Be Excellent To Each Other

Got a 3DS games backlog here too. Still not very far in Pokémon Y (unlike my sister, who completed Pokémon X in 11 days, stupid nerd).

The 3DS is the games machine of 2013. Nothing has come close to it, or will by the end of the year. It's done so well considering how floundering and games-drought-afflicted it was during its early months.

Not just 2013 though, I reckon 2012 was pretty damn good too. (If only for Kid Icarus. One of my favourite games fact fans)

Anyone else noticing they are getting more Street Passes when they take their 3DS out? I used to get one hit on a typical weekend, two or three when visiting the nearest city on a weekend, now I get 8-10 on a Wednesday late afternoon/early evening. Perhaps that's just the Street Pass relays out there now, but it is nice to see more 3DS users out and about.

Yes, I've found I've been picking up loads more lately, including one where it said it was the second tine I'd 'found' that person, which I found a bit spooky (in a nice way).

And in terms of Animal Crossing, seeing as most of these people seem to have been playing it too, it's great to get inside their houses and have a nose at their different furniture and so on.

Most of mine have Pokémon X/Y as their most recently played games, but not complaining even though I'm not a pokemaster myself.

The competition for games machine of 2013 ended when Animal Crossing was released.

Zelda finished - some really great dungeons (the thieves guild in particular was great) and I didnt mind the fact that you can do the dungeons in any order

Ended with 18 hearts / 56 maiamai collected and still missing one bit of ore somewhere (to upgrade my sword) so I could go back around and pick that up

End stats - 13865 Rupee's found
Times defeated 5

Finishing the game unlocks 'hero' mode so more damage from enemies but i dont think that would be too much of a problem (although i did die a few times it was at the start when i was just messing around with stuff)

December in Animal Crossing is made of magic and lovely.

I've had heavy snow for days now, plus festive lights have appeared on some of my trees, and everyone is well excited for Toy Day and keep telling me what presents they hope to get from Jingle.

Latest offer - link your Nintendo ID to your 3DS (I'm pretty sure it did this for me when i last updated) and get a free copy of Super Mario Bros DX (the GBC game)

http://www.nintendo.co.uk/News/2013/Dec ... _NNID_push

Ace! Shame that you can't connect it to the Gameboy Printer though as that was one of the highlights of that game.

I have a question. A Nintendo ID? Is that different to the username that I currently have on the Nintendo website?

I don't have a Wii U.

No its different - it guides you through creating one if you download the latest software update (its linked to the account you use on the Miiverse)

I'll give this a go, but I fear I did it when I first got my 3DS.

You probably didnt - i dont think it was possible before the last 3ds upgrade unless you did it on a Wii-u

You *can* create a nintendo account and use it to buy stuff and other things but its not quite the same (typical of nintendo for not making things simple)

Oh sweet. I don't have a Wii-U, and got my 3DS in Aug.

I have started a Christmas room at the museum. I luffs it!

I've been collecting as much of the special Christmas furniture as I can, and may well keep most of it in place after Toy Day, on account of it being super fine.

Have you built any snowmen yet? I've done a couple but they have mostly moaned about being the wrong shape and such. How ungrateful!

Yes, I've got a bingo playing snowman. He said he was perfect, and I made him by rolling up one snowball as big as it could get, then rolled one just so very slightly smaller, rolling it up to the larger one until it became his head

Oh I'll give that a go then, as I don't appear to be short on new snowballs each day.

I also had two new residents move in this week, which is nice for Christmas, but I suppose I'd better hurry up and find out what they want for Toy Day.

Oh, the responsibilities of being Mayor!

This picture might be helpful in terms of working out the scale. The snowman in the right was made today. The one in the left is a day old and so has melted a little

Ooh, ta for that. Also I see you have your Santa outfit on already! I've got mine all ready to change into tomorrow.

Have you had your birthday in the game yet? There are a couple of especially lovely touches when that comes around.

Not yet and still a few months to go, but yeah, looking forward to that.

