I used to be a passionate gamer, and I often find myself nostalgic for the golden era of video games when there were new ideas popping left and right.
Now, it feels like we’re caught between long-delayed triple-A titles and a constant stream of indie platformers. Originality seems to have taken a backseat, with many games regurgitating the same concepts.
What do you think defined the golden era of gaming? Are we currently in a rut, or is there a chance for fresh ideas to emerge again?
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Whenever you were 10-14
When I was 14 I played Ladder.
So no, not my favourite era for games.
This is the answer. Experience is subjective and what feels best to people is going to be heavily biased by where they were in their lives at the time.
“What was the best era to be aged 10-14 and into video games?” is a subtly different question.
The best moment is now, we’re in a Indie Game Renaissance, indie games that start at nothing and become worldwide household names, pretty much one after another.
Yeah, Triple A is fucked, but the old ways need to die so that the new path can be forged
Right now, since we pretty much can still play any of the old games we would like. There are enough great games out there to last anyone multiple lifetimes.
Now. All those games still exist, and are easier than ever to emulate if you wish. Good new games are coming out, and there’s simply no chance that you’ve exhausted all of the possible good games to play.
Of course if you focus on the highest-budget titles you will see buggy, overpriced delays. Shift your perspective to smaller titles by smaller studios. Bigger doesn’t mean better.
The golden age of video games was between when I was 13 and 21 years old. I was old enough to make spare cash to buy my own games and young enough to have spare time and energy to play them. Also my fast twitch reflexes were still good then so I could easily do a platformer or FPS. And this is true for everyone no matter when they were born.
PS2 generation because it was the last generation where your games were guaranteed to work without a web connection and they were generally shipped as finished products.
The PS3 generation started the current trend of still needing a web connection even for a physical copy and IIRC it also started the trend of shipping games unfinished and patching them later, and both trends went off the deep end with the PS4 generation where most of the games are broken at launch and patched later, and the ‘physical copies’ are little more than glorified license keys for games you gotta download anyways, or in more extreme cases, eg. GT7 on the PS5, need a web connection to even boot the game.
Like, you can dust off your PS2/GC/OG Xbox, stick a game disc in, and it’ll play just like it were new, but that’s not as guaranteed with the PS3/XB360 and good luck with the PS4/XB1 and newer.
That said, if you’re integrating a PS2-generation and older console into a modern AV stack, you’re going to want a hardware upscaler such as an OSSC, RetroTink, or Framemeister.
And we’re definitely in a rut and the only way out is a Second Video Game Crash.
Deep respect to Microsoft for the Xbox 360 Arcade. That SKU forced damn near every game to work without a hard drive. I think even GTA V could run off a USB stick.
But hoo boy did they fuck that up with the Xbox One launch. And Sony capitalized.
SNES went through a period where it just felt like every game I played was a classic - FF6, Crono Trigger, A Link to The Past, Donkey Kong Country, Super Metroid, Star Fox, Earthbound, etc.
I’ve no doubt a lot of it is nostalgia, but I remember sprinting home from the bus stop after elementary school to rush home and play these games with my brothers. Formative years of my childhood.
As others have said, I too think the golden era of video games is now. Games are getting better and better and there has never been a bigger selection of games to play than right now. There have never been as many people enjoying video games than right now. That being said, I don’t play as much as I used to, but that’s mostly because I’ve been getting older and working in video games for almost 20 years I’ve been a bit overexposed to the medium.
It’s right now. Indies everywhere, and we’ve successfully gotten past the worst of the always-online bullshit and PTW that plagued the early part of the millennium. More than half of my “all time favorite” games are still in active production today (sometimes continued by fans), and I’m not a young guy.
1991 to 2007
Prove me wrong people … prove me wrong.
PS2
Are we currently in a rut, or is there a chance for fresh ideas to emerge again?
Yes, and the problem is low standards. AAA games have resources, but no creativity. Indie games have creativity but no resources.
Back in the PS2 era, AAA games had resources and creators were making decisions instead of the people who went to business school.
I think there are a lot of great games out now, they just tend not to be AAA titles. Those kinds of graphics require a huge amount of manpower, which means a huge amount of investment seeking profit, which means people in business suits calling the shots. Frankly, I think the answer is that games devs need to unionize, both to push back against crunch and to protect their creative freedom. I think that might result in AAA games worth playing.
I dont know where youre looking for games but I have so many games with absolutely unique gameplay or artstyle on my wishlist that I could probably fill a lifetime and it keeps growing.
PS2 or PS3.
Those systems are where most of today’s stagnant franchises started. The modern universal control scheme started with the PS2 (that is, actually utilising both sticks in the modern tradition), so there’s no issues with playability.
I’ve been replaying GTA V, which is a PS3 game in case we all forgot.
A good PS2 and PS3 off eBay will reawaken your love for gaming. The PS2 has so many smaller classics that don’t get much love now (Sly Cooper!), and we’re still being sold and resold PS3 games to this day.
