Appreciating the NES Through the Nintendo GameCube | GEEK CRITIQUE

In the 2000s, gaming was inundated by nostalgia for an era that was before my time. Through the lens of someone else's childhood memories, I didn't see the appeal. Then I got Animal Crossing.
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[@TVsMrNeil]

I think the NES generation forgets what it was actually like to play games back then, and so they fail to articulate exactly what the full experience was like. They put the games themselves on a pedestal, and while there are certainly many younger gamers who've grown to appreciate the classics, there are many who still scratch their heads. To me, there is forever going t obe an element to playing the NES that cannot be replicated in modern times. First and foremost, it was the best thing going, and we didn't have the X-Box to pull us away. Second, the games weren't just the cartridges. So many games relied heavily on the instruction manuals to provide context to your adventure. I think of The Legend of Zelda being a key example. Sure, you can jump into the game, knowing basically what it's about, and putz around until you figure out what you're supposed to do, but that game also came with a spectacular full-color instruction manual. I would argue that the instruction manual was part of the game, adding mystique and grandeur to your adventure. It shows the world of Hyrule in that mid 80s anime art style, giving it a visual flare that the game never could. It tells you of Ganon's exploits, but it also shrouds him in mystery. Impa, a key character in the Zelda series, is mentioned by name in the instruction manual, but she never appears in the game. You're giving a lot of context to the story that you don't get by just firing it up on the NES Classic. But the thing that NES fans need to remember is that the reason it was that way is that it had to be that way by necessity. You wouldn't do that now. You can just put the story in the game. And since that's what modern gamers are used to, they won't understand what we saw back in the 80s. It'll just look like this confusing game that drops you into a field without context. When I think of how time has obscured the once-revered content of our youth, I think of how wonderful it was to get Nintendo Power, and all the warm fuzzies those memories bring, but I understand why it went away. The reason Nintendo Power was so great is that it was a massive dump of information we got from Nintendo every month,...and we didn't have the internet. Just like with the NES, it's technology that changed the perspective of the next generation, and those of us who came from an earlier time have to be able to put ourselves back in time and see how things have changed before we can really explain what made the NES so great. Also, it's been about 40 years since the launch of the Famicom, and game design has come a long way, even for retro-style, nostalgia-driven games like Shovel Knight. I mean, I get the gameplay argument that people have for retro consoles, but we need to give modern games *some* credit. I mean, that's just something that the NES generation still doesn't seem to get.

[@GeekCritique]

Awesome comment, I didn't know that about Impa, and hey, that was exactly MY experience with The Legend of Zelda. I bought a used copy of it with no manual, no map, nothing, and got plopped down in a field with no context. Of course, I was around early enough to *know* how sacrosanct those instruction manuals were (I read them religiously whenever I was away from my consoles as a kid), and I always make it a point to have them pulled up on my phone whenever I'm playing anything released before 2005 or so. I can never replicate the experience of playing NES games in the 80s, being surrounded by classmates who were discovering Zelda alongside me, rushing home after school to try out the things told me, but you can get a whole lot closer *with* the manual than without. On the bright side, that Zelda cart inexplicably STILL saves! It's by far my oldest game that does! :D

[@Furluge]

@@GeekCritique And don't forget, no one could get spoiled on the internet. Though in my experience very rarely did /everyone/ in class get the same game in play it. So often /one/ friend got the game and you'd be over at his house playing it after school or you'd swap games with each other. (I lost some good games that way.)

[@diegog1853]

I think this goes double for retro portable game consoles like the OG gameboy. Playing them blown up on the TV is as sensible as playing flappy bird or candy crush on your ps5 and then comparing that with elden ring. I didn't appreciated them much until I got a gameboy with games and even some manuals, and when you play them in that context you realize how addictive some of the games still are, games like tetris and picross haven't aged a day. And also how fully fledge some of the bigger games are when played portably, like links awakening or the pokemon series. Not to mention... they are really more portable now than most portable gaming machines and battery life of a gameboy color is close to 40 hours. When you factor all in you can definetely start to see why someone might rather pull out a gameboy in the bus and play a level of super mario land 2 as much as why would someone play some clash of clans on their iphone or whatever.

[@sboinkthelegday3892]

This video opens with a reductive strawman, there is no gap here that can be bridged with better articulation. You don't even acknowledge that most of modern "gamers" even in the forefront of identity political "us, the gamers" talking points, have the UN-nostalgia: they never liked the gaming part, they just latched on at various points where games where reaching their ACCEPABLE standard of being like movies. THEY are the ones projecting, like TGC is projecting hard too, that everyone ELSE is nostalgic. Mostly because they never had good faith to begin with, they reflect to THEIR past being assholes just for the sake of belonging to a group, or "being cranky sometimse". So they take this age old "I'm talking about myself before my reformation, so I can say whatever I want with authority" position. Please. That's a weak trick, leave that to protestant christians. Yes, no matter the funny voices you make like a child, "game" is the only word to articulate what games USED to be, and now its under eradication. The inarticulate people, are the ones rationalizing "if it's on a game console, it CAN ONLY be a game" as they watch their interactive movies because they can't sit still for a full movie or tv series witohut fiddling with their hands. And complaining that when they make mistakes they have to be PUNISHED by playing the GAME part of it, ever in their life, but they call it "repeat their progress". Of course you'd be bored, movies are boring, if you don't even appreciate rewatches. That's why gamers WANT movies to stay in the movie theater, and they can articulate new concepts like visual novels when they want books to stay in the library. But these modern types chewing out the corporate for doing what they pay for, treat gameplay like a soundtrack TO A FILM, and only hate their interactive movies if they are silent oor in black and white. They DO NOT LOVE games, music or film, let alone to combine all into a multimedia. They are distracted by the noise of multimedia and entertainmed by its novelty, only as long as it stays novel and disposable. Worth... giving away for free.

[@strangeweather8827]

Loving your reminder about the games being more than the mere cartridge (or even CD!). Hard to impart a notion when games are so singular, so removed from a context demanding anything more than one's will to collect (thinking of Steam libraries) the product. Friction goes a long way towards making an impact.

[@MatthewSmart]

Nostalgia is definitely a double-edged sword. There are many cases where people will write off new games for lacking the "magic" the older ones have. In many cases, it's simply because games from your youth are usually gonna have more of an impact on your life, and newer games will of course never mean as much to you as a result. But, the inverse can also be true with older games. And that was definitely me for NES and SNES games when they were on the Wii's virtual console. I started gaming on the GameCube, and those older games from before then never clicked with me as a kid. I wanted them to, but they felt so archaic to me. But then I stayed at a hotel back when they offered Nintendo 64 controllers and let you demo a variety of games for a small fee. I was hooked on Mario Party 3, to the point where I really wanted an actual Nintendo 64 for myself to play it more. And so, for one of my birthdays, my parents got me just that. After playing tons of Mario Party 4 through 7 on the GameCube and 8 on the Wii, I finally got to experience what the first three Mario Party games were all about, and I'd consider 3 to be my favorite to this day. And I also spent a lot of time finally understanding and enjoying Super Mario 64, as well as other games like the original Super Smash Bros. and Cruis'n USA. And since then, I've grown a huge amount of appreciation for retro games from the N64 and before. I think what's important is that everyone tries to keep an open mind no matter which era of gaming you're experiencing. I still love modern games when they're done well. Heck, Kirby and the Forgotten Land is one of my favorite games of all time now. But it really shouldn't matter when a game came out. As long as it piques your interest, and it's fun to you, that's all that really matters. Let your childhood nostalgia stick with you and give the games you loved meaning, but also live in the moment and don't let that deter you from new experiences no matter how old they are.

[@adamedmour9704]

The thing is that Nintendo games and early PCs felt archaic at the time. It’s hard to describe how simultaneously high tech and primitive a monochromatic command line interface or a dot matrix printer felt amidst the high color, high production value, fake sci-fi video future of the 80s an early 90s: Star wars, Star Trek, MTV, Hip Hop, Hair-Metal, Hi-Fi, Liquid Sky, Technocratically perfected rock and roll, David Lynch’s Dune, talking cars, 90s children’s Television, and Blade Runner: all trying to convince you you were living in the future by the sheer force of make up, smoke machines, and capitalism. But the real future were these children’s toys with neon-pixel art cave paintings, accompanied by an already ancient-sounding-out of the box monophonic synth that made hissing and buzzing sounds, the prehistory of a new world. The real future was the blank slate empty screen with Sophia toned cursor that made you feel quite rightly that you were some new ancient philosopher at the chalk board, getting ready to calculate the next reality.

[@Chronoboy21]

[stands and claps] Well said, mate. Well said.

[@BucketHead4901]

Sir, may I say that you have been one of the more influential presences on the internet for me. First video I watched of yours, was "DREAMCAST: Sega's fall from the cutting edge". I must've rewatched that video a dosen times. I frikin' memorized the words! And after thinking about it for a while, I decided to go and purchase a Dreamcast. The first game I purchased was WWF Attitude. The whole point of this story is just to say, I've had a nostalgia for things I haven't lived throug. There is a welsh word, "Hereath" which means: A longing to go back to a place or a time that you can never go back to, or that never was. Thats where I got into retro games. They give me a connection to a time I wasn't a part of. It was kind of a long winded explanation, but its a comfort to me.

[@Angelarius82]

I think one of the main problems with getting people interested in the NES library is that the "most iconic" games and "best games" are frequently not one and the same. I loved the Legend of Zelda on the NES at the time of its release and recognise its foundational role in gaming but to be blunt... both Startropics and Crystalis have aged better. Sure SMB3 is a standout that is both iconic and good but its at the top of a very short list. For games that are still fun today you need to be looking at stuff like Batman, MT Punch Out, Blaster Master, Mega Man, Little Nemo... I'll stop there but... these are games that are not not well known if you are not already slightly invested in the NES. My point is that as much as I love the NES I can understand a perspective that is "Lets try out the NES starting with Metroid" and come away with a bad taste in your mouth about it.

[@Gnidel]

And there's a category for good games that people never heard about. Some of greatnesses from my childhood are Kid Nikki 3, Felix the Cat, Jackie Chan Action Kung-Fu... Hidden gems that nobody talks about.

