Your most memorable moments in gaming.
 

Look back on your gaming life. What events do you treasure most and feel will likely never happen again? Was it opening the box to a new system, completing game X on Y mode, did it totally shock you when character A killed character B? List your most exciting, memorable, or otherwise fun moments in gaming.

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1. My mom bought me my own Sega Genesis. I had been wanting one ever since I saw the commercial for Sonic the Hedgehog. Fortunately my aunt had the game but she lived out of town and I only got to play it once or twice a month when she visited. When I got the system and the game for myself thats when my video games became my favorite hobby.


2. About 5 years later I got a Sega Saturn. I was really excited, it felt like getting a Genesis all over again. This was before I knew anything about Playstation and I was such a big Sega fan I ignored Sony completely. When I realized there were no good games coming out for Saturn I returned it to the store to trade it in for a Playstation. But PSX was selling like hotcakes back in those days and everywhere was sold out for months.


3. One Christmas later I finally got my Playstation and Final Fantasy 7. This would be #1 on my list but I'm going chronologically here. FF7 was my first RPG and I had no idea what I was getting myself into. This started a new addiction for me, I stopped playing regular 'games' and focused on nothing but RPGs. Until this day, thats still how I roll.. play. :P


4. Online Gaming. From Unreal to Starcraft to Phantasy Star Online (DC). Those games were the pioneers that got me even more addicted to games. Playing online was a whole new experience because it was so immersive, it felt like rediscovering the internet. Nothing like playing online with real people. I'd say playing Phantasy Star Online for the first time was the icing on the cake. For the few nights I got to play it at my friends house [before i got my own Dreamcast], the game was insanely fun.


5. Final Fantasy XI, the game I had been waiting for for five years. Yes five years, from the time it was announced in 1999 to the time it was released on PS2 in 2004. It was easily my most anticipated game of all time, it combined my two favorite things, Final Fantasy and Online gaming. It was well worth the 100$, I got a good two years of playtime out that game before tragedy struck.. My account was stolen and Square has such horrible customer service they could do nothing to help me get it back. Why? Because I couldn't provide the last four digits of the asshole's credit card who stole it. As if I would know that. Besides that, the game was a sweet, albeit often frustrating and challenging experience.


6. Last but not least, I finally got a new PC and was not only able to play loads of new PC games, but World of Warcraft as well. This made leaving FFXI behind so much easier because I knew for sure this was the ultimate MMORPG. And for a time it was, until my server got even worse after world transfers became available. Now I don't even play WoW anymore because it kind of sucks now. My main characters are alliance on a horde dominated server. I tried rerolling but honestly don't like playing neither horde nor alliance. And I REALLY don't have what it takes to level another job to 70 [Warlock was enough]. After getting three jobs to 75 on FFXI, I can't stand grinding anymore or any MMORPG.
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Thats my list of most memorable moments in gaming. That meaning things I'll look back on and remember when I'm 60 years old complaining about how games aint what they used to be as I watch my grandkids play Final Fantasy 77 International Substance Final Mix Special Edition on their Playwiibox 264.

1. I honestly don't remember what year it was, but in a situation similar to yours, I got an SNES of my very own for Christmas. It was the biggest single gift I'd ever gotten at that point, and it really slingshotted me into gaming. I mean, I played NES before that, but I never had that many games. With SNES, I had the option of renting and playing instead of buying them, which meant I got to play a lot more of them.


2. 1996 or so, my father bought me Doom II, which I played repeatedly, but I found my calling when my step brother introduced me to a little game called Diablo. I can still remember the exact setting when it happened. He had just gotten into Hell, and he was walking around and showing me some of the combat. Watching as he chopped enemies into screaming piles of bones, and seeing the bodies of villagers upended on pikes in the ground, I knew do want.

He would later get me interested in RTS games using Dark Reign (a moderately entertaining game with a better than average storyline) and Dungeon Keeper (Which remains one of my favorites even today).


3. 1997-98, I started hearing the buzz on Half-Life, and saw some gameplay and preview videos. I knew with a fierce determination that burned like the sun that the game would be something really special. Not only did it look great, using good looking 3d models and skeletal animation, but it was one of the first games to have scripted action sequences, and true interactivity on the part of the player. For once, the AI had reached the point that enemies didn't simply walk into your bullets, and the concept of NPCs was born in the FPS genre.

This is the one that well and truly stands out for me, because I bought the game at full retail price as soon as it came out, but it would be another 9 months to a year before my sister got a computer that could actually play it. I distinctly remember trying to play it using software rendering and having a blast regardless of the slideshow.

My love for mods grew out of this from TFC, Front Line Force, and some single player mods. The thought of getting content for free because of a proprietary engine was like sweet gaming bliss to me.


4. 1998, My friend managed to convince me to play Final Fantasy 7. I was hesitant at first, because I didn't consider myself an RPG gamer. Heck, I wasn't even that sure what an RPG gamer was, but I had never played a Final Fantasy game until that day. Seeing the cinematic approach the game took, as well as the steampunk setting and (for the time) unorthodox video game characters, and I fell in love.

I guess I don't have that many. There have been awesome games I've played since then, but my life as a gamer hasn't really changed much since those separate moments.

Hmm... a lot of my most memorable moments in gaming were to do with Nintendo, but I'll just select the most memorable of those with ones from other consoles...

1) Getting a SNES and Mario All-Stars: My first, real introduction to console gaming. Of course, by then the SNES was at its peak but I was captivated by all the games in Mario All-Stars. All of them had so many secrets (I remember shouting in excitement finding that first warp pipe that lead to the room with coins) and back then was a great challenge, prompting me to play it day and night. Long live nostalgia!

2) Wonderboy and Sonic Series (Genesis/Mega-Drive): Wonderboy (not Zelda) was my first "fantasy" game and although Zelda would later become part of my most memorable moment in gaming, Wonderboy's ability to take me away from the mucky-muck that is reality (Tenacious D reference here) made an impact. Also making an impact was the Sonic Series (1, 2, 3 and Knuckles). Although I loved the Mario games, I was never into the whole "Sega VS. Nintendo" thang, which allowed me to enjoy the fastest (for its time), coolest and secrets-to-the-wazoo-est game for the Genesis. The ability to use Tails for co-op and the add-on function of Sonic 3 and Knuckles blew my mind away.

3) Tetris made my Parents Play: The greatest thing about Tetris is that no matter who you are, anyone can play it. One of my most memorable moments in gaming was watching my parents play Tetris. I loved Tetris and that game was bloody addictive (and thanks to Tetris DS, my life shall be taken forever!) but for adults to play what was perceived as children's toys in those days was a crazy idea. Well, it happened and I don't think I'll ever see my parents play another videogame again (not even Wii Sports)! Classic.

4) Playing the PS1 for the First Time: Now, I was born too late and was too young too collect magazines, so I knew nothing of the plans for the CD-based consoles Nintendo and Sega were trying to make. Suddenly, a thing called the Playstation came out, and it was cool. It was hip. It had 3D graphics and a kickass game called WipEout. It also had a kickass fighting game called Tekken. The music wasn't all bleeps and phony violins. It had TECHNO!!! And it had a cool name: the Play-Station. Playing in this station of cool. Yeh... It was then I said "now this is the future of gaming!". I had this same reaction when playing the PS2, but the PS1 had a bigger impact.

5) Zelda Ocarina of Time (Ninteod 64): Okay, by now you may have gathered that I'm recounting my memories chronologically (like jujubee), so why have I left out Mario 64? Mario 64 made me go "wow" like many other people, but the feeling of wanting to explore and being overwhelmed by a 3D adventure came from Zelda. No other game (apart from the next memory) has impressed me, affected me and involved me emotionally as Zelda OoT had. I would spend hours on the field finding secrets, defeating Poes and traveling on Epona just to watch the realistic (back then) sunset. The dungeons were genius and perfectedly adjusted (in terms of difficulty) and the minigames (especially fishing) never got old. If this list were by which moment was THE most memorable, ZELDA OOT is number 1.

