Do younger gamers like games from 16-bit era?

[Mr. Detective]

I'm in my late 20s, so I'm not in your targeted age range. But just throwing out my opinion: I grew up with SNES and PS1. I had no understanding of the difference between 2D and 3D back then. So gameplay was what mattered to me the most. I still like going back to play some old games every now and then. Some games aged well, and others hadn't. I think the answer to this might depend on whether someone grew up playing retro games or modern games.

If someone grows up with 8/16/32 bit games, chances are they won't mind playing other games from that period. They are already used to seeing old 2D graphics, so jumping back and forth between modern and classic games will probably be easier. On the other hand, someone who grows up playing mainly modern games will have a hard time seeing what's appealing about a bunch of old games from more than 20 years ago. Maybe they will like the gameplay, maybe not. Of course, this is just what I think is the typical scenario. So, if you have children, let them play retro games first.

I think those old games are suck. People who try to copycat those old games with excuse of nostalgic feeling or classical RPG are doing all wrong.
If there are anything game devs of this era should learn, they should learn from mobile games

I'm not a fan of the so-called retro games nowadays, either. They completely lack the charm and the feel of a true classic game. Devs should learn from mobile games, yes. But what they should learn is what to never do with their games. Mobile games are usually very shallow, simplistic, and full of gacha or microtransactions. They can never compete with traditional games on console and PC.

This is how you learn from mobile games, it also apply for learning from PC games as well.
1. Find some games that catches your interest
2. Install and try to play for few rounds
3. If you found st interest, write it down, try to replicate it in your project
4. Repeat above steps
Not just about gameplay, story. There are also many other things to learn as well from the mobile games, for example:
How to make the much of profit from the game.
How to draw people attention & have them to install your game, despite the fact that your game are suck.
Lol, when you released at least 3 games, you will understand what I am talking about

That's how you learn from playing other people's games. Nothing to do with mobile or PC. And that only works if you find any decent mobile games to learn from.

- How to make profit from the game: make it good.
- That's just overhype marketing. You make a crappy game seems amazing, people flock to try it, and when they find out how much it sucks, they will bombard you with bad reviews and refund the game. Dead Island, No Man's Sky, Resident Evil 6, The Order 1886, and Cyberpunk should be clear examples of what not to do. You understand that when you pull that tactic, your reputation goes down the abyss, do you not?

Have you released at least 3 games? Show us. Do they capture people's attention despite being crap? Did people bombard it with bad reviews and ask for refund? I understand what you are talking about. But what you are talking about is how to ruin your business, not make profit.

 

[HelenPixels]

Well, I grew up playing on the Amiga 500+, and my best friend had one too, and a NES, and a Sega Megadrive. We would spend HOURS playing what are now considered 'retro games'. So for me, games like the original Sonic the Hedgehog, Super Mario Brothers, Pacman, Tetris and similar all give me nostalgic feels.

I have an 8 year old, who is willing to play some older games, but not others. She watched me playing pacman when it was added to the switch, but she doesn't like that one. She will however play some older games, like, Ocarina of time (not part of the 16 bit era, but still an older game).

Whether an old game will appeal to young people depends I think on how well a game has aged. Let's face it, kids won't play an old game for it's graphics, what they will play for is either a decent story, or a logic puzzle or whatever else it has. Some games seem to age quite well.

Whether kids want to play them or not depends on a lot of factors, but what is clear is that there is still quite a sizeable market for them. I have a switch subscription, which gives me access to a lot of classic games from the NES and SNES. I play with these extras far more than my daughter does because they were the sort of games I grew up with, but she will play on them occasionally and I encourage it so she can see where her modern games originate from. These days though, she spends most of her time tackling Breath of the Wild master mode (which is far easier than the master mode of Ocarina of Time as long as you can sneak past lynels)

 

[ericv00]

Passion, work, and craft show through regardless of the trappings of the game. I've seen everything from garbage pixel art to masterpieces. I've seen unimaginative vector graphics, and I've seen masterpieces. 3d garbage and 3d masterpieces. The "game" portion of a game actually has little to do with the visual style. The "story" portion of a game has little to do with the game or the graphics. If a project has great craft and passion, it shows, but it's HARD to pull off. And, to paraphrase Neil Gaiman, 'Two out of three will do'.

For every amazing SNES game, there are 10 pieces of trash. No different to games today. The real trick is to care about craft apparent in a game regardless of nostalgia or lack of, and seek out those great games. Not an easy task I must admit, especially considering one of the... business opinions expressed in this thread.

And on THAT note. Making trash that gets downloads is a great way to pay rent for a crudy apartment. Making a great game gives you the chance to make serious money.