[@carlosemilio5180]

​@@Gnidelgimmick and that billiards puzzle game spring to mimd

[@BryantheArchivist]

Little Samson is actually fun were it not for being stupidly expensive ​@Gnidel

[@TranscendentAzure89]

You know, this episode is fun because it makes me think about how I grew up on a nepo baby NES (mom and aunt had one from the NYC release and at one point were frequently playing it between SMB and Tetris until they "grew up" and let it sit in the back of the electronics "entertainment center" on top of the VCR and I got curious as a 3 year old) going through SMB+Duck Hunt and being told that there were more things to try and encouraged to explore and essentially spent the first half of the 90s going through the Super Mario Bros. trilogy, falling in love with StarTropics (the first game I ever "earned" by completing a challenge from my mom and aunt to beat SMB in totality in one sitting for them), getting a Gameboy and being present for the Land games (both the Mario and DK variety), until the gigalith that was Pokemon arrived and getting that N64 which was the first "then modern" console ever for me. Fast forward a little bit and there's this little risky indie game built called Super Smash Bros. that is showing me all these characters I'd somehow never seen before but "knew?" (Weirdest one for me eternally is Samus; somehow I just knew all about her despite having a complete 0 exposure to those games at that time) and I just really wanted to make time to find more of their adventures (which in Samus' case led to me finding Prime 2 and falling so deeply in love with a whole gameplay direction I'd never thought I'd feel that strongly for or in the Zelda series' case, finding out that there were inCREDIBLE experiences beyond the "solid gold box" which had actively worked against my young child brain when I'd browse game stores for new gets and a gold box with a "neat" logo was inspiring a complete blank stare versus seeing classic characters in new 3D renders or full on art that made my mind wander everywhere and rapidly) which then spiraled into a love for legitimately digging through the trenches of all the old houses' games that fell by the wayside over time or just never had that moment to click with modern audiences (seriously, one day I will see Mysterious Murasame Castle be there with its Class of 1986 contemporaries in Zelda, Metroid and Kid Icarus & I will see someone do something cute with StarTropics again) and all because someone said "what if we just made this all more available be it through cameos or actively including past hits in different modern packages". This might be a bit of a side step from the topic of nostalgia discussed prominently but it just made me feel like an aspect of these things that I think gets downplayed and even treated as a no-brainer is how easily someone's whole appreciation for and specific appetite in games could be fostered on these interactions. Lord knows I kinda have a Cranky™ in me that, while long since has calmed down, is still somewhat sad when he sees the way people go on about modern Smash celebrating and focusing on things we all know are universal constants in gaming/Nintendo nowadays versus that strange discovery period where it felt like everything was just someone pulling the most wacky exhibits out from the back of a small sized museum and you didn't even know who they were but the appeal was still immediate/you still wanted to research on who they were and what their claim to fame was.

[@Blankult]

Smash bros an indie game lmao

[@kingofthegrapes]

That concept of a rotating selection of retro titles actually is in a recently released game, Street FIghter 6. In a corner of the game's hub, you can access 3 old capcom arcade games, rotating on a monthly, weekly, and daily basis respectively. This was actually the first time in years I've seen a game include the entirety of some older titles

[@That_Lady_Charlie]

I was born the same year the NES launched in the U.S, which is the same year as Super Mario Bros. So I'm as old as the concept of modern gaming as we understand it. It's wild to have seen *multiple* waves of nostalgia in gaming in the time I've been alive, multiple waves of generations swearing up and down that their generation is the best. And honestly? All generations, nearly every system, has had not only amazing games, but games that have pushed the medium somewhere new. It's not that games are worse now. It's that the memories we, collectively, hold of the games we played 20 (or more) years ago take us back to more innocent, possibly better times. And that's okay! But while nostalgia is nice, one also has to stop and appreciate the good things available today. It's how to help the medium grow further. It's how to help *ourselves* grow too.

[@GeekCritique]

Yeah, you really start seeing the cycle after a while, those so-called "old men in their 20s" saying word-for-word what you remember people older than you saying 20 years ago, what you remember FEELING 10 years ago. For me, it makes me more inclined to appreciate where gaming is RIGHT NOW, because before long this too will be the "good old days".

[@Lightspeeds]

Well for me, I just appreciate the fact that right now good quality can be attached to the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise after everything it has faced.

[@Arcad3n]

I was born in 2001 and grew up with a game boy advance and a DS. I had a few game boy / color games that I could play on the advance, but I never got the appeal. Then when I got my 3DS, I always had a decision to make on the rare occasions when I would get eShop money: do I buy one expensive game? Or do I buy multiple virtual console games? Because of this I ended up completing Mario 1, 3, Land 2, and owning many more Game Boy and NES games. Now as an adult I own a modded Game Boy Color and play on it all the time!

[@GeekCritique]

Yeah, that was a big part of why the Wii VC was such a boon for me too! It wasn't often that I could scrape together $50 for a new game in those days. But $5-$10 for something old-school...

[@ty_sylicus]

This video proves a point I've long held to be very true: the time and form in which we experience our favorite media forever influences our love and nostalgia for that media beyond simply the value of itself. That was a mouthful. 😅

[@mj23kb08]

I was a kid in the 80's and the NES was my first console. It's still one of my favorites too. I can sit down at virtually any time, in any mood, and have a blast busting out Mega Man 1 or Ninja Gaiden 2. With that being said, for people that came after my era....I get it. Those same games may not be as engaging. I think this video is BRILLIANT. Not only did you touch on how hard it can be for gamers that came after the 80's era to resonate with NES titles, you also gave a heartfelt and logical recount on how you discovered NES love on your OWN terms. Totally brilliant and well-said. I can't overstate how much I love your videos. Thanks for being awesome, dude.

[@QuintessentialWalrus]

Funnily enough, the Angry Video Game Nerd exists as a direct response to the reverent NES nostalgia of the 2000s. James Rolfe wanted to make a show demonstrating that no, the '80s were not the golden era of gaming, a lot of stuff back then was garbage -- even popular games that people had fond memories of. My go-to sources for gaming content in the 2000s were Screw Attack and AVGN, so I got to see very polarizing opinions on retro 2D gaming in my formative years lol

[@cubedmelons876]

Funny thing is, AVGN is probably one of the better gateways into the whole retro gaming scene. When I saw his videos, my takeaway was that retro games did seem like an interesting experience that I wanted to try, but he also did a good job at warning me about how frustrating they could get, along with several of the games just being straight-up duds. I can't imagine I'd be nearly as much of a retro game fan without him.

[@hashtagwoke8506]

My younger brother is actually experiencing something like this.... he started emulating the virtual boy on his vr headset on a whim and now he genuinely loves the console. Worried for his eyes. Maybe the only virtual boy fan of the entirety of gen z

[@cubedmelons876]

Of gen z? Throw gen x, millenials, and alpha in there as well.

[@MerelyAFan]

Exposure to older games within the context of being unlockables in modern titles and even being free at times I think could really contribute to Nintendo being even stronger at its own video game cultural continuity. What I mean by that term is a sense having a strong thread of history from company's (and specifically its game series) past into the present through various elements. The obvious stuff is continual new releases (Mario games in the 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s, now), but even things like ports, cameos, just general references are things that can still bring semi-relevance to old series. F-Zero has unfortunately been largely untouched with any new games, however appearances in Smash or tracks in Mario Kart essentially allow that franchise to still resonate even without new entries; the gap between what it was and what it is now is still bridged by the awareness new fans get via such media. For young fans that largely do their gaming in the context of the Switch, having a means of exposure to older releases (beyond being bonuses of a paid online service) would be ideal because if if it were just a few free games? Maybe those fans that play it then get curious about all these retro releases, get their feet wet with a few more, and then gradually get to learn about them in a comfortable context via stuff like the rewind function. It would be a process that would (long term) essentially allow someone to really know the timeline of Nintendo since its arcade days and give them better appreciation for what it is now. The reason while I think this particular phenomenon is important to build on is because cultural continuity is not commonly maintained in lot of the video game landscape. Sega has had its identity and associated timeline so inconsistently defined by different consoles and different starts/stops for their own first party series, that stuff like Sonic ends up being the one of the few IP's that has an international through-line in the past 30 years. Certain franchises of theirs ceased to have releases, only continued in certain regions, or simply went into outright hibernation for a while without consistent media like a Sega Smash or Racing title to give it occasional prominence in its shout outs. A lack of more frequent quality compilations and ports of Master System, Saturn, Dreamcast, and arcade games means that its a company that too often feels ill defined unless your a dedicated fan seeking out older games via collecting or emulation. And even Sega is still lucky in comparison to the likes of Atari or the various microcomputer games in the 80s, both of which also struggle at times to have a pertinence to the modern scene because the proverbial vehicles to deliver them to new fans are too niche or outside the typical habits of contemporary audiences to experience them. I think one of the reasons the pop history of video games feels so defined by the post 1983 crash and by American or Japanese emphasis is because the lack of cultural continuity of stuff like with Atari or the British home computer scene has created a disconnect to fans about such contexts. TL;DR, moving certain older titles outside the paradigm of constant paywalls is something that could (in combination with its some of its crossover series) have value in maintaining a connection with the company's past that can all too often be lost with the way the industry is.

[@Nate-xi4zf]

Been rewatching a lot of your videos the past couple months, and just wanna thank you for such high quality reviews. Your work is always so well put together, keep it up!

[@DerekSquirreltail]

For me, it was save states. Even ignoring the accessibility of games that emulators helped with, the fact that it made so many of them so much more approachable was huge. I don't think I ever would have stuck it out with something like the first few Mega Man games if I couldn't play it at my own pace like that lol.

[@tparadox88]

Admittedly, I didn't get much opportunity to play games before college, but I remember having played Super Mario Bros for years and then discovering, "there's a second level? there's a second WORLD???" And then the only time I ever made it to the later worlds was when I started using an emulator on my laptop in college, thanks to save states.

[@cubedmelons876]

Idk. Whenever I end up using savestates, the experience always feels way too short and unsatisfying. I've always found a big part of the appeal of retro games to be getting better at them and blasting through stuff that used to give you trouble, until you finally beat the game. It helps that the games aren't super long compared to what we have today. Like with Mega Man, I'd start the game up, maybe experiment with different boss orders for the regular stages, and beat the game over a few play sessions.

[@DerekSquirreltail]

@@cubedmelons876 I can appreciate that now far more, but at the time, I considered it to be fighting against my ability to learn. Having to replay massive chunks of the game again that weren't challenging me just to get back to a point I actually wanted to learn would do more to discourage me from wanting to do it. In the case of a game like Megaman, getting to the boss just to die instantly after getting through a stage that wasn't challenging me anymore made it hard for me to even wrap my head around what I was even trying to learn with the boss. It was frustrating not feeling like I had the flexibility to experiment in the moment.

[@JadeRocks_]

Me and you come from very different time periods in gaming. I was born in 2004 and so I did dabble in the GBA and the old N64 my dad owned (that I now own), but I primary grew up on the 7th gen onwards. Despite the retro boom arguably being at it's peak, As a kid I had no idea digital storefronts even sold older games. As I aged up into a preteen and became way more invested in the history of games, my issue then became me not having the money to spend on older stuff because I'd rather have a new game. All of this being said, My main experience with all sorts of older classes prior to the 7th gen is through unofficial emulators, which I feel has really soured my enjoyment of some titles. It's a lot of work to to get these things set up so when a game doesn't live up to expectation it always felt disappointing. I would always love SOME older titles, especially a lot of the GameCube library, most mario titles, and the genesis sonic games. However for others i didn't see the hype. I played 30 minutes of super metroid on a old snes emulator and just didn't see "best game of all time", and put it down. I didn't hate it, I just felt utterly indifferent to it, but I picked up the game again earlier this year on snes online because I was stuck in college with little funds for games, and wow. Within that context it's like the game completely changed for me. This is why official preservation is so important, even if the unofficial emulators will always be better & more accurate. I want more people to experience the games I grew up loving, the same way I experienced a different generation's games. Very long comment I know but I had a lot of thoughts, great video!

