/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.4314609]

Hey guys, big Xbox One player here, I had an Xbox 360 growing up and I'm just wondering what the appeal in retro games is. I'm just genuinely curious what everybody sees in these old games when modern games are much more expansive and allow for open world stuff. It's also more accessible to play online with a friend and you're constantly getting new content as well due to downloadable content, which improves longevity. It's also nice to show off achievements.

What's the charm of older games in your own words? I bought Rare Replay Collection and I feel like I'm missing something.

[Anonymous No.4314629]

>>4314609
Not going to lie, nostalgia is a big factor for me. Not only for games I used to love growing up but also the aesthetic of the console etc. Challenge, mechanics and sometimes depth of gameplay are a few key points to keep me coming back to old games.

[Anonymous No.4314632]

>>4314629
That's understandable. I keep going back to games like the first Dead Rising just because I had them when I was younger even if new installments like 4 are out.

[Anonymous No.4314637]

Modern games tend to be too "bells and whistles" for my tastes, plus all the crud that modern developers pull to publish incomplete games, lock stuff behind pay walls, etc.
Want me to recommend you some good retro games?

[Anonymous No.4314642]

>>4314609
For me it's the novelty. The controllers are so different and varied compared to the modern ones, the unique challenges devs had to put up with causing unique workarounds, the neat things they tried (like by putting the Super FX Chip on the SNES for example) and not to mention that even if nothing else, a good game is a good game. It's just a really unique experience to go back and play stuff like a Sega Saturn or N64, consoles that came out before I was born. Not to mention playing on legit hardware feels different than emulating, too.

I dunno. It's just a neat experience for me.

[Anonymous No.4314646]

>>4314637
I'll admit it can be annoying when add-ons are done in excess and games are released unfinished, so I can see why that's a problem.

Are there any good classic FPS, sports, or hack and slash games? Maybe fighters as well.

[Anonymous No.4314650]

>why would you listen to classical music when there's dubstep? It's NEW

[Anonymous No.4314651]

One example I can think of, there was a sweet spot in FPS games where there was reasonable-ish graphics, and good gameplay. Now there is literally too much shit on screen, I need to worry about guys hiding in grass and bushes and shit. You get a lot of hiding, which I didn't like as a gameplay choice.

So I still consider Tribes or Tribes2 to be vastly superior to any other FPS, particularly more modern ones. I can appreciate UT and Q3 as pure refinements of their styles, but not my cup of tea, where I think something like BF2 or Tribes Ascend are just not worth playing at all.

[Anonymous No.4314654]

>>4314609
You will likely find that as you get into your 20's, 30's, 40's, 50's etc you will still enjoy some of the games you played when you were young, even though they may be out dated by then.

Same thing.

[Anonymous No.4314663]

>>4314609
Playing retro games send me back to the time when my world wasn't turned inside out, I become a child again and again by every boot up. This is why I play retro games when I can.

[Anonymous No.4314664]

>>4314646
Hmm, I'm not an expert on those genres (platformer guy here) but I'll try.
FPS - Wolfenstein and the original Doom are the most common ones I hear.
Hack and Slash - Would Ninja Gaiden count? Ha ha.
Fighters - Street Fighter, Tekken, Super Smash Bros. 64, etc.

[Anonymous No.4314673]

>>4314664
I'll try the old Ninja Gaiden games since Ninja Gaiden 2 was one of my favorite 360 games. Would I be able to download the PC versions of Doom and Wolfenstein for free? Also should I use websites to play old games online or download an app to?

[Anonymous No.4314676]

>>4314609
Because you're looking at raw gigabytes of game instead of the fun level of the game. The Super Mario Bros. on the NES doesn't have a lot of content, but I can pick that up any day and play through it.

>>4314646
>FPS
Doom, Wolfenstein, Quake, Blood, Duke Nukem, Shadow Warrior are the main ones.
>Hack and Slash
depends on your definition of hack and slash
Hexen
Zelda, in my definition, are pretty good as well.
>Fighters
All the good ones are /vr/
SF2 and all of it's /vr/ sequels are pretty good
Mortal Kombat
King of FIghters
Smash Bros.
Soul Calibre

[Anonymous No.4314681]

>>4314673
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos_games to pick one at a time, or
https://archive.org/download/eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0/eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0_archive.torrent if you've got bandwidth to burn.

