyes sometimes to be honest because the same cutscene happens after every world. You’d think he would learn…
All that said, I’m glad that the game actually has a real story. There are lots of cutscenes even if there isn’t much dialogue and the characters are very expressive so you feel like you are always in the mix. This game would absolutely do well with a modern remake because even this one has aged well. The gameplay is also very unique with how you put on different heads to gain different abilities. You need to get used to jumping and then launching your head since that’s a bit different compared to the usual action of jumping and automatically grabbing onto something. Once your muscle memory gets used to it, you’re set though.
Also watch out because there are what I call trap heads. One in particular involves putting on a giant head that prevents you from moving for a little while and then you get destroyed. The game is very punishing with your mistakes so if you put that on…good luck. It’s over by that point and you’re not going to make it to the end. Other power ups like turning tiny are good for very specific circumstances but if you use it in the middle of a level it will often hold you back instead of helping you. So I’d say you should definitely keep that in mind. The best power up is probably the one that surrounds you with an energy barrier that damages any enemy who gets close. That one is super handy with no real drawbacks.
Now like I said with the difficulty level, the enemies hit hard! You will lose all of your health very quickly and the attacks can be hard to react to. Specifically I have to talk about the final boss here because he is the most noticeable by far. He has a ton of different attack options up his sleeve and there is barely a chance to see what he is going to do before he does it. The guy seems to have a different pose for each attack which is likely your entry way to being able to dodge in time but it’s still an incredibly tight window.
You also need to be able to grab the specific power up that you need in order to dodge his attack and that is way easier said than done. Trust me this is exactly the kind of enemy that you do not want to face because he is always in the perfect position to take you down. I died probably over 50 times against him and that was with the power of the Switch Online. He’s an awesome looking final boss though. Great design all the way and really someone who does strike fear into you. He’s an excellent final boss and definitely a villain who excels over 90% of other platforming villains. This game deserves to be a big series.
The graphics have aged really well due in large part to the fun artstyle. The soundtrack is really good too and I definitely have no complaints there. The length is not the longest as each world is fairly short but the levels all have a lot of originality to them. For example in one level you are flying around the whole time, then you’re underwater in one, etc. The gameplay itself changes to match the levels which is impressive. It’s not afraid to change things up a lot.
In fact one level even had a whole puzzle which really did stump me for a bit. You have to basically bounce off of a bunch of walls to get to the top and you have to do this really fast before you fall down or hit a spike. The timing was so specific that I overthought it which is part of why I didn’t think that was how to get past the puzzle. I was looking for a switch or an alternate exit but in the end the direct way was the right way.
Overall, This game was better than I was expecting. I’m not crazy about one aspect of the ending since the implications are rather dire but otherwise this was very satisfying all the way through. The game feels ahead of its time with how many different gameplay mechanics it used and the fact that it had a true story all the way through. Trust me, that’s really not an easy feat and it only gets more and more impressive as I play other Genesis games.
Overall 7/10
Columns Stats and Records
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Columns Review
All right it’s time for our next Genesis title but this one’s not one of the more impressive ones. In fact you could say that this is one of the weakest ones. I’m not totally sure what they were going for here except to say that it did not work. It’s a puzzle game that’s similar to Tetris and other matching games but the big difference here is that you can’t rotate the pieces sideways. They just go from up to down and that’s about it which to me makes the game not quite as fun. There’s still a lot of strategy so I won’t say in any way that this makes it more basic but it’s tougher to really land the combos that you want.
When you launch the game there is only one main mode here. You can play it on easy, normal, or hard. Beyond that the game is exactly he same on all 3 modes and the only difference is the speed at which the pieces fall down and also the points that you start with. On easy mode you start with 0, 20,000 on normal mode, and 50,000 on hard mode. What this means if you should always play hard mode because even if you lose almost immediately, you have so many points that it adds up. At least me personally it feels like the right way to go. Now if you can’t move the pieces on their sides, how do you get matches?
