The Nostalga Effect: Or How Old School Games Dont Rock That Hard

Is it just me or in every video game conversation someone innevitably says "Man I miss the colecovision" or whatever old system fits your fancy. Then everyone turns and goes "Yeah those were so l33t super cool LOLL LMAO ROFL " or whatever AOL chat speak you prefer.

Is it just me or does this piss you off?

A. Most people never played a Colecovision, Atari, or whatever, and just say this to look cool.

B. Some games that are truly classics are hard to go back and play.

Is it just me or does anyone else have the fondest memories of playing Command and Conquer but find it hard to bear today?

Has anyone gone back and tried to fire up oh say Resident Evil Directors Cut?

IMO there is a nostalga effect. Your memories of a game smooth over its rough edges, but if you go back and try to relive those days you leave unsatisfied.

Maybe its because we are too accustomed to cutting edge graphics and gameplay, but I for one can only really replay an old game if it is latter era PS1.

I grew up with Nintendo but you dont see me playing Rampage day in and day out.

Maybe Im just ranting, or maybe Im on to something here.

Erm..
If youve become so accustomed to state of the art graphics and etc, then you play too many games lol.

I still go back to NES (thats without the super) and play games..

Just gotta look past the graphics and see the work that they actually put into the game.

Now if youll excuse me, im going to go play Earthbound.

Originally posted by shidge.
Now if youll excuse me, im going to go play Earthbound.

Now there was an old game I could play. Or at least I think I could play.

Its always different when you fire up your NES or SNES and actually start playing.

I kinda like old games better.. They seem to be more original and not so "geared" towards a certain audience. One of my favorite addictions of choice is Bust-A-Move.

I have probably stopped breathing so many times by just playing that game for hours on end lol

I cant really think of any Nintendo 64 games that really caught my attention and stayed in my memory as a "classic". Hrm.

Originally posted by shidge.
Nintendo 64 .

Well theres where you went wrong I kid

Ive tried to go back and play red alert or starlancer and I just dont enjoy myself as much as I use .

[Edited on 9-7-2004 by Agent47]

I still play shadowrun and ps4 on gens emulator. I don't say them to try and be some l33t ninja gamer, but because they still rock, Shadowrun you get to be a shadowrunner, I always choose the samurai, stock up on cyberware and then go unleash my might on the corporations in the game.

Phantasy Star 4 has awesome chrs! Rune, Wren, Alys, they all rule!

Now another game that is probably my all time favorite game is Star Control II for the 3DO, that game was so beyond it's time it's unreal, had an awesome story line and aliens!

The 3DO system was the christ of consoles at the time, too bad Homer J is a moron.

/mourns 3DO

Originally posted by Lysergic
I don't say them to try and be some l33t ninja gamer

I didnt mean to suggest any supporters of old school are trying to be.

I just sometimes feel the old school aspect is overhyped. Some areas people label old school arent that great while things like the 3D0 get no attention.

Man the 3DO was godly. Gex back then oh my, having a 32 bit system while everyone played their l33t ass PSone. bwahahaha.

For reals though, Star Control 2, was so sweet, all the aliens spoke to you, you didn't have to read anything, just pick your reply and listen to the voices, was gravy.

You gotta understand that was almost unheard of at the time, and the gaphics were so sekzay! wooo, I get moist just thinking about it. Sadly I loaned the 3DO to my lil brother who totally destroyed it


/weeps

PS: In my opinion Atari and any of those other crappy preNES systems totally #ing suck. And you can take that to the bank, gaming didn't rock unitl nintendo/sega came around

pps: and the atari jaguar /barf

psps: it sucked almost as much as the phillips CD-I the first model which had no game pad but a tv remote you had to use!

PPSPS: Dude Mechwarrior 3050 straight up rocked my ass as one of my first pc gaming expriences, however there is no way in hell I could be forced to play that blocky ass game now.

[Edited on 9-7-2004 by Lysergic]

I went back and tried to play Tekken 2 today.

It was so bad at one point my hands refused to comply with my combos I wanted to punch in.

I dont find any classic games annoying to play now because I suck too much at these stupid PS2 and xbox games, they have too many buttons and you cant just randomly smash all of the buttons and win.

Thats why I prefer Super Nintendo- Street Fighter TURBO!

Originally posted by Agent47
Is it just me or in every video game conversation someone innevitably says "Man I miss the colecovision" or whatever old system fits your fancy. Then everyone turns and goes "Yeah those were so l33t super cool LOLL LMAO ROFL " or whatever AOL chat speak you prefer.

Is it just me or does this piss you off?

I think you're way off base here.

Some people may say it to sound cool but I think the majority is sincere.

