After 26 years, the PlayStation 1 still finds ways to surprise us. A secret feature of the original PlayStation memory card has been revealed by YouTuber John Glasscock.
Have you ever deleted a save file by accident only for it to be lost forever? I know that I have, far too many times to count. On PC’s there are usually ways of retrieving lost data. But on consoles, more often than not, the data is lost to the slippery fingers of time. Or so we thought.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. But according to John Glasscock, your deleted data has always been retrievable. We’ve lived a lie for 26 years (thanks for bringing this to our attention LADBible).
Back in the old days of PlayStation 1 console gaming you needed external memory cards to save your data. Without them, you wouldn’t be able to save your progress.
These little memory cards typically stored 1MB of save data. This might come as a surprise to a gamer in 2020, but this was often enough for around ten games save data (give or take). Ah, the good old days. When that memory card was about to run out of space, you had to either copy data onto another memory card or delete the data entirely.
I know I’m not the only one who accidentally deleted the wrong data, especially when there were multiple saves of the same game on the same memory card.
In a video uploaded to the YouTube channel belonging to John Glasscock, he revealed a secret feature that lets you retrieve deleted data.
If you knew nothing about this feature then you’re not alone. No PlayStation manual included this information. I certainly didn’t know this!
How Do I Retrieve PlayStation 1 Data?
Upon loading-up the PlayStation console and entering the memory card screen, John deletes a game save. Then, by pressing the R1, R2, L1 and L2 buttons three times over, the deleted save file returns!
Despite this feature existing in secret on the original PlayStation, this secret way to retrieve data hasn’t been brought back for following PlayStation consoles.
It baffles me that such a feature existed on the very first PlayStation console and Sony didn’t inform its customers. Just imagine the heartache that they would have saved by letting us know!
At least in the modern generation, we have cloud saves to back-up our precious save data. With Sony confirming that PS1, PS2 and PS3 games won’t be supported by the PS5, this tip might have arrived at the perfect time!
Was this a deliberate act by Sony or did they just forget to tell us? Let us know your thoughts across our social media channels and by reacting to our Emoji’s below.