Why we still love retro

[Vox Novus]

Retro games are those often from a specific time frame of when those videogames were out, early console games from the NES, Snes, early sega systems and Atari, etc...

Retro has become more than just its literal definition though, its become sort of genre of itself. Games like the recently released Undertale or the game Pier Solar (Website for those unfamiliar-  http://www.piersolar.com/) are referred to as retro games or retro styled games. You see musicians making retro music, etc...

You also often see older retro games resurface via downloadable stores such as nintendo's e-shop, psn, steam, etc... Many games often fade into obscurity after their initial run with consoles yet many of these retro games refuse to go away.

So as the topic title says, why do we love retro so much? Is it all nostalgia or did these games from a bygone time generally have something you don't see as much in modern games?

 

[trouble time]

Retro games could afford to be more abstract than current games, and generally could get away with more imaginative elements. Let's take a look at the world map, that's something you probably won't see again from square, at least not in one of the more high-end graphics games because people would complain that it breaks their immersion. I could and should probably elaborate more, but at the moment I don't have much time before I head to work and don't want to spend it all typing.

 

[whitesphere]

I think a big part of it is that older games took more risks than modern games.  Because they didn't cost an arm and a leg and take years to make, mainly due to graphics and sound resources, companies could try out riskier games that may not do well.  Back in the early 1980s, coders would literally create games on their own, load them up into a demo cabinet, and the games that they all really enjoyed playing got sold, no matter how weird the concept might be today.

Imagine trying to sell Pac Man these days, assuming the executives never heard of Pac Man or its ilk.  "Yeah, I have this sphere with a mouth that moves around a maze, eating little dots.  If it eats a bigger dot, the ghosts chasing it will turn blue and the sphere can eat them."

The games were much more abstract than they are these days.  While it can be good for immersion to have high quality 3D graphics, it takes teams of talented artists and programmers years of work and costs the company tens of millions of dollars.  So they wouldn't dare risk that on a game that they think might flop.

Also, in AAA games, the big push is Online Play, MMO preferred, because it makes the most money for the developers through purchases (if you want to play with your friend, you both need a copy), microtransactions and so on.  With that type of focus, single player in those games is just glorified training for the Real game.  So, if you want a single player experience, many AAA games won't be for you.

I'm sure nostalgia helps along the retro market.  But in terms of classic video games, they could afford to be more creative and even outright strange or silly.  While there were a LOT of stinkers, when the games were good, they were downright amazing.

 

[Ms Littlefish]

I think a lot of people enjoy the simplicity of many older titles. A lot of games back then had really straight forward scopes that were easy to pick up and play, and invest whatever time you had available to play them. A lot of people also simply love the aesthetic of 8-bit and 16-bit art and music. 

Not all retro games were good. In fact, a lot blew chunks and some were outright unplayable. Another group of games were great at the time, but didn't age well. So, there is probably some nostalgia at work. However, some games really did stand the test of time and are still fully enjoyable to this day.

Personally, I think many nuances of retro games are really quite dated. Not all, but some. But, I do like games that capture the simplicity and the aesthetic of these games; while enjoying some modern conveniences given to what may not work nearly as well in games today.

 

[amerk]

Dragon Quest 2 through 4, Final Fantasy (NES), Crystalis, LoZ, Willow, Battle of Olympus - all great games for there time, and many have aged well. For example, Crystalis was one of the earlier action rpg's that surpassed the mechanics in Zelda, and it's still one of the finer games at the time.

And SMB 3, probably one of the finest platform sidescrollers to this day, not to mention being able to battle it out in 2 player.

But even then, games like Metal Gear and Snake's Revenge were unique experiences at the time. Bionic Commando with the bionic arm in place of jumping, Zelda II (yes, one of my favorites) and other side scrolling rpg's (Faxanadu, Castlevania 2, etc).

Many were short on story, to an extent, but they offered great amount of secrets and game play content, something which I think many believe has been sacrificed in favor of realism. And... while realistic graphics are nice, there is something magically charming of Dragon Quest IV's graphics. Maybe it's because they remind us a time when games were simple and fun and not to be taken seriously as they now are.

 

[Vox Novus]

I don't think there can be much disagreement that nostalgia is a huge factor with this, people enjoy going back to a time where things were just about fun for them and etc... There is definitely more to it though, nostalgia only gets you so far. Older games seemed to deliver experiences that went behind simply what they looked like, they created experiences that were just fun for the player to play. Of course there were bad older games, I won't go into E.T. here but when they hit it right boy did they hit it right.

There's is a lot more finer things as well, like what was mentioned in Sharm's thread about what we can learn from mapping of older games. It was pointed out by Indrah I believe that a lot of good maps in older games told you "stories" or gave you the slightly subtle hints on where to go without saying it directly; things like that only capture a player's imagination without frustrating them.

I definitely feel a lot of titles back then were made with a very different passion than we see today from some companies and something like that shows through.

Whitesphere summed up some of what I wanted to say as well. Also I think Ms. Littlefish makes a good point in that simply using outdated mechanics because we love retro isn't the best design choice, a l lot of what we loved about those games aren't from frustrating mechanics by today's standards.

 

[amerk]

To sum up abit of Vox's comments:

I loved the innovation, the game play, the simplicity of the times, the maps and subtle clues, the experience, and the joy of figuring out a puzzle or getting passed a tough spot.

But I hated the heavy grinding, the translation in some of the games, the censorship going on during those times, the lack of save spots (back then saving on the world map was a blessing in disguise when many only allowed it in towns), and the tedious encounter rates.

What I would love to see is a return to older style games that uses the things we loved most and negates or changes the things we loved least.