|
 What is The Guardian Legend? The Guardian Legend is an NES that came out in 1988, near the middle of the NES’s lifespan, and is actually a sequel to a MSX game Guardic. Despite its release date, TGL manages to do a lot of interesting things with the NES' limited hardware. It features two distinct gameplay modes, doles out a variety of different weapons, and manages to be reasonably long. I find this to be a pretty impressive and sometimes overlooked game from the NES era. Thread layout Videos will be posted on Sunday and Thursdays. If you’d like to see something that I didn’t point out or go over, feel free to ask. Bonus content will likely consist of a stream of the game's special mode somewhere near the end of the thread. Videos Area 0 - The Basics and Powering up Area 1 - The World of Water Area 2 - The Kid Gloves are off Area 3 - The Train Wreck Area 4 - The Leisurely Stroll Area 5 - The Crystal Caverns Area 6 - The Roundabout Area 7 - The Eyes Area 8 - The Heart Area 9 - The Endgame Area 10 - The Finale TGL - The Extra Mode TheWanderingNewbie fucked around with this message at 02:47 on Feb 25, 2015 |
#
?
Jan 2, 2015 01:24
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 15:29 |
|
|
Oh wow, this is the game I played as a kid that I had a fever dream about, as it was a weird 'Zelda game that turned into a SHUMP" with the world longest password screen. Thank you for LPing this, Wanderer.
|
|
#
?
Jan 2, 2015 02:14
|
|
|
I absolutely love this game and feel it's one of the few games on the NES that's still really playable today. Glad to see it's getting LPed!
|
|
#
?
Jan 2, 2015 02:45
|
|
|
This is an amazing game that I loved back in the day, and it's still quite unique and enjoyable today. I've been wondering recently why it hasn't been LP'd before. Looking forward to seeing you play and what other people think about it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 2, 2015 02:48
|
|
|
This is the best game. Broderbund made a dual-commercial for it and Battle of Olympus in '89/'90 and the footage looked so awesome that I begged for it for my 10th birthday. For a long time I was stuck on the blue Optomon, and what seemed like forever on the red Grimgrin. I'm hoping you'll also do the Secret Edition romhack (current version 3.2) when the regular game is done. Also TGL mode! One thing that's neat about the attract mode is that if you let it continue to run after the first two demo stages, it will cycle random stages from anywhere in the game. It was cool as a kid seeing some later (read, Desert) levels I couldn't get to, even if the demo "player" gets absolutely destroyed due to lack of gear. You mentioned that the sword (called Saber Laser) isn't that useful in the shooter corridors - it completely trivializes several bosses and cuts through high-durability trash mobs. Don't discount it. I've never tried it, but I think a Saber-only run would be pretty fun. The "levels", or point totals where you receive a full health restore + extra pip are as follows: 30k, 100k, 500k, 1m and every 1m thereafter. Yes, you can actually grind several million points to give you an edge, but the life meter maxes out at 32. Also, the chip points at which your main gun range increases are 100, 200, and 2000. A story - I went out-of-town to visit an aunt/uncle, and brought the game with me to play with my cousins (we all did this at family gatherings). One of them loved it so much that the day I left, he rushed out and bought it. 
Ofecks fucked around with this message at 23:47 on Jan 2, 2015 |
|
#
?
Jan 2, 2015 23:42
|
|
|
This game was my favorite rental from the video store in the local mini mall. Unfortunately it had no manual, and trying to figure it out myself was more than my eight year old brain could handle. Still, I have fond memories, especially of the music.
|
|
#
?
Jan 3, 2015 15:21
|
|
|
Ofecks posted:I'm hoping you'll also do the Secret Edition romhack (current version 3.2) when the regular game is done. Also TGL mode! I was unaware that there was a romhack I'll have to look into that, and unfortunetly I've already recorded the next two episodes because now that you mention it I don't try too many of the close range weapons in the shooter parts because of how quickly contact damage can murder you, but I can think of a boss or two that they would be good on now. ANYWHO, update time.  This is the European Boxart, I really like how they decided to make the Guardian the focal point as appose to some weird ominous whatever the NA one did. Area 1 - Water World I don't think I ever actually say it in the video, but the reason why this one is shorter then normal is because Corridor 1 is actually part of Area 1, which we did in video 1.
|
|
#
?
