|
Post by Ex on Apr 2, 2019 9:36:42 GMT -5
I'd argue that's part of why the Switch has been more successful than "handhelds" of the past: we've hit the point where games don't look ridiculously downgraded to get them in portable form. Honestly we hit that point years before the Nintendo Switch via the Sony Vita. The Switch is a just a Vita 2.0 by way of Nintendo. Except this time much more successful stateside, because Nintendo knows how to market a portable.
|
|
|
Post by Sarge on Apr 2, 2019 11:06:57 GMT -5
I think the Vita could have succeeded, too. Just Sony got greedy with their ridiculous proprietary storage format, and as you say, they didn't put the resources into it to make it successful here.
Also, I recognize your avatar! Defenders of Oasis was really good.
|
|
|
Post by anayo on Apr 4, 2019 18:43:00 GMT -5
20thcenturygamer I only have a SNES and TG16 everdrive and I love them. But they killed game collecting for me. I used to lurk eBay for SNES carts but getting SNES2SD just squashed that urge. At least that’s good for my wallet, I guess? 20thcenturygamer I also like how this era could invoke profound feelings with very simple pictures. An adorable 8-bit skeleton in The Legend of Zelda can somehow be more threatening than creatures from some of today’s photorealistic games. @gunstargreen I find it very interesting you would say that. Judging from what everyone else posted on this thread there’s a lot of dissatisfaction with modern gaming. I’m glad you’re enjoying it. Ex I think I had the same fascination as a kid even though the 16 bit generation was in full swing by then. At that age I remember being surrounded by a lot of media that didn’t make sense to me, like films or commercials with grownup subtext that went over my head. But I just knew video games were for ME. Ex I’m there with you on the saturation point, though I’ve noticed I’ll still buy games if I think they’ll go up in value after I buy them. A huge motivation behind this was watching prices climb after the 2000’s. So if I see a vintage game at a thrift store for less than it’s eBay going rate I usually pick it up unless it’s total garbage. I also pull the trigger on most Limited Run games I have the slightest interest in paying. Those really climb in value very shortly after release. There’s one I sure wish I had pre-ordered and it's almost $100 now. I wonder what this will portend for collectors in the future aiming for complete sets. Ex I agree with this so much. I have to categorize games as something I use to depressurize so I can go back to being productive again. If games become my main reason for living, then it feels kind of like eating ice cream as a meal. As for the inhibited creative output, I wouldn’t wring your hands over that too much because pursuits like that suck. They’re so costly and difficult and time consuming that I think they’re only for crazy people. I still write fiction and study Japanese, but it’s kind of like I’m in love with them and can’t part with them even though they abuse me. If I didn’t feel that way it wouldn’t be worth it. I had to part with 3D animation as a teenager because I didn’t love it enough to be great at it. I’m also on board with espousing the value of games as a stress coping tool. A few years ago I had some trying times in my life where I would play games to calm down in the evening. It improved my morale so much. Those fear mongers who would go on about games rotting brain cells and inspiring violence were dead wrong. Ex I did not know I wanted this until you described it. Sarge I wish I had been around for that. I took an interest to early 80’s arcades in my teens and experienced them by the compilation re-releases available at the time, but that’s not really the same.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2019 13:22:38 GMT -5
I don't find it very surprising that there's a lot of dissatisfaction about modern gaming on a forum dedicated solely to retro gaming. There's nothing wrong with preferring how things were to how they are now because things have certainly changed a lot, but I think people look past the positives and inflate the negatives while doing the opposite with their interests. That goes for all things, not just gaming. For every retro gaming enthusiast there's probably at least a dozen people who find older games hopelessly clunky and uninviting. You like what you like after all and with hobbies you tend to get back what you put in. I think we live in a pretty exciting time where more people are able to execute their artistic visions without needing to have a corporation at their backs. As Ex said, this means there's a lot of crap to sift through to find the gems, but I also feel like this has always been the case. The best of the best usually floats to the top or is at least discovered by a niche audience that tries to spread the gospel while the crap just sits there being crap. It's actually kind of a problem that there's too much to play, but as long as you keep the "fear of missing out" in check it's a wonderful problem to have. In fairness though, the kind of modern games I do end up enjoying most often have their roots in retro game design. There's a lot of modern games that do that exceedingly well. It's much rarer for a large AAA title to knock it out of the park for me, but it still happens occasionally. If I had to pick a serious problem I have with modern gaming, it's modern gamers. Everything and anything is always turned into some kind of over blown controversy. There's a reason I haven't bothered with online gaming much since the 90's.
|
|
|
Post by Sarge on Apr 5, 2019 14:02:29 GMT -5
Now that last point I can absolutely agree with. I think it's mostly the Internet culture at large; everything has to be some ridiculous controversy where folks fight about things and then forget about it a few days later once their often-faux moral outrage has been vented. As someone who still plays a pretty equal mix of modern and retro gaming, I think I can say with at least some authority that the overall quality level of gaming has improved quite a bit from the retro-gaming days. There are mounds of junk to sift through on the retro front, and many of us are perhaps willing to give it a pass because what many of us actually play are the best of the best, filtered by consensus and hindsight. I think most of us here are hardcore enough to deep-dive into more obscure games for purely historical reasons, and I also think you see a lot of us giving quite average (or worse) reviews of those games. Now, I think the best of retro gaming absolutely kills most of AAA gaming, but that's more a statement of mean vs. standard deviation. The quality level of many retro games on average might be lower, but the highs are blissfully so, and the lows are outright broken. You rarely see professional releases these days that release as just outright broken, although it can happen on occasion. But even all the braying about Anthem or Mass Effect Andromeda feel overblown. These are not the worst games of all time. Not even close. (Not that I can go by my opinion, but my brother has played quite a bit of both.)