[@yehuda8589]

This is one the reasons why I really appreciate the Yakuza series, since the games 5 and onwards started including IRL classic SEGA arcade games like Space Harrier and Virtua Fighter inside that you can play at in-game arcades. They went even further with this in one of the most recent games, the spin-off Lost Judgement, where you can get (without microtransactions) a Sega Master System for your protagonist where he can play stuff like Alex Kid in his office. I really appreciate the series for keeping the spirit of including free retro games within modern releases alive.

[@chaospoet]

It goes beyond video games. TV and Movies are the same thing. When I was growing up in the 80s and 90s, with the rare times your parents would take you to the movies, and back before there was a Blockbuster in every town, you just had access to whatever was on TV. Back then it was a mix of old and new. I remember watching Gilligan's Island and Adam West Batman then watch Punky Brewster and Transformers, so I was being exposed to what my parents grew up along with what was contemperary. It was the same thing with movies. I know so many people under 30 who have never even heard of, let along watched, The Wizard of Oz. Then at some point all that older stuff and even stuff I watched when I was younger went away and it was just exclusively (with the exceptions being Turner Classic Movies channel and Nick At Night with old shows like Bewitched) whatever was new. Now even though you may have access to everything most younger people are only watching whatever the "IT" thing at the moment is unless they have a reaction movie channel or something taking requests. It creates a disconnect and generational gap. I continued exploring older stuff to the point where I own a silent film movie collection which utterly baffles everyone younger than me whom I say that to.

[@lordlouie3550]

A new Geek Critique video? ON MY BIRTHDAY? Truly, I am blessed. I feel as though I am in the minority of people who discovered NES of their own volition as a kid. My parents never owned an NES and I didn't have internet access, so there weren't any external factors influencing it. As an 8 year old in 2012, I played Smash Bros. Brawl, and mained the Ice Climbers. I had no comprehension of who these characters were, but I liked them enough to want to play their game, so I bought Ice Climber off the Wii Shop and played it. To say I played it a lot would be an understatement. This would be the start of my long obsession with NES games, but to say I sought them out wouldn't paint a full picture; it was far more often that I would see a game somewhere else, and suddenly want to play it. Clu Clu Land and Balloon Fight music in Smash? Better go play that. Heard someone mention Blaster Master's weird intro cutscene in a KZbin video? Install it on my 3DS right this instant! See an image of Master Belch? Like just a PNG of him? Oh, he's from EarthBound? I'm gonna pl- Oh, it's not available on Wii or 3DS... The universe where Earthbound got on the Wii Shop is the one where I could've been an EB fan at age 9, instead of age 13, but I digress. Point is, never understate the power of chance encounters. Though the industry doesn't hand out classic games for free anymore, the fact that (some of them) are still available on modern platforms means there'll always be a way for people to organically discover old games the same way people did when they were brand-new. ...I still can't beat all 32 mountains in one run though. Sob.

[@GeekCritique]

I'm probably too late now, but happy birthday anyhow! Mine's just a few days away, too!

[@jackwilliams801]

Great video as always! Can’t say I had the same experience with the NES games in the original Animal Crossing, mostly because my brother and I never unlocked any of them outside Balloon Fight. I can say that the newer AC don’t appeal to me the way the first one did. I often joke that I’m a flat earther when it comes to Animal Crossing (mostly because I prefer the flat map of the original and for some reason despise the curved map in introduced in Wild World). When it comes to discovering classics, I would say the most recent example for me was last year’s release of the Klonoa Phantasy Reverie collection. I always heard good things from die hard fans and was curious for years. I absolutely fell in love and l’m only upset I never got to experience them (and cry) back in their heyday (N64 and GC kid growing up). I would have to say that the Metroid series is one of the best ways to showcase how games and game design has evolved over the years. Super Metroid is practically a perfect game that I recommend to anyone. The three different incarnations of Metroid 2 are differently designed but are all equally worth playing and experiencing for how they tell the same story and the design principles they exhibit ( RoS - Ambition, AM2R - Refinement, SR -Evolution)

[@GeekCritique]

"Animal Crossing flat-earther" is hilarious!

[@TimbrrWolfe]

The way my gaming journey worked out only led to me organically running into the timed demos of older games in Brawl, and maybe a handful of other smaller instances that I'm blanking on now. But what I /did/ run into was a lot of remakes of older games. Super Mario Bros. Deluxe on GBC, Link to the Past on GBA, Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland on GBA. Super Mario 64...DS. Probably more. But being able to experience the classics in a more modern form (often with additional features and such) probably planted some seeds that have grown into my current interest in retro gaming. Not quite in the way you're talking about here (I still have a hard time wanting to play the older games in their original forms), but enough to look beyond just what's nostalgic from my own childhood (and what I missed out on on those systems) and look further back for games and systems that I have no such connections to. So while the game industry seems to be treating remasters and remakes as more and more of a cash grab, hopefully there are still enough faithful adaptations that they can plant similar seeds in younger gamers to go back and look at stuff before their time as well.

[@noone-mo6gy]

Still waiting for the Dread review.

[@Fredthepizzaguy929]

Casually walks into the Regi worship room 4:32

[@ultimatezukey5402]

Always great to see a new Geek Critique video. These personal retrospective videos are always interesting as someone who grew up with the DS and Wii

[@Galanthos]

I was an SNES kid, and never had very much exposure to the NES and it's library. I think I maybe played a few minutes of the original Metroid, and Duck Hunt and my aunt's house, and that's pretty much it. But in the early 2000s I discovered the emulation scene, and played so many old games that I never had access to. I had my first experience with the original Final Fantasy, (a game which I had never seen before, and that I wasn't sure existed despite being aware of Final Fantasy "2," "3," and 7.) and I still go back and replay it every year or so.

[@slyguythreeonetwonine3172]

9:56 That's our responsibility little bro. It's up to us to share those experiences with the younger generation. I'm around a kiddo that I sometimes have to look after on occasion and I've introduced him to retro. He's young and doesn't get it yet, but if he gets big into gaming I think he'll appreciate the experience. Blew his mind taking him through a digital history archive which I guess is what my library is. From Atari to PlayStation. What took years and decades for me, took like 10 minutes to go through picking two or three games to show him and talk about before moving up through generations. I guess it kinda blew my mind as well. There is an experience to be had for both in the act of sharing that, and I'd highly recommend it.

[@azure361]

Its nice to see other people get to know and understand older games hidden inside the actual main game. I first experienced this through playing Sonic 1 inside of Sonic Generations. I still remember being nine years old, stumbling around the game and progressing at a snails pace, when I finally had enough points for a Genesis controller in the market. I didn't even know what a SEGA Genesis was at the time! I booted up Sonic 1 for the first time, excited to see what made this game an all-time classic just to game over on Green Hill Act two. Surprisingly I wasn't frustrated at the game, instead I wanted to try again, this time beating the whole zone. Then I got to Marble Zone, and where most players tune out at this point, I wanted to see what made this level click. I was interested because I had never seen it before. This continued for all of the zones of the game. However, I didn't actually get around to beating it until I was 13! When I finally had beaten the game, I was good enough to get all chaos emeralds on my first completion, and I did b this with an Xbox360 controller in my hand.

[@Jake76667]

i remember when i was a kid in the mid 2000s, my dad was constantly talking about how much he loved playing galga & the original super mario bros back in the early to mid 1980s. so when i got a 3ds for christmas 2011, i downloaded the original super mario bros from the 3ds virtual console a few months later & it clicked

[@cookiestar3069]

Great video! You raise some intriguing questions. Considering how inaccessible many retro games are-in a way that say books and movies usually aren’t-it does make me wonder how much is being lost culturally. Newcomers don’t always get to experience older design principles, and that’s a shame. How weird and detrimental would it be if the only way to legally read Hamlet was through some conglomerate’s streaming service?

[@hamsterdragon]

The moral of the story is: Piracy keeps art alive.

[@bpcgos]

I experienced NES, Genesis and Playstation very late in their lifecycle. Bought by my parents a NES back in 94 when I was 9 yrs old, although I knew it since a year before due to my cousins having one. And then, Genesis came in late 90s where person that close to me suddenly having one at their home. My childhood friends have sega mega drive (its the japanese version I think), and once a week we're having a blast playing MK2, Contra the Hard Corps, and WWE Wrestlemania. Then my neighbour bought their 5 yrs old new Genesis, when they set it up it just didnt want to turned on, so as a known tech kid in the neighbourhood they calling me and it turns out they just forget to fully inserted the cartridge inside the slot, they thank for the help and allow me to come to play whenever I like. Fast forward the end of the 90s ,Playstation cafe start to grown in my country, we can rent for an hour or two, and I was rent it a lot along with my friends around the neighbourhood and sometimes friends from junior high. They like to ask me to play because I understand English and knew about Playstation a bit from the gaming tabloid I used to buy. I even remember when the owner of the cafe bought a memory card but didnt know what it was used for and how to use it, so I explained to him what it is and how to use it according to article I have read in the tabloid, and he was very happy finally knew how to save the bonus character he got when playing all night in Tekken 3 and giving me an hour of free play. Due to the tendency of me going out at night to go to PS1 cafe, my parents was worried surprised me with my own Playstation back in feb 2000,we are not rich family btw, so Im genuinely surprised of be able to having one although its very late in the PS lifecycle (Feb of 2000 afaik was the released month of PS2 back in japan), but it come with a lot of advantage, many classic Ps1 games already in bargain bin and even when I took it randomly ilfor cheap it turns out to be a classic masterpiece. From Klonoa (whom the cover already sun burned), Legend of Legaia , FF VII (yep, never knew FF because I never play RPG in NES prior, and I never see or own SNES), FF VIII, Xenogears, etc. And until nowadays PS1 is the most nostalgic one for me, the vast library Im able to collect,and how it can sharpen my english capability, make it the best console for me...

[@professorwiggs5192]

I've kind of always had a thing for old games. There's just something special seeing the history of videogames even though I was born in the early 2000s. Its probably due to the fact that when I had first got my gba my parents got the classic mario bros on it since they really only played nes games growing up. I would play that game for hours so I guess that define my love for old games

[@bradendubois3661]

Gaming is just so much different now than it was back then. I was born in 2004, and that was pretty much the turning point for gaming when high definition would soon take over, online gaming was becoming huge, and downloadable content would take over.

