Random Video Game Thoughts

[Chad]

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

Can I get this on a T shirt?

[Wihzerd]

My take away from this conversation?

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

One could just as easily say:

Without nice graphics, modern gaming mostly sucks.

Or more aptly:

Without the things that I like, gaming mostly sucks.

There are some old games that have aged well and are still fun today. There are also a lot of new games that suck. There's going to be a lot cherry picking either way

[Azhrei Vep]

My take away from this conversation?

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

One could just as easily say:

Without nice graphics, modern gaming mostly sucks.

Or more aptly:

Without the things that I like, gaming mostly sucks.

There are some old games that have aged well and are still fun today. There are also a lot of new games that suck. There's going to be a lot cherry picking either way.

Nah, I can do without the nice graphics, that's fine. They don't really contribute anything important or useful. Decades of trial and error have improved gameplay in a lot of areas, though, and that's what matters. Also they started doing actual stories! Not especially amazing ones, but good enough.

[John]

the skinner box model

The only hill I will die on complaining about how the old days were so great is in the infection of the industry with the Skinner box model.

It's not total, it's not complete. You can still get good new games with good new graphics and good, modern design that doesn't have a Skinner box grafted to it (or does not exist entirely inside one). But they're a lot more common now. They're extremely effective dark arts, they drive engagement, they make money, they keep people playing all day every day forever. But they're usually used for evil and they've taken over the gaming mainstream in the past decade or so.

[tombombodil]

My take away from this conversation?

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

One could just as easily say:

Without nice graphics, modern gaming mostly sucks.

Or more aptly:

Without the things that I like, gaming mostly sucks.

There are some old games that have aged well and are still fun today. There are also a lot of new games that suck. There's going to be a lot cherry picking either way.

Nah, I can do without the nice graphics, that's fine. They don't really contribute anything important or useful. Decades of trial and error have improved gameplay in a lot of areas, though, and that's what matters. Also they started doing actual stories! Not especially amazing ones, but good enough.

As long as we don't conflate good art and visual design with graphical fidelity. How a game looks is hugely important both to gameplay and in terms of aesthetic enjoyment, but a game having more pixels, better ambient occlusion, or anti aliasing are only tools that serve good art direction and visual design and do almost nothing on their own to make a game "look good".

[Azhrei Vep]

My take away from this conversation?

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

One could just as easily say:

Without nice graphics, modern gaming mostly sucks.

Or more aptly:

Without the things that I like, gaming mostly sucks.

There are some old games that have aged well and are still fun today. There are also a lot of new games that suck. There's going to be a lot cherry picking either way.

Nah, I can do without the nice graphics, that's fine. They don't really contribute anything important or useful. Decades of trial and error have improved gameplay in a lot of areas, though, and that's what matters. Also they started doing actual stories! Not especially amazing ones, but good enough.

As long as we don't conflate good art and visual design with graphical fidelity. How a game looks is hugely important both to gameplay and in terms of aesthetic enjoyment, but a game having more pixels, better ambient occlusion, or anti aliasing are only tools that serve good art direction and visual design and do almost nothing on their own to make a game "look good".

Fair. But in that case ... games have managed to look pretty good since at least the 8-bit era, so age is a non-issue there.

[BottledViolence]

My take away from this conversation?

Without nostalgia, retro gaming mostly sucks.

One could just as easily say:

Without nice graphics, modern gaming mostly sucks.

Or more aptly:

Without the things that I like, gaming mostly sucks.

There are some old games that have aged well and are still fun today. There are also a lot of new games that suck. There's going to be a lot cherry picking either way.

I'd love some examples of games that held up well, my buddies and I are on an attempted retro gaming kick. Unfortunately, nothing we've tried has held up very well beyond fighting games, which ironically enough are one of our least favorite type of game.

That's another issue, the further back you go, the fewer game types were viable. Great if you like side scrollers, platformers, or fighting games. Not great if you FPS's, flight sims, or MMO's.

[tombombodil]

I mean the issue here is that what a "true deal-breaker" even is depends a great deal on the person you're talking to. Missile Command is still one of my favorite games and I will play it for hours anytime I get a chance to play on an original cabinet. But I've shown it to some friends and they just hate playing with the trackball; they can't stand it. In other words, one of the core components of the design, deliberately chosen to be weighty and require effort to use and practice and skill to be both fast and precise, and that informs all the other design decisions of the game, is itself a deal breaker for some people.

Side note if you're looking for a game you can play co-op with friends, that almost certainly restricts your retro-gaming options more than genre preferences does. Unless you want to buy a 4 person arcade cabinet and break social distancing in a big way

Also it's worth noting that ports of older games to PC or emulators can completely lose the core of the experience, especially ports of old arcade or console games.

Also also I think defining what "retro" even means is worth-while here since it's also subjective. I have cousins in high school for whom PS2 games are absolutely retro.

[BottledViolence]

Also it's worth noting that ports of older games to PC or emulators can completely lose the core of the experience, especially ports of old arcade or console games.

I honestly can't tell a meaningful difference between a lot of games played on an emulator compared to original hardware on a CRT. Of course the fact that I don't like platformers and am really quite terrible at fighting games may have something to do with it.

Also also I think defining what "retro" even means is worth-while here since it's also subjective. I have cousins in high school for whom PS2 games are absolutely retro.

To be fair, that is a 20 year old console. When it came out, we would have considered the nearly as old Atari 2600 vintage as well.

[tombombodil]

Also it's worth noting that ports of older games to PC or emulators can completely lose the core of the experience, especially ports of old arcade or console games.

I honestly can't tell a meaningful difference between a lot of games played on an emulator compared to original hardware on a CRT. Of course the fact that I don't like platformers and am really quite terrible at fighting games may have something to do with it.

Yeah by no means does it always make a big difference, and it doesn't always make it way worse? But some of the time it does make the game feel pretty different in one or more fundamental ways.