Lurker > Natalie

I think a data export feature might be planned once the new site is stable? Not certain but I know it's been talked about before.

I am kind of dreading the new design because I'm very much not a fan of modern mobile-first sites where everything is in one column and all the buttons do soft page loads and stuff. But entering that data anywhere else is such a huge task, and the other sites I've seen don't seem very intuitive.

KamikazePotato posted...

This one needed the New 3DS to function.

We should do a separate topic for New 3DS games.

I recommend popping into the Backloggery Discord to share your feedback. I'm hopeful that Drumble will clean up the new site some more and get it looking alright, but I think constructive criticism is helpful.

Peach's Castle
Station Square
Gruntilda's Lair

I guess maybe I'd check in there more often, but Discord is a bad platform that's begun its own downward slide. Forums/message boards have a lot going for them that Discord, even with its faux-forum mode, can't replicate: the ability to maintain ongoing conversations intended to be referenced and backread is the main thing, since it's a very "in the moment" design, as well as the lack of searchability, the social pressure that comes with its user list/"<name> is typing" format, the ephemerality of messages making it less worthwhile to make longform contributions, etc. I think you can only retain the vibe by moving to another forum.

The biggest exclusive RPG is probably either Lost Odyssey or Blue Dragon. It's gotten a lot of multiplatform stuff in recent years for... some reason.

Suprak_the_Stud posted...

Minesweeper

Minesweeper, the game where you try to come as close as possible to exploding without going over the threshold? I don't think so

Gran Turismo
Mario's Early Years! Fun with Numbers
Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing

Not sure what to pick for a fourth yet

Fred Rogers addressed the Robert Kennedy assassination. Does that count as political?

https://misterrogers.org/videos/assassination/

I feel like there was someone named Shadow7x but I might be thinking of another site, or maybe a fever dream.

BlueCrystalTear posted...

Wait, so a show that was a huge deal for a year and a half is preferable to a show that's still going strong after 52 years and has been watched by numerous generations?

I mean when you put it that way it sounds stupid. I dunno, I guess I grew up in a bubble where nobody cared about The Price Is Right. I've never known anybody who unironically cared about it beyond acknowledging that it's been around forever and its hosts are respected.

Thinking about it, I also associate Millionaire with the more modern style of game show like Deal or No Deal, where it's got a lot of lingering tension. It might have only been in the zeitgeist for a few years but I feel like it was the template for the genre's 21st century incarnation.

Jeopardy
Wheel of Fortune
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
Family Feud

Ultimately I have to do this as an American, though I'd love to slot in either Takeshi's Castle or Ninja Warrior as really iconic shows that represent Japan's huge lineage of game shows. Choosing Millionaire over Price because it felt like a way bigger deal at the time, and I think Family Feud has to be on here because the Steve Harvey run is probably the most relevant/contemporary game show of the last decade, unfortunately.

Second:
Stupid video game names
Konami games

This is awesome. I need to see a full version of this that's not edited down so heavily.

Statue of Liberty
Washington Monument
Mount Rushmore
Vietnam Wall

The 'Nam memorial is the only one that feels actually reflective and aware of the costs that led to its existence, and Rushmore is increasingly viewed as a huge misstep both in terms of colonial ambitions and environmentalism... which ended up being what swayed me to add it, since that's so very quintessentially "American monument"-y.

No one outside of Pennsylvania actually cares about the Liberty Bell, there's no way.

Lopen posted...

I personally don't think Crash Bandicoot has any business touching any rushmores aside from "most irrelevant flagship character" rushmore

Total footnote of a series. The first of a long string of nothing is still nothing.

Tomb Raider is a has been, Crash Bandicoot is a never was.

Three of the top 11 best selling PSX games were Crash games, and the sequels both outsold the first game. It was the platformer on the system and Sony's first attempt at a North American mascot, moreso than Spyro ever managed.

Like, I'm not trying to argue that popularity equals quality, I was never crazy about these games, but it's really surprising to see people claiming these games weren't a huge deal. 20 years of mediocre sequels has taken its toll, I guess, but in the context of the PSX it's got a big position and it was the launch point for the long line of assorted mascot platformers Sony had for the first ten years of their gaming life.

MacArrowny posted...

It sold well enough to become a Greatest Hits title. It wasn't something no one played.

Yeah, it didn't bomb, but the Greatest Hits bar wasn't crazy high - reportedly the threshold in 1997, when SotN first came out, was 150,000 units sold. I see claims that the game actually struggled to hit that mark and was given a green label rerelease despite this, but I can't find the source for those claims.

