STEAM | September 2015 - The Phantom Pre-Load or: AAA Movies Are Just +1s To Us

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A Steam review of Ducktales: Remastered, a game which I finally had the pleasure of jumping into, after a long time away from playing the original NES version on an online emulator.

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Pogo everything. Leave no survivors.

I was too young to fully enjoy Capcom's Ducktales when it originally came to the NES back in 1990 (I was two years old then), but I made up for it by playing the game constantly when it was available on the NEStalgia online emulator a few years back.

What a treat, then, that Ducktales Remastered (a port/remake developed by Wayforward Technologies) is light-years ahead of the original version. I don't think it's hyperbole to say that this is a faithful remake that does justice to the license while throwing a boatload of extra content for longtime fans.

The original game had what can best be described as an "excuse plot" - you journey around the world to find five treasures, and at the end Flintheart Glomgold and Magica de Spell show up to ruin your party and force you to lose them again. The remake goes much, much further than this, to the point that I would characterize it as a "mini-season" of the show. There's an honest-to-God story this time, which ranks up there with some of the best episodes of the show.

You begin the game as Scrooge McDuck, racing to the scene of an attempted break-in by the Beagle Boys at your Money Bin. Once you take care of the intruders, several things open up to you - a gallery where you can purchase unlockable content (ranging from character sketches to a sound test, complete with the 8-bit retro soundtrack), the legendary Vault - yes, you can go swimming in it, complete with "gold-spewing" animations - and your choice of levels from the computer, just like the original.

The best thing about the game is that it is filled with continuity nods and nostalgia galore. Everything from unused items in the prototype version of the original game, to nods to various episodes and character concepts, to little in-jokes based on the level design of its predecessor, is on full display here. It's a game that was clearly made by fans of the series, and it shows in spades.

I could spend an hour rattling off all the ways I love this game. Running away from a giant boulder as Scrooge yells "Children and billionaires first!" at the top of his lungs. The lampshade hanging of why you can breathe on the moon. The way all of the supporting characters get much more screentime and characterization, and how their jokes fit so seamlessly with the lore (Glomgold and Scrooge's rivalry, anyone?). The way they still managed to capture the tight controls of the pogo stick from the original. Alan Young seamlessly jumping back into the Scrooge character, despite being 94(!) at the time of recording his lines. The extra Money Bin/Vesuvias levels. The New Game Plus mode. The "light muzak" version of the main theme that plays over the end credits. Mega-Dracula Duck trying to chomp you. Gizmoduck is a bro that kills anything in your path.

You get the idea.

I don't say this lightly. This is an incredible tribute to the series. I'd even go so far to say that this is one of the best Disney products ever made. We're taking "Legend of the Chaos God"/Castle of Illusion-tier quality, folks. It was clearly made by people who grew up as fans of the franchise and poured their heart and soul into making it as good as it can be.

From a difficulty standpoint, this game isn't for children. Even on the Easy difficulty level, there are level portions and boss battles that are much more taxing than the original incarnations. The Amazon/Incan relic boss fight in particular has you using near split-second timing to avoid crushing walls that come in from all sides.

The quality of the port is also somewhat lacking. You can clearly tell that this port was a rush job to get it out to PC audiences - the command prompts at Scrooge's office have an "A" button prompt (you have to press Space to activate it by default), and I experienced slowdown at a couple points in Transylvania and the Money Bin.

I didn't experience the dreaded "end boss crash" others have reported. Rather, the game locked up when I was near the end of the Moon level, causing me to lose a half-hour of playtime. All things considering, a few technical glitches are a moot point.

Ducktales Remastered is an amazing achievement. It makes me wonder what Wayforward could do with other franchises. You can't tell me that a Talespin or Chip'n Dale: Rescue Rangers remake wouldn't be awesome. Hell, this game makes me excited to see what they could do with Ducktales 2, the more technically advanced NES sequel that made a lot of changes to the formula.

If you value your childhood and love this series, go out and get it now.
 