6) Perfect Dark multiplayer: Long before (or after depending on your view) online multiplayer was mainstream, Perfect Dark was THE ultimate game between my friends. Forget Goldeneye (although the single player was more exciting), Perfect Dark's multiplayer introduced me to 3am and hallucinations (as well as coffee) due to the ridiculous amounts of time me and my friends would spend fragging each other. The options were limitless and we would create every scenario we could think of, then frag away. I recently pulled this out of the grave of old conoles and now that my cousins have grown up, the time has come for the frag-fest to rise once again!

7) Playstation 2: Although I am primarily a Nintendo guy (due to it being the reason why I play games), I have always had a secret love affair with Playstation. As soon as the PS2 was out, my breath was taken. Powerful machine, realistic graphics (some of which still impress today) and all the bells and whistles of a high-tech device (a DVD player? What the hell was a "VDV" player?). Some of the most memorable games came on the PS2, such as Metal Gear, Final Fantasy just to name a few. The hype before the PS2 came out was crazy as well, with one news story sensationalizing, "This, could start World War 3 (PS2 control shown)." Good times.

Good times indeed ^_^.

1) Those looong nights that I spent with friends playing multiplayer with the N64. The fun we had with Snowboard Kids and Goldeneye was absolutely priceless. The split-creen is soooo underated when it comes to fps. The level of strategy where everyone knew exacly where the other ones were was great. Playing Goldeneye for 8 hours straight is still our most memorable moment.

2) As many people already said, when I first got my Snes. I was kinda hoping to get the Nes and I didn't even knew the Snes existed. I was so amazed and happy to see the amazing graphics of Super Mario World and Super Adventure Island. That was my true introduction to gamimng.

3) When I finally got to play Megaman X. I've wanted to get that game so much. I watched every single video I've seen on Tv many many times (I recorded a game show with my VCR). I got it two years after it's released. It was one of the biggest mind orgasm of my life.

4) Finishing MGS3. I've never felt so much satisfaction from a game in my life. Half the game was ok, but as soon as I left the jungle the game became absolutely amazing. It was one of the few games that actually made me cry. It has a very special place in my heart.

My most memorable moment in gaming....

I can only think of one, but it was the best one ever.

When I beat EarthBound. I cried.

1. My mom bought me NES for my birthday, complete with the good ol' zapper. I had played games before this, but this was really what made me a serious addict. Back then I was just a poor kid, so I was rented most of the games I played. I only owned like 7 games.

2. Got a Sega Megadrive, slightly before the SNES came out. It was the shit at the time, the SNES eventually matched it's success, and probably beat it in terms of sales, but I was a big Sega fanboy back then. Games like Streets of Rage 2 and Shinobi III will always be in my memory, even know, I still play them on a emulator.

3. I read in magazines about Nintendo's new console, the Ultra 64, later renamed the Nintendo 64, this was quite possible the console I was anticipating more then any other. I actually preordered it, which I had never done before. I had to do a lot to get the money to be able to buy it, several months allowance in advance, borrowed money from my sister, it was bad, but it was worth it. Mario 64 was great, and Goldeneye and Zelda: OOT are legendary games, I'm glad I was able to play them.

4. I met a guy from my class, and he was talking about his PSX, he didn't seem to play it that often, so at some point I asked if I could borrow it from him, up till that moment I never played it before. He only had a few games that I didn't really care for, but the demodiscs he gave had enough to gave me a good taste of the PSX. He never got his PSX back, I ended up buying it from him, and after a year or so, I modded it and well it were happy times.

5. I saw a lot of commercials of Final Fantasy 7 around the time I bought my friends PSX, so one day I went to the videostore and rented it, I had played some RPGs before it on the SNES, but this one, it really was the milestone for RPGs whether people like to admit it or not. It certainly got me hooked on them. I never played anything quite like it. It was so bad, that I invited a friend of mine to come play it with me, cause he had to see it, and well we ended up playing it for literally 3 days straight, doing nothing but the game.

6. I was relatively late in buying the PS2. Maybe 9 months after the release. I believe I waited for some must have games to come out, eventually I did, and bought more games for it then I ever had before for any console I owned. It was around this time that I really stopped renting games, and just buying them non-stop.

7. Somewhere between the N64 and PSX, I finally got a internet connection. I never experienced dialup modems, I went straight to a low bandwidth cable connection. I remember I was really excited when I finally got it to work. (it was a real hassle to set up at the time) and I couldn't decide what to do, download stuff? watch movies? but Eventually I decided that I should play something online, I never played anything online before. I read some things about Counter-Strike at the time, so I gave it a shot. It was certainly a great experience. I ended up playing CS on a daily basis, joined a few clans with some good friends I knew, and ended up becoming a pretty good player. Eventually I stopped playing, but for at least 3 years I loved it. Even went to several LAN parties and Internet Cafes to play it, but of course other games were played as well.

8. I played a lot of games on the PS2, but one thing that always annoyed me, was how a lot of games don't get released in PAL, for whatever reasons, so I eventually decided to import a NTSC PS2. Looking back now, I might has well just modded my PS2, but I didn't. Either way, it was a great decision. I was able to play a lot of RPGs that never did get released over here. It has other advantages as well, such as not having the black bars onscreen. Right Now I own even more NTSC games then PAL for the PS2. I believe over 60 last time I checked.

9. The Last "OMG" experience I had was with the infamous World of Warcraft. I am a victim of it as well. It all started when I got selected for the closed beta. I had absolutely no expectation of it, I honestly didn't even know anything about the game, I just signed up one time. It certainly was a great experience. I loved it right from the moment I started my little Night Elf in Shadowglen. After 6 months I bought the commercial game, and became a hardcore player. Ended up in a raiding guild, raiding everyday. It started with just Molten Core and Blackwing Lair, later ZG, AQ20/40 and Naxx, but unfortunately, fate had other plans, we had this nazi guildleader, who pretty much killed the guild, all my friends split up. Some quit, some changed server, some joined a new guild where the nazi was in charge again, I had my principles I wouldn't join a guild with her in it, so I decided to quit that day. For me the game was more about talking with my friends on ventrilo then it was about getting purples. It was great while it lasted. I tried the expansion when it came out, but it wasn't the same, playing without my friends made it pointless for me, I quit soon after, and haven't played it since.

1. My first vivid video gaming memory was when my mom beat Dragon Warrior before me. Her name in the game was "POO" which I thought was bloody hilarious. (interesting postscript - She's playing through Phantom Hourglass and named her character Poo for lulz)

2. My uncle had Street Fighter 2 for SNES, and we would play it all the time together. One day, the day he got Game Genie, he not only played as the same character as me, but he showed me the mid-air fireball cheat, and it BLEW MY MIND. He refused to give me the code because he was a little shit back then, but I'll never forget the first time I saw that for some reason.

3. My friends and I were huge Mortal Kombat fans, and I managed to get ahold of Mortal Kombat 2 for SNES the night before it was supposed to be released to the public. When I got home around 8PM, and called my friends and they all came running over to play till 10PM, well past our bed time.

4. The fiasco in getting Ocarina of Time is a downer moment I'll never forget. I went to reserve the game, and the guy at EB told me that all I needed to do was put my name down for a copy and I'd be all set. So I did that, and I was all psyched.

A few weeks later, I went in to EB to collect my game, and they refused to give me a copy, saying that I needed to put money down. I pleaded with the asshole, telling him that I was told I could simply put down my name, but he wouldn't hear it. I walked out of EB, extremely pissed, and to be honest, a little sad.