[@user-xk5nl8xr4p]

This reminds me of my personal experience with Zelda II. When I first tried it, it was after I had also gotten the original Zelda, Ocarina of Time, and Majora's Mask. As you might imagine, Ocarina got most of my immediate interest, Majora's confused my poor little child brain, and the first two Zelda games were difficult enough to discourage it. It's honestly kind of baffling how little direction an NES game can choose to give you, and I understand that that's the charm of it to a lot of people, but I don't find it entertaining to spend my first multiple sessions of a game wondering what I'm supposed to be doing or where I need to go (Kind of like your experience with Metroid 1). Despite this, years later I decided to emulate Zelda II, grab a guide (and cheat the lives system of that game, because seriously, why is it there), and give it another good try. I can admit I was motivated by jojo56380's Linked Universe blog on Tumblr (if you don't know what that is, I HIGHLY recommend you check it out - if nothing else, the artwork and creativity is enthralling), and specifically how much I liked the character of Hyrule in that story. Surprisingly, when you have guidance through a game and that game no longer punishes you so harshly that a cattle prod looks soft, it's a lot easier to appreciate. Oddly enough, I now tend to be a defender of Zelda II, when before I would have absolutely bashed it into the ground. I think there's something to it that just stands out, but only if you force it to show you. It's certainly not an inviting game on it's own, but I promise there's merit to it. Anyways, keep critiquin', Josh. I'll keep geekin', I promise. c:

[@AlaskanPanda907]

I'm one of those weirdos that had a mashup of games growing up. My dad had his SNES and Genesis from when he was a kid, my uncle gave us his PlayStation 1, and we also had a Gamecube. It was a ton of fun jumping between different consoles when I wanted to play Mario or Sonic or Monsters Inc: Scream Team (that game was SICK). Or maybe pull out Quackshot before playing Burnout with my sister! It's given me a really unique perspective where I can appreciate modern and classic games since I grew up with both. They've each got something unique to offer. Different design principles, different technical backgrounds, etc. etc. Nowadays I mostly stick to 90s titles and indie games for their creativity. I feel like teams with fewer resources (like hardware constraints, finances, team size) really have to stretch what they've got to realize their vision. Or maybe that's just my confirmation bias talking ;)

[@BluesM18A1]

"Retro gaming" has been part of my mindset for as long as I have been gaming. My first exposure to video games was an atari plug n play console my dad owned (that was his generation of games, back when atari nostalgia was a thing before NES), my first console was a hand-me-down GBA from a parent's friend when the DS was already out (and I had a lot of gameboy color games in the assortment of games that came with it, at that), and when my mom decided to buy a Wii and found out you could buy and download Mario 3, she was all over that so I ended up playing a lot of virtual console games on that. From the getgo I understood that many older games would be far simpler, but still very enjoyable. In a weird twist I play so few contemporary AAA games that they often exceed my expectations when I do get around to playing them, considering all the "modern games bad" rhetoric out there. I did however have a very difficult time understanding people's reverence for some early 80s computer games that were more popular in europe. A lot of early computer games were very experimental for better or worse, but eventually I got around to seeing their appeal.

[@pencilneck2871]

For the longest time i used to think nes games were old, antiquated timewasters that, while they kickstarted gaming in the 80s and onward, did NOT hold up to to archaic design choices of early video games, and i held this belief for a really long time. Then i played zelda 1 a few years ago with an open mind and found that maybe there really is something to love about the nes. Ive always loved 16 bit and beyond but now i can understand the appeal of such classic games

[@evansowards5979]

I don't have a particular game that I didn't "get", in part because I never used to take a chance on a game that I thought I wouldn't get. When I was a kid, I had to prioritize which games I got because I only had so much money to spend. But that changed after I got to be part of the 3DS Ambassador program (yeah, I was that hyped for the 3DS at launch). Being given 10 free NES games, most of which I hadn't touched (some of which I hadn't heard of) opened my eyes to games from other franchises, most notably Zelda. Yeah, Zelda 1 is pretty much impossible now without a guide, but I played a large portion of it without it and came to appreciate it and that opened me up to other Zelda games that I missed out on, like Minish Cap, which came with the Ambassador program later and solidified my love for a series that I don't think I would have ever experienced if not for the Ambassador program. As for NSO, my hope is that enough younger gamers are getting it to play online or get DLC for free that they view the classic games as a bonus and try them out for themselves.

[@Desenrrollado]

Funnily enough I grew up with a nes, genesis and various old consoles. Even actual arcade cabinets like Galaga, Pacman, Ms.Pacman, Asteriods and Dig-Dig. They were cheaper and affordable so my parents and family kinda had them. I did play mario, and some classic titles, even experiencing nes. I experienced almost every console and have exceptions. But I didn't grow up with internet forums or online things immediately. Just singleplayer gaming for a long time. It wasn't until middle school that I started to play valve's tf2 for free. I hold a lot of these games near and dear and appreciate them. I get the perspective you have, and while I didn't experience the same exact 1-1 reactions. I'd say I did get to enjoy things and do have a nostalgia for a lot. From vhs tapes, and windows 95,xp dial up noise. I still miss a lot yes. It was happier and simpler, and I think I'm 10 years younger then you. Retro-gaming means a lot to me. I want to play a lot of older titles. I want to experience some of that stuff. Not out of acceptance or to fit in. Some of the stuff wasn't perfect I know. Though I'd be lying if the best stuff didn't shine through. Arcade gaming was dope and still is, despite the way they gobbled up coins. I think it's nicer that there's access to information. That you don't have to pay a company hotline for tips. That you can just look up a video or get a perspective. I definitely grew up through a drastic and rapid change. I do have that bias and vision. I recognize that, as that games I like aren't perfect. Though I enjoy them. I do dislike some newer games, but I'm not the target demographic I don't think. That doesn't mean that I don't find gems or dislike them all either. Indie titles are a gold mine, and the massive old gen libraries exist. There's so much to play and experience, and I don't think I'll ever truly run out of things to play. I can't say I never got the appeal. In fact I wish I got to experience more. That I was able to play these and talk to closer people or a community/neighborhood. I was definitely a shut-in and lack people to talk to even to this day. The shining memory I have is of playing super mario 64 for the first time ever. God I was sold on it, and by then it was far from new. Same with dkc I played it while visiting a friend of my dad's and their kid let me borrow it and play. The music, ambience and gameplay. It was superb, and to date I still love David Wise. Anyhow I'm not gonna keep talking, you get the gist. It's fascinating to see what your perspective and other's though. It's cool. Also check out retro-achievements. You'll find that there's still a good chunk of users doing retro-games, not to mention an on going magazine today. I digress, thanks for the video.

[@diegog1853]

Imagine if BOTW included the original Legend of Zelda (the game BOTW is trying to go back to with its design) as a bonus for beating the game or completing all shrines or something like that. Imagine if TOTK included Zelda 2. How many kids that are so enthusiastic about those games would get enthusiastic for playing the original zelda, now that they earn it with the only currency they have, which is their time and effort. By Nintendo trying to make costumers out of adults in every opportunity with their nostalgia, they are missing out on the opportunity of making new fans for these old games, which would translate into new costumers down the line.

[@ShadowStarkiller]

You pretty much hit on why I couldn't get into Ocarina of Time. The constant praise built up expectations in my head that no game could ever possibly match, so after 1 dungeon I walked away with "THIS IS IT? THIS IS THE GAME YOU'VE ALL BEEN FELLATING ALL THESE YEARS?" That's why I developed a different approach to my nostalgia: I don't tell people why i think the game is great, i just have them try it. And I DON'T demonize them if they end up not liking it.

[@RichardHartness]

"Those 80s kids were hard core." Damn-straight we were! :P I love you man. Thanks for the blast from the past, even if I do still entre weekly NES competitions.

[@covanentsbane]

The Game Boy Advance releases of classic NES games is really what made it hit for me (Animal Crossing games too, but they came later for me). I got the Final Fantasy 1 & 2 cartridge and the original Metroid cartridge and those games went from complicated messes for me to something I could do in band camp during the excessive amount of downtime you end up with in a large organized thing like that. It really is a world of difference when you put those games in the context that they're supposed to be played in short bursts like that.

[@kargaroc386]

And then look at the people who only had a PC for gaming back then. They were pretty much living in an alternate timeline. The PC platform in the 80s and 90s was basically "what if the video game crash and its consequences just never happened"

[@Klonoahedgehog]

I didnt get internet at my house until i was 10 so in my early childhood i didnt hear any 80's kids talk about NES and their nostalgia so my experience with the console, at least the good games on the system was on roms on my elementary school's PC. So yeah i 100% get the vibe your describing on this video.

[@haberbro5282]

Subscribed to the patreon after seeing your tweet about it. Great stuff as always, making me consider this medium from an angle I hadn't before.

[@GeekCritique]

That's so kind, thank you so much!

[@expithesocfurry4099]

Great video as always! This actually kind of describes my feelings about Sonic Adventure 2 funny enough. I wouldn't necessarily say it was "before" my time since I was actually born the same year it came out, but I didn't end up playing it growing up. Yet, as I got more into the series via the Classic Collection on DS and Sonic Colors on Wii (plus stuff like the demo of Generations on 360), Sonic Adventure 2 was among the ones I just felt I "had" to try seeing as it was often cited as the best 3D Sonic game (with some even outright calling it the last "good" Sonic game). In 2012 the HD version came out and I ended up giving it a shot that way, and as you can expect - I just didn't really "get" it. I thought it was alright but I didn't find myself enjoying the mech stages especially and even the Speed Stages just didn't hit close to the same as Colors or Generations did for me. I do think over time this led to some hype backlash on my part since I just wasn't seeing what everyone who called it the "best Sonic game ever" was. As the years have gone on, I still wouldn't say I necessarily "love" Sonic Adventure 2, even now I think there's just something I'm missing about it but I've at least gained a better understanding as to why the game is as beloved as it is. I think sometimes you just don't see what others see in the same game and this can definitely come down to context, nostalgia and how the way you experience games kind of evolves in that timeframe.

[@KaiserMattTygore927]

Must be a generational thing, because I can't sit through colors or gens, they just seem pretty vapid and flimsy to me, Adventure 2 is something I always like to come back to every now and then and sink my teeth in to. To me (colors especially) is like biting into a piece of paper, I just don't feel any substance or bite to it.

[@jonathanc3001]

I didn’t have sonic adventure 2 growing up either, but after having tried it for the first time a year ago at age 25, it’s definitely my favorite sonic game. The mechanics feel skill expressive and I love that the story takes itself seriously and not seriously at the same time.

[@jordancooney6817]

I expected to love Adventure 2. I decided, however, that I would play Adventure 1 first. I did, and I loved it. Still do. I then moved on to Adventure 2 and had a similar response. "I don't get it." I had always heard that Adventure 1 hadn't aged well or was just ok, but Adventure 2 was a masterpiece. Yet I loved Adventure 1 and didn't really care for Adventure 2. This is all within the last year, so I don't know if SA2 will ever click for me, but SA1 will definitely remain a favorite.

[@KaitouKaiju]

SA2 is pretty overrated Only a third of the game is good and they ruined the treasure hunts

[@ehhorve857]

to everyone here who wants to 'get' it, or at least get a thorough explanation of avenger 2 at the time, I'll point you to surisvidya's video, 'sa2 was more than a game. it was an event.'

