/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.5558310]

What makes retro gaming better than modern gaming? Is there something special or different about it?

[Anonymous No.5558313]

me in the green ;)

[Anonymous No.5558375]

It's free

[Anonymous No.5558474]

>>5558375
also harder, more depth, more soul, less bloat, less cinematic experiences, etc

[Anonymous No.5558482]

>>5558375
Modern gaming is free too. Piracy is so easy it's unreal.

[Anonymous No.5558506]

>>5558310
The unconscious connection with a period of your life unsaddled by responsibilities and worries

[Anonymous No.5558508]

>thread number 6 million on this very subject
lurk more

[Anonymous No.5558538]

>>5558310
Japanese soul and uncompromising craftsmanship.

[Anonymous No.5558541]

>>5558310
Shorter games, more fun, coop play, less grinding (unless its a retro-game that revolves around grinding)

King of Dragons can be done in an hour when you're skilled and is still fun to play because of random elements.

[Anonymous No.5558564]

>>5558310
>What makes retro gaming better than modern gaming? Is there something special or different about it?
Soul. Unironically.

[Anonymous No.5558626]

>>5558506
>>5558506
This. Its people longing for their innocent naivety.

[Anonymous No.5558953]

>>5558310
Countless companies were at their absolute best.
Arcades were still a thing and the penultimate gaming experience.
AAA budget games were few and far in between, reserved only for titles like Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid.
Mainstay developers took far more risks in being innovative and branching out than simply playing it safe.
Game companies did not cater to casuals nor went for a blue ocean approach like the Wii and modern consolemakers try to.
In terms of 4th and 5th gen, pixel art had been perfected. Meanwhile the jump from 2D to 3D was groundbreaking for the gaming world at large.
Games featuring licensed characters were actually hot shit if they were developed by a gaming giant like SEGA, CAPCOM, Konami or Nintendo instead of being shovelware trash that they usually are now.
DLC and patches were nonexistent, meaning that extensive playtesting had to be done by the developers instead of releasing a half-assed, buggy and clearly rushed game.
Expansions were actually worth their shit and was "more game" rather than "the rest of your game".
Manufacturing defects were actually rare, and the products of then were built to last.

[Anonymous No.5558973]

>>5558474
>less cinematic experiences

This is the main thing for me. A friend bought me RDR2 and I can't get 2 hours into the game I find it so boring. I feel like I need a Game Boy while playing it. I do wish something like Rocksmith 2014 existed in the 90's though. That would have been awesome.

[Anonymous No.5558993]

Gotta say I like things that pioneered genres, I like seeing the roots of certain things
I love FF4 even though I can get the same or similar story in any jrpg from 91-05

[Anonymous No.5559048]

I liked that games were complete on release day.

[Anonymous No.5559061]

>>5559048
This. Fuck early access and 6+ year long beta phases.

Fuck it. Fuck it. Fuck it.

[Funcoland Clown No.5559068]

Simply put, density. Once developers had far more than enough processing power and storage space to do anything they could possibly want mechanically they got sloppy. Focus shifted gradually to superficial qualities leaving the actual quality of the game low on the list. When the rate game came out that DID succeed on the methods of its actual design it was instantly imitated and diluted.

I do think we're getting away from that lately though thanks to the efficiency of indie game distribution. Looking through the lists of games that get released every day with little to no fanfare feels a lot like sorting through 2nd gen games to me. Almost all garbage but with regular glimmers of brilliance.

[Anonymous No.5559101]

>>5559068
I think we're also perhaps seeing AAA devs having to get back to that to some degree seeing as a large portion of the gaming community is pissed with a good portion of the leading franchises. Sad it took them this long to get annoyed, but bell curves tend to prove points.

[Anonymous No.5559221]

>when history repeats itself
>you can take any generic modern military guy slap any franchise on it and it’d make sense
>All games play the same
>all games look the same
>no soul in them
Replace military guy with Space shooter and it’s the 80s again

[Anonymous No.5559227]

>>5558310
>buggy bullshit is rare
>no dlc
>completion of good retro games give men confidence to approach any woman they want
>children will listen to parents and be good citizens for opportunities to play ducktales on nes
>stories to drive a man to tears
>retro game community despite having a few dumbasses still strengthens society as a whole

[Anonymous No.5559252]

>>5558310
Developers used to use the words like 'fun' back then.