[Anonymous No.4314693]

Good games are good games, regardless of their age. Honestly, the intense importance most people place on this issue is tiresome. If I can read translated literature from the ancient era, I can play some computer entertainment made in the 1980s. Yeah, there's a period of adjustment, but the easy availability of emulation makes that a minor issue.
Unlike many people on this board, I don't have an exclusive love for old games, or games I grew up with, I just play whatever fascinates me or seems historically significant. I don't think games "went bad" at any specific period. Certain genres may have regressed, I suppose, but there's always gems to be found.

[Anonymous No.4314707]

>>4314609
play through the following

Ultima IV-VIIp2 No One Lives Forever 1-2 Blood FEAR 1 + Expansions Half-Life 1 + OpFor NWN 2: Mask of the Betrayer Marathon 2 + Infinity Crimzon Clover: World Ignition Gradius Collection Ys VI + Oath + Origin Max Payne 1-2 The Tale of ALLTYNEX Turrican Deus Ex Thief 1-2 Terra Nova: SFC SWAT 4 Ultima Underworld 1-2 Dragon Quest III-IX Betrayal at Kondor Parasite Eve Vagrant Story Severance: Blade of Darkness Burnout 2-Paradise Diablo 1-2 Dark Sun Pool of Radiance LISA: The Painful Dodonpachi Mars Matrix EDF 2017-4.1 Ace Combat 2-6 Geneforge Risk of Rain Exile Ninja Gaiden (NES) Ninja Gaiden 1-2 Armored Core 1-For Answer (excl. Ninebreaker) Gothic I-II Doom I-64 Ratchet & Clank GTA III-CW System Shock 1-2 Descent 1-2 Planescape: Torment Fallout 1 Quake 1 + 3 Turok 1-2 Jedi Knight Trilogy STALKER SoC + CoP Serious Sam MDK 1-2 DMC 1-4 (excl. 2) God Hand ZoE2 MGS 1 + GB VtMB Novalogic games Ghost Trick Ace Attorney 1 + T&T Mega Man 2-3 Mega Man X1-3 Need For Speed HP-MW Mushihimesama (Futari) Barkley, Shut Up and Jam! : Gaiden Streets of Rage 1-2 Thunder Force III-V Duke Nukem 3D Cave Story Iji Tetris Hotline Miami 1 Yakuza Mario & Luigi SS-DT Hotel Dusk: Room 215 Arx Fatalis Dorf Fort NieR Unreal Gold-Tournament 2k4 Super Metroid Metroid Prime Contra 1-4 Metal Slug 3 TimeSplitters 2-FP Black Uplink DEFCON Darwinia Chronicles of Riddick: EfBB The Darkness SMT 1-SJ Wizardry 6-8 Might and Magic IV-VI Heroes of Might and Magic II-IV Wild Arms 1-4 Return to Castle Wolfenstein Chrono Trigger Vanquish Rayman (excl. Rabbids) Rollercoaster Tycoon Sonic 1-3 Mount & Blade: Warband Shadowrun SNES+Genesis Myth 1-2 Einhänder R-Type Resident Evil 1-2 + 4 Silent Hill 1-3 Perfect Dark Dragon's Dogma Lufia II Myst-Riven Freespace 1-2 Freelancer Raiden I-DX X2 - X3: Albion Prelude PoP SoT - WW WipEout SNATCHER Policenauts Beyond Good & Evil Mechwarrior 2-4 Cho Ren Sha 68K

[Anonymous No.4314718]

>>4314609
OP, just imagine it's 15 years from now and some squirt kid is asking YOU why you liked the games of this era. Do you know what you'd say to him? if so, then it's just like that.

