Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest

This is jumping back into my SNES roots. Dust off the cartridge, give a short blow, and shove it into the slot while firmly pressing the Restart button. Ah the Super Nintendo was the first system I ever saw in action at age three. Of course I didn't play back then but I observed and fell in love with that grey and purple hunk of plastic.

The Donkey Kong Country series is fantastic. This does not include Donkey Kong 64 (notice the lack of 'country'), rather it covers the SNES DK games as well as the Wii Donkey Kong Country Returns. All four games are awesome in my eyes, the third one is the most lacking though still a fun play. Today we discuss my absolute favorite of the series Diddy's Kong Quest.

Some krunchable bits about the game:

• Donkey Kong is not a playable character rather this is his sidekick Diddy's turn to become the hero. 
• It introduces Dixie Kong, Diddy's girlfriend, who is by far the easiest/most fun to play as due to her ponytail twirl move.
• The game is a side-scroller adventure game which takes place on Crocodile Isle.
• The point of the game is to rescue DK rather than give his banana hoard (the point of the first game) back to King K. Rool.
• DK County 2's soundtrack is beautiful and adds to game's darker touch on the barrel bursting series.

What to say about this game? Hmm, characters seems like a decent place to begin. It's a starting point anyhow.

Now there are four major types of characters in this game; the Kongs, the animal buddies, the Kremlings, and the baddies. The Kongs include the two heroes mentioned earlier, Diddy and Dixie, as well as all their helpful NPC companions Funky, Wrinkly, Swanky, Cranky and of course the damsel in distress DK.

My favorite Kong character is Dixie because she is a badass.

Not only can she perform acrobatics that match Diddy's own (In the first game DK was much slower than Diddy) but she can use her hair to hover to the ground and extend jumps. That's one amazing pony tail. Dixie also has one rocking ending to each level where she wails on a guitar and head bangs. Again, badass Kong.

Real quick, a close second to Dixie would be Cranky Kong. He is the original Donkey Kong from the Mario days and complains about how easy young Kong heroes have it nowadays while giving level advice. He's mean with a cane but clever with nostalgic puns about the old NES days. Best Cranky quote, "I didn't! Whisking off maidens and chucking barrels, seven days a week I was! There was none of this lazin' around on a beach!"

So onto the other beings involved in the game. The Kremlings are the main bad guys who resemble anthropomorphic crocodiles and are found all over the place on Crocodile Isle, surprise there. They let out a funny "Krunk!" sound when you kill them which is always amusing. They are constantly trying to kill you and in a variety of ways ranging from cannons to over sized swords to skeleton ghosts and even ironically to

barrel throwing. Only one type of kremling cannot be killed without touching an invulnerable ! barrel, this guy. Behold the horror that is Kruncha! Just avoid touching them in general because after you tap him he turns red and that ain't good for your extra life count.

In any case there are more things out to kill you besides Kremlings; these things are known as the other "baddies". Some of them are really cute, some of them are really useless, and some of them are really mother fucking annoying as all hell. Such a combination of the two manifests itself in Klampon the snapping little alligator/crocodile thing.

Klampon doesn't really count as a Kremling seeing as how he is an actual reptile without thumbs. He's adorable (in my eyes) and even makes a cute "Snap! Snap!" sound as he scurries across the ground. Plus he is so exotically colored with big bulging eyes. What is not to love? A lot. He's a little bastard of an enemy. Unlike most other baddies this little guy is quick as shit. He also snaps his jaws in rhythm to his "Snaps!" which also happen frequently. The only way to kill him is to jump while his jaw is down otherwise it's bye-bye Kong. Little fucktard. 

Moving on to better and cuter things. The animal buddies I won't spend too much time on cause they aren't really worth it. They do what they sound like they'd do; they help you instead of trying to kill you. There are some crossovers from the previous game with this one which include Rambi, Squawks, and Enguarde. The two main "new" additions are Rattly (the only snake I will ever love) and Squitter (a sneaker wearing spider). Squitter is easily the most rad out of all the animals since he spits two types of web; one kills enemies and the other creates "sky" landings that enable you to cross over areas and reach hidden bonus barrels. Squitter is somewhat of a badass, just not as much as Dixie. 

So the main gameplay of DK Country 2 is side-scroller based with an over world map of each level. Like all DK Country games levels can be replayed as many times as you desire (this is useful for racking up extra lives), have a collectible DK Coin floating around, and include various hidden bonus barrels that reward the Kongs with Kremkoins. The levels are awesome and become horribly difficult, especially if you fully complete the game to 102%. I have done so because I am a lunatic who enjoys completing games to their fullest extent. Just wait til the Zelda posts. 

