What are some old games that are hard to revisit, because a more modern and superior version exists?

Submitted ⁨⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨venotic@kbin.melroy.org⁩ to ⁨games@lemmy.world⁩

I tried playing Harvest Moon on the SNES today and having played Stardew Valley for hours, I thought I'd try and see how tolerable the original Harvest Moon was in comparison. I know and understand it is unfair because there's a 20 year gap between Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley, while also discrediting Harvest Moon's later entries since there's more than one.

Harvest Moon to me is a bit hard to revisit. Having to get used to only carrying two tools at the same time, your farm don't seem as big, you don't have a way to know that you're tired as readily, you just have to watch for the signs and the village you visit doesn't seem as characteristic. It's a basic farming sim, it has to start somewhere.

But Stardew Valley does so many things that it is easier to revisit.

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LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
I would love to experience X-COM UFO Defense, but the only X-COMs I’ve played to any extent are the two “modern” Firaxis games. Going back to the originals is a real effort, especially without having the manual to hand.

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- Nalivai@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
  If the originals are too difficult to sink your teeth it, you can start with Xenonauts.
  
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JakobFel@retrolemmy.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Do the original version of Doom and Doom 2 count? The relatively recent, re-released duology is objectively superior. Also, OpenRCT2 makes classic RCT and RCT2 feel incomplete at best, and outright horrible to play at worst.

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Mechanismatic@lemmy.ml ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I tried, but I just can’t go back and play Oblivion after playing Skyrim with all the quality of life mods. I’m waiting on the Skyblivion release to revisit it.

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- tonyn@lemmy.ml ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  The loading screens omg
  
  I put hundreds of hours into that game and loved all 15 of them I spent actually playing
  
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- lath@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I could and i did. It was great. Sorry you couldn’t find a similar feeling.
  
  Ps: nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh
  
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- emb@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I’d say TES as well, but with Oblivion > Morrowind. I had trouble getting used to it being more toward the RPG side than Action. But it’s rewarding if you see it through.
  
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- dogslayeggs@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I actually did. After waiting 10 years for a new TES game after Skyrim, I got bored and installed Morrowblivion. Played that all the way through. Then I played Oblivion with some visual mods. It was still quite fun, though I didn’t do a full play through. If I hadn’t already done a full play through, then Oblivion would still be an awesome game after playing Skyrim.
  
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cattywampas@lemm.ee ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Goldeneye. Revolutionized the FPS genre at the time. Nigh unplayable now. Tried recently using both NSO and on an original N64, it just hasn’t aged well when compared to something modern.

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- RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Plug in a second controller and switch the control option to 2.4.
  
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- catalyst@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I played Goldeneye at an arcade recently that had an N64 set up and actually had a great time. But people who hadn’t grown up with it and tried to join in found it pretty frustrating. So I can see that going either way tbh.
  
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- Lemmist@lemm.ee ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I played a port to the modern system recently. WASD, mouse… Was rather fun.
  
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  - brap@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Hell yeah man
    
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- LainTrain@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Play the xbla version via Xenia with mouse support and you’ll love it more than you ever did.
  
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RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
NES Metroid, being replaced by Metroid Zero Mission.

NES Metroid is interesting to play through to see where the franchise came from, or for the nostalgia factor, but Metroid Zero Mission is vastly superior in nearly every conceivable way, its not even close. Its not like Silent Hill 2 or Resident Evil 3, where the originals are still better than the remakes overall, everything taken into account (though in that case, SH2 remake is superior to the RE3 remake). Absolutely every element of Zero Mission is an improvement on the original.

Metroid Zero Mission did not make vast sweeping changes to alter the identity of the game, making only minor adjustments to designs that were not thematically important (for example, the physical appearance of Ridley or Kraid being different is not thematically important). There were not big amounts of cut content, with only minor elements being cut like the fake Kraid enemy, which was not thematically important. The music is all familiar with the same composition, but with added flair. Its not different just for the sake of being different. Items and suit upgrades are almost all in the same places as the original NES Metroid, with the addition of new items that were added to the Metroid setting later on such as the Charge Beam and Super Missile. A map was added to the game, and the beam weapons now stack like in Super Metroid, rather than replacing the last beam you had.

All in all, Zero Mission leaves very little reason for the player to play the original game, especially if all the player cares about is the overall story of the Metroid IP. The player won’t get more thematically important designs that enhance the story like they would playing the original Silent Hill 2, and they won’t get more original game content and story like they would playing RE3 Nemesis. They wouldn’t get an improved experience. The choice to play NES Metroid mostly just comes down to nostalgia, historical value, or personal preference. Or if someone only has an NES or device capable of emulating the NES but not the GBA.

