The PS1 Nostalgia Thread

[Carbomb]

The PS and PS2 contain one of my favourite game series of all time: Legacy of Kain. Blood Omen was clearly designed for older PCs, but it fit the console very well, and it was the first game I'd seen that had places and things you could only access at certain times of day, like caves which had stone doors that would only open on a full moon, or at noon. Soul Reaver was also ground-breaking, with the main character, Raziel, shifting in real time between the material world and the spectral one - the landscape shifting and changing before your very eyes, and certain paths only open to you via one or the other.

Still holds up pretty well now. My favourite of the entire series is Soul Reaver 2 on the PS2, but I do like to sometimes play the whole series over (excluding Blood Omen 2, which was not good).

Edited August 11, 2022 by Carbomb

[Daaaaaad!]

1 hour ago, Fatty Facesitter said:

Bastard hard as you got to the latter stages, even when you promoted your pigs. The final level on the Isle of Swill is absolute torture if you do it the conventional way. 

I didn't know anyone who ever won it fair and square. Weird thing though - there's a glitch/cheat which promotes your pigs which I discovered by complete accident! I still remember it happening and being flabbergasted - basically, it involved going into a multiplayer game with some sort of FMV cheat on, which then rebooted the game back into the single player, except suddenly all your players had been turned into Commandos.

Wanted to write into PlayStation Power magazine about it but never got around to bothering - email wasn't prevalent at the time and fuck writing a letter.

That, though, was another game bought through the famous and previously mentioned OPM demo discs. One multiplayer game with 'madness gas' on was all it took for me to persuade Grandma to part with her money at Toys R Us.

[Loki]

3 hours ago, Carbomb said:

The PS and PS2 contain one of my favourite game series of all time: Legacy of Kain. Blood Omen was clearly designed for older PCs, but it fit the console very well, and it was the first game I'd seen that had places and things you could only access at certain times of day, like caves which had stone doors that would only open on a full moon, or at noon. Soul Reaver was also ground-breaking, with the main character, Raziel, shifting in real time between the material world and the spectral one - the landscape shifting and changing before your very eyes, and certain paths only open to you via one or the other.

Still holds up pretty well now. My favourite of the entire series is Soul Reaver 2 on the PS2, but I do like to sometimes play the whole series over (excluding Blood Omen 2, which was not good).

I worked on a Legacy of Kain reboot but  Konami killed it.    I loved Soul Reaver, particularly as it loaded in the background, something we did on Silent Hill on the Wii, so there were no loading times as you explored.

Edited August 11, 2022 by Loki

[Rule One]

INTERNATIONAL TRACK AND FIELD!

Holy shit how did I forget about this! Getting blasted on a Friday night and four of us sitting around the TV legitimately trying our hardest to out do each other. I had a game changer and it came in the form of a trainer sock. (Please be high brow with wanking jokes!) Slip it over the two main button masher fingers and it never failed. That was until my mate Paul banned me from going round his unless I 'played fair'.

Big shout out to Tony Hawk's bastard brother Dave Mira BMX, I loved putting the jump cheat on and seeing what crazy combination I could come up with. Shame what happened to him though.

[Jesse]

6 hours ago, Carbomb said:

The PS and PS2 contain one of my favourite game series of all time: Legacy of Kain. Blood Omen was clearly designed for older PCs, but it fit the console very well, and it was the first game I'd seen that had places and things you could only access at certain times of day, like caves which had stone doors that would only open on a full moon, or at noon. Soul Reaver was also ground-breaking, with the main character, Raziel, shifting in real time between the material world and the spectral one - the landscape shifting and changing before your very eyes, and certain paths only open to you via one or the other.

Still holds up pretty well now. My favourite of the entire series is Soul Reaver 2 on the PS2, but I do like to sometimes play the whole series over (excluding Blood Omen 2, which was not good).

