I’m thinking about the AVGN and how Nintendo makes you pay to play shitty emulator games from like 50 years ago.
Especially for the very old games like atari lol
I mean that’s hit or miss with people in general. I have a 19 year old coworker who’s really into the SNES, and I know a 37 year old who refuses to play anything that isn’t Call of Duty.
Retro gaming is already a niche hobby, but I don’t think it’s entirely driven by nostalgia, because to say that implies retro games are somehow less valid or less engaging than modern games, which isn’t true. Older games have different design decisions that can hook different people. Like if your favorite type of game is a 2D platformer, you’re gonna be into retro games by default.
The biggest hurdle for some people seems to be when graphics aren’t what they’re used to, like I have relatives who can’t visually interpret 2D sprite graphics or early 3D games, but can see what’s going on in a modern realistic HD game like RDR2.
But yeah, lots of retro games are enjoyable on their own terms, so I’ve met people of all ages who still like them.
Ludology has advanced by leaps and bounds since back then. Games today are far better, because we know what people like to do. Games used to be hard as fuck for no reason, but now they’re easier because it turns out people don’t want to feel bad when they play. They like games that give them good feelings. So work backwards and end up with a game state that gives the player a good feeling instead of a bad feeling.
I will note that: “Games used to be hard as fuck for no reason, but now they’re easier because it turns out people don’t want to feel bad when they play. They like games that give them good feelings.” definitely is generally true, in that you’ll get more game sales. But there absolutely is a market for ‘hard games’. Dark Souls is the obvious jerk, but a lot of indie games with cult followings have that too: Enter the Gungeon, La-Mulana, Spelunky.
And like, yeah, those games will always be niche. But for those who like them, there’s nothing else on the market quite like it.
they weren’t hard for no reason, they were sucking quarters in arcades and spiking difficulty to mess with renting
Here’s what it’s like to play a hard game.
Games changed to easy for a reason. Turns out, when people have some spare time, they don’t want to spend it feeling frustrated and angry.
I mean in general sure, there’s more quality of life stuff in most modern games. There’s a lot less cryptic puzzles that make no sense, and a lot fewer situations of getting lost. But you I could say Cookie Clicker and Genshin Impact are the epitome of modern games then, because they offer quick and consistent satisfaction to more people. They hit the nervous system right and keep people playing in ways that games 30 years ago perhaps didn’t.
People are different too. A lot of people like hard as fuck games, even if they didn’t grow up with them. The popularity of Dark Souls should show that at least. Some people might latch onto how a game like a 2D Castlevania feels. Also most people I meet aren’t even into games in general, they’re into specific types of games, like there’s fighting game communities, there’s people who prefer FPS, there are some people I know who only get interested in VR. And so I’ve met people who only get interested in retro or retro style games.
Atari games just objectively suck, they barely worked and you could only think they were good when there was nothing to compare it to. I’m not criticizing the people who made these games, they got paid like 2 bucks and had to make a game with pong as the only reference pint for what a game was, and it had to run on a dollar store calculator. but there’s just no reason to pick up adventure for the atari 2000 unless you are interested in the history of video games.
Once you get to the NES there are things worth playing. The original Legend of Zelda is terrible, and the second one is worse., but is interesting to play if you are big on the series. Mega Man, Metroid, and Mario mostly worked at that time. You’re better off playing Metroid Zero mission instead of the original, but Mario definitely was fine the way it was, really made something special that holds up, same for Mega Man(with some frustrating exceptions). Outside of nintendo there’s the original metal gear and sonis going on, which definitely show their age but are still fun and cool for some people. SNES was when games actually started being playable, sometimes even fun, on a consistent basis, but that’s after the timeline you discussed.
I am a zoomer, albeit a kinda weird one, so take all this with a grain of salt.
It is. Half the puzzles are just knowing what to do, or the game doesn’t progress. They don’t even require thought, you either know to burn down one random tree or you don’t, or you just push every block until something happens. Enemies have waaaaay to much health for the most part, which especially bad in the last couple dungeons. guards should not have that much health and need to be hit from the correct angle and just move around randomly. It’s infuriating. It was revolutionary and essential and had some really good ideas, but the execution sucked hard looking back.
Totally accurate. I grew up on NES but only Mario and a couple other games are good. Super Metroid is great but Metroid 1 is honestly fucking dog shit.
Going way back, Pac Man and Tetris hold up and that’s like fucking it.
Oh yeah true, forgot. Yeah it’s just Pac man then.
And there are a few other fairly good mid 80’s games that were arcade exclusives at the time back when they were 10 years ahead of home consoles, so basically Super Nintendo level technology.
Edit: Oh I think Tetris is actually like between the NES and SNES though, also I just looked up some dates and it’s like, after the Japan release but before the NA release of the console, but then the actual NA/non-Soviet release of Tetris was later
Super Metroid is the only one there that’s way after
Depends on how far back counts as retro. Your thought that no one plays Atari games is more or less true, and I would even say most NES titles aren’t particularly known or popular. SNES territory is where we see a lot of games that are just as playable as modern indie titles.
2D graphics went though the same weird uncanny-valley growing pains as 3D, kinda like how the PS1 has this janky “bless them they’re trying” charm to it but the N64 just kinda looks bad. Super old vector graphics and lots of colorful arcade games still hold up, but the Atari looks like pastel ass.
N64 looks bad? Conker looks so good, banjo, Mario games. They had the limitations defined by hardware and made that shit look awesome within those limits. Just full disagreement about those. Games that wanted (or even want now) to look realistic never hold up and are kinda boring. The good art knows it’s limits and defines the art by what is fun and nice within them
i do but i am not a good sample i am like the oldest zoomer possible and also i was born in latin america which meant that i was mostly behind gaming for a lil bit of time, so i have a lot of nostalgia for old ass games like i was born in 97 and we only got a nintendo 64 when i was like 5 or 6, but we did have a mega drive and a super nintendo so i can get into games of that era and so do most of my friends who are into games and are around my age, also a lot of nostalgia for arcade games is a thing, but if we go real retro it gets rough i never even saw an comodore 64 or an atari and i go to street fairs where people sell antiquities here in rio, i’ve seen actual soviet stuff being sold but never anything gaming related from before the original nintendo console
Was the NES officially even released in Latin America back in the 1980’s/1990’s because i never saw a real NES/Famicom only those knockoff consoles.
I do remember seeing Sega consoles and the SNES and n64, but never a real NES.
Am an older zoomer, can’t really get into anything older than PS1/N64 games. Love the PS2 and early PS3/Xbox 360 era though.
Understandable, am dead-center millennial and my limit tends to be late NES.
Also >PS2 >retro :walter-breakdown: :yes-honey-left:
Understandable, am dead-center millennial and my limit tends to be late NES.
This definitely depends on the type of older game. Text adventures can still be very playable and Monkey Island is amazing for a game that was available on the Atari.
Asteroids and Pacman on the other hand get boring in like 5 minutes. Space Invaders on the other hand for some reason has staying power for like 20 - 30minutes.
Oh for sure, especially text and good writing don’t get dragged down by the growing pains graphics were going through at the time. I’m much more of a mechanics and “gamefeel”-minded person so I can’t quite cheat the technology like that, there’s this stretch of time between late arcade and SNES where it feels like devs were still getting a grasp on the changing tech and there’s a certain stiffness to everything.
