1/11/2025
Pokemon Emerald Rogue V2.0.1
My Balatro. This game is so so addicting, and I don't lnow if its just the Pokemon fan in me speaking. I love roguelikes/roguelites and this game never trully leaves my mind. There's so much to do and so many challenges. The sence of progression is not the best to be honest but it might just me being adamant that I want to have a mono Bug type run, while not doing other challenges that would help me more first (yes Bug is my favorite type). Also I love that we can ride pokemon in this game, they even show if its a shiny!
I think a big part why I play this so much is because it is always available. I have it on my TrimUI Brick and on a flash cart for my GBA SP so it is always in my pocket. This game feels like Pokemon turned to the max, all 9 gens, with all gimmicks (megas, z-moves, gigantamax, terastallize) ALL AT THE SAME TIME. This is one of the few games that I prefer emulating over original hardware. Being able to speed up here feels even better than normal Pokemon games and I love seing the sprite art of all 9 generations pop on a modern screen.
Thank you to Pokabbie for making this game!
Monster Hunter 4U & Monster Hunter XX
I hate Capcom for how they made Wilds but god damn it 4 Ultimate is so good. The ongoing joke is that the 1st game you play in the series will be your personal favorite, and to that I say its true. I don't know why I downloaded 4U to my hacked New 3DS, but I'm so glad that I did. I do remember my mind being blown away at how well the game played/controlled/looked on the tiny handheld. Somehow, playing the game trully makes you feel like the hunter in the amazing game intro and it's trailers. The mere absurdity of the monsters, the weapons, the characters in this game series make me feel like a kid playing games again. I think this video by Flyann2 highlights this the best, trully one of my favorite videos on the whole intenet. Actually I think its this guy that made me a MH fan.
After 4U I played MMXX on 3DS. Call me crazy but I prefer playing it on the 3DS over the Switch, its the combination of exclusive armors, extra portability, the c-stick, and the shoulder buttons (yes, I actually like the c-stick and I don't like analog stacked shoulder buttons). Oh and I play Heavy Bowgun in XX so I'm extra crazy I guess. So in order to play MHXX on the 3DS, I had to find an English translated ROM, as MHXX is the Japanese version of the game (MHXX is MH Generations Ultimate in the West, and MHGU is only available on the Switch). Here is the patch.
MHXX/GU is the most 'fun' MH game in my opinion. Being an anniversary title, everything is joyful and bright and loud and in your face. Oh, and you can PLAY AS A CAT! So normally as a hunter, you would have cat companions called palicos that would help you with hunts, but in XX, you can become the cat! Not just that, if you watched the Flyann2 video linked above, you will see that you can dress up the cat in armors that are collaborations with othe media franchises, so you can be a Yu-Gi-Oh! Black Magician cat, or Sailor Moon cat, or Mega Man cat, or Ace Attorney cat, or Sonic the Hedgehog cat, ect. And we MUST NOT forget about the Monster Hunter XX x Hunter x Hunter collab. Trully unhinged.
9/11/2025
Gundam vs. Gundam NEXT PLUS
The most 'hidden gem' game I know. My first encounter with this game was years ago at the mall near my house, where they had a couple of arcade cabinets, with the most washed out screen ever, of the older version of NEXT PLUS (I think it was just Gundam vs. Gundam). I saw Gundam and I just had to play it. My initial impressions of the game was great! There were so many MS (mobile suits) available, from multiple Gundam series, I think I picked Exia because giant sword is cool, and the controls were quite easy to grasp, just a button each for Shoot, Slash, Dash and Change Target. So I played the game for like 10 minutes, as I ran out of coins and my mom was waiting. I got to play the cabinet one other time, but a kid just fucking snatched my other coin I was leaving on the cabinet, I'm still bitter about that. But I never knew the name of the game, as I was a kid and kids don't memorize things very well; and the game was in Japanese.
Cut to years later when I got interested in game emulation. I only had an Android phone and one of the available emualtors was PPSSPP, a PSP emulator. So I downloaded PPSSPP (I can never get over the name), searched for a Gundam game on the system, as I am still very into Gundam, and found an English patched version of Gundam vs. Gundam NEXT PLUS. It looked cool (again with the variety of MS on the cover) and was one of the few that were in English so I downloaded it. The game is SO GOOD! The controls felt amazing, despite the fact that I was playing on a touch screen, and there is UNLOCKABLE SUITS AND STAGES! I was immediately hooked, my go-tos are Ez8, Kämpfer and occasionally Zeong, Dom or The-O. The funny part is that even though I loved the game, it never dawned on me that this game and the one in the mall were essentially one game. This only came recently and I felt so happy that my favorite game is also one that I have a weird but memorable childhood memory of. And no one can say I like this game bevause of nostalga, cuz I didn't even knew that I liked it!
Here is the link to download the game ISO.
This game series is actually very much not dead. After having the realization mentioned above, I went into a deep Gundam vs. Gundam rabbit hole. There is in fact a quite healthy playerbase of the game in Japan, where it is played in arcades, with crazy set ups. Remember the Change Target button, it is there because Gundam vs. Gundam is a competitive fighting game that is also an arena fighter that is played by 4 PEOPLE AT A TIME (2 teams of 2). So the whole setup consists of 4 cabinets AND a viewing screen for the audience. While this is extreamly cool, it also means that these cabinet setups are only available in Japan, as importing the game means importing 4 cabinets and a huge screen, for 1 setup for 1 niche game. It also doesn't help that arcades are dying out everywhere in the world. This is an amazing video summarizing the scene around this franchize.
Now you might be thinking 'Damn, that's such a cool game. Pity that I can't play it'. BUT IT IS NOT ALL DOOM AND GLOOM! You can still play the latest Western-available version of this game, MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM EXTREME VS. MAXIBOOST ON, on PS4 or emulate MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM: EXTREME VS. FULL BOOST on PS3 (or on RPCS3 of course, however the game will get glitchy and has significant audio stuttering). ORRRRRRRR thanks to the series' crazy and dedicated fanbase, you can play MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM EXTREME VS. 2 XBOOST (I love all these names), a version of the game only meant to be played on arcades, on PC. Get the game here. However, the setup process is quite finicky and from what I've read, it doesn't work too well on AMD GPUs. It is also only for Windows sadly. But hey, this is the most updated version of the game that we have, if this entry has convinced you that this game series is cool and you are willing to tinker, then go at it!