THE NOOB'S WEEKLY GUIDE TO BLOGGING!
Retro... When people hear this word associated with an upcoming video game release, (ESPECIALLY younger gamers) smug remarks, crass attitudes, and four letter swear words are flung around chatrooms and forums at an alarming rate. It's ridiculous. I have an opposing view because I'm a child of the 70's... I thought squares with two circles under it made a bad ass-looking truck. My generation may have been the most creative generation ever... in the existence of mankind I mean, but a topic for another day. In modern times, video games are all about the aesthetics and framerates, and things like gameplay don't receive the attention it use to when pixel was "king"... AAA titles (usually shooters; pick any one... there's a sea of em') focus solely on a monetized experience, which in my humble opinion robs the client/customer of enjoying the complete story, unless they pay $9.95 to see "more"... I had "more" in digi quotes because DLC stands for "Don't Languish ya Credits" in latin... I'm kidding, but you start to see a pattern when you examine the marketing ploys of the publishers. A) get them hooked... Once you've accomplished that, B) milk em' dry before the IP implodes... Shady business: 101(well... not really "shady" but still). So with all that established, I get back to the point of graphics and art... Retro games consisted of bitmap pixels used to form crude looking images (ie sprites) on the computer monitor. Most games probably used the 640x480 scale for the environment, and 32x32 for sprites and other objects. This made "detail" a frighten word for devs back then... Most games were literally just blocks... blocks moving around very slowing to simulate the movements of a tank or whatev... The user/client had to use "imagination" to get the most out of the experience. Speaking of...
The Legend of Zelda would have to be my best example (speaking from my experience) of putting this practice to good use. If you google the backstory on the game, you'll find out that story was an after thought for the devs... So essentially NO STORY in this game, but an open, lush sandbox to escape in for hours at a time. I played this game till my nes burned out. So imagine a game with pretty much a non-plot besides "rescue the girl/defeat ultimate evil" and crude pixel art... Had this game try a steam greenlight now, well... I'd hate to read those comments on the thread. But it's heralded as an "iconic" game which paved the way for the dungeon crawlers of today. I'm trying to make these points in my defense of retro games because this "sub-genre" gets a bad rep. People with no experience in playing 8-16 bit classics, have a distaste for pixel art, chiptunes and whatever else they can find to complain about. I know... I'm bias because I grew up with gaming... Maybe I'm not the right person to discuss this, but as an artist I felt the need to expose some things and connect the visual "dots"... Remastered art in a remake is by no means "god awful" in my opinion, but I feel it should be done tastefully. Sticking with the original art, while making subtle changes to the design is key. Too many times I've seen old school IPs get a reboot, only to see that they've strayed from the source material. (Transformers/GOTG anyone???) Well... I can see I have a rant on my hands... Hmmm... Ok I'll conclude with this: Too all born in the age of DOOM/Halo and beyond... Get out of your FPS mentality and try to experience a game where you don't blow the crap out of everything around you. Play a game like MYST, where you literally just walk around a "paradise" the entire game. I believe there are some puzzles and whatnot, but the plug is sight-seeing. Just don't have a narrow, dogmatic view on different games and/or genre... You will miss out on gems, and finding your very own (non-monetized) euphoric experiences.