(Logo by Death_Strandicoot)
Insert Credit Forums Remake
December 2024
new year, new me, same old forum
2024 is twenty-twenty-no-more; it’s a new year, and a new issue of Insert Credit Forums Remake! Sorry that this issue is arriving so late. I have no excuse, I’ve had the time to get this done and just have gotten distracted with other things. Please pretend that it’s still January, so that whenever I refer to “this” month, I’m not incorrect. Obskyr and Tom have both written contributions to this month’s issue, so thank yous to them!
Now, let’s move on from this apologetic preamble into the full-amble!
ICFR Jams
~Cool Sega Jazz Fusion~
…at least I think it’s jazz fusion, I’m not always great with genres…
Forum Clubs
Last month, the Monthly Game Club played Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong’s Double Trouble! Opinion seemed generally positive, though divided on Kiddy Kong: is he a big, beautiful baby boy, or is he a big, ugly baby boy? Kiki posted a wonderful screenshot let’s play of the entire game, though the person who the game seemed to impact the most was Obskyr, who had this to say about her experience:
“For the final Game Club game of 2024, Donkey Kong Country 3 was chosen as a particularly winter holiday-smacking game. I didn’t get it – but together with a sledful of fellow forumites, we made it a holiday game. I think I’m justified, however, in saying that it affected me in an exceptionally profound manner.
“I stoked my oven this December with the winds of the Northern Kremisphere. Feelings that were initially lukewarm quickly grew into an obsession – a vice, even, as when I needed to calm my nerves, I would produce a PS Vita out of thin air to donk a kong to calm my nerves. (My girlfriend couldn’t complain – whenever I look away, she suddenly has a cigarette in her hand.) The SNES version wasn’t enough – after completing it, I went on to the GBA port, and tickled my comparative video game history receptors. Like some perverse shadow of H. C. Andersen’s little matchstick girl, when life got frightfully cold, I’d light up a Kiddy Kong and see the most captivating visions of banana birds, bonus barrels, and motorcycle bees.
“Eventually, I had played all there was to play – I was done, cold turkey – and found myself forlorn, hands grasping for one more banana. But life must go on, and I’m sure you’ll all be proud to hear I’ve been clean for just over a week now…
…because it doesn’t count that I’m now in the middle of Donkey Kong Land Ⅲ on the Game Boy Color, right?”
We can only hope, for her sake, that the Kong Donking stops soon.
This month, the club is playing Attack of the Friday Monsters! A Tokyo Tale. Continuing the trend DKC3 ostensibly set by including an exclamation mark in its title, this short Millenium Kitchen developed 3DS game tells a story about Japanese youthfulness.
The IC Fishing Club has continued convening, to chill, fish, and chat; having now joined in I can confirm it’s a good time. You can gamble and put worms on a piece of string and throw it into water and talk to people, what’s not to love!
Finally, this month the time attack and score attack threads were revived! Every 2 weeks will alternate between either thread; currently, the time attack thread is attacking Ridge Racer Type 4, so c’mon, get with the program! (my grandma can drive faster than that).
Thread Spotlight
This month’s thread is Adventure Island Online - Maple Story is secretly Wonder Boy in Monster World. While both Maple Story and Adventure Island are well known games, their similarities aren’t often noted. Through comparing the two games, Treefroggy makes a strong case that Maple Story was designed as an MMO adaptation of Adventure Island, from having similar gameplay mechanics, to similar music, to the smoking gun of Maple Story being named Adventure Island Online in China. Also, see this thread for treefroggy’s ventures into other forums to share this knowledge with them.
Gossip Corner
- Anonymous slanderers claim that freakscene is in fact not a freak, but a completely normal individual; despite the questionable validity of these claims, they must be reported anyways.
- Rumors abound that the name “insert credit” might be changed to “extract value” in a bizarre pivot to crypto-blockchain podcasting; Bonk will still be mentioned just as frequently, however.