I get why people are putting SotN up there, as a game it's incredibly solid and has an important place in the development of a genre, but I also think people are forgetting just how poorly it did at the time and glossing over some of the negative coverage it got for being a 2D PSX game. It stands tall in its field but really doesn't have much relevance to the console to me.

We're saving Gex for the 3DO Rushmore.

Nominate: 3DO games

Final Fantasy VII
Metal Gear Solid
Gran Turismo
Crash Bandicoot

The lack of respect for Gran Turismo surprises me, it was absolutely massive and unprecedented and a huge step in carving out this niche for car/racing people to get into games when they otherwise wouldn't be interested. It invented the sim racing genre. Fourth slot was really hard to pick, but I feel like people overlook how influential mascot platformers were early in the PS1's lifespan. Crash, Spyro, and Croc combined for so many millions of sales, they were really core to the console's identity for people who weren't RPG nerds. It's tough omitting RE and TR and MGS is probably the least solid pick here, but it's so big it's hard to justify pulling it.

It's not immediately clear unless you compare the two. If you watch the original Trials of Death clear Luster linked above, you'll see that a Yoshi is grabbed about ten seconds into the level and sacrificed maybe three seconds later. This is the Yoshi that's saved and used in the other video, and from this point on the second run is 100% different and navigates the level in an entirely unique order.

Super Mario 64
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
GoldenEye 007
Mario Kart 64

Really boring list but it's really non-negotiable for the most part. Slot 4 was always going to go to one of the party spinoff games.

Also:

Nominate: Video game commercials

It's also worth sharing that Trials of Death has been beaten not once but twice now, with this incredible unintended route having been discovered:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTbEoZonl9A

Grand Theft Auto III
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Kingdom Hearts
Katamari Damacy

I'm really surprised by the results here. Granted, the PS2 is maybe the hardest console to do this with because it had so many games in different areas that represented the apex of their respective series. I guess I think of these Mount Rushmore things as not just being about the top four games but about trying to broadly represent that console's landscape and identity. FFX sold better but Kingdom Hearts felt inescapable and I think it's had a louder legacy, and Katamari Damacy is the biggest success story from the PS1 and PS2's niche low budget scene which spawned so many cult classics.

LightningStrikes posted...

So whats the feeling on Mortal Kombat. Its obviously an incredibly important game and this was the better console version, but is it associated with the Genesis/Mega Drive enough to count?

It was a really big part of the console war of the time and emblematic of the difference in curation between the two platforms. Between that and its being one of the fighting games of the '90s, I think it's a good shout. If it were a 1990s Sega Mount Rushmore I'd drop it for an in-house title but I think its legacy is wrapped up in the console in a more enduring way than a lot of true exclusives.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Mortal Kombat
Phantasy Star IV
Gunstar Heroes

The thing that tips it to Sonic 2 rather than 1 or 3&K is the marketing push. It's one of the first games to ever receive a huge amount of hype leading up to release, and it got a simultaneous release all across the western markets, which was basically unheard of. "Sonic 2sday" is a real forerunner of the way modern games are hyped up and released.

In general though, the Genesis has one of the least uniform libraries out there. So many of the games in contention here - Ecco, Golden Axe, Altered Beast, Madden, Vectorman - were significant in their time but had extremely short legacies (or in the case of Madden, an extremely long one that almost immediately ceased to be associated with the Genesis or Sega). It's strange trying to put together a list of the most important titles when there were so few that felt universal to system owners.

Wii Sports
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Super Mario Galaxy
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

I don't even like Twilight Princess but this game was such a big deal at the time in a way I don't think people remember. The backlash against Wind Waker was so immense that those early trailers of a (relatively) realistic Link and Hyrule with OoT callbacks were a massive stabilizing force, and I think it moved a lot of consoles in 2006 when people might have otherwise viewed the Wii as more of a toy.

Bob-Omb Battlefield
Whomp's Fortress
Tick Tock Clock
Rainbow Ride

Rugrats
Spongebob
Hey Arnold
Avatar

Kotaku was great for several years. I wasn't a regular reader or anything but whenever I'd see an investigative piece posted or an article from one of the more idiosyncratic staff writers like Tim Rogers, it was good stuff. During that post-clickbait period, they didn't mince words when it came to maintaining a progressive stance, and I appreciated that when so many outlets are unwilling.