Anyways the hardest level agreed upon by most people including myself is the last "extra" level called Animal Antics. Throughout this level you don't play as Diddy or Dixie but rather are forcibly changed into your animal companions. Sounds like fun right? Well it fucking isn't! I went through countless lives beating the damn Squawks area.

Try being a bird that constantly has to flap his wings because otherwise he will die surrounded by thorns that kill you and bees with spinning saws for stingers while maneuvering through ever changing wind. Not fucking fun. You feel like a god when you beat it but still not enjoyable. 

What is enjoyable about the game is basically every other level and world because they are creative, have interesting themes (such as volcano, pirate ship, and theme park), and are played to beautiful scores that I still listen/workout to today. My favorite world is in fact the first world (pirate ship!) which gives it even more nostalgic charm. Replaying Gangplank Galleon is similar to discovering in Donkey Kong Country Returns that the first level is named Jungle Hijinx. Nostalgia is my favorite drug which I take in possibly dangerous doses.

Diddy's Kong Quest is a classic game filled with interesting characters, enemies, gameplay, and humor. Just be prepared to swear at Animal Antics. Happy gaming audience!

MapleStory, cuteness overload

Many of you have probably never heard of MapleStory; there's nothing wrong with that, it's a weird game. It's an MMO that is based in the Maple World and includes everything cute known to man. Yhe twist is that the cuteness takes the form of enemies with the sole desire to kill you. Let's make a bullet list on some of the details of Maple World.

• You start off as a blank slate of hero who kills snails for exp. Yes, snails, just like the ones shown above.
• Eventually, you can choose a class; thief, bowman, wizard, warrior, and pirate. There are special classes like Evans, but those are the basic five. 
• Once a class is chosen, you find your master on a specific branch of Victoria Island and begin class specific quests.

Sounds pretty basic and, on the bare bone level, MapleStory is just that, basic. Now, this game is much more fun to play with other people, especially when you have a vocal chat system set up. Why? Well, you can comment on the weirdness of characters, enemies, items, etc. And boy oh boy, there's a lot of that crap in the game. Don't have me wrong, I love MapleStory but more for its weirdness as well as the hilarity of playing with my older brother. Let's go into the fun thirsty parts of the game. Oh, and this time I'm not going to do the whole, "what I like and dislike" since it's kinda boring. Select server and play!

My little character in MapleStory is named Slashlass; the name is a pun on cutlass and lass (meaning girl), took way too long to create. Going along with the whole pirate theme, Slashlass is a pirate, more specifically a Gunslinger. I wield pistols and shoot the crap out of any enemy that crosses my path. I can also do this,

I can fly, sorta.

Cute right? In any case, this is my character whom I personally find to be awesome. She just has that swashbuckling attitude.

As mentioned before, MapleStory has class oriented quests which become available only at certain levels. I've already completed the Gunslinger quests. This means that I need to progress to the next milestone level, via farming and various Maple quests, before I can move up a rank in the Pirate skill tree. Here's where the fun begins.

Although class quests are important, the bulk of MapleStory is found through world quests. My personal favorites, to-date, are the Mushroom Kingdom quests . I won't give away spoilers for those who wish to take up arms against King Pepe. Just know, you will be fighting intoxicated pigs and adorable penguin soldiers along the way. Also, the mushroom princess is um...well, she's a piece of effeminate work.

Time to stress the co-op awesomeness in MapleStory. Pete, that is your cue.

Click the picture and note the heart earrings.

Was there any doubt what LeScurvyPete would be like?

On MapleStory, co-op is generally team oriented, though there can be some friendly fire along the way. This mostly happens with competition based quests. Or, when monster cards are dropped (I'll go into the cards a lil later). It pays to have a friend around when you're facing a boss or high level enemies. If your buddy is a different class than you, it's even more worthwhile because you can play off each other's strengths. For instance, Pete is the tank of our fighting duo; he has higher defense and a bigger health bar. This means, when my sorry ass is being beaten to shit by cuddly looking ghosts, he can step in a take a few hits while I heal. That being said, my character is more agile and can perform attacks faster. Being a Cannoneer, Pete's attack take longer to reload and cause him to rebound across the screen whereas my little Gunslinger has the advantage of bullets and speed. So, as a team, we piggyback each other rather well.

Cards, what about cards now? Monster cards, to be specific, and boy oh boy, is it impossible to collect every single one.

All monsters, whom you encounter on MapleStory, drop both a character card and a companion card. A character card logs information about the monster into a nifty little almanac. That part is useful. Each monster does drop a character card, so almanac wise it is possible to collect all of them, it would just be a bitch to do so. Heh, now the companion cards are something elsel. By something else, I mean annoying as all hell.