On a tangent, something I've observed for a while now is the inability to discern between "disappointing" and "bad". Using one of the previous examples, Mass Effect Andromeda might have been disappointing in relation to its predecessors, but it wasn't actively bad. I felt the same way about Final Fantasy VII back in the day. Disappointing, especially coming off of Chrono Trigger, but certainly not a terrible game, and actually pretty good.
|
|
|
Post by Ex on Apr 5, 2019 14:54:05 GMT -5
I don't find it very surprising that there's a lot of dissatisfaction about modern gaming on a forum dedicated solely to retro gaming. True enough. Although a fair many of us here do play modern games in addition to retro ones, myself included. We're not all a bunch of Luddites or anything. That said, the vast majority of modern gamers don't give a damn about old games, and prefer to leave the past long gone. To me that's a very ignorant way to treat this hobby. There's so much forgotten gold in the mines of old. I've played many modern AAA showboats, beat some as well. My issue with them is they're usually just glorified movies, with gameplay coming second place to presentation. Also due to wanting to capture the largest demographic possible, the difficulty and complexity tends to be low tier. It's like going on a fancy date with a ditzy bimbo. Or flying in a luxury jet but the only thing to eat are bags of peanuts. I don't mind lower budgets when the focus is instead on actual quality game design.
|
|
|
Post by 20thcenturygamer on Apr 5, 2019 16:34:14 GMT -5
I only have a SNES and TG16 everdrive and I love them. But they killed game collecting for me. I used to lurk eBay for SNES carts but getting SNES2SD just squashed that urge. At least that’s good for my wallet, I guess? My current setup is an SD2SNES, EverDrive N8, Mega EverDrive X5, Turbo EverDrive, EverDrive GB, and Harmony Cartridge for my 2600. I'm gonna be busy with these for a long while. I may eventually add a Neo-Geo AES if flash cart options for them come down some (the only one available is around $500 at present). Less time shopping does mean potentially more time playing. I've found that it makes big game events like PRGE a lot more fun, too, because I'm not as focused on running around frantically scooping up deals and I can relax and enjoy the guests, panels, arcade, etc, much more. I still have a few hundred real cartridges, but I'm thinking not for too much longer. I'm planning to spend several weeks touring Europe next year, so a mass sell-off will help me finance that and clear up a ton of shelf space at the same time.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2019 16:55:13 GMT -5
I don't find it very surprising that there's a lot of dissatisfaction about modern gaming on a forum dedicated solely to retro gaming. True enough. Although a fair many of us here do play modern games in addition to retro ones, myself included. We're not all a bunch of Luddites or anything. That said, the vast majority of modern gamers don't give a damn about old games, and prefer to leave the past long gone. To me that's a very ignorant way to treat this hobby. There's so much forgotten gold in the mines of old. Just like with film history or anything else you're always going to have the general consumers and enthusiasts and the former will always outnumber the latter. I don't think the ignorance is an issue, I think there just isn't enough hours in the day for everyone to be an enthusiast or try to find meaning in games they don't immediately enjoy. There's just too much entertainment out there to expect people to consume all of it or to know or even care about the history of the medium. That's a job for us maniacs. All I can do is share my enthusiasm with people.
|
|
|
Post by Ex on Apr 5, 2019 17:12:07 GMT -5
I don't think the ignorance is an issue The reason I said ignorance, in relation to the general consumer, is because laziness begets ignorance. Why do most people watch only the big name films, listen to the popular music, or play the popular AAA games? It's because those are the media titles they are exposed to, with the least amount of effort on their behalf. They experience only media that flows into them, as they themselves lazily float down the river of general mass consumption. Because of this low effort approach to consuming media, they are as a result ignorant of any potential outliers. The good stuff that wasn't pushed into their faces, or was too old to have known about through advertorial happenstance. Indeed when you are too lazy to swim against the tide, you will be ignorant of what lies upstream or tucked away in eddies. For someone to call themselves a "gamer" and think that older or lesser known titles are worthless, well... they are no gamer in my eyes. But in a holistic media sense I agree with you. I would not be able to tell you what the best underground films or bands are today. Once upon a time I knew, when I cared. Now I find as I get older, I care about lots of things less, and less things more.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Apr 5, 2019 17:39:48 GMT -5
Meh, "gamer" is a pretty meaningless label anyway. Now if they were pretending to be some kind of authority on games then I'd have a problem.
|
|