Who's still playing their Wii?

[ClodBuster]

What if I tell you the Hori pads had been under 30$ including customs duty and all from your friendly import game shop back then?

Also, don't be too sad about the Hori N64 Mini pads. I got two of them some years ago when they were already expensive, yet still affordable for playing purposes (not just collecting). So I can tell you the N64 Hori pad has a good stick, but that's all about it. The placement of the d-pad is crammed. And the four shoulder buttons have the pivot point around where your index finger tip usually rests, which makes you press them in an uncomfortable way - e.g. you wish a Yakuza would have shortened your index fingers by one bone each. Yes, this is the controller secretly developed for Yakuza who still wished to play N64 when the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2 were already released.
Also, you won't be able to count the many many times you will confuse L, R and the two Z shoulder buttons, making aiming and shooting in GoldenEye a pure joy to behold...
...not.

[crazydean]

What if I tell you the Hori pads had been under 30$ including customs duty and all from your friendly import game shop back then?

I was never into the import scene, so I don't even remember seeing any stores which carried imports. Also, the limited experience I have had with third-party controllers tells me that it's not worth taking a chance on.

[ClodBuster]

Well, yeah, the local stores in Berlin didn't carried imports as well back then. But there was already a well established network of national mailorder and web stores that carried the hottest shit from Japan. Often with a slight premium attached to it (since they had to pay rent for their warehouse to store their stock, as well as import duties). But in a time where Paypal wasn't the norm and only very few Japanese sellers existed on Ebay, this was where good deals on otherwise uncommon games and hardware to be had.

[Raizen1984]

We're talking about the Cube, right?

Yup. But I thought you were talking about the Wii for DVD load times and it appears that everyone is just going Nintendo fanboy at this point.

I never said it was a good DVD player. It literally cannot be a good DVD player because it takes 3" discs only, you f*cking herb.

Smoke 'em if you got 'em. But seriously, I'm not a f*cking idiot. I know this. Again, this was edited to reference the Wii because everyone is just gushing about a whole bunch of off-topic shit.

The Wii doesn't play DVDs either...

[MrBroadway]

The Wii doesn't play DVDs either...

It's an easy mod, though.

[Mas]

Does anyone have any suggestions on some good neo geo vc games I should download on the virtual console? I have 1800 points and I was thinking of kof 99 and last blade 2.
I own the metal slug Anthology , samurai showdown anthology, snk classics and I will get kof orchi saga soon.  So I'm looking for suggestions on games that I won't have on these collections.

[Michirin9801]

Definitely get Last Blade 2! I don't know if KoF'99 is included in the KoF Orichi saga, you should probably look it up, and if it isn't, you should probably get it as well, it's really good!
If it is, do you have Baseball Stars 2 yet? If not then try it out! It's like, probably the best Baseball game I've ever played (note: I haven't played many Baseball games, but almost every other one I've played was rubbish)

[Mas]

Baseball stars is on the snk collection. The kof orchi series doesn't have kof 99. so ill do those two

[Mas]

Just looked at ironclad Ill be buying that first. that game looks sick

[ClodBuster]

So I got myself Super Smash Bros., F-Zero X and Alien Crush for the PAL Wii Virtual Console.

While the two N64 titles look as blocky as I remember them, they play pretty well. Emulation-wise, good thing the screen resolution has been upped to 480p, so the trademark anti-aliasing blur of the N64 isn't as hard on the eyes as it was back then. The background music has the usual issues of emulated N64 games, with slight stuttering when loading the next menu screen, level or area. But nothing gamebreaking - I've seen N64 emulators on Windows PC doing much, much worse in terms of crippling the music and placing ugly seams on semi-transparent 2D objects. Try PC emulation of games like GoldenEye 007 to see and hear with your own eyes and ears what I'm talking about.

Both F-Zero and Super Smash Bros. are PAL versions, so they run slightly slower than their NTSC counterparts and have slight horizontal black screen borders. But since they are decently optimized for 50 Hz, the difference isn't as much noticeable as when talking about non-optimized games - they'd look, feel and sound horrible. E.G. take a look at videos of Sonic 1 (Mega Drive PAL) and Castlevania 1 (NES PAL) to see a PAL conversion gone awfully wrong, Nintendo didn't bother to fix this for the Virtual Console release.

Turbografx-16/PCE games are NTSC 60 Hz all the way even on the PAL Wii Virtual Console - NICE!

I didn't noticed any input lag whatsoever on all these and the other VC games I got so far. Which is quite remarkable, cause usually I'm quite allergic to even the smallest of lag. Good job on that.

Super Smash Bros. character models are quite low on the poly count, noticeably lower than you know them from their original games. E.g. compare Smash Bros.' Donkey Kong, Super Mario and Link to their counterparts of DK64, SM64 or OOT. Made my head scratch why Nintendo did this in 1999 and still does make me continue scratching it 18 years later.
Occasionally, the Wii VC version of Smash Bros. may crap out sound wise, producing funny noises for both music and sound effects. Playing against Master Hand or resetting the game usually fixed this for me.

Super Smash Bros. does play well with a GameCube controller, familiar button layout to Melee. You need to press down the analog shoulder buttons all the way to the "click" for blocking, though. F-Zero X is better played with a Classic Controller Pro, due to the digital shoulder buttons make destroying opponents easier, since you need to double-tap them for tackles and spin attacks.



Devil's Crush is just Devil's Crush. Pure awesomeness. I'm glad I tried it! Nice graphics, good music, great level design and the gameplay has stood the test of time very well. The emulation is quite good, apart from the usual graphics change regarding the pentagram. Being able to save the gamestate anytime and continue playing another day is what I find very convenient. I used a NES classic controller attached to the Wiimote for this game.


