Replaying Old Games: The Importance of Graphics

[4RM3D]

Some games age better than others, whether it's because of the graphics, gameplay or something else.

Game that use sprites, cell shading or other stylish effects (like World of Wacraft) tend to last longer in the graphic department. I still find myself (re)playing Zelda on the Super Nintendo. The graphics still hold up, even today. But replaying, lets say, the original Tomb Raider makes my eyes bleed. Not to mention almost every game before the Super Nintendo era.

Normally, graphics are not that important to me. I'm more about the style and aesthetics (the look and feel). Besides, I play a lot of indie games with 'old school' graphics (e.g. Terrarria). It's just... I can't find myself replaying games that look ugly in this day and age, even though I enjoyed the games back in the day.

What do you think about replaying old games and graphics?

 

[Little Gray]

I am of the same opinion as you. If a game looks like ass then its not going to hold my attention for very long.

 

[DoPo]

I don't mind. I frequently replay Might and Magic 7 and Dungeon Keeper 2, both of which look quite bad - DK especially if you go into first person and M&M7 looked bad even when I picked it up (heck, it looked bad for 1999, I played it in 2002-ish). I've been playing some Blood 2, as well, which...is worse than I remember, but that's not really due to looks but rather other stuff (AI opponents immediately lunge for you, even if they see just your toenail and you haven't had a chance to see them. Some monsters die really hard. Some level annoyances.). There is also Arcanum

I also frequently play other older games (as in, like a decade old. Seems that's "old" by some standards) but the looks aren't really be as bad as these - Half-Life, Fable: TLC, Red Alert 2, StarCraft, Quake 3.

Dunno where to place Heroes 3, though - I'm not sure if it'd be considered "ugly". But I like it.

 

[krazykidd]

I don't care about graphics . They were good enough for me then. They are good enough for me now . At least i can feel priviledged to be able to play and enjoy old gems , while others cannot . Graphics don't make the game . It just enhances the experience , ever so slightly

 

[piinyouri]

It depends.
Old games I enjoyed in their time, I can go back for the most part now and enjoy them just as much.

Games that I didn't play in their time however, tend to be very very difficult for me to get into.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Graphics are no big deal, unless they're truly eye searing or the game is one that leaned heavily on the quality of its visuals and has little to offer in the game play department.

Far, far, far more important than graphics when it comes to retro-gaming is the UI. Cumbersome, clunky or painful UI experiences will derail a happy memory far quicker than any aged graphics could ever hope to. It's part of the reason I won't hesitate to recommend, say, Planescape Torment to someone, but I won't recommend Ultima IV. Not because the latter isn't an excellent game and important RPG, but because Planescape won't provoke 1/10th of the UI agony.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Graphics rarely keep me from enjoying a game. About the only time that they do negatively impact my enjoyment is when they're bad enough to impact the gameplay -- objects that you're supposed to be able to see completely blending into the background, for example. They can /positively/ impact my enjoyment -- for example, Morrowind is a great game stock, but with graphics mods it does an even better job of sucking me into its alien world -- but not so much negatively.

 

[Little Gray]

Graphics are no big deal, unless they're truly eye searing or the game is one that leaned heavily on the quality of its visuals and has little to offer in the game play department.

Far, far, far more important than graphics when it comes to retro-gaming is the UI. Cumbersome, clunky or painful UI experiences will derail a happy memory far quicker than any aged graphics could ever hope to. It's part of the reason I won't hesitate to recommend, say, Planescape Torment to someone, but I won't recommend Ultima IV. Not because the latter isn't an excellent game and important RPG, but because Planescape won't provoke 1/10th of the UI agony.

That cant be true. I refuse to believe there is a game out there that actually has a worse UI then Planescape.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I would edit this into my previous post, but since BloatedGuppy won't get a notification if I do, I'm making this one:

Graphics are no big deal, unless they're truly eye searing or the game is one that leaned heavily on the quality of its visuals and has little to offer in the game play department.

Far, far, far more important than graphics when it comes to retro-gaming is the UI. Cumbersome, clunky or painful UI experiences will derail a happy memory far quicker than any aged graphics could ever hope to. It's part of the reason I won't hesitate to recommend, say, Planescape Torment to someone, but I won't recommend Ultima IV. Not because the latter isn't an excellent game and important RPG, but because Planescape won't provoke 1/10th of the UI agony.

I agree with this whole heartedly. For an extreme example, it's why I can't get into Dwarf Fortress at all but enjoy the occasional round of Nethack. For a less extreme example, it's why I have a hard time going back to most pre-Duke Nukem 3D FPS games that lack source ports -- there's often no way to circle strafe without either contorting your hands into a ridiculous position or using both a joystick and your keyboard. This is despite the fact that the difficulty quickly ramps up to a point where you really need to be able to do that.

 

[The Madman]

I play Dwarf Fortress and Nethack, frankly I'm just happy when an old game *has* graphics. The only time it really bothers me is when it's just an eye searingly bad art-style, but in terms of polygons and such, nah, I still replay the originals fairly often.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

That cant be true. I refuse to believe there is a game out there that actually has a worse UI then Planescape.

Dude, Planescape is practically state of the art. I still cringe a bit when I have to refer to it as an "older game".

Here's Ultima IV.

20 minutes in Britannia and you'd be begging for that sweet, sweet Torment interface.