[Anonymous No.5559430]

>>5558953
Was going to say love, but it also answers

[Anonymous No.5559439]

>>5558953
This.

[Anonymous No.5559508]

This applied to video games. They worked more out of less and you could see the craftsmanship. As technology improves there's less effort/more ease in the design, and that's why modern video games are the way they are.

[Anonymous No.5559518]

>>5559508
Basically the imagination factor, I guess. Sprites allow for your mind to visualize far greater landscapes and characters than any graphics could perform.

[Anonymous No.5559519]

>>5558508
>Expecting a board like /vr/ to continuously be covering new subjects
Literally impossible.

[Anonymous No.5559532]

>>5559508
This. The endless persiut of realism is a fools errand, despite nearly every modern game company attempting to do so.

Also, games were just games, not movies.

[Anonymous No.5559538]

>>5558310

[Anonymous No.5559546]

>>5558310
Pixel games just gave a quality that you cannot get with polygon games. Not that it is objectively better. It is just different. To me it seems like how a "video game" should feel and look like. Polygon games are of course video games to but they feel more broken and less refined if that makes sense.

[Anonymous No.5559549]

>>5559532
>Also, games were just games, not movies.

this. still have buyer's remorse because of Witcher 2 since every chapter got smaller content-wise and it was just more movie than game. QTEs out the ass and no camera options either. I sure as fuck won't get another CDP """"""""""""GAym3""""""""""""".

[Anonymous No.5559553]

>>5559061
I must admit I was trying to be devils advocate by using an expansion back as my image, but fuck, I'd rather pay for a whole bunch of new maps/scenarios than get nickel and domed on pre-order guns or some shit. The one nice thing about modern gaming is if you aren't retarded and buy stuff on release you'll get a bundle down the road cheaper than the base game.

[Anonymous No.5559561]

>>5558310
Because it gets you straight to the point

[Anonymous No.5559569]

>>5558508
it's like peeling back layers of an onion
try not to cry so much

[Anonymous No.5559578]

>>5486480
Here's a thing about Diablo 2 - it is very well balanced. However the first playthrough is pretty easy and can be passed by pretty much any character. If you built it wrong you can grind 2 or 3 extra levels in an hour and overpower your opponents anyway.

If you do everything right however, then you don't have to grind for anything (not even exp) until you are about 85lvl and basically completed all difficulties, since any specialised equipment can be substituted for something with similar properties that you've found. The gear listed in the build is for min-maxing purposes, showing you the absolute best it can ever be.

Further difficulty levels introduce resistances to enemies and add resistance penalty to you. This is where you have to actually think about the build, take care to actually have the ability to beat any opponent that might have resistance to your main element, and so on.

Highest difficulty levels can be passed only by characters that are somewhat competently built and can take on any threat.

The builds you see in the forums and such are tried and tested to guarantee they can pass any challenges game throws at them. You can use them as-is and be sure that you will have what it takes to push through all difficulties. Or you can use them as guidelines and build upon them - quite a few builds have leftover points for distribution as you see fit.

The greatness of Diablo 2 comes from how you can combine gear (especially skill-granting gear or runewords) and skills to come up with crazy solutions like a melee Zealot-Sorceress and such.

Another thing is you can "uplift" older gear up to the current difficulty level with Horadric cube to make it stay relevant, but can't make it overpowered (like you can it shit like Torchlight)

[Anonymous No.5559593]

>>5558310

less buttons

[Anonymous No.5559594]

>>5481875
Diablo 2 knows how to give you rewards that count and keep handing them to you. As well as give you proper motivation to get the rewards that you have to work for IE:Runewords

No game, even PoE, managed to do that for me. Everything past Diablo has been either random number generators farting out shit that occasionally was useful or extremely limited loot-tables of which only one or two things were ever any good for any level of player.

Its' like mid 00's the game industry got hooked to the dynamically generated phase and killed good loot forever.

When you go into Diablo you have to remember that everything you have is transitional. You don't own any piece of gear that you're not looking to replace. What's the goal of D2? Not to get levels,but to grind gear. Getting levels comes with grinding gear. Completing the story gives you more areas which has more gear. Etc. etc. It was the perfect feedback loop for the player.

