Can retro games hold up WITHOUT the nostalga?

[Unia]

Depends on genre largely. I tried playing Ultima V some time ago and actually liked it despite minimalistic graphics and somewhat cumbersome UI. Too bad some bug kept corrupting my save.

A lot of older games seem to confuse 'challenge' with 'tedium' though. Getting killed in one hit, no saving or checkpoints etc just means you spend more time repeating the same procedure because of a single slip.

Some of worst offenders in this respect *pulls on flame-proof cloak* are Baldur's Gate and many other games on the same engine. Maybe it's the DnD rules but isn't it kind of iffy you make the biggest decicions about character build right in the beginning? Then even with a good stand any event comes down to chance, which is kind of the idea in tabletop RPGs but just doesn't fit in a computer game. Reloading a game for the umpteenth time because this time a master thief with a (+6,+7) dagger rolled critical miss against all odds doesn't even come down to the player messing up, but just having bad luck.

Anyway, back to topic: I'd say the first System Shock for one was still enjoyable without nostalgia, provided you get past the graphics and the not-quite-3D that may make some people nauseus. All the extra displays, various leans and things bewildered me at first but the beauty of the game is you can play it as a puzzler, shooter or anything between. Just ignore the elements you don't care to learn. Heck, come to think of it that's more forgiving than most newer games.

EDIT: Couldn't the captchas at least be actual words, wth is lOha? I understand the Escapist might have no say in details but seriously?!

 

[Fightgarr]

Many do. I play games from the era of my childhood that I'd never played or even seen as a child and though they were totally rad. I tend to only be turned off by "retro games" from the early days of 3D that I don't have pre-existing feelings about.

 

[Vault101]

well yeah. the poetry of JOhn donne holds up after 400 years and i bet most of that language is not recognised by a modern dictionary its archaic and just awkward at times. Why should dated games be different.

but that said i think people who play retro games will be a different breed of gamer to the conventional one.

its interedting, back in the day I used to be a retro gamer...only because I had no other options (and I didnt get any new games)

I lived in the middle of nowhere, only had a standard computer and an N64

so it was worms, age of empires, Diablo, rayman 2, monkey island series, theme hospital, age of empires 3 which bearly worked, some bizare pirates of the caribean game that had nothing to do with the moives....

then I got a wii and thourght that was mind blowing

THEN I got Bioshock which runed all older games for me.....now Im a graphics AAA whore :/

 

[Aphantas]

"look at thread"
- It appears to be part of a bustling public forum where poeple can air their opinions... whether others want them to or not. You hear a small white canine expressing his doubts about the utility of the old relics found in the neighbouring woodlands. Around this fluffy orator a small crowd is gathering. You best respond quickly if you don't want to have your voice lost in the crowd
"give opinion"
- No-one needs, or wants it
"air opinion"
- You let your opinion loose on the crowd. The Grue hiding in the corner seems particularly amused by its awkward structure.

'Old games still stand up if they were the cream of the crop at the time. But it depends on what games you like.
Recent games tend to be less complex and obtuse then the older games, and more convenient. So if you like whimsy, Lots of text, lots of deaths, and generally harder games, Retro will have aged well for you.
I think that Goldenaxe and Quest for Glory have held up particulary well since neither took themselves too seriously, something i think that modern AAA games can learn from the past.
Humor does a game wonders.'

- You seem to have attracted the attention of one of the Moderator Beasts. This one holds a rather small but unpleasent looking hammer, which was hanging from his belt until just moments ago.
The creature moves towards you, fidgeting with the hammer.
"pick nose"
-That lock is too difficult for you to pick at this time
-The Moderator hits you with the Hammer, The Grue then eats you rather contentedly
-You are Banned, press F10 to create new account, or F8 to exit.

 

[Auninteligentname]

I played Super Metroid for the first time, a year or 2 ago. It was awesome. With that, I'll say, games, can indeed hold up without nostalgia. Also, I will say that if the game is a sidescroller with at least 32bit graphics, I think they will more likely hold up.

 

[remnant_phoenix]

It definitely depends on the game.

Some games have presentations and gameplay mechanics that are ageless. No matter what games come and go, they keep their appeal because they were just designed so well in the first place: Chrono Trigger, Super Mario Bros 3, Street Fighter II, just to name a few.

But then there are games like Goldeneye on the N64... Some say that it still totally holds up, and I really don't know how people can believe that without a huge influx of nostalgia. There are plenty of console FPSs that have have come since that are much better in terms of presentation and mechanics.