[@Blankult]

Being a relatively poor brazilian kid in the 00's meant that we couldn't afford the latest consoles, so while the rest of the world was enjoying their ps3 i was there playing snes games lol. I had a lot of old consoles, but the main thing we got was a crappy pc, which we could play emulators because that's all it was good for. We did have a ps2 when i was a kid but i always found the games there more boring, while the older games felt more lively to my ADHD brain. The amount of games my brothers and i discovered because of emulation is insane, a lot of our nostalgic memories are centered around emulation and it allowed me to learn and appreciate what's come before me, while other people were focusing only on the new. This made me go into the phase of "i was born in the wrong generation" and "old is always better". Over the years i started to more critically analyse the games i play, and it made me realize that some classics actually suck too, and that the reason i like older games is more about the style of the time which is not so common anymore. My circumstances led me to discover things i would never do otherwise, and the way it has influenced me is priceless, i wouldn't have it any other way, and the crazy thing is that a lot of people in south america have the same experience, long live emulation.

[@maddosshmillore]

Have been rewatching all of your videos! Such a great treat to end the marathon with a new video!

[@herooftime1704]

My answer to your question at the end is the original Final Fantasy on the NES. I've been an enormous Final Fantasy fan for several years at this point, but the original version of the first game was always something I viewed the way lots of people tend to view NES RPGs -- slow, unbalanced, etc, etc. Primitive is the word here. Around last year or so I decided to give it one more try, desperate to realize myself what made it such a hit at the time of its release, but for the first time under the conditions of "no cheating", which essentially just amounts to no save states, rewinding, any modern emulator enhancements. To a lot of people this probably sounds like a waste of time, but my theory was that playing the game the way it was intended to be played on its original console when it first came out would make it finally click. Put yourself in the shoes of a kid playing it back in 1987, you know? And... honestly, I had a blast. The game's nowhere near as grindy as I previously believed, it's easy to get used to the speed, and so many other elements of the game I previously couldn't stand just... finally clicked. Most of all, it sparked a realization for me regarding the game design itself. You have such limited magic spell charges for a reason, you get so few opportunities to buy items for a reason -- you're meant to push your strategizing skills to the absolute max and manage your resources perfectly to get through the dungeons. Something as superficially inconvenient as your characters not automatically targeting different enemies if their original target died is a feature I realized is meant to keep the player engaged for every single battle in the game, it's meant to ensure the player has a full understanding of their party and their own power levels so they can always deduce which characters will kill which enemies in one hit, which ones will need backup from a spell, and so many other situations. This experience didn't just help me appreciate the original game in my favorite series more, though. Finishing this playthrough broke down a wall that had previously blocked my mind from understanding so many games. My preferred method of playing games now is this "no cheating" style -- not that I am against the existence of save states and the like, I am very glad they exist for those who do choose to use them and I absolutely think they have made retro games so much more accessible for those very people. But I realized that for me, personally, this is what had been holding me back from "getting" these games. I see the beauty of the game design in so many of these games and can fully analyze what makes it work. Resident Evil is a great example of a series that, for me personally, just doesn't work if I don't put myself in the shoes of someone playing it on console at release, and I think the design philosophies of those games are phenomenal. Would I even think that without having completed that playthrough of the original Final Fantasy? I'm not sure, but I'm so glad I do. Thanks if you took the time to read this, I love your content!

[@g.u.959]

Funnily enough, I was also born in 2001. Animal Crossing was one of the ways I discovered a bunch of NES games, but I think old gaming KZbin (think AVGN, HVGN, early let’s play) was what got me curious about older games. Admittedly, I like to do research about older titles and play them on authentic hardware when I can, but I know that’s a route that’s not available to many people, especially financially. I love new titles, but I find myself playing games most often from a few years back and further… dunno why. But I really wish older game systems would be made more available and not just farmed for a quick buck/nostalgia. I’d be curious to see how the gap between those who stay ONLY on new releases and people who play older stuff progresses in the future. Great stuff as always, Josh. :)

[@kaplisisdx8651]

That was an interesting retrospective. I remember a lot of NES/SNES era fans in the early days of youtube, and they did influence me to respect the older games...I already had some doubts about the quality of newer games during the experimental GC era, but i was still having a lot of fun because it was still based around traditional gaming...It was during the early wii era, that i finally started to question the typical "Newer is better" mentality, and started donwloading retro games on virtual console. The wii's motion controls and slower paced games, on top of the concern that it was the future of gaming, made me appreciate super mario world, kirby superstar, Yoshi's island and DK country's arcade like feel. NES games are a bit rougher, but they still feel like you can do some really crazy and pro stuff if you know how they work...Ice climber and balloon fight are hilarious xD

[@bwminich]

EXCITEBIKE! My one nephew got in to Mario Kart for the first time when he was like 5-6, and saw the pixelated Excitebike logo. Having no idea how to contextualize this . . . weird thing, he just called that race course "the chicken track". Which is what we still call it to this day. It's one of those childhood names that the kid still thinks is hilarious and fun, so we have no objections to it.

[@porky1118]

3:30 I had an NES as a child, but not that many games, I mostly grew up with SNES and N64 when I got older (age of 4 or 5). But as a teen, I played some NES games on virtual console and emulator, some of them were pretty nice.

[@DeadweightLKS]

I’m in my early 20s. My favourite video game is on the Wii. And I’m surprised by how much I’ve enjoyed some older games and not others. I played SMB3 in my teens and it just clicked. I played Super Metroid too because I was curious in the series, knew how popular it was and there weren’t any new 2D games at the time, and that turned me into a Metroid superfan for life. This year I played the DKC SNES trilogy for the first time, worried that the amount of praise I’d heard for it from older adults was going to frame it in such a way that could only disappoint me… but no, these three games blew me away, and DKC2 is one of my favourite games of all time now Some games work better to check out as a product of their time and a living history, some work better as just a game, and some a little of both. This video’s point on pricing and accessibility has given me some food for thought.

[@MunkiZee]

You know, if you enjoy something and you are on Earth at the same time to enjoy it then that is something to be cherished, and to be grateful for. Play games because you want to play them, that is the full extent of it

[@sirdryden42]

I grew up as an NES kid in the late 80s, but I also had an old-school Atari and Intellivision consoles at my grandma's house that my dad owned. In addition, I played a lot of classic arcade games like Galaga and the original Pac-Man at my local Pizza Hut. So I've never really had the feeling of "discovering" games from before my time because my experience with games from an early age goes pretty much all the way back, even though I'm not that much older than most of my favorite millenial KZbinrs. I don't think I ever realized how much that has shaped my opinion about classic games from the pre-SNES/Genesis era; to me, everything before 1992 feels like it was from "my childhood", even though there's about 20 years of gaming history in that category.

[@supermakermatic2111]

As a kid in the 2010s, I got super hooked on the 80s and 90s nostalgia and completely bought into it - and when I played those games, I was more enthralled than I was by a lot of at-the-time modern games - and that wasn't just NES/SNES/MD/SMS/GB stuff that was still in the nostalgia zone, I also got hooked on 70s Atari and LCD games, which I still stand by as having aged better than people say. I think that because of that experience, I have a higher tolerance for games with low content or poor graphics and less forgiveness towards a good story or content quantity covering up a mediocre gameplay experience (lookin' at you, Ultimate), which I'm grateful for - hell, when I play retro-inspired games my biggest gripes are usually the modern touches (did Shovel Knight really need that many checkpoints???). Might've helped that I was super into WarioWare, flash minigames on Nick/CN/Disney websites, and the bootleg flash port of Pac-Man in my single digits.

[@self-absorbed5269]

I had never even heard of Ristar before Sonic Megacollection. And if it weren't for that , I wouldn't have got Sonic Gems to get other unknown games. That's when I found the rental I couldn't name but never forgot , Vectorman. But looking back , with games today , I see what you mean.

[@fishactivation5087]

Chrono Cross is an example of a game that I hated initially, grew to like it over time, and then wrapped back around to despising it. I was born on 2004, smack dab in the middle of the NES nostalgia boom, so by the time I was old enough to... _think,_ that ship had sailed and everyone was fawning over games from the SNES and N64 era. One of the games that always got brought up in conversations like that was the 1995 Squaresoft classic, Chrono Trigger. Pretty much everyone who was older than me paraded that game around like it was the second coming of Jesus Christ, calling it a "timeless masterpiece of a game." I also distinctively remember someone claiming that the final boss of Sonic Generations 3DS reminded him of a part of the game. Thing was, at the time, I didn't care much for RPGs, so I didn't bother touching it until 2018 when I finally bit the bullet, downloaded a ROM of the game, and sat down to play it. Thing is, though, that's not the game we're talking about. When I started going through the game, I found that it deserved every ounce of praise it got. Everything about it was essentially perfect, with the only thing holding it back being that it was, well, a turn-based RPG. Chrono *Trigger* was love at first sight. What we're talking about here is Chrono *Cross.* In comparison to Trigger, Cross was a game that I heard essentially nothing about. If it was ever mentioned at all, it was basically just a footnote, only mentioned to clarify why people were petitioning for a Chrono 3 rather than a Chrono 2. All Square-related nostalgia for the PS1 era was directed towards the Final Fantasy games and Xenogears. Couple that with the fact that I don't feel near as comfortable emulating the PS1 as I do with cartridge-based systems, and I had to wait a bit to experience Cross. About half a year after beating Chrono Trigger, my family and I moved from Tennessee to Alabama. One of the first things we did, before even packing our stuff, was we checked out this retro arcade that doubled as a video game store. It just so happened that they had a copy of Chrono Cross on the shelf. We had a PS2 back home, so I bought the game, along with Final Fantasy 8 and a PS1 memory card. When we got back to our Tennessee home, I popped that sucker into the PS2, grabbed that old, sticky controller, and...dropped it after an hour. I just couldn't get into it. The battle system was a mess, even just a basic attack meant going through this weird menu where you had to select between three different types of attacks, where the stronger ones used up more of this guage at the bottom of the screen. There was this weird color mechanic where if your field was a certain color, it'd be more susceptible to a certain element, and the color of your field gets changed through certain commands, and enemies still had their own elemental strengths and weaknesses independent from the color of their field. Not to mention, the battle music was gross. I don't know what happened there, all the music in the first game was perfect, and even the intro music to this one was absolute fire. And then the setting of the game...why are we just on some random island? Where's Guardia? Where's Zeal? The last game had us travel across the world, across pretty much every major time period, and here we are on some random island that we never saw even when flying over the sea with the Epoch. I eventually just put the controller down, chilled out to the Caribbean rendition of the first game's main theme, and after a while, I shut the system off, put the game away, and didn't touch it for a couple of years. I believe it was last year that I tried picking it up again. I made a video on the Nintendo Direct that announced the game's remaster, and ratted it out for being "not Trigger, that one's the good one. Cross is the bad one [...] because it's not Trigger." After recording that line, I realized that I was judging the game too harshly for not being a carbon copy of the game I adored. And really, can you blame me? I played Trigger and tried Cross at a time when I used the term "RPG" as a derogatory catch-all for any game that had a greater focus on menus and brain power over reflexes. I didn't even want to call Secret of Mana and Kingdom Hearts RPGs simply because their gameplay wasn't halted by the appearance of an enemy. Trigger was the first turn-based game other than Pokémon that actually captivated me and got me to finish it. By the time I made that video, I had fallen in love with Final Fantasy 7 and 10, Persona 5, Super Mario RPG, Earthbound, Deltarune, and the first Fire Emblem. I was more than ready to give the game a second chance. So, I threw the old disc into my PS3, and for a while, I actually enjoyed it. I couldn't really get a hang of the battle system, but I was still having a good time following Serge's journey for...whatever it was, I don't remember, something about a frozen flame? Whatever it was, it held my interest, not to mention the fact that there was a character named Glenn, like the from from Trigger. And then there was a cave, and the cave had a dinosaur, and that dinosau kicked my ass twelve ways from Sunday. Another thing about this game I'd that it doesn't have a standard EXP system. Instead, level-ups and moves drop from enemies at random. And I wasn't interested in traveling back through the caves that were already pre-rendered and difficult to navigate just so I could backtrack to where some certain enemies are and grind them out until I had the right moveset that could kill the dino. I had already dealt with the dwarves, I was tired of getting beaten up in a turn-based RPG. So, I dropped it again. To this day, I haven't beaten that dinosaur, and I don't know if I'll ever come back to it. Maybe after I'm done with the Battle Network games, which I find equally as obnoxious due to everything *except* for the battle system. I'll be honest, I haven't really had a lot of those moments where a game I've heard get hyped up so much ends up being a letdown at first, and then for it to click years down the line. All the other examples I could think of, those being Metroid and Devil May Cry, weren't actually examples of that, and were more of me just pushing through them and reaping the reward of getting to play the phenomenal third entry of both series. It's also what I'm hoping for with the aforementioned Battle Network series. I think the difference is that I was always in that stage where those old games were freebies. I come from a family of pirates, sailing the high seas of shady websites and laughing at the landlubbers paying hundreds of dollars for the right to Snatcher. Some of my earliest gaming memories, after wondering what happened to Roxas in KH2 and seeing boobs for the first time at the end of Twilight Princess, were playing Final Fantasy 6 and Sonic 2 on a Toshiba laptop in 2008. It was that laptop and the Atari Flashback we had that set me up to be the retro gamer I am today. To this day, my list of favorite games is dominated by 3D hack-and-slashes, nostalgia trips, and games from twenty years ago. And I don't think I'd have so much love for games that are twenty to forty years old now if I wasn't a fan of games that were twenty to forty years old then. And I don't know how to end this, so I'll just say I've been writing for two hours, it's 3AM, and I have my high-school graduation party tomorrow, so GOOD NIGHT.