I really enjoyed the Ducktales Remaster.. It's such a shame that so many people hyped it up to something way beyond reason. The fact that they got all the original voice actors to reprise their roles from a 20+ year old series, and the fact that Scrooge is 95 years old just didn't mean anything, because people just said "he sounds lazy". I want to see them be 95 years old and go into a studio and voice act. I will defend that game anytime it get's brought up. It's not the most amazing game ever, but man for a $20 dollar downloadable remaster of a old NES game... I have no clue what people were expecting.
 
crazyrabbits said:
A Steam review of Ducktales: Remastered, a game which I finally had the pleasure of jumping into, after a long time away from playing the original NES version on an online emulator.
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I really liked DuckTales remastered, the original is one of my favorite games ever and I have played through it like 1000 times. My only grief was that the pogoing doesn't work quite as well as it does on the original and that the extras menu is really buggy.
 
Half-Life 3 won’t be a VR game, says Valve GAF Thread

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ok i can't live in a world in which i know mca is working on something i'm not backing, so backed divinity 2 on ks

i like creating just one character and having a more serious story and i like even more focus on systems-based gameplay, so this is gonna be a pretty damn cool game
 
JaseC said:
I generally don't care for achievements, but I like it when they're creative. My go-to examples are Episode One's One Free Bullet (finish the game having fired only one bullet) and Episode Two's Little Rocket Man (put the garden gnome you find at the beginning of the game in the rocket at end).
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I was quite proud of myself when I completed Episode One for the first time ever with the One Free Bullet achievement. I enjoy creative stuff like that.
 
LurkerPrime said:
Achievements, as they are called, are 100% bad game design. They're purely designed for the constant gratification era of games, where everything is a +1 or reward of some sort. Designing games with achievements in mind has led to the current open world wasteland of video games.
  • You played the tutorial. Achievement!
  • A match was completed. Achievement!
  • You shot five apples. Achievement!
  • You complete the campaign on casual difficulty. Achievement!
  • ...and on normal difficulty! Achievement!
  • You killed five thousand enemy soldiers. Achievement!
  • You let the game idle for 24 hours. Achievement!
  • You killed an enemy soldier covered in blood while you had 77 HP and one shot left! Achievement!
  • You completed 100% of what we're defining as the game even though that's not really a good metric or anything like that. Achievement!

If achievements mean something to you, just SAM them and be done with it. Lord knows you could get away with it because they're ultimately a meaningless crutch. Better yet, disable notifications and forget about them entirely.

Don't let this bottom-of-the-barrel design garbage dictate how you spend your time playing video games. There's enough of that already built into games these days.

This post was an achievement.
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You are too focused on the fact that they're called achievements.
 
Guys, what's the thing some of you use to monitor GPU and other stuff performances that appears in horrid purple color with a 90s tv show hacker font in the upper left corner of the screen?

I feel like my fans are spinning kinda weirdly, like, they sound noisier than before now that I'm just using Chrome, and they sound, uhm, throbbing while playing, and keep throbbing for a while after quitting the game.

I honestly don't know how they're supposed to spin (nor which fan is doing that), so at least I would like to check if they spin as hard while playing as when not.
 
Copons said:
Guys, what's the thing some of you use to monitor GPU and other stuff performances that appears in horrid purple color with a 90s tv show hacker font in the upper left corner of the screen?

I feel like my fans are spinning kinda weirdly, like, they sound noisier than before now that I'm just using Chrome, and they sound, uhm, throbbing while playing, and keep throbbing for a while after quitting the game.

I honestly don't know how they're supposed to spin (nor which fan is doing that), so at least I would like to check if they spin as hard while playing as when not.
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MSI Afterburner I believe?
 
Copons said:
Guys, what's the thing some of you use to monitor GPU and other stuff performances that appears in horrid purple color with a 90s tv show hacker font in the upper left corner of the screen?
Click to expand...

MSI Afterburner, and you can change the color to your liking.
 
