Old games are great, don't forget
 

many gamers forget about them(oldschool games),some times even saying that new games surpass by all means old ones.

seriously guys many should think about the game play and "cool ideas" part for a change.

don't you agree? :)

Yes, the new games have cooler graphics and all, but as a general rule they've seemed to get easier. So the old games for the NES in particular still have massive potential for people wanting a good challenge. Screw how many people you can teabag in Halo 3, you can't be considered a gamer with talent until you can beat Megaman 4 on the console.

Yeah, I still find myself playing the 'classics' such as Final fantasy IV and VI, Zelda, Mario and Megaman. They are great games with that special 'feeling' where people are being more inovative at the time rather than just adding in features to make it bigger/longer.

BTW, so you know for future reference, this thread would be more suited for the VIdeo Games forum here.

Agreed. Game developers have probably gone mad for complex graphics, as the current pieces of hardware are hungry and need to be fully exploited. This wouldn't be much of a problem for younger gamers and newcomers, who wouldn't have forcibly witnessed some absolutely gorgeous games. For those who actually did, the gaming field at its current state and evolution rate will never rollback to what it used to be.

For the gameplay part, I think people are tending to play for pleasure rather than to accomplish tough, and most likely annoying, challenges. I might be wrong, but this is the way new games look like to me anyways.

Finally, some good old school gamers who understand my point.
For all who want to enjoy a good rpg, i suggest playing CHRONO TRIGGER and CHRONO CROSS.
These two great games will surely be appreciated by all rpg fans especially new ones.

Don't you think so?

Sticking to my strength here, I love every game from the FF series I have played (goes back as far as VI), but as soon as X came out my best friend got interested in it and so did my brother. People expect better graphics because of the power of the console and I think they really miss out on some damn good gameplay because of it. Bear in mind though, amazing graphics doesn't necessarily = shitty gameplay.

Absolutely right.
But sadly not too many games are like that (awesome graphics+cool gameplay) especially RPGs.

As for gameplay, even amazing graphics should be considered at a somehow "chronological" context. FF7's pixelated sprites would look crappy as hell compared to some new stuff, say FFX-2. However, FF7's graphics were among the most sophisticated when it was released, probably around 1997. My point is that old "rich" games were quite well-balanced, and therefore the graphics part was never that neglected.

An interesting thing nowadays is that in Gamestops, many PS2 and XBox games are reduced to $5-10, even the top-rated classics.

I've started quite a collection of PS2 games (~280 so far) and I see so many people just brush by the giant bins of "old" PS2 games because they either can't stand the graphics or need to have only the absolute latest games.

This week (Buy 2, get 1 free on used games) I'm slowly working my way up and down each bin and shelf and usually walk out with a hefty stack of games. There are so many forgotten gems that just go by the wayside.

Although X-2 had amazing graphics it was, in all fairness, shite.

I get your point though. What I was trying to get across was that although I hadn't grown up with the graphical style of FFVI, I didn't write it off as a shitty game because the graphics aren't as good as the later games (which I did grow up with).

FFVI is a marvel. There is no better Final Fantasy, IMO. I certainly won't forget the old-school, thanks.

Gamers are becoming spoiled for good graphics and really aren't being given good story-lines and interesting characters to accompany the graphics. I am not sure who said it, but the argument is made that 3 dimensional graphics is rather arbitrary when it is accompanied by 2 dimensional characters and story-lines. I tend to agree with that almost exclusively.

There are good games being made now too though but there are quite a few awesome 'elder' games that will always garner respect for their excellent design.

Yes, old games *are* great. If a game can truly stand the test of time and remain playable and fun many years after its release, then you know it accomplished the creator's goal. Chrono Trigger's a good example, since most people who played it back when it came out can still pick it up and play it even today.

I'll concede that *some* people don't like FFVI because of its graphics, either as a product of their rearing on next-gen titles or just being that picky, but there is a certain quality to it that makes the game really shine even if you can't get past the sprites and pixels. Maybe it's the music, maybe the story, characters, setting, or a combination of all it them, but FFVI and older games like it have a certain inner presence that goes beyond graphics, mostly because they had to given the technological limitations at the time. In this case, even though it may not be playable to everyone today, it did give nearly an entire gaming generation a reason to love their past-time, and preserve good memories for years to come, something that you, even as a new-schooler (I don't mean it in a bad way at all, just making a point) can appreciate.

That's true. People like to use the argument that new games are "all about graphics" to explain the correlation between the rise in picture quality and the lack of game-play or story. It's the same way with movies: "all CG, no substance". There's a balance that many newer games have been able to achieve that blends good graphics and good game-play, but nowadays it's a lot more noticeable when the two ends don't even out. Back in the day, graphics, sound, and even text were limited by the available memory on consoles. Even when a game's graphics were great (for the time), you didn't really have anything else to compare it to. The sound was, even at its best, low-fi MIDI, and the creators only had seven or eight lines of dialogue to get their point across in any scene. These features became less integral when compared to graphics, so there wasn't any way for anyone to even tell if the other factors even measured up. Today, programmer's have near limitless potential (barring time) when making their product: they can have hundreds of lines of text to weave a story, or soundtrack quality music to fit the scene. Suddenly, graphics aren't the only integral part of the process, and when a game's story or game-play falls short of the industry standard, it's more apparent than it was, say, five or ten years ago. The expectations of the public have risen dramatically, and everyone wants each piece of the puzzle to fit.

There's very few old school games that have stood the test of time. Money can be better spent, and I prefer to have a bit of graphics when I'm playing a game. There's no tossing up the atmosphere that some next-gen games have. Some people insist that they enjoy old school games just to differentiate themselves amongst the masses of gamers.

Give me a break.