Well each tile has 3 colors so what you can do is change the orders of the colors on the block even though you can’t turn it. It’s definitely a tricky one and it’s hard to get the hang of it. You really have to forget everything you’ve learned about matching games previously and then get used to these rules. Otherwise you will really just end up playing yourself the whole time and putting yourself in a rough spot. Even by the end when playing this game I felt like I was making most of my matches by mistake. It was super hard to actually plan for them and more often than not I would just end up losing eventually without knowing what I was really doing.
The core problem is that as a result the game just isn’t super fun. It’s not awful or anything but there’s virtually nothing to do in the game. It’s as basic as possible and that doesn’t have to be a bad thing but then you really need an excellent gameplay style. Just being okay is not nearly good enough and that’s the real problem here. Give me some different backgrounds or something. Of course a story mode is the number one factor that would be super hype but these are other things that could have helped more. More songs, backgrounds, modes, etc.
As it stands this game is just too barebones and has not aged particularly well. There is really no particular reason to play this game as long as many others exist. I will just naturally find myself gravitating to those instead and I’m sure that the same is true for many gamers which is why you never hear about this title nowadays. The graphics are okay but it’s not like there is much on the screen for the game to show off either. So what you have is a game that is absolutely stuck without the ability to improve.
Also I’m pretty sure this is more of a Nintendo Switch Online thing than with the actual game or at least I hope that is the case but the game does not save your high score. Yes, you heard that right. It goes back to 0 each time so every time you play the game says that you now have the high score. A little suspect eh? That also takes away from wanting to play for too long because yeah you can write the high score down but how long will you actually remember it? It’s a real load off your mind to have the game store this kind of basic information instead of you.
Overall, There isn’t a lot of replay value here because you’ll basically just be playing the same level over and over and over again with nothing much beyond that. Nobody is going to be spending that amount of time on a single game for very long. It just wouldn’t make sense. You know it and I know it. I’d like to think that this would have potential with a modern day remake but I do think you would need a ton of bells and whistles to make it worth the purchase. Otherwise I would really just go with the classic Tetris style instead because I find it to be more fun. That’s what it really boils down to in the end.
Overall 3/10
Castlevania: Grimoire of Souls Stats and Records
Stats time!
Play Time 22h
Game Completion: 53%
Account Level: Max
Weapons Obtained: 51%
Sub Weapons Obtained: 60%
Armor Obtained: 64%
Enemies Fought: 94%
Memories Obtained: 81%
Character Levels
Alucard: Max
Simon: 71
Charlotte: 50
Maria: 62
Shanoa: 55
Castlevania: Grimoire of Souls Review
It’s time for the last Apple Arcade review as I have now canceled my subscription with the service. It had a good run but that’s how things have to be. This one’s more of a real title than Mane Merge although it does suffer from a few issues with how the original game was designed. It was going to be a gatcha title after all but had to remove the freemium elements for the Apple Arcade. So what you have is a game that is not very well balanced and yet…it is fun. You just have to use some special methods to get around.
The basic plot is that Alucard becomes aware of another plot to revive Dracula. He has to make sure that this doesn’t happen and so he partners himself with an organization to stop this. Basically they have to go through the books of history and recruit all of the strongest vampire hunters. The villains are trying to change history at the same time to remove these heroes. Whoever moves fast will claim the edge but with Death itself trying to resurrect Dracula, is there any way to stop him? It definitely won’t be easy but Alucard is an old hand at this and ready to win.
The gameplay here is your classic 2D platformer. You use your sword, wand, or whip to mow through enemies and get to the end. Each level is fairly short so you can breeze through them but of course there are a lot of levels in each world. There are 10 worlds here and each one has 16 levels although you only need to complete 10 to move onto the next one. Beating the rest of the levels is often recommended to get progress towards new S class weapons and to get stronger. So you go through the levels and claim victory right? Well there is one thing stopping you from doing that and this is your power level.
