What are your landmark gaming moments?

LunarAura

LunarAura

[09] Warrior
I'm curious to see if you have any experiences in gaming that you'll remember because of its significance in your life. Here's a few of mine. (warning: LONG!)
  • Original GameBoy packed in with Tetris: This was the good ol' days. My mom and dad both worked awful jobs for their meager wage. This Christmas present cost them $89.99 + tax back in 1989 (which is like $148.70 today money). Opening the box revealed the GameBoy, Tetris with a GAMEPAK CASE not some flimzy plastic baggie thing (holy shit amirite?), Stereo Headphones, FOUR MOTHERF*ING BATTERIES and maybe a leprechaun I don't really remember but it was awesome. I really wanted a NES for Christmas because it was on TV and color but they probably got me this instead so there wouldn't be fights over who got the one TV in the house. Thank goodness, because gaming anywhere and anytime beat the pants off of gaming in color if and when a TV was available.
  • Secret of Mana: This was the first game I played during the first time I ever had a friend's house to go to after school. It felt badass playing together and the graphics/sound were and still are awesome. It's in my top 5 games of all time.
  • Import Dreamcast: Any allowance I saved over the years went out the window March 1999 when I blew $430 on this (no modem), Marvel vs. Capcom, and the Agetec Arcade Stick. The closest thing to arcade perfect I ever got before this was Killer Instinct on the SNES. It felt nice to see MvC or MvC2 in the arcade and think "heh, I got that. Sweet". I imported MvC2, Soul Calibur, Code Veronica, and REZ just to name a few. Of note was the japanese Dreamcast magazine that came free. It had previews of Soul Calibur and DoA2 with a very non-pockmarked Tomonobu Itagaki without his shades. Has it already been 10 years? Wow...
  • Xbox: Back in 2001, Microsoft held a 48-hour event called Xbox Unleashed to spread the brand around in LA and NY. Of course, I attended the LA one with my friend. Friend felt ill and had to call it quits after hour 20 I think. I kept on competing and by the end of the event landed 10th place on the giant screen and got to be in both the stage with the people who placed and the people who "also" stayed the whole event without getting any sleep (I say "also" because I saw a few of them catch some Z's in the Citywalk's movie theater). At hour 48, the event crew was giving stuff away and someone handed me a 30-pack bottles of SoBe. Seeing as my family was out of state and I had no ride home, I figured I'd have to call a cab. By luck, one of the MS event reps saw me and knew by my worn-out event bracelet or my pleasant eau de gamer scent that I wasn't going to drive home. He asked me if, on his expense, I wanted to take a cab home or stay at a hotel (umm, durr...). I left the SoBe and limped to the hotel (I don't remember if he handed me a card for the front desk or what, I was dead tired) where I just fainted. 13 hours later I get a wakeup call so I finally took a much needed shower (change of clothes courtesy of event swag) and headed down the lobby. Sunday was champagne brunch day and being so sick of chicken quesadillas I sneak my way in. I chat it up with a SoBe rep and he gave me 20 coupons for free SoBe (lol it's like the stash I left behind now in convenient coupon form). Come time to pay the bill I decide to push my luck and charge it to my room. After "checking to confirm", they allowed it. Where the hell am I getting with this? Because two weeks later they mail me an Xbox before the official launch and a card saying "Thanks for coming!" You kidding me? I should be thanking you! Months later I softmodded it and FTP'ed emulators and games.
  • Okami: Previewed this at E3 '06 and just had to have it. One quote in particular struck my heart given my situation. "Life is all about resolve. Outcome is secondary. It is resolve that determines the value of your life." It was the last game I played through before going back to school and repairing my 0.6 GPA. It's now 3.6. Not saying that it means anything but at least I proved to myself that I could.
 
The opening sequence in FF6 with the epic music and the marching magitek. Gives me chills every time.
 
My best experiences come from XBox Live with my friends. There is one game imparticular though, that i think that Chuck the Landslide, and Rek should remember.

Warning: This shit is gonna be super long, but it was a hell of a game. You'll also probably have to have some knowledge of H2 for any of it to make sense.

Game: Halo 2 (we were still into it at the time)

Before the match we're gonna talk about happened, its of note that I hadnt played a game on live for 3 months cause my original Xbox had to be sent in for maintinence. I still kept in touch with my friends, namely Chuck, Rekano and a girl gamer we had in our group at the time named Bonnie via AIM. I used to ask them how the game was in my absence, and it was about that time that the whole modding craze had just started. They were telling me crazy stories about people shooting sniper bullets out of pistols and whatnot. I didnt really believe that it was possible at first, but I was curious to find out when I got my Box back.