The old ideas from even the first great games still hold strong today. I know I throw the name around randomly at times, but there's a reason Geometry Wars Evolved was such a big seller for the 360 (even if it was out during a time of game drought). On a fundamental level, when you give players an objective, an enjoyable means of trying to reach that objective, and a decent enough coat of paint, you're going to have a game you can enjoy. Whether it lasts for 2 hours or 20 hours.

Looking back further, past even the NES, there are great ideas that can still be applied to new titles these days. Competing with a friend in Pac-Man Championship Edition for the top spot on the scoreboard is one of the most memorable moments I've had with video games this year. Old games are great, it's good to be able to still appreciate them. Whether we're going directly back to them, or dusting them off and making them like new.

I think it depends on what we mean by old school. I have systems going back to the old NES sitting under my TV, and I probably play them more than my next gen stuff. I mean, when asked to give a list of my favourite games, it reads like a who's who of old consoles:

Final Fantasy Tactics
Final Fantasy III/VI
Final Fantasy II/IV
Secret of Mana
Dragon Force
Shining Force II
Suikoden I, II, V (last one not so old)
Breath of Fire I, II, V (last one not so old)
Earthbound

I'm gonna stop there, but you see my point. "Old-school" games I think have a certain charm. Even in platformers, I find the SNES to be just very entertaining. Joe and Mac, Super Adventure Island... love those games.

Now, Nall has basically said everything I think on this subject (as the boy has a tendency to do, I've noticed) and I don't have a ton more to add to it. Graphics don't automatically equal a bad game, but they seem to sometimes be more concentrated on by a developer than the story is etc... All I can say is I've been highly disappointed in the modern gen games, and have a lot more old school games I like to replay than I do newer games.

Wow Denicalis. Replace Suikoden and Earthbound with Star Ocean 2 and Valkyrie Profile and that about sums up my favorites.

I agree that gaming generally doesn't feel like it used to. I no longer have a working NES or SNES. But I'll never part with my PS1 RPGs which also includes alot of NES and SNES remakes. While there are alot of newer games I enjoy and play, I tend to get rid of them after I do just about everything in them because I know that most the time, I'll never play them again. This especially holds true with how many game series nowadays get a yearly title released.

I've always been fascinated in what we'll see when players list their favorite games of old, Deni. It'd be stating the obvious to say you're a fan of RPGs, but I just did it so we have that out of the way. I'm interested in what you'd say, if you had to say something in response to someone with something like a more PC oriented list of games. Or someone who did a majority of their playing in an arcade.

The things we value as players are vastly different. I see that people such as yourself value experiences crafted by scripted games with gripping stories. I grew up playing RPGs and Fighting games, and eventually I came to appreciate more of the raw game aspects. Whether the competition was going to be worth engaging, balance vs. variety, and level design.

I don't find story to be much of a factor, especially with games like Ninja Gaiden or Street Fighter. I do enjoy being engaged as a player in a variety of ways, and I think that is the greatest part of being able to look back at such a large history of games with the ability to play them to boot. While sometimes our judgment might be swayed by things we've learned to expect or have grown to dislike, it's nice to know that we can share things that other players might not have touched before. To help others understand just where it is we're coming from when we talk about games the way we do.

I've noticed this since about the start of the PS2, casual gamers and the industry as a whole are very fickle on how good a game is unless it's staring them in the face, although 280 games? Come on now there's no way those are all must have classics I sense some klepto in you sir.

Retailers base a games worth on age, sales, how much the company wants for it and however much profits they want (Soul Calibur 2 for around £15 or less but something like rumble racing still demands at the very least £20? Wtf) not how good it really is, case in point every movie tie in game ever made.

We can't forget the classic games and what they taught us makes a fun game if this industry wants to avoid getting as stale as most of Hollywood (which it's working on) here's hoping virtual console style features will continue to remind people of that. God forbid there comes a time when 'bad' graphics are frowned apon, to the point of ignored like most people do with black and white movies x.x

VP would be on my list, though I've never really liked the SO series. There'd be a bunch more on that list, too. Things like Vagrant Story, Chrono Trigger and... well, I'll get to that in response to Rotorblade.

RPGs are my first love, no doubt at all about that. But as for someone who had a more PC based list? My list of favourite games period would include Full Throttle, Monkey Island I, II, III, and maybe even IV, Day of the Tentacle, LOOM, X-Com series, Planescape: Torment, KotOR...

And as for Arcade, I love me some fighting games, sir. I'm terrible at them. But I am mad addicted to Soul Calibur, Tekken and Street Fighter. Also if they made a new Streets of Rage, I'd probably have an orgasm on principle alone. You're right, we do value different things, but I'm willing to bet most gamers have some cross over love in there somewhere.

There are cross over interests in games, no doubt about it. Just funny that what you mention on your PC list was about what I'd expected, no to sound pretentious. When I said PC, I was wondering if I'd see games like Starsiege Tribes or X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter along with the other games you've listed already is what I mean by that.

There are a lot of things we draw the line on as players. "I don't really care about story." or "I'm terrible at fighting games." just to contrast us. Have you ever thought to yourself, "I don't want to be terrible at fighting games. I want to win."?

I remember picking up Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter in a time where I harbored a great deal of resentment toward RPGs. The one thing I remember clearly was that the story and gameplay were so intertwined that you couldn't do one thing without being reminded of either element. You can't waste your time grinding traditionally, the D-Gauge is there to remind you that you have manage your time. I didn't think there was anything RPGs could do differently and the game made me want to start playing them again.

But I fell in love with everything about that game. Have you had any moments upon picking up older games that you hadn't played in the past?