[Anonymous No.5559606]

>>5463526
People think strategy is all about how simply moving units around and besting another player. Yet at its core, it isn't, its about dealing with uncertainty. Thats why the best strategy games have significant random elements, to create uncertainty. Panzer General (with Fantasy general), Steel Panthers, Atomic's V for Victory series, are the best examples. Most of the games people cite as "good strategy games" actually aren't strategy games at all. Chess is not a good "strategy game" neither is X-Com, starcraft or most RTS. They have their own strategy elements, but not games that require good understandings of probabilities and their effects on planning..

[Anonymous No.5559612]

Exoddus has more gameplay variety because of course it does, they had time to tweak the game formula, but from a relative standpoint I think it’s the inferior game. In terms of “tone” it’s basically a level pack. The area makeup and Mudokon placement back this up as well. In Oddysey it feels like you’re in this weird world discovering secrets and occasionally rescuing a lost soul. In Exoddus it’s this loud smorgasbord of lights, levers, and other moving parts with all sorts of ways to get the pleasure center of your brain going. Oh look, a “hidden” path, there’s ten Mudokons to rescue at once!

Quiksave is a double-edged sword; saving was a bit fucked in Oddysey but Quiksave is like giving you emulator save states. You can tell yourself you’ll be responsible with it but when the game makers didn’t really indicate where the line is, it makes it a bit difficult.

[Anonymous No.5559629]

>>5455139
It was that guy who brought up the style thing, not me. I just said it was debatable that SF2 was the best despite how influential it is. I don't dislike SF at all, I just don't like it as much as KoF and if we're talking style I don't think there's any contest. Take a game like MotW though which doesn't have some of what I think makes King of Fighters shine and I don't think it compares well to Street Fighter 2 for example. Designs are cool but they don't really matter.

I like King of Fighter's large rosters and team battle set ups which make extended play sessions much more interesting and makes for much less predictable match ups. Dodges and rolls add another layer making projectile spam a much less viable option and close range characters don't all have to be balanced specifically to deal with it. Also specials in KoF are often more complex and require more effort and practice. Pulling off a pretzel or even simple orochinagi motion under pressure raises the bar in my opinion and is one of the reasons I have a lower opinion of Mark of the Wolves.

[Anonymous No.5559660]

Why does video games as a hobby have such a bad reputation, really? Think about it. To play and master retro games you need huge amounts of patience and willpower to finish them, and unlike most other hobbies you don't get that instant gratification normies crave from their netflix and fast food. Take for instance good old Castlevania. You need to experiment and memorize patterns throughout the expertly crafted levels to master it, and you will probably be frustrated at some parts, but I believe this process builds character. Whereas a hobby like cooking, although very useful, mostly amounts to buying expensive ingredients to make something that is really not physically or mentally demanding just to eat. Playing video games is like reading a book or playing an instrument. Sure, you do not get any real extrinsic reward like learning new facts about the world or something to impress potential partners with, other than maybe improved hand-eye coordination and reflexes, but playing video games really teaches you patience and problem-solving in a way other activities can't.
Ok, maybe MMOs are boring time-sinkers and modern games are too easy and forgiving in comparison, but retro games are in my opinion a great activity for people of all ages, even if they tend to have more juvenile aesthetics.
i hope this doesn't sound too pretentious

[Anonymous No.5559780]

>>5559660
Because people who play video games post shitty pastas.

[Anonymous No.5559831]

>>5559780
Which as we all know is definitely worse than making shitty off-topic original posts for a question which has already received thousands of answers before

[Anonymous No.5559843]

>>5558474
>soul

[Anonymous No.5559867]

>>5558310
While not without many of their own faults and a lot of technological imitations a lot of the their advantages come from the climate of the time, so it's not just any one reason.

The biggest though, insofar as I see it anyways, was that games could get by pandering to their respective niches and didn't have to worry about mass appeal. So JRPGs could just be JRPGS, fighters could appeal to fighter fans and racing games where actually a thing etc. More to the point, this niche appeal means that games had more reasonable budgets and didn't have to recoup millions of dollars in advertising so the developers basically had to focus on making their niches happy and coming back.

Also no bullshit DLC. I don't care if it was only because the technology to do it wasn't there they didn't pull that shit.

[Anonymous No.5559962]

>>5558310
It takes me back to a time where I could just play a game that was a game and not a movie-game hybrid that tries to shove a political message down my throat.