[@GeekCritique]

Hey, you had the same experience with Chrono Cross that I *remember* people having a few years before you were born! The first time I ever even heard of Chrono Trigger, it was being used to contrast how utterly disappointing its brand-new supposed "sequel" was in comparison. And while I can't relate to that *specifically,* I do think there's something to be said for coming back to a game with a little more maturity and a lot more perspective, and discovering something in it that you didn't see before. I'm almost twice your age, and I'm happy to say that *still* happens for me all the time. Carry on, fellow retro gamer, and congrats on the graduation! :D

[@Voidling242]

I was born in 2007. My first two video game consoles were the Atari 2600 and the XBox 360 where I mostly played indie games. I never really cared much about graphics and stuff.

[@irritated_name]

My family already had an NES and N64 (with very few games) when I was born in 2001 We had borrowed our aunt's SNES for a while, so I have memories of DKC 1 and Super Mario World as well My oldest sister had a gamecube and PS3 so I saw a lot of those games, though I was never really allowed to play them because she was protective and I was rough on controllers I got my first handheld in 2007, a Gameboy Color that my brother was randomly given at school As far as I can remember the only games I owned for years were WarioLand and Link's Awakening, which I bought with a plastic bottle of change (I'd grab my siblings' gameboy games too) We got a Wii in 2008 for Christmas, and would play Gamecube games on it just as much as Wii games Mum randomly brought home a PS1 one day, with GT2 and a demo disc- My sister got Spyro 2 one christmas, My brother got Metroid Prime, and I got Spyro Enter the Dragonfly lmao eventually bought Crash 3 and CTR for it years later I got my DS Lite in 2010 for Christmas, and for quite a while (months) the only game I had for it was the GBA port of Super Mario Bros that some kid on the bus had given to me months before for some reason because I didn't get any games with it, so I again had to grab games from my siblings who had quite a few gba and ds games By this point, I finally had access to the internet in my home so I started to watch youtube videos and download SNES, Genesis and GBA ROMS, which is where a lot of my experience with those libraries comes from I got my 3DS in 2012 for christmas (my cousin had gotten hers in July and I missed out on the ambassador program, I was so pissed) In 2014, I did a bunch of work at my gram's house and with the money she gave me I bought a Model 2 Genesis with Sonic 2 I got a Switch and my first Phone in 2018 with my first job I got my PS4 in 2019 with money from a different job, Persona 5 really made that summer for me I bought a Fat PS2 in 2020, though I haven't touched it much I bought an XBOX in 2021, A personal favourite of mine at the moment, though it was modded poorly and broke after a while before I found the problem and got it fully funtional And, Finally, last year I imported a Model 1 Saturn, not only to explore its odd and obscure library, but also to try and push me to learn Japanese (its really really hard) and right now my favourite game is Panzer Dragoon Zwei and I am very eagerly awaiting my Repro of Panzer Dragoon Saga I've been getting games for all of these consoles over the years, and these days my XBOX and Saturn get a lot more attention than my PC or PS4 (Tears of the Kingdom is eating my time atm tho) It breaks my heart to see prices for old games skyrocketing because of soulless collectors and """investors""" because I love how I grew up with games and I wish that experience with original hardware on CRT was more accessible these days

[@nibot2101]

I’m gonna be honest I like more the older thumbnail of this video

[@GeekCritique]

I do too, but it died such a death in terms of views I decided to try something different.

[@richbichrich]

Always appreciate your perspectives on subjects like this! As much as I bemoan the death of the Virtual Console, I have to say that having much more *immediate* access to large chunks of the NES, SNES, and now GB libraries through Switch Online have let me try experience far more of their libraries than I ever have before. And frankly, without emulators and rom sites, I probably wouldn't have tried out much from the N64/PSX generation either. To your point, being able to try these games out without the pressure of actually having put money down specifically for them is a far better way to experience them outside of their original release and context.

[@anthonytamuzza591]

Back in the mid 2000's my only real exposure to the NES were videos that the Screw Attack guys would put out. Every time they would sing the praises of a game and it came out on the Wii's virtual console I would give it a shot. Some of them I liked, a lot of them I did not. Nowadays I see people younger than me talking about how a lot of N64 games don't hold up or how the good old days was during the PS3 and 360 era. Gaming hits us all the most during childhood like a lot of things, it's just a natural cycle of things.

[@deathbysloth]

My first console was the SNES, but I had many friends and relatives with the NES, so I grew up playing both. Frankly, there's not many games from either system that you couldn't find an equivalent experience or better at some point in the past 20 years. But also just because we have perfectly-rendered 3D-printed cups doesn't mean there isn't value in contemplating and admiring the craftsmanship of a handmade clay bowl from 3000 years ago.

[@Drinkabeerandplayagameofficial]

It’s funny, one big thing I wanted from Prince of Persia: Sands of Time was to unlock the original game to experience it. I did the work…played it…and absolutely hated it. Still, it was so cool to experience classics that way. Early 6th gen is definitely a vibe we will never see again

[@vineheart01]

Im an 8bit junkie. I grew up with the NES, i had it until almost the N64 released. I went out of my way recently to get a NES and all the games i could get my hands on for a reasonable price, some im still hunting that are a bit pricy (shatterhand...). However, i fully admit there are VERY few NES games that unless theres nostalgia or oldschool curiosity about there isnt much reason to play them. A lot of them are decent but plagued by early design flaws, hence the nostalgia requirement. What i will say though is they are a part of history and in the context of what was available they were insanely good, even comparing early NES vs 1990s NES games is unfair because of the progression made in designs. Honestly, only games i can recommend people who dont have nostalgia for NES is Mario3, Megaman2-6, Blastermaster, Kirby, and Shatterhand. Off the top of my head anyway. You will note that majority of those are very late NES games, when the growing pains of game design lessened a bit. Even Blastermaster i struggle to recommend now because BlasterMasterZero is a thing now and ignoring the time gap its the obvious superior version. I still play the NES one because of nostalgia and fully admit it.

[@imkindadumb5351]

This is very well timed I’m just digging into the NES library

[@geno2925]

I was born in 1998 and grew up with the Gamecube, N64, and SNES all at the same time. For the most part, that kinda already prepared me to be "open" to a vast number of retro console games (as well as arcade games, thanks to a certain Namco Museum on the Gamecube), and I suppose it also helped that I didn't have a proper method of internet access at home until I was halfway through middle school. As a kid, I knew of the NES as a thing that existed (the console showed up in Wario World and was referenced in Super Smash Bros. Melee after all), but I didn't see any of the people online or in magazines hyping up the console as the best thing ever, so when I finally got access to NES games, my expectations were not too high, and I enjoyed (and still enjoy them) a lot, to this very day. I had a lot of difficulty finding friends in school though, as most kids my age didn't know and didn't care about what a "Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble for the Super Nintendo" even was, most of them only had a PS2 or an Xbox. And even when I found some friends with similar gaming interests (so, people who also had Nintendo consoles), its been difficult or impossible to get them interested in some of the games I love so much. It absolutely upset me once when I invited some of my friends to my house once, expecting to have a ton of fun multiplayer Mario Kart 64 sessions with them, only for them to want to switch off of the game after only a couple matches! And now, I'm seeing a bunch of people online expressing how stuff like the SNES and Genesis "look too old" or whatever, and that just completely confuses me. I just do not understand how people could just instantly reject huge swaths of video gaming just because... idk, they use sprites? I don't actually know what about them is so unappealing to others, they're timeless classics in my eyes.

