Short Defense of the PS2

by Kris Wolfe

I think the Dreamcast is spiffy, but I'm not sure that it would kill sales for any of the other systems. They don't come out for a YEAR. You know what? I owned a Genesis and a SNES within WEEKS OF EACH OTHER. That's right. When I was 13 and had to work for my parents to get money I still managed to buy both of these systems. You know what else? I got lots of great games for both systems!

It was even easier with a PSX. When I got a SNES, they were quite pricy. When I got my PSX I had a job and it was only like $120 anyway. I bought FF7 with it. That was the whole reason I got it, honestly. I never bought an N64 because I didn't like the analog and it had no RPGs or anyhting I'd want to play for more than 30 minutes (well, okay, it had Tetrisphere, but how long can you play that?) But I could have gotten one if I wanted to.

The point? You can own MORE THAN ONE SYSTEM! Oh my god! Especially if you have a job! I realise (from reading the Q&A) that a number of people can only afford one system, but many of us will sacrifice other things we don't want as much for a new system, or work a few extra hours. Furthermore, even if you don't have the cash now, you could probably get a Dreamcast now and save up for a year to get a PS2. If you wanted it.

Someone complained that the PS2 has almost no games, especially not RPGs, and the Dreamcast had a dozen titles on it's release date. Okay, so, these poor, impoverished gamers can afford to buy a new system and 12 games for it in the same month? Whatever. I think I could wait a month or two for a few games to come out each month; besides, I have a life. It took me a few months to beat FF7 because I was doing other stuff. People who can play a game for a week straight with no distractions should go get a job and stop whining that they have no money.

Also, the PS2 isn't out for a WHILE! And you expect it to have all of its games and stuff planned already? I assume that more games will be ready by then; Sony's not THAT stupid.

As for the price; Mr. Poor may already own a DVD player, but I don't. And I want one. And I like the quality of current playstation games and the backwards-compatible things is very cool. Also, it's just a better system than DC because ultra-big Sony is behind it. So, hardware-wise, it may not sell to some people who don't care about that sort of thing, but I certainly want one! I think many other people may feel the same way. The two systems aren't comparable. It's like comparing the SegaCD with the PSX. (I own both, BTW--I really have no system affiliation. I get whatever has good games.)

Plus with the dolphin; there are a LOT of people who are very pissy with Nintendo because they loved their SNES and hated the N64; you can never tell if that'll hurt nintendo or what. And almost all the good developers are all behind Sega and Sony; who knows if Nintendo will do okay with basically just its in-house titles (which are usually pretty good, granted)... And of course, in "the old days" games would come out for multiple platforms (usually action games, yeah, but even so..) who knows if the developers will bring back that idea?

Basically, I think it's too early to say someone will "win"; and I believe that the systems war won't be as completely one-sided as some people seem to think.