They don't make them like they used to

saguy

saguy

saguy

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I usually dismiss all those threads rambling on about older games as a load of nostalgic nonsense. Well that may have changed as this weekend I was a bit bored so I decided to sort out my games shelf and found a copy of Sacred for whatever reason at the time I did not finish. OK, Sacred is not that old but it is pre the 3D generation of hack and slash games. I was surprised by how well it fares compared to newer games like Titan Quest, Loki and Legend: Hand of God.

The skill and combat system is so much better and there are loads of quests and locations to explore. I do believe a fixed viewpoint or camera is the best for these types of games as a rotating view does nothing to improve game play.

I am however playing it at its native 1024 x 768 resolution with black borders because my LCD scales very poorly. This is why I have not considered playing the Fallout games which are 800 x 640.

I am going to take a look around to see what other gems I have missed out on.
 
I keep meaning to go play Dungeon Keeper 1&2 as they are meant to be real gems.

I'm looking at getting a laptop soon so I can play games on the train to work, and these games are the sort I will be playing.
 
Can't get much better than DK1 and DK2. Absolutely classics and nothing else in the market is quite like them.

Loads of absolute classics which fare well even now.




M.
 
DK 1 & 2 were really funny, shame not too popular for network play and ai is a bit weak in both.
 
I was struck by a little nostalgia over the weekend when I came across my old Daggerfall CD. I got it all set up and working late last night with DosBox :D The only problem is that the games resolution is 320x200 and my monitors native resolution is 1920x1200, so it was on a tiny window in the middle of the large screen. With a bit of luck I should be able to scale the window up a little bigger before giving it a go :)

Unfortunately it is quite expensive to buy these days so unless you already own it, you are out of luck ;)

Mr-Xoc
 
If you want to play a really good older game I would suggest Sacrifice.

It really is great and not one I ever see mentioned on here.

Don't think I ever completed it either!

*goes to hunt the CD's
 
Isn't Daggerfall freeware now? or am i thinking of another game in the series? :confused:

A perfect example of not as good as they used to be.... DOOM!!:p
 
Fonz-Valo said:
Isn't Daggerfall freeware now? or am i thinking of another game in the series? :confused:

A perfect example of not as good as they used to be.... DOOM!!:p
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Doom had a quality which has not been seen since. Doom 3 was too dark and did not have the same feel to it. Lets hope Doom 4 if its made, is more like the original with updated gfx.
 
Abe's Oddysee and Abe's Exodus are on Steam, £8 for the two games.

Cheap, quality nostalgia :)
 
Snakedoctor said:
Doom had a quality which has not been seen since. Doom 3 was too dark and did not have the same feel to it. Lets hope Doom 4 if its made, is more like the original with updated gfx.
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I still go back to Doom 1 and 2 today:D
I'm using the Legacy Doom front end for it at the moment as i want to keep it very close the original look but with better controls
 
AHarvey said:
If you want to play a really good older game I would suggest Sacrifice.

It really is great and not one I ever see mentioned on here.

Don't think I ever completed it either!

*goes to hunt the CD's
Click to expand...

Oh wow, I remember this, thanks for reminding me. I was thinking about this game a few days ago but I couldn't for the life of me remember what it was called. I just remember it being really fun. I'll have to check this game out again.
 
Games such as Constructor/Street Wars were 2 of the best pc games i ever played in my early pc gaming days, i have always tried to look out for similar games, the only game i found was Evil Genius which is great! (and is being re-released)
 
I thought Evil Genius could have been brilliant. Instead, for me, it was meidocre. To slow paced and waiting ages for anything to happen.



M.
 
With the appearance of the 8bit computers(Atari,Amiga etc) back in the 80s, it marked the birth of games industry era as we know it today. Suddenly you had a system whereby 3rd party companies and individuals alike could write programs and games to be used by millions. Many classics games suddenly sprung onto a virgin audience with a taste for 'behind the TV' virtual interactive entertainment. This era was IMO the start of what we are playing today.

For people like myself, who where aged between 15-25 probably had the best out of that era and forged many livelong memories with some of our own personal favorites. Never before had our minds and senses experienced this kind of virtual interactive world before. A game could grab you in such a way it would leave a lasting impression with you.

Then even more people were pulled into interactive game world with the birth of the Home PC(Amstrad, Dell, Gateway etc). A person could now own a PC with more power then the computers they used to send a rocket to the moon and this power gave the games industry another major boost. Many games were ported over from the earlier consoles and 8bit computers but many new games were created too. One of the biggest advantaged that PCs had over the earlier 8bit was networking and soon after, internet access, this was proven with the arrival of Doom. Many of us will probably never forgot our first LAN experience with Doom (or other LAN games) and also it was one of the first games of that type that was made available as a free downloadable demo from the internet, I remember playing 4 player lan demo with my friend and never before have I laughed and shouting with them so much. Because of that, I bought the game when it eventually came out. Then a few years later, the birth of MMOrpgs, which pulled again, new and old gamers alike back into a new type of gaming world.

Many great titles were made both in the 8bit and early PC era, but that is exactly my point. We have been spoiled, our experiences from past games are so great and our memories of them are so fond, that most games nowadays, eventhough they are 100x time better in graphics, sound and complexity, they could, in our own opinion, never beat our first experience with a game/games that really grabed us. We still keep playing new games, and some of the time we may even go 'WOW thats amazing' for a while, but in the long run, most of us 'veteran' gamers will probably never feel that same as the first time.

Like with all things in live, you always remember your first time... and I hope she does too :)

PS The greatest game to me would have to be 'Alternate Reality' Atari 8bit version. It was way ahead of its time and if they ever make that into a MMO's, it will probably be made by Carlsberg. I spend about 2 years of my live playing this game and was still discovering new places, encounters and items after 18 months of playing it, amazing. A close second would have to be my first proper MMOrpg experience, Asherons Call, the biggest joy I got out of that was cause I could play online with RL friends and have great laughs/talks about it afterwards with them. Those were them days.
 
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Its not just a case of rose tinted glasses syndrome.

We have the rapid improvements in hardware to blame as well for the current states of games. Its too easy to make a pretty game!

I have a book called "Game Design: Secrets of the Sages" where a big guy from Valve talk about how they had to get around the limitations of the minuite graphics power they had then.

Gameplay came first and programmers had to work around problems, think outside of the box.

With technology moving along so rapidly programmers can barely keep up never mind having to face certain challenges. Now again we get a sudden spurt of inspiration injected into the games industry, but now it seems everyone is making games of some sort and flooding the market with rubbish.
 
I came to gaming fairly late and the first game that I played that gave me that big rush apart from Doom was Alone in the Dark and then Myst which came on that wondrous new invention, the CD Rom. I remember going out to buy Baldur’s gate giddy with excitement and then spending the next month in ecstasy.

I still do get a rush from games now and again but not to the same extent as before. It is nice when games pop out from nowhere, hype free, like Far Cry and The Witcher. I am trying to think of something from this year and I can't.
 
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