What made you 'go retro'?

[NE146]

I never "went" retro.. As a kid in the 70's seeing the newfangled video games come into existence, they were always about what was NEW and cutting edge, and they kind of still are.

 

The only difference is the new stuff mostly added to, and not replaced the games I enjoyed. So I just never abandoned the old stuff and always kept them around, like a packrat, ... even if it meant storage in boxes under my bed for several years

Edited January 22, 2017 by NE146

[keepdreamin]

Pointing out critical flaws with todays gaming is jaded? Seriously maybe its the other way around and youre the one who needs to stop and THINK before calling someone pathetic, man. I've seen lots of modern gamers who don't even involve themselves in retro gaming complain about the state of modern gaming today. Youre coming off a wee bit defensive. And to address your point..sure its nice to have games patched and working properly. But to see countless patches that break things that were already working pretty well isn't what I call a good patch. Look at the Witcher 3 on consoles. They've had to patch it so many times that it often took away from an area of the game that was working great before,but then went wasn't working so great after that patch. Sure its working good now, but how many patches were issues before things finally settled down. Thats the stuff I'm speaking about here. Not pathetic, just calling a spade a spade and this happens far too often today.

 

 

 

The outlook is pathetic, I don't know you from Adam to call you outright a pathetic person. Just like it's possible to have a bad idea, doesn't mean you're a bad person. Capiche?

 

Games are multi million dollar endeavors with many year development cycles. They're essentially infinitely more complex. Go watch the credit roll for the Witcher 3 vs any NES game. Gone are the days when a team of 5-10 people can churn out major industry leading software (they weren't bug free either, BTW). Regardless of how many play testers they hire, there is no way they could test every possible scenario in games which the activities the player can produce ramp in number exponentially. Games would never see release, budgets would run over. They need those millions of copies out there with on going testing and active patching. It's the price of doing business.

 

If you want bug free games (again, no games were truly bug free) , then hardware/games advancements should have ended in the 16 bit era. Which some may say is an awesome idea, but then games like the aforementioned Witcher 3, The Last of Us, Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid etc... would never have been made. I for one, and glad that isn't the case.

[The Usotsuki]

When I started, the games I was playing were new. I just never dropped them, and play some of the same ones 30 years later.

[juansolo]

Really interesting this. Been a gamer all my life, as have friends and I wonder if it's a UK thing were when we move on, we tend to move on the old kit. Mainly down to a lack of space. Though also to help fund replacements in my case. For instance I remember selling my ST to help fund the PC that replaced it (all to play Doom).

[Asaki]

Like everyone else, I just never stopped playing the old games. There's certain favorites that I have to replay every so often, and Heaven knows my backlog of unplayed/unbeaten games just keeps getting bigger and bigger >_< Especially now that money/eBay/flash carts/etc. make is so much easier to play whatever I want.

 

Although I do get a bug sometimes to collect stuff I never had as a kid...maybe stuff other kids had (Virtual Boy, Game Boy Pocket, Playstation), or relatives (Sega CD, Sega Saturn), or at school (Apple ][), or maybe just stuff I missed out on (Dreamcast).

 

You prefer game breaking bugs in $60 products stay unfixed? Uhh, why?

Well back in the day, they had to do lots of proper playtesting, and had to pass Nintendo/Sega/etc. quality control before the game could go gold.

 

Today you can just ban websites from posting negative reviews, and release a half-finished game, hoping that fan backlash won't hurt sales too much, and that all will be forgiven when the patch eventually comes out. And the next patch. And the patch after that. And the $30 DLC that adds back in some of the features that were promised at E3 =)

 

...I wonder if it's a UK thing were when we move on, we tend to move on the old kit.

It's not just a UK thing, we definitely know how to keep GameStop in business here in the USA.

Edited January 22, 2017 by Asaki

[adamchevy]

Boredom and a desire to play games I've never played. Also, hindsight is 20/20. It makes choosing a great game to play very easy.

[Flojomojo]

Really interesting this. Been a gamer all my life, as have friends and I wonder if it's a UK thing were when we move on, we tend to move on the old kit. Mainly down to a lack of space. Though also to help fund replacements in my case. For instance I remember selling my ST to help fund the PC that replaced it (all to play Doom).

 

Nah, I think that's what most people do with their old stuff. Hanging on to old things is an AtariAge thing.

 

I have a friend (mid-40s with kids) who trades in stuff to GameStop for credit all the time, just like a teenager might. He gets to try and play a lot more that way.

 

Not me ... I'm a bit more choosy, and haven't traded anything in for ages. Several years ago I went digital-only because: I only buy what I like, I don't want to trade anything in for pennies on the dollar, and I like having stuff around so I can easily go back to it to replay (or finally start) without clutter. I've boxed myself into never selling off my old stuff, it's bound to me now.

[keepdreamin]

Today you can just ban websites from posting negative reviews, and release a half-finished game, hoping that fan backlash won't hurt sales too much, and that all will be forgiven when the patch eventually comes out. And the next patch. And the patch after that. And the $30 DLC that adds back in some of the features that were promised at E3 =)

 

 

Well, back in the day Nintendo also had unfair non-compete clauses for developers too. And they'd sue the pants off em if they even decided to try and get a game on competitor's hardware. So.... I'd say today's the better situation.

