The top 5 Retro games in my collection I could never sell

I talk to lots of people who buy or have retro games and we all seem to collect slightly different things, some people are into RPG's or the games of a certain studio or for a set platform, some peoples collections are in the process of growing others have started to downsize, some people have even quit collecting and then started again. On one of the forums I am on I thought it would be a good thing to discuss the games in peoples collections that people simply wouldn't be able to say goodbye to for one reason or another.

I wanted to think of ten games I own that I could simply not get rid  of but this proved tough so I decided Id start with 5 to get the ball rolling and then I could return to this topic in the future.

The number one game I could not get rid of is World of Illusion on the MegaDrive, the reason I couldnt get rid of it is purly sentimental, I dont really think it has that much worth money wise and I dont think its particularly a rare game but to me it holds huge sentimental value.  I can remember getting it for Christmas from my parents, I can remember how excited I  was the first time I played it and I have many happy memories of playing it with my mum who unfortunately passed away about 6 years ago. As silly as it might sound selling it would be like selling part of her, it would be like parting with a family heirloom and its not something I am prepaired or willing to do. I miss my mum a lot all of the time but even playing this game for a few minutes reminds me of how blessed I was to have her in my life and not only what a great mum she was but also how much fun we always had togther.

The second game I wouldnt want to get rid of is Fire Emblem for the GBA. Yes a fully boxed Pal copy of this game might be hard to come by and costly and this does feed into the reason im going to hold on to thid game tightly but theres a little more to it than that.  I got this game from a carboot for £5 complete back when the GBA was pretty current, I have to admit that as far as I remember I didn't have a clue what it was, I played it and instantly fell in love with it, it reminded me of Vandal Hearts  which I had previously rented on PS1 and extremly enjoyed. As far as it goes with this game I love the way it plays I find it extremly replayable, im really happy I didnt pay much for it and it sparked a love for a whole series of games which still burns brightly within me more than this though its the purchase that reminds me of many happy carboot trips and for me is like a symbol of my collection, and of the way I go about collecting games.

Number three is yet another Fire Emblem game, this time it is Fire Emblem Path of Radience , I first played this game when a buddy lent it me not long after release. He basically played it none stop, then lent it to me and I played it none stop and then we talked about the plot and characters loads. It was one of those games that I knew I would play through a whole bunch of times and that I needed to purchse it. So I kept my eyes open and looked for it all over the place, even when it was relativly new it wasnt exactly an easy game to get hold of, eventually I found a second hand copy in a local branch of GameStation and I purchased it for £20 and then a friend stole it, I struggled and struggled to get another copy which cost me £40 , its the game which actually stopped me letting people lend games from me. I guess I have it now and even if I ultimatly paid £60 as I had to buy it twice lots of people have paid a heck of a lot more for this game and with the amount I have played it the game has certainly been worth every penny.

The 4th game is The Punisher on Megadrive, lots and lots of happy memories of playing this with my brother, we were like best friends but we have drifted apart, this reminds me of the good old days. To be honest I wouldnt really want to get rid of any of my walk along beat em up games because its one of my favourate genresbut this is particularly true of the rare ones which would be incredibly hard to get again.

The 5th game I wouldnt ever want to get rid of would be Xcom Enemy Unknown for the PS1 , my whole friend group played this when I was younger and we chatted about it loads. My favourite person to compare notes with now lives in America, playing it is not only enjoyable it makes me think of our friendship.It was really funny as in the early stages of the game id use a certain tactic which would drive him up the wall, he always refered to  it as me cheating. So what did I do that was so bad? Well basically when I was on a mission with a tiny alien spaceship that had landed I would get a solider and make him prime a grenade, I would then have him walk into the alien craft knowing that he would be instantly gunned down but his grenade would then explode at the end of the turn killing the aliens inside, winning me the mission and securing me a tonne of things to sell and research, id sacrafice this one dude and it would really get the ball rolling. My friend would refuse to let anyone purposly die but would meanwhile loose loads of soldiers engaging in fair warfare with the Alien menace, my tactics might have worked better but if theres ever a real alien war id sooner he be my commanding officer than someone like me, just incase im the one holding the grenades.

Movie Debate: What makes a good sequel?