Even if you already have a Nintendo ID for your Wii U, you still get the game simply for linking that ID to your 3DS, and since the offer works retroactively from the date of the update, basically anyone with a 3DS can benefit from this offer (except the ones that already bought the game), as far as I can see.

So I went and bought Space Harrier in the Nintendo eShop, which is finally back on line. Here follows a short review.

Don't be dismayed by the Mega Drive labelling in the eShop; this is an emulation of the arcade version, including having to virtually insert coins and everything.

The emulation is basically perfect, but with the obvious addition of 3D. And this is not just lazy 3D shoehorned in either, the developers paid proper attention. For example, the backdrop is layered, and they added 3D effects to some individual sprites, such as the player sprite. The 3D does not have any "pop out" effects that tire the eyes and it does not try to use extreme depth either, and generally just works really, really well. Everything just looks exactly like you'd hope, and after a short while you'll swear this is how Space Harrier was always meant to be played.

It has all the options you could want, too, including the arcade dip switch settings of difficulty, number of lives and extra life score point (no "trial time" option, though); you can choose between 4 different cropping/aspect ratio settings, plus there are some sillier options that you'd never have thought of, such as emulating the noises of the hydraulics of the original arcade machine. Or how about screen tilt meant to give you the sensation of the g-forces? That just makes me feel a bit queasy, to be honest.

The analog nub controls the game just like the joystick on the arcade machine. You can also use the d-pad, in which case you get proper digital control with no auto-centering. Or you can control with the stylus, where the player sprite basically tracks the stylus movements, but without exceeding the maximum movement speed, just like the analog control. You can invert the vertical movements, and you can choose to play with or without auto-fire, the rate of which is adjustable. It is basically as good as it could possibly be.

The game saves your high scores, and you can even save up to one replay at a time.

5 euro is a lot to ask for an arcade rom dump, but fortunately the 3DS game on offer here amounts to a lot more than that, and it is essentially the perfect portable Space Harrier.

I couldn't have put that better myself. It's brilliant and it's making me want to try all the others... Even Altered Beast!

Finally have a 3DS thanks to my very generous wife. Added everyone on the list. If you'd like to add me, my friend code is 1177-8173-1418. Thanks Beexers!

Done!

I also added everyone on the list a while back, but less than half added me back. So get on it people! Unless you hate me, which is exactly how I am going to interpret it.

A reminder to everyone: In the first post of the thread there is a link to the post with the friend codes.

I've added you to the main list - since the system needs *both* people to authenticate you'll need to wait until other people spot you are online and add you

All done

Scarysheep, tried adding you on my gf's 3DS but won't quite connect to the Internet properly at the moment. I'll add you on that and my own 3DS once the connection issue is sorted.

Been playing some of the 3DS remakes. Didn't enjoy Super Hang-On, the analogue control doesn't really work, seems too 'digital', if that makes sense. Space Harrier was pretty wonderful for an admittedly shallow arcade game, and the graphical design is such a nice contrast to the grittier sensibilities of graphics in modern games. Sonic the Hedgehog is, err, the first Sonic game with some depth-y effect on the parallax scrolling, Galaxy Force II was (unexpectedly) the real star of the batch to me. The feeling of 3D depth is far better than on any of the other Sega remakes, even better than the polygon-based Star Fox 64 3D believe it or not, and I get a kick out of the '80s sci-fi look and feel of the thing.

BTW, 2013 was a pretty astounding year for the 3DS generally, wasn't it? I can't remember a games machine getting so many high quality playable titles over the course of 12 months since the heyday of the 16-bit consoles.

It does also help that it had a few good previous titles which you could then pick up on the cheap

List of titles released in europe on the 3DS in 2013 from Wikipedia (probably not complete but its as good a base list as any)



But if you consider that its a year which gave you Luigi's mansion 2 / Animal Crossing / Pokemon / a New Layton / New Castlvania / Monster Hunter / Donkey Kong / Fire Emblem and many more

Yeah, the controls are not good enough. There seems to be a huge dead zone regardless of control method, and it makes the sort of small, fast corrections needed for avoiding the other bikes nigh on impossible.

