Those games you just never beat

[Nam]

Desert Strike.

I loved this game when I was younger. It had several sequals, none of which I ever played. The game was basically you in an Apache helicopter trying to take out the military forces of Iraq an unamed middle eastern country to stop the mad dictator Saddam Kilbaba's plans.

But God damn I never once got passed the third damn campaign. The first campaign was simple, blow up a powerplant, then two airports, before finding and freeing an intelligence agent.

The game quickly gets harder though. Before you know it you're trying to navigate out a crowd of hostages on a bus through a course lined with [censored]ing Rapier missile launchers (picture to remind you), and trying desperately not to get blown up.

The game's so hard because it's a combination of shooter and management. It's all to do with the way health and lives work. You start with 600 hit points of health, and while there are some health packs laying around the levels, most health comes from returning missing soldiers/spys/civilians to landing zones. Each person you drop off to safety gives you just 100 HP recovery, and you can only carry upto six passengers at any one time.

The game can become a case of carrying a shedload of passengers just incase you suddenly need to fly to an LZ, so you carry them around, hoping you don't take too much damage, then you find your next mission requires you to save hostages or something, so you need to drop off everyone you're carrying, return to where you were, to pick more people off, and try not to die.

And then, by the time you've done that, you've probably forgot to pick up fuel and your helicopter has crashed.

You need to keep an eye on everything. You will find yourself flying around the map, searching for ammo, fuel, missing people, and by the time you've dropped them off, got your ammo re-filled, and got back to where you were, you've got about thirty seconds before you'll want more fuel.

Did I mention that while you might have 600hp's, in the later levels, some of the enemy tanks fire missiles that'll kill you in four hits. Furthermore, to pick up these items, you need to hover over them, and try to line up the winch to scoop them up. Can't just grab them, need to reposition yourself just right. Often while avoiding enemy fire. And if you're particularly unlucky, you'll blow up whatever it was you were trying to get to, cos it was inside a building/next to an enemy you needed to destroy to get to it.

This game was far too hard for me when I was younger, and still is too hard for me. I swear one day I will beat it, I've not given up, and I will, one day, get to that fourth campaign, and finally win that gulf war!

[Moo]

I rarely get past the second level in Desert Strike, so invincible and unlimited ammo is a playing requirement for me. As is the turbo controller. <__>


Also, thinking about it, I finish very few of my games.

[Lost Mercenary]

Ninja on the Master System

THAT GAME IS [censored]ING IMPOSSIBLE!!!!

[Alex]

Mar 26, 2010 23:02:22 GMT Lost Mercenary said:

Ninja on the Master System

THAT GAME IS [censored]ING IMPOSSIBLE!!!!

Only if you suck.

[Devo DrakeFox]

Terminator 3: Redemption

Despite it being based on a movie, I thought this game might actually be rather entertaining. And it was, until I got up to this horrendously annoying stage set in an alternate future where SkyNet has won the war. The stage involved hijacking an FK Venom tank, driving it through a huge complex of winding corridors in pursuit of an FK Bomber, which I had to land on. Most of the time, the Bomber would get away before I could make the ramp jump, but other times I did make the jump with minimal health to spare, which is when I'd get picked off by these little drone things that swarm at me. I had a turret to shoot them down of course, but there were always so many of them I couldn't pick them all off before they nailed me. I'd never given up on a game before then (that I can remember) and I will always remember T3: Redemption with the utmost scorn and hatred.

[Beeth]

Need I really be reminded again?

Mortal Kombat 3.

There are actually quite a few games I've never beat, but I'd say I'm capable enough of beating most of them, anyway. Just haven't got round to it, mainly because they're crap or I can't be bothered.

[Balls]

Mar 26, 2010 23:19:49 GMT Alex said:

Mar 26, 2010 23:02:22 GMT Lost Mercenary said:

Ninja on the Master System

THAT GAME IS [censored]ING IMPOSSIBLE!!!!

Only if you suck.

Nah, man. Ninja was [censored]ing stupid hard. I beat it once and I don't think if I went back now I could do it again.

Games I never beat despite trying several times but never bothering to finish would be Tomb Raiders II and III. Not particularly hard and in an age of Gamefaqs, puzzles and such are no issue, but they just went on for so long. Furthest I got on Tomb Raider II was the last underwater level and on Tomb Raider III I've beaten London, Nevada and South Pacific Islands, but all on separate playthroughs and I can never find the will to continue.