I liked a few games of that type, but I wouldn't put them on my favourite of all time list. However, I'm not sure if I take your meaning on that question. Have there been older games I've picked up and had them make me take a second look at a genre? Not really. Though Bioshock made me take a look at that genre anew. I'd hated it up until I played that. And then Gears of War and Bioshock made me find something fun about it. But an older game that made me rethink an entire genre? No, not really.

Wow, you really have 280 PS2 games? I'd love to see some pictures of that.

I'm really fussy with my collection. Unless I absolutely love the type of game, and game itself, I won't buy it. That said, I have about 60 Japanese PS2 games, 20 American ones, and somewhere in the single digit figure of PAL ones. I've always preferred older games, and the newer ones I don't usually get around to trying or playing until they're about 3 years old.

You must mean Mega Man 2. That one was the hardest for me.

Looking back at old games is an interesting thing to do. Sometimes, I believe that people are strongly blinded by their nostalgia and the mentality of "back in the mah day." I think the reason that older people find old games better is that new games haven't changed much. And when the experience is fresh and new, it really sticks in the brain. There's nothing I haven't seen in the last five years that I hadn't seen before. It's harder to remember a game when there's nothing new or memorable. However, when you talk to younger gamers, they note that old games are exactly like new games. So, why would they want to deal with the crufty old sprites* when they get polygons? The core gameplay is still the same.

280 PS2 "classics?" I think that's close to probable. Go to gamerankings.com and filter for the top PS2 games. I read through the games and most of them I considered pretty fun at the time. Some of them I'd consider good games, but not classics.

What are these old games you speak of? Oh OLD GAMES. I remember old games! Haha, remember when 'platform' games existed? Or how about when Sega actually made games worth playing? Yeah, old games were the best!

I still havent even beaten pac man, and super mario world.

You haven't lived until you've seen the final boss in Pac-Man! Make sure you've located the secret diamond teeth in the underground lair before taking him on.

Sorry to say, I don't have the interest or attention span or time for 40+ hour games anymore, so my older games see lots of action...In some cases, ones I've replayed for years without getting tired of. I just want to plunk in a quarter or press start (preferably 5 seconds or less after hitting power) and just fucking PLAY! No storyline, no overblown characters I'll end up not caring about anyway, no tutorials explaining the retarded control schemes...Just give me stuff to shoot and collect and a Dpad/A/B buttons to do it with. It's amazing how much good time I had/have with...uh, Sqoon* than I'd have with 99% of what's out on PS3/360 and probably Wii. And I've said before...I think one of the reasons Guitar Hero is so big right now is people just pick up, play a couple songs, and go do something else.

Even "old" RPG's are sort of like this...A LOT of stuff happens in 10 hours in an older RPG, whereas 10 hours you're still learning the nuances of the people who introduce you to the cousins of the main characters you'll deal with in more recent RPG's.

Funniest part is...My NES games probably look better now than I ever thought they did in the past. 8-bit cityscapes are <3. Think the only generation whose graphics bother me are the 32/64 bit era and that was because 3D games looked like ass on all of them (the 2D stuff was sweet).

*A small, NES shooter from Irem that features aliens from Neptune melting the polar ice caps and you control a pink ship to shoot shit and save people underwater. People get eaten by sharks if you don't get them in time, while saving them powers you up. You also die if you don't refuel at least once every sixty seconds. Greatest storyline ever. Also has, like, 2 music tracks through the whole game that get stuck in your head...You go to turn the sound off and then realize how much you miss it, and put it back on.

Newer games aren't all like old ones. You never see side scrolling beat em ups anymore and fighting games play nothing like they did in 2D.

I know nostalgia is part of it, but that's not the whole thing. Our media as a whole has been becoming rather stale, not just video games. Look at TV for instance, rather then having good shows like we used to have, it's overflowing with crap like reality shows. We just occassionaly get a show that's a gem these days. Heck, I still love cartoons and most of what they expect kids to watch is complete crap, I know I wouldn't have watched alot of it when I was a kid.

Yeah... old 3D graphics have not aged well. As great as the game is, Final Fantasy 7 is kind of painful to look at nowadays.

Man, thinking of old games. I miss my Commodore 64, I used to spend hours playing Jump Man, Bruce Lee, and Shogun. I also miss playing the old Dungeons and Dragons golden box games on PC.

Yeah, that's exactly what I was wondering. I appreciate your time, anyway, heh.

The thing is, while game graphics keep getting more detailed and complex (I won't say better), the gameplay has hardly evolved to meet up. The EA guy who said we're still not playing next-gen games (and got a lot of flak for it) was exactly right. It's not necessarily a bad thing per se, lord knows we need "gamey" games like Super Mario Galaxy, but it is counterproductive to constantly destroy the atmospheres and settings in stunningly designed or realized worlds with desperately drab gameplay design and choices, like the timed flag collecting in Assassin's Creed (a notably schizophrenic experience) or the surreally limited environmental interaction of games like Bioshock or even Half-Life 2 (though Valve's effort is well on the way of touching that elusive next-gen).

If so many publishers and designers are so keen on abolishing old school values and visuals, why insist keeping so many admittedly outdated features and design choices? I would much rather have "gamey" visuals (sprites, healthbars, etc) than the bloom-filled cutscenes followed by the same drab lock-and-key puzzles, only now with an exciting lightning ability instead of a keycard.

At least old games can get away with such silliness much easier. You don't mind the silly inconsistencies and odd choices if the game is presented in a way to make it feel more plausible, even if Noah Antwiler is quick to point them out anyway (much to my amusement).

Not that I mind new games, no. I don't remember when was the last time I'd had as much fun and intrigue with games as I did with Portal, FFXII or say, Penumbra Overture. But it doesn't mean I shouldn't love and adore Super Mario World, Secret of Mana, FFVII, Metal Gear Solid or Radiant Silvergun, much less the likes of Contra 4.