[Anonymous No.4314729]

>>4314707
actually, don't play any of these

[Anonymous No.4314730]

>>4314609
Fun bit of trivia:
In tribes you could deploy objects around your base, this was originally intended for turrets and inventory stations and ammo stations, you might be familiar with it from TF2.

Now some mods came and made different types of turrets and walls and turbo pads and other shit you could deploy

'Tree' actually became a valuable defensive object for awhile. It was difficult to navigate around, but it actually had so many polygons on it that it was useful because guys flying in to get the flag needed full FPS to dodge shit normally, and now you got this tree in the way, AND it's dropping them to like 10 fps.

[Anonymous No.4314740]

I generally don't like the direction gaming is going now. Loot crates, devs that seem more interested in making a movie than a game, lame "morally gray" stuff that actually isn't, and hamfisted attempts at preaching values to you just don't appeal to me. Devs have forgotten what a game is in favor of being Hollywood rejects and acting like they're much smarter than they really are.

With games like Quake and Duke Nukem, it's all about the gameplay. I don't have to worry about a sudden "ethical dillema" that's poorly written and easy to see through, don't have to open loot crates to customize my game, and I feel like I'm playing a game that was made to be a game first and foremost instead of some wannabe directors trying to make their totally cool and original donut steel movie in video game format because Hollywood rejected them.

[Anonymous No.4314746]

>>4314718
I'd probably just tell him it's good for him he's enjoying games that makes him happy and figure he doesn't like the games I once played because they're out of date.

[Anonymous No.4314756]

>>4314707
Dumb macfaggot, use an OS with real line breaks when pasting txt into 8xan

[Anonymous No.4314772]

>>4314746
Why do games have some last consumption date when nobody cares how old movies or books are? How are games so different?

[Anonymous No.4314774]

>>4314609
>Rare Replay Collection

This has only a few great games, and doesn't have Rare's greatest game, Donkey Kong Country, or another fan favorite in Goldeneye. But a lot of people only liked that for the multiplayer, so you'd miss part of the fun anyway.

Most of Rare's games were actually not terribly memorable even in their own time. Battletoads was fun, but frustrating. Killer Instinct and Blast Corps were OK rentals. Jet Force Gemini and Perfect Dark were OK if you were into that. Banjo-Tooie was a poor sequel, and almost everything after Conker was utterly forgettable.

[Anonymous No.4314794]

>>4314609
A few reasons:

1) There are plenty of legitimately great games. Why would I want to limit myself to only recent ones? This is especially important since many of the older genres are hardly represented today.

2) With emulation I can play basically any game made from gens 1 - 5, plus more recent handhelds. I'm a busy guy, and sometimes its nie to be able to play something shorter.

3)I enjoy the history of the medium. I'm at the end of Might and Magic 1, and its really cool to see how things like level progression, battle mechanics, and quests evolved over time.

[Anonymous No.4314798]

>>4314772
I don't think that's necessarily true for everything. Animation, for example, is often judged 'too old', especially Japanese animation.

[Anonymous No.4314801]

>>4314746
Games don't get "out of date" bro

[Anonymous No.4314806]

>>4314798
Falsely judged, I'd say.

[Anonymous No.4314814]

>>4314772
I don't think it has an expiration date I just think sometimes things are aimed to an audience of a different time period that doesn't reflect the tastes of another.

[Anonymous No.4314815]

>>4314609
The first half of Rare Replay has aged badly, worse than many other games of the era. Play some other retro games

[Anonymous No.4314823]

>>4314798
What? People love old animation, hell one of the biggest games out there emulates the old 1930s style really good.

[Anonymous No.4314916]

It's kinda sad that you can have so little appreciation for a medium you claim to love, that you think all its achievements are thrash after 10 years.

[Anonymous No.4314920]

>>4314609
I honestly dislike the direction the "industry" is going these days.
You're either being gouged for money, getting an unfinished/unoptimized product, or not playing something that's more "movie" than "game".
Though that's mostly western developers/publishers (and oriental copycats).

If I play an older game, it's usually because I didn't get to play it before, or if I did, because I remember having enjoyed it a lot.
For example, Star Ocean 2 was released in NTSC-U/PAL regions on the PS1, but the first game on SFC wasn't. Until the PSP remake was released, getting the unofficial translation patch was the only way to play it in English.