So what makes a good sequel? While I was looking at all of the Demoni/Demons films and talking about which was a real sequel and which was a sequel in name only I was also trying to review the sequels to a limited extent, I was talking about if they felt like sequels but also if they were in fact good films. This got me thinking that for my next blog post maybe I should talk about what makes a good sequel. Now all of my examples and such will be based around film sequels but a lot of the points made within could also relate to video games or books.

Well an easy place to start would be to name a few really good sequels and then maybe think about what I like about one or two of them. The following are films which for one reason or another I believe are some of the best sequels you can find, not all of them will have a 2 plastered on the end but they are definitely considered real proper official sequels. OK so here is my list Dawn of the dead, The Empire Strikes back, Aliens, Star Trek 2 The Wrath of Kahn. I am not saying that these are the only good sequels or that they are the best but they are all sequels I respect and feel don't disappoint fans of the original.

So taking Aliens as a starting point, what does it take from the original film? Well it takes the character of Riply and it takes the alien creature the Xenomorph, it takes everything you learned and know from the first film about both this woman and this type of monster and then applies them to a new situation. It is definitely a sequel and feels like a sequel because it is the continuing story/adventures of Riply. So what is different? Well the first film was very much a horror film, there was one Alien hence the films title Alien and it basically stalked the crew of a ship the ship was a commercial spacecraft so they were just regular working people with no military training, there were also no real weapons on board with which to defend themselves, where as the Alien with its claws, its large frame, predatory instincts and acid for blood was a born killer. In the sequel Riply becomes the civilian advisor to a team of Colonial Marines basically bad ass soldiers with all of the weapons you could dream of, hand guns, plasma rifles, assault rifles, grenades, body armour, helmet cameras, they are tooled up trained professionals, professionals who would have killed that one lone Alien with very little trouble. The problem is that in this case they are not set against a lone Alien, rather they end up facing a relentless hoard of Aliens, yes they shoot, kill and incinerate lots of Aliens but with everyone they kill more and more just keep coming. It would be hard to call this a horror film like the first one, I would be inclined to think of it more as a Science Fiction Action movie with Elements of horror in it, in fact it kind of feels like a War film at times sort of either a Vietnam movie or one of those old Western fort under siege flicks. Yet this is one of my favourite sequels and that is because it has a strong connection to the original film bringing back both the last survivor and using the same Monster but it also is not afraid to take these set pieces and do something new and interesting with them instead of being just a cash in rehash of what came before.

Star Trek 2 the Wrath of Kahn and The Empire Strikes back are even more obvious than this, they are set in the same world's and feature pretty much all of the main characters from there respective prequels. Yet if we look at Dawn of the Dead the sequel to Night of the living dead there is no central character from the first movie returning to feature in the sequel, all that is returning is the monster, the Zombies.and these guys look a lot different, a lot better really. The first film was in black and white yet this sequel was in colour. The same Director was at the helm of both films and they were both based on his vision which wasn't true in the case of Alien and Aliens, Aliens was more like someone new jumping in to the original guys toy box and playing with the toys in his own way. So you can argue that in one way Dawn is a truer sequel because its by the same Director yet Aliens has a returning lead character, which one matters more? Well that depends on your own personal view, I don't mind somebody new being at the helm, new people can bring new ideas and a fresh perspective but I also don't mind sequels that are set in the same world but don't directly follow a certain persons story, in some cases it can be the world itself which is the central character.

So I guess basically a sequel is a continuation, it can be a continuation of a world story or a persons story or a whole group of peoples stories, it can be any of these things and be a good sequel as long as its good. If its the continuation of a person or a groups story then they don't have to do the exact same thing in the exact same place, if its a continuation of a worlds story it doesn't have to even be set in the same part of that world as the last film. A sequel can even be a part of a slightly different genre, what it has to do though is feel somehow connected and deliver something which will interest those who were interested in the original. Often it is when a sequel is too similar or far too different that it is considered bad, people will moan if something is just a rehash but then they will also moan if it doesn't feel connected at all. I think the best formula would be to take elements of the past but to use them to do either a completely new story or a continuing story which offers your fans something of the old while not overly repeating yourself to the point people might as well just save themselves some cash and watch the original again.