Where's the game?

[asiepshtain]

A week ago I found all the old X-COM games bundled for 5$. Now, this will be the third time I buy the first two in the series ( 1.when they came out 2.a cd collection around 2000 3. today) but I've lost the old ones and it's 5$, so what the hell.

for the young: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-COM:_Terror_from_the_Deep

Now, on my computer I have installed at the moment all the current top hit games, and every night I find myself putting my kid to sleep and playing Terror from the deep( released 1995). It's fun, addictive, exciting and has lost none of its vigor. The UI is a bit antiquated, but never broken, and the ship levels are still ridiculosly over-complex, but the game is amazing.

Which got me thinking, how can a game made in 1995 feel so much better then so many modern games, am I just nostalgic or is something going on here? The following night I downloaded the demo for new batman game and as I was playing it, It hit me. There was no game in the game I was playing!

Now, I know the new batman has been getting insane scores, and maybe the demo does it a disservice, but it was so stupid. The whole thing is a just a big quick time event. Click left to hit, click right when you see flashing lights and the only one who can call that "Jump from a -> b then on opponent" a puzzle must be brain damaged. Now, again, this was just a demo and just the start of the game, so maybe it gets better. But from what I saw, there was no game there! Hitting buttons when told then watching pretty visuals isn't a game, it's a toy.

There more I think about it, the more it seems that most games today have become more toys then games. And as I was allocating a new research team, tuning my soliders and thinking about optimal entery paths into an alien ship in a 1995 video game masterpiece I kept asking myself, where's the game?

 

[Stalk3rchief]

It's just nostalgia. I recently went on a binge replaying all of the games I loved growing up, and I ended up hating them all. The only thing that makes them good is the fact that they were, in fact, good, once upon a time.
DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

 

[asiepshtain]

It's just nostalgia. I recently went on a binge replaying all of the games I loved growing up, and I ended up hating them all. The only thing that makes them good is the fact that they were, in fact, good, once upon a time.
DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

That would hold up if I was just remmbering it as good, I've been playing it every night now for a week, and it's amazing. It's so much richer in gameplay then the games I've been playing lately.

 

[haruvister]

I was deeply underwhelmed by the Batman demo too, although it's a mite unfair comparing a strategic combat game with a straightforward beat 'em up. It's like playing Serious Sam immediately after two hours on Populous 2 and wondering why you can't raise and lower land.

This isn't to say I don't agree with you though. To me, it seems the closer video games become to movies, the more they rely on narrative, characters, and atmosphere, and the further from GAMEplay they drift. Hard Rain may be a milestone in this respect. I reckon it's something of a decline.

 

[sneak_copter]

It really does depend who you ask.

Personally, I'm sick of hearing about this so-called "Decline of Gaming." In my opinion, this is in many ways a golden age. Think about it, did you ever see games in 1995 get mass-headlines, the biggest entertainment launch of all time, midnight openings, trade shows, a specialist subsection of journalism, and mainstream recognition?

No Sir.

Although, from a gameplay standpoint I will admit your typical game has had a few layers of substance removed, but that can actually be a good thing. Look at Morrowind's Interface- So cluttered. Look what just a few years of improvements made with Oblivion's Interface.

 

[asiepshtain]

It really does depend who you ask.

Personally, I'm sick of hearing about this so-called "Decline of Gaming." In my opinion, this is in many ways a golden age. Think about it, did you ever see games in 1995 get mass-headlines, the biggest entertainment launch of all time, midnight openings, trade shows, a specialist subsection of journalism, and mainstream recognition?

No Sir.

Although, from a gameplay standpoint I will admit your typical game has had a few layers of substance removed, but that can actually be a good thing. Look at Morrowind's Interface- So cluttered. Look what just a few years of improvements made with Oblivion's Interface.

What you're saying is: Games are much better now except for the gameplay?

I'm not saying games haven't evolved, and there are some great games now, not to mention that I think the digital distrbution has really opened up the doors for great games from small developers. It just that I can't shake the feeling that more and more of todays games are not really games, they are toys.

 

[TheNumber1Zero]

It's just your taste,your preference.

Of course things of old do tend to be better in some cases than things we have today.
Plus,like you said,It was only a demo

 

[Stalk3rchief]

DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

That, sir, is bullshit. Flat out bullshit.

Oh man... you got me. I see now, it's all so clear.
-_-
Grow up, get on with the times. Old games are bad. I played them both, and they suck balls. In fact, they do so quite vigorously. They were good for their time, but that's just it, their time is long gone.

 

[bcponpcp27]

I don't know, could be nostalgia, but I've been playing an old game from when I was a kid. I still have my dreamcast, which came with a demo cd, which had this old genesis game on it. Shining Force, Legacy of Great Intention. I played it some when I was younger, and really liked it, but never beat it (kinda because I didn't...and still don't...have a memory card). I started playing again a couple days ago, and it's awesome! So replayable and fun.