A couple days went by, and my mom came home to surprise me with a copy of OOT that she found at BJs. I was so excited I played it for 7 hours straight. It wasn't the gold cartridge, but it was still Zelda, and I loved the shit out of it.

5. Junior year of college, it was a pretty terrible year for all of us because of a shitty film we were working on. My friend Matt never hung out with us because he was so god damn busy with this film and he hated every second of it. The year before, we would all gather and play Mario Kart Double Dash nearly every night. We had rarely done that this year.

One day, Matt was sick of all the shit he was putting up with, and he said "guys, Mario Kart." So he came over, we ordered pizza, and we played Double Dash for hours into the night. It was a great night.

1. My first encounter with video games was with my cousin. He lived about 10 minutes away from where we lived and apparently they lived a very luxorious lifestyle living in one huge mansion style houses around the area. Anyway, he owned an NES. Back then, I would just be in shock and awe watching him play. I was too chicken to even try initially, since I knew I would do horribly and probably not play as awesome as he was playing. The memorable standout game for me was Super Mario Bros. 3. Thanks to him, I know a good majority of the in-game warps. :3:

2. I believe it was 1994 when my brother had gotten a SNES. It was one of the first video game systems we owned and if there was any game that we were addicted to at the time, it was Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. Game was hot back then. It was pretty much at that point when I took video gaming on as a habit. My parents, however, were very restrictive with me and my brother playing video games on the weekdays becuase they didn't want it to interfere with our school work. Even today, they're still like that. <_<

I don't really listen to them about that anymore though. I'm in college for christ's sake.

3. Next generation in gaming comes along and my parents are happy with my CAT scores in 2nd grade. To reward me, they decided to get a Nintendo 64 for me. Probably one of the greatest, but also, painfully long, days of my life. Why painfully long? A garbage truck flipped over on on the parkway blocking en route traffic both ways. What was supposed to be a 45 minute drive, turned into 2 hours of waiting. What the fuck.

So we finally get to the huge Toys R Us in Elizabeth and my parents are ready to decide on what game we want with the system. I almost made the tragic mistake of choosing NBA on NBC: Showtime, or whatever the hell it's called. Since my brother wasn't a huge basketball fan, he nudged me off of it and we ended up getting Super Mario 64 instead. I'm happy he made me change my mind. :><:

4. So the dawn of the 6th generation is upon us, and I was a huge Nintendo fanboy. Of course, I still gave love for Sega since a good majority of my friends had Sega Genesis. However, it was around 1999 when my neighbor got a Dreamcast and Sonic Adventure with it. Me and my brother were so amazed with it, we HAD to get it. Lucky for us, my brother's birthday was rolling around the next month. So my parents forked over the $300 for the system, however much it cost to get Marvel vs. Capcom, and a decent 3rd party controller. It was heaven on earth for that amount of time.

5. Chirstmas the same year rolls around, we get Soul Calibur and Sonic Adventure II. Nuff' said.

6. Me and my family venture off to the Philippines and at the time the Playstation was still a hot commodity. So I finally convince my parents to get me one since we had never owned any Sony consoles in the past. What was a greater perk was that, not only was the system priced about the same in the Philippines as it was in the US, it came with free copied games upon purchase. So we ended up choosing about 25 free games with our system. One of the games (along with the various sequels) I picked up was Dance Dance Revolution. Since then, my life was changed forever. :3:

7. It's about 2003 when I finally get PS2. My aunt gave me one despite the fact that my parents never wanted me to get one in the first place. Not like I cared, but hell, I could finally catch up with the PS2 games I never played.

8. Come present time, I was on the search for a Wii for about 3 months before WiiTracker.com finally picked up on Wal-Mart having some available. The ultimate win for me since they were still hard to find at the time and EVERYONE wanted one. The week long wait sucked, but hell, I got 6 games with the system, what was there to complain about?

That's about it for now.

o lawd. Gaming memories =d Gaming has been, like, my #1 hobby since FOREVER. Literally, I cannot remember NOT having an NES.

My memories kinda fade in to obscurity and -- ohh. I have a NES. To be honest, it was my older brothers' (five and two years older respectively) moreso than mine. I'd play and fuck around, not exhibiting much skill. But yes. Memorable moments?... We'll fast-forward to SNES since NES was an era of fucking awesome in itself.

1) FFIV or FF2 in the US. The game was a phenomenal, unprecedented RPG. The best scene in the whole game? It still gives me chills :3:

2) I dunno why, but the Aladdin games for the SNES & Genesis had very fond memories o__O Awesome games, and I dunno why, but the SNES version was fucking awesome.

3) Phantasy Star IV. Comic-style cutscenes that stacked up like an anime. This was around when I started to get drawn in to Ranma and delve directly in to anime itself, so it was of rather special interest to me =3

4) The Shining Force games. The first two, along with the game gear game and the Sega CD one. Those were fucking awesome games. I've replayed all of them so many times but I always stop midway through the Sega CD one (beaten it once). Hmm.

5) Sega Saturn. Period. One of the best systems ever. I recently found a GOOD computer emulator for it, and it's just a huge amount of awesome, win, and nostalgia. All at once ='D Shining Force 3 on this was otherworldly. So fucking awesome.

6) Sega Dreamcast. Period. One of the best systems ever. The games and creativity were top notch, but this also led to a gateway drug, following which I was kept away, cold turkey. I am talking, of course, about Shenmue 1, then later #2 ;__; WHERE'S MY #3. I shouldn't wish too hard though... Sega will probably re-release Shenmue racing games or some fucking shit >=(

7) Playstation 1 had some awesome games, but the Lunar remakes definitely rank up there as "fucking awesome". I still have the original boxes, CDs, and goodies (and I don't wear Lucia's necklace. lol SirVG).

8) Playstation 2 had two monumental games: Metal Gear Solid 3. Nice gameplay, best storyline I've EVER seen in a game of the genre. It felt so god damn *real*. Xenogears had deep story but this for some reason just snagged me and pulled me right in. The ending was so sad ;_;

The other monumental game? Shadow of the fucking Colossus. I heard so much about it at E3 (when it didn't suck~). I bought it on a whim as soon as it came out, the premise sounding cool. It was a fantastic game when I was just walking around, enjoying the scenery. But when I finally got on to the first colossus?

OHH CHRIST ='D I was cackling like a madman at the game's awesomeness. Stabbing the weakspot and being met with a geyser of blood was just so damn awesome. Fuck. I need to get that back from my brother and play it on my HD TV this time through >=(

9...) I could list more, but I'll just go out on a limb and list most FPS games for the PC. The US RPGs don't interest me as much as Japanese ones (the structuring, leveling, story, mood, character development, etc) but most of the FPS games are fucking awesome. Deus Ex, Thief trilogy, Call of Duty, etc. But I think I'll leave it here =U

Getting to the airport in TMNT for NES.

Game is harder than medical school. Why lie.

I totally agree with you. It was an amazing experience playing Lunar. I specially like the second one more. It was the first time I ever cared about the characters. There are actually 3 games that made me cry like an idiot and gained the title of awesomeness: MGS3, Lunar Eternal Blue Complete and Shadow Hearts 2.

I love you!

You mean Xenogears or Xenosaga? For me, Xenogears is the game that everyone must play and pay respect. It has the most amazing story I've ever seen in a videogame. And that's a fact.

If you ment Xenosaga, I wouldn't know, I'm half way Episode 3 and finally the saga is getting better (episode 2 was kinda let down)

Xenosaga? Ugh. No thanks. I watched (lol) #1 and didn't care for it afterwards. Plus they aren't going to remake Xenogears eventually. The original plan was to go through all the Xeno story stuff, Xenogears being, like, the second to last installment. It'd eventually get remade, but that fell through. I hate Xenosaga. So hyped >=(

I said Xenogears =V And I meant Xenogears!

