SNES and NES make a comeback?

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HAPPYFACES
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 08:26

Today on my quest for the Holy Microphone in the land of Fred Meyer, I came across something unusual for a retail store.
I'm sorry I didn't grab a pic while it was there, but this rather caught me off guard:

There was a device called the "Retron", or something. And it was specifically tailored to play NES and SNES games! Now, right when I saw this I immediately thought, "This looks out of place," But on further inspection, it was completely new and the box looked pretty. I thought these things were only available via online shops and the like until now. I mean, an old gaming system on the shelf of a retail store? I was legitimately surprised.

Anyone else have this experience or are there any thoughts?

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idiot9.0
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 08:52

I'm not too surprised by this, one of the game stores at the mall in my area sells systems like that too, along with retro games. It's quite nice, seeing as you can't buy the original consoles in stores anymore and could run a pricey penny if you venture into online shopping sometimes. Plus the 2-in-1 part makes it very convenient, so you don't have to have two systems hooked up, leading to less power cord clutter.

I'd have one already if I had the money for it.

HAPPYFACES
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 09:49

It was simply unusual for me. For one, I've never seen anything like that in a retail store like Freddie's. Second, I thought people had given up on old school games. To clarify, I'm glad it was there. It could remind people that games aren't just about shooting and saving the world.

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renhoek
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 09:52

I had a store that sold old games/consoles, it got converted to a kids playground or something (it's what I've been told) but while it lasted I picked up a few game boy games like mario land, mario land 2, wario blast, etc.

HAPPYFACES
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 10:19

And that's why I'm losing hope in people's acknowledgement to the past. Man... What I would give to see a local gameshop that buys sells and trades everything old and new in tandem.

Camewel
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 14:56

The reason you don't see people playing/buying/selling/acknowledging old games is that they're not as good. Anyone who disagrees is either biased by nostalgia or terrified by change.

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TurretBot
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 15:51

I would go retro over an FPS any day.

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TheSeek
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 19:21

Camewel wrote:The reason you don't see people playing/buying/selling/acknowledging old games is that they're not as good. Anyone who disagrees is either biased by nostalgia or terrified by change.
Gotta say that i both agree and disagree with you on the reason why one would disagree with what you said...
First, my point of view is based on beating the games themselves and the challenge they give without multiplayer.
I have to say that yes, nostalgia takes a huge part in why i like old games, but taking that apart i also have to say that many of the old games I've played are harder and funnier thn the latest ones for the callenge they give...a good example would be fighting games, I can (relatively) easily beat any latest Tekken or Street Fighter at the hardest levels and they become boring quickly( I remember spending time learning almost every charachter moves in the Tekken training), yet games like Street Fighter 2, the SFAlpha series, the firsts King Of Fighters, they all still gives me some challenge even at the hardest levels and even at lesser levels, even if I'm playing them for more than 10 years.
Same applies with other games, like the first Contra on the NES, Metal Slug on the NeoGeo, Pop'n TwinBee on the SNES...I mean, one hit and you're down, a few lives, no save system, you need some skills to beat the game...not to mentions even older games like Wizard's Lair, Mutant Monty, Bonecruncher, or Mayhem In Monsterland(that game was techically amazing for the time), all on the Commodore64 and they all still stand a chance(and some even win hands down) with the latest games if we see them for the challenge they give to the player.
Of course there are still a lot of recent games which are way, way better than older ones on that side, but still saying that "old games are not as good" is a bit wrong, IMHO.

On topic: i remember buying a couple of cheap knock-off consoles full of NES games, but I've never seen stuff like Retron being sold in retail stores, but I'm sure I'd buy it if i should find one.

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Automatik
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 20:06

TheSeek wrote:a good example would be fighting games, I can (relatively) easily beat any latest Tekken or Street Fighter at the hardest levels and they become boring quickly( I remember spending time learning almost every charachter moves in the Tekken training), yet games like Street Fighter 2, the SFAlpha series, the firsts King Of Fighters, they all still gives me some challenge even at the hardest levels and even at lesser levels, even if I'm playing them for more than 10 years.
Arcade games were harder to invite the player to play( and pay) again.
And old games were generally harder because they couldn't fit a lot of content in a game(due to memory restriction).
Nowadays, we don't need that anymore, and casuals gamers don't like not to be able to beat a game.

On a side note, why most indie games are retro? Not only it don't look good(older games were meant to be played on a CRT, not on the "perfect" screen of a computer:I've read an article about that, but I don't have the link), but it's also not accurate to a "true" old game(no color palette, uncoherent pixel size...). They are just doing it because pixel art is easier to make, because Minecraft sold a lot, and because nostalgia.

HAPPYFACES
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 20:53

Is there something wrong with nostalgia that I'm missing? o-o Everyone seems to use it in a negative context.