The first day I get my Box back, Chuck, Rek, and Bonnie and I decide to do some Team Slayer matchmaking for the night. Within about 3 games we came across our first Modders, my first experience overall against them. The map was Turf and out of the 4 guys on the opposing team, 2 were modding, im assuming boosting the stats of the other two since they only came out occasionally. Didnt make the match any less difficult though, since the two modders had given themselves:
-Super running speed
-Super high jumping
-Every weapon shot sniper bullets
-Every weapon had rapid fire
-Every weapon auto aimed for your head

So, within about a minute it was like 15-1 in their favor. I think Bonnie got a lucky spawn and managed to kill one of the dudes that was trying to boost. It was rather quickly that I realized that we needed to cook up some plan if we were going to have any chance at all of winning. I thought of the layout of the map and had everyone move into the center area, around where the plasma pistol spawned. Now this area, I figured, would give us the strongest strategic advantage. It had high walls, so they couldnt super jump and shoot us over it, was a small area to reduce their speed advantage, and had two paths on either side that we managed to obstruct with some boxes that spawned on the map. Everyone took positions at various angles, covering each other inside the small area, and I called where they were coming from or if a grenade was incoming.

It worked like a fucking charm. The tide shifted really fucking fast as we managed to pull almost level very quickly and i think that gave everyone on our team a big boost cause they started kicking ass. Everytime they tried to zoom in and kill any of us, they'd get caught on some of the boxes we through in the way and our team combined fire to take them out very quickly. Chuck even stuck one of the bastards moving at full stride. After we had pulled ahead on kills they'd gotten so desperate they were trying to high jump and lob random grenades into our area. When there was 10 seconds left the other two fools came out for one last full-on push and we fucking raped all 4 of them. Time eventually ran out, and we ended up winning something around 45-35. in the end game shit talk area, we were so hyped up we didnt let the other guys say a word, although they were trying to talk some shit to us for some reason.

There have been a lot of good moments with friends on XBox live for me, but that one tops them all.
 
Gopher, that was a very high and landmarking moment in my gaming career as well, fuck man. I remember killing 2 that ran by with a shotgun and watched as their dead bodies just FLEW. its a shame that since, Halo 2(well, actually GoW) we really havn't found a game that we all really sit down and play on live together. You'll see me on SF4 for sure though, not the gentlemen's version called HD Remix :P.

Gaming has been a very tied part of my life growing up so for me to sit and list a shitton of moments would be a 4 to 5 page essay alone. I'll list a personal one or 2.

My first Gamecube was a special moment for me, as it was the very first console I personally went myself on a launch to go and get with money I had saved up all on my own. I remember it being brutally cold that school day, morning. I met one of my classmates while waiting at the door. We discussed nintendo fanboyish stuff and were dissing the shit out of the xbox(THE IRONY that by 03 I would actually get one and love it to death! LMAO)then at 7am, the doors of the Cynthania Kentucky Wal-Mart were opened and my class mate and I, first 2 in line mad a running sprint for the console, I remember as I ran on a straight war-path to the electronics, dodging and darting employees, displays, and anything else. We both made it to the electronics and although he beat me to the damn system, I was the first one to pay and leave with that son of a bitch. I held that shit up like Link holds a piece of the fucking tri-force as I shouted in victory, leaving the store.

My old Xbox had some sentimental value to it. Allow me to explain. In spring of 2003 my best friend died in a car accident, to be honest one of the things that kept us friends for so long was our love for games. He had picked up an xbox(along with his GCN and PS2) and the one game he went on and on about was how looking forward to Halo 2 he was. So, it seems rather odd but few days after his passing(which I vowed I'd get Halo 2 pretty much for him), my mother won on the lottery about 4 to 6 times in a row which landed me an XBox of my own in my hands. Whats really funny is that those 2 full years I bashed the Xbox I had never fully given it a chance until I had one of my own. I fell in love with the damn thing. So fast-forwarding, eventually I was introduced to XBL and later came Halo 2. Long story cut drastically short, I feel I held my promise to my friend for Halo 2, quite well and I think even he knows, I had alot of fun.
 
