Difficult games "saved" if played on emulation

[RanmyakuIchi's icon RanmyakuIchi RanmyakuIchi]

Not really "saved", but save-states can be very useful to quickly retry a difficult section or boss in a game without having to wait on a game over screen and/or return to title screen after each failure. I used them to quickly get back into the game when I was learning Tyson in NES Punch-Out, for example.

 

[Clxmj]

Fantastic Dizzy on the Mega Drive/Genesis. I was chuffed when reaching credits even with save states - this was our dark souls if you like when we where younger. It's fucking insane to try it when your like 8yrs old and you get smushed so easily. Our house has fond memories of trying to finish this one.

Legit soundtrack too, Treehouse Village hits me in the tinglies:

 

[twistedbee]

I used fast-forward on Sailor Moon: Another Story on my recent playthrough. It has some serious grind issues so being able to just fast forward walking around and grinding levels on really helps it. There is a patched version of it on the Repo that rebalances the grind and makes it easier to progress now but if you ever played it you know that FF makes it much more bearable.
https://retrogametalk.com/repository/snes-rom/sailor-moon-another-story-english-patched/

 

[Zerpina]

View attachment 73181

I used fast-forward on Sailor Moon: Another Story on my recent playthrough. It has some serious grind issues so being able to just fast forward walking around and grinding levels on really helps it. There is a patched version of it on the Repo that rebalances the grind and makes it easier to progress now but if you ever played it you know that FF makes it much more bearable.
https://retrogametalk.com/repository/snes-rom/sailor-moon-another-story-english-patched/

Oh my God, this game... sans the patch, was a downright slog to play to get anywhere.
It was the poster child for 'grindy'
MMOs have nothing on the unpatched version for grinding

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

I'm playing Pilotwings and savestates help a lot.

 

[CaesariusMagnum]

When I was younger I used savestates on the gerudo fortress section in OOT, because I kept getting defeated by the gerudo thieves.

Other than that, I found myself using the nifty rewind feature to beat Super Mario Brothers on the switch.

 

[TentaclesMod]

Oh my God, this game... sans the patch, was a downright slog to play to get anywhere.
It was the poster child for 'grindy'
MMOs have nothing on the unpatched version for grinding
View attachment 73215

Imagine a timeline where this game was brought to the west and they pulled that little trick where they reduce the exp. enemies give and/or increase the difficulty to make the game last longer...

 

[Zerpina]

Imagine a timeline where this game was brought to the west and they pulled that little trick where they reduce the exp. enemies give and/or increase the difficulty to make the game last longer...

 

[Kremiso]

Final Fantasy Tactics, in the well know Wiegraf battle at Riovanes Castle; it is a double consecutive fight, first with Wiegraf alone and then with his evolved Belias form and his monsters platoon

there the game raised a lot the difficulty bar, and kicked out a lot standard players back then

using the emulators help, it's great to examine and perhaps replay each single step of those battles, to find the still not easy combination required to win

incredible well developed phase, like a chess game vs a champion

 

[trickybus]

I really only started appreciating save states when I emulated Haunting Ground for the first time. Mind you, I still only use the in-game save points for progression but I will abuse the hell out of save states for what I believe is the worst and most bizarre part of the game: item crafting.

To put it bluntly, it's bullshit RNG. You get these drops called "medallions" that you can insert into a machine to make items. You're taken to a separate screen where you're expected to match up colors in a specific way to get the items you want.

Each one of those nodes up there spins like a slot machine reel. You have to time your button presses perfectly to get the reel to stop on the color you want. And no, doing it by sight is not an option. By the time you see the color on-screen it's already too late to stop the reel on that color. Oh, and if you get too many grey nodes? You get nothing.

Such a godawful crafting system for what is otherwise an excellent game.

 

[Bonkers225]

All of them tbh with the save states, and rewind features. Which are basically God Mode. Question is, do you have the patience. I sure as hell don't.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

All of them tbh with the save states, and rewind features. Which are basically God Mode. Question is, do you have the patience. I sure as hell don't.

Funny how even with rewind some games are still hard as hell like Battletoads' penultimate level.

 

[GardeniaSky's icon GardeniaSky GardeniaSky]

I use save states and rewind constantly. The only difference imo is not having to 'get back to' whatever is giving you trouble. It just saves time.

 

[MegaDrive1987]

View attachment 65138

How come? I've always fancied playing this as I loved Alien Trilogy as a kid.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Emulation can also mean romhack that would make some of the rough edges more smooth.

Yes, there are everdrives as well but I'd argue that some hacks are so advanced they work better (or work at all) on PC.

 

[Nidstang]

The Rocket Knight trilogy. I dont think I would have been able to beat them without save states/rewind features.

 

[dr grim]

The savestates really helped me in this one, oh boy those platforming sequences..

 

[Bakuma1997]

Both Rygar and Blaster Master are great games with a awful caveat: NO SAVING no passwords either, if you fuck up, back to the beggining, and no, there is no save patch yet (I looked for them) fortunately Savestates has let me see the ending of those by hand

 

[Blamhammer]

The game is not difficult but Drakengard 3 on the PS3 was tedious to play on original hardware, thanks to god awful performance. (Although kicking the output res to 480 in the PS3 settings helped.)
It's not a slideshow on the PS3 emulator.

 

[Graves Ruinwalker]

I used savestates alot too. Even today im using it to get through some games that i never played. And in a few games , the savestates helped me to spare me of pure anger and frustration .

But now im using save-states very sparingly and accept my bad skills at the games i struggle .

Yes , i hate to be frustrated from a game but in many games ( especially old ones ) are failures and errors a part to the game which should be experienced too and patience must be learned and earned to get better at a game .

Savestates are an option to use and enchance/improve our enjoyment even when the game is balls hard and crushes you with its difficulty .

 

[Kremiso]

View attachment 83310

The savestates really helped me in this one, oh boy those platforming sequences..

damn i love the first Alundra! i still own the original cd with the map;
oh yes i remember some tricky jumping parts and also some difficult bossfights, btw i reached to complete this on PS1 back then, at least two times
great challenge!