I joined late so most of what I'd say has been ninja'd so it's basically a quote-athon here. Here's a couple games that I don't believe have mentions:
-Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
The game still looks and plays great. Even the combat has stayed pretty solid while not really being the game's focus due to it not requiring lock-on like my games around that time.
-Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus
The 1st game of the series was easily the best of the original 3 at least (I haven't played the 4th one). The game uses classic platformer mechanics like 1 hit kills you and there's a lives system even, but it somehow works still. There's even some clever stealth mechanics like you can speed up the guards' patrols so you don't have to wait for a guard to come all the back around. Every level is unique and extremely varied while being a joy to play. The sequels went all open world and lost a lot of the charm and originality of the first game.
-The Team ICO games: ICO and Shadow of the Colossus
I can't believe I almost forgot these gems. I've never had a problem with the games' controls even though I know some don't like how they control. I've never had moments where I died or couldn't do what I wanted because of the controls. ICO is just running around and hitting stuff with a stick so there's not much there to begin with. But with SotC, I never had issues with the camera or anything even playing it semi-recently on PS3. These games are still gorgeous looking and the remasters (not remakes mind you) look damn good. I'll gladly add The Last Guardian to the list in about 10 years or so.
-Mercenaries: Playground of DESTRUCTION!!!
I still think this is my top open world/sandbox game of all-time because of how open-ended the missions are. The controls are alright at best as no open world shooter (GTA for example) was very good at that time. When a horror game, Resident Evil 4, probably has the best 3rd-person shooting controls from the PS2 generation, no pure 3rd-person shooters from that era have aged well.
-Midnight Club 2
This may still be my favorite arcade racer ever. The level design (especially Paris) is still so ridiculously good.
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BuildsLegos said:
Obviously.
Maximum Bert said:
I dont think any of the old Mario games 1,2,3 have aged at all they still look and play amazing.
No shit Sherlock
Stewie Plisken said:
I find Deus Ex still extremely absorbing and enjoyable.
It's still the best of the series and got so much right that the new ones got wrong.
josemlopes said:
Mirrors Edge 1 is a bit older and damn, that shit looks wack, have a nice read on its lighting
I'd say Mirror's Edge has aged well because that gameplay is really good and there's nothing else like it (besides for Catalyst obviously). Even Catalyst doesn't look very good either.
Extra-Ordinary said:
Serious, serious props to the artists that did the backdrops for Bulletstorm. It's been ages since I've played it and maybe the wow factor would be worn away if I went back (I don't think so though) but with the Full Clip Edition coming out in a little while, I've been thinking about it lately and I think that was one of the first games to really make me appreciate a horizon in a game, gorgeous stuff sometimes.
And I like to think of that as a relatively high praise for a game that was pretty mindless bro-dude shooting most of the time, they didn't cut corners when it came to building the world, at least from a visual standpoint.
BulletStorm is awesome and just sheer fun to play, and it will always be. It's graphical style isn't hyper-realistic so the graphics won't age.
Bitter Hobbit said:
I think Metal Gear Solid 1 has aged quite well. The keycards needing to be equipped items is annoying but aside from that it still plays very very well, a good fast paced arcade stealth game.
MGS1 is still great because it didn't try to play like a typical shooter like say Syphon Filter, those controls aged horribly (and the writing and voice acting is even more horrid). The graphics have obviously aged, but you can remake the game with updated graphics and keep the gameplay exactly as is and it would still play great.
Casual Shinji said:
The first God of War and Ratchet and Clank, and the entire Jak and Daxter series suffer from an awkward stiffness to the controls. Don't even get me talking about the PS2 era GTA games.
I don't recall any awkwardness or stiffness in the 1st God of War's controls. They all control the same because of the fixed camera. I still find the 1st God of War the only good game in the series. Now, Ratchet and Clank or Jak and Daxter, I have no clue. GTA3 was the worst because you could only shoot by locking-on to someone but the lock-on would lock-on to the closest person I think so you'd end up killing civilians instead of enemies so often. Vice City fixed the lock-on priority issues of GTA3.
Johnny Novgorod said:
Actually came into the thread to nominate the very first Uncharted. I'm watching my girlfriend play it right now and while it hasn't aged impeccably - water/foliage textures are always a dead giveaway in these games - the perfectionism in the animation department remains outstanding. Game is full of little details here and there that were way ahead of its time, and many of the games of today would only do well in learning them.
Uncharted 2 on the other hand I think has aged about as well as the third game.
Uncharted 1 wasn't that good when it came out because I bought it Day 1 and was disappointed. You can't even throw grenades well in that game because they made you use the six-axis shit to do that. Maybe the remaster fixed that shit though. Overall the level design was really weak with very flat shooting levels and lots of chest-high cover making the game play too whack-a-mole like. Then, you have the waves of enemies issue and their sponginess. Those "set-pieces" were lame jet-ski sequences that were lame then and even more lame after Uncharted 2 "aged" them even more. The 1st game has by far the worst shooting of the series and Uncharted has never been a great shooter. The best thing Uncharted 1 did was the "twist". Uncharted 1 came off very much as a tech demo for me even when released, the game looks great (graphics and animations) but the gameplay isn't much above the very first cover shooter, Winback. Uncharted 2 is still, by far, the best of the series and has aged really well. I've played the entire series and the 2nd game is the only one I still own.