[Anonymous No.4314938]

The more time has passed since a game was released, the easier it is to know how good it was

I can't understand why anyone would think something is good just because it's new and popular

[Anonymous No.4314956]

>>4314938
>I can't understand why anyone would think something is good just because it's new and popular
Marketing.
Publishers generate artifical demand so they can rake in the shekels.

[Anonymous No.4314968]

>>4314956
Same reason people now seem to love buying incomplete games and paying extra times for that missing content. Let's call it DLC

Or buying a game that isn't even finished, you won't get in many months, don't even know if it's good or even get what you were promised. Let's call it pre-order

[Anonymous No.4314993]

>>4314609
Some things are never replaced. I just finished Quake and am currently playing through PSO and both of them do everything they set out to do perfectly. That's not to say there aren't a plethora of modern games I'm looking forward to and enjoy replaying, but some games did things right and are worth playing even now.

[Anonymous No.4315013]

>>4314609
>I'm just wondering what the appeal in retro games is

I'm sure it differs from person to person, but in addition to growing up with retro generations of games, I'm just too put off by common standards found in the industry today - DLC, microtransactions, social media integration, etc.

Another thing that bugs me is the increasingly complexity of hardware, and forced gimmicks like motion control or cross-device communication. (e.g. Nintendo's Wii U and Switch involving the use of tablets) This kind of hardware is much more fragile, prone to inexplicable failures like YLoD / RRoD, and not as easy to service. This tends to come off more as forced obsolescence than it does "innovation." Meanwhile, retro games will always be around in some form or another. If you don't want to waste any money on resellers and their price-gouging, then you can at least take comfort in knowing that retro emulation is piss easy and can be done on most any modern device.

So to recap:

- DLC sucks
- Modern hardware is too complex and fragile to be sustained
- Emulation of modern games is too difficult and is not cost-effective due to the technical specifications required
- Retro emulation is easy, so retro games are never obsolete, even if retro hardware is

[Anonymous No.4315015]

>>4314609
Retro games have the same appeal to me that modern games have. Challenge,exploration of worlds that are not my own,stories.

Why do you like modern games?

[Anonymous No.4315021]

You must be over 18 years to post on this website.

[Anonymous No.4315035]

>>4314609
Modern games are designed for people of low intelligence (tyrone and billy bob) and/or low testosterone (women and children). They've removed the challenge and complexity of older games, and replaced them with graphics and story.

Devs figured out that the best way to make video game more appealing to the idiot majority was to turn them into movies.

[Anonymous No.4315038]

I was really big on games like Quake growing up, which always had a huge modding community. So all of that DLC you're buying today was available back in the day, just free and more frequent. But really, nostalgia is a big part of loving games from the past. Going through the days of running around arcades, then years later getting console versions of those arcade favorites was a pretty big deal.

I play way more 'modern' games than I do retro these days (01 to 05 are my favorite years), mainly because as you mentioned open worlds are fantastic to be a part in and games have innovated a lot over the years. But I'm still just as happy sitting down with my sister taking turns on SMB3 as I am exploring Oblivion and such.

[Anonymous No.4315041]

Open world is a pretty cool concept, as you said, but most modern games don't handle that concept well at all. Some of the best examples ever - such as Morrowind - are already pretty old.

[Anonymous No.4315049]

>>4315021
Someone could be born in 1998, have its formative vidya experiences on the Xbox 360 and be of sufficient age to post on this board.

[Anonymous No.4315057]

Modern games are simply not often made like a lot of the 1990s and 1980s games.
Nevermind that post NES, technology is advanced enough, that it was possible to actually create timeless classics.
Thats true even for Gameboy and Gameboy Color games, which also got a crapload of amazing first party games, meaning they have a deep library beyond that. Thats also true of the SEGA consoles, even if their general flagship quality is lower outside of Sonic.