I would agree with you on Xenogears if it wasn't for the crap they pulled on disc 2. The first disc was pure win, so why...? why did they have to ruin things on disc 2. There was hardly any gameplay involved, you just watched scenes, after scenes, it's far worse then Xenosaga episode 1. (which I btw didn't mind that much)

Planescape Torment (PC RPG). I had read from a few online discussions on how tough the final battle was, various strategies for beating it, etc.

Xellos --
Disk 2 is where Square more or less went "hey guys hurry the fuck up" and rushed the game. It was still good but it didn't get the chance to get fleshed out. This was one reason I was hoping for a remake. It'd allow the story to get build as it should.

Yeah, I read about that, but still, it's for that reason I can't rate it as high as I would other games that managed to stay true till the end. It's funny how they ended up doing it again with Xenosaga. =/

I have another one to add.

My friend and I were playing Final Fantasy VII and we got to the part where Aeris dies, and it made his little sister cry. Awesome.

Oh wow, that must have been hilarious to watch. ='D

:sworded: http://www.acerbandit.net/emoticons/crying.gif <- :tpg:

Nope. Common mistake, was never gonna happen, etc.

I really hate having to repeat this every time it comes up but Saga was not a prequel to Gears. There are too many story inconsistencies, there would be no Xenogears remake (Saga Episode 5 would not coincide with Xenogears Episode 5, since that implies Episodes 2 and 3 match up with the perfect works timeline of Episodes 2 and 3, which they don't), and so forth.

Plus the developers, y'know, said they weren't connected and shit.

See the Saga Ep. III thread where me and another fellow who's name I can't recall drop more facts than anyone would care to know about to prove this point. I ain't gonna reiterate it all here.

Note that I said the original plan. When #1 was about to come out, I remember folks mentioning this, but it strayed from that. At least from what I heard. Wrong, right, whatever. Bottom line is that it didn't happen.

Now. 'Nuff about that.

when playing Super Street Fighter 2 Tubro, and seeing Akuma appear as your opponent for the first time :tpg:

Never was the original plan, sorry. That would have involved Monolith getting the rights to the story from Square, which would NEVER HAPPEN IN A BILLION YEARS.

It's a common mistake. I'm not faulting you for it, but I'm just sayin'.

1995: Dad picked up Sega Master System for my fith birthday, this was exciting since only games I ever played were those handheld mini games.

1997-1998: First PC. I remember saving enough money for Y's collection (The title was Y's and brackets around it saying Y's in Korean.), of course this was after getting free-set after buying gaming magazine. At the same time, I got Star Craft and Diablo. I never played them much since they scared the hell out of me.

1999: Bought N64, I chose N64 over PS due to LoZ [Looked so epic], 007, DK64 [Never liked CDs]

2002: Started playing R.O, my first MMORPG.

Aunt sent: Pump It Up, my first rythem based game.

2003: I got PS2 for Christmas, I was REALLY excited... but the excitement went really down due to

1. Slow loading time (I was still used to N64)
2. Crappy ass games (Never liked RPG on console)

During the christmas I bought SP, I remember this playing under bed cover during night >:]. Good ol' days.

2004: After R.O Beta being finished (2003), I remember Nabhan reintroducing me to the game [with English interface ._.]

On Xmas, got Nintendo DS. I didn't give a hoot what games came with it, I remember playing countless hours of Metroid Prime: Hunters Demo.


2005: First FPS on PC ever: F.E.A.R, started to play online, this is the game that hooked me with FPS.


2006: Preordered Wii and PS3. Ps3 wasn't exciting, I knew the price would be skyrocketing so I preordered to sell it.



Bought Nintendo Lite, kick ass system.

2007: I hate to admit it, I hate Sony. But some games on PSP grabbed my attention really bad and I ended up buying PSP slim/lite.


P.S Haha, M$ didn't get jack from me other than paying for OS.

Fighting Kefka- hearing Dancing Mad and watching the ending for the first time in Final Fantasy VI- is about as good as it has gotten for me. I think I sat in silence for half an hour after it was over, just taking it all in. I was sad it had to end.

I've got a few memories of gaming in general, and of great personal achievements.

1. Buying my Nintendo 64. My parents bought me an NES when I was 3, and an SNES when I was 9, but they later told me video game systems were getting too expensive, so they wouldn't buy me anymore in the future. When the N64 was announced, I really wanted it, but my parents told me to save up for it myself. So I saved up my three dollar a week allowance for one and a half fricking years. And then I finally bought that sucker. (in an unrelated move of ass-hattery on my parents behalf, they turned around and bought my sister a Playstation the next week so she wouldn't feel left out)

2. 1999 was a great year for me and my NES. I pulled out my NES and decided to go through and beat those games that were impossible as a kid. Within a few weeks, I stormed through the following games, all for the first time.
-Super Mario Bros.
-Punch Out
-Solstice
-Metroid
-Castlevania 3
-Double Dragon 2
-TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA FRICKING TURTLES (haven't beat it since, haha) (and god, I was on my last half of a life bar too)

Man, I jumped up and down on my couch in joy so much that year.

3. DDR tournaments. Until DDR, I was never really great at any game which involved competition with others. I could only fare well against predictable computer opponents. But I started with DDR in 2000, before it was really big, and in 2002, I entered a tournament. I lost terribly, but I learned from a few good people, and met some cool people. I started constantly playing with these much better players, and got up to their skill level. By 2004, I was one of the top players in Michigan. I ended up winning a few tournaments and placing high in some others.

4. I moved on from DDR though, and on to IIDX. I was getting tired of it for a few reasons. I was already at the top tier of songs, and whether or not I did better was usually coming down to a matter of one misstep, and I didn't want to keep paying at the arcades for a slim shot at minimal improvements. One of my friends had imported some Beatmania IIDX games, so I played them at his apartment. I was amazed. The difficulty was ramped up so high, even with good DDR skills, I got destroyed by 90% of the songs. It was an incredibly masochistic challenge I was willing to take on. So I bought a Japanese PS2 and imported the games myself. After 3+ years of this game, I still am nowhere near passing some songs and still find fun in the vast improvements I can make. Apart from a few moments of frustration, this series has been a blast to play.

5. The Lunar series is awesome. Especially with what Working Designs did for it. I bought both of the games for the Playstation, and I love them both. They may have been the earliest instances of cutscenes in games for me, and the high quality art/voice acting really impressed me. Add to that the great script that WD put in and all the bonus material, and I was just amazed with the whole thing on every front. The included soundtracks made it even better, for someone like me who loved video game music but hadn't quite come to realize it yet.

6. Kind of similar to the previous one is the Metroid series. Every game has amazed me. The gameplay and atmosphere make for an incredible experience, allowing for a huge world, a lot of exploration, but a lot of fast, intense moments too. And with the added element of time attacking and item collecting that the games have always focused on, and I had reason to keep coming back over and over.

One of the most memorable things in gaming for me was being able to afford my own games. I was a poor kid, so my mother bought a lot of the stuff for me.

In 1990, she bought me a Fountain Tunix which came with a bunch of games. In 1992, she bought me a Mastersystem. I remember staying up until 11 pm playing Alex the Kidd. We both played a bunch of games.

The Megadrive came along, which we rented from time to time. I loved renting Aladdin, Cool Spot and Sonic 2. They were really fun games to play. Eventually she bought my own Megadrive and I managed to get myself a handful of games. A lot of game trading occurred because I didn't have enough money to purchase my own. Games were really expensive back then.