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- MimicJar@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I completely agree and to I’ll add that this also applies to Metroid II. As Metroid II was on the Game Boy the game resolution is far too small to ever revisit. For a side scrolling game you can barely see what is in front of you.
  
  Luckily the fan game AM2R, or the slightly less good but still excellent 3DS remake do for Metroid II what Zero Mission did for the original.
  
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  - kratoz29@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    
    Luckily the fan game AM2R, or the slightly less good but still excellent 3DS remake do for Metroid II what Zero Mission did for the original.
    
    I just started with the Metroid saga (it is never too late I guess) and I started with Zero Mission, I am actually struggling with what is next for me, whether to start with AM2R or the 3DS one… Both look appealing to me, but as I don’t have nostalgia googles for the older 2D games and the 3DS one has always called my attention, I might lean more to it… On the other hand, AM2R is a fan game… And I have a huge respect for those…
    
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- dogslayeggs@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I have an NES and a PS5. I guess I’ll be on the old version.
  
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  - RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    If you have a smartphone, or a computer built after 2005, you can definitely emulate Metroid Zero Mission, but unfortunately Nintendo makes it really hard to do it the easy way.
    
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Aielman15@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Having grown up with the PS1, it’s been fun revisiting old classics and see what has aged well and what hasn’t.

Platformers like Spyro, Crash, Rayman, Abe’s Oddysee and Ape Escape have aged like fine wine (although Crash 1 is a lot more janky than the others). But that back into the past, some games also showed no signs of proper playtesting aimed at kids, which means overly difficult levels, annoying completions and such - I remember spending months playing Tarzan, The Emperor’s New Groove, Croc 2, Kingley’s Adventure and others to 100% them, and some of them I could never finish. I only recently 100% Croc 2 for the first time, for example, and yeah, it wasn’t really that good.

Some JRPGs are also as great today as they were the day they were released (Final Fantasy IX, Xenogears, Chrono Cross, Star Ocean and even lesser known ones such as Legend of Legaia, Threads of Fate and Wild Arms), and are arguably better than many of their contemporary competitors. BUT you have to stomach one too many random encounter, overly distracting old/early PS1-era graphics, bad translations, or all of the above (I’ve never been an omega-fan of FFVII, and let me tell you, revisiting it in the pandemic really didn’t improve my opinion of that game).

The slow gameplay afforded by the console really allows action-horror games such as Resident Evil, Dino Crisis and Silent Hill to shine, but those that attempted to be more action-oriented, such as Siphon Filter, really show the signs of age. Dino Crisis 2 is the exception here, being very action-heavy, but also distinctly “modern” in many of its design choices.

Stealth games such as Metal Gear Solid and Tenchu are also great, although very limited in scope by today’s standards, and the latter’s low render distance is something that may annoy players accustomed to modern gaming.

FPS games (Medal of Honour being the biggest title) really have no place in any contemporary gamer’s playlist. The same can be said about Race/driving games, unless you like revisiting the catchy tunes of the Gran Turismo 2 soundtrack. For example, I found CTR - Crash Team Racing quite dull and too easy even at max difficulty, but had a blast collecting all achievements in the remake (shame it never got released on PC - I wonder why).

It’s probably the same about fighting games: modern entries are much more fluid and dynamic, have better AI and allow for a greater skill ceiling. I say “probably” because I’ve never been a fan of fighting games, in fact I suck at them and have never played them extensively.

There are other cases where I found the original game “good enough, but not worth your time over the most recent entries”. For example, as a kid I spent countless hours crossing the skies of Ace Combat 2, but all the titles that came after it are just better. If I had to chose only one game for this thread, AC2 would probably be it. I loved it and I still do, and its soundtrack is bonkers (seriously, it’s really good), but yeah, I’d take 4, Zero and 6, or even Project Wingman, over it any day.

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- PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  On the subject of fighting games, its true that modern games are more fluid and dynamic and obviously visually superior, but they are also chopped up into a thousand microtransactions and dumbed down. There are six games in the Soul Calibur series now, and SC2 is still the peak there. I’d also argue the best games of both the Mortal Kombat and Dead or Alive series lie somewhere in the middle. The latest entries in all three of these series are honestly disappointing, as well as absolutely riddled with microtransactions.
  
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  - Aielman15@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
    That’s sad to hear. I was aware of some of them MTX-heavy, but I thought it was compensated by the base game being more feature-rich than their predecessors.
    
    I appreciate the correction, I really am ignorant when it comes to this genre.
    
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- fefellama@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Great comment, lots of examples! I agree with pretty much everything you listed.
  
  Regarding CTR, have you tried Crash Nitro Kart? I always loved that one more than the original. It had a few improvements over the first game, so I wonder if it aged a bit better.
  
