Help (Disc 1) Can't climb ladder in gateway

soulred12

soulred12

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I just started playing FFVIII a few days ago, and I got up to the part on Disc 1 where Quistis leads Zell and Selphie through the sewer and they finally climb the ladder to go back into the gateway. They climb up, step into the gateway. Then I press X in front of the ladder again and choose "go up".

Then I hold up to send them all the way up the ladder into the top room. But it won't let me into the top room; when I get to the top of the ladder, it switches to show the upper room (where the gateway team is supposed to be) but then nothing happens when I hold up except after a few seconds it sends me back into the lower room as if I had been pressing down (though I'm holding up...). This happens no matter how many times I reset the game.

Here's a video I made of the bug: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPeWH5PTx5k (you can just skip to 1:38; I narrate for a bit before to provide context to someone who finds it through my channel instead of here)

Why is this happening? Has anyone else heard of this? I can't find anything like it in a google search, except walkthroughs which just say "climb the ladder and trap the sorceress" as if it's a given. I really want to play the rest of the game. Any ideas to get past this?
 
That's weird. I know this sounds kinda stupid, but have you tried not holding the up button when you get to the top room? What happens when you don't press anything?
 
Same thing, sadly. I've tried tapping up to trigger the room change and then not pressing anything, as well as holding up on both the joystick and the d-pad, and holding up while mashing buttons, and even holding up and then holding down after the scene change (dunno why but I was trying everything...). I just can't get them to go up that ladder.
 
Been trying to think whether I done things differently in that point of the game, but I really can't think of anything. I'm sure you've tried cleaning the disc and whatnot... :hmmm:

I remember on FFVII, I had problems due to a scratched disc. I managed to get around that by swapping the discs whenever the game froze. For example, the disc that was buggered was disc one. So, when it froze, I swapped it out for disc two. I ended up getting a completely different cutscene, but I was able to proceed with the game afterwards.

I've never had that problem with VIII, so I don't know if that method will work. On the scene change, why don't you try putting disc two or something in it instead? Don't turn it off, just open the disc tray and swap them 'round. As I said, it worked for me with FF7. Hopefully it will work for you. Otherwise the only alternative I can think of is finding a replacement disc one.

Only other thing I can think of is maybe there's a problem with your controller, but then... You got that far without any issues, so.
 
Let go off up when it goes to the dark screen, see what happens there, then slowly press up. sounds like a control glitch, they happened a lot on the PS1 games, if that doesn't work, just wait a few seconds for the screen to come into full effect then press up or right (don't ask why right and not left, tends to also help you go up.)
 
I've this happen to me tons of times specifically during parts with climbing ladders. I learned that I was constantly pressing the up/side button during the transition, thus making the character immediately climb back down the ladder before I even reached the next area. You just have to be careful when pressing the buttons I guess? :hmmm: Have you tried pressing another button instead of up to climb the ladder? I found that moving the d-pad to the side before reaching the top usually got me through. Your problem seems like an extreme version of that though so maybe you've got a bad disc. I'd do some more research online for that.
 
Alright, so I tried another disc, same thing. But then, I tried a combination of Vircon and Exoskeleton's suggestions. I held up, then when the screen started to fade black I slowly moved from the up button on the d-pad to the right, then let go just as the screen went black, and then started pressing right just as the screen came back on, and...it worked! Somehow Quistis finally climbed all the way up the ladder. Boy let me tell you, I'm glad I didn't die against the Sorceress.

Interestingly, when I got to the next disc and the next save point, I saved to slot 2, loaded slot 1 so I was back in the end of the sewer, and tried again. Holding up didn't work, so it wasn't some weird fluke that only happened yesterday. But even trying to do the fanciness with moving from up to right didn't do it. So it really must be the touch. Though, it still makes me wonder why more people haven't written about this issue online.

Anyway, thank you all so much for the help, I'm an hour into disc 2 now. :)
 
:) This happens to me all the time. It's because of holding the direction button, sometimes when the screen changes it mixes it around so it ends up making the characters go back where they came from. Glad you got it sorted.
 
Glad we could help, it really was some kinda programming thing back on the PS1 games. we really don't know why, but it seemed to be a confusion of games and controls. Just remember this for next time cause I know FFVIII has a lot of times when the screen will fade to black then go to the next screen.
 
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