 

[someone1100]

People enjoy nostalgia, just look at how much old Pokemon games are selling haha. Just make sure you have a good story or something special with combat because nostalgia by itself won't do anything.

 

[Juno-Loveheart]

The youngest people I interact with on a regular basis are my two nieces (11 and 5) and a few kids my sister helps babysit. None of which really play video games aside from Minecraft and mobile games, so I can't give a solid answer from experience there. Many of my younger friends (18-early 20s) however do tend to like older RPGs, at least older style RPGs.

Games like OMORI and, say what you will about them, the FF remasters helped introduce a younger generation into the oldies, proving they're still good and fun games beyond nostalgia. I personally as a 25 year old mostly played older games growing up because they were cheap and I was from a poor household.

I think good old video games are like good old movies or TV shows -- they'll never really lose their place as long as they're accessible -- and good heavens are they accessible. I think it's part of the reason shows like Columbo got a resurgence in recent years, it's just a good show that's easy to watch.

 

[Tiamat-86]

and good heavens are they accessible

....ya...
skies of arcadia legends
robotrek
secret of evermore
i could go on but my point is that alot of great games arnt accessible at all. (very depressing)
and some of the newer games are at major risk of losing the possibility of 100% completion turning amazing games into only good games that are missing content.
(its going to be a very sad day when xenoblade cornicles x losses their servers and can longer beat anything over lv80 because cant farm squad currency or items like ryyz's and dagahn's drops)

 

[NamEtag]

1. Find some games that catches your interest
2. Install and try to play for few rounds
3. If you found st interest, write it down
4. Repeat above steps

While I ostensibly agree, the last 12 times I did this for mobile rpgs went very poorly. It's only sort of worked for the genres that were born or are mainly done on the mobile in the first place.

I'm still willing to give it a shot, but the only "lessons" I've learned is how to make games actively LESS fun in the pursuit of profit. I'm not the market that funds these, and I certainly won't support the devs that make these.

It's not like they're even very good at these profit-driven strategies, they aren't subtle at all about where the hook on the wallet comes in.

 

[kirbwarrior]

It's surprising how often I hear about people born this millennium actively enjoying FF6, Chrono Trigger, and Super Mario World and wanting more SNES games because they finally played one that was great.

If there are anything game devs of this era should learn, they should learn from mobile games

I'm not going to treat this like a serious thing, but there definitely are gamers out there (and younger ones) that seem to only like gachas and other similar games. I couldn't tell you why, but I've definitely seen all sorts of wild opinions and then see them shared widely.

 

[sabao]

@watermark Man, I was there when you first released Deus Card (loved it), so this whole "Do you young people" thing makes my bones creak.

That said, I'm not the demographic being inquired about either.

I appreciate 16-bit/pixel art inspired projects for the artistry. Modern titles like Chained Echoes and Anno Mutationem, or the likes of Octopath Traveler I-II are excellent contrasting examples showing pixel art is pretty timeless as a medium for RPGs if not used as just a crutch.

 

[kirbwarrior]

pixel art is pretty timeless as a medium for RPGs if not used as just a crutch.

Really, this. Pixel art is a medium, not a time period or genre. I've seen games use 3D as a crutch. I've seen plenty of stories told through the wrong medium.

 

[AquariusKawaii96]

In my opinion... more appealing now for young people is HD 2.5D like Octopath Traveler or Eiyuden Chronicle. Remake Dragon Quest 3 use that visual too.

16-bit just for nostalgia.
At this time, rpg need good visual and good story. Gameplay stuck in action game now for all type RPG, even they trying surpass DMC style combat (FFXVI).

 

[sabao]

In my opinion... more appealing now for young people is HD 2.5D like Octopath Traveler or Eiyuden Chronicle. Remake Dragon Quest 3 use that visual too.

I'm personally ambivalent to HD 3D. I appreciate Square Enix for it: the success of Octopath Traveler showed big publishers that pixel art as a medium isn't just for scrappy indie game devs.

Octopath, Triangle Strategy, and Live A Live all suffer from their studio's penchant of using muddy palettes, excessive vignetting, and way too much bloom and depth blur though. It's definitely because it's the same studio that made them, but they all look the same.

Thankfully, DQ3R from the same studio and Eiyuuden Chronicles from a completely different company are both adopting the HD 3D aesthetic and showcasing it in different styles.

 

[AquariusKawaii96]

I'm personally ambivalent to HD 3D. I appreciate Square Enix for it: the success of Octopath Traveler shows big publishers that pixel art as a medium isn't just for scrappy indie game devs.

