That which I had once thought would never happen has actually come to pass.

Whether I like it or not, I am now in possession of a Playstation 2.

Those who know me know that I am a devoted and loyal Nintendo fan, and I am proud to be one. I dutifully obtained a GameCube upon its release, as I did with almost every prior piece of Nintendo hardware. The thought of owning another system is sacrilege to me. Sure, I flirted with other systems back in the PS1 days, but I ultimately found them to be hollow and unfulfilling relationships. To me, Nintendo hardware has always served my purpose and never let me down. And yet, through no action of my own, here I am with a PS2.

From what I understand, without going into too many details, this PS2 sat in storage without any packaging, and thus it could not be sold. My dad brought it home from work and gave it to me to see if it was functional. Not only does it work like a charm, but it appears to have never been operated before and is in perfect condition. So far be it for me to refuse. I had been entertaining the thought of buying one, since there are a few PS2 games that I’d like to play, but it wasn’t worth that much to me, even to buy a used one. A brand new one free of charge, on the other hand, well, I’ll take that! No problemo! And if someone can dig up an old X-Box or Dreamcast, then what the hell, I’ll take that too!

So now my GameCube and Nintendo 64 have to coexist with their new PS2 roommate. It’ll be interesting to see if they get along.

I only have one PS2 game, Need for Speed Underground. It’s pretty fun, though I can tell first hand, from an objective point of view, that the PS2 graphics are inferior to the Cube, moreso then I expected. There are a lot of jagged edges and the picture just doesn’t look as polished or as smooth. But, this game was also free, so I ain’t complaining. That said, should a game that I want be available on both systems, I’ll pick the Cube version, hands down. But it’s nice that I now have the ability to pick up a game that isn’t available for GameCube. I’m looking at the Transformers game, the Street Fighter Anniversary Edition, and the upcoming Godzilla game, all three of which, in my opinion, should get a Cube release, but are not.

A part of me is pretty happy about this, but another part, the Nintendo loyalist part, is a bit angry. Not that I have betrayed my roots or anything like that because I still consider myself a hardcore, die-hard fan of The Big N, but because I now have the ability to play games on the PS2 that I should have been able to play on Cube anyway. Companies act like the X-Box and PS2 are the only systems that exist, and don’t support the GameCube because the games don’t sell as well. Well that doesn’t cut it with me. I mean, in a race between 3 horses, somebody has to come in third, even if they’re all thoroughbreds. But I digress.

I wonder what else I can do with this, if I should get it modded or something like that. I mean, I haven’t really been paying attention to the PS2 scene, having no reason to until now, so I have no idea what’s out there or even possible. I know from watching The ScreenSavers on TechTV that there are some crazy cool things you can do with an X-Box, so I’m wondering what the PS2 can do if I unleash it’s potential.

Anyway, I hope that this does not change me as a person. I still want to be the same Super Mario-playing guy I always was. I’ll have to keep the dark influences under control. But I do have a way to purify my soul. For you see, the PS2 was not the only thing that was uncovered in an unsalable state. There were also two fully functional black GameCubes, complete with all the accessories. I’ll be giving these away to other people in my family who don’t have video games, so I can share the Nintendo love. I think that evens things out.

Sayonara.