25 years of PlayStation: the best memories of the editorial staff of Mastergame

PlayStation would have arrived in Italy only in September of the following year, also winning many of the boys who, more than twenty years later, are here writing on the pages of Tgcom24 and Mastergame.

We decided to celebrate the first quarter of a century of PlayStation with an individual tribute, a reminder of what has most characterized our bond with the Sony console and its games.

Alessandra Borgonovo

PlayStation was not my first console but it is the one I ended up fond of the most, so important to me as having defined myself as a gamer: being a child when it came out, the video games I tried were often simple, like Disney classics Hercules or Tarzan, but I did not fail to raise the challenge. Despite collecting thick titles like Resident Evil or Tomb Raider, if I have to talk about a game that fascinated me, the thought goes to Klonoa: Door to Phantomile.

Obviously I was too young to judge him as I could do now but I remember very well the 1998 Namco game as a fascinating experience, challenging enough not to make it prohibitive for a child and with a level design in some ways very clever. There are many aspects that distinguish it from the mass of platforms and for which it should not be missing from every enthusiast's collection but in the West it has not been very successful, finding itself involved in the 3D race that has slowly left behind the most hybrid titles like this. It is a pity because although I have not yet understood what kind of figure is Klonoa (a dog, a cat, maybe even a rabbit or a mixture of the three) I think it is one of the most fun and stimulating experiences of my early years as a gamer.

Alessandro Apreda

There was a time when Square 1) was not yet called Square-Enix, 2) it did not only produce RPGs with kids and Donald Duck, but also shmup, fighting games and wrestling games, and 3) they often smashed. Bad. einhander (in German "with a hand", given the prehensile limb that characterizes the shuttles of the game) is simply the most sublime form of synthesis between sparacchina activity and techno / electro music. The devastating soundtrack by Kenichiro Fukui, which alone was worth the purchase of the game, drags pounding in a world of pure 2D blastatory action (the third dimension is in fact explored only by some research missiles and camera movements).

An intelligent management of the weapons system, jaw bosses on the ground, tons of effects, a level of difficulty that has not yet known the bullet-hell drift that would soon take the kind of shoot'em up, make Einhander one of the best shooters of all time. A pearl for all PSone game collectors, although unfortunately only released on the Japanese and US markets.

Andrea Minini Saldini

As editor-in-chief of the official PlayStation magazine, I had the good fortune of being able to try almost everything that came on the market in those years. It is easy, therefore, to fall victim to a sort of "Stendhal syndrome" in returning to memory in those years.

In my case, however, a title stands relatively easily among the multitudes. Wipeout 2097, in 1996, it represented at its best all that PlayStation was able to give. Graphics, music, adrenaline, style. A gameplay clearly superior to that of its predecessor represented the classic icing on the cake, for the game I showed to friends to make them understand the steps that video games had taken, in a matter of a few years.

Francesca Guido

When the "Play" arrived, I was a regular and faithful PC gamer. Most of my memories have to do with long afternoons when I was waiting, loading floppies onto floppies, before finally being able to play my favorite video games. Then she came to upset my video game plans, small and discreet, with her sparkling CDs. I had seen her at a schoolmate's house and I was immediately intrigued. I only remember that after a few days he greeted me with the lid open on the glass of my TV stand ready to go. Indeed, to make me start with my head, as one of the first games I tried was Resident Evil.

I played for two days without ever saving, I paused just to run away to the bathroom, to take a bite or not to hear my shouting from the other room because I was pulling too hard. I only know that, from time to time, I still see some zombies wandering around the house corridors like then, and it makes me smile. So thank you PlayStation, for jealously guarding precious and fun memories in a 25-year Memory Card.

Gian Luca Rocco

Twenty-five years? And how did this happen? Who stole a quarter of a century from me? I remember perfectly the day when the Playstation entered my life. I was a done and finished video game player, back then from a dozen years of Colecovision, Commodore 64, Amiga, Super NES, PC, Game Boy, with a splash of Game Gear, Mega Drive and more or less anything provided for a joystick, a joypad or a coin to insert.

At PlayStation I did not arrive immediately, but a couple of years after the release in Italy. Not an easy moment in my life: I was 20, my hair was long and I had recently suffered a serious loss. However, from that moment, it was a close and lasting relationship. A companion for all the years of the University that ended, not even saying, with the purchase of the PlayStation 2 that accompanied me in my second life (but it's another story). That day I didn't buy one, but two: one for me, one for my "brother-in-law" at the time. Two Play (modified ehm ehm, one had to go upside down to work!), Dual Shock, memory card and a mouth that remained wide open from the start menu.