Octopath, Triangle Strategy, and Live A Live all suffer from their studio's penchant of using muddy palettes, excessive vignetting, and way too much bloom and depth blur though. It's definitely because it's the same studio that made them, but they all look the same.

Thankfully, DQ3R from the same studio and Eiyuuden Chronicles from a completely different company are both adopting the HD 3D aesthetic and showcasing it in different styles.

Yeah, sometimes blur makes nice effect but bloom erased/washed out the color. That's happen in octopath I & II, developer personal choice of visual lightning. I want to see HD 2D game with realistic lightning color photorealistic UE 5 huhu.

 

[Milennin]

Can't exactly speak for the younger generation as I grew up with 16-bit games myself, but the way I see it is that 16-bit graphics will always have its own unique charm while also being perfectly capable of looking good and appealing (unlike 8-bit, which is a big graphical downgrade in comparison and requires the player's imagination much more to fill in the gaps.)

 

[Tamina]

That, to me, is bordering on the absurd. The vast majority of mobile "games" are not games in any sense of having a progression through story or having any interesting decisions to make.

Most of the mobile games I try are terribly translated copies of, like, three different core mechanics, all intended to waste time and get you to buy useless things. The majority of what's left over are ports of actual games designed on other systems (or classics like in the OP).

Exactly what are a few mobile games that you think game developers should learn from?

What do you mean? Do you mean the progression only happened in story, such as obtaining certain a skill or a character? Because I don't think that is the requirement for a good game.

Mobile games may have difference business model, but these days higher budget mobile games generally have:

1) Good story, or at least good story presentation from a higher budget. because they can afford good writers, animators and voice actors.

With good production value sometimes mobile game story presentation surpasses lower budget single player games.

2) Automated grinding which saves time. I personally dislike grinding and repeated battles over and over in traditional jrpg, many mobile games let us skip them, which is an improvement in my eyes.

3) Carefully tweaked progression curve. Since mobile games need to retain players for a much longer period of time, a successful mobile game generally have well designed progression curve than a bad mobile game or single player game.

It is possible to make progression without paying anything in many modern mobile games, by the way.

Exactly as stated above. Those business tactics are scummy, and border on unethical. I'd rather be obscure than get caught up in that garbage.

It is not that scummy if they listed the chance of getting the items and let us exchange for desired items after many tries.

Mobile games many years ago may be bad, but the genre has improved sinced then. I played a few mobile games from 2015-2018 and never liked any of them because of what @ATT_Turan said.

But some of the newer games were quite enjoyable, at least for a few months. I've never pay a cent in any mobile games, but not paying did not hinder the experience in many newer games. Safe to say mobile game developers really learned from the past and improved.

100% agree that single player game developers should learn from modern mobile games. Maybe not the business model, but how they implement progression or present story.

 

[kirbwarrior]

Good story, or at least good story presentation from a higher budget.

Those are very different things. One of the big issues I hear a lot about AAA and specifically mobile games is the amount of effort put into making the presentation good without giving it a good story. Like icing on an unbaked potato.

2) Automated grinding which saves time. I personally dislike grinding and repeated battles over and over in traditional jrpg, many mobile games let us skip them, which is an improvement in my eyes.

This is a bandaid solution. If a game has a boring, repetitive battle system, saying "At least I don't have to play it" is not much of a saving grace.

3) Carefully tweaked progression curve. Since mobile games need to retain players for a much longer period of time, a successful mobile game generally have well designed progression curve than a bad mobile game or single player game.

I would just simply ask to expand on this because as far as I can tell mobile games have both too fast progression (you can get a character maxed out pretty quickly) and incredibly, tediously slow progression (play this event one hundred times for some crumbs).

It is not that scummy if they listed the chance of getting the items and let us exchange for desired items after many tries.

The scummy part is the constant manufactured FOMO and taunting you with solutions to problems they made by spending money. That and the way they manage to get around gambling laws with technicalities so they can get kids to gamble.

100% agree that single player game developers should learn from modern mobile games. Maybe not the business model, but how they implement progression or present story.

Now this part is confusing because you said earlier their progress model must be different from single player games because they have to make sure their players don't ever stop playing.

 

[watermark]

For everyone saying whether graphics matter, I've got two words for you:

Vampire Survivors

And yes, I'm jealous too.

@sabao Thanks so much for remembering Deus Card! I do plan on remaking and finishing Gus and gang's story btw. On Unite probably, as this gives it a chance to become a multiplayer game.

 

[Tamina]

Those are very different things. One of the big issues I hear a lot about AAA and specifically mobile games is the amount of effort put into making the presentation good without giving it a good story. Like icing on an unbaked potato.