I loved the old systems and I still do, since I still have them and play them every once in a while. I've been playing Vid Games since 1982. Just so you know here is where I started.

1) ATARI 2600
2) SEGA MASTER SYSTEM
3) NES
4) SEGA GENESIS
5) Turgo Graphx 16
6) NINTENDO SNES
7) SONY PSX
8) N64
9) SEGA DC
10) PS2
11) Gamecube
12) XBOX
13) PC - My pride and Joy in Gaming!

People pay too much attention these days on fancy graphics and all that superficial # that doesnt really mean anything if you dont have the gameplay to back it up. That's what missing from 90% of the new games that come out these days, they are not fun to play. That's what set the classics appart.....they were actually fun to play. If game developers today paid as much attention to gameplay as they did to graphics we would have a #load of great games coming out.

Originally posted by Ocelot

I loved the old systems and I still do, since I still have them and play them every once in a while. I've been playing Vid Games since 1982. Just so you know here is where I started.

Im sorry if I rubbed you wrong Ocelot, my comments were geared toward members of my age group.

The earliest system I played was an NES and that was a blast.

You have a long and distinguished gaming experience so more to you.

in the order i played them

atari
sega master
nes
snes
gens - sega cd - 32x
3DO
PC
PSone
N64
ps2
xbox - lil bros

however I must agree with ocelot, PC > All

[Edited on 10-7-2004 by Lysergic]

The nostaglia effect is less about a certain old game being better than it is about US being different then (the players) IMO.

Take Atari games for example. Some of the very first games most people were exposed to outside an arcade (which pretty much were just Atari games like Pong anyway).

Combat? Freaking brilliant! It was (at least my) first exposure to two player, real time gaming with what seemed like virtually unlimited options. Of course, by today's standards it's a joke. But try to get two kids to basically do geometry for 10 hours now (which is all Combat was).

And what about Adventure? My God that was like opening up a new world to people. Who didn't not only solve it once, but like 10,000 times in every conceivable way possible? And the "hidden room"...it was the very first hidden anything EVER in a game. Finding that (then) was like...well it was pretty close to a religious experience.

You didn't play expecting something to be hidden. You couldn't log onto the net and get the cheats. You had no expectations, and were simply floored with each and every aspect of the games.

Ahhh, innocence.

It's the same with movies. "Resevoir Dogs" doesn't "rock" if you watch it now...but it did 15 years ago. Watching "Terminator" now I just laugh. But in the context of the times...all the groundbreaking stuff rocked and relatively puts today's crap to shame IMO.

Death to cheaters, cheaters only cheat themselves!!!!!!!! BOOOO!!!!! BOOO!!!!!!!
*pulls a snake out of a hand bag*
*hiss*

and if you cheat in online games, I hope you choke.

[Edited on 10-7-2004 by Lysergic]

Originally posted by Agent47
Im sorry if I rubbed you wrong Ocelot, my comments were geared toward members of my age group.

Well, I don't understand your point, especially if your age group hasn't played much.

I have never played the old Atari, Commodore 64, or Colecovision systems, but I did play the PC games of the late '80s and early to mid-'90s. I thought those games were superior to those of today. Besides a few exceptions, there aren't many PC games out there that have the same kind of depth that the old games did.

I also miss adventure games. That was the genre of the day. I loved a game with a really good story, a good cast of characters, and really cool gameplay that required every bit of thinking and skill. I love games that really involve you. Games like the King's Quest series, Gabriel Knight, Police Quest, Full Throttle, Sam & Max Hit the Road, are all classics.

Not that today's game are bad. But it seems like there are less quality games out there these days. Depth is a word that seems to have been forgotten these days.

here's the order i which I played the systems!

Super NES
arcade
Super NES
arcade
Sega ( Dont remember what it was called, the one where you put in a cd i think)- awesome system, anyone remember Knights??!?! I LOVE IT
Super NES

Back in 1990 the apple mac plus was king. I remember playing games like bird race, apache strike, journey man, shuffle puck, etc. It wasn't until later when the internet came out out that I made the switch to PC. Sad truth is more people use the PC. The apple is built for graphics. But you can't argue with free games.

Games that haven't lost their touch are Pacman, Digger, Tetris, and Bricks.

And not to mention the handheld games which had no graphics at all like teenage mutant hero turtles. Kind of like the first gameboy that came out. It wasn't until 1993 when Sega released an extraordinary handheld gaming device. The though eludes me.

Originally posted by sweatmonicaIdo


Well, I don't understand your point, especially if your age group hasn't played much.

I dont understand this sentence.

Are you trying to provoke me or am I simply misreading it.