I remember seeing a 64, PS1 and Saturn in a store. I saw the Saturn playing the original Rayman, and instantly knew I preferred 2D games over 3D. Cool Boarders was playing next to it, but I didn't like how it looked.

However, the says of owning a Saturn came and went, and I jumped from 64, to PS1, to Saturn, to 64, to Saturn, to PS1. I only stayed with the PS1 because of it's variety. The Saturn didn't do very well here. But really, what I wanted was a Dreamcast.

On December the 4th, 1999, the Dreamcast was released. I had $200 saved, which I even took to school so we could go there afterwards and purchase one immediately. They had a kiosk playing Soul Calibur. Weeks prior they had a kiosk with House of the Dead 2 which my mother and I both loved playing.

The bad thing about this was, they didn't release memory cards for the DC at the same time as launch, making it impossible to unlock anything in the two games which my mother bought for me - Soul Calibur and Sonic Adventure. We ended up returning the Dreamcast when we received a letter saying Sega was going bankrupt.

Then came the PS2, which I had to pay off each week for two years. It came with MGS2, which I played through, followed by Jak & Daxter. I had a paper run and wasn't earning that much money, but enough to pay off the console and buy a game once every few months. It was nice.

This went on for awhile, until I turned 18 and got a real job. I bought a PC, which was an insane amount of freedom from using my mother's computer for such a long time (since 1999). About a year later, I got myself a credit card, and started importing games almost exclusively. I think this was the best time in my gaming history, as I could finally afford my own stuff.

I didn't like to do it, but I had my PS2 modchipped. I could finally play games without having the hassle of using a Swap Magic and such.

Then along came the limited editions, box sets, imported consoles, you name it. I think the most memorable purchase would have been the ANUBIS Zone of the Enders 2 Premium Box Limited Edition which someone was offering me (only discovered through conversation) since he was coming up to Auckland anyway. I grabbed it. There's only 1000 of these things created. I'm also very happy with my Ice Blue DS Lite, Felicia Blue PSP and Japanese 360 which I all purchased this year.

Also, my big box of stuff Enkidu sent me from Japan this year. Great fun.

But mostly, shmups have been my favourite genre of all, and 1ccing Mushihimesama in August 06 was my first real achievement. I was proud. I've improved so much since then, 1ccing Mountain of Faith and Imperishable Night both on Lunatic.

Any console or expensive purchase should be celebrated, I think.

Alright so it's 1996 and I'm playing my favorite video game, Super Mario Kart. It's the special cup 100cc and I've been having an epic battle for the lead and in the lead up for the final race I did some calculations. For me, Luigi, to win, all I had to do was just beat Yoshi, everyone else was out of contention and I was a point behind Yoshi. Rainbow Road. So the race starts and it's an epic struggle, I'm just about crying as I'm in forth place going around the final corner, Yoshi nowhere in sight and when. OH WHAT?! THERE WAS YOSHI BEING LOWERED ONTO THE TRACK! THE CLOWN HAD FALLEN OFF! What an epic moment. I raced past him, swerved around the thwomps and took third place but more importantly the gold cup.

Im pretty much running around the living room punching the air and yelling during the credits. The trophy proclaims that I am now a Super Mario Kart EXPERT. And then, then it returns to the title screen, WHAT'S THIS?! 150CC!?!?! that shit wasn't there before!

Oh man, epic.

I gurned this one but it's gone. This year's Pokémon tournament.
I promised myself when the tournament was first announced that I would get myself a battle on the big screen and open with a FEAR Pokémon (if you won’t understand the term, bear with me.) Apparently they had been discussed at most of the tours around the country but at the end of the day, nobody yet had the audacity to use the most hilarious, humiliating and reckless tactic in the Pokémon world. I had made myself a level 4 Ratatta who was a good candidate but the day before my friend Dan called me to say he wont be coming to Pokétour, choosing Harry Potter instead. However he said that his sister who wanted to go but found herself stuck in Kalgoorlie had trained up a FEAR Phanpy for the tournament and he asked if I wanted it. I said sure as Phanphy is generally regarded as the ideal FEAR Pokémon, being able to withstand sandstorms. He sent it over and I lolled when I saw it’s nickname was XBOX-360.

The setup for round two was different. If you were one of the 64 contestants left remaining you simply walked up to one of the battle stations with a partner and away you went. The main screen cleared out and some kid eagerly stepped up “We need one more” the attendant announced and I pushed my way through for the second spot. My opponent was one of those dorky 11/12 year old kids who reckons he’s tip top but is in actual fact a total loser, ie. He was perfect for FEAR.

I am trembling with anticipation at this point and busily swapping around my team and items to accomodate XBOX-360 into the party. The kid is getting agitated “yeah sorry just saving now” I innocently reply. The other thing about big screen battles is that one player (in this case me) has the oppurtunity to view his opponents Pokémon prior to battle. The kid understood this and tryed to negoiate looking at my Pokémon in return. I declined and quickly chose my team. Being the good sport I am I looked away and chatted to the small crowd that had formed.

Battle begins.
“Roland sent out XBOX-360” the screen announced. The nervous giggles from the crowd at the sight of the nickname quickly turned into outright laughter when XBOX-360 turned out to be a Phanpy, at level 1.
-------
Phanpy, n/named XBOX-360, Lv 1
Original Trainer: Rachael
Fissure
Endeavour
Ice Shard
Rollout
Hold Item: Focus Sash
-------
“Don’t laugh I just caught him” I told the crowd. I did however, over the laughter, hear a few gasps of joy and excitement from the maybe 2 or 3 people watching who knew what was about to happen.
He sent out Gyrados and the crowd was in stitches, even the attendants who Nintendo just hire through local modelling agencies were amused at what appeared to be the biggest missmatch since David and Goliath.
“Are you serious? How did you get to round 2 with a level 1 Pokémon?” the kid asked with a snear.
“Oh I dunno, I have a couple of others”
Gyrados attacked with Hydro Pump, hitting poor Phanpy. The crowd is still laughing their heads off, and the noise was getting louder as other people stopped to look at what the fuss was about. Phanpy’s health bar was plunging downwards and then stopped! “It’s super effective!” the screen proclaimed. In this second or so, the crowd was just gasping in amazement, a Nintendo rep stopped in her tracks, stunned “Woah!” she says. “Hax?” someone watching nervously asks. “XBOX-360 hung on with Focus Sash!” the screen explained to the stunned crowd.
“XBOX-360 used Endeavour” the crowd started up again but this time instead of laughing they were CHEERING! “OH MY GOD MAN” some kid is yelling at me. I have this huge smile on my face, my opponent is totally flabbergasted. Gyrados' HP bar plunges to match mine at 1HP. Facing the crowd, I triumphantly raise two fingers in the air and bring them down again, selecting Ice Shard, an attack that always goes first. “XBOX-360 used Ice Shard” as the screen fills with the blue Ice Shard effect the crowd has gone totally crazy, a couple of guys pretty much mobbed me, wanting to shake my hand and swap high fives. Nintendo reps are telling everyone to get back behind the white line. Everybody is laughing their heads off, even the people in the other battles who had paused to watch. Everybody except my opponent who was absolutely livid in anger, the colour draimed from his face.

1)Decimated a kid in UT 2004......and he was literally crying.....

I dunno if I should have felt good or bad at that time. :gonk:

2) Beating Battletoads. Dunno how it was possible when I was a kid.

3) When playing F.E.A.R, a friend of mine, whom was on the opposing team, just came out of no where, blasted me in the face, then someone blasted him in the face, he re-spawned in the same area and killed his killer, and then I came in to kill him for killing me. Double Revenge if you understand it.