Of course presentation matters. Most of the "good story" in the entertainment industry is the same old formula being used over and over again. But a good presentation delivers the same old story in a more enjoyable way.

This is a bandaid solution. If a game has a boring, repetitive battle system, saying "At least I don't have to play it" is not much of a saving grace.

I agree, but single player games didn't remove that flaw. Even newer games like octopath traveler has same old repetitive battles over and over. In that case I would like to automate it at least.

I would just simply ask to expand on this

What I meant is, many single player jrpg, especially older ones, seems to suffer from pacing issues with very limited skill/character selection until dozens of hours later.

Since the players already paid for the game they kinda have to tolerate slow pacing.

Mobile games are f2p, and players can uninstall the game anytime after they download it if they don't enjoy it. So the initial pacing is generally designed to keep the player glued to the game for much longer until the paywall.

I guess that is what you meant by "progression too fast"? It's a way to create instant satisfaction at start so players don't quit immediately, which many older single player jrpg really needs in my opinion.

Now this part is confusing because you said earlier their progress model must be different from single player games because they have to make sure their players don't ever stop playing.

Why is it confusing?

Mobile games have different business model, of course they work differently from single player games. Single player game developers shouldn't copy everything, but they can learn the successful design philosophy and apply it in single player games, if it works.

If fast initial progression works well in a mobile game, use it single player games. If paywall and business model from mobile games suck, then don't add them into your single player games. You can pick and choose.

After all, mobile game is a very competitive genre, most games that can survive generally are higher quality ones with better game design than their competitors, with something to learn from.

Case to the point, recently I played a mobile jrpg that each character in the party has random voiced banters as the player explore the dungeon or pick up items. I thought designs like this make dungeon exploration so much more interesting than a silent party.

This is not a new idea, as I've seen older jrpg like ff13-2/LR/FF15 done the same thing, but with worse execution and dialogue. Since mobile game genre is competitive, the competition pushes game developers using new and improved ideas based on the old one.

tl;dr: I think many people here are too quick to dismiss mobile games completely only because of their business model. I think sometimes they do have good design ideas that can be used in single player games.

 

[Willibab]

For the most part. Prolly not, unless it becomes trendy to do so but that also applies to grown ups tbf. The difference between then and now is more the gaping chasm of choices. They might work better on mobile (Not seen any numbers though) as that market has a lot of ''samey'' stuff due to the ever shrinking limitations of phones. Meaning, maybe not for long

Just what sounds logical to me at least, I am basically just talking out of my fertilizer dispenser.

 

[kirbwarrior]

Most of the "good story" in the entertainment industry is the same old formula being used over and over again.

I don't even know how to respond to this. Who is saying this? Who is calling the generic stories 'good'? In every medium most stories aren't good.

I agree, but single player games didn't remove that flaw. Even newer games like octopath traveler has same old repetitive battles over and over. In that case I would like to automate it at least.

Wouldn't you rather just play a game that's fun instead of playing a game that isn't fun but makes the not fun part take less effort?

I guess that is what you meant by "progression too fast"? It's a way to create instant satisfaction at start so players don't quit immediately, which many older single player jrpg really needs in my opinion.

This makes sense. It's probably the biggest flaw of FF9, for instance.

Mobile games have different business model, of course they work differently from single player games. Single player game developers shouldn't copy everything, but they can learn the successful design philosophy and apply it in single player games, if it works.

So then shouldn't we instead say they should adopt specific those things instead of the more general statement?

After all, mobile game is a very competitive genre, most games that can survive generally are higher quality ones with better game design than their competitors, with something to learn from.

I don't think this is true in any industry. Quality is definitely less important than marketing. Gacha players don't even hide that their games largely revolve around eye candy.

tl;dr: I think many people here are too quick to dismiss mobile games completely only because of their business model. I think sometimes they do have good design ideas that can be used in single player games.

Literally any game can have good design ideas for a game someone is working on. Fire Emblem Heroes is a terrible plague, but I know a couple mechanics in it that would vastly improve the mainline series. It's when someone says 'single player games should be more like mobile games' that gets responses like 'no, I prefer to treat my audience like human beings'.

But a good presentation delivers the same old story in a more enjoyable way.

After having to put up with games that have bad/boring stories but good presentation, I don't know how someone can think this. Again, it's icing on a potato, all it does is trick the audience into thinking something is better than it is. You can have better than James Cameron's Avatar.


EDIT: I realize this is entirely off topic of the discussion. If you want to open a new thread to continue it, just @ me and I'll continue responding.