Video Game Shopping & Rayxanber II

[nat]

Thanks to a heads-up from Aaron, I was able to visit a badass game shop in downtown Seattle for the first time. Places like this are what I live for and part of the reason I love gaming so much. This place has everything and anything, and I really do mean that. From original Famicom consoles to XBOX 360's, and everything in between. They have complete-in-box games as old as 25 years (Famicom and Master System) and obscure Japanese console hardware I've never seen nor heard of before. And I'm not talking just a handful, they've got a shitload. They have f*cking TurboDuo controllers hanging from the ceiling! Their Turbo/PCE game selection is impressive too-- an entire wall section with at least a few hundred titles. They even had a complete, mint (new?) copy of Sapphire for $350. They had a game selection available for any console imaginable, including a healthy Famicom Disk System section. What was neat was that they had monitors set up around the store running the "attract" mode for different games/consoles. One of the monitors was running a demo of New Zealand Story on the PCE.

While I was there I spent way too much on Turbo, Dreamcast and NES games. My friend bought an XBOX 360. Their prices on some things are a little on the high side, and others are quite reasonable, but if you buy a clothing item you automatically get 10% off your purchase total so I made my wife buy a thong with the store logo on it.

Anyway, to the point. One of the games I picked up was Rayxanber II, and at $34, it was the most expensive game I purchased. I'm not sure if this was a good price for this game, but it seemed a little high to me. I rationalized it as being OK though, because I got a handful of other games in the $2-$6 range.

I only had 15 minutes or so to play today, but this game is tough! It took a couple tries to pass level 1, and I only made it as far as maybe 3/4 through level 2. I'm only really guessing here, but that's gotta be about right. I can't imagine what the later levels will hold. Rayxanber II is definitely one of those games that is going to take a lot of dedication and a bit of memorization to beat. Luckily, the music is pretty good so far so at least I won't loath the journey. The graphics are also nice with some pretty cool parallax effects, although a little plain in level 2. Hopefully the parallax will stick around the entire game and not disappear Sinistron-style after a mere couple levels. Bottom line is I feel it was worth the purchase price, even more now after playing a bit of it, since I have a feeling it's going to keep me busy for quite a while.

On Saturday my copy of Beyond Shadowgate arrived in the mail and I spent most of the day playing it. I'll post my impressions of that one tomorrow since I know runinruder is just dying to hear about it.

[runinruder]

I loved Rayxanber II.  Great music.

It seems hard as hell at first, but once you get the hang of the first three stages, you'll be breezing through them.  Stage 5 isn't so tough, either.

There are two truly hellishly difficult stretches: the second half of stage 4, and all of stage 6.  These parts can drive a man mad.  But damn, conquering them feels great.

[SuperDeadite]

Rayxanber II's flaw is that there is only 1 level of powering up.  It takes an enormous amount of hits to kill normal enemies.  Once you learn to adapt to this style of gameplay it gets a lot easier.  In fact in some ways its far easier then most other shooters because a death doesn't affect your power more then a smidgen.

Also the boosting ability takes some practice to use effectively.  I had a lot of trouble using it properly, because I was so used to the far superior boost ability in Steam Hearts'.   

[GUTS]

What is the name of the store?  I'm visiting seattle soon, that would be sweet to stop in and check it out.  I've never been to an actual store that had a huge Turbo selection.

[ApolloBoy]

What is the name of the store?  I'm visiting seattle soon, that would be sweet to stop in and check it out.  I've never been to an actual store that had a huge Turbo selection.

IIRC, Pink Godzilla is located in Seattle.

[nat]

What is the name of the store?  I'm visiting seattle soon, that would be sweet to stop in and check it out.  I've never been to an actual store that had a huge Turbo selection.

IIRC, Pink Godzilla is located in Seattle.

How did you know what store I was referring to? Who ARE you?

GUTS: This dude is correct, the store is called Pink Godzilla. It's located on the border of Chinatown (although the owners aren't oriental) on the corner of King and Maynard. You will likely have a hard time finding the front door. They have some US Turbo stuff, but their selection is obviously much heavier on the Japanese PCE side of things. Here's a link to their website: http://www.pinkgodzillagames.com/pg_bam/seattle.php. They have an inventory list on the website that is updated daily. While I think the online list is fairly complete as far as software goes, they have a shitload of hardware there that isn't listed on the site. It's also worth noting their inventory seems to rotate quite a bit, even the PCE/Turbo stuff so what they have today may be gone tomorrow. Why are you coming to Seattle? Friends? Family? If you're going to be in town a while hit me up and we can play some 2-player Sapphire or Genpei Tormaden and laugh at how shitty a game it is. Or even hook up with Aaron and play some Bomberman or something. Good times!

[GUTS]

Sweet I'll check it out when I'm up there, I have a friend up there I'm gonna visit for a couple days when the Smashing Pumpkins come to play this year.  That'll give me something to do in the down time, hell even if I don't buy anything its fun as hell to peruse shops with classic games.  You guys know of any good shops in Portland?  I can't find any around here other than some pawn shops that pretty much suck (and the big chains of course).