So here’s where the gatcha type elements come in. Each of your characters has a level and then your account has a level. You raise character levels by beating enemies and getting EXP while your account level goes up by completing stages. Your weapon, sub weapon, weapon 2, weapon 3, and 5 armors all have individual levels as well. Those you level up with gems but every 5 levels it gets maxed out and then you have to limit break the equipment. You limit break it by getting memories of the weapons which you can try to find in a stage, search for through an auto complete, or summon. It will take a while to do each one so these are basically stopping points where you just have to wait until you get them.
Summoning is expensive and searches are limited to 60 times per day so the rest of the time you will need to actually go out there and just keep on completing the levels. That part is limitless at least but you can see how this would take a while right? The levels keep jumping up in terms of difficulty level so you have to try and stay close to compete. In the end I was able to complete the game with a power level of 88,000 and it took me 22 hours to accomplish this. The number is partially RNG based on what you summon so add or subtract from that amount if you aim to complete the game.
There is a trick that I mentioned earlier though so lets talk it through because without that I would not be anywhere close to beating the game. On the Arcade none of the shops work and it sounds like this is being worked on but I didn’t have time for that. So the trick is to turn off your mobile phone’s automatic date finder and manually put in an earlier date. I warped myself back to 2023 which activated all of the shops and I was able to grab what I needed. The one annoying thing about this is your phone’s other apps like your email will keep asking you what’s going on with the date so accomplish as much as you can in one shot before going back to normal.
I’m not sure if messing with the date could cause any problems with your phone but it’s best not to really take any chances with that right? Then you can keep warping days to collect the login bonuses and refresh the searches so you can progress through the game. So while I played the game for 22 hours, I lived through close to half a month by moving myself through time. Without that ability, it would take me about that long to complete which is pretty crazy. Apple Arcade really enjoys adding a grind to its games but since this one was left unfinished that worked in my favor since they didn’t bother setting an automatic date.
It’s still something worth considering in the review though which is what holds this game back from being higher. I enjoy the actual gameplay but you’re effectively locking all of the players out with the way the difficulty jumps up. You just wouldn’t be able to damage the boss until you got upgraded and that’s why gatcha elements can be a little annoying in gameplay. Particularly when getting stronger is such a time consuming project.
What helps compared to something like Mane Merge is that at least the story was a lot of fun all the way through. Again I do think we should have gotten more cutscenes and voice acting but the crossover effect was cool even as someone who doesn’t know a ton about Castlevania. I imagine there were probably a lot of easter eggs and such in the story. Everyone got their props and respect in the story which is what you always want to see and the ending was actually very satisfying.
The graphics in this game aren’t quite as impressive as the other Apple Arcade titles. This is the one aspect that the game really lacks in. It’s a bit surprising but maybe it’s just the art style that it was going for. Whatever it was, the game definitely doesn’t look very good. Meanwhile the soundtrack is fun though, there are actually a whole lot of tunes in the game so you don’t hear them repeat very often.
Overall, The length of the game is pretty impressive. As noted, it’s 20+ hours while playing through even with the enhancements Play it normally and you’re probably looking at 50+ hours. I didn’t even touch the special event stages which will add some replay value. I will note though that the replay value is limited in this case because after you play through those last levels, there is nothing else. No other mode to have fun with the gameplay or anything like that. You’ll just have ended the game and then it’s time to put it own. That’s actually a bit rare for a gacha title but I guess once a title is no longer supported it makes sense not to keep on adding stuff. If you enjoy Castlevania and have the Apple Arcade then I recommend checking it out but otherwise you can probably grab one of the classic Castlevania titles instead.
Overall 6/10
My Little Pony: Mane Merge Stats and Records
Stats time!
Play Time: Unknown
My Little Pony: Mane Merge Review
It’s time to look at an Apple Arcade title that is definitely a very long one. I poured in tons of hours to complete this game and unfortunately the length is actually a weak point here. I tend to enjoy matching gameplay but there should be something with it as opposed to matching just for the sake of it. The game has a story yes, but it is really dragged out with whole chapters going by without much plot progression. The grind was a little too much for a little amount of content which is what doomed this title.
