Tag Archives: N64

Mario Top 10: 5 to 1

Introduction

As I wrote in the previous two articles, the end of school kicked my ass this year. It probably did last year, too. But, this year is fresh in my mind, so the ass kicking feels fresher. That means that any videos related to Mario in May come next month. But, I wanted to keep the page active, I present Mario Top 10: 5 to 1. What’s going to be number one? Actually, you may be surprised by number 3.

5 – Super Mario Galaxy (Wii)

Lest you think from my low ranking of SMB2 that I shun them trying new things in the series, I present you with the first game in the top 5. This game took some big swings with what you can do in a 3D game and mostly hit. The main complaint is that the camera issues continue to plague the games, actually made worse by the high flying game play. But the fun of slingshotting Mario all over the galaxy more than makes up for that minor inconvenience.

4 – Super Mario 3 (First Played – SNES)

As we get closer to number one, it becomes more and more difficult to rank these games. I know number one, but the gap between 5 and 4 is greater than that between 4 and 2. Really, any ranking of these games is possible, depending on my mood on that particular day. This game topped my list for a few years until they took the game and improved it in every way. More on that in a bit.

3 – Super Mario Sunshine (Gamecube)

I told you that I’d zig when you think I might Zag. Unlike the other games up here, I never considered this one my favorite in the series. But, I like it more than Galaxy. I know that’s not an opinion shared by many. What can I say? I appreciate the wackiness of this game and look forward to a similar game or a return on the virtual console.

2 – Super Mario World (SNES)

This game took everything great about Super Mario Bros 3 and improved upon it. For the longest time, this game topped my list. Even now, I pick it up and play it to relive all of the fun that it brought me as a teenager who bought my first console with my own money. Never underestimate that feeling.

1 – Super Mario 64 (Nintendo 64)

This game blew me away in a way that no other did before or has since. They took everything great about Mario and moved it into the 3D gaming world seamlessly. Okay, not seamlessly. The camera was janky as hell and I missed Luigi. But, I still had a ridiculous amount of fun with this game and it’s the first one that I pursued a 100% completion.

The Verdict

That’s my Mario Top 10: 5 to 1. What do you think? What did I get wrong? Which games would you include instead? With over 40 years of games to choose from, you can’t go wrong with many of them. How many entertainment franchises can say that?

What I did on my Summer Vacation (Part 1 – PC)

(Editor’s Note: Welcome back, class. Today, we will share what we did over the summer. Oh, Noob has his hand up, so we will start with him.)

Well, it’s September. Summer is winding down. My wife and kids all started back to school last week. I started back today. What better time than now to reminisce back and write one of those lame essays about “what I did this summer” that were always the first assignments in elementary and middle school. I’m actually writing four of these. This one will focus on PC gaming. Two others will talk about console and mobile games and the final will deal with my tabletop exploits.

I am starting with PC because it allows me to open with a long and meandering story that may more may not have anything to do with the overall point of the article. It is one of my favorite things about writing for the page.

I am currently restricted to my ancient Acer laptop after yet another electronics disaster. I have had computers get stepped on, tripped over, fall off of the couch and chairs, and one even fell down a flight of stairs. I sat on my tablet. I also dropped it out of my bag onto the parking lot after repairing the screen. That happened even though I got smart and started putting it into a case. Oh, but it wasn’t in the case because I took it out to clean the case and then didn’t have time to put it back in. What could go wrong? In that same parking lot, I watched as my month old phone got run over by a car. The point is that I have bad luck with electronics. I have bad luck with vehicles, too, but that is a different story.

If I was ever stupid enough to do this, I'm positive that this is how I would die.
If I was ever stupid enough to do this, I’m positive that this is how I would die.

This last laptop lasted me longer than any other one had by several months. I had no reason to believe that it would not continue to perform for months, if not years. Sure, I had to replace the screen and two hard drives, but the thing kept going. And then, one day, it didn’t.

That’s how it happened. It was working fine as I watched some stupid Hearthstone streamer as another. It was shaping up to be a fine day of relaxation. But, wait, what’s this? The computer does not appear to be charging. That’s okay. Maybe there’s a loose connection in the cord. No. Okay, well, I’ve had this problem before and it was just a quick solder job. I’ll pop on Youtube just to see how to disassemble–

Oh, my. Oh, well, that’s complicated. Okay, that’s fine. It won’t be a quick fix. Just take my time and it will be no problem. Well, to make a long story short (I know, too late!), you know that the story ends with the computer being non-operational. More specifically, I severed one of the ribbon cables. that might have been an easy and cheap fix, too, but by that point, the computer was in so many pieces that I just gave up. I’ve also learned my lesson. My next computer will be a desktop.

Just so we're clear, Twitch, I blame you.
Just so we’re clear, Twitch, I blame you.

So, as a result, I’m restricted to my old laptop that has somehow survived the five plus year purge of electronics. The thing is a tank. t overheads and is only really good for web browsing and word processing, but it works decent for those two things. That brings us, finally, to the reason for this lengthy explanation.

The laptop may not be able to run many of the Steam games I own. So far, it has been unable to download the card images for xMage with any reliability. Heck, it sometimes has trouble playing Twitch streams. One thing it can play, though, is Hearthstone.

Hello, Darkness (no, Hearthstone, that's it), my old frenemy.
Hello, Darkness (no, Hearthstone, that’s it), my old frenemy.

Chris will give me crap about this because the number of times that I’ve texted him to tell him that I uninstalled Hearthstone only to come crawling back. Heck, one of my articles just before the summer hiatus talked about my hate/slightly less intense version of hate relationship with the game. So, I deserve the abuse. All of that notwithstanding, the only PC gaming I’ve done all summer is Hearthstone. I can therefore report that, even though they’ve recently released a new adventure since the last time I covered the game, not much has changed.

In fact, the game has become even more face-centric and control decks exist only in legend, whispered by Mt players as proof that their game is superior. As a dyed in the wool blue mage, I consider myself among that group. The interaction of different archetypes and the ability to win games through different strategy on a consistent basis is what makes MtG a vastly better game. still, when I’m feeling SMOrcish and I just want to point that arrow at the opponent’s face, Hearthstone is there for me.