Even if you don't like their coverage, it's a shitty thing to see a substantial company collapse and put a lot of people with families out of work. I think rooting for that is pretty fucked up.

Nominate: Mobile games

Apple pie
Chocolate pie
Pizza pie
American Pie

-
-
-
Panel de Pon (SNES)

Mew Under the Truck
Sonic & Tails in Melee
L Is Real 2401
Nuclear Gandhi

Holy shit, I had no idea the Gandhi thing wasn't real. I never played Civ and I've never heard anyone dispute it. It's unbelievable that it's so prevalent.

Super Mario Bros.
Super Mario 64
Mario Kart 64
New Super Mario Bros.

First, I don't really buy into raw sales numbers as an absolute metric when you're comparing across console generations as distant as these. Mario Kart 8 is the best selling Mario game because the video game industry and its audience have grown in orders of magnitude in the last 15 years, but that doesn't necessarily align with impact; Mario Party 8 outsold the first Super Smash Bros. game, but you wouldn't put that up on a "Party Games Mount Rushmore."

Mario Kart 64 doesn't have quite the same proportional attach rate that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe does - ~30% compared to 8's ~42% - but I think it's important to acknowledge two things. First, the significance of lineage and influence, obviously, but also the fact that Mario Kart 64 is basically the birth of four player couch co-op and a precursor to the entire party game subgenre. It was inescapable during its time in a way that I don't feel 8 really is. Despite its sales, I don't think 8 is even the Switch's preeminent party game, SSBU has a much greater cultural presence.

As for New Super Mario Bros., the first NSMB game came out in 2006. It was the best selling DS game, and each subsequent entry (barring the port of U) was also a top 5 selling game on its respective console. I know I dismissed raw sales numbers earlier, but taken as a trend, between this and its continued presence in Super Mario Maker, NSMB has been one of the strongest major presences in the Mario franchise for close to 20 years. It outsold contemporaneous 3D Mario games. An entire generation has had these games as a major reference point for what Mario is.

Green Hill Zone
Live and Learn
Can You Feel the Sunshine?
Windy and Ripply

There are an incredible number of viable picks for this one.

The statements from his colleagues in the industry made me sad. Everyone seems shocked.

https://www-shonenjump-com.translate.goog/j/2024/03/08/240308_oshirase.html?_x_tr_sl=ja&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=sc

Tony the Tiger
Trix Rabbit
Toucan Sam
Captain Crunch

Bowser
Ganondorf
Sephiroth
Eggman

Oh.

That's dumb.

Yellow paint discourse?

GranTurismo posted...

do you think highly of the logitech gaming mouse?

I haven't used any of their current gen hardware, so it really depends on where the quality level is at these days. Like I said, they worked well for a while but I started to get two problems: additional unwanted click inputs when I clicked, and sorta fluttery unwanted scrollwheel inputs when the wheel moved sometimes. The double click issue in particular is very well known, and if they're still using the same components it's probably still a problem. I think there are fixes you can attempt but it's one of those things where nothing works for everyone.

Aside from those problems, they were good mice, but I've found that the Corsair is more comfortable for me. The side buttons on the older Logitechs were smaller and harder to get at, and they had DPI buttons on either side of the scroll wheel that were easy to accidentally hit. That's very much personal preference though and I'm sure their design choices have changed in the last several years.

GranTurismo posted...

how much were your gaming mouses? they usually avg like twice as much as normal mouses or something?

In the $40-50 range, I think, though I know at least one of them I got on sale for less. If you want wireless that price will go up though, but these should last you a good few years if you buy something with good build quality and aren't super rough on it.

I used to use Logitechs, but on multiple mice (G400 and MX518 revival) I started to experience scrollwheel issues and phantom clicks after a while. I've switched to the Corsair Sabre and it's been really comfortable and reliable so far. Side buttons are nice and big so you can pretty easily hit them from several thumb positions.

For gaming, the two main advantages are the DPI adjustment, which for non-pros is probably best as a "set it and forget it" kind of thing unless you're really into playing sniper or something, and the additional buttons that you can map to whatever. I find them really useful in FPS games where I can set them up to change weapons without having to fiddle with the scrollwheel and take my finger off M2.

The real star is having the side buttons for non-gaming use. They should default to forward/back in web browsers, Windows Explorer, etc., and it's a convenience that can't be understated.

Nominate:
Pokemon towns

Second:
Board games
Beatles songs
Emo songs

Poke Ball
Home Run Bat
Beam Sword
Smash Ball