Too many games I loved, I mention three: Final Fantasy Tactics (maybe the one I spent most hours on), Winning Eleven (which later became Pro Evolution Soccer) and, of course, Gran Turismo, which I preferred to watch rather than play in first person, causes serious inability with driving simulations. I spent hours at my fiancee's house admiring my brother-in-law taking golden licenses as if there were no tomorrow, anticipating in some way a trend today. Every curve was an emotion. As well as any game, but also any rescue that gets corrupted on the unofficial memory card. They were other times. The girlfriend is gone and, thankfully, even the memory card. The PlayStation remains: long life on the PlayStation.

Giovanni Marrelli

If I had the opportunity to erase the memory and rediscover a video game with the same astonishment of the past, that game would certainly be Metal Gear Solid, the work of Hideo Kojima who, at the time, was able to bewitch me with an unforgettable adventure. Not surprisingly, when it comes to thinking about PlayStation, the first image that comes to mind is that of a young Solid Snake busy infiltrating the base of Shadow Moses.

At the time I didn't own PlayStation yet, but I clearly remember that it was Metal Gear Solid that pushed me to buy Sony's console: the first (clearly failed!) Attempts to explore the base without letting me discover, the moments spent spying Meryl in secret, the first boss fight against Revolver Ocelot, the small or big genius found by a designer who always wanted to stand out, the constant attempts to break the fourth wall (ah, how much I loved the fight with Psycho Mantis!): this was – and it is still today – Metal Gear Solid.

These are emotions that I experienced as a boy and that I rediscovered when, thanks to PlayStation Classic, I rediscovered the exploits of Solid Snake in the company of my son, seeing in him my own reactions, that same sense of wonder and amazement in front of the crazy ideas of Kojima. The credit is all yours, PlayStation. The same PlayStation that I found in the laboratory of Otacon, the same console that changed my relationship with video games forever. Thanks for everything, my little friend: we'll meet again in another twenty-five years!

Mattia Ravanelli

Growing up in the best hypothesis with Jerry Cala and Jovanotti ads, with Mega Drive and NES pushed like glorified versions of toys like an Emiglio Robot, the arrival of PlayStation was equivalent to a sort of meteor that disrupts the climate and extinguishes who was there before. Although not especially in Italy, and more generally in Europe, Sony's first console fell with the assurance and arrogance of those who do not want to take prisoners. He did not. For me it was a long and exciting approach to the fateful PlayStation Friday (September 29, 1995, which sanctioned official availability in Italy as well), starting in December 1994, when the distribution in Japan began to make us understand what it was made the bet of the Walkman multinational.

My first real game and therefore one of those that I've always been most fond of, is Battle Arena Toshinden. A fighting game, as the period required. Not the best and not even one of those who, more generally, would have remained embedded in history. But it made sense: the excellent technical realization immediately clarified the technical caliber of PlayStation and, if desired, also Sony's ability to select whom to work with. Issue then remarked with impeccable punctuality by Psygnosis productions for the European launch (WipEout is Destruction Derby). Power and strategy in short, for a thrilling start.

Simone Soletta

I already had a beautiful PC with bodywork at the time of the release of the first PlayStation, and frankly, despite having carefully followed the genesis of the first Sony console, I admit to having accepted it with a certain arrogance. After all, I already had a high-level gaming platform, and this thing about the TV manufacturer – beautiful, for goodness sake – that started playing video games I greeted her with a raised eyebrow to make Ancelotti envious. Then, however, I found myself in the usual video game shop, one of those that hardly exist anymore and whose owner became a friend, confidant and at the same time a dealer in novelties. And I saw it. But above all, I saw Wipeout, and the new console struck me with the force of a hook in the face.

How it moved, Wipeout! Fast, almost sick. And how it sounded, Wipeout, with the pressing soundtrack, made up of real, powerful pieces, protagonists along with those crazy paths, those very colorful auto-spaceships, that unthinkable screen update. I also tried to play at Wipeout, and I also understood why it was not the case to make fun of the horns of the PlayStation controller: it was perfect, ergonomic, made to disappear into the hands and connect directly to the game, just a few moments and not enough you could do without it anymore. In short, within a few minutes PlayStation became something to be had, something that a fan of video games could not ignore, and since then there has never been a PlayStation connected to my TV.

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