And yet I find myself completely addicted and unable to stop playing. Bloody Sega. I finally made it through the Beginner course yesterday after a couple of hours of playing.

I now pretty certain I've added everyone. Let me know if I've missed you.

I've started Link Between Worlds as of this weekend and, you know when you get the feeling you're playing something special? Yeah, it's got that feel about it.

Its wonderful , and also for the standard play through does not outstay its welcome - maybe around 8 - 9 hours to complete all the dungeons , or if you want to do some of the side stuff and grab more things then you can spend more time on it.

Or when you finish it unlocks a 'hero' mode to allow you to go back through at a higher difficulty if you want.

Thanks for that. 8/9 hours, I can cope with and can probably fit an hour a night in while new BabyVison sleeps!

Handheld gaming is my future it seems.

Yes, I've started that too. It looks absolutely gorgeous.

I played a fair bit of New Super MarioBros 2. I had heard it's just a coin collect-em-up. And it sorta is, but it's still got loads of cool real Mario moments. Not a patch on Mario 3D Land, but I wouldn't expect it to be. When I complete/get stuck on Zelda, I'll go back to it.

Getting paid on Thursday. I'll get more.

So far I have

Super Mario 3D Land
Mario Kart 7
New Super Mario Bros 2
Zelda

Suggestions? I'm mainly planning on getting Mario games...

Kid Icarus is a must in my opinion. One of my favourite games on any system.

Price is a little bit of an issue with the 3ds stuff because it holds it so well however I'd suggest

Luigis' Mansion 2 - especially if you ever played the first one - its an amazing update and although I've only done about 3/4s of the first mansion I loved it and intend going back

If you like others in the series I'd also say :
Professor Layton - more of the same but the older one should be cheap
Starfox - remake of the N64 version and still impressive even now
Zelda - Again an N64 remake
Street Fighter IV - its cheap (expect to pay around a fiver) and its a really well put together version of the game which has big 'touch' screen buttons for some of the ultra combos
Animal Crossing - just read the last few pages in here if your unsure :-)
Castlevania - other I've not really put the time into but seems impressive if your a fan of the genre

Others that I've heard good things about but not played :

Rhythem Thief
Fire Emblem - 'Medieval Advanced Wars
Paper Mario

Mario 3D Land is legit. One of the best Marios.

Stay clear of Paper Mario, boring beyond belief. Mario and Luigi's Dream Team is better but too long for its own good, takes a good 30 hours to complete and was a bit of a slog for the last third.

Interesting. Paper Mario, Dream Team and Luigi's Mansion were to be the next things I looked at. Shame I missed Starfox in that 3 for 20 at Amazon.

Kid Icarus and Pokemon are both things I'm intrigued by, too. I've never played a Layton - this is my first ...DS.

Castlevania looks like something I'd like. Kinda makes me want a 3DS Metroid, Mega Man or Redareemer game.

I agree about Paper Mario. Worst of the series, unfortunately.

Ocarina of Time, Fire Emblem Awakening, Luigi's Mansion 2, I recommended all of those.

Haven't played A Link Between Worlds let, but looking forward to eventually. Bought it for my brother at Christmas,, he played it solidly, completing it in 3 days(!). Which is a solid recommendation in itself.

3DS games I didn't like much were Star Fox 64 (not terrible, just short and underwhelming), Kid Icarus: Uprising (amazing presentation, but terrible controls), and Resident Evil Revelations (not really an RE fan, but RE4 fans will enjoy it).

Yeah Lewie has it up as well - unclear if its a sale or a mistake



http://savygamer.co.uk/

Some of them are going back up to their normal price (Pikmin 3 / Animal Crossing) but Mario & Luigi and Lego are still showing at the low price for me at the moment.

Nope, all gone.

Some people are saying that they already have the codes - both mine (Mario and Lego) are showing as 'processing' on the website so the question will be if they let them go through or try to cancel.