Retro Takes on Modern, Wins!

Well hello everyone! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Mike. I’m 22 years old and I’ve been here at Thumbmonkey for three years now. I am a jack of many trades here at Thumbmonkey. Typically I am the man who picks and packs all of your orders (except the ones that are wrong or damaged or missing altogether, that’s someone else), and will from time to time ship them out as well. On top of that I have a variety of other tasks here that I will not bore you with. Just know that I’ve been around the Thumbmonkey block.

Now I’ve been playing video games for quite a while. Being 22, I grew up in the late 80s and early 90s, and I started gaming at the perfect time. It was around the time that the NES was losing steam but still relevant, and the SNES and Genesis were really beginning to get the kids excited. I’ve owned every major console since the 16 bit era, and became more and more in love with games as I got older. So in love, in fact, that I went to college and got my Bachelor’s Degree in Game Art & Design. It is my goal to some day create the games that I will love.

Favorites of mine include the Metal Gear Solid series, the Banjo-Kazooie series, the Legend of Zelda series, the Phoenix Wright series, and of course, any major Mario platformer. And while I have a massive game collection and am constantly out buying the newest titles, there’s something about old games that prevents me from keeping up with today’s gaming scene as much as I can.

Here’s the thing. Just recently, I’ve discovered I missed all the hits back in the day. Sure I played the Sonics and the Marios, but there were plenty of big titles that I missed out on. So while I try to catch up with modern games, there are old titles that I’m discovering for the first time that get me hooked far more.

For example, this year I played Chrono Trigger for the first time. Created by then SquareSoft (now Square Enix) and released in 1995, this is a time-traveling RPG with an addictive combat system, a wonderful story, a stunning soundtrack, and graphics that still hold up to this day. At the same time, I was trying to play Fallout 3. Guess which game is collecting dust? I am not giving you time to guess, although I suppose this sentence has given you more than enough time to think this over to come to a conclusion, especially given the article title. Fallout 3. Great game, don’t get me wrong, but Chrono Trigger roped me in.

Still beautiful after all these years.

Why, you ask? Fallout 3’s graphics are unmatched, the gameplay is fun, the world is massive and demands hours upon hours of exploration! The story is gripping, the mood and atmosphere perfectly matches what a post-apocalypse world would actually be like! This “Chrono Trigger” I speak of is… is… old! Well let me tell you something. A lot of people play the retro games because they grew up with it. A lot of people think you had to be there to appreciate it. But the fact of the matter is, good gameplay never ages. Chrono Trigger’s combat system is out of this world, with all kinds of special attacks, and just enough in the way of weapons and armor to keep you constantly invested. The story may have been done a thousand times, but Chrono Trigger was where it started. Everything about that game is brilliant, and while Fallout 3 was fantastic, Chrono Trigger simply out-charmed it.

Once Chrono was beaten, it was off to Final Fantasy VI. I can say the same things about this game that I can say about Chrono Trigger. Excellent story, fantastic music, fun and unique combat, and graphics that, again, still hold up. At the same time, I’m trying to shoot my way through Far Cry 2, a game that does some amazing things with in-game storytelling and is one of the few games that ACTUALLY lets you choose how to complete a mission. But FFVI’s story is far more engaging, and the world is still pretty massive, especially for a Super Nintendo game (well, I’m playing it on the GBA).

Beautiful, but not as beautiful as 16-bit sprites.

I’m also blasting through the Metal Slug games, a classic series born on the Neo-Geo. Amazingly fun, gorgeously animated, and with a hilarious sense of humor, these games do things modern games just don’t.

Now I’m not blasting modern games, not at all. Metal Gear Solid 4 is one of my favorite games of all time, BioShock made me look at the world in a different way, and Resident Evil 5 made me sleep with the lights on. But the fact that I can play these old games, games I had NEVER played before, and be more hooked on them than games that are pushing the medium more and more each day, that says something about the Golden Age of gaming.

The real question is… will today’s games be able to be played in 10, 15 years by folks who have never played them and still hold up? Well, I guess we will answer that in 15 years.

Unless someone has a time machine.

Anyone?

…worth a shot.

Add comment July 31st, 2009