Intensive Gaming Diary

The blog about videogames.

Category: 80s

Why Would You Play Mega Man 3 Today?

Posted on by Viljami

It takes some nerve to play Mega Man 3. You can play it with emulation or hardware. What ever your chosen form of play is you are going to face a very difficult game. Although it takes only three hours (regarding to HLTB website) to beat the game it does require a concentrated mind and good reflexes. NES as a gaming platform is not making things easier in any way. You also have to memorize many elements of this game.

I did try my best to beat the game in one sitting. I played Mega Man 3 for about two hours. I can only imagine the players back in the day trying to beat this game for hours and hours day after day until they finally could say something like “Man, I just beat the Mega Man 3 on my Nintendo Entertainment System!!”. For me the Sega Mega Drive was the closest thing to something like this. Even with Mega Drive I didn’t face a game as difficult as this one. This also tells us something about how gaming actually was back in the 80s and early 90s.

While Mega Man 3 is a hard game it is kind of rewarding after all. You get to know this game so thoroughly. When to jump and how hard should I push to accomplish a perfect landing that secures a some way of progression inside the game. You might get a hit from an enemy. Is it a critical hit? Can you continue to your goal or did you just miss something important that takes you all the way back to the beginning of the level?

Mega Man 3 isn’t for someone that is somewhat of a perfectionist. In several cases your character gets hit by an enemy or you miss a correct spot of a jump and lose some of your health. The health bar is your most important way to see how are things going and how are you getting with the overall progress in this game. Often in this game things get tight. There is a constant tension present while you keep playing and trying time after time.

Should you even try to play this game in 2026? You might like it. You might not like it. Regardless of the way you are going to play Mega Man 3 I am going to say to you that you will have to try it. It is a legendary game. That’s not even something to debate about. The game is legendary in a way that many youngsters today will never going to able to understand. And if you really like NES games the question about if you should or should not try to play this game, if you haven’t ever yet, is a kind of a “no brainer”.

We can go through some game mechanics. In Mega Man 3 you control the main character with a basic controller. You can move the character to forward and backward. You can jump and shoot with a press of a button. There are obstacles and enemies, that sometimes shoot ammo at you. If you get hit by an ammunition or an enemy you lose some of your health. You can pick up bonuses that can give you more health, lots of more health or maybe an extra life point. You get try each level for three times. The game progresses to a certain point. If you spend all three attempts, you’ll have to restart the whole level. Once you progress to a boss you get a try to defeat it. If you defeat the boss you get through the whole level. There are more than eight levels in the game. I only got to play two levels as I only played for two hours (I guess I will have to try again some other day and spend some more time with this game).

With some limitations that NES console does have I am encouraging you to play this game. If you like NES games this game is a must to play. You actually cannot save the game. You do have a password system that helps a lot if you are going to try to beat the game. Mega Man 3 was originally released in 1990 for NES. There are some later games released in the series. We can mention Mega Man X series and also some collections that have been released just lately. I think the game is also very much available as a NES cartridge as it doesn’t cost a whole lot. The price of Mega Man 3 seems to be about 45 euros today.

Herra 47 – Midsummer Festival

Posted on by Viljami

Herra 47 – Midsummer Festival is an adventure game inspired very much by Leisure Suit Larry. It is released for C64. You might be surprised about a new game getting released for such an old, or maybe “retro”, type of platform. The game is a new release after all. If you are interested should head to this address for more information and instructions on how to buy the game.

I got interested in this game just last Friday when I got my hands on the new Pelit magazine that is published here in my home country Finland. The magazine is released monthly. Herra 47 is produced by Vector 5 Games. The team consists of just a few people. The game takes strong influences from a comedy show from Finland from late 1980s and early 1990s. This show, called “Pulttibois”, featured this character named Herra 47. It is a character created by actor Pirkka-Pekka Petelius. You can actually find the picture of Herra 47 from this blog posts featured image. The featured image is actually a photo that I took from Pelit magazine just one moment ago.

Pirkka-Pekka Petelius is a funny Finnish and well-known comedian. He played a big role in Finnish television comedy scene and was actually one of the pioneers of Finnish television comedy scene. There was also another actor that played in this comedy series (“Pulttibois”) and his name is Aake Kalliala. Herra 47 – Midsummer Festival takes strong influences from Petelius’s character in this game.