Companion cards enable you to summon that specific monster to fight by your side. You can use three companion cards, total, on the same monster (this simply strengthens their health bar). Once you use one card, you can even give your monster a personalized name. The names are censored (so much so that "sploosh" is unavailable) but that only leads to creativity. The masterpieces of my brother and me are as follows; Boo Earns, Horner, Yeasty, Sir Frankie, and Qweef.

So far, the monster cards seem to be pretty awesome. They definitely are, when you can actually find them. The higher the level of monster, the less likely they are to drop a card. Monsters drop cards on a random number roll. Even if there is technically a one out of forty chance of a drop, that doesn't mean forty dead monsters are going to yield a card. Kinda sucks.

Monster companions, in general, are a must have in this game. Fortunately, many useful ones are low level high drop rate monsters. Each monster has a different specialty when summoned. For some, they increase defense. Others, they just turn your character sprite red. Te most useful ones (in my opinion) heal magic/health. Magic or mana is vital for most classes of the game, making a mana healing companion pretty damn awesome. Jr. Boogies do just that (the Sir Frankie ghost pictured above with a flying Slashlass) and are a low level monste. Therefore, you can acquire this companion early on in the game. Fantastic pants!

Ah, well, that's a decent MapleStory blog. I have to wonder, what is the allure of this MMO? Honestly, I love playing it with my brother because it is so ridiculous and overly cute all the time. We tend to make fun of it a lot, but what is a gamer without a few silly games that they rag on? In any case, this most likely won't be the last MapleStory blog. Being an MMO, it can be a rage game as well.

Til later audience.

Die you pixie bastards die!

Plants Vs Zombies, tree of wisdom be damned

Alright technically I wouldn't be posting a blog at this time, I'd be in class. However one of my French professors sent out an email explaining that class was cancelled due to her being sick with a cold. Strange to catch a cold in 100 degree (Fahrenheit of course) weather but alright, no class. So what to do in my free time?

I was awake and functioning (barely functioning) at six in the morning since that is my new sleep cycle schedule. Fear not those who know me I'm simply doing this for school not as a change of personality. Honestly mornings, bleh. The point is I've been up for hours mostly reading and felt I deserved a little academic break. I don't have many one player games on my PC but I have enough to fill in a moment such as this. Today that game was Plants Vs Zombies.

Now for those of you unfamiliar with Plants Vs Zombies here are some quick details about it:

• It is a tower puzzle game produced by PopCap
• You are an unseen suburban resident who defends his home/life from zombies by growing a garden of mutant plants. 
• Each plant has a different function of either defense/offense against zombies
• The zombies differ greatly in their speed, attack power, and health. Some of them even dance!

What I LOVE about this game

The almanac of plants/zombies, Crazy Dave, the various level styles, and the music. 

The plant/zombie almanac is a reference book of useless and interesting facts about zombies and plants. It includes a picture and a little quip about the plant or zombie. I just love reading through this thing since the creators clearly had fun writing it. My two favorites are the Ducky Tuber Zombie and the Ice Shroom. You can see why below. 

Crazy Dave is your neighbor and guide throughout most of the game. He appears about every five levels and owns a shop located in the trunk of his van. He often says ridiculous things, however hidden beneath the crazy there are some decent pointers. At the last level he tries to give you advice but of course he is snatched away before that happens.

Now his shop is very interesting. Not only does it sell new upgraded plants (which are expensive as all hell though completely worth it) but he also has a decent selection of necessary objects used in your Zen Garden. 

The Zen Garden is a place where you can grow plants that simply spit out coins. Of course you need to water the plants, feed them while they're growing, spray them for pests, and play them music all to make them happy. That costs money. However once a large enough Zen Garden is made then actual money is earned. Meaning those upgraded plants can be yours. I'll go into "money making" later in my rant section of this post.

So the levels are standard but change as you progress through the game. I mean if they didn't it would be boring as all hell. At first you're defending your front lawn which is divided into a 5x9 grid. As you complete levels of zombie raids you gain new plants. At first you have very few plants, the basics. However once you're in the third and fourth stages of the game it becomes difficult to decide which to use and which not to. Ah, tricky you are Popcap. My favorite stage type is fog; this where you are defending your backyard (complete with a pool) that is covered by nightfall and a very thick fog. The fog makes the zombies "invisible" meaning you can't see which row they are walking down. Oh crap. I have a lot of fun with these levels because it adds an extra bit of intensity to it all. I was that kid who genuinely enjoyed pin the tail on the donkey. Something bout being in the dark. And possibly blindfolds. Moving on!

So the last BIG love of this game for me is the soundtrack. I could describe the brilliance of the composer or I could have a link to my favorite song in the game. Warning, it's catchy!

Now the two things I cannot fucking stand in this game! 

Money making and the Tree of Wisdom.