Basically the game starts with a villain deciding to take down Equestria and she has some kind of magical abilities that allow her to summon vines which start to terrorize the populace. Nobody knows that she is doing this but in a way that might have been an issue for her because nobody takes the threat too seriously. Yeah the ponies are removing the vines but there isn’t a lot of urgency. Has she underestimated the resilience of the heroes?
Well she absolutely has, that’s a big guarantee here. The heroes keep on chopping down the vines and rescuing their friends. Rinse and repeat for all 11 chapters, the heroes just don’t stop. You get little cutscenes every now and again and then one main one at the beginning/ending of a chapter but there isn’t any real voice acting. Each character has one word that they will say as a sound effect and they will keep on saying it but that’s like the bare minimum of voice acting. An Apple Arcade title could absolutely afford to have real voice acting.
The graphics are really good though, I can give the game that much at least. The character models are on point and the backgrounds all look sharp. This does at least look like a very modern title. The soundtrack is very limited and while the main theme isn’t bad, there’s nothing very exciting here. You will very quickly forget all about the tunes. This game is aimed a bit younger so I’m not expecting heavy metal or anything but there are plenty of great Mario and Sonic tunes in each game and those are aimed at kids too.
As mentioned, the gameplay itself isn’t bad. Basically you match different items together in order to form new items. Form those new ones to get newer ones, etc. There are 6 kinds of objects and each one has up to 10 levels of items which means a lot of merging. You don’t have unlimited energy either. When you run out of spins you can either wait around 2 hours to replenish 100 merges or you can play a minigame to get up to 75 merges back. It’s nice that there is a way you can just wait it out, but it’s not very practical given the amount of merges that you need. You could go through well over 1000-2000 merges in a single chapter so that’s a lot of merges.
The game also forces you to switch sides every now and again. For example you might just figure you’ll do a ton of minigames to stockpile a few thousand spins and then go do the merging right? Well the cap is 200 so you have to go back and do some merging before you go to the minigames. So you’re constantly switching between the two areas. I don’t think there is really much of a point to making you limited like this. I’d have preferred to focus on one and then the other. There are a lot of minigames but the fastest one in my opinion is feeding the critters. I would just spam that one over and over again.
The game does have a ton of content though, I can tell you that much. The main story probably took me at least 50+ hours to complete and then there are two other story modes to contend with as well. Every 3 days there are mini events you can compete in for fun and of course there is a sticker book which holds your achievements. If you want to 100% that, you will need to play every minigame at least 50+ times and ace all of the story modes. It’s actually very achievable but of course very long.
As far as I know the main story mode is easily the longest out of all the stories but even then I bet this will take a good amount of time for you to beat the others. This is just an example of what I would call a fairly pointless grind. If you really enjoy the game then of course you will be glad for some extra content but if not then there is no incentive to go through the other stories. You will barely be able to muster up the courage to beat the first story mode.
It’s just a shame because a ton of effort was put into this one but the effort was focused on the wrong area. It should have been on making the story mode as compelling as possible and always having some kind of a reward for the merges. When you get enough hearts to unlock the next item, there should always be a cutscene. Maybe make less items but each one costs more merges to unlock and then you would have a better balance here. It’s just rough to play for an hour or more gathering hearts and no real progression to speak of.
Overall, Mane Merge is a game with a ton of content but it was just bloated without a lot of incentive to make it fun. It’s certainly not worth getting Apple Arcade for and I wouldn’t keep the service for this game either. At the end of the day you should give it a go if you’re a huge MLP fan but personally I would say to play one of the matching games like Fruits Mania or Lollipop instead of this title. Those didn’t even have a story and yet they were a lot more fun to go through. This one lacks that addicting edge to it so instead of being lost in the game, you’re wondering when it will end.
Overall 4/10
Monsters Review
Lets take a look at Oda’s original oneshot! One Piece has become one of the most recognized franchises in the world and yet before that he had already written a quick story here. You can tell that his art style is a little rougher around the edges from back then but it still looks clear enough. It’s a fun story and you can bet that I was inspired to check this out since the new Netflix adaption just came out. It’s a rare case where I saw the adaption before the original special. It’s a very faithful adaption though so it’s just about the same.
