Silverfleet

That's where I got stuck. I decided on backing off trying to beat him and decided to go get better stuff. There are so many other things to do in the game. Mainly, I'm going around and getting things that will help with the battle, like the Rubber Armor set (cuts lightning damage) and the Master Sword.

Working on getting all the bits for the rubber armor set right now. Got the helmet and the pants so far. That should help with Thunderblight Ganon as well! Since playing again, I've rarely been using horses. I am never in an area that seems to have them, and when I do find one, I forget to bring them to the stable, so I've been on foot 99% of the time.

I ended up just leaving to go explore some more. Going to do some armor upgrades and shrine finding so I can get more heart containers. I think I want the Master Sword for this.

I picked one up for around $35USD a few months back with the Target app exploit where they double-discounted them. I basically played it for a half hour and put it back in the box. I feel like it's more of a novelty/collector's item than a good game console. Some thoughts: -Presentation and packaging are top notch. They NAILED this aspect of it. It really looks like a small Playstation! -Controllers are not Dual Shock, but they are convincing replicas of the originals. And since they are USB, they work on other stuff. -Game selection is just OK, as many people have communicated. Some run slow because they are PAL releases. -I haven't hacked mine yet, but I will eventually since there are tons of options for this now. Before I bought this, I put Retropie on a 128GB SD card and loaded it with PS1 titles for my RPI 3. I used the same emulator that runs on the Classic, and it works very well, if not better than the Classic does.

Yeah, I can't even get that far. He zaps me with the lightning orbs which makes me drop my weapon. Then, I end up getting murdered while I fumble around for it. Sounds like I need to get better equipment and revisit this one.

Ha, revisiting this thread since I now have a hour long train ride to and from work every day since my job moved offices. I dug out the Xperia Play and I'm trying to make it better at playing games and worse at being a phone. I haven't used it in a few years, and it was running like crap, so I did a factory reset. I also just rooted it and now I'm looking at trying to install Android 4.0 on it to get better compatibility with emulators (it's running 2.3.3 right now). Man, Android devices have changed since 2011! It won't even let me sign into my Google account on it no matter what I do right now. I had to download a shady 3rd party "marketplace" app to get emulators back on the device. Hopefully I can get it working well enough to be a viable emulation machine.

There must be something in the water around here, because I also started playing BOTW again after taking nearly a year off. I am playing through the camel divine beast now. The boss keeps kicking my rear end. I ended up giving up and will go scrounge for more food/heart containers/better armor, because a single hit wipes my health out. It's still a great game.

I have plenty of sports games in my collection; always have and always will. There are the essentials, like the Tecmo Bowl/Super Bowl games, some NES classics like Ice Hockey and Punch Out, and the NHL series on the Genesis, and then there are the obscure "hidden gems" like the Baseball Simulator 1000 games, Super Baseball 2020, and MLB Power Pros. Hell, the first game I ever pre-ordered was NBA Showdown '94 on the Genesis, and I still have it after plunking down $49.99 for it at Software ETC all those years ago. I have gotten tired of the same Madden game coming out at $60 a pop every year, but there are plenty of fun games from the old days and even some new ones to keep me occupied. They are great for casual gaming, too!

This has been on my list for a while now. I guess I'll just have to wait for the physical release at this point!

I've spent more time playing the Switch since I picked one up a little more than a year ago than playing any other console I have. 99.9% of the time, it's in portable mode too. It's great being able to sit on the couch while the wife watches whatever mindless reality show she's watching while I'm playing a modern game! Do yourself a favor and pick up a Hori D-Pad left JoyCon for all the 2D stuff you are going to be playing. One of the best things I ever did.

Congrats on the purchase of your new favorite console! You are gonna love it.

