so you actually didn't have one of those RPGs?!

I say you saying in that Crisis Core thread, that you want real rpgs, unlike Crisis Core,
well dude, if you REALLY like rpgs, then you better get back to that PSX you hate,
and start playing it's killer RPG line-up!

i'm not kidding!

you prefer the PS2's, cause you don't know the PSX's.. ;)

oh well,
If you ever run out of rpgs, know that the true goldmine is the PSX

Back in the day I was very critical on the Playstation because, although it had a gigantic wall of games, there was (in my opinion) a similar number of good games between the Playstation and N64. I think some people underestimate how bad many of these Playstation games were, everything else being equal if you took the gameplay elements and flaws of a game that was receiving 60's and 70's on the Playstation it would probably get in the 30% range today; they were buggy, had massive performance issues, the gameplay was cliche (even back then) and there was very little enjoyment to be had playing them.

The thing I learned in that generation was that (when it comes to third party developers) "High Quality Exclusives" are just a numbers game. If you take a developer (like Ubisoft) and you take their 2 best teams and task them with creating an exclusive games for one platform and then take their next 8 teams and task them with creating exclusive games for another platform the platform which received the 8 games will (likely) have more games which interest you. In a lot of ways this is why I felt durring the PS2/Gamecube generation that I enjoyed the games I played on the Gamecube more, but there were far more games I enjoyed on the PS2.

I definitely remember the PS1 vs. N64 war. There wasn't quite as much bitching though because Sony was the newcomer and thus, didn't really have expectations to live up to. In some ways it sorta came out of no where - it didn't have any arguable good 3rd party support until 97/98 (about 3-4 years on the market...), and once the floodgates opened there was no turning back by 99, just in time for Sega to nullify the Saturn completely.

I remember the PS1/N64 era fairly well. The devoted Nintendo fans were all defending the N64 by pointing out that Super Mario 64 was way better than anything the PS1 could do (not that there weren't attempts to bring SM64 clones to the PS1, but only Klonoa really came close), while the PS1 was drawing mostly the mainstream gamers and long-time RPG fanatics. Of course, at the time there was a much lower realization of the impact of mainstream gamers on the industry amongst the core demographic (and how could there not be, since the 16-bit era had been largely core-demographic-focused?), so a lot of people in the scene started to say that it was the N64's lack of RPGs that was making it lose ground to the newcomer PS1.

"since the 16-bit era had been largely core-demographic-focused?),"

That´s why I miss the 16-bit era so much...I miss the days gaming wasn´t mainstream.

The core-focused market is not something the industry misses, I'd wager. Ultimately, the presence of mainstream games doesn't hurt the industry; it only helps it, since more sales means more revenue (and hopefully more profit). And it's downright silly to say that mainstream-appeal games somehow hurt gaming; do your favored games somehow lose their quality if you can also get the likes of Barbie's Horse Adventure on the same console as they appear on? I venture they do not. If they do have that effect for you, then what does that say about your ability to enjoy something for what it is versus what you want it to be?

Also, pining for a time when the amount of downmarket games was fewer than upmarket games ultimately just gives you the image of an elitist, or of the stereotypical "boy's tree house club". No icky girls or old people allowed, and all that.

it's not like casual gamers came in the industry with the PSX

cause the NES was not less a casual console than a hardcore console

millions of kids got a NES from their parents and where certainly no hardcore gamers,
the NES was something to keep the kids busy with.. certainly casual