We start off with the famous Shirano stopping by a local village and he is recognized by the waitress Flare who was saved by him as a child. She survived a very traumatic ordeal when a dragon murdered everyone and destroyed the village but thanks to his help she survived. Unfortunately a samurai known as Ryuma appears and picks a fight. Shirano defeats him and diffuses the situation but that same samurai picks a fight with a villainous figure known as D.R. who decides to summon a dragon as revenge. Now the village is doomed to be destroyed and Flare wishes that Ryuma had never stopped by. She will have to relive the same tragedy all over again and this time Shirano will likely die as he has decided to stay back and fight it which is a fool’s errand.
Ryuma definitely comes across as really irresponsible and not the kind of guy you want to have as your hero. Picking fights for minor things is a bit much no matter how he tries to justify it. Yeah I put no blame on him for the D.R. matter because villains will do what villains do but he shouldn’t have picked a fight at the restaurant. The guy does have a good rage mode in the story though. Seeing Flare break down and jumping into action was definitely the right move. The scene showing her trying to keep it together was really good.
I give her a lot of credit there because trying to put on a brave face is a really tough thing to do but she pulled it off. It may not have fooled Ryuma but she wasn’t trying to burden anyone with her problems. I deduct some points for her blaming Ryuma for everything right away though. D.R. is the one who looks shady and at the end of the day he summoned the dragon so shouldn’t you be blaming him the most? Same goes for all of the villagers who panic as always.
Shirano definitely has a really big role in the story as well. It’s a role you can probably see coming but he pulls it off well. There’s always something scary about a character like this when you feel like you know him but then find out the hard way that you never did. It’s why you have to be careful who you trust and how far you trust them. Trust is not something to be given lightly. D.R. is a very forgettable character though and there’s nothing to make him stand out.
As mentioned the art is a little on the rough side but I would still say it’s good enough. You can always tell what is going on. It really has changed a lot compared to the current One Piece days but hey time will do that to any artist. There is a decent page count to this oneshot but with the wide panels and lots of reaction type shots, it really goes by very quickly. You’ll easily be able to read this one in one sitting. The action scenes we get here are really short so at the end of the day this is more about the adventure. You won’t be bored at any point and it moves pretty quickly so I have no issues there.
I think this could have even worked as a full ongoing if the author was interested in that. It definitely would have been more of a Kenshin type story about a wandering samurai but with the dragon in chapter one, the author already opened the door for a lot of supernatural events which would be different. Dragons themselves aren’t super rare to find in a story like this but if the author went far enough with spellcasters and such this could have been pretty unique. Ultimately I am glad that we got One Piece instead though.
Overall, Monsters is a fun oneshot. It’s a nostalgic trip to the past and an interesting look at what could have been rather than One Piece. It’s a good title which is enough for a oneshot like this but naturally doesn’t have enough in it to pass the average ongoing title. It’s free on the viz site right now so I’d recommend giving it a read. Then if you enjoy the series, it’s time to quickly check out One Piece and begin one of the longest journeys of your life!
Overall 6/10
Monsters: 103 Mercies Dragon Damnation Review
It’s time to look at the Monster special/mini movie that came out recently. You know when they first announced this project I figured it’d be at least an hour or longer but I guess that would have not really made sense since this was based on a one shot. At the very least they would have had to add a lot of extra scenes. Maybe if they included the full fight in the after credits scene instead of just the ending but for people just trying to watch this as a stand alone it probably would have been a really odd way to end this.
The story starts with Ryuma showing up to a village in a state of near starvation. He hasn’t eaten in days and so Flare (I feel like her name was a little different when I saw the film but this works well enough), a nice person lets him eat a bunch for free. He considers himself to be in her debt now although he has a funny way of showing it considering that he starts a big fight in the bar. This happens because the world’s strongest swordsman, Shirano ends up bumping his sword into Ryuma’s. It should have just been a simple accident that they both laugh at and walk away from but Ryuma takes this kind of thing personal.