[@KagemaruHitokiri]

I'm a bit of an odd case. Though i was born in the early 90s, I didn't grow up on the current consoles. I was always at least one gen behind in my gaming. I grew up with a classic NES, and got both SNES and Genesis before I was 10 (meanwhile PS1 and N64 were both giving way to the next generation not long after). My own nostalgia goes back far enough that, as far as the industry we know today, it may as well be from the beginning. Except, there are two major parts that this leaves behind. The age of Atari is one that I've seen and experienced, and while I couldn't tell you what I played or particularly enjoyed, I can see why it was an important step in the journey of gaming. The other one is the one where I personally failed to engage. The first era of PC gaming, the time of Adventure Games. King's Quest, Space Quest, Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, Sam & Max, and dozens less known and spoken of. All went right past my radar, because...well, I had grown up with games that tested my skill. I was used to "here's a platforming challenge, if you don't figure out how to pass you don't progress," so the focus on puzzles, variations of "use key on lock," and lack of action didn't connect with me. It didn't help that what I knew of the games (even from people who loved them) was nonsense logic and "use everything on everything until something changes" It wasn't until I started listening to people talk about what those games meant to them (and some playing the more iconic games) that I started understanding the value of these old gems. It eventually led to me even finding a few specific adventure games that spoke to me personally (still hoping The Fall finally becomes a trilogy and ends with some closure instead of a cliffhanger). I took a different road to reach a similar appreciation for the past, by allowing the passion and perspectives of others open my mind to an experience I'd previously written off as "not for me."

[@Nin10Guy]

I remember as a teenager back in 2007, my aunt gave me an Atari 2600 with a huge selection of games. At first glance, the games were quite simplistic and felt like they didn't offer much in terms of variety and content. But given that console had such a historical legacy, that aspect alone intrigued me enough to continue playing the console and its games with an open mind. Then after a while later, it finally clicked with me and I suddenly began to realize the replay value comes from trying to improve your own score/skill before getting a Game Over as the games get progressively harder the more points you earn (an old game design philosophy that has largely been ignored in modern gaming in favor of length). It was at that moment that I was hooked on the Atari 2600 despite being well before my time. I introduced this console to my other gaming friends and we had a blast competing against each other in games like Kaboom and Warlords.

[@Furluge]

12:00 - "Tell me about video games before your time." But Josh... there are no video games before my time. ;.; But seriously though, the industry began around five years before I was born. I was turning five just in time for NES to land big. But the first console I ever had was an Atari 7800, which played 2600 games so I ended up getting boxes of the things as hand me downs. I'd eventually get other consoles and experience the libraries of the major systems when they were relevant, if not always brand new. ( As a kid I worked my ass off getting my hands on new games. At one point I actually went door to door hawking off old NES games to get new ones. :D) But it really is only a small toe dip in the pool. There's all sorts of computer systems like the MSX, and ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 I didn't get to try at the time. The Vectrex was pretty niche, and then there's things like the Magnavox Oddysey and pong consoles. It's definitely harder to get attached to something older you did not experience when you were younger. Even as an enthusiast, someone who ran a long-running retro gaming competition, I don't regularly sit down and decide to play older games. I like and appreciate them. I enjoy playing them from time to time to experience the history of the medium for myself. It's fascinating to play through them. To see how design concepts and ideas were created and spread from developer to developer, to analyze them for good ideas and lessons they can teach us but it was definitely not "better" in my day. (Do you remember how expensive games were back then? I looked up some ads recently. $70+ N64 games. The drop in price PS1 games were was night and day.) There were definitely some good points. Certain bad practices had not reached popularity, but there were other issues too.

[@ReadyDude]

Since I was born in 2007, I had grown up during the decline of the Wii and the lifetime of the Wii U (so basically, the decline of the Wii U). By this point, I’d say that the NES nostalgia had for sure died down, but almost all talk of the NES days were still very positive (positive in that way you can tell it’s 90% nostalgia), and you still had to go out of your way to find critiques of actual NES games. However, that didn’t stop me when I was around 7 from buying multiple NES virtual console games on my Wii U, excited to experience all of the great things I had heard about it. And just like you, I just didn’t get it. It seemed too simple. And I like simple games, stuff like New Super Mario Bros. Wii is my absolute jam, but this was simple in a different way. Levels in platformers all felt the same, and anything that wasn’t a platformer was way too confusing without a guide (you know exactly what game I’m talking about). I don’t even think I had beaten a single one of those games I had gotten until I played them again years later on Switch. Even now, while I still enjoy NES games, I never see a reason to play them. When I play them with the Nintendo Switch Online service, after like 5 minutes, I just think “why don’t I just go play [modern sequel to classic NES game]?”

[@alfo2804]

Ownership is a huge factor in attachment, personally. Having been born in 2003, I have no nostalgia for NES games (honestly, I have no nostalgia at all, for anything, even the stuff I grew up with) but having spent, for example, £30 for the original Zelda meant that I immediately felt a lot more devotion to actually spending time with it, and it all started to click. I was sitting there, cross-legged on the floor, face illuminated by the glowing phosphors of my (admittedly not period-accurate) CRT - doing exactly what people did back when it first came out. It feels ritualistic and *real:* a world away from the experience of just booting into an application full of old games on a system that is far better suited to playing much more advanced software.

[@VampyreBassist]

Funny thing, I have found some of my favorite games through emulation. The summer of 2010 is ingrained in Clay Fighter, Demon's Crest, Shadowrun on Genesis, Type O Negative, and general 15-16 year old shenanigans.

[@Majora_T]

Animal Crossing GameCube was a time and place. Discovering my first NES game, Clu Clu Land, I hated that I got such an awful NES game… but I loved the function. I only ever ended up getting two more but I was always on the hunt in Nook’s shop for a new NES game. Nowadays, NES / retro classic games are so in your face, that same thrill isn’t there. You have to find ways to make your own thrill.

[@dandelionProphet]

Thank you for this. This echoes how I felt as a kid growing up with the Gamecube. I was obsessed with Animal Crossing, and while the NES has been difficult for me to come back to despite trying to rediscover the classics of old (the SNES felt better in every way), I absolutely loved playing Punch-Out, Balloon Fight, Donkey Kong Jr., and all the others. The games on Animal Crossing are still my favorite NES games for that reason (though games like Sweet Home absolutely still hold up today).

[@wolfgod6443]

So happy someone is talking about this. Animal Crossing made me a Punch-Out fan, and I had a game pack with Balloon Fight which I loved, but it sadly broke. Animal Crossing brought that back in my life. It was wild hearing your story given that.

[@Renigade68]

It's funny, you're from an older generation than me, but despite that the original MegaMan games clicked with me instantly, I beat every single one of them through the MegaMan anniversary collection on the Game Cube back in the day, and gosh this is something I haven't thought about in a long time but I think it was the MegaMan NT Warrior anime that got me into the series, but I had no idea that that anime was based on any existing video games (Battle Network) and my parents realized I liked MegaMan so they got me that anniversary collection for Christmas or my birthday or something, I think that's right, NT Warrior has mostly faded from my memory entirely (and I still haven't played any Battle Network games, I should really give them a try one of these days) but MegaMan anniversary collection has stuck with me, I still go back to play those classic MM games regularly, on the flipside it was actually MegaMan X that didn't initially click with me, I experienced OG MM for the first time on the GameCube, which was the system that defined my childhood, but by the time of the Wii (which is when I first experience MMX through the VC) I was entering my teen years and becoming a lot more cynical, I had heard about how much of an upgrade X was over the classics for years so I was excited to finally play it, but I didn't like it at all, so many of the fundamentals I had grown used to with the classics had been changed for X and imo many of those changes were not a good idea, at least that's how I fealt at the time, it's only within the last few years, as I've started to understand the negative bias that I had for just about everything from the Wii generation, that I gave X a chance again, and I loved it! So I've been slowly making my way through the rest of the X series ever since, I will say, I would in no way rate the X games as straight up improvements over the classics, and I think trying to look at them through that lens back in the day was part of what gave me such a negative experience, they are their own separate thing, and I've grown to like this separate thing, though I still think for my tastes I like the classic "thing" more, is that just nostalgia talking? Maybe, but it's how I feel.

[@philinegro]

This was really nice reflection and great video TGC! I love your content brother, I hope you’re doing well 🤙🏾

[@joe_kloos8512]

I remember when I was like 15 or 16 I would watch several reviews on Sonic games, the 3D ones in particular. It was shortly after Sonic Forces was first announced and I wanted to play the actual good 3D games for a change. The general consensus back then was that Sonic had, at most, 5 good 3D games worth playing: Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes, Sonic Colors, and Sonic Generations. I ignored the latter two as I didn't have the hardware required at the time. Starting with the first, Sonic Adventure was viewed in a very similar light as Sonic 1 back then. Good but not worth playing in light of its sequel. This was the time period where the "it aged poorly" statement was the dominating opinion surrounding Sonic Adventure. Every time it was included in a top 10s list, it was always relegated to the bottom. Where the first game felt like a footnote, the second was given an exceptional amount of worth and presence. Sonic Adventure 2 was likely the most worshiped game in the series to not come from the Genesis back then. Sonic fans may have been dismissive about Sonic Adventure but they wouldn't shut up about this game. There were a few who expressed opposite opinions but I chalked them up as contrariens in a vast ocean of truth and I did not want to miss out. After all, if an opinion is supported by a vast majority it becomes fact. I played Sonic Adventure first and I liked it. I found it to be every bit as good yet unremarkable as people said. Definitely deserving of the footnote status. It had problems but they were faults that I had been reassured that the sequel would fix. So I waited one year, after Sonic Forces released, till I had $10 to buy the game on Steam. To cut this short, you already know. I was confused and frustrated all throughout that very first playthrough. I, of course, didn't like any of the three gameplay formats. The speed stages were too narrow, treasure hunting was slower and more tedious, I don't even want to elaborate on the mechs. I even preferred the Sonic X adaptation over the story told in this game. I was baffled. By the time I finished the game and watched that final cutscene, I thought I had done something wrong, like I was missing something. Over time, my feelings have subsided a little. I've replayed it a few times and I've gotten good at it. Presently, I prefer to appreciate Sonic Adventure 2 from a distance. If anything, this experience elevated my fondness of the first game even more. At this time, Sonic Adventure is still the only 3D game in the series I like but that could change really soon. I own a copy of Sonic Unleashed, I just need an Xbox to play it. I forgot, I like Sonic R quite a bit too.

[@ankitmahat5598]

Are you making a Metroid dread video??

[@Orange_Swirl]

Wait, he didn't already?

[@alxcus2962]

As much as I don't want to sound impatient, I'd like to know this too.

[@KalokesMysteries]

I remember he said something about this after Dread came out. He said he would give it a couple years before giving it a full critique, like he did with Samus Returns. I think the reasoning is that he wants to return and play it after the fact, having a more critical mind of catching its strengths and weaknesses in a new light. Or, something like that.

[@alxcus2962]

@@KalokesMysteries oh yeah, I remember that.

[@noipoi5403]

Always a treat to get a new TGC!

[@AlyxxTheRat]

Lovely video. I discovered most old games before my time through emulation as a PC gamer. I had friends who showed me ROM sites and emulators and I quickly got hooked on pretty much everything from the 80s and early 90s, both stuff I grew up on but also stuff I never had the opportunity to play.