- In the time since DStrogen stopped sharing pictures of big hats, BigHatPaul has joined… what’s the connection?!?
- After the switch over last year, everyone’s been more or less satisfied with Discourse, but ghost hunters of the forum are starting to suspect the ghost of Flarum might soon exact its revenge…
If you’ve chanced across any rumours you just know have to be in next month’s issue, please discreetly send them to NoJoTo via private message; she’ll take care of them (put them in next month’s issue).
(Insert Credit Forums Remake takes no responsibility for any of the claims made in the “Gossip Corner”)
2024 Forum Stats
Forum mod Tom has put together a nice breakdown of some interesting statistics about last year on the forum! Due to the move from Flarum to Discourse, some of the stats don’t pertain to before the switch. Here is what Tom sent me (which he even formatted so nicely as well!):
Total posts (including Flarum) - 51648
Total posts (Discourse only) - 39767
Total likes (Discourse only) - 168111
Average likes per post (Discourse only) - 4.23
New Users - 333
New Users in Discourse - 242
New topics - 381
New topics in Discourse - 267
Busiest Day - 2024-12-13 - 801 posts
Busiest Topic - KEIGHIEYLY CORPOSLOP PROPAGANDA NIGHT 2024 - TGA Discussion and Live Blog Quarantine - 666 posts
Longest post (HTML) by characters - Dec '24 Monthly Game Club - Donkey Kong Country 3 - #91 by Kiki - 98370
Longest post (Markdown) by characters - the mortal enemy of videogames - #2403 by yeso - 38601
Total Polls - 122
Total Options - 388
Total Votes - 2892
Average votes per poll - 23.7
Average questions per poll - 3
Busiest Poll - Insert Credit Forums Remake - October 2024 issue - 60 votes
Largest voted response - https://forums.insertcredit.com/t/will-exodus-see-this-limited-time-event/3211/16 - 38 votes for Mods keep the thread open and shut it down as originally scheduled and we all pretend that we haven’t been seen by the forum host
Posts with mention of console manufacturer:
Nintendo - 677
Sega - 393
Sony - 183
Microsoft - 78
NEC - 12
Posts with mention of game consoles:
Sega
Genesis/MD - 1705
Saturn - 465
Game Gear - 293
DreamCast - 222
Master System/Mark III - 210
Sony
PSP - 1512
Playstation 2 - 608
Playstation 5 - 301
Playstation 3 - 260
Playstation 4 - 251
Playstation - 206
Nintendo
Switch - 5093
SNES/Super Famicom - 2261
N64 - 1133
NES/Famicom - 903
GameBoy - 864
GameBoy Advance - 453
3DS - 352
DS - 343
GameBoy Color - 121
GameBoy Pocket - 48
2DS - 25
Misc
PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16 - 917
Neo Geo - 345
Neo Geo Pocket - 215
Neo Geo Pocket Color - 66
PC-98 - PC-98
FM Towns - 12
Sharp X68000 - 5
New Threads
This month: the Beastie Boys, foolishness, and gamer’s thumb.
-
The REAL Game of the Year Thread (2024)
Unlike the all those other FAKE game of the year lists, captain wants to know what your favorite games you played in 2024 were, regardless of their release year. -
What is the best japanese FPS??