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  - Aielman15@lemmy.world ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Unfortunately, I haven’t! I didn’t have a PS2 growing up, I went straight from the PS1 to the X360, so I missed on a lot of titles from the sixth gen. I eventually got back to play some of them (.hack games, Ace Combat titles, and a few more), but I don’t have as much free time as I did when I was a kid and I’m still missing on a ton of stuff.
    
    That being said, the CTR remake did have all the Nitro Kart levels in it and they were a true joy to play. I liked them even more than the original’s levels, which I certainly did non expect as I had a lot of nostalgia for the OG. Let me tell you, if the remake had been released on PC with cross-play, me and my brother would still be playing it to this day lol
    
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simple@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Honestly, Diablo 2. It’s a classic, it set the standard for the entire genre and it was a brilliant game. Playing it recently, it feels quite shallow compared to modern ARPGs and lacks a ton of quality-of-life features. Games like Grim Dawn, PoE, Torchlight 2 are way better.

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- Ashtear@lemm.ee ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Action RPGs, especially the ones with a heavy focus on loot, suffer the most for me. Trying to play through Vagrant Story now is brutal. MP for fast travel!
  
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emb@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The early Pokemon games are pretty rough, after you get used to improvements from the GBA era, particularly the remakes.

Likewise, the original NES Metroid after playing Zero Mission? Takes some getting used to.

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- ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I enjoyed the fighting simplicity of the original pokemon games. I could recognize and know the names of 151 pokemon and their weakneses/strengths. Now there’s too many pokemon and too many counters and hybrids. Too much work to keep track of.
  
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- Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Ahhhh I love how crunchy the old versions are! The only thing I wish I had on my carts is a FFWD feature for grinding.
  
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oddspinnaker@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
This is pretty obscure, but the Game Boy Advance remake of Mario Bros. (Not Super Mario Bros.) is more fun than the original.

You can run, for one thing, and the controls are more responsive in general.

It’s one of the games on Super Mario Advance, and one of the main reasons I originally wanted a GBA when it came out! I had the original Mario Bros. for the NES and thought it would be fun to have a portable version. I was right.

They did a great job updating the game!

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Surp@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Diablo 2 Lord of destruction, Diablo 2 resurrected is sooo much better in many ways I’ll probably never play the og again.

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- Yokozuna@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Best part is you can have the look if you press a button!
  
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spankmonkey@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The original Neverwinter Nights after Baldur’s Gate 3.

NWN was fantastic for it’s time, loved the DM mode and online mods, but the clunky movement and walls of text without voiceovers just can’t compare.

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- chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I actually prefer walls of text these days. I find myself too impatient to sit through long, voice-acted diatribes. I can read 10 times faster than the voice actor can speak, so I just end up turning on subtitles and skipping most of the voice acting anyway.
  
  I also just find that voice acting tends to compromise the amount of writing. They just won’t have the VA read a wall of text and instead they’ll cut it right down, removing tons of nuance. Voice also similarly compromises the amount of dialogue options available to the character. I have yet to see a voice acted game with the sheer breadth and depth of dialogue option choices as games like Planescape Torment or Fallout 2.
  
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- ampersandrew@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I’m trying to see some stuff in BG1 and 2 that I missed as I take another lap through the entire series, and I remember BG1 being a fairly easy, straight-forward game, but now that I’m replaying it, I remember that’s only the tail end of the game. Early in the game, when you’re stuck at level 1 for hours, lots of attacks just one-shot you, and it takes so long to get level 2.
  
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  - chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    If you’re visiting BG1 via the Enhanced Edition it’s actually been changed a lot from the original game. One of the biggest differences is that summoning spells don’t scale in the number of minions you get the way they did in the original. I remember summoning great big walls of skeletons with Animate Dead and just having my entire party pelt the enemy with slings and arrows from relative safety. Can’t do that anymore!
    
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  - spankmonkey@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I think BG3 also does max HP for 5e which is higher than the edition(s) used for 1 & 2. Did 1 & 2 use random HP for first level as well?
    
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- tal@lemmy.today ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I got through the original NWN multiple times, as well as various mods.
  
  I got bored partway through BG3, never finished. Barely touched NWN 2.
  
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  - CheeryLBottom@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    I had started The Aielund Saga a couple of weeks ago. I never did finish the first time.
    
    NWN is something I like to go back to, same with Titan Quest. I have newer games piling up
    
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- dogslayeggs@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I tried playing Baldur’s Gate 2 after a few full plays of BG3, and it was nearly unplayable.
  
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catalyst@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
For me games from the NES era can tough to enjoy for more than a short period of time. They just tend to feel punitively difficult in a way that is not very fun. I’d much prefer a Mario from SNES onward any day for example.