Anyways, going off Seek here; I think it would be nice if this generation sees the past of gaming. What they had to do due to lack of memory, the kind of imaginations they had back then, and the crunching and practice it took to beat just a single level.
'Course, there are a plethora of current-gen games that do have a lot of thought and imagination in them, but those older games did it first. XD

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Mari0Maker
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 21:07

I've never heard of this, but I did see a Atari console "remake" a while ago...

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rokit
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 21:44

Turret Opera wrote:I would go retro over an FPS any day.
+1 apart from TF2

If Camewel is a cod fanboy then I lost faith in humanity.

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TheSeek
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 21:53

Automatik wrote: Arcade games were harder to invite the player to play( and pay) again.
And old games were generally harder because they couldn't fit a lot of content in a game(due to memory restriction).
Nowadays, we don't need that anymore, and casuals gamers don't like not to be able to beat a game.
Not entirely true.
Techically what you're saying is true(limitations in old games sometimes made them somewhat harder), but esecially with fighting games there is another thing to consider: the tons of moves the characters can do in nowadays games are not different from the combo you can do in older games like the ones i've said before, the only difference is that in older games they weren't in the "move list" due to memory restrictions like you said, but you can still perform a 20 or more hit combo in games like Street Figter 2 in which each character has just 5 or 7 moves in its "move list", even without using all of them.
Not to mention that there are games which actually have tons of moves even with all the restrictions, like Killer Instinct on the SNES or the DarkStalkers series.
Honestly i find it a bit frustrating to buy a fighting game and then being able to beat it with almost every character on the hardest level in a single day or 2 when on older games I had to spend days on a single character to master it.
Automatik wrote: On a side note, why most indie games are retro? Not only it don't look good(older games were meant to be played on a CRT, not on the "perfect" screen of a computer:I've read an article about that, but I don't have the link), but it's also not accurate to a "true" old game(no color palette, uncoherent pixel size...). They are just doing it because pixel art is easier to make, because Minecraft sold a lot, and because nostalgia.
I dunno why most indie games are like that, but what i know is that they're not retro, they're "pixel art", which is very different since it have no technical restrictions...pixel art is is made to be like that, pixelated, so the connection with "old games and CRT monitors" whern talking about indie games made like that is almost non-existent, that's why "they're not accurate", and games made with pixel art exist way before minecraft, and just cuz minecraft made pixel art go back in fashion it doesnt mean that every game made with pixel art after Minecraft is cuz of Minecraft being pooular.

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Automatik
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 22:20

HAPPYFACES wrote:Is there something wrong with nostalgia that I'm missing? o-o Everyone seems to use it in a negative context.
Nostalgia is having the clichée that (almost) every new game is bad and (almost) every old game is good.
Yes, there are tons of old goods games, yes you had ton of fun when playing these games, but that don't means that clichée is true.
Not entirely true.
Techically what you're saying is true(limitations in old games sometimes made them somewhat harder), but esecially with fighting games there is another thing to consider: the tons of moves the characters can do in nowadays games are not different from the combo you can do in older games like the ones i've said before, the only difference is that in older games they weren't in the "move list" due to memory restrictions like you said, but you can still perform a 20 or more hit combo in games like Street Figter 2 in which each character has just 5 or 7 moves in its "move list", even without using all of them.
Not to mention that there are games which actually have tons of moves even with all the restrictions, like Killer Instinct on the SNES or the DarkStalkers series.
Honestly i find it a bit frustrating to buy a fighting game and then being able to beat it with almost every character on the hardest level in a single day or 2 when on older games I had to spend days on a single character to master it.
Yes, new games are oversimplified. It's because casual gamers don't want to learn anything to play.
I agree, it make things less fun.
I dunno why most indie games are like that, but what i know is that they're not retro, they're "pixel art", which is very different since it have no technical restrictions...pixel art is is made to be like that, pixelated, so the connection with "old games and CRT monitors" whern talking about indie games made like that is almost non-existent, that's why "they're not accurate", and games made with pixel art exist way before minecraft, and just cuz minecraft made pixel art go back in fashion it doesnt mean that every game made with pixel art after Minecraft is cuz of Minecraft being pooular.
But they claim to be retro games.(At least those I was thinking to.) And making art then pixelating it isn't pixel art, It's trying to be retro. Pixel art is taking care of every pixel in yours sprites. It can be 1 pixel per pixel.(not upscaled)
rokit boy wrote:
Turret Opera wrote:I would go retro over an FPS any day.
+1 apart from TF2

If Camewel is a cod fanboy then I lost faith in humanity.
Stop circlejerking about how Cod is bad and how those who say it's not horrible are fanboys, it's dumb.
Sure, Cod has it's flaws(Trying to be realistic, unlike Tf2), but it's a decent game.
And Retro is a "style", and Fps a genre. A Retro Fps game is perfectly imaginable.

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TheSeek
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Post » 03 Mar 2013, 23:04

Automatik wrote: But they claim to be retro games.(At least those I was thinking to.) And making art then pixelating it isn't pixel art, It's trying to be retro. Pixel art is taking care of every pixel in yours sprites. It can be 1 pixel per pixel.(not upscaled)
I 100% agree on the concept cuz i know what pixel art is, but...can you make an example on the "making art then pixelating" where it was actually used in a game? Cuz im not sure what you mean, or to say it better, im not sure on how to visualize what you mean.

