@dmcmaster said in Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack:

@oscillator
True but if I remember correctly that just letterboxed the game, this seems like true Wide-screen support or rather a more updated rendition of it. Plus it's the first game on the N64 service with Wide-screen I think.

Nope, it always had actual anamorphic widescreen support (and letterboxing too). Demo'd in emulator:

Normal

16:9

Hardware demo from reddit:

@dmcmaster said in Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack:

Wide-screen is surprising, is that exclusive to Goldeneye or will that be a system Wide-screen feature?

GoldenEye had widescreen support on original hardware.

@jdincinerator said in The EZA Forum Hall of Greats (January 2023):

I must say at this point that I thought picking Rayman: Legends would bring some spice to the Hall of Greats. What I didn't know was the level of competition I'd be facing. It's like I went in to give a jet engine a kiss before it blew a fireball in my face-cos that's the sheer power of the competition I'm up against.

Enthusiasm can potentially count for a lot.

@ffff0 Now that's passion. :-)

@longview said in 5 Years Since GameTrailers Shutdown:

I miss the forums :(

We'd love to have you post on this one more. :)

@jdincinerator said in The EZA Forum Hall of Greats (January 2023):

To @Oscillator for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3:

1. I see how Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 has a grander ambition than its predecessors, and has the ability to showcase that ambition on a greater scale thanks to the power of the sixth generation of consoles. Do you think THPS3 just ups the ante on its predecessors with new features more than anything else?

2. I find that completing THPS challenges can be quite an arduous process at times. You're given a few minutes to accomplish objectives, which doesn't give you enough time to do anything substantial. Then when the time is up, your successfully completed objectives get crossed off, but then you have to replay the same level again to complete more objectives until you unlock the next area, where you'll do the same thing again. Isn't this a tedious loop? Do you feel like THPS3 might annoy people who just want to be able to complete everything in one go without being swallowed up and spat out again?

1. All that THPS 3 retains from THPS 1 and 2 is the core gameplay. It looks very different, sounds different, the average level size is significantly increased, the UI is cleaner, and there are a bunch of minor quality-of-life improvements (increased field-of-view, less fine detail to make things easier to spot, slightly faster forward speed, more trick opportunities/less time spent just skating around).

2. Some newbies might get annoyed at the repetition. It depends on how much the core gameplay hooks you. For me (and many others), it NEVER stops feeling good to do grind combos, get sick air, and find better and cooler trick spots (which the games reward you for with "gap" bonuses). The most purely fun level in all of Tony Hawk might be THPS 3's final competition level, Tokyo, which has SO many rails, SO close together (and with SO many "gaps"), that it feels like no matter where you jump, you can't help BUT combo! THPS 3 also has a great, lightly humorous atmosphere - it's more charming to skate around in than other Tony Hawk entries.

Here're all my questions (I think)!

For @ffff0 (Apex Legends):

Watching footage of Apex Legends, I'm getting a strong sense of derivativeness. The art style & gameplay meta looks like a more mature/busier Fortnite, the gunplay looks like Destiny, and the characters look kind of Overwatchy. What element(s) can you point at that substantially makes Apex 'its own thing'?

For @Brannox (The Last of Us Part I):

1. From a distance, as someone not a part of the PlayStation ecosystem, Sony's modern-day tentpole first-party games such as Uncharted, The Last Guardian, God of War, and The Last of Us give me a strong sense of being glorified movies, with the narrative being much more prominent than the gameplay, what gameplay there is being basic, and a general lack of player agency - you follow the path the game lays out for you and little else. Can you dispel these assumptions?

2. How dismal/depressing is the narrative? Is there ever a sense of hope, or is it like the movie "The Road", where nothing has a point anymore and the characters are surviving just for the sake of surviving? (I feel that works for a movie, where you are viewing it statically like a painting, but a game is hurt by stakes for the player being removed.)