I have a colleague who'd never played Silent Hill 1 before and couldn't play my copy because he felt the graphics were so bad (I can imagine they look even worse on an HDTV, throught his PS3). His loss :(

So what would a next generation game be to you then, Q? ((QUESTIONS, AGAIN)) I think a lot of those "old conventions" we reference can't go away so easily, because they're fundamental to video games. But I'm curious, again.

I suppose that unless you came from the Pong or Atari 2600 era (which actually I did, haha), it is pretty hard to go 'backwards'. I still remember a friend of mine having this super old computer where your party was represented by the letter P. I could enjoy it because I took it for what it was, which was a pretty darn cool RPG at the time. Yet, I could forsee people in even say the NES area looking at that and squirming a good bit.


I have found for myself that I just can't get into 3-Dish games. When Mario 64 came out I thought it looked nice but lost interest in it quickly. It had NOTHING To do with the game-it was a classic. However, I grew up in the 2-D era so save for a few exceptions (mainly pro wrestling games) I like to play my Atari/NES/SNES/PS1 games. It's only a wonder why of all the systems I have played, I like my GBA/NDS the most and looking at the PSP as a potential purchase in the near future.

Something else that I think is hurting modern games is the overemphasis on cutscenes. In the FF12 thread, Denicalis mentioned something about the game's poor pacing, and it occurred to me that it's become a problem in a lot of modern games, even the ones that shouldn't be focusing heavily on story bits. In going out of their way to cram in pretty FMV scenes, fully voice acted dialogue, and whatnot, they break up the actual game portion.

Let's go way back and look at Ninja Gaiden, the game that invented the concept. How long does it spend on the cutscenes? Maybe a couple minutes tops? Then you're right back to flipping out and chopping people's heads off. Zelda 3 had terse bits of dialogue even at critical plot points, and then shut up so you could navigate the dungeon. Final Fantasy 4 doesn't feel the need to linger excessively on any one plot point, since it's not trying to sell you on visual flash. You can blip through the dialogue boxes as fast or as slow as you care to.

Compare to a lot of modern games where they seem to think they need to stretch everything out to a tedious degree. It's even infected Zelda - look at how often you sit down and do nothing while the game hits you with story stuff. The really good games integrate the story seamlessly with gameplay, ala Half Life. The not so good games segregate the two elements, and even favor the story over the game itself.

I agree somewhat, even though I don't so much have a problem with cutscenes per se. I kept playing games like FF7 and Vagrant Story just to get to the next story bit.

Many people feel they are detrimental to the game experience since they remove control from the player and thus take away from the very playing of the game. I don't mind them, they are a story device as much as anything else, and can be used both well or badly. I think it's most hurting when cutscenes genuinely are at odds with the rest of the game. Seeing your character do all those backflips and flamboyant shooting and flying in something like Dirge of Cerberus, only for him to be depressingly stiff and cumbersome to move around in the actual gameplay was a particular eyeopener. Then again, I found the completely over the top cutscenes in MGS: Twin Snakes a large part of the game's charm (though I still like MGS1 better).

Sorry, my camera's broken... / I don't have a digital camera...

Heh, just kidding, don't you hate it when people say that?
http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/7...amesir6.th.jpg
I ran out of room in the main shelf so I had to start replacing rows of my DVD collection with games. I have more shelves of those. Some of the games are blocked by my PS3 games/Blu-Ray on the second shelf (left) and bigger game boxes (like Growlanser and such) on the bottom shelf.

Here's a link to my game collection in a more readable form (although they are all alphabetized on the shelf with A/# at the bottom left).
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And don't think I'm showing off, about 85% of my games I bought used at a much lower price than retail, so I haven't spent THAT much money (couple thousand, maybe). I do peel off what stickers I can to make them close to mint condition.

It hasn't? Out of nostalgia and boredom here at work, I recently played Doom and Quake online. Both of them were complete shit, had horrible balancing and speed issues, no voice chat for teams to collaborate on a strategy, and a severe lack of game types. There's also the fact that you actually can't aim in Doom.

This is after coming down from long stretches of Call of Duty 4 multiplayer where me and my clan can discuss strategy before, after, and during the game, use multiple player types on multiple different maps that often require varying degrees of strategy to keep the upper hand.

And we really shouldn't forget at how well integrated online matchmaking is in some games. Or that hardware has the ability to factor in things like realistic physics, lighting, and the damn coriolis effect.

I'm not exactly sure what your idea of "evolved gameplay" constitutes, but to this long time gamer, I much prefer today's offerings over games a decade old.

Is it possible that you're just not playing the right games? I think one of the Wii's biggest selling points (and criticisms) is the availability of the dozens of "pick up and play" styled games. It's not a very accurate estimate to say that new consoles lack an arcadey experience when the most popular console has an overabundance of quick shot titles and the competition have platforms for small, short, pick up and play games. All three systems cater to that gametype in some what, especially the Wii since you can download all of those old games anyway.

This I heartedly agree with. Lots of developers got 3D right, but most 3D games on the 32 bit systems were down right ugly.

Thankfully we still have side scrolling beat'em ups and 2D fighters still in development.

I'd like to take this moment, though, to present the argument that:

A> Most side scrolling Beat Em Ups were complete toss.

B> Fighting games are a genre that will polarize fans anyway. Personally, I'd take Virtua Fighter over any of them.

Why wouldn't you say "better"? Doom looked better than Wolfenstein, Link to the Past looked better than Legend of Zelda, Duke Nukem looked better than Doom, Minish Cap looks better than Link to the Past, and Mario Galaxy looks a hell of a lot better than Mario 64.

Unless you're confusing "art direction" with advancements in graphics, but that's more of a fallacy than a talking point.