Camewel
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 03:28

HAPPYFACES wrote:Is there something wrong with nostalgia that I'm missing? o-o Everyone seems to use it in a negative context.
When someone picks up Super Mario Bros and plays if for the first time after playing better games, such as the New Super Mario Bros series, they won't think Super Mario Bros is as good (they'll be right). If someone grew up with Super Mario Bros, they'll think it's the best game in the world and that all this 'New Super Mario Bros' stuff is nonsense. They'll be biased and wrong, they only like it so much because they're so used to it.
rokit boy wrote:If Camewel is a cod fanboy then I lost faith in humanity.
The fact that you'd suggest that reminds me why I don't like you.
Automatik wrote:Stop circlejerking about how Cod is bad and how those who say it's not horrible are fanboys, it's dumb.
CoD is like Facebook in that they're both objectively not as good as other alternatives, it's just that all your friends are on it.
TheSeek wrote:Honestly i find it a bit frustrating to buy a fighting game and then being able to beat it with almost every character on the hardest level in a single day or 2 when on older games I had to spend days on a single character to master it.
You're generally better at gaming then you were back then so another game in a similar style will be easier for you to pick up and master. Sure, some franchises have decreasing difficulties, but there is no shortage of hard games still being made.

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TheSeek
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 04:39

Camewel wrote: When someone picks up Super Mario Bros and plays if for the first time after playing better games, such as the New Super Mario Bros series, they won't think Super Mario Bros is as good (they'll be right). If someone grew up with Super Mario Bros, they'll think it's the best game in the world and that all this 'New Super Mario Bros' stuff is nonsense. They'll be biased and wrong, they only like it so much because they're so used to it.
This is so true...when we talk about this kind of games where the gaming experience is basically the same(you can die for a piranha plant or a miscalculated jump both in older and newest games in the same way), saying the older were the best is just negative nostalgia.
Camewel wrote: You're generally better at gaming then you were back then so another game in a similar style will be easier for you to pick up and master. Sure, some franchises have decreasing difficulties, but there is no shortage of hard games still being made.
Well...I'd agree if my growing experience in fighting games made me able to easily handle any fighting game at its highest difficulty quickly, but is not the case: when I bought Tekken5 it took me 1 day to finish it with all the characters at the highest difficulty level, and at the end of the 2nd day I had learned all the moves of a few characters. But with Killer instinct, I haven't finished the game with all the characters at the highest difficulty level yet, and i'm particulary struggling with a specific character, and I'm playing this game since 1996. Sometimes is the experience maiking a game easy depending on who'splaying it, other times is the game being too much easy to master for pretty much anyone who puts a little effort in it.

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renhoek
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 04:55

I remember years ago I beat a boss of a game (I forget which game) and came back to the game a few years later replayed the boss and I could not beat him at all and wandered how the hell did I pass that guy when I was younger...

HAPPYFACES
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 05:36

Camewel wrote: CoD is like Facebook in that they're both objectively not as good as other alternatives, it's just that all your friends are on it.
So much truth.

Still, bias goes both ways. Sure, SMB may be bad in hindsight, but without it where would NSMB be? How could they even call it "New" without the original? In it's simplicity and challenging gameplay (If you don't use the warp pipes), it's good.

So, if you have only played NSMB and then looked at or played SMB, you're biased by the new age.
And if you find all the new stuff crap and SMB the golden age of Nintendo and Mario... Then yes, you're biased by nostalgia.

But who really gives a shit? It's a really good series in all. None of it is crap... Well, maybe except the idea for NSMB2... Coin collecting... really?
And if retail stores are now putting retro gaming on the shelves then I say "Hell yeah".

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rokit
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 21:50

One reason I hate cod is the kind of community that plays it. By that I mean "TROLOLO QUICKSCOPENOSCOPETRIKKERZSHOT IPWNDOWNDUANDSOISURMUM!!1!" and don't tell me that doesn't happen. That's what I mean by a Cod fanboy. The game itself is not as bad even though I myself don't like it.

So whenever I say cod fanboy I mean "the usual member of the cod community", and I don't have much against people playing it because I know that just because I don't like the game I can't make people not buy it.

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Automatik
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Post » 04 Mar 2013, 22:47

Camewel wrote:CoD is like Facebook in that they're both objectively not as good as other alternatives, it's just that all your friends are on it.
(I don't play Cod, I was just saying it's not terrible(terrible as in metascore<40%))

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domnitrolp
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Post » 06 Aug 2013, 23:23

Im so dissapointed that any of the retro/old consoles werent sold anywhere.
But sometimes you have problems too if you want to get a game for DS,so that is not wondering me :))
Yeah,you heard right,im from Germany.the...äääähm...outländer???:D:D:D

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