4) While playing a Counterstrike match, I got killed by a random flashbang hitting me in the face. :(

LOL my brother went to the Pokemon Tour this year and used his "haxed" Magikarp (nicknamed Tyrannosaurus). Because it was the last day in Victoria, he decided to used hacked, shitty Pokemon like Bidoof and whatnot. Hilarity ensued when after splashing a few turns, my brother accidentally used Hyper Beam. KRUNCH!

Promising his opponent that he'd throw the match though, my brother used Explosion and sacrificed his place for a few laughs. Priceless.



Oh, and I've only listed past memories. More recent memorable moments for me are mostly Nintendo related (lol *cough* fanboy fag *cough* XD rofl), but anyways they are:

1) Playing Ico (PS2): After Zelda, games had never filled me with a fantastical feeling. Ico brought that all back with atmosphere, subtle/dreamlike graphics and ingenius gameplay. It was then I decided to break away from being a "Nintendo consoles only" guy and, with the help of my girlfriend, brought a PS2. I played all the great games I missed out on, but jumped to get Ico when the opportunity came.

2) Nintendo DS "clicked" into my mind: I blame the Gamecube for my slow falling-out with Nintendo. So when the DS first came out I never got the concept. What were Nintendo thinking? Luckily, my girlfriend brought it for me (so I couldn't say no) and although I was initially unimpressed, Nintendogs changed my perception of Nintendo's new strategy. Alright, there are a HEAP of games out there that utilise and show the DS's strengths better than Nintendogs, but it was while playing that game when I though, "Y'know what? Nintendo's BAAAACK". DS Rocks.

3) Announcements of Super Smash Brothers Brawl: Ooo... I was originally going to put the announcement of Zelda Twilight Princess but my hype for that ended up in disaster, so I'll put the equally as effective SSBB announcements as a great memory. The trailer rocked my world: all the characters were getting an upgrade and the new characters seemed awesome (PIT!!!). The biggest punch came not from Captain Falcon (cause he's unconfirmed as of this post), but the inclusion of Snake. I thought that Nintendo decided to show a separate Wii Metal Gear game at the same time, but as soon as the box was shown in a bit of gameplay, I creamed.

And dojo has made me go crazy with a few announcements. Online, Sonic and stage editor are the more memorable posts and will most likely stay in my mind for now and in the future (when the SonyWii60 zaps our brains with hyper-reality machine thingies... oh my!)

Dear sweet Jesus, that's priceless.

Even with all the shit gaming experiences lately I still have some gaming memories I'm proud to have experienced. Believe it or not this is a short list:

1. Space Harrier: first game that ever gave me an adrenaline rush as a kid and also the first game I ever completed oddly enough. The classic first and second level music is now forever burned in my mind.

2. Trading my bike for my sister's sega genesis, my hardcore gamer status pretty much started there... and someone stole the bike not long after :(

3.Streets of rage: because me and my dad played the crap out of those games, when you can kill enemies without looking at the screen you've been playing too long :gonk:

4. Choas Engine: Because I was a dumb kid and the boss speaking at the end scared the crap out of me at the time "OMFG! IT TALKS!" :tpg:

5. duke nukem 3D and zombies ate my neighbours: the only 'scary' games I've played, zombies I've outgrown and managed to finish both games in the end but duke nukems facehuggers still have the strange ability to turn me to a suicide bomber as long as I kill them too :riiight:

6. street fighter alpha 2: doing a near perfect run and then me meeting shin akuma for the first time who handed my ass to me. Little did I know at the time online gaming would soon make me feel the exact same way on many occasions...

7. sonic 3 and knuckles: argued the best sonic game ever made, the last few acts were awesome... only now every sonic game tries to recreate them somehow -_-

8. Tomb Raider: First 3D game I played, I laugh thinking back to me turning in circles to look at the poorly rendered 3D textures now.

9. Serious Sam2, ragnarok online, and jediknight: why all 3 under one title? Because they were my first online games so a large amount of my newb years were spent on them, plus name me a game besides gunz that let's you do real time online sword fights with near fighting game precision... not an easy thing to do...

10. Lan + unreal tournament + college class = EPIC LAWLS, Plus throw in a guy who screams like a girl whenever he dies and one of the best team death match comebacks in 30 seconds ever when you're on the underdog team and you begin to get the picture.

11. In a similar vein to the previous point beer+timesplitters+ monkeys+flamethrower. You'd have to have been there to get it, but I proudly say I wet myself laughing at my friends freaking out the sight of "pyro monkeys"

12. The weird shit that's happened to me in online games. Although bullshit at the time they would probably be hilarious if I got the delivery right as stories.

1. Getting my Commodore 64. The Odessy was my first system, but the Commodore 64 was what originally cemented me as a gamer. I still played alot of those games up until the SNES came out even though I had an NES. Heck... my Halo 3 unit number is C64.

2. Beating Super Mario 2. This may not seem like a big deal, but to me it was at the time. This was the first time, I realized it was actually possible to beat a game or that there was actually an end to a game. All games I had previously played either seemed to be endless or just too hard to beat.

3. Beating Chaos in Final Fantasy 1 without getting hit a single time. Somehow, when I had my ninja cast hold on him for whatever reason, it actually worked. He never broke out of it and neither my friends or me have been able to reproduce this occurance again.

4. Playing Guardian Heroes on the Sega Saturn. Me and my friends had some epic moments in that with the 6 player vs mode.

5. Playing Everquest for the first time. It was my first MMORPG and basicly anyone who has played those would probably agree that the first time you play one of those, there is just this "magical" feeling about it. Of course after awhile it just kind of becomes routine like everything else.

6. Finding Valkyrie Profile used at Playsource. I honestly didn't know anything about it, so it was kind of an impulse buy. Probably the greatest impulse buy of my life, I was in awe at the art and stories when I played it later.

Yeah that one got youtubed man. It was fantastic to watch.

#1) The day we got an SNES and EarthBound. I was 5, and I loved playing that game. We had also gotten PGA Tour Golf (correct name?), Final Fantasy 6, A Link to the Past and Super Mario World afterward. I hadn't beaten any of them (And for future reference, I sucked at the golf game. xD) from then even until Event #2, but I still had a lot of frigging fun playing the SNES anyway. Speaking of Event #2...

#2) The day my sister wanted to lend the SNES and games to a friend.

The last time we saw it, we went over to her house to get it back, only to be told it was lost, until I found it. It was fucking ruined. Coke spilled all over it, cracked, dirty. It was a really sad day for me. Assholes. (Never again was a console lent out until I made sure that the person was going to bring it back in the condition it left the house in. Present-day, the consoles are in excellent condition, and are lent out sometimes, excluding the Wii and the Xbox 360.)

#3) The day I played Super Smash Brothers.

I had gone over to a friend's house to play some Mario Kart 64, but they were playing a game called Super Smash Brothers. One friend gave me a quick lesson on the controls and another handed me the fourth controller. When I went to choose my chracter, I freaked out and said "Ness is in this game?!" only to have everyone say "Who the heck is that?". Won five matches in a row with Ness that day.

#4) The day I played Doom.

My uncle had put the shareware version on my computer. My dad wasn't into shooting games that much, and my mom got a small case of motion sickness while trying it out. They were really surprised to see me flying through the game while kicking some imp ass. xD

#5) The day I played Twisted Metal.

We had gotten a PlayStation, and I wasn't really playing it that often (I got tired of playing Crash Bandicoot, it was the only damn game we had for 3 months.), until my parents had rented Twisted Metal. Me and my sisters played this non-stop until we either had to go to school, or return it.

A while later, I had gotten Twisted Metal 2 as a birthday present. ;D

#6) The day I beat EarthBound.