Can't believe I never mentioned Soul Reaver! That game more than any other is the reason I decided as a kid I wanted to work in games and set me on the path I'm still on now I'm turning 35. Even forgetting how great the gameplay concept still is - its the cutscenes filled with a sense of Shakespearean drama and delivered by some world class actors that suckered me into wanting to become a games writer. Didn't quite make it into narrative but I got pretty close and some of that credit has to go to Amy Hennig's writing on Soul Reaver

[Carbomb]

4 hours ago, Loki said:

I worked on a Legacy of Kain reboot but  Konami killed it.    I loved Soul Reaver, particularly as it loaded in the background, something we did on Silent Hill on the Wii, so there were no loading times as you explored.

I remember you very kindly PMing me about that, telling me not to tell anyone on pain of death! I was so hyped for it.

And then somebody (think it was Square, 'cos they own Eidos now) released that shite MMO RPG, Nosgoth. Think it's best just to leave be now.

1 hour ago, Jesse said:

Can't believe I never mentioned Soul Reaver! That game more than any other is the reason I decided as a kid I wanted to work in games and set me on the path I'm still on now I'm turning 35. Even forgetting how great the gameplay concept still is - its the cutscenes filled with a sense of Shakespearean drama and delivered by some world class actors that suckered me into wanting to become a games writer. Didn't quite make it into narrative but I got pretty close and some of that credit has to go to Amy Hennig's writing on Soul Reaver

Y'know how part of the unlockables in SR2 is the game's dialogue scripts? I've learned most of the monologues in that as preparation for voice acting jobs. It's a hell of a challenge not reading Kain in the style of Simon Templeman, who just made that role his own. 

[Thunderplex]

RC Coptor.  After about 8 hours of constant playing, managed to hover for 11 seconds without crashing.  Loved it though.

[air_raid]

Add me to the Soul Reaver list. What I loved for trivia was that the main voice was Michael Bell who is one of the millions of crossover actors from two of my favourite franchises, having both been the voice of Swoop in the original Transformers cartoon, and appeared in Encounter At Farpoint in Star Trek TNG.

[Loki]

Some of the Kain reboot footage has made it onto Youtube - 
 

 

It was headed in a more God Of War direction as you can see.  The creative lead, Sam Barlow, is a fantastic games designer who I've worked with a few times now.

9 hours ago, Carbomb said:

I remember you very kindly PMing me about that, telling me not to tell anyone on pain of death! I was so hyped for it.

So was I.  In the end I went off to do Harry Potter instead, and so didn't have the heartache of having it cancelled out from under me.

[Jesse]

Damn, I love Sam Barlow! Straying way off topic but I just saw that EDGE gave his new game IMMORTALITY a 10, so I've gotta check that out.

[FLips]

Not to derail talk from the Soul Reaver discussion (I've never played them properly but enjoyed what I did) but here's a couple more reviews.

Fighting Force

What is it?

Fighting Force is a 3D Beat-em-up developed by Core Design fresh off the heels of Tomb Raider. Originally slated to become the fourth Streets of Rage game before being turned down by Sega, FF is a curious what-could-have-been made by arguably the hottest developer at the time on Playstation.

How is it?

A favourite of my younger brother’s when we were growing up that we put a lot of time into, I have fond memories of Fighting Force. At our age we had no expectations, no idea who made what and though we both loved Streets of Rage on our Mega Drive we had no idea this was ever meant to be a sequel to them, though we could clearly appreciate the similar gameplay.

After work yesterday I took this round and we played through it Co-op again and we got quite bored very quickly.
It’s a bang average game in almost every aspect. The characters are completely unmemorable and in hindsight blatant knockoffs of Axel, Blaze and Max. The sound is almost none existent to the point I can’t remember any of it less than 24 hours removed, only that the stage music was a low generic thudding. The gameplay is slow and sluggish, buttons are mapped to multiple actions meaning you’ll pick up items when you want to punch, you’ll punch when you want to pick up items, you’ll hit backwards when you want to grab, and so on. Even the faster characters move slow and methodically and you pick up items so slowly that half the time you’ll get walloped and drop it before you can even use it.

Friendly fire is on but the hit detection is brutal. A lot of the time yesterday one of us would throw a punch at an enemy and it would go right through them and hit the other player.