Over the weekend, my wife wanted to go to the Iraqi Antiquities Store... err... Hobby Lobby, and she knows full well that if we are going to this particular store, I'm hitting up a small retro shop I always score deals from. I consider it payback for making me listen to the church music. This time, I was actually hunting for records, and scored these: The Scorpions album was the most at $10, but it's an original pressing and flawless. The other two were similarly flawless and $3/ea. Still better than the prices I see at the local flea market by a mile. This store also sells comics, collectibles, and retro games, so I had to see what they had for games. They were stocked really well, but nothing jumped out at me on the shelves except for a $10 copy of Star Ship with a number label. I passed on that and went to the glass case. In there, they had Vectrex games! No one has Vectrex games in the wild around here, and when you see them, you buy them! They had a bunch of games I already had, but one I didn't, so I grabbed it. It was $16 with the overlay, which I felt was a good deal. As I'm checking out, I see a pile of games on the counter and asked the guy what was up with those. He recognized me from the last time I was in, and said "Oh yeah, you like the obscure stuff. Check this out." Then, he pushes forward a boxed Jaguar game hiding behind a stack of Genesis games. I have rarely seen loose Jaguar games, and this was the 1st time in the 15 years that I've owned a Jaguar that I've seen a boxed game. Another $10 later, it was mine! I'm not a big Jaguar collector, but this was one of the few titles I wanted for the system, so I was happy to snag it.

My NES came with R.O.B., Duck Hunt, and Gyromite and NOT SMB! Another weird one: I almost had a SNES with Stanley Cup Hockey and NCAA Basketball packed in. It was a Christmas present, but it had been opened and someone stole the Stanley Cup game. I returned it and they didn't have another, so I got a game-less Control Deck, Super Castlevania IV, and Samurai Showdown instead.

I won a Xbox and a bunch of games once! When I was in college, I worked at an auto parts store for a while. There was a sales promotion from Bosch for their spark plugs, and my store came in #1 in the region for sales somehow. As a reward, we could either choose a Bosch power tool kit or a Xbox bundle with the following items: -Xbox console -Xbox Live kit with headset, subscription, and Crimson Skies -Project Gotham Racing 2 -Rallisport Challenge 2 -extra "S" controller So yeah, I picked the Xbox. I immediately went out and bought a ton of games for it. I still have it, and I still play it all the time!

I haven't had much time to game so far this year, but I found myself sick on the couch recently, so I fired up the Switch and played through an old favorite: Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (NES via the Switch): This was my first Zelda title back in the day. I went to the store to buy the first one and got confused and brought this home back around 1988 (I was 6 and easily confused, LOL). Beyond all comprehension, I beat the game back then! I have always loved this game, and it ranks among my favorite in the series, despite all the hate it gets. I like to run through it every few years. It's like comfort food.

First game ever played? That's a tough one, as my family got a Colecovision in Christmas of 1982 when I was 11 months old. I am sure I played something on it before I can actually remember, but the first game I distinctively remember playing was Cosmic Avenger. It was real early, because I remember it being in my family's old house, which we moved out of in early 1985. First arcade game was Moon Patrol at a long-demolished bowling alley in Hull, MA. I was small enough to need a step stool to play it! First game ever owned by me specifically? I got my NES for Christmas in 1987, and it was the bundle that came with R.O.B., and it came with both Gyromite and Duck Hunt, so it was a tie. Honorable Mention: First game ever purchased was Tiger Heli for the NES, shortly after I got my NES for Christmas. It was $29.99 at Service Merchandise, and I still have it!

I picked this one up a few weeks back on sale at Target. It's really, really good. I haven't played a JRPG in a while for two reasons: lack of spare time and the over-complex nature these games started getting into past the PS2 Era. This tackles both of those notions head-on. It plays like an old-school JRPG, looks awesome, and I like playing through all the stories of the other characters as you explore the game. One of my favorites on the Switch right now for sure!

A few months back, they were having a big sale on collectibles and retro stuff. I bought all of this for about $25: The Pixel Pals were new and had no issues whatsoever. The games were a mixed bag. The F-Zero cart was near perfect; the thing looked new, and plays perfectly. Altered Beast is the same, and it was complete in box! Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour, however, came in a dinky paper sleeve and was resurfaced, and poorly. I can't get it to work on my GC or Wii at all. By the time I play tested it, it was too late to return it. If you buy from them, test things out ASAP.