Fast forward to a few years later, we bought another SNES and I got another EarthBound cartridge. This took a while, but I finally had both of them back. This is when I played EarthBound non-stop, as I had lots of experience with video games by now. I had finally gotten to Giygas, and I was ready. Whooped Pokey's ass, only to have the Devil's Machine get turned off (I saw Giygas when we had the first SNES. My sister was playing, and when I saw him, I ran out of the room screaming. It scared the shit out of me.). Kept swinging at Giygas and firing Multi-bottle rockets him, and then I used Paula's praying to seal the deal. After 7 years of waiting, I finally. Beat. EarthBound. Probably the greatest moment in my video-gaming part of life.

Here's my most memorable gaming moments:

Getting the SNES
I got the SNES for christmas in 1995. Coincidentally it was the reason why I stopped believing in Santa. I heard dad sneaking out of their room and putting the presents under the tree. Go figure. I was stoked I got the SNES though XD

Selling the SNES....to get an N64
A few years later, the N64 was launched, and I saw the Super Mario 64 demo at the store for the first time. My God it was so beautiful. I went into another store, and they had Lylat Wars...WITH THE RUMBLE PAK. OMG WHAT WAS THIS?!?
I knew I had to have one. I asked my folks, but the only way I was getting it was if I aced my Year 8 maths test.....and if I sold my SNES.
I made the choice...and got the N64 with Mario 64.
I was happy.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Oh. My. God.
I had never anticipated a game as much as this. I don't even know how I started lusting after it. I had never played a Zelda game before this, nor had I even heard of the Zelda games. I just knew deep down in my gut that it was gonna be one special game.
I bought it, and when the intro came up...with the moon setting below the horizon and Link rode past the screen on his horse......I was instantly in love.

My N64 getting stolen
In 1999, we had moved into a flat because our new house was being built. The area we lived in wasn't well known for it's safety or low crime rate, and it was with great shock that I woke one morning to find my N64 stolen as well as Mario 64, Ocarina or Time, and Rogue Squadron. It was a kid who did it, cause they climbed in from the small window in the kitchen, took everything, and just walked out the front door. Mum was working night shifts at the time, and when she came home the door wasn't shut.
Fortunately, it was the only thing taken, which was quite heartbreaking for me.

I got a second hand N64 a few months later. I've been buying games for it ever since.

Gamecube's Unveiling
Spaceworld 2000. Man I was totally stoked. I still remember watching that games showreel hundreds of times.
I trolled every single website I could and literally printed out hundreds of pages of information on games, hardware, pictures, interviews...all so I could read at night and dream peacefully. I actually still have those pages in my drawer here.
It takes me back to a time where I was so naive and so at ease in my own world.

Reggie @ E3 2005, and the new Zelda trailer
Reggie made a HUGE impact that day. It could not, and has thus far never been beaten.
And i remember nearly crying when I saw that Zelda trailer.

Beating the first boss in Sonic 1; my friend at the time had a lot of trouble figuring it out lol!

Getting the facility cheat on GoldenEye; you all know the one ;)

Seeing Aeris die; and then finding out all my hard work to level her as a character was for naught.

Finishing DMC3 on the default difficulty setting and trying to understand why so many people had trouble with it; DMD was of course painstakingly hard.

That's all I can recall right now.

Oh wait, dicovering that there was a gaming forum here . . . I originally saw this place as purely a videogaming music one lol!

I still have freaking nightmares. 2:05 in 00 was insane.

That reminds me of one more memorable moment.

BEATING THAT DAMN "CHALLENGE 30" IN PERFECT DARK. King of the Hill with expert sims and pistols only. That was insanely hard to finish not because of the computer skills, but because of my teammate skills. He was so retarded running without guns towards the enemy. I had to be extremely fast to cover his ass. The only way I could finished it was with two maulers, charged shots and a looooooot of luck.

Beating Breath of Fire II: Breath of Fire II was one of those seminal games for me. The first Breath of Fire was also my first RPG, and I beat it fairly easily, but the sequel was another matter altogether. The biggest pain was Barubary, the second-to-last boss and royal pain all around. My brother and cousin would gather around as I attempted to beat him go after go, but but it never happened. Easily took a whole month before he went down, his sprite disappearing from the screen with no sound effect, and my heart stopping for a few seconds. Everyone was stoked; it was great! You can imagine my excitement when I found out about Breath of Fire III years later (aka, the sole reason I bought a PS1).

Getting my GameBoy: My eighth birthday would have been pretty bland If I hadn't gotten this. My grandparents got me this, Super Mario Land, and a polyester carrying case I still have and use to this day. Tetris was insanely engrossing in of itself, by the whole package was really special

Playing Bad Dudes: It's not a great game, really, but I remember the day my brother and I, on a mission probably inspired by God, were determined to beat the arcade version of Bad Dudes vs. Dragon Ninja. Fueled by soda and pretzels we played on, and five dollars a piece later we left with failure, but oddly enough, we felt like we had actually accomplished something that day.

Playing Duke Nukem 3D: Not my first FPS, but the only one I've ever enjoyed. I guess because it doesn't play like a normal shooter; there's just so much to find, so many secret areas to explore, weapons that, although not exactly useful, are insanely fun to use. The codes, the deep-as-you-want-it level editor, the humor, the bots; it was all so well done. I hadn't played the game in forever, and was still able to beat my friends at it during my first death-match session in college (My home internet was never good at that sort of thing). Easily my most played PC game.

There are plenty more, but I'll save 'em for later!

I remember the first time playing Mario on the NES. We had borrowed the NES from someone we knew and I didn't really catch what was going on at first, being like 3-4 years old, but after they plugged it in to the TV and started the first stage I gasped like I had never done before and I never will again :P It was amazing that you could actually control something on the TV.

Not long after my father, got a computer. It had a few games on it, like Wolfenstein 3D and others, so I sat there by the computer, 4 years old, killing nazis :D

Then for christmas a year later we got a SNES. Oh boy, what a joy it was. It was the true start of my life as a gamer. Playing the SNES was an activity for the whole family, I remember playing Super Mario 2 on the Mario Allstars game, taking turns with my mom, dad and sister. My father favored the Princess, my mom Luigi, while we two siblings just couldn't stop playing with Toad :) I remember when my dad found the shortcut with Peach in level 4, you know the one where you gotta leap over the water and hover, it was a real hallelujah moment. I tried afterwards to do the same with Toad but unfortunately, it didn't work :P

I remember getting Zelda 3 for the SNES while we we're away on a trip. I got it with a huge game guide, with lots of artwork in it and huge detailed maps and everything. But since we were away from home and I didn't have the SNES with me I spent almost every waking hour looking through that game guide, getting amazed by the pictures and the screenshots.

Then, 2 years later or something, with my father being a computer enthusiast heard about emulating on the computer and that you could play SNES games for free on the computer. "FOR FREE!?" I exclaimed :D Oh, how many great games I got to play because of that. If it weren't for that, I wouldn't have gotten to play all the great RPGs of the SNES.

I learned English initially by playing RPG games on the computer. I'm Swedish and at the time I were like only 7 years old, but I was so eager to know what they said in the games, so by always sitting there with a dictionary checking up all the words I didn't know I practically learned to speak English more or less. I remember how shocked everyone was when we started learning English in school, they even called home to my parents asking where I learnt all that English :P

Oh well, the memories are many, might write down some more later, need to go to bed now though.

I have many memories but here are just some of them that I do remember.

Getting Duke Nukem: Zero Hour for the N64.
Duke Nukem: Zero Hour was one of my first games that I have owned and played. I absolutely loved that game and was very addicted to it because of the story and some of the interesting boss battles.

Getting over 200K in RE 4 Mercenaries.
This was a complete shock to me. I was intent on getting over 200K on that. I managed to get this one day hoping that I was gonna do it. You guys can imagine my shock when I finally achieved it. I did it with Wesker. I just went crazy and had nearly a 200 enemy combo!