It’s not all bad though. The core gameplay itself, though executed poorly, is familiar enough to SoR to kinda work. Enemies are varied fodder with the usual names like Masher, Crusher, Bodger and Badger and despite the sluggishness it’s still fun to smack them about with a pipe or throw them around the stage.
The best part of the game by far are the environments. Levels, though not bursting with colour are at least fairly varied so you get your typical street level, subway, the good ol’ elevator level and so on. There are boxes and barrels full of goodies to smash all over the place, and things like rails can be torn right off the walls. Smash a car up and chuck the wheels and engine around. There’s a lot you can do and you have to think maybe in modern development or better hands how a beat em up with quite this much stage interaction would fare. Pretty well, I think.

Overall it’s some good ideas and some bad execution coming together to make a package that in 1997 was completely passable but today has not aged as well as games in the genre that came long before it. It’s too slow and the move from coin-ops to pure console beat-em-ups like this means that the game has very little replay value.
It does make you wonder how it could have turned out if Sega said yes to it being SoR4, would they have upped the quality or would it have sank the SoR name? Would we have ever gotten the fantastic actual SoR4 either?

It did well enough to warrant a sequel in which you play as the most boring of the four characters in a single player only action game. Sounds bad on paper and despite having made Tomb Raider which is the same type of game, they made an absolute dud which I had as a kid but won’t waste time with now. Fighting Force is still worth a dabble but don’t get your hopes up.

Valkyrie Profile

 

What is it?

Valkyrie Profile is a JRPG developed by Enix, famous at the time for Dragon Quest and ActRaiser games, but later would fuse with Square to become the giant Square Enix. In VP you play as Lenneth, a Valkyrie responsible for collection human souls to fight for you in Asgard. 

How is it?

This is a difficult one. It’s well regarded among PS1 RPG fans and there is so much to love about the game, but I feel like I never got to fully appreciate it due to how inaccessible the whole thing is.

To put the following review into perspective, there are two endings in the game, one of which is considered the canon ending and can only be achieved by playing on Hard Mode. Not only that, but it’s not just the ending, but in fact a huge part of the game’s story that changes depending on the mode.

I played on Normal Mode and so despite sinking dozens of hours into the game, was given a less than stellar presentation that is lacking most of the important story and character elements. Almost as punishment for not wanting to play on Hard Mode. Like how if you ever played on Easy on some platformers it would cut half the levels and you’d be locked into getting the bad ending.

So my review will be biased because I can only review what I played personally, not what the whole game could offer.

Like I said, plenty to love about the game; however, it’s almost like a coin in that every positive has a negative attached to it.

The story is exciting and unique but you don’t get to see it on Normal mode.
The characters are memorable to start with but there ends up being so many of them that by the time you’re halfway into the game you start to lose interest.
The battles are a thrilling combo-building turn-based affair that are fun in the moment but require so much faffing on with equipment and knowing what each character can wear or do that it gets repetitive fast. Using magic is overpowered and puts your mage on cooldown for multiple turns too.
The music is nice but a lot of tracks repeat and none of them are really that memorable, though the battle music is banging.

I want to go into more detail about such a huge game but honestly the whole package is just so aggressively unapproachable that I find it hard to properly talk about it because despite getting so far into the game, so many of the core mechanics are never explained or unnecessarily complicated. Every guide I saw when looking for bits I was stuck on or where to find certain things unanimously said “play the game on Normal first to understand what you do and then play it on Hard to get the proper game” which sadly, when you’re up against some of the games this was up against, just isn’t for me and likely why it remains a niche favourite on a console rammed with JRPGs.

It feels like a game made for die-hards and made to keep casuals out. On Normal mode the core gameplay boils down to being given a set period of time to fly around the overworld map and visit towns and dungeons; however you quickly notice that to get all the characters and visit the dungeons in that period of time all the game becomes is a series of cutscenes of you getting a character, then beating one or two short dungeons, then sending your characters off before the next period starts.