Punchmaniacs wants to determine what the best Japanese-developed first person shooter is. -
20 for 2024: Your favorite songs this year
goatmyboat is curious what your top 20 songs of 2024 were (captain would consider this thread REAL, as it also cares not for when the songs were first released). -
Developer Workstations, Player Play Stations
Seeing developers working on games, the hardware they’re using, and what their overall workspace looks like is interesting, and so treefroggy has started a thread to share pictures of just that. -
The Insert Credit Holiday Gift Guide
The holidays may be over, but this thread started by Hunter might still be useful for help in picking presents or for showing off presents you’ve given or received! -
Autism 69000
biff_stallion has created a thread for themselves and others to talk about the experience of being autistic. -
The Wonderful Games of Oz
For all you friends (and acquaintances) of Dorothy, TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee has started a thread to share and discuss games based in the world of Oz. -
KEIGHIEYLY CORPOSLOP PROPAGANDA NIGHT 2024 - TGA Discussion and Live Blog Quarantine
The gamer’s Christmas and Thanksgiving in one epic package, The yearly Gamer Awards have come ‘round again, and so Gaagaagiins has started a thread to talk about this year’s celebrations. -
Year in Review 2024 (Switch/PSN/XB/Steam/Etc)
Tradegood wants to know what all your game platforms say you played last year, in their end-of-year recap thingies. -
Forum Moderation & Leadership Changes for 2025
Slink and Tradegood are joining the moderation team, captain and tom’s roles are taking on greater moderation responsibilities, and antillese is stepping down from the team; thank you all for your work, past and future, in caring for this forum. -
Bouncing off, only to return again
RubySunrise has started a thread for discussing experiences with games that you initially bounced off of, then later returned to and enjoyed in a new way. -
Most foolish game purchases
It’s inevitable that one’s internal clock will eventually strike fool o’clock, and us game purchasers are no exception; exodus has started a thread for sharing instances of such foolishness. -
infinite thread on threads in Infinity Nikki
If you want to share pictures of your outfits in Infinity Nikki, onnuhhhh’s got you covered with this thread. -
Ergonomic Gaming(my thumb hurts)
sabertoothalex has created a thread for sharing ways to game more ergonomically and stave off the dreaded “gamer’s thumb.” -
Intergalactic Discussion
I think this is a thread, started by Gaagaagiins, for a song by the Beastie Boys, but as I am not such a beastie boy, I’m left only with feelings of uncertainty. -
Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio Please
If you want to talk about the Yakuza series or read a review of a restaurant that reminded thread-creator treefroggy of video games, this is the thread for doing just that! -
Daily Games (with words or otherwise)
onnuhhhh has started a thread for talking about all the various daily games, be they about guessing, crosswording, puzzling, or otherwise adhering to a 24-hour schedule. -
Mist Walk with Me
If you want to talk about the games of the studio Mistwalker, why not join Tradegood on her walk? -
Is Your Partner Into Games?
treefroggy wants the stats on whether your partner is a gamer, and has started a thread to find out. -
Gaming Resolutions
RubySunrise wants to know what your gaming-related New Year’s resolutions are!
The Conclusion
Well, it’s the end of the issue, but It’s the start of a new year, which hopefully will be the first full year of monthly Insert Credit Forum Remakes! Though, as you can tell from this issue’s lateness, I’m not particularly good at putting this thing together on time… While I certainly enjoy putting these together, I, uh, wouldn’t at all mind if anyone wanted to help out by writing for certain sections, put together more ICFR Jams playlists, provide general feedback, or otherwise contribute, even if you’re just yelling at me to get to work. If helping in such ways at all intrigues you, feel free to join this discord server! I’d love for this thing to someday become self-sustaining and unreliant on me, though I’m still willing to put in the work if that never happens!
…there is one thing left, however…
Unofficial Mascot for the Month
Jeff Gerstmann won last month’s poll, defeating a zoo’s worth of animals, from a dog, to a hedgehog, to a bull. This month, however, the contestants are:
- “Hotshot Crotchidile,” From Super Genjin 2(submitted by Death_Strandicoot)
- Kiddy Kong, from Donkey Kong Country 3 (submitted by Obskyr)
- Gorilla Mask, from Godhand (submitted by Gaagaagiins)
- Ecco, from Ecco the Dolphin (submitted by NoJoTo)
If you want your pick in the next month’s installment, please DM me (or otherwise privately contact me) with the character whenever you want. It doesn’t have to be a video game-related character, just any character you think is befitting of being the forum’s unofficial mascot!