The PS2 is one of my favorite consoles ever! As soon as they were announced, I wanted one. Problem was, so did everyone else. Finding one was impossible, as all the scalpers bought them up right away because they were hawking them all before the holidays. I wasn't able to find one until the following March at a CompUSA store, which got a handful of them after Sony started shipping them out again. The day I bought it, I went to Gamestop and picked up TimeSplitters and a multitap, called some friends, got a couple pizzas, and stayed up all night playing 4-player deathmatch. It was glorious. About a year and a half later, it started acting up. I was getting the dreaded Disc Read Error on PS1 and non-DVD PS2 games. I tried all the tricks: taking it apart and cleaning the laser, upping the voltage on the laser, putting tape on the games to act as "counterweights" to keep them spinning, and more. Eventually, the thing started getting errors with DVD's, and I tore the connector ribbon while taking it apart after probably the 30th time taking it apart. I was pissed, and wasn't about to drop more money on another "Fat" PS2, so it sat in a box in pieces while I played my Gamecube, Dreamcast, and Xbox. About a year after that, I got a Slim PS2 for Christmas. And by that time, a lot of the games I wanted to play while my Fat PS2 was sitting in a box in pieces were in the bargain bin, so I started amassing a large collection of great games for short money. When the recession hit around 2008-09 and retailers were starting to tank, I was there buying up all their games, including their PS2 titles, for pennies on the dollar. I still have a sizeable horde of sealed PS2 games that I'm afraid to open at this point! My collection stands at 166 games and four PS2's: three Fat (one CIB) and one Slim that's still hooked up to the TV in the game room. It still gets played!

Octopath Traveler finally went on sale, so snagged a copy at Target. While I was there, I took a stroll by the rest of the games, and scored Shenmue I & II out of the clearance bin for $9, and I had to take those pint glasses home!

So yeah, 2018 was a much slower year for collecting for me. Here's what I said last year: Some notes on those goals: -I bought exactly zero new consoles last year outside of the Playstation Classic plug-and-play, if that counts. I just missed a Sears Heavy Sixer and a boxed Fairchild Channel F on the super cheap because "Some Guy" got them first. -All my gaming pickups were from thrifts, gaming stores, online or regular brick and mortar retailers. I didn't pick up a single bulk lot of games; just piecemeal stuff here and there. -I also didn't sell anything off. I did however give a PS2 to a guy at work, so there's that. -I never got that Star Trek: SOS for the Vectrex. I need to get on that! -I did buy A LOT of digital titles, especially for the Switch. I also spent a lot of time messing with emulation, particularly with my Retropie. -One thing I did do was replace my aging CRT with a 42" plasma 1080P TV in the game room. I still have the CRT, as well as another small one kicking around, but they are both in storage now. So far, I haven't missed it. My goals for 2019: -Sell off the extras. It's time for it to go. I need the space. -Keep perfecting emulation with the Retropie and other methods. I got a RPI Zero for Christmas, which would make a fun tabletop arcade cab project. -Speaking of arcade games, I want to pull my Galaga/Galaxian cocktail cab out of hibernation and get to restoring it. That should be fun! It's sat dormant for far too long. -PLAY MY BACKLOG! I have recently been going back and playing my insane backlog of titles, and I need to keep doing that instead of buying new stuff. That's about it. Keeping it simple for 2019.

I played mine last night for a bit, fully stock. I was fully prepared for it to suck, based on all the negativity surrounding it. Honestly, it wasn't that bad. Some quick observations: -Like many have said, the choice of games is strange and mediocre at best. There are some good ones on here, and there's a few decent RPG's, but man, there are so many that should have made the cut! -The controllers are dead-on perfect repros of the originals. But seriously, leaving Dual Shock off the table is a terrible choice. Also, I plugged one into my Retropie and it fully recognized it! I played some Playstation games on the Retropie with it and it felt perfect. -I still can't tell if the Retropie plays Playstation games better than the Playstation Classic. I want to say that it does, but I haven't modded mine yet or changed any of the Retroarch settings, so the jury is still out.

Oh man, looks like they took it down. Just checked my app and instead of "40% off" it says it's $59.99 with the app coupon. Looks like they closed the loophole.

I just asked the guy to match Best Buy, and he pulled out his scanner and opened an app that shows different retailer's prices for the same SKU. He saw that everyone had it (including themselves online) for $59.99, and I told him I had a coupon on the phone and he scanned it from the app. Bam... done. If it was $59.99, I wasn't buying the thing.

Yeah, they aren't really supposed to. The store I usually go to is usually liberal with the discounts, so they didn't question it. The guy that rang me up was impressed that it worked!