Other games I've had similar experiences with include Croc and the first three Spyro games. I just never ended up finishing them, but have started again on them millions of times. And I guess the NES/SNES Mario games. Never owned a SNES so there was only so much I could do at my cousin's house.

Then there are those games that I didn't beat because of difficulty. I got quite far on Comix Zone with the use of save states and I still couldn't hack it. I don't see how anyone could manage to beat that game in one sitting like it was intended.

And Revenge Of Shinobi can [censored] off as well.

[Nam]

Mar 27, 2010 12:35:27 GMT Balls said:

And Revenge Of Shinobi can [censored] off as well.

This was going to be my next post. Dunno if you failed for the same reasons as me, but Christ almighty, Revenge of Shinobi was insane.

If you're not being attacked by an enemy who's just offscreen as you're trying to make jumps over clifftops, you're probably failing to kill dogs, or getting hurt by all the environmental hazards the game throws at you.

Joe Musashi has a sword, which to use you have to get right next to enemies, most of whom have projectile attacks, and have unlimited ammo. Meanwhile you're stuck with a finite amount of shurikens, which only fly horizontally, unless you could master the double jump, which would allow you to throw about eight in a quater circle. Which is crap, because the enemies get to throw shurikens in all sorts of directions.

Even on the easiest difficulty, you never had enough of those things (unless you cheated), meaning you'd invariably have to fight some enemies with close range attacks.

You did have some super powered attacks to use, one gave you a better jump (very helpful for clearing a couple of the vertical scrowling levels, otherwise useless), an attack that killed all enemies on screen, and an attack that would do the same but blow you up. This was actually the better one, as it at least gave you another special afterwards, unless you lost your last life.

If you're skilled enough to beat the enemies (which included Spiderman, Batman, the Terminator, and Godzilla, or copies of them at least, as well as a giant samurai, a brain in a jar controlling a plane, and a gun turret wielding train cab), you're doing better than me. Most the time I'd just dash through the level, and suicide my way through if I couldn't beat the boss with that spinning throw attack.

And then there's (what I think) is the last level. The Labyrinth. I got there so many times trying to beat Revenge of Shinobi, and never once did I make it through the damn thing. I swear it's impossible to get through this level. It's one of these frustrating "Hall of doors" type tings, where you need to pick the right door, or end up back at the start. It's an absolute pain, and unless I'm mistaken there's absolutely no way to find your exit. No indication, no signal that says "this is the right door", not even any kind of sound effect. I stumbled around that level for hours determined to get to the end, before I turned off.

Chances are, even if I had got through it, I'd've ran out of lives blowing myself up because I'd already run out of shurikens when I fought the final boss.

[The Shad]

Mar 27, 2010 14:16:20 GMT Nam said:

Meanwhile you're stuck with a finite amount of shurikens, which only fly horizontally, unless you could master the double jump, which would allow you to throw about eight in a quater circle. Which is crap, because the enemies get to throw shurikens in all sorts of directions.

Even on the easiest difficulty, you never had enough of those things (unless you cheated), meaning you'd invariably have to fight some enemies with close range attacks.

You can alter the amount of shuriken you're given, from zero to (I think) infinite in the options screen. Which isn't really cheating, since its an option right from the start.

[Nam]

Infinite's one via cheating, and even with the maximum shurikens, I always ran out. Always.

*grumble*

[Mambo's Here! Look Busy!]

Argh, I hated Revenge of Shinobi - I never got past the brain-in-a-jar boss. ¬_¬ Evil, evil game.

I never finished the first Ecco game without cheating as well, bloody prehistoric Asterite kept frying me. So I'd use cheatcodes to skip that level!!

[Moo]

Ecco. DX

You get to the second level and think "oh [censored] right off you enormous cod."

[Dave]

Spiderman Vs The Kingpin on Master System - I killed Electro, and could not shut off the bloody electric things to get the key at the top?!? Ridiculous!

Magic Land Dizzy, old PC game, could not get enough Crystals to get past this troll, and there was just lava the other way and no apparent way to get any more crystals!

Hugo 2: Whodunnit.. did everything possible, but could not figure out what I needed to go to get things going.. turns out I needed to rub catnip on a bell!

Genma Onimusha on the original Xbox. I have to be honest, it came with my xbox, my younger sister goes "Dave, you have to play Genma Onimusha - it's amazing!". I played one level, having to use the stupid D-pad, and stopped forever. So this one was out of choice lol.

[madhair60]

Wow, you're all pretty terrible at games

[Mambo's Here! Look Busy!]