I agree with this whole heartedly. For an extreme example, it's why I can't get into Dwarf Fortress at all but enjoy the occasional round of Nethack.

It's my stumbling block for Dwarf Fortress as well. Give me a mouse driven GUI for that game and I'm all over it, but I'm done with memorizing complex keyboard commands. Done I say! I did my time! I slaved in the DOS mines!

 

[HoboToben]

Selling a game through graphics is a way of encapsulating the people who see 3D as a selling feature when buying a cinema ticket. If a game has very good looking graphics, I am obviously going to have the proverbial breath taken from my lungs (Nods to the opening scene of Bioshock Infinite)But if it's all mouth and no trousers, I'll find myself turning it off and walking away. Deus Ex: Human Revolution was a classic case of this, for me.

Two games I have only just finished are Doom and Doom 2.

We'll not mention the 3rd installment, if that's okay with you....

Excellent gameplay, straight forward controls and not top of the range graphics. But, it suited it perfectly. I enjoyed putting a bullet through a demons skull, without a fountain of red blood cascading over my screen, as Gears of War would have put it. Hell, play 'Thomas was Alone' on Steam. It's bleeding Rectangles! That jump! No bells and whistles, but one of the most awesome games I have played for a while. And it wasn't because it was the gaming embodiment of Rembrandt.

I could go on about how graphics are only aesthetic, but it's a age thing, isn't it? When gaming first came into the world, we were blown away by 8 bit,16 bit, 32 bit, 64 bit. And now? We need a explosion so realistic, it'll take your eyebrows off.

 

[Vegosiux]

.

Here's Ultima IV.

For a moment there I thought that was Excelsior, on a quick glance. But yeah, completely agreed about the interface.

 

[Chester Rabbit]

Seeing how it almost literally just seems like it was yesterday to me that the PS1 graphics were the standard for games I have no problem throwing myself back into the past and "enduring" some old graphics. I can see past. And I must admit I kind of really like the old graphics due to the fact that they couldn't do as much as they can now with the models so it leaves a lot for the imagination to fill in.

 

[Little Gray]

That cant be true. I refuse to believe there is a game out there that actually has a worse UI then Planescape.

Dude, Planescape is practically state of the art. I still cringe a bit when I have to refer to it as an "older game".

What are you talking about the Planescape UI was terrible. Sure it worked fine if you never ever got into a fight but if you did it was just a clunky pain in the ass. I think we are going to have to agree to disagree though because the UI was literally the thing that made me throw planescape in the garbage.

As for the picture you showed its hard to tell since I never played the game.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

What are you talking about the Planescape UI was terrible. Sure it worked fine if you never ever got into a fight but if you did it was just a clunky pain in the ass. I think we are going to have to agree to disagree though because the UI was literally the thing that made me throw planescape in the garbage.

As for the picture you showed its hard to tell since I never played the game.

I think you're taking all this a little too seriously, Little Gray. The point I was trying to make was not that Planescape plays like a dream...obviously it's plonky by modern standards. But that it wasn't that long ago for me that Planescape WAS the modern standard, and it was a huge improvement on the plonky games that preceded it.

Trust me...if Planescape and its ilk are an issue for you, going 10 years earlier would make you want to start cutting. That was the point I was making.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

Old graphics are fine for me if I loved the game back in the day. Final Fantasy VII and VIII are...well, they are not exactly shining. But I still love playing them. After my mind re-adapts to their style, I don't even notice anymore. Graphics tend to be at the bottom of my list of things that concern me.

I often feel that better graphics tend to take away from other aspects of the game even. Remember when the developer for Crysis said that games are %60 graphics? That's when I finally understood while their games never appealed to me. They focused on something that just isn't that important in my mind, and they made it their main selling point.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Ehhhh whatever, if the game bothered to come up with a unique artstyle then age is practically a non-issue. Okami anyone?

I mean look at BlazBlue. That is never going to get dated. Ever.

I'm going through System Shock 2 for the first time and fuck it is still scary. You know, proper atmosphere building and shit? Kinda important.


And jump scares STILL WORK with all the shit low res graphics. I had to turn Hardware Acceleration off though because I had no audio at all otherwise. (good port, good port) So that'll make it look more like arse. Literally hit the first enemies then quit. Totes the sort of game you play in short bursts. I accidentally picked the starting Psi path as well, I hear wrong builds can fuck you over later on and I have no interest in Psi crap. Just give me a gun.

I SWEAR Persona 4: The Golden looks worse than Persona 4 on the PS2 from the screenshots i've seen. Tell me they didn't do a Silent Hill 2 and remove all the fog? That's the twatting point you noob. Oh and I hear they replaced Pursuing My True Self with some new crap as the opening. From bad to worse I tell you...

I doubt i'll ever be this much of a purist about anything else but you don't NEED to add anything to it. It's perfectly fine as it stands. No super evil betrayal ending that ruins the entire point of the game good job Atlus you tards or anything. Yes you don't NEED to take it but it doesn't NEED to be in the game in the first place.

You know I seriously think Persona 4 is pretty much perfect in every way right? Because it is. I thought it through and everything!

Fuck it, i'll get a Vita with my birthday money and see if this shit is any good or if i'm right in my assumption that adding more shit for its own sake is not necessarily a good thing. FUCKING BETRAYAL ENDING MAN! I'm annoyed that's even a thing. What is this? SMT Nocturne?