[Anonymous No.5560078]

>>5558310
It isn't you only think about the good retro games when you think about retrogaming, for every generation the shitty games have massively outnumber good games, it's just in more recent memory you seem to think modern games are more shitty because you mostly see shitty games because again they outnumber the good so you go on thinking modern games are shit.

Digimon world next order on ps4 is better than digimon world on ps1 and I love digimon world.

[Anonymous No.5560151]

>>5558310
modern games are made to sell, not entertain. retro games were derived from arcade challenge and the fact that you paid a flat price to enjoy it at home so they not only had to make it feel just as atmospherically convincing (soul) but they had to make mechanics that reflected arcade style gameplay. things had to matter. your actions had to have weight. things had to feel good so they could sell well by word of mouth. now games are made to sell, not entertain.

[Anonymous No.5560167]

>>5558310
the games are finished out the box.

No Day 1, micro-transactions, DLC, or Season Pass bullshit

[Anonymous No.5560191]

>>5558310
Different strokes. Both are good in their own ways. What I notice and appreciate more and more about retro games (which I grew up with, I'm not new to them) is the relaxed pace of pretty much all of them. Modern games drive me nuts when I'm trying to enjoy a scenic view or listen to the music and some character is rushing me or the protag starts repeating what I'm supposed to do. I got it, let me play my way. Retro games let you screw around or explore or just stand still. The plot isn't shoved at you at breakneck speed, constantly dragging you to make sure your ADHD doesn't kick in.

Also retro games tend to have more filler but the good kind. Play FFXV and it's just aimlessly poking around if you aren't on a specific quest and even if you are it's just generic kill stuff fetch quests. Talk to NPCs? Ha no. The retro FFs let you do everything from collect coffee to find out more about characters just from talking to people around town. It's funny to me that worlds got more open but storylines became hyper focused and linear.

[Anonymous No.5560863]

>>5559606
>People think strategy is all about how simply moving units around and besting another player. Yet at its core, it isn't, its about dealing with uncertainty.
well, if you are playing another player (eg Starcraft) that's where the uncertainty comes from. An RTS is most definitely a strategy game, even by the true definition of the word. In an RTS you have to choose an overall strategy and then build up your forces and make tactical decisions based on that strategy.

[Anonymous No.5560893]

Someone said it: Bloat
Modern gaming is bloated as fuck, too many options, too much diversity and variety, cinematics, long drawn out conversations, too many "paths" to choose, too much wasted space, games are dozens of hours long because they are bloated as fuck --- just give us slick gameplay, hard bosses and cool sprites.
Games should be 30mins to 1hour MAX, from start to finish, but hard as fuck so they warrant tons of replay and practice to finish.

Everything else is BLOAT.

[Anonymous No.5561365]

>>5558474
>My childhood was better than yours, because we had 25 minutes GI Joe commecials: The Post
>t. actually born in '98

[Anonymous No.5561604]

>>5559831
This but unironically.

[Anonymous No.5562696]

>>5560893
Have I got the game for you; Pong.

[Anonymous No.5563493]

>>5558973
this
i've played more exciting visual novels than the first 3 hours of RDR2

[Anonymous No.5563519]

Brevity is the soul of SOUL.
Mario World's intro is 5 seconds.
Mario 64's intro is 10 seconds.
Mario Sunshine's intro is 10 minutes.
When I have 15 minutes to play a game, I don't go for Sunshine.

[Anonymous No.5563562]

>>5558310
I think it's pretty safe to say that console games before the 2000s, especially during the NES era had a more simple, straightforward gameplay. You wanted to play some balloon fight? Turn on the console, play for 30 mins, get bored and get on with your life. Too many games require hours and hours of meaningless farm'n shit, everything is an rpg. At least that's my opinion.

[Anonymous No.5563576]

The whole industry seems tired, hooked on money, and burned out. Most of the excitement is gone from games now. No one really innovates any longer. The measurement of what a good game has shifted from the actual quality of the product, to sales figures alone. Gaming has shifted from what the consumers want, to what the big wigs want, and that is MORE money. Vote with your wallet and DON'T BUY THEIR SHIT. That sends the loudest message you are capable of.

[Anonymous No.5563582]

The whole industry seems tired, hooked on money, and burned out. Most of the excitement is gone from games now. No one really innovates any longer. The measurement of a good game has shifted from the actual quality of the product, to sales figures alone. Gaming has shifted from what the consumers want, to what the big wigs want, and that is MORE money. Vote with your wallet and DON'T BUY THEIR SHIT. That sends the loudest message you are capable of.

