Purchases on a Whim

I bought Blue Dragon on a whim - I knew the gamer consensus was that it was boring, but Akira Toriyama and Mistwalker had me convinced to give it a go. Same with Last Remnant - it was $10 and I thought sure, why not?! The original previews were all I saw, the aesthetic felt kinda like FF12, and I was sure to install the game to save so much loading pain.

As a kid, I only got games as gifts so I was always sure to study up on stuff I wanted. When I got my first job at 16, all best were off! I bought so much impulse crap, like Star Ocean 2, Valkyrie Profile, One Piece Mansion, Super Magnetic Neo, Red Dog, MDK2...games I had next to no knowledge about at the time, but the back of the cases made them look interesting!

The two that immediately come to mind are Fester's Quest and Final Fantasy on NES. I think I got them both at Babbage's with birthday money or something similar. I actually liked them both, though Fester's Quest was brutal. After that, I typically at least had seen games in magazines before biting. I took a flyer on a lot of Lynx games based solely on the marketing booklets that Atari used to put out though. I also recall Thunder Force III being a flyer soon after I got my Genesis.

I didn't have many NES whim purchases. There was a local joint that rented games for 50 cents each per week. I'd take $2 every Sunday to get 4 more games.

The place had a huge library and I at least tried everything they had. Which turned me into the kid everyone asked about Nintendo on the playground.

What's funny is I used to rent NES too, but it was similar to how I treat demos now. I almost never rented anything I had any intention of buying. I can't explain why that is.

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Originally Posted by Yoshi

What's funny is I used to rent NES too, but it was similar to how I treat demos now. I almost never rented anything I had any intention of buying. I can't explain why that is.

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I'm the same way. If I did rent something that was way better than I expected, I wouldn't play it anymore until I'd bought it for myself haha.

There were some games I'd rent for weeks on end because I liked them so much.

I didn't have the money to buy my own games (outside of the occasional yard sale find) so I had no real desire to own them. I think I got about $15 a month for my allowance and $8 of that went to rentals.

Although between my 2 siblings, myself and my mom we owned about 80 NES games by the time the system was dead.

As a kid, I was faced with my first buying decision: Mega Man 2 or Silent Service. I chose Silent Service because, y'know, SUBMARINES! Thank God the store had a lienient return policy. After that, I made lots and lots of purchases on a whim in the Genesis era. Some were so good, but StormLord was probably the worst at that time. I thought I was getting a Ghouls n Ghosts-style game, but I was really buying a shitty shitty game. Fuck Stormlord.

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Originally Posted by Some Stupid Japanese Name

I bought Project Altered Beast last night on a whim.
I know its not very good, but ...i had to.
I was looking at the Overworks wiki and saw it listed. I had completely forgotten it existed. A few clicks later, it was purchased.

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How much? I have a Japanese PS2 with no games, and PAB would be good for a hands-on for Sega-16. I need to get Thunder Force VI too.

The Dreamcast was the last console where I made blind buys a lot, and that was because it always paid off. Jet Set Radio, Shenmue, Chu Chu Rocket and so many others - all awesome.

I've made a few this gen, but they've all been $20 purchases, and many of them have stunk.

I bought Jaws and Athena based on their cover art. Jaws was obviously a hit since it's rad but Athena was the worst game of all time.

It was $23 shipped. Pretty sure i saw another listing for about the same.