The mesmerizing fireflies on the main menu screen are called "Dancing Dots", and they actually serve a purpose! Each of the seven dots follow a circular pattern a fixed rate synced to the number of seconds in a minute. At the beginning of a minute (The :00 mark), all seven dots are combined to form a single light. At 10 seconds, two of the dots combine to form 6 lights, and so on. If the dots are not dancing, it means the system time is either not set or the battery has gone bad. Batter replace it!

There's also another hidden feature- As an hour passes, the circle the dancing dots form gets larger. At the top of the hour, it reverts back to it's original size.

My recreation for the PS2 shrine is not synced up with the system time, but should still move in the regular pattern the dots make in a minute.

You've probably heard this factoid by now, but did you know the PlayStation 2 could play DVDs? It was the only one that could properly play DVD movies out of the box- The Xbox required a separate remote and dongle in order to unlock its functionality.

A lot of people contribute the success of the PS2 solely to the fact that it was a cheap DVD player. Makes sense, right? You and your wife want to get a DVD player to watch Mel Gibson's The Patriot for the 1,776th time while little Reginald wants the new hot game console to play Madden. You look at the console and go, "Hold up, that game console that little Reggie wants can also play my DVD copy of Mel Gibson's The Patriot?? It's a Christmas miracle!"

While it wasn't the sole factor in the PS2's success, it was definitely a large help in getting it in people's homes early on and getting a huge lead over its competition. Over time, as DVDs went out of fashion, the PS2 still held strong even after the next generation came and went.

On the back of the PS2 is an expansion slot where you can insert a hard drive and a network adapter. As the name so-mysteriously suggests, it was used for connecting to the internet via broadband or dial-up for online play. Sony did not have a unified service like Xbox live, and so online play was mainly up to the developer. As a result, while Xbox live required a subscription service, owners of a PS2 only needed to purchase the adapter. The hard drive saw less use, as it was mainly only used for Final Fantasy XI, RPG Maker, and installing Linux.

Earlier models of the fat PS2 didn't have a slot for a hard drive. Instead there was an official external HDD with its own power supply and port you plug into the back. These HDD-less models were only available in Japan during its launch of March 2000. Odds are you will NEVER see these!