Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

This The Donkey Kong Country Promo VHS Tape Is Totally X-TREME!

Somehow I got this tape in sent to me in the 90's and I loved it. It really got me excited about Donkey Kong Country and as such the hype was so real I bought it. After I played and beat the game about a zillion times I came back to watch the tape and it never really hit me the same way after playing the game. As time passed I ditched the tape, which in hindsight wasn't a great idea but my young self didn't really realize that kind of thing might be useful to keep around someday. Nor that i'd be collecting VHS tapes 20 years later.

The Donkey Kong country tape video embedded above is 17 minutes of 90's Nintendo at the height of it's power and majesty. The video is... Read All

DF Retro Analyzes Each Doom Console Port From The Worst To The Best!

Makes sense that DF Retro's longest episode to date covers Doom, one of the most important games ever made. In this nearly hour long opus DF Retro talks about each Doom console port and how they nearly all relate to each other. He also talks about the Doom console ports history, limitations and playability.

"id software’s Doom played a key part in gaming’s transition from two to three dimensions, and its legacy of technical innovation continues to this day. On this episode of DF Retro, John explores its origins on the PC before comparing and contrasting this against every official console conversion. There's a lot of ground to cover so buckle up for the longest episode... Read All

Lose Your Life To The Latest Humble Endless RPG-Lands Bundle

Do you have a hole in your gaming life that needs to be filled with Borderlands? Do you love endless RPG's and want something else to play? Humble Bundle has just the thing for you in the new Humble Endless RPG-Lands Bundle featuring: $1 Tier (Borderlands. The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing: Final Cut, Wurm Unlimited), $4.97 Tier (Borderlands 2, Endless Legend - Classic Edition & Guild of Dungeoneering) & $10 Tier (Borderlands the Pre-Sequel). And for a couple bucks more you can get both Van Helsing game Soundtracks, which is a nice bonus.

I can't say enough great things about Borderlands beyond the reality that I keep coming back to play these games over... Read All

Awesomenauts Free To Play Gets Massive Update In Brawls & Daily Quests

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Awesomenauts is a really fun 2D sidescrolling take on the MOBA genre that hit things pretty hard when it launched and has been getting massive updates since. This year it went entirely free to play and now is getting a huge update making freemium game progression easier and giving people more things to do.

Brawl of the Week

This latest update also introduces Daily Missions. These missions challenge players to complete matches with a specific type of character, to claim victory in a certain number of matches, or to fulfill another objective. The reward for completing these missions? Sweet, sweet Awesomepoints that players can use to purchase additional characters or... Read All

When I Found You, I Saw Raw Untamed Power - New Last Jedi Trailer!

The new Star Wars The Last Jedi trailer dropped and it's great. It's a bit darker and way more edgier than I was expecting. As I was watching the trailer Luke looked... really on the edge of a breakdown or maybe it's the fact that he's been living as a hermit for a while?

What do you think? I've been watching the new Star Wars movies on opening night for the last 2 years and I plan to do the same here too.

Cheerful Ghost Radio Episode 6 - The Best of Both Abrams

On this episode of Cheerful Ghost radio, we discuss a bunch of topics that we couldn't get into the previous episode, including the news that Nintendo is shipping more SNES Classic and NES Classic units than previously planned, JJ Abrams returning to direct Star Wars: Episode IX, Age of Empires IV, and Humble Bundle hitting $100 million in charity donations!

Also be sure to check out our friends at Game Dev's Quest, a podcast about the game development process: http://airpodcast.com/category/gamedevsquest/

Mother Brain Destroyed, Pray For True Galaxy Peace! NES Metroid Completed in 3.33.

jdodson gives this an astounding "Must Play" on the Ghost Scale

This achieves something special, and it would be a shame to miss it.

jdodson gives this a "Must Play" on the Ghost Scale

This achieves something special, and it would be a shame to miss it.

"You fulfilled your mission. It will revive peace in space. But, it may be invaded by the Metroid. Pray for a true peace in space!" - Ending screen text to NES Metroid.

