At what point is retro too retro?

Post by **Mozgus** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 5:06 pm

If you are only satisfied with the latest and (not necessarily) the greatest, this post is not for you. However, if you do find yourself playing games from years long past, I have a question for you.

Quite simply, when you try out an old-school game for the first time, do you find that the older it is, the less likely you are to enjoy it? By playing a game you have never tried before, despite it's age, we are throwing nostalgia out the window. This lets us give a much more honest evaluation of the title. I'm sure that for most of us, it's no sweat popping in Super Mario Bros 3 or Megaman X. You're already accustomed to the game. You know where it's finer points lay, and how to enjoy them.

But with a more obscure game, you're diving headfirst into new territory; very aged, unwieldy, unpredictable territory. You may not know how to appreciate it's finer points. You might make a negative judgment call within the first 10 seconds.

So I ask you; what is your retro limit? For example, I can still often fire up a 32-bit game I've never played, enjoy it, and even beat it. I tend to do this 3-5 times a year, still. As long as the load times are manageable, I'm fine.

Then comes 16-bit. This is where things get tricky. It becomes a little tough to get around the old-school difficulties. It becomes embarrassing to rely on cheat codes, and annoying to have to look them up. Password systems are torture. There's a lot of annoyances in this generation that I have trouble ignoring today. But with patience, I have been known to enjoy a newly discovered gem now and then.

8-bit, primarily NES. This gets tough. So much sprite flicker and slowdown, often brutal, unfair challenge, severe monotony in the gameplay, zero story, and unresponsive controls. So many of these flaws exist in our overlooked NES games, that they feel like work to play today.

Atari 2600. Despite this being my first game console, and knowing for a fact that I loved it when I was 4 years old, I just can't bring myself to say that anything on the 2600 is worth playing today. Absolutely nothing. Not even Combat. 2600 is torture now. This is officially my gaming limit.

Again these opinions only apply to games with zero nostalgic factor. So how about you guys? What's your limit? At what point can you simply not enjoy a "new" game on an old platform?

Post by **Curlypaul** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 5:56 pm

Funnily enough I was pondering on starting a similar thread, but in poll format.

I'm definetely not a gamer that demands the latest all the time although I have deleoped a fondness for one feature - the ability to save. I can appreciate that the satisfaction gained from pre-16bit era games actually comes from the monotonous gameplay and putting the time in to gain total mastery but unless a game has some nostalgic value I'm unlikely to play it for long nowadays.
I like games where I only have to complete each section once unless I enoy it so much that I want to see it again (or one of my button mashing children deletes the file). So with that said I guess that leaves me at the 16-bit era, I dont mind passwords too much.

Post by **racketboy** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:11 pm

8 bit is generally my limit.
If the game is older than that, I usually look for a newer remake.

I love playing Asteroids, Pong, and Space Invaders, but I'll play them on newer machines.

Post by **jrod1986** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:23 pm

8 bit is definitely my limit as well. As Mozgus mentioned, the difficulty and password saving (or sometimes no saving) can be a royal pain in the butt to deal with. It still amazes me today that the original Legend of Zelda had a save system, whilst many games after it on the NES did not. With work and school, I can't really dedicate that much time to any game in one sitting.

Post by **GSZX1337** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:27 pm

8-bit is my limit as well. 16-bit seems to be the sweet spot for me.
And, is it just me or is the fact that I can make Atari-quality games with a little bit of programming knowledge make them less enjoyable?

Post by **Espio 1919** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:46 pm

Usually I don't play many games before 16-bit nowadays, and even some of the more obscure 16-bit titles it gets tough. 32-bit and early sixth gen (Dreamcast especially) I love doing this sort of thing, the 32-bit era is probably one of my fondest memories in gaming.

Post by **marurun** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:53 pm

8-bit is my limit. Except Combat. I still enjoy that, Ladybug, and Donkey Kong. So I guess there are some older arcade games that I still find fun.

Post by **GagaMan** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 7:53 pm

Probably 8-bit for me too, seeing as that's what I was born into. The NES was my first console. I can play Atari 2600 stuff, but usually it's for no longer than 5 minutes before I lose interest. NES games, depending on which one it is, can last me up to an hour at a time. 16-Bit and above is what I tend to have the most pateince for, if that makes any sense.

Post by **Droid party** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 7:55 pm

Like so many others 8-bit is my limit. Atari 2600 is just far too crude for me. However 8-bit has just enough detail to fill in the gaps that my imagination cannot.

Post by **diehllane** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 9:08 pm

I'm with everyone else here. 8-bit. I do have a lot of atari 2600 titles that I play occasionally, but one button just feels so wrong to me these days. I think it also has to do with the fact I grew up on RPGs. There was no save feature wayyyyyy back in the day and NES RPGs were saved with batteries.

I dislike having to replay an entire game to get to a certain point sometimes. I do enjoy games like Pong and Frogger though. I play Test Drive on PS2 just to play Pong on the loading screen.