It would be pretty dumb to say that someone couldn't enjoy both new games and old. If you can't remember the last time that you enjoyed a game as much as Portal, then why the nostalgia? You said gameplay hasn't caught up with graphics, but then you bring up Portal, a game that would have largely been impossible on previous systems.

Pretty much, yeah. A shooter is always going to feel like a shooter, a fighter is always gonna feel like a fighter, and an FPS is always gonna feel like an FPS. Of course, you'll have developers that do something interesting within each game type (Senko no Ronde, Smash Brothers, Portal respectively).

Do you think this is a good idea? The main selling point of the PSP is "a portable Playstation". If you aren't a big fan of 3D graphics, I can't think of too much to like on the PSP, outside of puzzle games.

Definitely a big agree here. Can't play most JRPGs because of. I also hate infinite superfluous dialog. Advance Wars DS is a great game, but I couldn't play it because no one would ever shut up.

I think my final point overall is that a game is a game. People can use the same complaints about old games versus new and apply it to anything. Chess Go/Igo has the same gameplay as any tactical game on the NES or SNES, so a fan of a board game could easily dismiss videogames as self indulgent messes. Hell, most DnD fans I know do.

These discussions always remind me of my music studies. People said Jazz was dead. Then Free Jazz came along. People said that Jazz was dead. Then Miles Davis entered his electronic era. It's all circumstantial and largely irrelevant. There's never going to be any great leaps in gameplay because it's all still firmly rooted with it's origins, but to contrast, saying that gameplay hasn't evolved isn't correct because there's plenty of things to point at to say that it has.

EDIT

Also, I think some are forgetting the Wii and the DS. Two pieces of hardware specifically developed to ignore trends in graphical capability in favor of different styles of gameplay and interactivity.

Nice collection you got there. Just wondering, have you beat them all? :eagletear:

Holy shit, PS3 games! I always thought they were a myth until now.

In any case, nice collection, despite the fact that you're never going to end up completing all of them. But, how much did SMT: Nocturne and Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence LE cost you? Nocturne sells for $80-100 on eBay, and the MGS3 LE sells for $120-60 too.

Hope not. He's got some real junk in there.

Heh, what can I say, sometimes I like a solid 6.0 rated game (usually a repetitive dungeon-crawler or obscure Agetec game).

I do have most of the good series though (NIS titles, Atlus games, Ratchet, Jak, Final Fantasy, Suikoden, MGS, Silent Hill, etc...), so I do try to avoid obvious "worst of the worst."

I leave that for Infernal Monkey and his collection of Phoenix Games titles (which leads to hilarious YouTube videos, so even garbage games have their purpose).
Oh, I was fortunate enough to have pre-ordered those in advance and just got lucky that they ended up rare. I even have the pre-order bonus DVD that came with the MGS3 LE. I'm such a stickler for those things. I'll probably be kicking myself for not picking up certain Atlus games soon, though. Plus, I'm trying to track down some first party Gamecube games and they're gaining in price now that Gamestop is essentially tossing GC out the door.

I've always been curious myself as to why people like what they like. As fate would have it, my first big RPG was Secret of Mana, which is a game that puts gameplay above story. Anyways, I've always been more of a gameplay-oriented kind of guy as well. Maybe it's because I've always been a logical, strategically-minded kind of person. I love Chess and in my youth I ran into what might be considered key titles in the development of my tastes, like Sim City 2000, Lode Runner: TLR, Magic Carpet, Ogre Battle, and Syndicate Wars. I don't know if it's because of that experience that I have a greater tolerance for games that aren't totally focused on cinematic storytelling, but there you go. I think that the journey IS the story. How you interact with a game world yields its own reward. So I don't need a Xenosaga-like approach at all, and if anything, I sometimes get impatient with games that guide me on a linear path and inundate me with force-fed dialog and/or cutscenes.

Of course, Metal Gear Solid was amazing when it came out, and I loved it as much as anyone else. It was something fresh for me the first time and later on it just seems like none of the sequels have been able to achieve the same consistent intrigue and gameplay variety. So there are a few titles which perhaps might be considered to be exceptions to the rule among my favorites, but for the most part I think that my preference for engaging gameplay shows through. I could give a damn about how 'deep' a story is if the gameplay is not up to par.

BoFV was my favorite PS2 RPG to be sure. I played it because it was recommended by a guy I knew who had greater experience with RPGs past and present than most. It is definitely one of those games that makes a 'safe' game like Final Fantasy X seem uninspired. At this point I find it hard to enjoy even a polished game like Suikoden V. I need to have something unique and engaging within the gameplay and world. Something that makes the game standout from its predacessors if it's part of a series or something that makes it standout out from other RPGs period. The game can't just have a good stand-alone story. The gameplay has to be there.

I felt very impressed by Castlevania III, which I didn't play until maybe 2005 or 2006. The challenge level was high, but not unfair, which gave it an addictive quality. The music was great, the branching levels were great, and being able to swing between one character and another was great too. It's just too bad that the game gets overshadowed by the popularity of SOTN the same as the other Castlevania games do.

Some games just exude a certain quality regardless of when you play them. The good ones amount to something special when you add everything up regardless of how shiny they may or may not be on the surface.