For @Shoulderguy (Portal):

While I've yet to play Portal, I've seen a lot of it over the years, and the art style across the game doesn't seem to change much, and seems pretty stark as well; mostly white, grey, black, with quite flat lighting. This is actually part of why it's always been on the backburner of my to-play list - I'm always worried that the visual repetitiveness will make me burn out on it prematurely. How does the game manage to disrupt this potential monotony?

For @JDINCINERATOR (Rayman Legends):

What does Rayman Legends do to differentiate itself from Rayman Origins? At a quick glance, they look quite similar to me.

@ffff0 said in The EZA Forum Hall of Greats (January 2023):

Question for @Oscillator about Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3.

I’m a gamer who can’t perform complicated inputs, like long button combinations and time-sensitive actions. I’ve never played Tony Hawk games, but from the outside they seem to require very precise inputs to achieve most of level’s goals. Since it’s a game in which new levels are locked until you clear enough goals on the previous ones, I will be forever stuck of the first level if I decide to play it. It’s perfectly fine to have tough goals and achievement only a few can accomplish but locking less capable players out of most of game’s content seems unnecessarily harsh by 2023’s standards.

Do you agree that this game’s progression haven’t stood the test of time?

The original Tony Hawk trilogy actually has fairly gentle progression. And with more space to move around, the goals illustrated in cutscenes, and the most flexibility in combos, THPS 3 might be the easiest of the three.

The Tony Hawk franchise as a whole doesn't require a ton of precision at its base (and the original trilogy stays closer to this base than later entries). Aside from high scores, the typical goals include knocking over objects that are usually easily spotted, collecting floating "SKATE" letters that are usually easily spotted, doing a basic trick on or over a specific object (THPS 3's goal cutscenes will show the object), hitting/doing a trick on a trigger to wreck something, and finding the "secret tape".

Those latter two goals do require more precision/timing/hunting around, but your peppy movement speed and tight controls make exploration comfortable, and while getting in position to "hit your line" can sometimes be annoying, a reasonably adept gamer should need, maybe, 25 minutes max for each of them? The most annoying thing you typically do is change position around the same spot & move the camera around, trying to track down the exact line you need to take for the secret tape (THPS's traditionally hardest goal, alongside the "Sick" score).

But as I said in a previous answer, you can complete as many or as few goals as you want in any order (you need on average, I think, half to two-thirds of the goals on a level to unlock the next?), and difficulty ramps up slowly with each new level unlocked. Collecting Stat Point tokens can help you complete goals by increasing jump height, spin speed, and grind/manual balance.

I must emphasize, the core gameplay of THPS is NOT absurdly complex and precise like a fighting game. You have leeway in landing tricks - tricks that need rotation in the air can be landed a bit off angle, and you can end a grind or manual at any time and retain your points by just jumping out of it.

You can also avoid attempting special tricks which are trickier to pull off until the back half of the game. Even then, the input is usually just one extra direction press, you can change them to be quite basic like Up-Down-Y, and sometimes choose a special that executes faster (but scores lower).

And if watching footage of grinding thin wires spooks you, perhaps the most signature mechanic of Tony Hawk is how you only need to jump close to an edge, hit the Grind button (or just hold it down during the jump), and your board snaps to it. Tony Hawk tends to be an arcadey experience (in the loose, playful sense).

@brannox said in The EZA Forum Hall of Greats (January 2023):

To @Oscillator for Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3:

Reading through your presentation, I quickly got slightly overwhelmed with the highly technical terminology, and as someone who isn’t into skating, it’s a difficult task for me to become invested when I have no idea what “Vert” and “Street” tricks are. Do you feel THPS 3 is welcoming to newcomers who have no affiliation/knowledge of the shorthand lingo in learning how to play?

Speaking of which, I didn’t really notice much in your presentation how it feels to play and whether or not it’s easier or conversely more difficult to “pick up and play” without prior knowledge. Regarding gameplay systems, what does THPS 3 do that polishes the experience from its predecessors and conversely, does the likes of its direct sequel and the remake of THPS 1+2 offer an easier barrier of entry from a gameplay standpoint that makes THPS 3 not stand up to them as much?

