Odnetnin Ages
03-29-2004, 05:02 PM
Back in the cartridge days, renting RPGs was a problem. If you didn't finish them in one rent, it was difficult to start back where you left off because it was hard to find the same cartridge you rented before, especially if it was a popular game from a big store that had lots of copies. And even if you did find the same copy, chances were someone had already deleted your saved game.
One weekend I rented Final Fantasy II for the SNES from Blockbuster Video. I really liked the game and wanted to finish it, but although I had gotten pretty far into it, I didn't have the money to re-rent it. So I had to return it. A friend of mine decided to mark the cartridge with a marker so we could find that copy next time. But as time went by, we both forgot about this plan as we moved on to other games.
One day a while later my friend was browsing Blockbuster for a game, but couldn't find anything he really wanted. So he picked up Final Fantasy II. When he got out to the car and looked at the cartridge, he noticed a mark on it. He thought, "what's this?" Then it came back to him. He'd put that mark there!
Still, since it had been a while, it was likely my game had been deleted. My friend got his hopes up nevertheless, and ran over to my house very excited. So we put the game in, and low and behold, my game was still there. At this point I was excited too. Ecstatic really. Since I was already so far into the game, finishing it before I had to take it back again would be no problem.
So that's how I finished Final Fantasy II by renting it twice, before the days of memory cards. Of course, I could have finished it by renting it again and starting someone else's saved game that was far enough into it, but I would have considered that cheating. I had to do everything myself, and luckily I was able to. But memory cards have taken all the luck out of renting RPGs today.
Nik Robbins
One weekend I rented Final Fantasy II for the SNES from Blockbuster Video. I really liked the game and wanted to finish it, but although I had gotten pretty far into it, I didn't have the money to re-rent it. So I had to return it. A friend of mine decided to mark the cartridge with a marker so we could find that copy next time. But as time went by, we both forgot about this plan as we moved on to other games.
One day a while later my friend was browsing Blockbuster for a game, but couldn't find anything he really wanted. So he picked up Final Fantasy II. When he got out to the car and looked at the cartridge, he noticed a mark on it. He thought, "what's this?" Then it came back to him. He'd put that mark there!
Still, since it had been a while, it was likely my game had been deleted. My friend got his hopes up nevertheless, and ran over to my house very excited. So we put the game in, and low and behold, my game was still there. At this point I was excited too. Ecstatic really. Since I was already so far into the game, finishing it before I had to take it back again would be no problem.
So that's how I finished Final Fantasy II by renting it twice, before the days of memory cards. Of course, I could have finished it by renting it again and starting someone else's saved game that was far enough into it, but I would have considered that cheating. I had to do everything myself, and luckily I was able to. But memory cards have taken all the luck out of renting RPGs today.
Nik Robbins