And thats before you get into the 1990s experimental 3D games. There is simply a lot of horribad design decisions that ended up sticking around for a lot of genres, into the PS2 gen and The Next Gen after that.
Something like Turok is amazing. So is Doom, and Unreal. Or Blood, Duke Nukem, Shadow Warrior, and a lot of games, even in just one genre.

[Anonymous No.4315061]

>>4315041
This. Morrowind remains the most imaginative and interesting world created in an RPG. Why hasn't it been topped by now? They're not lacking the technology.

[Anonymous No.4315079]

>>4314798

No, everybody thinks modern Japanese animation is complete garbage. Nobody in Japan could make Akira today, including the studio that made Akira.

[Anonymous No.4315081]

>>4315061
>Why hasn't it been topped by now?
Because it's not safe, easily digested, designed for the lowest common denominator.

Disgusting. No one wants to take a chance anymore, even though it could pay off in a huge way.

[Anonymous No.4315085]

>>4314609
I've been playing since there was only Nin, seg, atari and coleco. I have seminal games from every system from every generation. What bugs me is that casuals and new people suck at liking the things I like, but claim to like 'em as much as I do. It's some kind of contrarian echo chamber filled with folks who only play 'cause muh graphics, thinking these things are s'posed to be movies or books or tv or some shit that they ain't and trying to make the developers cater to their every hand holding, sucking at liking things needs and demands. Like games if you want, but don't shit on the ones that layed the groundwork for every game you've been playing since you could hold a controller, pls :D

[Anonymous No.4315089]

Modern games don't have much content, and generally DLC is a bad thing. In the old days, games were generally released when they were done.

I don't think there's any Xbone or PS4 game with the depth of Mechwarrior games.

[Anonymous No.4315090]

>>4314609
>I bought Rare Replay Collection and I feel like I'm missing something.
Rare never made any good games anon.

[Anonymous No.4315097]

>>4314609
Since no one asked and I'm morbidly curious for some reason, just who is this apparently crazy tattooed tranny in OP's pic?

[Anonymous No.4315104]

>>4315079
No one's denying that Akira is a hallmark of animation, but modern anime has some good ones in it as well.

[Anonymous No.4315109]

>>4315061
LOTR happened, which did poison a lot of games.
LOTR is amazing, but the copycat games simply do not have any of the research, depth or quality to keep up with it. So suddenly you get Elder Scrolls 4: LOTR edition, which is fine, because the game is still bad for many reasons.

Another thing is that is that Nazca Lines entered world heritage in 1994, which triggered at the least half a decade of Aztec, Indian and other Mesoamerican inspired games.
Games such as Turok, Banjo series, Terranigma.
There is a reason Nazca had more impact than heritage of Machu Picchu, even if Nazca amplified it

[Anonymous No.4315141]

Games dont age they are timeless. Timeless crap or timeless brilliance. In thousand years from now people will still play SFII. No one will play battlefront 2 anymore.

[Anonymous No.4315154]

>>4315090

This is important to point out. If you were seven and really loved platformers, then sure, DKC would seem amazing to you. But really it's just a meh game with good graphics and music.

I think one of the main reasons people say old games aged badly, especially fifth gen, is because of Rare.

[Anonymous No.4315223]

>>4315097
OP here. It's Jinx from League of Legends. She's not actually trans though.

[Anonymous No.4315225]

>>4314916
It's not that it isn't impressive, it's that you don't have an online profile to display your achievements if you're playing a game on an old console, y'know?

[Anonymous No.4315259]

>>4315225

Ahaha, that is so shallow.

About six months ago a friend posted on Facebook that he had, after years of trying, beaten Ecco the Dolphin. He was treated as a hero because that's actually hard.

[Anonymous No.4315262]

>>4315104
>Redline
Good taste.

[Anonymous No.4315308]

>>4315225
Achievements are like IQ. Only losers brag about theirs.

[Anonymous No.4315349]

>>4314609
because old games can still be fun. judging from what you said in your post you're probably near my age and grew up with the same console generations. but i dont shy away from playing mario on nes because it's before my time because its still a perfectly fun game despite its date. its why people still drive old sports cars, listen to beatles, or watch old movies even today. sure they're old and maybe out of date but they're still fun and cool

[Anonymous No.4315446]

>>4315223
So just a chestlet, huh. She's got an intriguing look, but lack of chest is a no-go for me. Thanks for the info, OP.

