Sharing a random experience from the PS1 days

[SoThankful]

This is what the launch countdown for Vagrant Story looked like on Squaresoft's website just one day before its release.

 

[Segadude113]

only ever read about it in a magazine, didn't know there was a countdown. coolness!

 

[midnitecarnival]

Awesome game.

And there's never been another like it.

Started it many times but never completed it.
That's the story of my gaming career: Massive ever-piling backlog where I've only put in the first four hours of each title.

 

[UnDubious]

Good stuff. 2000 seems like a different world now, as far away from this current reality as the '90s.
I didn't know Vagrant Story when it launched, even though I was into RPGs, and it didn't appeal to me for years after I learned about it. It didn't have the typical RPG look, it was a dungeon crawler, in fact it kind of reminded me of a Western-made computer RPG from the outside. I only tried it eventually because back then I wanted to play every RPG ever made. I had a great time. It's one of the best PS1 games, IMO.
--
Slight novella ahead, I tried to make it readable and interesting.
If we're expanding on this to talk about random PS1 experiences in general, I didn't own a PS1 when it was relevant (I had a Saturn), but my older brother's friend lent him one for a while at one point, along with several games. He left for a day or a weekend and set up into his room and tried all the games. Breath of Fire III was the one I really got into; I had discovered the genre through BoF II, and it had the same spirit, plus it still felt more like an evolution of SNES RPGs than a revolution like the new wave of fully 3D RPGs, which I didn't like (I like them now). I played it for several hours that day and felt the same magic, but then my brother came back home, and the PS1 was returned to his friend.

I quit gaming for a few years as a teen. Years later, I got a used PS2, and bought DQVIII along with several PS1 RPGs - BoF III being the one I most looked forwward to. But I stepped on a wire or something, the PS2 fell, and it broke before I could ever play it. Eventually I went to a small used goods store (there were still a decent number of them, though they were already on the decline) and saw a PSOne there for maybe 50-60$. I pretty much bought it just to play BoF III, after all these years. I really liked the game. I'll admit 2 and 3 have overly high encounter rates, but other than that I think they're top RPGs. I kind of hated IV, in comparison. Never played Dragon Quarter.

 

[qw90700]

My PS1 story is too long but long long story short learning about PS1 and it having amazing games when I got the oppurtinity to go to Japan I took my chances and bought a PS1 and the games I liked there and when I returned my country I found out the power system PS1 uses is different in my country so had to take it to an electrician to figure out making it work. And then we turned on the PS1 and seeing this screen I thought we broke something lol:

After many years that my country really skipped most of the PS1 craze happening around the world due to we were still having Sega Genesis craze, finally the last English PS1 model came to my country. Me thinking my PS1 is broken and never had a chance to fact check because no internet back then, I knew no one had a PS1, no place even sell a PS1 game in my city (so I had to find my way to buy games from Japan) and public libraries doesn't contain any information about video game consoles lol I had no way to learn if my PS1 is fucked or not, it actually was broken twice which we could fix by simple part change so to be safe I bought the last PS1 model and then its games started to be sold in only video game shop in my city. After like few years that the internet became a common thing in my country I checked and learned this screen was actually the intended design choice WTF lolol.