My favorite moment was when I joined the {W}arriors clan for Age Of Empires the Conquerers Expansion we were the 10th best clan on the MSN Gaming Zone and the 2nd best clan in GameSpy Arcade. Owning everyone in every type of game as a team me and {W}SSX,{W}^ILL, and {W}^Magic. Then AOE was taken off the MSN Gaming Zone which led us into a MICHI league which was an amazing gametype where each set of teams were seperated by trees that you had to chop or destroy with a catapult you recieved in the final age. Although I didnt get as into MICHI as I did the others it is a gaming experience I will never forget.
^
^BIG NERD!
 
Wow, trips down memory lane. I've got a lot of memories with games too. Been playing them since i was able to pick up a controller.

Secret of Mana was definitely a great game, i especially liked collecting all those spirits for magic. Only negative thing about it was you could spam spells over and over again almost killing bosses without taking more than a couple of hits.

FF6 was another all time favorite of mine. Lots of great moments in the game but nothing tops the Leo/Kefka confrontation. All the way up to that point, the game makes you feel that Kefka is someone you could kill somewhat easily. They did similar things in FF7 with the midgar Zolom and Sephiroth but i dont feel anything he did quite stacks up to Kefka.

I remember the first time i saw Donkey Kong Country and thought "Oh shit! This cant be SNES!!" I was blown away by the visuals on that. Music was top notch too AND it was a fun game. Cant beat that.

When the PS1 came out which i believe was in 97 or late 96?? My friend picked it up along with FF7, and Castlevania SoTN. I pretty much just watched him play FF7 since it wasn't mine to play and i felt i would need a lot of time to complete that. So i just played his Castlevania instead and that was great. Definitely one of my all time favorites. I almost shat myself when i finally got enough money for the duplicator.

Around this time was also when another friend of mine had a saturn with SF Alpha 2 and X-Men CotA. I sucked pretty bad to begin with at X-Men but, a couple of days practice using Omega Red alowed me to typically shut down my other friends. Omega Red was fuckin spectacular in that game.

But the game that i've loved and spent more time with than any other game is probably WC3/TFT. I always loved WC2 and SC so this game was seriously a drug to me. Nothing more satisfying than getting rage quits from the other team because they didn't scout and weren't prepared for an early attack. I remember one 3on3 game that i was losing horribly. Both of my team's units were whiped out leaving me with my units consisting of Undead spiders/wurms/Statues/deathknight/lich. I had the entire enemy team trying to chase me down and kill my units but they couldn't because of the speed aura from the deathknight. So all i did was keep hit and running using deathcoil/frostnova/spider attacks. They kept moving to my friends buildings to finish them off but then turned around and chased me everytime i attacked. After doing this repeatedly over and over, I eventually cut them down by half when the rest of my team recovered and respawned full armies, we won shortly afterwards. I assume that the regeneration from the aura coupled with the statues helped me last that long. Best moment in gaming ever for me.
 
Gopher, I'm glad to say that that is easily in my top gaming moments of all time. That was a LITERAL multiplayer boss-battle. I'd have to say that overall my experiences with Halo 2 were the most fun I've had simply because it was a game that ALL of my friends enjoyed. But I do have a moment in it that I prize the most.

We were playing Team Slayer on Relic, and GOD knows that that is probably the worst map in the history of Halo. the score was 49-47 in their favor with about 5 seconds left on the clock. The other team had done a great job of running away like little punks the whole game, but finally I had a clear shot. Well, I fucked it up and missed but I was able to stick what had the be the VERY last pixel on his back as he ran around a corner, and apparently he thought that it was a pretty good throw too so he went to go show his friends and gave me a killtacular, ending the game at 1 second left, 51-49 in our favor.
 
Finally completing a Megaman Zero 100 point run on hard mode from beginning to end! Playing MMZ with the aim of trying to get hit as little as possible seemed to be a feat out of my grasp, but after a few months of failure I managed to pull it off. Too bad that instead of feeling a sense of accomplishment, it simply re-enforces the fact that I suck since it took me so long to complete and I made sooooo many ridiculous mistakes. Damn I'm pathetic.

Had lots of fun times with Quake 2, I believe it was my first time I took 1 vs 1 play 'seriously', where I strived to improve by reading up, watching demos of other players, etc. It was nice to see my personal development as time went along, learning simple stuff like switching to the right weapon in the right situation to learning individual map strats. It was also the first time where I had to suffer and suck up major blowouts, with scores like 20 to -2. It still happens, only that I realize that I'm too poor of a player to do anything about it and so I can gracefully accept it heh.

