Destructoid Changelog - The Mayor Should Do It Himself

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Bluh. I’m sick. Not as sick as yesterday, where I wouldn’t have been trusted to write out complete paragraphs without a hallucination in the middle. No, today I’m well enough to write a newsletter. And complain.

So, while I was miserable on the couch yesterday, I watched The Thing. John Carpenter’s The Thing. I hadn’t seen it before, but because Nightdive Studios is remastering the 2002 video game, I figured I should get familiar with the source material. Good movie. Except maybe don’t watch it while you’re running a fever. It made snuggling my dog for the rest of the day really awkward.

So, I’m pretty sure my brain discarded all the memory I had about the week, so far. This newsletter will be as much to update you as it is to remind myself. Did you know we only had one review for the week? Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake came out, but we got a key rather late, and I wasn’t going to push myself through a 30-40 hour JRPG in a weekend. Not after Mario & Luigi: Brothership. Especially not when I was spending the weekend at my parents’ to celebrate my birthday. I did an impressions instead, because I’m not sure I’m going to get through the game anytime soon.

I have other things to play. Speaking of which, brace yourself for the first week of December. I have at least two reviews slated for then.

As a reminder, you can view older editions of the Destructoid changelog newsletter on this site here. Also, consider indoctrinating a friend or family member via the link below. If you get someone to sign up for the newsletter (using the link), you’ll be added to our list of folks who get the special monthly edition of the newsletter. It arrives the last Monday of the month (25th for this month.) This time, I’m interviewing Fever Dream Johnny (Johnny Ellis), the developer behind Orbo’s Odyssey, the upcoming Orbo’s Exodus, and Nowhere, Mi. You’ll get to learn if he actually has fever dreams or if he’s just a faker.

Undercover Cops

I’ve been meaning to get around to Undercover Cops for a while now, but I kept forgetting about it whenever I thought about what I wanted to play next. It came back to the top of my mind after the recent Irem Collection Volume 2, since this was another Irem game by the developers of Metal Slug.

A beat-’em-up by the dudes who made Metal Slug sounds like a dream game for me, and it has a lot going for it. Despite the name implying officers covertly operating out of uniform, you actually play as one of three vigilantes hired by the municipal government. Crime is really bad (to an extremely noticeable extent), and the mayor’s solution is to just unleash a few people to beat up criminals. The mayor should probably just do it himself. Like Mike Haggar.

It’s over-the-top in a satisfying way. One of the playable characters is just a football player, and his coverage attack is to summon an energy football and spike it into the ground to create a shockwave. Every so often, you come across giant concrete pillars, and each character will pick them up like a bag of milk and swing them around like a pool noodle. It’s full of weird bosses, and it’s packed with art that is extremely evocative of Metal Slug; especially the explosions.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the Metal Slug of beat-’em-ups. By that, I mean it’s not the peak. It’s not the beat-’em-up that other beat-’em-ups have posters of on their bedroom walls. The art is terrific; you can tell that the Metal Slug folks had a hand in it (I want to attribute this specifically to Akio, but I know he always worked with others). However, the gameplay is just enh. It’s decent, but it doesn’t come close to one of Capcom’s best. Or even Streets of Rage, for that matter.

Most egregious about it is that the last level, which probably has the blandest background, feels like it’s half the game. It goes on, and on, and on, with little variation. Reminds me a bit of how Metal Slug 3 ended.

Also, if you try to play it now, make sure you’re on the Alpha Renewal version. I was tricked into just playing the international version. For some reason, when it went overseas, a lot of the background detail and a lot of the characters’ movesets were removed. It’s terrible. Alpha Renewal combines the international version’s English text with the Japanese version’s everything else to make a more definitive version. Now, if only we could get a re-release.

Elsewhere on Destructoid

The Game Awards nominated Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree DLC for GOTY, and the internet is furious

I mean, I personally am not “furious.” I just hate The Game Awards in general. Not even just in principle (that too), but I have to watch it every year as part of this job, and it’s agonizing. Most of the games have the same way to advertise themself. I can’t wait to hear another sullen, slowed-down version of a pop song playing over grumbly dialogue again. I also find Geoff Keighley to be so bland. For a guy who loves the spotlight, you’d think he’d have a personality.

Anyway, this year’s controversy is that DLC (Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree) has been nominated for Best Game of the Year. Sounds dumb. It doesn’t bother me a tonne, but Julián F.L. tells us why it should. Bother us, I mean.

Silent Hill 2 sucks on the PS5 Pro, Konami is silent about it

I felt that the Silent Hill 2 Remake was a good-looking game, but it had performance problems and a lot of temporal artifacting that marred its visage. If you shelled out for a PS5 Pro, you might hope that this would get addressed. In fact, according to Tiago Manuel, it makes things worse.

I would hope that Bloober and Konami are already working on a fix for this, but supposedly they haven’t said anything. Taigo already beat me to making a “silent” joke about it.

STALKER 2’s A-Life is either broken or nonexistent

Speaking of performance issues. Here’s Filip Galekovic giving the scoop on STALKER 2’s A-Life system, or apparent lack thereof. By the way he describes it, it sounds like they designed around not having it, but GSC Game World is saying that it’s just bugged out and that they’re working to fix it.

It sounds appropriate. I mentioned this last week, but while the STALKER series has become something of a niche darling, the first game launched in really rough shape. Moreover, it was also a pale shadow of what had been promised in years of hype leading up to it. However, I think it’s important to remember that GSC Game World is in a country that is currently under invasion by its neighbor. Pretty difficult development environment by any standard.

Reviews for review this week

Miniatures

This is the soul review for the week, and it’s a small one. Miniatures is an art game. I have very little to add beyond that. It reminds me of the art games of the late ‘00s, early ‘10s, which I don’t necessarily mean as a compliment. In the review, I also relate Miniatures to strange shorts from the National Film Board of Canada that a cartoon station here in Canada, Teletoon, would sometimes air. I don’t recommend it, but at the same time, I don’t not recommend it. I don’t disrecommend it. Maybe try it.