A Brief Introduction to "Platforming Week"

Jump!

This past week, my good friend over at Cinema is Cinema wrote about a different RPG each day of the week. I may not be as well-spoken as he is, but I figured I could give this "daily post week" thing a shot. However, in the interest of keeping things slightly different, I figured I would stray from talking about the same genre of games. Instead, I've decided to talk about the genre I played first and grew to love even more as time went on: the platformer.

Anyone who knows my taste in games at all knows I am a huge fan of platforming games, or, as I like to call them, "Go right and jump games." Why do I love them so much? That's a damn good question, and unfortunately, I don't really have an answer. Perhaps it's the fact that it's how I started playing games. Maybe it's because of the feeling of satisfaction I get upon completing a level. It could be that "easy to learn, tough to master" mentality that's so prevalent in most platformers. I really can't say, and as such, it's difficult to objectively review platformers. After playing a game, I can tell you whether or not I enjoyed it, but the more I try to analyze it, the more confused I get. Therefore, I likely will not be looking at too many specific qualities, but a few main things I will mention in each game will be the soundtrack, difficulty, control, and overall fun factor of the game.

To conclude this introduction, I would like to point out that I'm not claiming the games I write about are the "best platforming titles of all time" or anything like that. They're simply games that stand out in my mind as enjoyable platformers. It goes without saying that there will be many popular fan-favorites that I will not be mentioning. The platformer is a genre that's seen hundreds of titles so it would be nearly impossible for me to play all of them. That being said, it is a genre I truly love and will continue to play more games in.

I will kick off the week tomorrow with a look at the first 2D Castlevania I played and what is likely my favorite of the "classic" series before the "metroidvania" style gameplay, "Super Castlevania IV."