The Castlevania one is fine since it's the most apples-to-apples comparison he's got. I kind of disagree with his comments on Castlevania IV because his major complaint (that the extra weapons don't have much purpose with the whip being more powerful) is like... You don't like that they threw in extra optional features? Well okay then.
Mega Man X one is also funny but it's not really him comparing MMX to MM, it's just raving about how great MMX is.
It combined with the Zelda sequelitis demonstrates something about Arin's gamer profile which is that he's stuck in an 8-bit mentality of game design. Mega Man is great because it can teach the player without being intrusive, but Mega Man also has two buttons. It doesn't need on-screen tutorials because you'll literally figure everything out just by hitting the buttons at the beginning of the game, and then everything in the game is contextual. 3D games are far more complex and sometimes require tutorials. Now yes, there are many instances where the tutorials are annoying and disruptive, but when you see something like in his OOT sequelitis where he complains about the spinning spike trap and it's like.. You can't keep track of an object moving in a fixed path on the Z-axis? And that's the game's fault?
(btw the "The game introduces a puzzle to you in a safe environment, allows you to 'master' it and then adds a twist to it that tests your skills" formula he talks about in MM is also in Mario 3D World's level design so I wonder what he thinks about that game)
There was a moment in the Sonic 06 play through (which Sonic 06 is NOT a good game at all but I still feel this is worth mentioning in its favor) where Arin was playing as Silver and didn't know what to do, walks straight towards one of the question mark tutorials, then deliberately circles around it while complaining that he doesn't know what to do. Jon gave him shit for it but there's countless times in the Mario 64, Sunshine, Wind Waker, Sonic Boom, Sonic 06 etc. play-throughs where Arin flails around because he didn't pay attention to something in the game that explicitly told him how to use a certain ability or solve a certain puzzle. Danny figured something out in the Sonic Boom play-through that Arin dismissed for several episodes, figured out on his own and was just like "Oh, well it's still stupid"
Game Grumps is a silly comedy show so it's not that big of a deal that they suck at some video games, in fact that often adds to the joke - but when he wraps it up in honest game critique it's hard to take anything he says seriously when you realize how many of his problems with a game just come from him playing badly.