(you quoted a bunch of people, but this was one of my snippets ;))

I'm definitely playing the right games...now. I find it much easier to concentrate on newer games knowing my roots and what I'm comfortable with and what I expect. Giving up trying to "catch-up" on everything I wasn't playing for one reason or another (ESPECIALLY RPG's...An RPG has to absolutely knock me into next week for me to give it a chance now and I don't see that happening anytime soon) was like a breath of fresh air. I keep quoting Guitar Hero because it's basically an arcade game that delivers quick, cheap thrills and a storyline that does the NES era proud (read: nothing that gets in the way, except put on a good show, have a good time, look good and don't fail!) I'm not saying modern systems don't provide the "pick-up-and-play" experience (Live Arcade is very tempting, retro collections rock and I'm a huge Burnout fan and Ace Combat/Dynasty Warriors are some of the best story/action fusions I've seen), I'm just saying the NES/SNES stuff I have is very good and compares favorably to stuff that is technically way more advanced. I just prefer to get away from the whole "games as art" mentality (you know, where you feel obligated to see what the game has to offer, even during totally dead periods) and just see how long I can stay alive and how many points I can get (another YOINK! for GH...I forgot how much fun playing for points was) I used Sqoon as an example of a very average game that is still good for 5 minutes of fun here and there...If a modern game can't compare to those 5 minutes of Sqoon, I'm probably not going to sink more time into it than needed.

I still have all my old systems and carts, so the VC doesn't really interest me. However, I stand behind it because it keeps some of the true classics from fading out entirely.

Nothing says "old" like getting your ass handed to you repeatedly by those goddamn falcons in any NES Ninja Gaiden title. I'd like some more of that again, though I doubt I'll ever see it.

Also, a Startropics title for the DS wouldn't hurt either.

What sucks these days is developers want great graphics so much that they sacrifice performance. I'm not talking about those people that can't run the games because their computers are below the recommended requirements. I'm talking about games for both PC and consoles that just run at terrible framerates and have crazy texture pop-in just so they can show off the graphics through stills. That's a load of crap. If you show awesome graphics, it better look like that the whole game. Taking 5 seconds to load Gears of War textures really kills the experience for me.

But anyway, old games are definitely the best. I don't have any of my older consoles any more so I usually just play them on emulators. There are times when I just feel like playing old school games and I can't imagine how many times I've loaded up roms in place of current games.

They actually do that to avoid long loading times (texture pop-in, i mean) but yeah, I sort of wish they'd just use lower resolution textures then to achieve the same results.

I always like a balance, integrating gameplay and story so that one doesn't over power the other is usually ideal. I mean, it's a no-duh there. There are things about RPGs that just aren't that transparent to me, especially when I started trying to find out how one "breaks a game." When a piece of equipment removes all the challenge from a game, when is it acceptable to grind for hours on end, when completionism heavy players are being exploited.

For example, Dragon Quarter spoiled me on Side Quests. Specifically because forward progression in the main game was required to progress the ant colony side quest. It was very apparent that was needed. Progressing in the main game of FFXII usually reveals more hunts, but a lot of times you have to grind your ass off to be ready, and sometimes I just don't find that enjoyable. Don't even get me started on characters and parties.

Sometimes I think a lot of developers hit paydirt on the first installment of a game, and the things they end up adding end up robbing the game of what the first installment had going for it. I know I enjoy Halo 1 a lot more because it's just a very simple game, and that pretty much allowed for what was good in the game to be unimpeded by things such as overly long cutscenes or frustrating scripting/enemy placement. In regard to Metal Gear Solid, I really think the story ended up getting in the way. But, the series is by no means horrible, but it certainly feels a bit packed at the seams these days.

I found it interesting to contrast the Bioshock making of DVD and the Halo 3 making of DVD. Halo 3 just ended up looking so very uninspired, because you can see the ideas and goals that each team had were very different. A bit off point, but I noticed I was ignored by Qwarky (I wonder why). Again, I ask, what is a next-generation game? That term is a gigantic misnomer. It's a pretentious and, quite frankly, completely ridiculous term.

What's a next generation RPG to you? What's a next generation RPG to me? Who decides these universal terms? What if I wanted to make next generation Pac-Man? Or next generation Pong? Perhaps there's something I don't get, but since no effort was made, consider yourself called out.


Now that you point it out, that really was Breath of Fire V's strongest quality. It had balls. I could watch the intro to that game over and over, because I've come to love everything about the game. The music, the characters, the gameplay.

And it's all because of the gameplay elements. You're absolutely right about that. Frankly, I see complaints about story, but I just have to say, what if you run into a game that is fine and has a shitty story. The story that's awful, while unfortunate, can be ignored, a game that is just horrible is generally just going to end up as a frustrating waste of money.


Symphony of the Night just really sucker punched that series, didn't it? Homogenizing every game that followed it, I really don't understand how people can buy the same game over and over. If it ain't broke, don't fix it... but we can only play the same game over and over so many times.

I wonder when Castlevania's "Dragon Quarter"-esque title will emerge, personally.

Damn straight.

Same here...I enjoyed Symphony for what it was and absolutely loved COTM, but at no point were either close to replacing the challenge and structure (and fun, honestly) of the older CV games and none of the newer games can hold my attention for more than an hour, despite how Igarashi thinks he's giving us "value". I felt the same way about Simon's Quest, but at least that had platform death going for it and lives (did it have levels? I forget...Never noticed them)...Might be a cool challenge to try doing it without continuing. ;p

Dunno...I think "RPG elements" are really blown up as adding depth, but I don't really see how adding levels really helps a platformer. Other than needing to find places to load up on EXP (and equipment) and powerleveling to the point the game is a cakewalk. Think it kind of nerfs the whole "problem-solving" aspect of games like CV3, which kind of forces you to get better. Imagine if you could level up as you play Guitar Hero and build high enough to absorb Jordan on Expert with hitting barely any notes (but still clearing). That...would be really lame to clear Expert Jordan with, like, 3000 points.

I respect the ability stuff like in Super Metroid and these Metrovanias, but I GREATLY prefer the left-to-right-and-I-dare-you-to-make-it-through-alive stuff.

You can't entirely blame Konami here for that. Old School platformers are a dying breed all around. Gamers these days just find them irritating. It's a genre that is going the way of the dodo, along with those old click adventure games like the longest journey.