EDIT: Corrected typos and added some doodads.

[Michirin9801]

Super Smash Bros. character models are quite low on the poly count, noticeably lower than you know them from their original games. E.g. compare Smash Bros.' Donkey Kong, Super Mario and Link to their counterparts of DK64, SM64 or OOT. Made my head scratch why Nintendo did this in 1999 and still does make me continue scratching it 18 years later.

They did that so that the game could run smoother, higher-poly N64 games have a bit of a hard time keeping a good frame-rate, especially if you didn't have the expansion pak (or the game doesn't support it)

Is your Wii modded at all? If so, you should really try this N64 emulator called "Not64" if you haven't already, it's way better than the abandoned Wii64 project, I've been using it to play Banjo Kazooie for the first time, and I was surprised at how much I liked the game, as well as at how well it ran!
It's not perfect, the game can't render the backgrounds at the pause screens or whenever it's doing any screen-transitions, but it's pretty much on-point otherwise, and it doesn't get in the way of gameplay at all, and well, you won't get Banjo Kazooie (or any of the Rare games) on the Virtual Console for obvious reasons, so I'd say it's worth it for those!
But still, if you wanna play N64 on the Wii, get the games on Virtual Console if available, they're not gonna run better on this emulator than they will on the VC one...

[ClodBuster]

Yeah, I guess you're right. Back in the day when playing SSB with in four player mode, I noticed there was quite a slowdown on wider stages like Fox' stage. Still, I wonder how other N64 games managed to pull off having more than four mid-to-high poly count detailed characters on screen in a detailed level environment, without excessive slowdown. Smash Bros. stages with all the flat 2D sprite elements are sparse on detail as they are. And its blocky and pointy characters wouldn't look out of place in Quake 1. Donkey Kong's model has such sharp edges, he could double as a Shambler.

I played Banjo Kazooie/Tooie on N64, and later on the Xbox 360. That emulation turned out rather nice, highly recommended, and Rare even managed to retroactively squeeze in the Stop 'N' Swop feature for both games and Nuts and Bolts.

My Wii isn't modded. Yet.
I might change this once Nintendo eventually closes down the VC storefront for the Wii.


I guess the next VC games I'm going for will be Final Soldier and Wave Race 64.


Maximum Powerrr!!

[Michirin9801]

My Wii isn't modded. Yet.
I might change this once Nintendo eventually closes down the VC storefront for the Wii.

Honestly though, I'm surprised it's still open... Good on them for keeping it up!

[ClodBuster]

Yeah, I'm pretty glad, too.

Yesterday I downloaded Wave Race 64 and Yoshi's Story from the VC shop.

I already own Wave Race as a cartridge, but the thought of playing it in 480p over a component video signal and with a good controller in my hands won me over. Thank goodness the emulation is as perfect as it gets. All BGM and sounds are spot on. For an early N64 game, the graphics hold up surprisingly well. I usually play as Dave Mariner, with custom settings (first bar reduced, second and third increased), to make him steer well, have lots of top speed and ram opponents from their jet skis. Still plays as good as I remember it, and a Game Cube controller works best since all you need is the A-button and the control stick.

GOOD.

GOOD.

GOOD.

GOOD.

MAXIMUM POWER!!!

VROOOM!

I wonder if I'm still able to do the stunt mode challenge for Dolphin mode.

Yoshi's Story is new to me. I was surprised how good the 2D graphics look in 480p, since I was expecting a blurry mess from being bloated up from the original 240p or so. Nope, all fine, and there's no blurry filter, thanks. So music and graphics wise done well, gameplay wise this is a bit awkward, with needing a certain count of fruit to beat a level instead of walking through an exit. Yoshi controls slippery, especially when jumping and doing the double jump. Still playable, but I miss the times of pixel perfect jumping and momentum mechanics like in SMB1/3 and SMW1. This is best played with a GC controller, too.

[crazydean]

Yeah, I'm pretty glad, too.

Yesterday I downloaded Wave Race 64 and Yoshi's Story from the VC shop.

I already own Wave Race as a cartridge, but the thought of playing it in 480p over a component video signal and with a good controller in my hands won me over. Thank goodness the emulation is as perfect as it gets. All BGM and sounds are spot on. For an early N64 game, the graphics hold up surprisingly well. I usually play as Dave Mariner, with custom settings (first bar reduced, second and third increased), to make him steer well, have lots of top speed and ram opponents from their jet skis. Still plays as good as I remember it, and a Game Cube controller works best since all you need is the A-button and the control stick.
I wonder if I'm still able to do the stunt mode challenge for Dolphin mode.

Yoshi's Story is new to me. I was surprised how good the 2D graphics look in 480p, since I was expecting a blurry mess from being bloated up from the original 240p or so. Nope, all fine, and there's no blurry filter, thanks. So music and graphics wise done well, gameplay wise this is a bit awkward, with needing a certain count of fruit to beat a level instead of walking through an exit. Yoshi controls slippery, especially when jumping and doing the double jump. Still playable, but I miss the times of pixel perfect jumping and momentum mechanics like in SMB1/3 and SMW1. This is best played with a GC controller, too.

Yoshi's Story was definitely aimed at a younger audience. I've played a good deal of it, but it's not a great platformer.  It's no Super Mario 64. If you're looking for another contender from big N, try Yoshi's Island on SNES. It can at least hold its own as a Mario title.

Idk if it's on the VC, but have you tried Chameleon Twist for N64? It's short, but I found it quite engaging and fairly unique. I'd recommend it over Yoshi Story, at least.

The shift to 3D was necessary, but it's definitely harder to find good platformers on the N64 than SNES. The controls are never as tight as they were in the 8 and 16-bit eras.