Same story for me. My dad bought me a PS1 in the summer (May) of 1998. We lived in Al Jubail Saudi Arabia at the time. Before that I had Sega Genisis and I was blown away by the graphics upgrade.
My dad couldnt afford the console at the original price - SAR1200. But then there was an ad in the local Arab Newspaper about Sony slashing the console price to SAR699. I requested my late dad to buy the console and he agreed. I still remember the day we bought the console as if it was yesterday.
At the store, they had two games available - Crash Bandicoot and Destruction Derby 2. I chose the latter and had a blast playing the Psygnosis game at home. There were also a demo disc with games I remember include a ship game, Abes Odeworld. Also, I was amazed by the dino animation.
This console provided hours of fun for three years until 2001 with my favorite games being MGS, RE2, and that gem FFVII.
Two years later my mom bought me a PS2 in my home town of Karachi, Pakistan, and I bought the game - MGS2 admiring how much games graphics had improved.
Sony PS has been entertaining generation of kids and adult alike, making it a global cultural icon.
PS may have lost a lot of its shine lately, but recent games like Astro Bot and Wu Kong shows the company still can surprise you with gaming gems. I am skeptical at the moment whether or not to continue the journey with PS6, but one thing is for sure I and other gamers like me will cherish the memories created playing PS games.
I do hope that WRT internal games, stuff like Astro Bot is representative of SIE turning over a new leaf, which would look a bit like a leaf from prior eras but with new stuff (where it makes sense and fits in). The superfluous GAAS gambit was the wrong choice, and it might be a little bit before the entire internal pipeline is back on track, but those problems can be fixed.
They just need a good balance again and AA games have to be present, especially to foster some of the more artsy/creative game ideas that would be too risky in the big AAA games, or aren't a fit for GAAS. And SIE have to be better at identifying what'll be worth it as a GAAS; look at Helldivers 2. It was successful in large part because it wasn't trying to be a copycat in a saturated space.
And they also need to continue fostering partnerships for stuff like Stellar Blade, Kena, Stray, ZZZ, FF, Granblue, and do partnerships with 3P on 1P & 3P legacy IP alongside the various Hero Projects. Now if they just had a more sensible multiplatform rollout strategy (something I've gone way too in-depth on before so not gonna do that here), that'd be perfect.
PS1 i did not get day one. My parents bought me a Genesis probably around release of the PS1 and i didnt know it existed anyway till i visited a "rich" friend.
The day i laid eyes on a PS1 and "movie scenes" in Resident Evil and Twisted Metal 1 i was blown away. That was my life pursuit to own one lol
By 99 I had my PSX(PS1) along with a N64.
I did manage to snag a Dreamcast by trading in my N64 at the time and convincing my grandma to put up the rest at launch. Great year of Dreamcast before i bailed on it with a trade towards PS2.
Same timeline as myself in terms of Genesis; my dad picked up the Madden sports bundle sometime around my birthday in '95, and I played Madden for all of about a couple days before moving on to other games. Wasn't a big football fan (that's probably why he got it, to convert me to a big sports fan xD), so Madden did nothing for me. Quickly moved on to games like SF2 Champion Edition, Aladdin, Sonic 2, Streets of Rage etc.
Tho Genesis was my first game console, it's not the first time I ever played video games. My dad took me to arcades prior, and some laundromats my mom went to had coin-ups in them too. I think what finally made me ask for a PS1 was probably Parappa the Rapper & Crash Bandicoot xD. Then by the time the Dreamcast came out, I had just gotten both PS1 & N64 the year prior so my parents were like "okay, that's enough consoles for now!" xD
Kind of wild they are just 4 years apart.
Generational leaps were massive back then. Ironically I think it the industry today weren't focused on sheer power we could've still had those type of major generational leaps. Just through things outside of graphics (immersion controls, for example) or with graphics/fidelity but at lower native resolutions (to decrease development costs).
At times I really wonder if Sony & Microsoft made a mistake prioritizing resolution over fidelity when moving from PS2/Xbox to PS3/360, and if the growth for native resolution was better served in advancing upscaling technology sooner, even if through custom ASIC technologies. It's fun to think about, sometimes.
Wassalam dude. NeoGaf indeed binds gamers of all races.
How the heck did I forgot to mention Tekken 3? The game seems to be in our DNA
I did bought one in 1999. And oh bouy what a fantastic game. I really loved the Dr. and little dino characters - forgot their names. But man that was one heck of a game from Bamco.
IMO Tekken 3 is probably still the single-best full-package (traditional) fighting game ever released on a console. From the characters to the backgrounds to the OST to the story to the game modes to the bonus content, everything just fits together perfectly with that game.
Some fighters have gotten close though (Tekken 5, maybe Soul Calibur 2, Guilty Gear X/XX/Accent Core, VF4 Evolution and so forth).
