Do you guys ever miss how gaming USED to be?

[CoMaToast]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

I agree a bit, trophies (....) have hurt a bit since now you have a lot of dumb ones, some because the programmers think they are funny and others because they want people to play the game qand there are "trophy hunters" out there. I also agree in part that some games look like if they spent more attention in on-line and so multi-player might be "down graded" a bit. But in the end the gaming experience is what you make of it. If you don't like that there are easy/dumb trophies then just don't pay attention to them, if you want to have tournaments (I know I do) with others in the room then buy games that offer that instead of ones that offer on-line and let multiplayer slip.

I would put this under the “nostalgia issue” it is easier to remember the best games of an age gone by and forget the weaker ones while it is easy to remember the crappy game you played yesterday and still be pissed about it. Maybe X years ago you were young and you could sit down on Sat and Sun and have a 10 hours tournament almost every weekend but now you can only do it for 3h once a month, it is not the games fault.

it is nostalgia.. I will admit that... And I by no means want to say I am a hermit or against onlineplay... I just miss the days where if you wanted to spend hours on end gaming, that you would be next to friends doing it.. Im not reminiscing on the past /// Just miss the one one one.. or one on four

[octagon]

Originally Posted by CoMaToast

it is nostalgia.. I will admit that... And I by no means want to say I am a hermit or against onlineplay... I just miss the days where if you wanted to spend hours on end gaming, that you would be next to friends doing it.. Im not reminiscing on the past /// Just miss the one one one.. or one on four

My nephews play together and with their friends all the time.

I miss going to theaters and while I can easily point to a dozen ways the theater experience isn't like it used to be the truth is I don't go to theaters largely because I don't feel like dealing with getting dressed and going out and coordinating schedules with friends and so forth and so on.

Theaters haven't changed that much, my tolerance for them has.

[Pondosinatra]

I miss playing games before the Internet existed. I remember spending literally months playing Ultima V and back then there were no cheat codes, no walkthroughs, no online forums. At most you could buy a book that offered hints. You were truly on your own to complete it.

[Elandyll]

What I miss:

- Meaningfull single player instead of many games (the PC is largely to blame on this one) being a glorified multiplayer sandbox with no real single player to speak of (F2p shooters like MWO, Sins of a Solar Empire...)
- Games so hard you were spending hours upon hours on one game instead of buying several each month
- Budgets were not inflated to be completely invested in the graphics/ mo cap / music, but we had reasonable budgets mostly in story and game engine

What improved (besides the technically obvious):
- Games now have multiplayer, when hopefully single player doesn't suffer from its inclusion
- MMORPGs "can" be great for immersion and did not use to exist
- Now there are difficulty levels that let you adapt a game to your level, and replay it to crank things up
- Level design has geenrally vastly improved. Not -always- true (e.g. FFXIII corridors), but generally.

Besides all that: I miss discovering some games for the first time, I am now at an age (41) where I have seen a lot, and it takes quite a bit to impress me. I do not think it's so much about how it "used to be so much better" (I don't think it actually was for most games), but rather "I miss when things were new to me".
It all comes down to this: it was good to play your first RPG / Shooter / Racer ... as a child, when everything was new and exciting

[Icemage]

Originally Posted by Elandyll

What I miss:

- Meaningfull single player instead of many games (the PC is largely to blame on this one) being a glorified multiplayer sandbox with no real single player to speak of (F2p shooters like MWO, Sins of a Solar Empire...)

You need to play Spec Ops: The Line. Also The Walking Dead by TellTale Games (NOT Survival Instinct).

- Games so hard you were spending hours upon hours on one game instead of buying several each month

You need to play Demon's Souls.

- Budgets were not inflated to be completely invested in the graphics/ mo cap / music, but we had reasonable budgets mostly in story and game engine

This is a fair point. A lot of studios got into trouble this past generation for excessive budgets and emphasis on stupid "throwaway" multiplayer just to put a bullet point on the back of a box.

I'm happy to see the pendulum starting to swing back in the opposite direction (see: Bioshock Infinite's multiplayer mode getting axed because someone finally came to their senses about this stupid practice).

Besides all that: I miss discovering some games for the first time, I am now at an age (41) where I have seen a lot, and it takes quite a bit to impress me. I do not think it's so much about how it "used to be so much better" (I don't think it actually was for most games), but rather "I miss when things were new to me".

It all comes down to this: it was good to play your first RPG / Shooter / Racer ... as a child, when everything was new and exciting

Boldfaced for emphasized truth.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Icemage

This is a fair point. A lot of studios got into trouble this past generation for excessive budgets and emphasis on stupid "throwaway" multiplayer just to put a bullet point on the back of a box.

I'm happy to see the pendulum starting to swing back in the opposite direction (see: Bioshock Infinite's multiplayer mode getting axed because someone finally came to their senses about this stupid practice).

Yeah, this was EA's undoing.

Apparently market research showed them that games needed to have multiplayer!

Hint: NO THEY DIDNT!

I can think of several games that had multiplayer unnecessarily added to them. Dead Space 2, Mass Effect 3.

[Terjyn]

Originally Posted by Elandyll

- Games so hard you were spending hours upon hours on one game instead of buying several each month

What really bugs me about people saying stuff like this, is that this difficulty still exists in a ton of games.

The difference is it is now behind a difficulty slider.

I don't know why people consider forced difficulty better than selected difficulty.

[Captain Kirk]

I miss arcade style gaming too. I used to go play at the arcade for hours, even when on vacation. There were some hotels at the beach that had the arcade games right by the pool so I could still enjoy the atmosphere and view the ocean, but play Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter if I desired.

Now that's all been replaced by wifi areas....