Jan 4, 2015 23:34
|
|
|
You picked up a subweapon at the start of the level and never showed it off. You just kept putting the cursor on it in the menu but never did anything with it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 4, 2015 23:56
|
|
|
This game does some pretty interesting things, at least by 1988 standards. I really like the mix of shump and overhead exploration. Maybe not as polished as it could be, but hey, 1988. That double sword looks really neat to use. Rotate the d-pad to pull off some sick Darth Maul moves against space fish. Darius could use this.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2015 00:27
|
|
|
If I remember correctly, one of the versions of the game is bugged so that if you get the maximum score possible (which I think is 10 million or so), instead of it rolling over or getting stuck there, the game crashes instead.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2015 00:52
|
|
|
The beginning part was always the hardest for me. I kept dying even before reaching the foot missions.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2015 04:13
|
|
|
Nice timing; the Tumblr 70's Sci-Fi Art has an entry today about some early NES box art, and The Guardian Legend PAL boxart is the first one.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2015 21:51
|
|
|
With that box art the Guardian looks like a cyber-pixie. Awesome.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2015 23:07
|
|
|
Oh man, I loved this game but it was always just way too cryptic for me to ever figure out on my own. I really wish they'd make another game like it with the mixed genres. Everything about this game was just so different and fun for the time. I'm really looking forward to seeing the rest of this LP.
|
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2015 05:52
|
|
|
I rolled this game during a try at one of those random game gauntlets, and loved every bit of it. I never finished it, though, the second-to-last door refused to open for me even though I did what it said.
|
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2015 19:48
|
|
|
Hrist posted:Oh man, I loved this game but it was always just way too cryptic for me to ever figure out on my own. I really wish they'd make another game like it with the mixed genres. Everything about this game was just so different and fun for the time. There's Sigma Star Saga for the GBA. It's a shmup/RPG hybrid. I always thought a remake of TGL would be cool if it were first-person like Metroid Prime, having shooter segments with crazy backgrounds like Radiant Silvergun/Ikaruga.
|
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2015 22:31
|
|
|
Ofecks posted:There's Sigma Star Saga for the GBA. It's a shmup/RPG hybrid. I think I've seen a bit of that one streamed before, if I'm thinking of the right one. It looks pretty interesting for something with a similar idea as this, but I think the shooter sections were on a timer instead of something you had to go find and use to progress. I just felt like that would probably get kind of annoying after a bit.
|
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2015 22:59
|
|
|
Yeah, Sigma Star Saga was an interesting idea but it had bad execution: the ship you got teleported into was random as was the stage you were supposed to beat with it, but some ships were too big to make it through corridors without getting hit in the progress and at least in one case, getting screwed over by the RNG meant that you took a hit from crashing into a wall before you could even control the ship. The shooter battles basically replaced random battles, but you still had to fight enemies while on the ground, which made the progress tedious. And finally, while the whole gundata system (choose a bullet pattern, the type of bullet and what happens when it hits an enemy) was a nice idea in theory, it made basically every ship identical to play as, you could only have a single type of shot available at any given time and the secondary ship-specific shots were just plain useless.
|
|
#
?
Jan 7, 2015 00:15
|
|
|
AnotherGamer posted:Yeah, Sigma Star Saga was an interesting idea but it had bad execution: the ship you got teleported into was random as was the stage you were supposed to beat with it, but some ships were too big to make it through corridors without getting hit in the progress and at least in one case, getting screwed over by the RNG meant that you took a hit from crashing into a wall before you could even control the ship. The shooter battles basically replaced random battles, but you still had to fight enemies while on the ground, which made the progress tedious. And finally, while the whole gundata system (choose a bullet pattern, the type of bullet and what happens when it hits an enemy) was a nice idea in theory, it made basically every ship identical to play as, you could only have a single type of shot available at any given time and the secondary ship-specific shots were just plain useless. There was also a bug related to one enemy type that made it so if you killed the wrong thing at the wrong time you'd end up being unable to finish a random shooter segment ever. I think that if they made a second Sigma Star Saga they should concentrate more on the mini-bosses. Those were great to run into.
|
|
#
?
Jan 7, 2015 11:09
|
|
|
Ha ha, good to see this crop up finally. I have many *words* about this game for *happy campers*, but for the most part you don't need to know any of the underlying mechanics to do well. TheWanderingNewbie might talk about them at a later time, so I won't right now. This is a surprisingly forgiving game, even though you can die incredibly quickly. Sadly, most of my NES stuff didn't make the move to the new house so I can't pull out the manual - luckily, people on the internet archive everything so it can be found here. The manual contains spoilers for upcoming bosses, but I can reveal that the fish boss is named Fleepa, and the loving irritating green eyeball is Optomom. Depending on how pedantic you feel, it also provides names for all of the subweapons.  Power shot indeed grumble mutter grumble. Anyways, game is good. Also has  music.
|
|
#
?