It's almost on-rails how repetitive it is, and it’s a testament to how well made some of the dialogue and character backstories are that it never felt as pointless as it was. Visiting towns out of order when there isn’t a character to collect there wastes your time and has nothing in the town to do or see. You make all your own equipment and items so there are no shops, and the NPCs, unless part of a town you have been told to visit, will say next to nothing and are void of any personality.
The entire thing gives the illusion of freedom but everything has to be done in the order the game asks or you get nothing in return.

I got to the halfway point and hit a difficulty spike so hard I just stopped playing because this isn’t a game where you can go have fun grinding for a couple of hours, you’re against the clock so one wrong move or one wrong soul sent to Asgard early and you’re done.

Overall Valkyrie Profile has a lot going for it if you’re a die-hard JRPG fan who loves a deep story and overcomplicated mechanics that require full guides to understand. There are some brilliant heroes and villains but you can only see them in certain modes. If you want almost a visual novel with some dungeons in-between the pages then this is for you. A lot to sink your teeth in to for better or worse.
If you want a story-driven RPG like Final Fantasy where you can play at your own pace, still finish the game without secret bosses, weapons and characters but feel like you still got the full package, then give it a miss.

Currently playing:

Crash Bandicoot 2 - Cortex Strikes Back

Developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment, Crash Bandicoot 2 is the much loved first sequel in the original Crash Bandicoot Trilogy. Collect all the power crystals and secret gems to destroy the Cortex Vortex once and for all! 

Resident Evil

Developed by Capcom, Resident Evil is the master of Survival Horror games and a timeless PS1 classic that I'm sure everyone has been spooked by in one way or another. 

[Carbomb]

I remember Fighting Force! That was a ton of fun - played it on a friend's PS. Unfortunately, it seemed to be quite rare - was never able to find a copy.

Am intrigued by Valkyrie Profile - I have VP2: Silmeria for the PS2, but that's part of the damn backlog as well. Presumably I don't need to have played the first to understand the second, it'll just have the odd Easter egg for fans of the first?

[Guest]

I was very keen on the idea of Fighting Force when it was being advertised in magazines, but I didn't have anything capable of running it. One thing I remember sounding a bit discouraging, though, was the inclusion of guns, which seemed totally out of step with the spirit of a brawling-based game. Still irritates me in Yakuza today.

[Dai]

Outstanding thread! Dont think its been talked about yet in the thread, but I seem to remember the PS1 costing an insane amount! I kept the box for years, and can see the Electronics Boutique handwirtten price tag on it for well over £300. £329 maybe, which for the mid 90s is a lot of dough.

I played Tekken to death on it, but for some reason the main thing I think about is that it had a cardboard case. Dont think any other game had that! What was the reason for that?

Ill throw two games into the mix here:

 

Die Hard Trilogy

Liam brought this up earlier in the thread, and it brought back some great memories. What a game! Not sure what the rational was behind doing three mini games, but it worked so well. My favourate was the arcade shooter, played that for hours on end. All three were great, mind.

 

 

Psychic Detective

Speaking of ahead of its time, this definately falls into that catagory. Watching the youtube clips of this, Im not sure why the hell I bought it. Think it was in a Dixons '2 for £50' deal or something. Can remember playing this for ages, and always getting stuck at the same point. Funny to think we used to live in a world where if you got stuck, you simply couldnt continue, and would just have to play something else. I remember doing that plenty of times on this one.

[HarmonicGenerator]

2 hours ago, Dai said:

 

Psychic Detective

Speaking of ahead of its time, this definately falls into that catagory. Watching the youtube clips of this, Im not sure why the hell I bought it. Think it was in a Dixons '2 for £50' deal or something. Can remember playing this for ages, and always getting stuck at the same point. Funny to think we used to live in a world where if you got stuck, you simply couldnt continue, and would just have to play something else. I remember doing that plenty of times on this one.

The one that springs to mind for me for getting stuck is the first Crash Bandicoot. I could not get past Pinstripe. Throwing the controller in a fit of frustration, absolutely completely stuck, and never finished the game until earlier this year when I played the remastered one and used a YouTube tutorial to finally beat the bastard.