[Anonymous No.5563590]

They weren't boring and samey.

[Anonymous No.5563601]

There's less bullshit between you and the game, and I have to say, >>5559508 is a massive chunk of it.

Games are ugly now, especially western ones, where realism is foolishly held up as an ideal, when in actual fact, nothing is more disgusting than reality.

[Anonymous No.5564076]

>>5558310
It's not really about older games being "good". It has way more to do with current games being bad.
When the typical AAA game looks like this
>watch long cutscene
>action scene where you need to just press 2 buttons and you see the character perform an amazing stunt and win
>go to point x kill guy y
>millions of fps games where you shoot and cover, shoot and cover
>and lots of other repetitive bland shit
older games feel like a breath of fresh air.
Say what you will about "nostalgia" but when it comes to the actual gameplay (the most important aspect in video games, after all) retro games tend to be better.

[Anonymous No.5564087]

>>5559508
The funny thing is, it's dead wrong when it comes to visual art itself.
The real degeneracy came much later, and it had absolutely nothing to do with realism. Rather, it's the opposite.

[Anonymous No.5564216]

>>5564087
This^
Decadence/degenerate art is precisely anti-realistic, anti-nature and anti-human.

The great art of classic times was quite realistic with a bit of style and artistic manipulation, but when you go too far from realism you get poop in a can and people call it "art".

[Anonymous No.5564227]

>>5563582
I think there are a few specific problems.

The one you allude to is obviously scale. Investors would often rather invest big and get a big return than invest small, even if the profit margin is better. $100 million for $200 million is preferred over $1 million for $10 million. This reduces the potential variety of games, meaning you skew towards having lots of little projects and lots of big projects with not as much in-between. (And the big projects will not be taking risks).

But a bigger problem is the economics of microtransactions. DLC in the form of additional content is one thing, that's an issue with 2 sides. But the sad reality is that many microtransaction systems are targeting the tiny fraction of people willing to blow thousands of dollars on in-game purchases. This is most obvious with free2play models where everyone else playing the game are just there as bait to bring in those whales.

[Anonymous No.5564273]

>>5559508

That's Jean Renoir, right?

[Anonymous No.5564279]

>>5558310
Almost no women worked on retro games.

[Anonymous No.5564287]

>>5558310
Pay one price for the entire game. No loss of functionality because the company shut down the server. Also, you were playing against family and friends for the most part, not some rando from Brazil with a foot-pedal to disconnect if the match doesn't go his way.

[Anonymous No.5564309]

>>5564279
This is a big part of it. The "culture" of the gaming industry in the 80's and 90's was very different from today's political abomination.

Developers had Passion. Teams were a handful of people or even one man developers. There was no outrage mobs. People wrote what they wanted. Humor was genuine to the author. Ect...

Man, the whole scene sucks today.

[Anonymous No.5564320]

>>5559508
Limitations are the seeds of Creativity.

[Anonymous No.5564324]

>>5564087
>>5564216
You have a point, but he's still not wrong.

[Anonymous No.5564336]

>>5564324
I was talking about the picture. What he said about games in particular is correct.

[Anonymous No.5564701]

>>5559780
I was about to reply to >>5559660
>>5559780
Thanks for letting me know it is pasta.

[Anonymous No.5565260]

Soul. As in, they are more often than not designed by a bunch of guys who genuinely care about fun and interesting concepts instead of hundreds of corporate slaves polishing the latest designed by comitee AAA lootbox infested common denominator turd.

[Anonymous No.5565324]

>>5558310
I would argue that creativity, innovation, originality, complexity, difficulty, etc. started going downhill in 2006. But that's mostly because I'm an RPG Codex fag who agrees with them about Oblivion and this might not be accurate for other genres.

/vr/ talks about games like BGII, RCT2, and Diablo II even though they don't pass the 1999 rule anyway. And for WRPGs the early 2000s had Morrowind, Gothic 1&2, BGII, KOTOR 1&2, Arcanum, and VTMB, all of which are easily on par with, if not better than Fallout, PS:T, BG, Daggerfall, and Ultima VII.

[Anonymous No.5565638]

>>5564701
when did you realize that you're a drone who can't think for herself

[Anonymous No.5567082]

>>5558313
Damn elves