First, a little back-story. I never owned a PlayStation(though I do have a PS2), so it was by chance that I came to play one of my all time favorite games that just so happened to be a PS game: Star Wars Jedi Power Battles. My best friend, who passed away just over a year ago, was one of the zillions who did own a PlayStation. He and I would get together every weekend and indulge ourselves in drink and all that crap. One weekend he suggested renting Jedi Power Battles. I was pretty interested in the game, what with the non-stop commercials for it and all. So we rented it, fell in love with it, and rented it about every weekend for some time. When I got a PS2, I eventually picked up my own copy of JPB. I loved the game so much, I also bought the DreamCast version used for 30 bucks. So anyways, we beat the game every which way, with every character, without continuing, etc. One thing that always eluded us was beating the game solo with Plo Koon. He's slower, doesn't combo well, and Darth Maul owns him. About every weekend my brother comes by and we play games together. We usually play SSBM, but lately we've been breaking from it a bit and playing other things. This last weekend I introduced him to JPB on the DC. We got to the final level before he had to go, but playing agian for the first time in years lit a fire under me. I still had never beaten Darth Maul with Plo Koon. I'd always talk about picking the game up and giving it another go(I think I may have mentioned it here a time or two), but I'd always put it off. Today I took up the challenge. After checking GameFaqs in hopes that someone had posted a good strategy, I was still at square one. None of the faqs had a good strategy other than using his quickest combo and hoping for the best. After getting destroyed many times over, I noticed something. It's best to run from Maul, then when you have space try and catch him charging you. That's fine and dandy, but it wasn't effective enough. Then I noticed that often when you run away enough he'll stop, then fire a Force beam that sweeps across the screen. After toying with this a while, I found that if you jump over the beam and land a certain distance from him(not too far, not too close), you can catch him with a one-two combo, often the second strike would land. Rinse and repeat. And that's it. After all these years, something so simple had kept me from completing this game fully. I mean, it's simple, but it's not exactly something you're bound to figure out quickly. But nonetheless, I did it. Adding this to the fact that I finally beat Mike Tyson in Mike Tyson's Punch-Out, I'd say I've had a pretty eventful year in gaming. I also was able to finish Ninja Gaiden this year. This leaves the list of games that have stumped me rather small, and at the top of that list is TMNT on the NES. I don't know if I'm quite up to that challenge just yet, but maybe sometime soon. In closing, JPB has been bested. Jack, this one's for you. :)

Ah, that was a good game...never owned it but played it at my neighbor's house a long time ago...glad you could finally beat it.

I always loved the fancy attacks and cool combos in that game. It's easily my favorite Star Wars game of all time.

I agree guys, it's a very fun game. Too bad the bugs in the game have tainted it's legacy. I'm always hoping more old school-ish beat-em-ups will be released, but at least we have the oldies to keep us entertained. I often fantasize about making my own Wii Ware tiles, with beat-em-ups being the number one genre I'd like to explore. Too bad you gotta know computer crap to make games, as I think I could make some killer Final Fight/Double Dragon-esque games. :)

Has anyone else out there conquered any tough games as of late? Are there any games sitting in your collections that you plan to finally beat? If so, I'd love to hear about them. :)

Good luck with TMNT. After nearly 20 years, that game still haunts me. I'm still too scared to go back and try it again for fear of ultimate failure that may lead to my jumping from a bridge.

I really hate that game.

TMNT is the devil. It beat my ass as a child, and recently I found it and thought "wow, this game sure was tough when I was a kid. Let's see how easily I can beat it now...."

It didn't quite work that way.

Guys, I feel ya on TMNT. I picked it up about a year ago for the first time since the 80's and thought I might be able to handle it better. For instance, I had a much easier time as an adult with Mike Tyson's Punch-Out, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, and Kid Icarus, though I had beat Kid Icarus when I was a lad. On the other hand, I had a devil of a time playing Castlevania on my GBA(NES Classic series). I remembered it being tough as a kid, but not as tough as it turned out to be. I was able to finish it, but I thought "How the hell did I beat this as a kid?".

Anyways, when I did try TMNT last time, I had a hard time with the infamous underwater seaweed from hell level. I want to go at it fresh and full of gusto, like I did with Ninja Gaiden and MTPO. I know if I go in half-hearted it's going to break me down and toss me to the curb.