[Anonymous No.4315480]

>>4314609
>It's also nice to show off achievements.
Can't believe you twits are giving this guy serious responses. This line should have made the bait obvious

[Anonymous No.4315503]

>>4315480

But that's a real thing that people that age do, anon.

So far as I'm concerned, achievements are only useful for figuring out how awful gamers are. Steam says 7.8% of people have gotten the achievement for beating the final boss, for instance.

[Anonymous No.4315525]

>>4315480
Not to mention the picture, the filename of which begins with "tumblr" no less. And of course he would pick Rare Replay, being an Xbox One game that is composed old retro titles. The bait could not be any more obvious.

[Anonymous No.4315540]

>>4314609
It's literally just nostalgia. I find games released before I started gaming (1993) to be pretty much completely unplayable and the only reason I can tolerate anything else is because I grew up with it.

[Anonymous No.4315542]

>>4314609
certain genres lately are nonexistent

space shooters and fighting games were plentiful back then. Also platformers were at their prime in the 90s.

games were also easier to get into and the music was pretty catchy instead of "marvel movie shit"

there's also thousands of these games you can try for free, and you'll know immediately if a game is good or bad from the moment you press start

[Anonymous No.4315550]

>>4315061
>Morrowind remains the most imaginative and interesting world created in an RPG
Morrowind reeks of early 90s D&D copypaste shit, what the hell are you talking about? It's the same shit as the previous Elderscrolls games.

Stop trying to push your opinion as facts.

[Anonymous No.4315618]

>>4314609
Plenty of old games do open world and honestly open world games are very barren half the time because they can just be filled with generic shit and then the devs call it a day instead of actually crafting a good experience.

Doom can be played online and there are still new mods and content being produced to this day since 1994.

Achievements and trophies are meaningless things so people can compare their dicks online.

And really, if you're too young, you're probably never going to get the appeal of old games since you weren't around then and you're too used to good graphics and more refined gameplay that was built upon all those old games.

[Anonymous No.4315627]

Some genres just aren't made very often anymore, like shoot-'em-ups, traditional JRPGs, 3D platformers, run-n-guns. Indie devs sometimes try to fill the gaps, but they kinda suck at it.

Retro games are usually shorter and place more emphasis on skill and "mastering" the game. I prefer to spend hours honing my skills at a game than going through a bloated experience I know I will never want to play again once it's over.

The aesthetic of retro games is unique and rarely reproduced today. What passes for sprite work or pixel art from indie games is usually vastly inferior to the original thing.

Retro games tend to be very pick-up-and-play, newer games tend to have long tutorial sections, lengthy installation times, a generally longer introduction, etc

Nostalgia is also a really powerful element, but in general I find myself enjoying older games more often than new ones.

[Anonymous No.4315645]

>>4314707
>play through the following
>Ultima IV
Stopped reading here. Jesus dude, you're gonna bore OP to tears with this autism simulator.

[HormonaLisa !AnVbXjgZco No.4315654]

>>4315223
>She's not actually trans though
You don't know that.

[Anonymous No.4315678]

I particularly like the 16-bit era (genesis and SNES) the most. All gens before ps2/gamecube/xbox weren't part of the mainstream industry and there's a certain aspect of games made before that time where, if it was an exceptionally good game for its time, you can tell the devs really put their heart and soul into it rather than it being some multi million dollar corperate venture. It's the same thing that great indie games give off nowadays in my own opinion. The experience feels very personal. Mind you, I'm primarily an RPG guy and the DS/3DS is my favorite current platform due to the development standards roughly staying the same as they were 20 years ago.

Play star fox 64. It's fun and quick and still the best game in the series.

[Anonymous No.4315719]

>>4314609
I'm not as big into retro games as most people here
but I like to play them to see how games evolved over time, as well as experiencing a lot of classics that are as old as me, if not older