[Dia Lakilaki]

Back to game times that I hated, I say the Bloody Mary fight in Terrranigma... I was underleveled and dealt two damage per hit...

[Heccubus]

Or incredibly stupid?

Yeah, I was just being polite...

[looktothesky]

I lasted 5 seconds in Ghosts and Goblins, it is the most frustrating game I've ever played as well..

Holy jeeeez...

[Reader]

I've fallen back into the Puyo Puyo groove. As fun as ever! No HUGE amounts of rage coming to the fore, but i do still curse at it. It seems my phrase lately has been simply "(fucking) COCK!!" Don't ask why cuz i don't know.

I think i swear at my games a lot more than i realize. Which is awesome.

[Slade]

Yeah, I swear at my games alot. I recently picked up a new copy of Skies of Arcadia Legends for my 'Cube, and when an enemy would cast an instant kill spell, I'd res the guy, and then he'd get killed next round I'd start swearing at the game. Also, before I figured out enemies' patterns in Viewtiful Joe (Another Joe: Pain right in the ass.), and practicing Soul Calibur II in Extremely Hard mode. I had a nasty habit of throwing my controller as hard as I could at my GameCube. The top is all scratched up, but damn that thing takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'.

To that diablo 2 guy (not Jordan), Iron golems don't suck when enemies in Hell are getting hit with over 500% damage returned stat. Also, life tap is your friend, and skels are too damned weak to use points on, except to get to revive. Damned skill trees, making us waste points on crappy skills like frighten...

Also, Ghosts & Goblins is indeed a hard mofo. Even with these new-fangled save states I could only get halfway through the second level, and then my time ran out. Now why make a game where I have to run through the level to beat it on time, but can't do to spazzy enemies?

[civilian_number_two]

My absolute favorite video game moment takes a little time to tell, so bear with me (or scroll down to the next story; see if I care). I was a late teen, I think, or maybe even older, but young enought I was still living in my parents' basement and playing my little brother's NES.

My brother had NINJA GAIDEN, which I had got for him for his birthday, hoping it would be like this fine arcade game I had played one time. It's nothing like that game; in fact it's more like DOUBLE DRAGON, but you're a ninja.

I couldn't (and can't) undertsand the appeal of this awful timekiller, but my friend Mike became obsessed with it and would come over a lot on his way home from work. Well, as a lot of you know, the game is divided into levels, and the levels are each broken into four stages. But no matter how many times you die, you can hit "continue." All you need to do is get past a stage to never have to see it again.

Mike was stuck on 6.2 This is one of those classic Nintendo sequences where you have to climb a wall while evil birds fly into you and make you fall to your death. You can kill them instead, but this involves jumping off the wall, slashing them, and then grabbing the wall again before falling to your death. Mike fell to his death a lot. He had been doing this one day for a few hours when it started to get really funny. He was determined to finish the level, only he'd die, and then he'd start screaming about how stupid this game was, and then he'd start up the level again. Watching him break down was a lot like watching George Bailey at the end of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, where you think he's going to flip out and kill his entire family, but then he changes his mind and decides to jump off a bridge in the freezing rain, so they can get the insurance money instead. I mean, it was that funny.

Mike had been at this for about three hours when my side started to hurt. I was getting a real kick out of watching him grab the sofa pillow and pull it close to his face to muffle how loud he was actually venting his frustration. This was not typical behaviour anymore for guys our age. We had cars and girlfriends and college courses, some (in my case all) with girls in them. It was a good time to be alive, and a stupid time to be fixated on some lousy game your friend's brother owned. Besides which, he also owned BIONIC COMMANDO, which was by far one of the most enjoyable games on the earth at that time. He also had all the Mario games, so I felt pretty guilty about having bought this once I realized how lame it was.

Anyway, I knew my lauging was making it harder on the poor guy, but we were stuck in this feedback loop. He'd die, he'd flip out, I'd laugh my ass off, he'd die, he'd flip out, I'd laugh my ass off. I couldn't see, I was laughing so hard. But I didn't need to see anything; it was the screaming that was funny.

Well, as luck would have it, he got through the stage after a few hours. And 6.3 was a breeze. I think he finished it the first time, and got shot throught ot 6.4, where you meet the big bad, and then the game is over. So he gave me this excited look: hey, we're gonna see the end of ths game! Even if he died, he'd just go back to the begining of 6.4, and meet the big bad again, and so victory was inevitable!

About four seconds later, he was dead. This big bad was just ridiculous. So he flashed me this look of "Holy shit; here we go," and hit "continue." What we saw shocked us both. After continuing from 6.4, you don't go back to 6.4, like all the other levels. What we saw was his little Nninja guy at the start of stage 6.1 !!!

Mike didn't scream, or say a word. He picked up his keys, grabbed his jacket and left the house in silence. I don't think he even looked at me.

To this day I can't thnk about that moment without at least smiling.

[Slade]

Hehe, that's pretty evil on the part of the developers. Bionic Commando is easily one of the coolest games I've ever played.

Another time that pissed me off was in Adventure Island II where I spent two hours getting to the second to last Island, and then died six times in rapid succession. I felt like an ass for getting killed at the same part consistantly, and then when I continued, I didn't even have any items! And you don't even start out with a weapon, you have to collect a pick up. I think I kicked my NES and never played the game again. I dunno how many of you have played Adventure Island II, but it's one of those really hard one hit death games where you're this little fat guy with a hat who isn't really cut out for adventuring.

[Slade]

And a helmet!

[Lynxfox]

I still hold that any character can be improved by giving him an inexplicable helmet.