Set Side B 2024 in Review

rodneylives — Tue, 31 Dec 2024 15:00:00 +0000

We used to do monthly summary posts, but they ended up being a lot of work to keep up, and often there would be something interesting I’d want to post about that would preempt them. So in their place, and in recognition of Set Side B’s new Bluesky feed (which supplements, but doesn’t replace, our Mastodon feed), here’s a recap of what I consider to be just some of the more-interesting blog posts we published in 2024.

If you’re just coming in from social media and wondering what we’re about, Set Side B is a daily blog that covers what we call “the Flipside of Gaming” (notice the tasteful use of our tagline), specifically in the Retro, Niche and Indie fields. All of that basically gives us license to chase after whatever gaming information we enjoy, which is usually the antithesis of AAA gaming. If we’re being honest with ourselves, we do cover games sometimes that might be called Triple-A, the Legend of Zelda series comes up a lot and they’re often considered headliners, but Nintendo generally tends to have rather a different approach to gamedev than other companies. I’m not going to say they’re perfect, frog knows they have their faults, but they still manage to surprise us from time to time.

So, let’s get on to that recap. Posts marked Sundry Sunday are finds from gaming culture, usually funny Youtube videos. Posts that largely include original content by me are marked Original. I might have misapplied that signifier in places, because I often include extra commentary on posts, and even after spending two hours constructing this behemoth of a list, I have gone mostly by memory and not reviewed every post here. I’m certain that you’ll find something interesting, if you have a look. Set Side B’s archives are unusually rich with wonders, mostly found but sometimes made, and I’m sure if you take a spelunk through our mines, you will be rewarded.

JANUARY

JAN 1: Mario Kart’s catch-up system

JAN 2: FM-synth enhanced version of the Space Harrier theme on Japanese Master System hardware

JAN 5: The many fan revivals of Toontown Online

JAN 6: Dialup AOL-era Neverwinter Nights

JAN 9: Original — The 10th-Key scatter bug in NES Pac-Man

JAN 12 & MAY 20: Hempuli’s many riffs on Sokoban – Part 1, Part 2

JAN 15 & 16: Dark Arts of Pinball – Bang Backs and Deathsaves

JAN 21: AGDQ highlight: Playing Gyromite, but with a dog in place of R.O.B.

JAN 24: Original — On Stephen’s Sausage Roll

JAN 27 & 29: Displaced Gamers’ Behind the Code on Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde, Part 1 and Part 2

JAN 31: Gamefinds — Cosmic Collapse, a Suika Game-style remake in Pico 8, but with better play

APR 27 & JUN 25: Original — On Dungeon, a 30-year-old CRPG system for the Commodore 64, and my own attempts to rerelease it. The original and efforts to revise it.

APR 29: Commodore Free Magazine

MAY

May 2: Moviecart, adapting films to play on an Atari 2600

MAY 3: The history of KidPix

MAY 5: Sunday Sunday — Animated Lego breakfast with Super Mario

MAY 6: Retro Game Mechanics explains how to glitch out Super Mario World by stomping Wigglers

MAY 9: Which version of Wizardry to play?

MAY 15: Original — Comparing the character sets of microcomputers

MAY 16: Original — A directory of U Can Be Video Games’ videos

MAY 23: Nintendo uncensors Vivian’s transness in the remake of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door

MAY 24: Original — @Play: Which is better, ring mail or splint mail?

MAY 25: Dani Bunten’s early classic computer game Wheeler Dealers has been preserved

MAY 30: Awesome Donkey Kong romhack compilation

MAY 31: Ocarina of Time timer bug, taking advantage of extremely low health

JUNE

JUN 4: The esports scene around Farming Simulator

JUN 7: Hardcore Gaming 101 thread on obscure arcade secrets

JUN 9: Sundry Sunday — Bing Bang, an awesome animation for a Splatoon 3 song

JUN 10: Why does Pac-Man’s split screen happen? Video explainer, with a lengthy text explainer-explainer by me

JUN 13: Complete but abandoned Tarzan Atari 2600 game recovered after 40 years

JUN 14: On Game Dads, small, inexpensive yet capable handheld emulation machines

JUN 16: Sundry Sunday — Mexican Flyer (that song from Space Channel 5) and its history

JUN 22: Dan Olsen of Folding Ideas discusses James Rolfe, the Angry Video Game Nerd

JUN 28: Mattel’s handheld Dungeons & Dragons LCD game

JULY

JUL 2: Website for generating animated Earthbound battle backgrounds

JUL 5: Original — On the history of Wizardry

JUL 8: The marquee and instruction card for Vs. Super Mario Bros (including a rather different official illustration of Mario than you usually see from Nintendo)

JUL 12: Snafuru’s extensive Wizardry fanpage

JUL 13: The MAD Magazine type-in program

JUL 16: Blade & Bastard, the (current!) Wizardry novel/manga

JUL 19: Dune author Frank Herbert’s book on 80s microcomputers, “Without Me You’re Nothing”

JUL 20, 25: Original — Getting Started in Digital Eclipse’s remake of Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord, Part 1 & Part 2

JUL 23: The Mr. Saturn text generator

JUL 29 & AUG 5: Looygi Bros tests various glitches in the Nintendo World Championships game, Part 1 & Part 2

JUL 31: A presenter at RustCon explains why MISSINGNO happens in Pokemon

AUGUST

AUG 2: Original — Review of World of Goo 2

AUG 6: Shmuplations translates an interview with a programmer on arcade Donkey Kong

AUG 13: Original — Science facts from No Man’s Sky

AUG 14: Comparing versions of Space Harrier

AUG 15: How randomness is used in Ms. Pac-Man

AUG 17: Complete Youtube playthroughs of the original Zork trilogy

AUG 19: A blog about Sega’s Flicky

AUG 20: Hidden Dialogue in Earthbound

AUG 21: The game Mission: Impossible on CP/M

AUG 24: Sunsoft’s Hebereke cartoons on Youtube

AUG 28, 29 & SEP 2, 4 & NOV 19: Original — How to play Atari Games’ Rampart, and also someone other than me talking about Rampart, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, someone else