Even back in 1986 Nintendo was opening up Metroid for a sequel. It's also kind of strange/fun to see a Nintendo game talk about praying for peace. Who does Samus pray to for peace and what is her belief system? I tried to do some searching to find out and it seems the Metroid Wiki doesn't seem to know either because talking about the Galactic Federation in the Metroidverse they say:

"The specifics of culture, religion, trade, currency, technology, civil rights/liberties, and so on are also unknown."

... Read All

Blaster Master 0 Review

For those of you not familiar with Blaster Master, it is a game that was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) back in 1988. Blaster Master 0 takes the original game, updates it for today’s hardware, adds in more modern day controls and game conventions and gives it a little more story.

Blaster Master 0 takes place in the future, where humans were forced to move underground at one point, due to an ice age. At the time the game takes place, humans are living back on the surface of the planet. You play a boy named Jason Frudnick. Jason discovers a new type of frog, which he takes home and names Fred. Fred eventually escapes and jumps down a hole into the... Read All For those of you not familiar with Blaster Master, it is a game that was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) back in 1988. Blaster Master 0 takes the original game, updates it for today’s hardware, adds in more modern day controls and game conventions and gives it a little more story.

Blaster Master 0 takes place in the future, where humans were forced to move underground at one point, due to an ice age. At the time the game takes place, humans are living back on the surface of the planet. You play a boy named Jason Frudnick. Jason discovers a new type of frog, which he takes home and names Fred. Fred eventually escapes and jumps down a hole into the earth. Jason follows Fred down the hole and makes another discovery in the form of a vehicle called SOPHIA III. Jason gets in SOPHIA III and takes off to find Fred. At this point the gameplay kicks in.

Blaster Master 0's gameplay comes in two forms: A 2D sideview platformer and a 2D overhead dungeon type of game. The sideview portion feels kind of Metroidish, where you are exploring different areas of the map trying to unlock abilities and items. While the overhead view becomes more of a dungeon-like shooter.

As a kid, I really enjoyed Blaster Master on the NES. Over time I have revisited the original game and have found it to be brutal and unforgiving. Some of the things in Blaster Master that make it unforgiving are: you only have one life, with no save or continue, and brutal boss fights. Blaster Master 0 takes away a lot of this difficulty by adding in save states, and making the boss battles easier. I feel Blaster Master 0 is more accessible due to this, but if you are looking for a game as difficult as the original, you will be disappointed.

Despite being easier, I still enjoyed the game as much as the original. The save points definitely made it easier to play the game in batches of time rather than needing to play all night and day to beat the game. The level design, weapons and updated graphics add to its enjoyability.

The story was a little weak, but it seemed to be more in depth than the original. I do not remember the original having much of a story, outside of Jason chasing Fred, so it was nice to see it expanded upon.

Blaster Master 0 is available for both the 3DS and the Switch. I played the Switch version, which makes use of the HD rumble. While the HD rumble is not required for the game, it does add another fun dimension.

Overall, I would recommend this game to anybody that wants a fun 2D platformer/shooter that is not too difficult and can be finished in under ten hours.

Shovel Knight Getting Battle Toads Content On All PC Versions!

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A while ago Shovel Knight on consoles got two updates I was envious of. XBone owners got a Battle Toads content update and PS4 owners of the game got Kratos content. I don't love console exclusives but the Battle Toads content looked really cool and I always wanted to check it out. Looks like Yacht Club is making the Battle Toads content free for everyone on PC today so we all can!

"Hop to it! The Battletoads are now available on PC/Mac/Linux versions of Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove! Steam, Windows Store, Humble Store & GOG."

I linked to a good article from IGN about how to get the Battle Toads content along with the Battle Toads PC patch notes and update Tweet... Read All

Battle.net Beta Gets Appear Offline Mode, Profiles And More!

Fans have been asking Blizzard to get an "appear offline" mode in the Battle.net client for ages and they are finally brining that feature forward in beta. Steam has had it for ages, which is nice when you want to jump on and play a game without anyone bothering you or knowing about it. Sneaky!

"Appear offline allows you to set your status to show you as “offline” to your Blizzard friends while remaining connected to Battle.net. This means you can launch the app and game away without distraction.

Appearing offline will show you as offline to everyone in your Blizzard friends list. Once you have joined a game, the experience of appearing offline might be slightly... Read All