Corsair (Day 120)

My PS2 has been broken for a long time because I attempted to soft mod it for Japanese games. My attempt was successful but I ended up pretty much destroying the disc tray. Truth be told the console probably still works, but getting discs in and out of the tray is such a hassle that it is not even close to worth it.

So it was that when I stumbled on a low-end configurations for PCSX2, a popular PS2 emulator, I decided to give it a try. Even with onboard graphics, these new settings seem to run most games I've tried really well. My copy of Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne ran almost flawlessly with some tinkering while Digital Devil Saga runs decently well. The only caveat is that I can't have anything running in the background of the FPS slows to a crawl. Regardless, just about every PS2 game I've experimented with seems to work--although Devil May Cry worryingly crashed in the middle of combat.

I have quite a few PS2 games that I've never finished thanks to my ham-fisted mod. Some of them I'm not quite sure I actually want to finish, but I've definitely decided that I'm going to play and complete the following games in no particular order:

• Final Fantasy X

It's actually a shame that I've never played very far into this game. I'm a devoted fan of the series but I missed a huge wave of early titles because I didn't own a PS2 at the time. I had one in time for Final Fantasy XII but for some reason I never went back and finished this one. I purchased it (along with X-2) a couple years ago, but my PS2's been broken for a long time.

• Final Fantasy X-2

Same as above.

• Front Mission 5: Scars of the War

This is pretty much the whole reason I wanted to mod my PS2 in the first place. I ended up playing the fan translated Japanese game for all of 10 minutes and then I never picked it up again. Still, the gameplay looks similar to FM4 so I'm sure I'll love it. FM4 was amazing, but difficult and glacially paced. It took me years to finish.

• Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne

I played the first thirty minutes of this game and was really impressed by the music and atmosphere. It's genuinely creepy. I'm actually torn on whether or not I want to go back and play the original Shin Megami Tensei on SNES. Apparently it is quite long.

• Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga (1 and 2)

I've actually played pretty far into the first game but I was playing it when my PS2 exploded. I don't relish the thought of starting over but the gameplay is pretty fun, if a little vanilla. Aside from the Persona series, this is probably the most traditional RPG that Shin Megami Tensei has to offer.

There are a few other titles that I'm not sure about yet, like Kingdom Hearts I + II, Suikoden 3, 4, and 5, etc. I'm already making quite the backlog for myself and I'm still playing Innocent Sin. Usually when stuff like this happens I just end up finishing nothing at all. Will report back tomorrow if I decide anything. I think I'll swap back and forth between games today.