Jan 7, 2015 13:33
|
|
|
Mehuyael posted:There was also a bug related to one enemy type that made it so if you killed the wrong thing at the wrong time you'd end up being unable to finish a random shooter segment ever. Not quite: the way you finish shooter segments is to kill a set number of enemies in one, but there's one specific type of enemy on one of the planets that's glitched (apparently a gravestone of some sort) and if it's the last enemy you kill in that shooter segment, it doesn't count towards the enemies killed but the game refuses to spawn any more, meaning you're stuck and need to reset. Pretty sure it has no permanent effects but it's still a huge pain in the rear end.
|
|
#
?
Jan 8, 2015 09:49
|
|
|
AnotherGamer posted:Not quite: the way you finish shooter segments is to kill a set number of enemies in one, but there's one specific type of enemy on one of the planets that's glitched (apparently a gravestone of some sort) and if it's the last enemy you kill in that shooter segment, it doesn't count towards the enemies killed but the game refuses to spawn any more, meaning you're stuck and need to reset. Pretty sure it has no permanent effects but it's still a huge pain in the rear end. Actually the problem is that the programmers put the check at if remaining enemies = 0 instead of <1 or something, and killing the gravestone (which has a ghost attached) counts as two kills, so the remaining enemies are actually at -1, meaning it's not equal to 0, so the mission continues forever.
|
|
#
?
Jan 8, 2015 12:55
|
|
|
Yesssssss, this is the best game. I'm pretty sure I did beat it on TGL mode, but the game proper, no.
|
|
#
?
Jan 8, 2015 22:55
|
|
|
Olesh posted:I have many *words* about this game for *happy campers* Important question: Does this game make you at all *frumple*?
|
|
#
?
Jan 8, 2015 23:01
|
|
|
dis astranagant posted:You picked up a subweapon at the start of the level and never showed it off. You just kept putting the cursor on it in the menu but never did anything with it. I caught this right at the beginning of the next video. I'm a dumb for forgetting to use it in the first place, don't worry though cause I forget to show off another one. Olesh posted:Lotsa game stuff No problem here, if you wanna give actual descriptions for the subweapons and bosses and what not I don't mind.  Today we have the Japanese Box art, which is a bit more Lovecraftian, but like the European Art I like that it focuses more on the Guardian. Area 2 - Kid Gloves are off
|
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 02:48
|
|
|
I'll try and keep this mostly supplemental - things like the boss and subweapon names are in the manual, which I already linked, but I'll channel my inner  and touch on the Gun powerup TheWanderingNewbie got in the latest video.The Gun powerup, perhaps unsurprisingly, increases your attack power. Each shot goes from dealing 1 damage to 2 damage - this halves the number of shots needed to kill enemies, which is significant early on. Something that's not immediately apparent, though, is that your subweapons also increase in attack power with the Gun powerup. You start at 1 Gun, and Newbie is currently at 2 Guns. Most subweapons do the same damage as your gun - they're based on your attack rating. The upgraded multibullets Newbie was showing off at the end of the video, for example, do the same damage whether or not he's upgraded them - the damage they deal is purely based on his current attack power. Upgrading them, however, makes the bullet bigger, faster, and cost more blue chips, so it's generally worthwhile. This is true for most of the subweapons you upgrade as well - they go up in speed, size, and cost, while their damage remains the same as your gun stat. The laser saber (and the double saber), however, do damage based on your attack power and do additional damage when they're upgraded - they're one of the exceptions. As for the other exceptions... I said most subweapons before - the grenade, by comparison, does a fixed 16 damage per shot no matter what your attack power is. The spin shot, quick wave, fireball, and the piercing laser also all do fixed amounts of damage, and their damage goes up when you upgrade them. The grenade may seem like a really good subweapon, and it is - but you might be wondering why Newbie isn't using them on bosses. Well, unfortunately, the answer to that is that TGL caps the amount of damage a boss can receive per hit - any attack that would deal more than 5 damage to a boss is instead reduced to 5 damage. So each grenade would only do 5 damage, making grenades not really a good option vs bosses. It absolutely tears up regular enemies, though! Also, as a fun side benefit, you can actually damage enemies by running into them - any time you take contact damage from an enemy, the enemy takes contact damage from you equivalent to a shot from your gun (except bosses, who are jerks and immune to your touch of death). It's not really a good idea as a primary means of attack, but sometimes you'll see enemies die when they run into Newbie and that's why. Something that's not really obvious about the multibullets, either, is that they can be fired in all 8 directions, even during shooter segments. They're intended to be sort of your default subweapon, because you can fire subweapons even while firing your regular gun. Olesh fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Jan 9, 2015 |
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 09:47
|
|
|
Man, I really need to play this again. I also wish more games these days did the hybrid stuff, I'd love a mixture of Megaman and a shmup in once.