Also I don't think I've enjoyed an FPS game's movement system more than Q2. Well, maybe QW/CPMA 'cause of t3h a1r c0ntr0l, and Gunz 'cause of the sword cancelling tricks. There's even a mod where you simply have to get from the start of a map to the end using Q2's various movement tricks. I can't believe how many hours I can waste just jumping past obstacles over and over and over. And I do mean over and over 'cause there are different maps, but each lasts 20 minutes or whatever the server settings are. All of your runs are timed, so you can try and perfect your run to get the best time on the boards. Sometimes just beating a map is an accomplishment 'cause some of them are really hard, really long, or both.
 
My most memorable gaming moment has got be the day my step dad brought home a sega master system.
first of all, the guy was probably about the same age as I am now, so naturally he wanted to try it out first.
Well, he set it up in the basement, which was his little secret garden, off limits to us kids. My brother got my attention because he could hear some misc. gaming noises emminating from the heating vents... So we snuck downstairs to one of the greatest sights a young gamer could ever see...

Space Harrier, in full color, playing on a brand new 21" TV on a brand new Sega!

I was so excited that I might have pissed myself.
 
Playing Twisted Metal 2 on co-op with my friends is one of the best memories I have.

I also remember going to a sleep-over when Resident Evil 2 came out. There were probably 8 other kids there and we all were on the edge of our seat, passing the controller around, and trying to help each figure out what to do. As the night went on, kids gradually dozed off one by one until it was just me and my best friend playing. I was controlling Leon and I was at the part where you have to go get the red valve out of the cabin to turn the water on and get past the burning helicopter.

After I went into the cabin, I looked over to see my friend had drifted off so it was just me playing and I started to get nervous. I saw the red valve so I ran over I picked it up in a hurry, just so I could leave the cabin and go back to familiar territory. Then I saw a door next to valve. "Well, I'll just check out this next room over, but I won't explore everything", I thought. So I opened the door just like the rest of the doors in the game. Unfortunately for me, if any of you remember, this is the only door in the game that has zombies pop out of it. Obviously I wasn't expecting this and I jumped back and screamed like a 5 year-old girl, effectively waking everybody up and scaring the shit out of them as well. :). I don't think I ever got to sleep that night, but that game was beast.
 
Finishing Xenogears. To date that is still the only time I have been emotionally moved by any game. Definitely the top moment for me.
 
When I got my PlayStation 1 in 1997 for xmas with no game but the demo disc included in the package.

Played WipeOut 2097 (1 track), crash bandicoot (1 level), Tekken 2 (Jun and Lei unlocked) and Ridge Racer Revolution (1 lap) over and over again for weeks. It blew my mind.
 
Xenogears is such an amazing game, and I just bought it on a hunch.

Another big thing was when my friend ruined my FFVII experience by telling me Aeris dies when I was at the dig site. Needless to say I wanted to murder him.
 
Impending_Doom66 said:
Xenogears is such an amazing game, and I just bought it on a hunch.

Another big thing was when my friend ruined my FFVII experience by telling me Aeris dies when I was at the dig site. Needless to say I wanted to murder him.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure the number of people in the world who haven't been spoiled before it happens is probably in the double digits.
 
Saw soul calibur 2 being sold in a local stall. Saw that Ivy was being used; used her for a bit. And the rest was history. :)
 
Probably my number one was getting the N64 for christmas. We had a sega game gear before then that we only got to play on car trips, so the N64 was the first game system we really ever had. My parents before they went through a shit divorce use to videotape us opening presents when we were little. I still have the tape somewhere... but its funny to see just HOW happy we were when we (me and my 2 brothers) opened it. It also reminds me of a happier time when your little and even when bad things happen you tend to forget about them really quickly and there usually not as horrible as things that happen as you get older. So videogames are PROVEN to make people happy :)
 
some of mine:

-finishing okami, one of the best games ever
-goldeneye n64 multiplayer sessions with four friends for months, owned everything
-impressive and creative boss fights like kingdom hearts 2, mgs4 or god of war, shit still owns
-buying consoles and games at launch, massive excitement
 
iKotomi said:
I'm pretty sure the number of people in the world who haven't been spoiled before it happens is probably in the double digits.
Click to expand...

This was only a few months after it came out, and I never payed any attention to anything game related so this was before the rabid FFVII fanboys came along.
 
-beating Ninja gaiden black on hard and beating all the missions
-fist time i hit iCS
-watching the cop get helicoptered into peices in GTA:San Andreas
-returning a kick to house as time expired to win a game in madden '05
-having my chief tauren kill 2 teams single handedly in warcraft
 
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