I’m going to jump ahead a little but to avoid a third SNES title getting introduced so quickly. So I’m maybe nine or ten years old and my older brother whips out this bad boy. My parents are probably less than thrilled when they realize I’ve just received a game where the objective is to kick the snot out of the other person.
But for me, this was the first time I really got into a real competitive head-to-head button mash fest for victory. I don’t mean to brag either, but I was terrible. If it weren’t for my perseverance in the face of defeat I would have most certainly just given up. But don’t let that fool you. I never really got any better until I was an adult revisiting the game. But I did genuinely enjoy all the different characters. I remember the first time I beat the arcade mode. I was yelling at the top of my lungs, victory had finally graced me. Then I found out if you played enough times, you would eventually unlock Soul Edge. So the quest was one for that. I did eventually unlock him, but my memory card seemed to have had a hiccup and next time I fired it up, he was gone. I’m fairly certain I stopped playing after that.
I very distinctly remember my brother in awe about how well the PS1 rendered the game. “Just look at those shadows. Its so realistic.” he spouted. And to me it was very impressive also. Unfortunately my love of these style games quickly died. Mainly because I feel they got so overcomplicated that I would always be at a disadvantage. I didn’t want to learn a million different combo moves or learn exploits that worked best on what characters. It just kind of sucked the fun out of it for me. I do still enjoy these games when its very casual, but I don’t see myself ever really being competitive with them again.
EK Creates 