I'll start with money since it ties into my hatred of the Tree of Wisdom. So throughout the game you have a cute bouncing garden full of mutant plants that willingly defend your life and home. Awesome! Not awesome is the fact that every item you buy from Crazy Dave in the game is ridiculously expensive for what it does. There are two MAJOR ways of making dough in the game. At first the mini games and puzzles seem like endless piles of cash. Well that's not quite true. As soon as you beat them the prize money for finishing the completed mini game/puzzle drops significantly. It ain't worth the time. So the two ways are really the Zen Garden and Survival Endless.

The Zen Garden really only becomes money-wise worthwhile once it's over halfway full of plants. At that time you can use Stinky the Snail to gather coins for you (after feeding him chocolate which is questionable) for an hour. He earns about 30,000 coins worth in an hour which is significant. Especially since you don't pay for chocolate but rather you find it by playing Survival levels and standard levels. Same goes for finding plants for your Zen Garden. Speaking of Survival,

Survival is an addition to the game where you try to last as many rounds as possible. There is a Survival Endless which as it sounds never ends. This is useful for gathering coins. Once your garden looks like this, you never have to worry about cash ever again.

 You simply have to keep playing until you eventually lose. Popcap was kind enough to include upgraded Magnet Shrooms which collect coins for you. Very useful indeed. Two of them on-screen and there isn't a single coin left out. Thanks for that Popcap it's just the patience of waiting is, well it's boring. Even with that much action going on you adjust to it. So it's either Zen Garden or Survival Endless to earn the coinage. The worst part is you have to be ridiculously wealthy to grow the damn Tree of Wisdom. And here the loathing begins.

So this is the Tree of Wisdom or as I like to call it the overpriced tree of crap.

 The only reason it is worth anything to grow it up to 1,000 feet is to unlock certain codes in the game. For instance if you type flowers (you can see this above in the Endless picture) when zombies die a trail of daisies is left behind. At 1,000 feet you can command the zombies to dance. That's pretty rad. I covet this ability but am very far from reaching it. So I really don't like the Tree of Wisdom, especially since it stops giving you wisdom after a certain point and just tells you to feed it. By the way, the bags of food which cause it to grow a whopping one foot cost 2,500 coins per bag. Sounds low; not really when it takes 25,000 to grow ten feet and 2,500,000 to grow 1,000 feet. Maybe someday when I'm retired I will have made it to 1,000 feet but for now I'm stuck at 350 feet with 1,625,000 coins to go. Well shit.

Should you play Plants Vs Zombies?

Hell yeah you should. This game is amazing addicting fun that both entertains and challenges your defense strategies. You honestly can ignore the damn tree and money; I don't cause I'm a completionist but such is my curse. The variety of plants and zombies is well thought out and enjoyable. The levels and extras as well are fun to complete. Trust me I did cartwheels after besting Pogo Party in the mini games. Fucking evil level! So yes you should give this game a go because it's definitely worth it. 

Also be on the look out for Plants Vs Zombies 2. It's now an app for the Iphone and Ipad. Since I own neither I'm missing out but hey I'm sure it's also sweet.

My Introduction

Hello there audience. Yes you, the person reading this from behind a screen. Welcome to a sliver of internet known as Some Pixel Dust, a gamer's blog. That is simply what this is; a blog where I write about various video games that I play. Why are you reading it? I don't know, are you bored?

In any case this blog functions as a way for me to write about something that I love. Video games have always been involved in my life going back to my older brother and me playing Mario Kart on his SNES before I could read. Nowadays I primarily play games on my PC and my 360. When home for breaks (college student alert) I do dust off my Nintendo cartridges and indulge in some old school gameplay. Who knows, if I keep up with classes well enough I might be able to bring another system to my apartment as well as a better PC. Time and grades will only tell.

Forewarning, some of the games I'll blog about are not my typical genre. This translate into I'll suck at them massively. As hard as I've tried to become good as FPS titles I just blow ass at them. The only ability I'm somewhat decent at is sniping thanks to Conker's Bad Fur Day; zombie squirrels are a pain in the ass.

The main slew of games that I play are RPGs, MMOs (surprisingly not warcraft), racing, adventure, and strategy. I enjoy solitary gaming but I have to say it's always more fun to co-op. My main co-op buddies are my brother (Sneaky)Pete and my best friends Tim and Brian. Hopefully I can include some recordings of us playing or at least dialogue segments for "memory purposes". To be honest we're not especially clever we're just silly. Sides it's all for the fun of it.

That concludes my introduction to this shiny new blog. I hope some of you will follow it and watch as it becomes a beloved beat up blog with insider jokes and soda stains. Time to press play and growl as the patch update takes forever.

Much (probable) love,

Mare