Mar 27, 2010 20:18:10 GMT Dave said:

Magic Land Dizzy, old PC game, could not get enough Crystals to get past this troll, and there was just lava the other way and no apparent way to get any more crystals!
.

I had exactly the same problem - it turns out as he wants 500 diamonds, theres no way you can beat him that way. Somehow you have to set the goat free and apparently it kicks the troll off the bridge. I could never figure out how to do it, though.

[madhair60]

Magic Land Dizzy is a cluster[censored] iirc, the hardest Dizzy of the lot.

[projectzuel]

Apart from Ikuruga there has been no game I couldn't complete (getting pissed bored with them does not count!!)

Ikuruga beat me down like a [censored] and I refuse to play it on easy.

[Nam]

Crash Bandicoot.

No matter how hard I try I cannot 100%. I can get to the end, I can beat all the bosses, and with time I can get through every level. But getting the gems is beyond me.

Now you're probably thinking "But Nam, this is a Crash game, they're usually piss easy to get to 100% in". Well, no you're not, if you played Crash 1 you know it's an ass, and if you playe any of the others you know how deceptively easy it looks to get some of these gems.

Naughty Dog, the makers of Crash 1, are evil geniuses when it comes to being crafty about hiding the bonus stuff. In Crash 2, for instance, many boxes are hidden just offscreen, with only a slight hint that they're there. But Crash 1 has some of the worst hidden bonuses ever seen. For instance, on many levels, there are hidden paths that only appear when you step on them. The only indication, a single Wumpa fruit slightly off centre towards the end of the path. If you didn't know already it was there, you'd never go for it.

Of course, that's assuming you can get through the levels in one piece. Literally. Unlike the sequals, the only way to get gems at all is to get through a level without dying. Seems simple enough right? Wrong. You need every box, without death, which in almost all levels requires one of the coloured gems. So even levels as easy to get through as the second level, can't actually be cleared with the gem, without completing later levels without dying.

Which would be fine, but these levels are insane. Sunset Vista is full of ledges that'll push you off the level, rotating platforms, and enemies who appear usually just as the window of opportunity through the ledges opens up. Toxic Waste is a standard level where you constantly need to navigate rolling and bouncing barrels, often up a slope, which makes judging the correct jump height, or wait point impossible. The labs is a seriously hard switch door puzzle level, that requires perfect timing.

But none of these compares to Slippery Climb. Slippery Climb is an absolute [censored]er. It's a lethal side scrolling level, with obstacles that wouldn't be out of place on I Want To Be The Guy, and boxes that are situated in places that are nigh accessable to someone of my skill level. And to think there was nearly a harder version. Full credit to the guy on the video for getting through that level without taking a hit. I know just by looking at it that I never could.

And that's not even to mention just how crap the game is for saving. I know it's early psone, and that savestates make games easier, but not being able to ever save getting past the labs? [censored] off. That's just cruel.

One day I'll get most the gems, maybe that second key, but I'm more likely to enter the 100% cheat code than I am to endure just how ball achingly hard clearing through many of these levels is.

[Moo]

Chaos Engine. :C

Edit: Oh, and Smash TV

[Spudiator]

Revenge of Shinobi was intensely difficult, but I do vaguely recall managing to beat it in one sitting many years ago (on an actual Mega-Drive, long before I'd ever even heard of emulators), but even that was only with help from the infinite shuriken cheat. Shadow Dancer was similarly difficult and another one I can only ever recall finishing once or possibly twice, same goes for the aforementioned Comix Zone.

I tell you another one that's damn tough, Streets of Rage 3. To get the proper good ending you have to kill the final boss in a ludicrously short time limit, I managed it once many years ago, but even with the aid of emulators I haven't managed it since.

[L. T. Dangerous]

Comix Zone. It kicked my ass so hard as a child. I swear there's a room that is COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE TO AVOID DEATH IN on page four. When I got Mega Drive Collection on PSP, I tried again, got my ass kicked, then used the infinite health cheat. Fun fact: whenever you land on insta-kill lava but can't lose health, the game freezes!

Eventually I got to the final boss. He just won't stand still long enough for you to kill him in time!

When I DID kill him in time, I forgot to kill the Kreep enemy he summoned so killing that little [censored] meant I'd taken just so long that Alyssa drowned in rocket fuel. No concept of holding her breath, that girl.

Will I ever get the good ending? Don't be silly, nobody's ever done that.

[Mambo's Here! Look Busy!]

Sorry guys, but we don't need two threads on this. It may get confusing!