[sega_SHARK]

I never really stopped playing NES games. After '88, I've always has an NES or emulator to play that system.

 

PSN network crash happened and I decided to learn how to get my Dreamcast online again.

 

I had a broadband adaptor shipped to my house and the Dreamcast was online faster than the PS3. (23 day outage for PSN)

 

Bought a ColecoVision because I remembered the old comic book ads that used to show off it's sweet graphics.

 

Never looked forward again.

[Tanooki]

Guess it dates me, but I got into if you could even call it retro yet in 1995. Local shop where I lived then, almost everything NES and Gameboy wise was $5, some of it was in the $10-15 range but almost nothing higher (ex: perspective, loose game or complete didn't raise price, Dragon Warrior IV was the most expensive NES game at $50 while stuff like Bubble Bobble 2, Bonk, Samson were $10-20 games pre-moving away end of 02.)

 

When I was in college I'd give myself usually a $20/wk budget to hit that shop and it worked out well. I got into it because Sony spun up so many media lies about the n64 being a kiddie box with no T/M games (despite the fact it had more in the same first year than PS1 did.) The games dried up to like one every quarter or half year I'd buy until their late 99 comeback with RR64, RE2, MM64, etc. I got bored. So I started buying up NES, GB, and SNES games I missed out on. He also had a stellar stack of mostly complete TG16 HuCards and CDs, so I went and broke from Nintendo and via Turbo Zone Direct(remember them?) bought a Turbo Duo and opened up my options and stuck with it for years. Later 3 weeks into it, in 99 I picked up my first new Sega, a Dreamcast, best system they ever made.

[Dashopepper]

Around the time of the Wii I lost interest in modern gaming and started buy "new" old games for my old consoles. Then I thought maybe some cool boxed stuff for my shelf. Then full blown retro gaming and collecting. I still play modern games as well old. Anyone who dismisses modern games for whatever reason are just as ignorant as those who dismiss retro games. There is such a broad range of games both new and old that anyone who draws the line at a certain point of time doesn't have a full understanding of the medium.

[Austin]

No epiphany for me. "Retro" wasn't really even a term for me until recently. I grew up with these games and simply never stopped playing them.

[fiddlepaddle]

...Anyone who dismisses modern games for whatever reason are just as ignorant as those who dismiss retro games. There is such a broad range of games both new and old that anyone who draws the line at a certain point of time doesn't have a full understanding of the medium...

Not true. Show me a modern game that starts in less than 2 seconds...very few, if any.

[Dashopepper]

Not true. Show me a modern game that starts in less than 2 seconds...very few, if any.

True. Let me show you 1000 steam (aka) pc games and 2000 phone and tablet games released in this year alone that you can start up and get playing just as fast as your Atari.

 

As I stated in my post you are ignorant to the breadth of modern games as some people are about retro. Its like saying all games from the early 80's are arcade-y.

[juansolo]

Yeah things like Inside and Trials Fusion (I've just finished the former and am utterly addicted to the latter). Both are modern games with an old flavour that play really well. That said I'm also running through Skyrim again. Even though it's a bugfest still (Bethesda...), it's still a great game. The new Doom also has a lot going for it.

I held off getting a PS4 until only recently and I'm glad I did. There's some good titles on it and they're not horrifically expensive now. Don't get me wrong there's a lot I don't like; pay for online play is a big one, so is it's insistence on installing every game to the HDD, necessitating swapping in a 2TB drive to make it actually usable. Oh and the patches, the endless patches... But as has been said, that's modern gaming for you. Try and avoid the bug-ridden unfinished games, the DLC-fests when they release half of a game (or less Forza 5!) and expect you to pay again and again to get the rest of it that is already in there and just needs unlocking... I'm quite proud of the fact that I don't own a COD or FIFA game for the PS4 in fact as that's not what I bought it to play. I still however think they're worthy. Not as worthy as many consoles that have come before it. But cheap enough now that I'm glad I bought one.

Edited January 23, 2017 by juansolo

[+-^CrossBow^-]

For me I started with an old Odyssey 300 pong clone in the house. Got my first 2600 in Christmas '82. Eventually I got the 7800 in '88 I believe. I did play and wanted the NES as my step brother had gotten one in '86 or '87 and used to bring it over to the house when he and his sisters visted. But since the NES was so expensive at the time, the 7800 was the best I was able to convince my parents to get. Anway, in the summer of '89 just a year later, we bought our fist actually home PC. A really nice 286 based system with lots of expansion abilities..etc. From there I pretty much stopped playing consoles completely and became strictly a PC gamer for the next decade. Then sometime around '99 I discovered emulation from a co-worker. I started messing around with them and really found that I like GENs and a few others and was having a blast playing lots of the older 16bit games that I never played when they were new.

 

Anyway, that prompted me to ask my parents about the 7800 I had shelved back in late '89 after we got the PC and retrieve it from the garage. Cleaned it and the games up and had fun all through that night just playing my old 7800 games again. That then prompted me to look at getting a used Genesis since I had enjoyed GENs so much. It kinda just developed from there.