|
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 12:38
|
|
|
Wow, that boss in Corridor 2 seemed pretty bullshit. Which, most NES games had bosses like that though, so it's not surprising! Regardless, this game keeps impressing me quite a bit. Thanks for showing it off!
|
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 19:39
|
|
|
With a subweapon equipped, you can shoot 3 normal shots at a time. Rather, you can have 3 on-screen at once. Take off the subweapon, however ("No use"), you can do 4. As a kid I mostly just stuck with the main gun and didn't use subweapons until the later levels; I learned that having no weapon equipped was optimal. The corridor 2 crawdad boss (I forget its name) can be cheesed by staying in the center of the screen and using the fireball weapon without moving.
|
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 19:48
|
|
|
Ofecks posted:With a subweapon equipped, you can shoot 3 normal shots at a time. Rather, you can have 3 on-screen at once. Take off the subweapon, however ("No use"), you can do 4. As a kid I mostly just stuck with the main gun and didn't use subweapons until the later levels; I learned that having no weapon equipped was optimal. It's generally not worth trading the utility of subweapons for the extra shot on screen unless you don't have the chips for subweapons in the first place. The game is also pretty good about making sure that you get regular refills, so you're expected to use your subweapons pretty regularly both in the corridors and in the labyrinth. Especially the grenade - finding a screen with spiders on it, hanging around for a few seconds, and then tossing a few grenades into the pile is a great way to get a bunch of drops to restore HP/chips quickly.
|
|
#
?
Jan 9, 2015 21:23
|
|
|
A worthy title to be LPed; thanks much Newbie. This was one of my favorite NES games growing up because of the dual genres. I'll be keeping an eye on this one.
|
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2015 03:57
|
|
|
TheWanderingNewbie posted:Today we have the Japanese Box art, which is a bit more Lovecraftian, but like the European Art I like that it focuses more on the Guardian. That seems more Giger-inspired than Lovecraft-inspired.
|
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2015 04:00
|
|
|
Genocyber posted:That seems more Giger-inspired than Lovecraft-inspired.
|
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2015 12:28
|
|
|
Genocyber posted:That seems more Giger-inspired than Lovecraft-inspired. Oh yeah, I can't believe I mistyped that bad on that. I did mean Giger.  So this update is going up so late because, right after recording today and Thursdays episode on Saturday, I knocked over my External and ended up breaking it. Luckily almost everything was recovered but it super delayed this update. ANYWAY ENJOY. Area 3 - Train Wreck
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2015 06:35
|
|
|
TheWanderingNewbie posted:
Is that not the Guardian? Is there some other Giger esq... whatever the gently caress you fight at some point that's that? Or is the Guardian some kind of eldritch... plane... monster... person? This game is cool, though. I'm really digging the mash up. Wish I had it when I was a kid.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2015 07:28
|
|
|
Ayup, that's where my game usually ended. Those beams from the boss are complete death.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2015 10:47
|
|
|
Never seen a better place for where save-states can save sanity.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2015 12:34
|
|
|
Night10194 posted:Important question: Does this game make you at all *frumple*? Do not forget to *enjoy the sauce*
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2015 22:49
|
|
|
Aaand here's where the game has expected you to figure out or intuit certain aspects of the mechanics. If I have the time I might record a video to show it off, but overall that boss is incredibly punishing - remember that Newbie has just gotten TWO defensive upgrades, practically back to back - and those seaweed strings it spits out do a crapload of damage. The fireball will eat shots, including the seaweed shots so long as they've been released from the boss. The fight gets a _lot_ easier if you figure out that the fireball clears those out and you don't let yourself get pinned down.
|
|
#
?
Jan 13, 2015 05:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 15:29 |
|
|
Olesh posted:The fireball will eat shots, including the seaweed shots so long as they've been released from the boss. See I THOUGHT I read that somewhere but i couldn't get it to work, I didn't know about the 'they had to be released' thing.  Today's level is a bit more laid back then the last one, so enjoy it. Area 4 - A Leisurely Stroll
|
|
#
?
Jan 16, 2015 02:30
|
|