1A. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater brought skateboarding to the masses. While it does use a lot of "foreign" lingo, particularly the names of tricks, all you really need to understand to actually play it are the four central mechanics - Ollie (jump), Grab (grab board when in the air), Flip (jump and flip the board with your feet), and Grind (stand on your board and slide along a railing or edge). These are mapped to the four main face buttons on the controller, making it very intuitive. Which specific moves you perform doesn't matter much aside from a small penalty for doing the exact same one repeatedly. The bulk of moves are accessed by pressing a single direction along with one button press. Special moves get you the most points, and they do require more complex direction/button inputs, but you only need them for optional "Pro" and "Sick" scores and getting optional Silvers and Golds in competition levels.

1B. THPS 2 and THPS 3 each added one additional move to the main moveset, both being linking moves to make longer combos. The manual balances you on two wheels when you're on the ground, and only needs an up/down or down/up direction input. It's typically used to combo together two Grinds whose railings are far apart. The revert is a bit more obtuse, but is the last move you learn in THPS 3's tutorial (which is a fantastic teaching tool for beginners, with a slow pace and explicit directions). When you go up a ramp into the air and come back down, you press the trigger just before hitting the ground to revert (turn the board) and continue your combo, typically with a manual.

1C. Understanding the difference between street tricks (tricks done on or near the ground, like an ollie, manual, flip, or grind) and vert tricks (tricks done in the air from a upwards ramp, typically grabs and spinning around) only matters to the gameplay in that skaters who prefer street or vert have their initial stats adjusted more in that direction, and the one "trick" objective in each level is more suited to them (like a grab instead of a grind). But any skater can perform almost any move (with some restrictions on special moves), and collecting Stat Point tokens in the levels can let you even out the stats.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

2A. The first three THPS games are a very streamlined adaptation of skateboarding into video game form. You accelerate automatically, and can only lose your balance or crash ("bail") attempting tricks or going out of bounds. You have complete freedom to go anywhere in each level and do anything, and can complete as many or as few goals as you want in any order. Difficulty ramps up slowly with each new level unlocked.

2B. The manual in THPS 2 and the revert in THPS 3 were the only significant gameplay features those games added, and both are really comfortable extensions to the formula. THPS 3's tutorial mode acts as a super gentle introduction/refresher for every mechanic in the game.

2C. Aside from extended combos (meaning higher scores) made possible with the manual and revert, the core gameplay is virtually identical through each of the first three Tony Hawk entries. Outside of the revert, the most significant things THPS 3 added are all in my presentation - incredibly improved graphics, bigger and busier levels, slicker presentation including showing you the goals in cutscenes and special setpiece objectives. It's what one always wants in a sequel - the same, but bigger and better, and no disruptions to what made you love the previous entry.

2D. THPS 4, however, is where the disruption started. It moved from 2 minute sessions with a goal list to semi-open world - taking away the arcadey immediacy - and largely continued in that direction until the final proper entry 6 years later. It also started adding mechanics that didn't integrate as smoothly as the manual and revert did.

2E. 1 & 2 Remake in 2020 did strip the gameplay back down to the originals, restoring the 2 minute structure, and appropriately taking out the revert, but keeping the slightly lighter physics & smoother movement featured in THPS 3 onwards and the quick turnaround technique "Wallplant" introduced in later entries. It's a semi-hybrid that largely works, but visually it looks darker and more contrasty than even the original 1 & 2 did, sometimes even making it hard to see your surroundings. It's actually somewhat less of a polished/singular product than THPS 3, with an uneven UI and branding, and some minor new mechanical quirks.

Also, thinking on it a little more deeply, such a move might not be as controversial to the EZA crew now, as Brandon isn't participating in HoG anymore.

I'll downgrade my sideways glance to an eyebrow raise (reaching for the card, but just brushing the dust off it).