 

[Clashero]

The Longest Journey's story hasn't been bested by any game in the history of man.
None will be as funny as Monkey Island. Or as enthralling as X-Com. Or as gripping as System Shock.

 

[Stalk3rchief]

DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

That, sir, is bullshit. Flat out bullshit.

Oh man... you got me. I see now, it's all so clear.
-_-
Grow up, get on with the times. Old games are bad. I played them both, and they suck balls. In fact, they do so quite vigorously. They were good for their time, but that's just it, their time is long gone.

That doesn't mean anything though, at all.. I mean it couldn't be any more clear than that. Just because you don't enjoy them anymore, doesn't mean a thing.. a good game doesn't stop being a good game just because it's older. That's ignorant.. that's really ignorant especially when you're talking about games that are FAR different from each other.

I bought both DOOM and Duke Nukem the second they came up on Live and I've played the hell out of them.. the hours I've spent in them far outweigh the ones that I put into Modern Warfare when I owned it. "Old games are bad" makes no sense at all.

Jesus. I'm talking about the originals you twat. DLC is for suckers.

 

[CrysisMcGee]

A large part of it is the fact that the x-com series was primarily made for the PC. Another is a games's effort to feel like more like a film than a game

Back then people didn't try to make games to please everybody, like a film does. They made the game the best they possibly could with their target audience.

I think that is the key. Making games that 100 people Love instead of making a game 1000 people like.

And although I've never played x-com, I did play a lot of games from that era. Now I will try, when I find it. Thank god for DOSbox.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Spoiler: You have these on.

Old games always receive the Nostalgia +20 awesome points boost right away. No matter how hard you try or how objective you may think you're being, It's impossible to remove the bias of the fact that you played it when you were younger. In addition, you're comparing a good game from the past to "most" games of the present. 90% of everything is crap and that's true for video games. Compare a really good game of today to a really good game from you're past. The old game will win but the new good game will probably not be totally blow out of the water.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Spoiler: You have these on.

Old games always receive the Nostalgia +20 awesome points boost right away. No matter how hard you try or how objective you may think you're being, It's impossible to remove the bias of the fact that you played it when you were younger. In addition, you're comparing a good game from the past to "most" games of the present. 90% of everything is crap and that's true for video games. Compare a really good game of today to a really good game from you're past. The old game will win but the new good game will probably not be totally blow out of the water.

not everyone has nostalgia glasses. some played old games recently then played a new game and like the old one better. you can't have nostalgia if you recently played an old game in the same time frame as a new one. i play old games frequently and new games too, old games and new games are in the same time line with me so nostalgia doesn't exist. unless you are kind of dude who gets nostalgic for things that happened 20 minutes ago like homer from the simpson when he yearns for the donut he just ate.

Nostalgia does not apply only to a game, it applies to a whole time period. A game from your nostalgic time can also be unintentional overrated in your mind. The style, art, sound, and fell of a game is heavily connected to a time period. Anyone who is nostalgic for games from a certain period will have similar feelings for other games from that period, regardless of when he/she played them.

 

[Flying-Emu]

DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

That, sir, is bullshit. Flat out bullshit.

Oh man... you got me. I see now, it's all so clear.
-_-
Grow up, get on with the times. Old games are bad. I played them both, and they suck balls. In fact, they do so quite vigorously. They were good for their time, but that's just it, their time is long gone.

Someone is forgetting Sonic the Hedgehog.

 

[Magic Muffin Man]

Ugh, I've been tricked by the rose-colored funland of nostalgia before, just recently, actually.

After reading a retrospective on the Final Fantasy Series, I bought FFVII on PSN, as my disks were scratched to unplayability. Guess what? I got bored an hour in. I don't know what it was, the blocky characters, the sometimes stiff dialouge(spelling, sorry), or that seeing Advent Children, playing Crisis Core, and watching the PS3 tech demo spoiled my outlook on a game that was revolutionary at the time.

Some retro games however, hold up quite well. Zelda: Majora's Mask, Super Mario Bros 3, and Sonic The Hedgehog come to mind.

 

[Stalk3rchief]

DooM and Duke Nuke'm will never be as good as CoD4, ever. That's just time.

That, sir, is bullshit. Flat out bullshit.

Oh man... you got me. I see now, it's all so clear.
-_-
Grow up, get on with the times. Old games are bad. I played them both, and they suck balls. In fact, they do so quite vigorously. They were good for their time, but that's just it, their time is long gone.

Someone is forgetting Sonic the Hedgehog.

Ok, you actually got me with that one.
lol
I miss that game so much!