February 13, 2009
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Weekly Photo Challenge – My Favourite Toy
This week’s subject was suggested by Usalapinhazzer:
My Favourite ToyThis involves my three favorite toys, two of which, the PS2 and Final Fantasy games, would each be nothing without the other. The third, of course, is my camera(s).
I have a long history of video game addiction. You could even say it started before video games were invented, when I played pinball and other arcade games every chance I got. I had a Fairchild game system in the ‘seventies, misspent an inordinate amount of time on it, frustrated my then-current husband’s TV addiction by playing Pong, Nim, and Cat & Mouse on “his” TV, and got a bad case of carpal tunnel syndrome before swearing off the demon console.
Games and consoles had progressed a lot before one of Doug’s friends moved in with us here about ten years ago and brought with him a PlayStation and Super Nintendo. The boys talked me into… no, really, they did, I swear it! I resisted and they persisted and I caved in and started playing Chrono Trigger on the Nintendo.
It was fun, I had to admit, but I wasn’t really hooked until the long-awaited Final Fantasy VII arrived. Even then, at first, I found the play stressful until the boys assured me that the train wouldn’t leave until I got on board. Even now, with innumerable hours of game time to my credit (or debit), it amazes and delights me the way the designers make them just challenging enough but not too difficult.
In FF Seven a happy discovery, that the chocobo breeding followed rational genetic rules, allowed me to (by keeping a stud book at which the boys laughed at first) race and defeat even the fastest of my adversaries’ feathered steeds.
By the time FFXII was released, the graphics design had improved radically and chocobos were (except in the Nintendo DS) no longer the cute cartoonish critters I had grown to love in Seven. I still love them, of course, but now I love moogles even more.
I find screenshots to be among the most difficult photographic challenges for me. These screenshots were taken with my old point-and-shoot Kodak DC3200. My fair-weather Fuji has too many megapixels, and the high-res images show all the black lines across the screen of the old CRT TV we use as a game system monitor.[more FFXII screenshots HERE]The photo challenge is not a contest. It’s not about who comes up with the best photo or who has the most expensive equipment. It is meant to be about people from all over the world who love taking pictures. You can’t win anything, except maybe some new xanga friends.
Everyone is welcome to join in. All you have to do is post one or more photos regarding this subject on your site and COMMENT HERE with a link to your post, so we can all come by and have a look.
Comments (13)
I use to play ‘Pong’ when it came out and we had a Coleco vision but that is as far as I ever got,now I am thinking I might want a Wii.
I love your photos.
Third person today I’ve seen post on the favorite toy subject. Interesting!!!
Mines a stuffed dog. Had it since I was five.
I wish I could get into games. I could use some of that kind of fun but I never manage, any game really. I do like scrabble and dominoes. I think the kind of game you like to play requires a brain that thinks very fast. You win, I don’t, I’m not a particularly fast thinker. Have a super week and have fun with your games.
really enjoy the golfing wii… nice blog and good gaming. that is really interesting info about photo taking and screens. the moogle is cute.
Kingdom hearts 0ne and 2… I Totally recommend it even though it is a fighting type game I loved it. Finished them twice as well as Zelda series.
We are planning on the New Final Fantasy for wii I never played them older ones but sister Whimmy and Son play them. i love the graphics.
Chrono Trigger for the DS is one my son is buying with his birthday money.
I got carpel tunnel while addicted to Sim city. We have owned Every system since childhood. Yep I am from the age of slackers.
We are such geeks in this house. A good evening is all of us playing some kind of video game in rounds. Explains weigh gain too LOL.
boohyeah gamer friend!
@Ikwa - Doug has Kingdom Hearts 1&2, and has tried to talk me into playing them every time I finish one game and start looking for something else to play. I tried, and the battle system takes too much finger speed and dexterity for me. I have trouble with the shoulder buttons on the controller, too, and blocking with the shield is necessary to stay alive.
Doug has just ordered a used Game Cube because he wants to play Zelda Twilight Princess and Skies of Arcadia Legends, and he says I can probably play them. He also ordered Suikoden 3 for PS2, for me.
We had 3 Zelda games for the GameBoy. Doug and I cooperated to get through them. There were puzzles he couldn’t figure out, and “finger” challenges he’d have to do for me. Now, in Okami, he does some of the tougher bits for me. Sometimes I help him with puzzles in his other games.
I used to love Sim City, especially with the Game Shark when I could have infinite funds. What a difference unlimited money makes!!
You have an XBox, too? Blue Dragon? I recommend it. Okagi for PS2 is another good one.
@SuSu - we had an xbox but the thing died and NO way am I letting my husband drop coinage on buying the new system when I heard it was full of bugs. What i wish for is the New PS3! but that is years away from our pocket books. Zelda is fun. I used to give the controller over to my son during fighting scenes.
I had trouble to with them But once I got the hang of it I got better and better. My oldest son learned to read at 3 because he wanted to play zelda: ocarina of time. That is my favorite all time play. We have Twilight Princess for wii I have yet to finish that. it is really hard to play for me. But my 8 year old makes it look like easy work. I guess I am getting old. OKagi? i will look it up!
But My favvorite game right now is SIms 2 onthe computer. I tease my husband that I have a god complex.
I hate Sims!
Having characters catch fire or wet their pants if I am distracted or too slow is just too much for me.
I call Doug’s first XBox 360 the XBox 900 because right out of the box it had to be returned twice before they finally sent us one that worked — 360 x 2 1/2 = 900. Doug has at least 12 games for it, so when that first one died after close to 2 years, he hesitated a few months, but then went ahead and ordered a new one. It is his money. I wouldn’t have bought one in the first place, with the bad reputation it had. All his friends were telling him how good BioShock is, so he ordered the 360 and several games. The first console they sent us ran just long enough to suck in the BioShock disk, and then wouldn’t open or run.
Despite being told about it on the phone and a note attached to the console he shipped back, they never sent his disk back to him. That was how I got Blue Dragon. After he had complained several times about the BioShock disk, customer service said they couldn’t find any record of the disk. BioShock was too new, big, good, or something, to be on their list of consolation prizes. Blue Dragon was on that list.
I don’t bitch about how he spends his money, but I do keep after him to make returns, pursue refunds for defective merchandise and not let them rip him off. Sometimes, I do bitch about how he spends his time.
Like everything else in life i seemed to latch on to games a long time after everyone else, only now am i starting to play games on the computer, i’m not sure if i would go so far as buying a playstation or x box though,
I was surprised by this. You didn’t strike me as someone who would become immersed in video games. I see you as a very outdoorsy type but maybe I’m putting too much emphasis on your location and setting. I’ve never looked into FF as I’m more into driving and flight simulation when I do play, which is rare – but I sometimes spend a few hours or more at it and end up with tender thumbs!
I did like the film Final Fantasy, which I know has nothing to do with the game, but was an early full CGI film that just blew me away with the detail and effects etc.
@rojobe - The characters in the movie were familiar to FF gamers, and the story was consistent with the game’s mythos.
I am a nature lover, but not an “outdoorsy” person, especially now that my physical ability is so severely limited by M.E. Virtually all those spectacular nature shots I take are within less than a quarter mile of where I sit right now.
Good work on the screen shots!
@SuSu - Sorry for the belated reply. For some reason the Xanga email telling me you’d answered my comment got caught up in my spam folder. Thanks for the info on the film. I had seen screenshots from the game and couldn’t draw any parallels.
I was surprised and saddened to read of your ME – especially as it sounds like if restricts you considerably.
Also, on a completely different subject, I read in your side-bar you have connections with Morro Bay. We stopped overnight there on a holiday a few years ago. Spectacular.