The game is available for a price of about 7 dollars. As the platform is Commodore 64 there weren’t actually no adventure games originally released for C64 back in the day by Sierra. These adventure games that were very popular in the 1980s were based on this particular game creation engine that makes all these Sierra games feel and look like they are developed in this certain and very recognizable way. You can notice this if you have ever played games like Larry, Police Quest, King’s Quest or/and Space Quest. Since all these games used this game engine they all look a bit like each other. There was an update to this engine and it was utilized later to make more advanced adventure games by Sierra.

The idea of a game placed somewhere in fictional Finland (at least I think the game takes place in here) is totally hilarious. My imagination starts running when I think about Petelius’s character, Herra 47, running around during  mid-summer, and trying to get some female company. It is funny because mid-summer is a big happening here and almost everyone has a vacation then. So, there are lots of parties and partying going on. If you don’t head to countryside to your summer cottage you can spend your mid-summer also in the city. It is very quiet here then. It is actually a pretty calm period. Thinking about Herra 47 spending his summer days this way is very very funny.

While the game is a good game there are some considerations. The humor might be a bit rough for today’s audience. Also Pelit magazine mentioned that the storyline and all of the puzzles could have been designed a bit better. There might be a sequel coming some time and fans are of course waiting this to be something wild. I think you can enjoy the game if you like old Sierra games and especially Leisure Suit Larry. Technically the game is a definite master piece. Vector 5 Games has done a good job.

Since I am not so much into Commodore 64 and I don’t have a real C64 console this isn’t although a game that I would actually play. The game is interesting. If you are into C64 you should definitely invest a bit of your money and time to this game. I think it really deserves it. The game received a grade of 6 out of 9 (a funny joke also, knowers will know).

When Games Had No Graphics at All

Posted on by Viljami

We’re you playing video games when there were no graphics at all? This screenshot is the featured image of today’s new blog post. As you can see there is only text content for the player and no graphics. You can see the title, “West of House”, and the score. You can also see how many commands you have given in the game. That value is displayed as “Moves”. There is also an opportunity to save a game. You progress in the game with writing commands like where to move and what items to pick up and how to use them. The player also has an inventory system that can be displayed with a proper command.

This game is a text adventure game called Zork 1 – The Great Underground Empire. It was released originally in the beginning of 1980s. As you can probably already figure the first computer and video games were many times very moderate when it comes to graphical performance. They had no graphics. Some of the best text adventure games that I have come across include the first version of the adventure game Leisure Suit Larry. There was also an interesting game called Colossal Cave Adventure. It was one of the first games ever released on computer. It was released already in the 1970s.

It is interesting for me to look back in the video game history as I am such a young person that games for me have always included graphics of some type. When I was a small boy I played many DOS games on our family’s PC. Even some of the adventure type games, many of them were released by Sierra, had some sort of graphics. Later we saw games from Lucas Arts that even had an user interface that utilized some mouse interactivity. So, these games had already a real user interface.

Playing a text adventure game that has no graphics can be very charming. Early in the game you become used to the limitations. While there are many functions in the game they are a bit harder to figure and image. So, this leaves a lot to your imagination. You have to figure out what are the main commands that can make you progress in the game. It helps if you have some experience in playing adventure games be it that they would have had some kind of graphics. You can get into text adventure games more easily if you know concepts like items, maps and/or inventory systems. In some games your character even has some kind of development that can be based on for example experience points. Your characters abilities can sometimes open new opportunities like some new function that is enabled as your character has a more advanced ability. Sometimes there can be a new option inside some conversation dialogue. This all is based on charaters abilities like intelligence, luck or strength that can have a value like a number from 1 to 10. So, this number increases when your character goes up a level. Sometimes you may have options on how to develop your character. Character progression is however considered to be more of a character of a role playing game. Most text adventure games aren’t considered role playing games.

I encourage you to try for example Zork 1 or its sequels. You can get an idea of the surroundings of the space or room you are in with a command like “look around”. Then you are beginning to find some points and items that you can interact with. The score tells you about your progression in the game. Text adventure games are a bit limited but they can be a fun way to experience something new. They sure tell us a lot about the history and origins of video and computer games. The first Zork game is considered abandonware and you can download it from internet and install it through Dosbox. You can maybe use a frontend like D-Fend Reloaded that I am personally using for this purpose.