Gaming

[Areala-chan]

Don't own a Switch, so no OoT Day for me (although I've got both the original N64 version and the 3DS remake if I was really dying to play it), but I hope everyone who is going through it, whether for the first time or the twentieth, is having a blast!

If anyone wasn't sure I loved Dead Space, I wrote ~38,000 words about it.

If anyone didn't know I loved Lara Croft and Tomb Raider, I did ~3,000 words about that. And many, many more beyond, although not here. That was a long time ago, on servers far, far defunct.

I'm more of a retro gamer than a modern one, although I did just finish up my first playthrough of Ghostwire Tokyo, which was tons of fun. Loved the concept, loved the aesthetic, spent tons of time wandering the streets and enjoying the map design and architecture.

Favorite game due to story? Final Fantasy VI. One of the greatest video games ever made, IMO. Runner-up would probably be Morrowind, which has consumed a frankly alarming number of my life's limited hours. Infocom's various offerings also ate a considerable part of my adolescence, especially the Zork trilogy, The Lurking Horror, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Planetfall, Trinity, Plundered Hearts, and Wishbringer. But if you want the best story Infocom ever told, that goes to A Mind Forever Voyaging.

I'll stop oversharing now...

 

[Callum_M]

I'm more of a retro gamer than a modern one

I’m right there with you! I have saved nearly every game and console I’ve ever owned and have been slowly turning a space into a retro game area. Recently added an Atari 2600+ along with all my mainline Nintendo consoles plus the literal thousands of ROMs I’ve collected. Going backward in gaming has been more enjoyable than forward in recent years.

 

[Areala-chan]

I’m right there with you! I have saved nearly every game and console I’ve ever owned and have been slowly turning a space into a retro game area. Recently added an Atari 2600+ along with all my mainline Nintendo consoles plus the literal thousands of ROMs I’ve collected. Going backward in gaming has been more enjoyable than forward in recent years.

Ah, a fellow silicon hoarder! Excellent, most excellent! Given the nature of current console-based gaming from Sony and Microsoft, I'm content to let the PS4/Xbox One era be my last in the console space. I've got more stuff to play than there are years left in my life, so long live the Super Nintendo.

 

[Callum_M]

Ah, a fellow silicon hoarder! Excellent, most excellent! Given the nature of current console-based gaming from Sony and Microsoft, I'm content to let the PS4/Xbox One era be my last in the console space. I've got more stuff to play than there are years left in my life, so long live the Super Nintendo.

Story time!

I’m volunteering at a hospital in the pediatric playroom. This is around 2010-ish.

Person who runs the playroom gets a phone call. “Hey, did you know they’re moving all the toys and games you have stored?”

They rush over, learn they have to move about a thousand items right then and there. They have me come help. It’s this huge room filled with all sorts of stuff. I’m packing things up on a cart and then I see it.

I pick it up, ask if they know what it is. They don’t. I tell them it’s older than any patient in the place. They say, “So no good? You want it? My way of saying thanks!”

And…well…

Unopened, untouched, pristine! I’ve had it ever since.

 

[deathlynx]

I had time for gaming before I started writing. The only one I do now is Skyrim on a rare occasion when I just don't feel like writing. I've been a huge fan of the game for a decade.

I'm right (write?) there with you. I will certainly be getting OoT. Also need to pick up Kingdom Hearts as I had the online play version. Glad I no longer need to worry about a stable connection to play that! Between the two, (and Harvestella and Disney Dreamlight Valley's endless updates and additions) I don't know I'm ever going to need to get another game again! I mean KH alone has a dozen full-length games.

 

[Areala-chan]

Story time!

I’m volunteering at a hospital in the pediatric playroom. This is around 2010-ish.

Person who runs the playroom gets a phone call. “Hey, did you know they’re moving all the toys and games you have stored?”

They rush over, learn they have to move about a thousand items right then and there. They have me come help. It’s this huge room filled with all sorts of stuff. I’m packing things up on a cart and then I see it.

I pick it up, ask if they know what it is. They don’t. I tell them it’s older than any patient in the place. They say, “So no good? You want it? My way of saying thanks!”

And…well…View attachment 2702994

Unopened, untouched, pristine! I’ve had it ever since.

My gaming story isn't anywhere near as good as a free, complete-in-box Super Nintendo, but I'll share it anyway.

My birthday's in October, and the PlayStation 2 released here in the US on October 26th, 2000, at a price point of $299.99. I told my girlfriend (now my wife) that I wanted it as a combination birthday/Christmas present, but as the launch date approached, more and more media outlets were reporting that supplies were lower than expected, pre-ordering wouldn't guarantee you one at release, and they'd basically be impossible to find. So I shrugged my shoulders and resigned myself to the fact that I probably wouldn't have one until 2001, when supply would hopefully catch up to demand post-holiday.

As it turned out, on the 26th we were out running errands, and ducked into the local Target (a US-based big box retailer). As usual, I headed to the electronics section to see if there were any PlayStation games on sale. I arrived and was greeted by a table with a gigantic stack of familiar blue boxes bearing the PlayStation 2 logo, and a price tag of $299.99.

Every media report I'd heard said the system was already sold out everywhere, so I assumed these were display boxes, and that this particular store had not received a shipment of what had to be 40-50 PS2 units, and just put them out on the sales floor, but I picked one up, and it was clear this was NOT a display box. There was a system in there.

I looked around and found an employee who confirmed that, yes, those really were PS2s, and yes, they really were for sale, so I ran and found my girlfriend and explained to her that I'd just found a PlayStation 2 and would VERY MUCH like to use the credit card, please. She said it was fine, so we went back to Electronics to ring up my new toy, when the clerk informed me that if we opened a store credit card, we got 10% off our first purchase...

So I got my PS2, a second controller, a memory card, and a copy of Dead or Alive 2: Ultimate at a 10% discount, on launch day, by walking into a random department store and finding a pile of them on the sales floor when everywhere else was holding drawings or pre-order lotteries. I may never be so lucky again.

 

[RejectReality]

One of my great missed opportunities.

I was in Toys R Us at some point after the Sega Saturn had been released. I was there to grab a cheap Genesis and Castlevania Bloodlines, since they were all marked down due to the new console being out. It was the only game on the console I really cared about, so despite having a full time job and few bills, I couldn't conscience buying the console until it was marked down. When I hit the game aisle, I stumble across a bargain bin that's filled to the brim with about 50 copies each of the original Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior for the NES. Factory sealed new copies. $5 a piece. I bought one of each because I had second-hand carts only.

Those go for hundreds of dollars nowadays. Even the couple hundred cash I had on me would have been worth thousands if I'd known to grab as many as I could afford. ( I was also heading to Waldenbooks to pick up some new releases. ) Could have bought the whole bin if I wrote a check.

 

[Erozetta]

My biggest game story is being on a road trip with my husband and stopping in at a random Game Stop in.. Pennsylvania or Virginia, somewhere in that area.

We were browsing and I came across this used game for sale. I liked the cover art. It was $5. I asked my husband if he knew anything about it. He didn't. So I put it back. But I kept going back to it and finally went "I think we should buy it."

It's called "Rule of Rose" and was apparently a super controversial game that is now worth a few hundred dollars just for the disk. (We did play it. The mechanics were difficult and the gameplay gave me a migraine, but damn I loved the story.)

Otherwise, not very much exciting ever happens to me.