I'm not a fan of CoD as a series, especially in recent years, but I will assert that CoD4: Modern Warfare is LIGHT-YEARS better than Goldeneye on the N64, and anyone who asserts the opposite MUST be wearing some thick nostalgia-goggles.

 

[Aussie502]

If Age of Empires 2: The Conquerors still had people playing it, I would definitely be playing it online every night. One of my favourite games of all time.

 

[zehydra]

Definitely. I still play SNES games I haven't played before, as well as NES games (though I've already played most of the best NES ones)

 

[Vkmies]

Oh, hell yes. As a fairly new retro collector, I have been getting my hands on HUNDREDS of retro games I've never played before. With the actual old-school hardware it's like a time machine. I just played the original Deus Ex through for the first time a couple of weeks ago and it quickly rose into my top 5 games of all time. I just bought Gradius for the NES TODAY! And playing it with an old-school TV, NES-ADVANTAGE-Joystick and a good ol' NES, it was amazing. Loved it.

 

[nomad240]

Four words for you man

Conker's
Bad
Fur
Day

 

[scorptatious]

I have played some of the Final Fantasy games last year and most of them up pretty well. Despite having dated graphics, FFVII was really good. And FFIX was even better. That latter now being on my top ten most favorite games list.

 

[ShindoL Shill]

i got the original DMC and despite the older graphics and fixed camera its still a great game. ive never played it before, and i got it because of DMC4.

 

[Klarinette]

Retro games are different (hurr durr) in that it's a different kind of fun. I was reading a Cracked article about this sort of thing, and for example.. games like Tetris, they're fun because the goal is the highest score possible. That's it. Nothing changed except the speed of the blocks and the colour, but it was fun anyway. A modern game like that now wouldn't get away with it, unless the player is a Popcap junkie or something, a la Bejeweled.

I had another point that was more valid, but I totally forgot where I was going with it. Bah!

 

[GeorgW]

It definitely depend on the game. I've relatively recently started gaming and I enjoy retro games. The best example of this is probably Deus Ex for me.

 

[Jakub324]

No. PS2/Xbox/Gameube games can still be fun, but not compared to current generation games. For example, Timesplitters was an amazing game in it's day, I played it to death, but modern games beat the shit out of it on every level. Comparing games from different generations is just stupid.

 

[interspark]

absolutely! some old games were fantastic! i still play my old N64 from time to time

 

[Apollo45]

All the Mario games still hold up, and are still fun to play. I'd even argue that Super Mario 3 was and still is the best of the lot, even going up against the new ones. The Zelda games are all still fun to play (my favorite was always A Link to the Past, and OoT definitely still stands up. Whatever Yahtzee might say, the Water Temple is the only place I've ever had to completely restart a game in order to beat it when I screwed up). Mario Kart games are always entertaining, even the first one is still extremely fun. Even Goldeneye is fun to go back and play through, despite the outdated controls and graphics.

Sangnz mentioned both Homeworlds, which I routinely go through and re-play at least once per year, if not more. Those have definitely withstood the test of time. On a similar vein, the Red Alert games are still extremely enjoyable, and I go back and play those on a routinely basis as well. The Civilization games are definitely still enjoyable, all the way back to the original.

And need I even mention the Pokemon games, which are the best selling games in the world and, except for a couple mechanics here and there, essentially haven't changed over the years? I love playing through Gold and Silver when I'm bored.

There are just some games out there that are spectacular, and will never stop being fun, whatever new graphics or consoles or whatever come out. I can pretty much guarantee you that in twenty years I will still be downloading Gameboy emulators to play my Pokemon games, and still be looking for ways to install and run many of my old computer games. And I'll still have my old SNES and N64 around (and likely my Xbox, for that matter) so I can go back and play those old games that are still unbelievably fun.

Edit: As seems to have been mentioned, it seems some gametypes age better than others. Isometric view games, for example, tend to age extremely well because detail often isn't needed. This includes RTS games, games like Rollercoaster Tycoon, Baldur's Gate, the Pokemon games, and so on and so forth. Side-scroller games are similar, because they're not made to be graphic-intensive or detail oriented (with some exceptions, of course). However, FPS's in general tend to age poorly, as do many 3D games, which means that if one of those withstands the test of time you know that it was a damned good game from the start.

 

[martin's a madman]

They can't live up to the memory of being absolutely brilliant without nostalgia, but they can still be perfectly fun games.