I disagree. See: New Super Mario Brothers. Not perfect (like Mario 3), but it sold quite a few people on the DS.

And yeah, I do blame Konami entirely for...well, not ruining a series, but totally altering what a lot of players liked about it. I mean, "real" Castlevania effectively died when SOTN hit and I just treat the later games as sort of a new series altogether. Koji Igarashi simply didn't like the old CV games and wanted to change them. I chalk that up to more of an ego thing than really "evolving" anything...Of course, he states that he's giving gamers "value", but I couldn't stay awake up to the first boss in Aria or Harmony (and I have to hold my insides in even seeing pictures of Lament or Curse of Darkness) and I still play CV1/3/4 on a regular basis and still am amazed by how well-designed they are (especially 3). So, uh, yeah...

Dude makes a hell of a dating simulator, but I can seriously leave his take on Castlevania.

A lot of people weren't that fond of NSMB and it's still a bit of a rarity. But eh, you are entitled to your opinion. It's not like I ever disagreed with the sentimentality that old school platformers are fun, but we're in the minority of people who want them when you consider the community as a whole. That's just not really arguable. :(

My point with NSMB was that it sold a ton of copies, so you can't really dispute that there is demand for the game and ones like it.

However, the truely great 2D platformers have been few and far between, especially nowadays. Maybe even nonexistant. Klonoa 2 is the only thing that really comes to mind and that was a long time ago (although it was nice that they FINALLY gave us domestic Rondo of Blood). For the record, I thought NSMB was fun, but it could have been much better designed...New power-ups were lame, the overworld felt kinda slapped on and the control paled VS SMB3 or SMW (or even Peach, which felt TOO easy to control...which I liked).

Critically, IIRC, New Super Mario Bros. was shunned for not really establishing anything new with the series. But what I do recall quite vividly was it selling a shitload of DS handhelds. Kind of a gray area to talk about, since it was basically a game that took the safe route as far as development and content go. I think I'd enjoy platformers more if I weren't constantly being sent on "collect X out of X number of items" type quests.

That's pretty much what I meant yeah. Plus, it's MARIO -- of course it sold well. But a lot of people weren't happy that it really was nothing new whatsoever.

I enjoyed it, but it was short and easy in addition to offering me nothing I haven't already experienced. I really wish they'd put some serious effort into a new platformer (an original one!) but as I said, it's rare these days.

I really loathed CC (other than the wonderful ost), but CT is a great rpg and still one of my favorites to this day.

Anyway, I agree with the OP whole heartedly. I think people these days are too hooked on pretty graphics to care much about good a game actually is.

The Battle Mode was tits.

Hey, now you're talkin.

That's dandy and all, and I agree with you to an extent, but that doesn't mean one should make sweeping comments about entire libraries of titles. I have a certain nostalgic attachment to the game's of my childhood (I have a freakin Ness tattoo), but I find tons of impressive, artistic, qualities in tons of games I play presently. That's why I love Mass Effect ant BioShock so much. Both of them have some gameplay faults, but both really did achieve the level of sophistication, presentation wise, that the developers aimed for.

I was chatting with a friend a few days ago about something similar. Gamer Points/Achievements being implemented and used to artificially extend playtime came up as a topic.

Through it all, though, I'm just not ready to resign and say that imagination is out. There's always developers that I can count on.

Seconded, in both regards.

2D Combat games used to be rather exciting, Indeed. However, some 2D games witnessed a mediocre transition to 3D, why not to mention KoF Series (say Maximum Impact). This may explain the rollback to older graphics (2D), perhaps to enhance the artistic touch 2D games are known for. This is exactly the case for KoF XI, you can really distinguish that game's fun, from its 3D predecessors, which look so damn crappy.

Uh, okay...I didn't. I just said there are many games nowadays I have no interest in playing because they don't look very fun or aren't, so I won't force myself to like something anymore or "try to understand what the artist was going for" if I'm not enjoying the gameplay or my eyes are closing during a cutscene/tutorial. That's a game-to-game thing.

What I mean about games as art...Ico/Colossus are always thought of as examples of videogames as "legitimate art", while I find them exceptionally boring to actually play. So I'm not going to press further in seeing what they have to offer to "legitimize" the status of games. That's what I meant. I find enough art in finding a game that can hold my attention, because that generally means there's more than just the gameplay I'm attracted to, but it's still getting that part down really well. Like I said...8-bit cityscapes are just as much art as the latest PS3-polygon pusher and if anything, they're much harder to appreciate since they're considered archaic by many gamers.

As far as "art" goes...Hell, there's GH notecharts I think of as art (because of how well they represent their respective songs), so I'm not trying to play the elitist card there. I'm just saying I won't even try to appreciate something if it's boring the crap out of me, although some aspects might catch my eye (graphics, music, female bustline, etc).

KOF: MI was meant to be a separate project from their 2D series from the beginning. Just wanted to clarify that. :)

I pretty much agree with the OP's sentiments. The fact that I can still pick up Tetris and have tons of fun with it should speak volumes for that game's design. I only with a lot more developers can hit such a mark. Only other game that can (for me at least) is Chrono Trigger. I can't even explain why, but I can pick that game up and play it through a infinite amount of times without getting bored of it. This game came out a very long time ago though. I only wish developers could hit such a pinnacle more often though.

Chrono Trigger is just one of those games that just worked. I dunno how many times I played it myself. I just know that a friend looked (and ruined) one of my saves with the words of 'you have no life' given how strong my characters were (read all stars for stats).

I think NSMB is a mixed bag. A lot of people who played SMB3 waaaay back have grown up. That game came out at least fifteen years ago and a new generation of young gamers is around. Hence, they don't see NSMB as awesome or inspired as other generations (usually anyway) and the older generations have grown up to the extent that games may not interest them as much anymore.

