Bubble Bobble final boss battle and Happy End

Inspired by the recent release of Bubble Bobble Plus (and the game’s conspicuous lack of a save or password system), I decided a few days ago to play through the NES version of Bubble Bobble again on the Wii Virtual Console. After completing the game’s regular mode, I played through the more challenging Super Bubble Bobble mode and completed that as well.

I sat down tonight to repeat the final boss battle and have included a recording of the fight, along with the full “Happy End,” after the break.

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Super Puzzle Fighter II X for Matching Service – Lei Lei v. Morrigan

Super Puzzle Fighter II X for Matching Service for the Dreamcast is one of my favorite puzzle games of all time. It’s unfortunate the best iteration of the game never saw a stateside release, but thanks to Sega designing the Dreamcast hardware without region locking, my friends and I have enjoyed countless hours of puzzle mayhem with our favorite chibi characters.

Past the break, I’ve embedded three selected rounds of puzzle battle between myself (playing as Lei Lei) and my wife (playing as Morrigan) past the break. All three videos are also available in HD quality; visit my Youtube Channel for the relevant links.

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City Connection – I Stepped On the Cat

One of my favorite video game-related memories is playing City Connection and hearing my mother laugh when my in-game car would hit a cat, which would be sent flying diagonally off-screen. (The irony is that my mother has had at least one cat since before I was born and, along with my father, taught me to take good care of pets.) The expression on the cat’s face, combined with the comical music that played immediately after the collision, must have made an impression on her because she’s asked about “that game with the cat flying across the screen” on more than one occasion.

While reading Wikipedia today, I learned more about that classic scene:

Other enemies include a cat, which, when hit, causes the player to lose an extra life as the cat goes diagonally off the screen (but does not cause the car to “explode”) with ‘Der Flohwalzer’ played as a comical music (this famous music piece is know in Japan as ‘Neko funjatta’ (I Stepped on the Cat)).

Source: City Connection – Wikipedia

As a tribute to the video games I played during my childhood and to my mother, I’ve recorded in-game footage of City Connection for my first “official” gameplay video. Click past the break to view the short video.

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Homebrewinstaller and Wii Homebrew Installer are scams

Never pay for homebrew.

Homebrewinstaller ($29.95) and Wii Homebrew Installer ($15) charge money for files and information available for free on other sites. Both of these web sites are scams. For information on free Wii homebrew, I recommend visiting WiiBrew or HackMii.

For those who are unfamiliar with Wii homebrew: It is not equivalent to piracy. The purpose of many homebrew applications is to extend the functionality of hardware past the limits of official software. For example: The homebrew application NuGaSa allows Wii owners to backup and restore Gamecube save files from an SD card.

The owners of WiiBrew, HackMii, and Brainstorm Warning do not condone piracy.

I have blocked all Google AdSense ads relating to Homebrewinstaller. If you see any ads attempting to charge money for homebrew files, please post a comment or use the site Contact form to let me know and I will block the ads as soon as possible.

Female figure in new Zelda art a living sword?

There’s conjecture among Joystiq readers that the female figure in the Zelda art released earlier today. The folks at 4 color rebellion seem to think the same and offer this evidence.

To a Western audience, the thought of a living sword likely sounds a bit odd. But several Eastern myths tell stories of the spirits of warriors inhabiting legendary swords. (Chrono Trigger players will remember the Masamune, a legendary sword inhabited by the spirits of two powerful creatures with the ability to merge.) It’s less common to find a story where a female spirit inhabits a sword, but given the Zelda series’ affinity for androgynous characters, it’s not surprising.

With Nintendo revealing Metroid: Other M as a “new, edgier” take on the Metroid universe, it’s reasonable to think Nintendo may be ready to take a risk and give the world a more mature (though very unlikely M-rated) Zelda title.

On mastery of the English language and the expression of love

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

-William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18

I love you like a fat kid loves cake.

-50 Cent, 21 Questions