KameoBurnout… IkarugaHeroes

If last week’s entry was brief, this one will be positively fleeting.

I had all of one attempt at another A-Rank in Kameo – I’m attempting the Snow Temple, I’d completely forgotten what utter shitpigs the ice trolls with shields are. I was attempting to get one A-Rank a week through April, but I’ve lost all inspiration now… burnt out, maybe?

It’s a shit segueway… but Burnout Paradise is still awesome online with mates. Up to 298 Challenges complete, now, with most of the stragglers in the 7- and 8-player categories.

I paid for Ikaruga. I played it on one of my demo accounts (so as not to taint my glorious completion percentage… in the short term). I gasped at the glorious rotated screen options. Oh yes, this is so totally what I wanted from this title… expect a painful blow-by-blow account of Ikaruga Achievement chasing later this year.

And finally… No More Heroes. I have to admit, my first impressions were not good, but I soon got into the groove of things… that groove is now nearing 40 hours, including two Sweet (Easy) playthroughs and a Mild (Normal) playthrough. All the collection sub-quests have been completed (even all 138 t-shirts!), all Gold Medals for side missions have been won, and I’ve started a Bitter (Hard) playthrough.

Oh. My. God.

The sheer joy of the fighting mechanic has now been revealed to me. Now, bear in mind that I normally hate boss battles… or rather, I hate boss battles that I can’t easily beat. Repeating the same strategies over and over and over and over again just shits me to tears; usually I can only give it two attempts in a row before throwing the controller away in disgust, angry at the black mark on The List that the game will likely leave (Bujingai, I’m looking at you).

But…

And I’ve just played Shinobu, the 8th ranked boss in No More Heroes (the third in the game) – and the conflict was fantastic. Utterly, utterly brilliant. Five failed attempts in a row, each getting down to the final pixels of health for us both, before finally breaking through for the win. A great ending, a brilliant fight; I’m loving this game.

Next week? More Bitter, more Burnout. And that’s plenty :)

One thought on “KameoBurnout… IkarugaHeroes”

  1. MetaRidley in Metroid Prime is the best example of all that is wrong in bosses. Best part of half an hour for me to do a cycle of “dodge, dodge, dodge, fire (watch millimetre of health disappear), repeat”. Drove me crazy, because it kept making me think there was an easier pattern (“dodge fire dodge” for instance) that would relieve the mind-numbing tedium. I think boredom’s something I cope with badly in games, and the need to perfectly chip down a boss with 100 repetitions of exactly the same combination of moves is gaming hell to me.

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