TheMadMan007 said:
I really enjoyed the Ducktales Remaster.. It's such a shame that so many people hyped it up to something way beyond reason. The fact that they got all the original voice actors to reprise their roles from a 20+ year old series, and the fact that Scrooge is 95 years old just didn't mean anything, because people just said "he sounds lazy". I want to see them be 95 years old and go into a studio and voice act. I will defend that game anytime it get's brought up. It's not the most amazing game ever, but man for a $20 dollar downloadable remaster of a old NES game... I have no clue what people were expecting.
Click to expand...

Honestly, I'm more surprised by half-assed the port is than the content of the game. The extras menu has button prompts (XBox?) for some of the options.

But yeah, it's quite a feat for what it is, and I think the new content justifies it. The unlockables, the new/reworked boss battles and all the new character moments sold it for me. There are so many little touches that make it stand out, right down to the helicopter that flies past at the title screen moving exactly the same way as it does in the show's opening titles.
 
crusaders-o.gif


ModBot said:
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Stupid security-related question. Is it possible to get malwares connecting to specific CS servers? Or TF? Like, downloading a "compromised" map/files or exploiting the integrated browser with the "message of the day" thing?
 
Snakethesniper said:
Stupid security-related question. Is it possible to get malwares connecting to specific CS servers? Or TF? Like, downloading a "compromised" map/files or exploiting the integrated browser with the "message of the day" thing?
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Well, the moment you download something in your PC, yeah, you can catch malware with it. Regarding the Steam browser, I don't know honestly.
 
That G2A thread is giving me an headache.
Still can't understand how people don't see them as shady grey market dealers.
They even sold blizzard keys last time I checked, like come on.
 
Spirited said:
That G2A thread is giving me an headache.
Still can't understand how people don't see them as shady grey market dealers.
They even sold blizzard keys last time I checked, like come on.
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But it's so cheap!!

Also I have to express deep sorrow about Yian turning cloak on us :(
 
abracadaver said:
are games on steam only released from monday to friday or could a developer release his game on the weekend as well?
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Leafhopper said:
Games can be released on the weekend but it's just really uncommon.

Actually I could be wrong dunno.
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JaseC said:
Weekdays only. Valve still has to change release states itself.
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Monday through Friday. Valve doesn't actually have to be there for you to release it though, they have to first approve the game for release, but they can do that months before you actually release it, once approved you can make it go live anytime when the release option is available, which is between Monday and Friday.
 
Anteater said:
fuck yeah, solved my hdd problems by unplugging it... and plugging it back in...

emot-thumbsupk6kh5.gif
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Congrats, my HDD died a few weeks ago, had to get a new one, but alas. I did have an external drive with some important things backed up so not the biggest loss, but I realized I forgot some things, but nothing to do about it now.
 
Chariot said:
But it's so cheap!!

Also I have to express deep sorrow about Yian turning cloak on us :(
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Hey, just for the record, I don't use G2A at all and I would never recommend it to anyone. Just bought my latest anime waifu game directly on Steam and wouldn't have it any other way!

I just have a neutral stance and like to discuss the issue without bias.
I don't think it's as cut and dry as people are making it out to be, especially after reading SirJackDaniels posts.

Fuck people who steal shit and try to get money by abusing review keys. I even see that shit popping up on local ebay and trading sites and reported it a few times, since someone was selling Vita review keys way before the official release.
Cross regional buying and selling or getting keys cheaper through other means is fair game and most people in this thread have done it at some point ot other, so painting G2A is the devil is hypocritical.

Ozium said:
What is the difference between G2A and the BST thread?
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There isn't one. I keep pointing that out in that thread but people are conveniently ignoring it.
 
TheAutomator said:
One has consequences for scamming individuals and is not immediately open to the vast dark abyss of the internet.
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the consequences of being banned from GAF?

even the OP of the BST thread states that NeoGAF takes no responsibility for any transactions there and that it's caveat emptor. G2A doesn't have the same disclaimer? people aren't banned on G2A if they are found to be selling stolen goods?
 
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