[partridge]

I don't like the way online play and social are pushed as being the be all and end all of gaming "of course you want to play with other people and of course you want to announce every achievement to the world". No, I really don't. I'm really enjoying Tomb Raider right now but I doubt I'll go near the online side of it just like I never played the online side of Uncharted. I'm very happy playing a game on my own in my own time.

Look at the Batman Arkham games; no online multiplayer because it simply wasn't needed. I'm sure I read that there will be no single player Tomb Raider DLC, it'll all be multiplayer maps, etc. I hope that report was wrong or I won't be buying any.

My other gripe is DLC that's created at the same time the main game is developed but held back for sale shortly after the game is released. On PS2 it would have been in the game, but now developers feel they can sell it to us as a bonus (ooh, aren't we lucky, er ,no, we're being ripped off)

Gaming is still great fun, but like the internet itself, it's too corporately controlled; the wild west days are gone. It's all a bit safe and predictable.

[i007spectre]

I don't care for multiplayer in any game. Give me a great single player story any day.

[FREYMAX 3D]

Originally Posted by i007spectre

I don't care for multiplayer in any game. Give me a great single player story any day.

Yes, we all know how anti-social you are, Mr. One-seat-in-my-movie-theater... So it goes to figure you would like playing games by yourself too!

Lol! Just teasing ya!

[i007spectre]

Yep!

[Canada]

Yes I miss how gaming used to be. Legendary Goldeneye four ways, nothing like it, yes it's nice to play online but it was nice to be in the room with your friends playing games.

[slick1ru2]

Yes and no. I'd spend hours playing Harpoon. You could play in real time so these naval missions could literally last days. But now the graphics are so much better and the variety is incredible.

[Show spoiler]

688 Attack Sub was another game I played



And M1 Abrams Battle Tank



And another favorite was later Gettysburg!

[binarymelon]

Originally Posted by MerrickG

Yeah, this was EA's undoing.

Apparently market research showed them that games needed to have multiplayer!

Hint: NO THEY DIDNT!

I can think of several games that had multiplayer unnecessarily added to them. Dead Space 2, Mass Effect 3.

What makes the multi-player unnecessary? Is every sequel that adds it unnecessary?

[fsavoie]

Originally Posted by partridge

I don't like the way online play and social are pushed as being the be all and end all of gaming "of course you want to play with other people and of course you want to announce every achievement to the world". No, I really don't. I'm really enjoying Tomb Raider right now but I doubt I'll go near the online side of it just like I never played the online side of Uncharted. I'm very happy playing a game on my own in my own time.

I fully agree with that. I don't care of online gaming. I played a bit of Uncharted 2 and 3 online wich was a blast, but I don't like most of online.

Originally Posted by partridge

Look at the Batman Arkham games; no online multiplayer because it simply wasn't needed. I'm sure I read that there will be no single player Tomb Raider DLC, it'll all be multiplayer maps, etc. I hope that report was wrong or I won't be buying any.

My other gripe is DLC that's created at the same time the main game is developed but held back for sale shortly after the game is released. On PS2 it would have been in the game, but now developers feel they can sell it to us as a bonus (ooh, aren't we lucky, er ,no, we're being ripped off)

That is something that a lot of people says that I don't agree. Sure it must be true in some case, but most of the time, like DS2, DS3, Bioshock2, RdR zombie, Deus Ex, Infamous vampire they really feel apart from the game.

[Trailbreaker77]

I will never forget that F'in Battletoads Speeder Level!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No game has ever come close to the frustration that, that game created in me.

[slick1ru2]

Multiplayer evolved with increases in Internet access and speed. Quake was the first multiplayer game I played online and it was via 28.8 modem. At first it was very hard to play with all the different latency of players with such low connection speeds. But then they did a patch where you could play resonably well against someone playing with a 128k ISDN line or at work with a T1 line. Quakespy was the precursor to GameSpy. It was exciting times back then with all the mods, Team Fortress came out of Quake.

I bought a US Robots 28.8 modem for my Packard Bell computer because you could send it in and upgrade it to 56k when that technology came out. Next I got a second phone line then later 1.5mbps cable but it never worked right. The day it was hooked up the installer remarked how I was getting dialup speeds. Eventually went to 1.5 mpbs DSL which worked well. And then speeds rose and rose until I went back to cable because of better speeds, online gaming got better and now many buy games for online and don't play offline. There are online only games.

Of course there are those that don't like online play. I'd say a lot of that has to do with many online players glitching or cheesing, insisting on going the easy route that requires less player skill and more on having the biggest advantage on the other players. The funny thing is that they brag after winning, like it was their skill, not their insane advantage they gave themselves with their cheating/cheeseing/team/weapon/equipment/perks, etc.. I can totally see were people prefer AI over these type players.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by binarymelon

What makes the multi-player unnecessary? Is every sequel that adds it unnecessary?

Reread the post. It's answered explicitly.

[PaddyMcAloon]

I really miss playing the NES when I was a kid. Used to go to a neighbor's to play Mike Tyson's Punchout, Excite Bike, Baseball, Double Dribble, and Contra (to name a few). Played those games for HOURS. Eventually got my own NES and fell in love with Tetris, Zelda, Super Mario Bros, Bubble Bobble, Castlevania.....the list goes on. There was even a few years that included the highly addictive game from the Turbo Grafx 16, Military Madness (for sale in the ps3 store with updated graphics).

Games today, to me, come off as intimidating at first. After playing them for a while, you learn there's not a whole lot that has not changed (use of controller, strategy, movement, patterns, bosses to beat, etc). While there is fun to be had with games today, I don't think such fun could rival the fun I had as a kid with all those 8 bit cartridge games that you had to blow into to get to work sometimes.