The same thing happens with someone else a few minutes later, but this time it is a villain named D.R. who pretends that he has been stabbed by Ryuma and uses the legendary dragon horn to summon a dragon to destroy the village. Now the whole village is mad at Ryuma but also just depressed because they are all going to die. Shirano vows to stay and fight the dragon but Ryuma knows that it isn’t his fault and just figures everyone should run off and live. Is this really the right move though? And why did this villain randomly summon a dragon like this? Something’s not right.
The special’s length is basically around 1 normal episode so things have to move pretty quickly. That includes the main plot twist here although it’s one that you will absolutely see a mile away. This is a fairly conventional story about a heroic figure slaying the giant dragon and so the plot around it is pretty much what you would expect. I’m guessing back in the day when submitting the oneshot to the magazine, the writer probably wanted to go with a safe story to start off with. It makes sense and the movie is a very faithful adaption. In a world of subversions and complex plots though, it works well enough.
My main complaint would be that I wish we got more action though. There is only one real action scene here with the dragon and it’s a short one. Yes there is a sword “duel” but that only lasts for a single move and is very fast. It does have the best action sequence by far though. I tend to like when an animation quickly switches to black and white for dramatic effect although you don’t want to overuse it. For example we get another black and white flash against the dragon but that one was really underwhelming in comparison. I would say the animation here is reasonably good but definitely not great or excellent like you would expect from a special. One Piece itself destroys this with many episodes in Wano.
As for the soundtrack, it’s pretty uneventful. Nothing to write home about so you’ll be forgetting the tunes pretty fast. As a main character Ryuma is okay but I wasn’t actually a big fan of his. The guy is super irresponsible, I still can’t believe that he broke a statue in Flare’s restaurant for practically no reason. I get that the sword is important to him but then you confront the guy outside. You don’t pick a fight where you can hurt innocent civilians. It’s also worth noting that Ryuma clearly went for a headshot against Shirano. So he was going to murder a guy for lightly bumping into his sword? Even after the guy apologized?
It’s hard to just overlook that. Particularly as it isn’t really played off as a bad thing either. It’s more of a comedic moment because Shirano had the skills to stop the attack and defeat Ryuma instantly but otherwise it could have been bad. This does also raise a power scaling issue later on. I mean a good rage mode easily answers that question but it’s why we should have had more of a fight later on.
I also think the climax raises some questions on exactly how the scheme worked. It seems to me like the dragon whistle actually works really well because the dragon never tried to attack them. So if you have a dragon working for you, then you can just blow villages up all the time. Why even bother with elaborate traps and schemes? It just seems unnecessary. There could be world building reasons around that like not wanting to attract attention but it seemed like the villain would make things harder on himself here.
D.R. is a fairly underwhelming villain. The guy can’t fight and isn’t too strong so he’s the kind of guy who really just hides in the back and hopes that things will work out. Flare is a decent heroine but a little too gullible. The fact that she was so quick to turn on Ryuma with no evidence was annoying. I get that it was traumatic but she really has no reason to jump in with the mob there. As you can tell I was not a big fan of the cast overall. Shirano would be the strongest character here by default. He may not go out very well but the guy is interesting all the way through and does help to enhance the special. With a better ending he would have fared even better.
Overall, Monsters is a fun special but I don’t see there being a lot of replay value. There just isn’t a reason to watch it for a second time. The best moment is a quick scene that plays after the credits though. I’ve actually watched that one a few times now. It’s got a lot of replay value but you could Youtube that instead of watching the whole thing again. The connection to a certain franchise is one of those open secrets where everybody basically knows about it, but I won’t spoil that in case you don’t know. If they could have hidden the connection more then the scene would really hit extra hard but then you lose out on some of the marketing angles so it’s a double edged sword. Regardless I do think this is worth a watch, particularly with how short it is.
Overall 6//10
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