That doesn't mean NSMB is a bad game. I played it. I didn't get into it but I don't think it's a bad game. I think it's just me not getting into games like that these days. I mean, it is a well done game with fairly decent levels and all. Yes, the new power ups (including that idiotic non-stopping shell) were not on the level as the super leaf and cape in previous 2-D Mario games but they had to try SOMETHING a bit new.

I agree about the sentiments about total freedom vs. charted path i.e. Castlevania III > SotN. I purchased SotN and played it on PSX looking forward to a great new Castlevania experience and instead it was worse. There was no challenge due to the fact that everything was open-ended. I think that works to some extent when a game is built from the ground-up to take advantage of that. For example, Grand Theft Auto III is built completely around that premise. The open-endedness works because the missions are built around this premise, and hence the "challenge" arises because of this. I didn't appreciate SotN because I didn't see the challenge in encountering enemies in hallways/corridors that were all basically the same. I prefer Mega Man or old-school 'vania challenge where you have to jump on a moving platform while reacting to an interactive environment (moving spikes or traps) while also at the same time avoiding enemy fire and possibly flying enemies, where any of these things could put you off that moving platform you just jumped on and down onto pointy spikes of death.

If somehow 3D games could do a better job of providing this kind of charted-path-difficulty, then I would find them a lot more engrossing.

P.S. - I think you have the right idea Jazzflight. After all, how many cheap yet good PS2 games could you get for the price of a PS3 ($500)?? Quite a few... more than you would have time to really play in a decade in fact.

I don't know if you've really beaten the game (by beating the game you should have cleared around 180%-226% of the map). I hope you didn't, it's better for you to be mistaken rather than to have such low considerations on such a masterpiece. Enemies aren't the same at all, and some bosses are damn challenging. Additionaly, CSotN has probably one of the most powerful melodies as being either a RPG or a simple game. Even if I had the same opinion, i would have -willingly- played the game for that unique reason.

Maybe you should have a look at this, it shall bring you to a less speculative conclusion.

"Open-endedness" and "total freedom" without a good plot guidence will lead to the creation of a crappy game.
That's why game developers and designers are careful in their choices, they tend to restict freedom and improve gameplay otherwise.

Btw, SOTN is an amazing game.
Have a deeper look inside you'll probably find a challenge, at least.

People could experiment back in the day. Development costs weren't nearly as high as they are for the current next-gen systems. Yeah, you can argue X-Box arcade and the like, but you're not going to see major studios using that as a channel for pushing new stuff...they simply can't afford to devote the time to developing new and interesting games that haven't been tested before, unless they're a major studio and damn sure that whoever's developing will have a hit on their hands.

What does 'oldschool' even mean these days? The fact that people are calling PS2 dated makes me feel like a blooming dinosaur.

When I personally think of oldschool gaming, I think of anything pre 3D; mostly 8 and 16 bit. (although there were games even before NES) Is it wrong to consider PS, Saturn, or N64 the beginning of the modern era of gaming? After all, the systems that followed these essentially have only improved on the established 3D formula.

My own problem is that I am a little too attached to old 16 bit games and I have a bit of difficulty acclimatizing to many games that are more modern. As a result, I think I've enjoyed my DS the most of the more recent platforms. Most of the newer games I have enjoyed have been RPGs on the PS but due to finances / career goals, I haven't purchased a PS2 or PS3 / Xbox 360 so I've not kept up on this genre. The latest FF I have played was FF X and after hearing about FF X-2, I was largely turned off from Square - Enix. I loved Tales of Symphonia on GC though. Although modern J-RPGs are fun, I find I am often annoyed with a rather archaic convention still seen in most games in that genre: battles taking place in a separate screen from the dungeon. Switching back and forth between the battle screen and the field map can be disorientating, especially when you have a 3D camera.

Oh well, I have played the Metroid Prime games (1 and 2) as well as Zelda TP, and I thoroughly enjoyed both.

On the lines of old school gaming, I really enjoy SNES games and some of the better NES games. It is astounding to me how much fun a game like Turtles III can be, even after being exposed to the likes of this latest generation, where the presentation is honestly jaw dropping. I feel as though the big budget more modern productions lack the earthy connectedness and simple, satisfying gameplay that makes the older games so much more fun. While I don't consider myself an oldschool gamer, I have to say that these games appeal to me more than the new releases. Maybe the quality of games is going down? Food for thought.

I think 'old school' varies per person. My parents play video games and were even telling my wife how they started when video games first came out with Pong and the Atari era. To THEM, that is truly old school. It's scary to look at the times now in which they are considering getting a Wii.

For me, I might look back at the Atari (as I played it a great deal) as old school as well. I guess I think of the graphics, the storylines (or there lack of) and the simplicity of the games at that time. I could also see NES and SNES games also being considered old school compared to the newer systems out these days. I don't consider though PS2 and such 'old school' because the system isn't even a 'generation old' let alone has stopped producing games (granted, there are exceptions tothis. People STILL make games occasionally for the Master System). Heck, I don't consider PS1, Dreamcast or N64 to be 'old school' as it still feels like 'yesterday' that I was playing each consistently.

Heck, as i sit back, i do wonder when I will consider PS1, N64 and Dreamcast 'old school'. My only guess is down the road when all the systems have full network support (remember that the Dreamcast had limited support), and/or have evolved to the next stage (something in the form of how Wii games are now played). From there, we will continually move towards a totally virtual world in which aperson's movements and actions are felt and used in that world (in which we are already making progess on). Basically, I forsee the day, albeit not for a long, long time because of feasibility and acceptability (remember how people didn't accept virtual boy all too well) in which people will basically take a quote right out of Back to The Future II (but slightly modified).

"You have to use your hands for that?! That's old school...."
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