Retrospectives

Everything I Learned, I Learned From Gaming PART SIX: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon Another Story (1995) ・・・ Emulating Nostalgia

February 21, 2015 — Leave a comment

When I first started using the internet independently as a kid, I was really into Sailor Moon. Sailor Moon R had just finished airing up to the usual part where the dub cut off mid story arc and it started from episode one again. Desperate for any other information I could find out about the series, I spent countless afternoons on different GeoCities Sailor Moon shrines. Finding out the Japanese names of the characters, discovering there were even more Sailor Senshi than just the inner five – it was like a whole new world of this series opened up to me. Don’t get me started on the soundtracks, because I was all over that. In midi form, of course…though I somehow amassed a rather large collections of .ogg files as well. I eventually came to terms with the fact that I wouldn’t be able to download all the newer episodes on my pathetic dial up connection, and gradually became engrossed in other anime instead.

As a teen who completely missed the 16 bit generation, emulators were crucial to filling the gaps when I was broke in high school with no easy way to track down classic consoles. I forget how I initially stumbled upon them, but it was amazing to finally play all of these games I had read about online. The majority of them being Japanese RPGs. Games like Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy V, and Terranigma. Of course the most awful thing about using emulators was the throw-away nature of the ROMs. If something didn’t keep my attention past the first three hours, I usually dropped it pretty quickly and moved onto the next game. Continue reading

Everything I Learned, I Learned From Gaming PART FIVE: Final Fantasy VIII (1999) ・・・ Seedling

February 13, 2015 — 2 Comments

When I was twelve, my parents got divorced and my brother took the Playstation. I was pretty devastated over my material loss. Also I guess it sucked that my parents split. I had my Gameboy, but Pokémon Gold could only hold my attention for so long as a newly found only child. The following Christmas I was given a PS One, the slim line Playstation with a much more pleasant grey colouring. Having been without a console for a year, I was desperate for some Crash Bandicoot so naturally I asked for Crash Bash. What a waste of a game that was. But I suffered through it, because it was the only game I had in my possession. Then one day my dad took me to an Electronics Boutique (as it was known at the time) and told me to pick a new Playstation game.

So I stood in front of a small wall of Playstation titles, as the Playstation 2 had been released the previous Christmas and shelf space was dwindling. For the first time in years, I was out of my depth for choice. I hadn’t been reading any gaming magazines, so I had no clue what was worth playing any more. Then I spotted two vaguely familiar games with simple logotype covers. The name Final Fantasy seemed to ring a bell, as a lot of the anime websites I frequented mentioned it all the time. When presented with copies of Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VIII, I had a Burns style ‘ketchup, catsup’ breakdown. To the uninitiated, they both seemed like the exact same thing. Guy with big sword and pointy hair in a vaguely militaristic fantasy setting. So, with all the experience I had with Final Fantasy (or even RPGs for that matter), I chose Final Fantasy VIII ‘because the newer one must be better’. This was one of those rare times where my instinct was right. Continue reading