[@DrongDrango]

Always appreciate seeing more of your stuff, it's interesting to hear the particular perspective of someone who is able to kind of keep track of history. Growing up as a 90s kid certainly did colour that stuff for me. Though I grew up with the SEGA Mega Drive, when I saw the Nintendo consoles I was always floored at how different it was. But I never really got to own my own Nintendo console until way later in my life (First Nintendo console I personally owned was the Wii U), so my only real experience with the Nintendo franchise of games was through playing it at a friend's house, or through other people's experiences on the internet like Angry Nintendo Nerd (before the better name change). But the issue that did bring for me was much like the one you and others in the comments here express: Being told that things before your time was better will build up a kind of expectation. I didn't play Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for ages, way past until I decided to try it out on an Emulator (little money leaves fewer options). People would always tell me it was the most magnificent experience of all time, truly the most acclaimed game ever created in not just the franchise, but the entire N64 console. It curbstomps Twilight Princess and makes Wind Waker look like a babygame! Previously I had only really played Mario Cart and Perfect Dark at a friend's house, so I didn't have much to compare to. But my experience with the game was... Well, frustrating actually! I do thank the fact I grew up within that generation, since that meant I could connect to the nostalgia better, but I did wonder for years why on earth anyone could like this game. It was absolutely nothing that I heard people talk about it during the 2000s, according to my own perspective, and even to this day I sometimes feel a little tinge of disbelief when I hear people gush about it. The controls were stiff, going into first-person aiming was atrocious and even though I do enjoy exploring things at my own pace, something about the way this game paces you didn't hit me right. Of course, that was because my perspective had been coloured by people who adored the game. It isn't their fault, of course - if you love a game, you will express it! You will talk about fighting your first boss in the mighty Deku Tree, how terrifying it was facing a monster that was given such an introduction; the wide world to explore, moving from cities to mountains to lakes; learning to use various weapons and items to proceed and growing more efficient as you played it, feeling cooler and more experienced as a player when you flex on enemies - it's the one game that always sticks to my mind when people gush about the games they grew up with, because eventually growing to understand where that love came from wasn't someone telling me why it was the best game, or properly experiencing it myself... It's through people who decided to go against the grain and actually talk what they didn't like about it. Now that might sound weird but, it did teach me a very valuable lesson: I wasn't there to experience the game within the context of its release. Much the same can be said about the Sonic franchise, which is my favourite one - but you have to take your own time to learn about it; your own conditions to learning about it. My first interaction with this was with Arin "Egoraptor" Hanson in his Sequilitis series. Before then I had never really heard anyone actually complain about OoT, but just hearing someone saying things that made that game not perfect helped to establish the love for it. For, of course, people started writing in the comments, and when everyone started stating their differing opinions, I could finally see a dialogue of the game come around. This helped me greatly to better understand why people would love a game, even if it might not clearly be up to the standards of tomorrow, but also how it is actually okay to not find the greatest game of all time, the actual greatest game of all time and still acknowledge its importance in history, be it in video games overall or just its own franchise. That's why I enjoy watching your videos so much! It's been the most fascinating experience of seeing someone willing to talk about that era of strange backlash, where people hated the Gamecube (today considered a masterpiece of console gaming) for reasons that might be incredibly strange to someone who didn't love through it. I find people both at my own generation and younger who has a hard time believing people hated Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker: It's considered one of the most beautiful piece of LoZ games from a wonderful console, why would people hate it? Until you realize the context of its time, when it came out compared to its competitors, as well as the general gaming culture that was growing at that time. And hearing you talk of this, or showing small snippets of internet history on screen always makes my day. So, uh, TL;DR, love ya' stuff and I can't wait to watch more!

[@bookishdelight]

1:15 See, the problem with this sort of nostalgia whenever it pops up in current day (and ESPECIALLY back in the 00s) is that the wrong people were always behind the keyboard and writing the articles. My version of that article would have told everyone to go just play Rock N' Roll Racing. (Or RC Pro AM if you _have_ to stay 8-bit.) Those you can jump into. Excitebike? That needs someone setting the context of the time for you first before you play it, much like if someone's recommending you a movie from the 50s. It's great, _but._

[@LunDruid]

I was sort of in a reverse-situation. I ended up in a state of buying wholesale into the nostalgic reverence for games from before my time, and just believing the certain set of classics were timeless and amazing... even as there were some I just couldn't get into no matter how much I told myself they were amazing. NES Metroid _still_ hasn't clicked for me to this day, even as I've gotten more fully accustomed to that era intrinsically. I do think we tend to overly revere the classics of our childhoods, entirely ignoring the areas where they failed, or where they've been (to borrow a term you used in your older videos) superannuated. That's just one of the many reasons I've been generally trying to move away from "good game/bad game" language, instead going for "I like/I don't like". One thing that I think has helped one younger person I've talked to "get it", is the idea that you don't have to actually beat retro games to say you've played them, or even play past the first few levels. Beating games is a given nowadays, but back then, it was a bonus.

[@GeekCritique]

Yeah, for most games nowadays, if you just put enough time into them, you *will* beat them. Back then though, you had to put a sometimes-ludicrous amount of *effort* into beating them. There are games I got as a kid that I literally didn't finish for 20+ years, some that I *still haven't* finished, because challenge was where most games derived their longevity back then.

[@HeavenlyKnight96]

As a teen Final Fantasy and Metal Gear were my main series. I bought the PSX versions of a FF 5and 6. I love the PSX FF's but 5's soundtrack is my go to for the classic but refined vibes. I finally was able to play the real Metal Gear thru subsistence. I didn't beat it, got bored after not finding the parachute and got stuck on some roof. Still it was fun to get a feel for 2d stealth. Through playing that i realized that MGS on PSX was really just a 2d stealth game. Presentation changed but the core was still there. Classic as ever.

[@lites73]

I have been patient but now I must ask the question. Where is the metroid dread review?!

[@Endarire]

Might & Magic V: Darkside of Xeen - and by extension, its bigger release, World of Xeen - didn't click with me initially. Then I read the strategy guide, played it, enjoyed it, and it become one of my faves. I even wrote and GMed a D&D 3.5 campaign in that world! Alleluia!

[@thimb3056]

I played DKC Returns as a kid and I thought the game was impossible (I couldn't even beat world 1 😂). I didn't understand DKC's appeal until relatively recently when after playing Tropical Freeze, I decided to go back, and I'm having a blast with Returns. This video has inspired me to do something I always thought I might enjoy: work my way through the originals.

[@Supercomet13A]

In regards to NSO, I actually think it fits this "try out a classic game for free*", at least more than the virtual console was. Let's say you want to play animal crossing on switch. One of the major aspects of modern animal crossing is online play. Twenty bucks a year goes towards that. Now you have the option to play nes, SNES, GB, and GBC titles at no extra cost. I know for me personally I had to get NSO for monster hunter and I have played a lot more nes/SNES titles than I ever did during the Wii/Wii u/3ds era

[@davisroth5437]

I got hooked to old videos games thanks to my grandpa he has an NES and me and my family would gather around to play Mario and duck hunt and it was great. I also have to mention the NES classic I was really excited to play more of the old classic games my grandpa had and I found new games that I still follow to this day like Kirby and Mega Man

[@noahmcbride2803]

I had always wanted to try the Metroid series, but I could never get into it. Until your Metroid series. Hearing you give it a shot after not liking it have my the inspiration to try it again. Now Metroid is one of my favorite series

[@sadham2668]

What’s your favourite game?

[@RavenFilms]

7:18 Balloon fight, some how, I had honestly never heard of until NES Remix on the WiiU and I got my NES in 1990 for my kindergarten graduation. I’ve been a gamer since I was 2, begging my parents to take their Atari out of the closet for me. I don’t know how I missed that one, but I definitely enjoyed it on Remix.

[@5raptorboy1]

I have had much of the same experience. I grew up on gamecube, and for me n64 games were damn near impossible. They were so clunky and ugly looking and weird. I remember getting into arguments with my older sister as a kid because her favorite game was Ocarina of Time and I just couldn't get it, I didn't see how that game was better than Twilight Princess in any way. In a lot of ways I think the dichotomy between the 8 bit and 16 bit generations is the same as the 64 bit and... 128 bit (?) generations. The first 2D generation to really make it big and the first 3D generation to really make it big, then the first 2D generation to polish off all those edges, and the first 3D generation to polish them. I think for me, the big breakthrough was Banjo Kazooie. I wanted for a long time to go and see what people meant when they said that the N64 was one of the best consoles ever, but it just never clicked with me until I played that game. For some reason, Banjo's controls always felt so instantly perfect to me while even now I struggle with Mario 64's controls. After getting through that game, and soon after Tooie, I was able to have so much of an easier time enjoying other n64 games, and now I think I appreciate very clearly the old school magic, in large part because since I grew up after they released I didn't really know what was in a lot of them, it was like I was able to go and explore these old worlds with the eyes of a child. I have had a lot of the same experience with even older games than the n64. I am a huge donkey kong fan, I loved the tv show, and DKC Tropical Freeze was one of my favorite games on Wii U, then Returns was one of my favorite games on Wii. I was 10 playing Tropical Freeze for the first time (and now I'm 20 for perspective on how old that game is), but going back to the original trilogy of games I thought the graphics were weird looking, and the gameplay of rolling through enemies to gain acceleration never came to me naturally because of my experience with the more patient later entries. It took me multiple tries and a lot of perseverance to get past that, but then I had 3 "new" donkey kong games to play and fall in love with again. I think this is all a big part of why I enjoy this channel so much, our analogous experiences has led me to have a similar appreciation for these games that are older than myself, to dig into these experiences, and wonder at seeing these old things with new eyes

[@MCastleberry1980]

I was born in 1980, so I was right smack in the middle of those days. I remember playing Atari, etc, and then seeing Super Mario Bros for the first time. My parents never did buy me an NES (i did get a SNES for Christmas when I was 12 though), so all my NES experiences were at friend's houses. Sure, I can pop in Zelda for someone younger, but i cant transplant the experience of spending the summef of 1989 at my best friend's house nearly every day trying to beat it. Or the next summer when he got Super Mario Bros 3. Thats really why I love those games so much: the context of being 9 years old hanging with my best friend. A LOT of old games really dont hold up lol Even back in the day, Excitebike was the game you played for like, 10 minutes before popping in Zelda or Punch Out again.

[@jakedover5301]

There’s a few 8 bits I can play, tmnt3 smb3 adventure island darking duck. But when I really started getting into games it was the 16 bit era, so that’s what I’m accustomed to.

[@REALMARCHINADER]

My first experience with the NES (Or more specifically a Famicom) was when my dad pulled out his old Famicom console out of his old home. As a GBA, DS, and PSP kid the games from the Famicom struck me as being so cool because of how historic it felt and how much my dad raved about it, I played games like Rockman 1-4, Mario 1-3, Mysterious Murasame Castle, and a lot of arcade ports including Double Dragon and Pac Man. Thanks to that experience I still play the Megaman games and Mario games to this day just like my dad did back in the late 80s. They might not be as feature packed as newer games but they are also less bloated and more straight to the point which is why I still pick up and play those games.

[@josephwilson3180]

I got animal crossing for Christmas in 2006! Played it for years. The NES games were so cool. I used to just randomly find one in the dump, and those were amazing summer days. I always hoped I’d get one when I dug up buried stuff.