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fefellama@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
A lot of strategy games fit this bill to me. Mainly the Paradox ones like Europa Universalis or Crusader Kings. I’d much rather play the most recent version (EU4 and CK3). However, it’s interesting that I feel the exact opposite about the Total War and Civilization Series, where I’ll prefer the original Rome Total War and Shogun 2 Total War over many of the more-recent games, as well as Civ V over VI and VII (though I haven’t played VII yet, to be fair).

The Football Manager series also comes to mind. There’s little tweaks and improvements each year (this year being an exception where they are redesigning the entire engine) so I prefer playing the most recent one (even if I still boot up a few of the older games for some nostalgia every now and then).

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Carmakazi@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I started Monster Hunter with 4U on the 3DS. After World, Rise, and now Wilds, I have a hard time justifying crumpling my hands into a pretzel to play the old games on portable. The movesets are comparatively barebones, and there’s a lot of tedium and jank that the new games stripped away. Veterans will tell you that’s the real Monster Hunter and the new games are infantilized arcade games, but whatever. I play games to have fun, not bang my head against a wall.

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- Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I do love old-style MH still! World and Rise are wonderful and Wilds is great so far, but MHXX/MHGU is my favorite Monster Hunter game for sure.
  
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Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Now you got Rock, Paper, Scissors, Stapler, Banana, Atomic Bomb, Literature, Handcuffs, Police Brutality, Spock, Tweezers, Howling Dog.

And really, who would ever expect you to pick Tweezers? But it doesn’t lose to much, so it’s actually a great pick to twist your friends nipples. Unless they start EXPECTING you to twist their nipples, so they pick Atomic Bomb, and blow up all of civilization in a 30 mile radius.

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MoreFPSmorebetter@lemmy.zip ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Pretty much all the racing games from my childhood. I remember them having super realistic grip and aerodynamics, but playing them again compared to even sorta SIM modern racing games today is just night and day.

I will blame my 1000+ hours in beamNG for some of that. Once you have seen super detailed soft body physics it’s hard to play anything that doesn’t have it. Wreckfest 1 had a decent hybrid soft/ridged system that worked for that game. Seems the second game that just dropped on early access improves on it some, but I’m gonna wait for the full release before I pull the trigger on that one.

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AceFuzzLord@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I still do it from time to time because I like playing them on original hardware, but Sonic 1&2 on Genesis/Mega Drive. The Origins Plus versions may not be 100% accurate gameplay with regards to movement/moveset, but anniversary mode’s retry special stages is real nice when half of the time I get screwed in those. Especially 2’s special stages where I feel I feel like I’m constantly getting screwed over by my favorite character/sidekick being incompetent at the special stages.

Just recently got the 3rd game (still need & Knuckles to complete the set) and while not being able to retry special stages is an issue, I can at least reset the game without having to worry about needing to replay the whole entire game over from the start. So it gets a pass because all I gotta do is replay a stage.

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- MyNameIsAtticus@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  2’s special stages genuinely got my nerves when i played the OG cartridge. It felt like Tails was more of a nuisance then an aid sometimes lol
  
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Sanctus@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I haven’t been on Space Station 13 since Space Station 14 came out. The controls are just actually intuitive and BYOND is dead in the water.

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jordanlund@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I find it the other way around. I can’t play Vampire Survivors because of Robotron/Smash TV/Geometry Wars.

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tatann@lemm.ee ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The Witcher, I hope the remake we’ll be good

The Witcher 2 is more than fine

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FrChazzz@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Not sure if it fully counts according to the question, but I can’t imagine playing any version of The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker that’s not the HD version for WiiU. That dual screen perfects the game and renders all other versions unplayable.

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hahattpro@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Because if you are playing old version, you aren’t having time to play new version.

Those greedy publisher doesn’t want their old, better and well cared product cannibal on sales of their new products.

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coper@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Silent Hill 2 remake has achieved a superior game in all aspects that it’s nosense now playing the original one

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Lemmist@lemm.ee ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Pre-VI Might&Magic. That quant-square movement was bearable in the late '80x but it was never good.

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Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition is basically worthless if you have Dark Souls: Remastered.

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- PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Dark Souls never even needed a remaster. The original could be released today and probably still be the best game of this year. The improved performance is the only thing worth noting, and even that only really matters in Blighttown, which everyone skips after their first playthrough anyway.
  
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RebekahWSD@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I have Grand Bazaar on the ds and I agree its hard going back to that from Stardew Valley. I managed to play through Knights of the Old Republic once and man. Loved it, can’t do it again. (I also had to cheat to make it through the end because “force powers? Nah sniper rifle is fine” turned out to be not fine)

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Coelacanth@feddit.nu ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I haven’t gotten around to them myself yet (they’re on the docket this year) but I’ve heard this said about Yakuza 1&2 since the release of Kiwami 1&2.

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