 

These days I tend to play my retro consoles much more than any of my newer systems. I still haven't picked up an XB1 or PS4 and not sure if I ever really will. No plans to get a switch currently either. I just like plugging in a cart...and instantly being able to play a game.

[Silverfleet]

Like many others, I never "went retro". I just kept playing the games I always have played. I did, however, start hoarding classic games beginning around 2000-01. Back then, no one wanted old games, and I would find lots of games at yard sales and flea markets dirt cheap. I also hit up Gamestop and some other local stores to pick up cheap games. Now, I tend to seek out individual titles to round out the collection rather than buy in bulk.

[Flojomojo]

I still play modern games as well old. Anyone who dismisses modern games for whatever reason are just as ignorant as those who dismiss retro games. There is such a broad range of games both new and old that anyone who draws the line at a certain point of time doesn't have a full understanding of the medium.

 

I couldn't agree more.

 

There is no "retro," there is no "modern," there are just "games." Very few games are sold in physical stores after a year or so. That doesn't make them retro, or better/worse than anything else before or since. I'm doing a lot more retro-style gaming in this decade than I did in the 2000's, because of things like Unity, Game Jams, mobile, emulation, re-releases, and indie games everywhere.

 

Genres, labels, and categories don't really matter to me. Nothing makes my eyes roll harder than people splitting hairs over Wikipedia's list of generations. There are whole threads of butthurt here about how the Atari 5200 doesn't belong in the same category as the Atari 2600!

 

[BillLoguidice]

Like others, I never left to go back to retro. I was always retro, endlessly fascinated in technology, new and old, and game experiences, new and old. I live equally with the new and old stuff. Perhaps one day I'll get "too old" and lose interest in the new stuff and wallow in the warm fuzzies and nostalgia of the old stuff, but I hope that day never comes. There are so many wonderful new things to experience in addition to all the retro stuff.

[+GoldenWheels]

Some people never left. Well, I left. There were "better" and "deeper" games to play, so I moved to those, each generation, and don't regret it. I don't know where all you box-keepers and collectors were when I was a kid, but in my neighborhood the kid playing on the last gen system (Atari to NES, NES to SNES, whatever) was practically on Molokai.

 

Then there were girls, and old (hell, MOST) video games suddenly seem super-unimportant.

 

But seeing Nesticle on a college friend's computer lit a spark for me sometime in the early 2000s, save states having a LOT to do with it. I did that for a few years, but I also dug out my old gear. Started ebaying. The rest is history. A history where I have a bigger bank account.

[fiddlepaddle]

True. Let me show you 1000 steam (aka) pc games and 2000 phone and tablet games released in this year alone that you can start up and get playing just as fast as your Atari.

 

As I stated in my post you are ignorant to the breadth of modern games as some people are about retro. Its like saying all games from the early 80's are arcade-y.

You're right...I completely forgot about phone games; I guess I was thinking about console games and all those infuriating IP screens at start up.

[Flojomojo]

You're right...I completely forgot about phone games; I guess I was thinking about console games and all those infuriating IP screens at start up.

 

That's one reason us Touch Arcade types like phone games as much as we do. Get in and game!

[kyle]

I really only had a short seven your gap of not playing Atari looking back on it. I put my 7800 in the attic in 1995 I went to my moms and found it in the attic in 2002 and I've been collecting ever since. But you know 1995 to 2002 to the ages of 15 to 22 sure seemed like a long time. Seven years goes by like a blur now .

Edited January 23, 2017 by kyle

[accousticguitar]

I bought an Atari 2600 when Space Invaders came out and then sold it right after buying Pac-Man. I went about 20 years without playing retro games, then I spotted an Intellivision with a whole box of games at a pawn shop for $80. I sprung for it and then a while later got a 7800. The collection kind of snowballed out of control after that.

[Eltigro]

I would imagine that there are people all over who never stopped playing the old games. I imagine that there are fewer of them than there are people who would toss the old stuff in favor of the new for every "generation". I think that here, in these forums, there are a higher concentration of those who never stopped, than in the general populace. Many of us are older, so we played these games when they were "current". I grew up with a 2600. I grew up with an NES. I never really stopped playing them, I just added newer stuff as it came out. I mean, I didn't have a 2600 for quite a while, but getting one this last Christmas wasn't me "go retro" or even "going back to retro". It was just me picking up another old console that I used to have.

 

It's kind of like asking a vase from the Ming dynasty, "How did you go about becoming an antique." We didn't really do anything, we just continued existing.

 

Now, I can see this question being aimed more toward a younger generation. Those who weren't around when the pinnacle of home video games was black and white graphics, overlays, and hardwired controllers. I mean, if they grew up with the PS2, then yeah, there might have been some point where they said, "Hey, I want to give this Atari thing a try." Or there may be the older gamers who had the "out with the old, in with the new" mindset until at some point, nostalgia hit them and they said, "I want to get an Atari again." But most of us here, aren't those two types of gamers.