Getting out of the map on Crackdown.
I finally was able to get out of the map which was awesome to finally do. After several attempts I finally got out, of it and did a death drop into the ocean. :D

got the url for that one?

anyway
Final Fantasy 6 (or 3us)
Four words - Best Final Fantasy Ever.

Tales of Symphonia
All of it, seriously. Evey last one of the 30 hours it took to complete it were brillant to behold, sure the story wasn't deap. Sure it was a bit ham fisted in it's story but god. the Voice acting, the battles, the music. Everything.

1. First console:
Of course getting a new system for the first time is gonna be awesome especially when every system back then was trying to be progressive. I remember when I got a Sega Game Gear and playing a hand held in the dark was pretty mind blowing. My Sega Genesis, SNES, N64, Playstation, Dreamcast, PS2, Xbox and 360; all of them were pretty fun to crack open.

2. Split screen fun:
I read one dude here mentioned playing some mad Goldeneye bouts with his bros. Yeah those were some good days. That never happens anymore. Mind you that Halo eventually came out and brought back the golden days for quite some time. Which reminds me, the first time I hooked up two Xbox's together for a crazy network fight was pretty kick ass. I had always wanted to do that. When I did it with my 360 for the first time was unforgettable.

3. Halo 2 tournament:
It was my first and only tournament and we played in a Galaxy theatre. It was me and my two friends who went. It was huge competition to see who was the best in Canada and it had come to Saskatchewan. That was a friggin' cool expirience. Every possible Halo scenario was touched (when it came to Slayer). I seen every strategy and trick known to Halo 2. Mind the fact that you weren't allowed to use gltches to give yourself an advanage over the competition; I'm talking about getting to places on the map, using weapons smart and on and on. Then this one Asian dude's turn came up and then everything went to shit for everyone. This guy goes and turns up his controller sensitivity to 10, grabs a plasma pistol and assault rifle and begins to mutilate everbody. This guy got every spree possible and went over 50 kills, the most that anyone got that day. It was just plain cool. I got a poster with the date on it from the whole tournament.

4. Game completions:
-Final Fantasy VII- it took me a while since I was new to RPGs at the time; but man was the whole story and ending was stuck in my mind for days. Mostly because after I finished it, it felt like there was nothing as epic to finish for a while. Of course I could've start the whole thing all over, but it wouldn't be the same.
-Metal Gear Solid franchise- any of these was a trip to complete. From the first one on the Playstation to the third for the PS2. I'm still trying to follow this clusterfuck they call a storyline.
-Kingdom Hearts- just the whole expirience of this game was unique at the time so I enjoyed it quite a bit. I mean Disney and Final Fantasy together was oddballed enough that I actually enjoyed it.

Hamlet in Illusion of Gaia, by far. ;________;

(Also, sup massive thread necromancy, but it's a cool thread so whatever.)

1: Although it's fairly recent, beating Infinite Undiscovery for the first time will stay with me for a long time, I loved every minute of that game.

2: When I first got my original Playstation I didn't have any games or a memory card, all I had was a demo disk that contained Metal Gear Solid in japanese. I played through that demo at least 50 times till I saved up enough money to go buy a memory card and the actual game, which I enjoyed every moment of.

3: When I stayed home from school because I was "sick" just to keep playing Goldeneye for the N64.

4: When I beat SaGa Frontier 2, Still one of the hardest last bosses I've ever been up against. Those who have beaten it might know what I'm talking about.

I have a lot more, but I don't wanna make the list go on too long. Great topic for bringing back old memories though.

1: Fucking Rogue. Back on our first old DOS-Based computer, I played the hell out of it. Still haven't beaten it, but yeah.

2: Atari 7600. Yeah, I had one of THOSE Atari machines. A crapload of games (including E.T. (!!!), which somehow I managed to beat). I'd get up early on Saturday mornings and try to go through my collection in some sort of order.

3: Playing Final Fantasy IV. My first JRPG and I <3ed. Still do.

4: Discovering Emulators. Holy fuck now I could play games I couldn't afford back when I was a kid. Holy fuck I can play stuff that's been fantranslated!

5: Corrollary: Finishing Terranigma for the second time. So beautiful, and there's a reason it's probably my favorite game ever. Best game on the SNES by FAR.

-Finding a hard copy of and beating Chrono Trigger for the first time. Yeah, it was like a year and a half ago, but it was such a long time coming it felt all the better when i finally did it.

-Finding a hard copy of and beating Super Mario RPG for the first time. This happened probably about 6 years ago. I used to rent that game a lot when i was like 8 years old, but i could never beat the game start to finished when i was that young.

-any of the times i've played through the Forest Temple in Ocarina of Time. That one, to this day, stands as my favourite Zelda dungeon. I love its over grown castle/mansion look. It's exactly the kind of environment i look for in a game like that. Those games need more (pseudo) creepy environment more like that.

Oh man, similar story here. A couple years after getting an SNES (first console) for my birthday, I saw Super Mario RPG at a KB Toys and just had to have it despite not knowing what the fuck kind of game it was; I just really liked the style of the graphics on the cover, haha. But as a kid who had only played platformers and beat 'em ups, obviously an RPG was way over my head and I had no idea how to play the game. Although I ended up having some fun just doing random shit, I didn't seriously play it until a couple years later when I actually understood how to play. But even then I still didn't beat it . . . I literally saved before the final boss and then just never played it again. Fast-forward about 8 years later and out of boredom during my senior year in high school, I popped it in and beat that shit in 15 minutes. Even though I had forgotten almost all of the storyline and the final boss was so easy, it was still so satisfying to finally complete something that I had started so long ago and something that I wanted so badly as a child.

Alright, here goes:

1. When i was small my parents were big time gamers but we were very poor so we only had a snes. My grandma got me a copy of earthbound for christmas one year. It was the pack with the game and the book in i nice little box. As soon as my mom brought over her snes i was playing it going through the dungeon fighting mice and the giant ant. Well i was about 6 or 7 so it took me about a year or so to go through. The first time i got to the last boss i paused the game and ran down the street about 2 blocks or so. I told my sister and her friends and my grandma that i was about to beat the game to come and watch!! I was sooo happy!


2. I know this is cliche but when Aeris died on ff7. I was at my dads house and it was about 1 in the morning. She got killed and i went down and woke my dad up and cried to him that she was gone. About a week later some stupid kid was playing Crash Bandicoot and erased my game. I had to watch her die all over agian! :(


3. Playing Brave Fencer Musashi on the psx with my dad. I would always stay the night over at his house on weekends. We decided to start playing games together. I would fall asleep around 11 or 12 and he would sit there and play for a few more hours. When i woke up i would ask him what i missed and we went back to playing (honestly i was glad i feel asleep when he hit the forest maze). We also did this with parasite eve. One reason why ill never get rid of those games...


5. As far as memorable scary moments go i would say my mom playing RE directors cut when i was a kid. I watched her for hours then go to bed. I would have zombie dreams and for 4 months straight i could not go to bed without checking the lock on the front door at LEAST 4 times.


4. Getting my ps2. About a year after they came out i still didnt have one. Well one year for Christmas i got a gift with ffx inside. I was confused and i looked at my dad and asked what it was for. He said that he as able to get the money for the game but he had a coupon to rent the system. I was happy! I could actually play a game i wanted to! He finally told me and my sister to check downstairs. I went downstairs and saw the ps2 with grand turismo pack at the bottom of the stairs. I was so happy i was crying!


To this day i have a strange habit of every game i own i can never get rid of just because when i played them it felt like a little piece of me went into them. I still have all my snes games and all my psx as well. I love them.

Holy shit how did I forget: beating Descent I without using codes. Holy god that game was brutal even on the easiest difficulty settings.