RGC Chats 01: Retro Games VS Modern Games (GR / English subs on vid)

Hello! Hello! Welcome to our new "Retro Chats" series of videos! (SUBTITILES MIGHT NOT BE 100% ACCURATE/CORRECT, we will keep trying to improve) We will talk about a subject which is very relevant to us, as we are the "Retro Games Couple": Retro Games vs Modern Games As you might have noticed, we also play modern games especially if they are sequels of Retro Games that we liked. E.g.: Resident Evils, Silent Hills, Dooms, Quakes etc Also the Final Fantasy series! So were retro games better than t

he modern ones? Some say they're better, some say they are worse. Some say the new games have lost their heart. Some people say that the old ones were garbage. Eva, what do you think about them? The debate is very big. Let's start, first of all, with what the retro games offered and what the new games have to offer. What did the old games offer? Masochism! Other than that, they offered endless hours of gameplay, head-scratching puzzles... They made you better your reflexes. And the one thing the

y surely did of course was to entertain you. There was always a very good story, there were always new graphics, art that made you say "Oh, what did they do this time!!" There was art, there was a point of view. The new games now. What the new games offer? Graphics. What else do the new games offer? Graphics. I said the graphics right? Nice. But you haven't seen the new graphics. They are incredible. So this is one point of view. Let's say I grew up with games, I've been playing games since 1986

. Or 1987. Somewhere around then. I don't remember anyway, I was 5 or 6 years old. I have been playing on computers, on consoles, handheld consoles, whatever was in front of me. But mainly computers, And I have to say that the games were not as good as we remember them. Especially now that I'm replaying them 30 years later for the channel. Yes, they offered hours of gameplay, but that was mostly because they were so masochistically difficult that you played them over and over again and you playe

d them again, until you bested them, until you acquired muscle memory. It wasn't that it was challenging, let's say, as the new games are, that have dynamic challenge. What that is? A game adapts the difficulty to the skill of the player. and they constantly offer a certain level of challenge, so to speak. And in the old games, there were pixel perfect jumps. or an enemy that you have to fight for fifty minutes in order to kill it. OK fifty minutes not even then, that was FF12. 20 minutes to bea

t it, let's say. And you couldn't lose a single life because then you were going to the beginning of the level again. The Castlevanias are an example, I played them recently for the channel, the old ones were brutal, that is, relentless, how else can I say that. You lose and have to beat the whole level from the beginning A modern game will take you to the last quick save before you lose i.e. at the beginning of the room or something like this. It might take you back a few moments if it has the

time rewind mechanism. Yes, now, sitting down to play a game, which, its pure duration, it lasted 28 minutes when I beat it and I played it for 3 hours because, every time, I've played 7 minutes I have reached the boss and I lose and go from the beginning of the level, I am not having much fun especially. It is more, how shall I say, more of a challenge, than a game. You understand the difference. I understand. Of course here we should say that every game was very different. Each company had ver

y different philosophies that they followed and that's why he made very different games. When a game was horror for example, it might have much more art behind it. Horror before 1992, I don't remember it especially existing. Well, I'll tell you that before then, I was not alive anyway. Yes, there's that too. There's that too. I mean, something like a text adventure, I don't know if you can call it horror now. They were just describing the scenes. In 1992, I the first horror I played, the game "A

lone in the dark", the 1st, the old one with four polygons per character. That one. This, the first one that scared me. Wolfenstein 3D I was a little scared in 1991, the Zombies' Doctor who was there. But I was also 9? How old was I then? 11 years old. Things like that, Gabriel Knight, 2, not very much. It's an adventure game, of course. The first one would have scared me, but I didn't play it Hadn't got it back then. We didn't have horror, like we do now, where there is so much of horror. Becau

se you have this immersiveness, you have amazing graphics, which make you "live" in the environment, which helps you to be afraid. The truth is that new games do this. So that's an "area" that the new games can offer something more, horror. But then, my next argument is RPGs. What about RPGs? Look, my experience is, though I didn't play much RPGs, is that the old RPGs were huge. Huge, that is, you played 50-60, even 100 hours in general. Not that the new ones are not huge. Some are. For example,

Baldus Gate 3 is said to be 100+ hours Indeed. And Witcher 3 too. I haven't played them. Witcher 1, we know it was 45-50 hours And if we go further back, Skyrim. And so forth. The Final Fantasies were also huge. Not he old ones The ones on the NES. But the newer ones, starting from the Super NES. I don't know, I don't think RPGs have changed too much Other than their graphics. Because I am an RPG Gamer, I have to say that, as far as this genre is concerned RPG, the games don't have much newer t

o offer. The only new thing a game can offer it is maybe if it has some new system, which is very rare, as there have been so many games before. RPGs that have tested almost every system possible. They can try. You are right, yes. In sports games, how are things? When FIFA 94 first came out, we were mindblown with the isometric graphics, because until then we had the KickOff and the Sensible Soccer gamnes, which were top-down and... Yes. And we scored from the center all the time, because it had

this bug, but in recent years they have reached a point that is now photorealistic. I saw the last Fifa game, on YouTube and at some moments, it is not distinguishable from the real thing. Especially when you see them from far away The graphics now are so photorealistic, with the shadows and all these and the field and you're like, what else can you do? They just sell to you, I think, the new players (roster) and teams each year. I think in sports games it has to do with the immersion again, th

at you have the real players and you manage them... I'm sorry, that, about the manager games, now they've added that too FIFA, let's say, has manager mode. Other football games, which also have a manager mode. In the old ones we had Sports Games and the Manager Games. Now they are boiled together, because they are just a mode and it's very easy to programm it (nowadays). No need to lie, a manager mode can be programmed so easily now. So they task a developer to do it and they put that in too. Th

ere's the feature in, too! So I don't know, and basketballs and hockeys and all those games that I see I think they have now reached a point where they have peaked and that's why I think they don't sell so much now. So, if you got the 2021 version, if you aren't a very big fan of the sport, you don't need the 22 -23 versions as well. You will get, say, the 2025 after that, it will have a little better graphics, newer rosters, etc. If you are a fan of the sports games, please tell us your opinion

and you are Pro or Fifa, or whatever. One could say it has a more cinematic experience in their favourite sport. Yes even this has been peaked. While in the old times, when the Kick Off came out, the Sensible, these comic games, as well on the NES, these games that were completely manga-like with the Super Balls, those Tecmo World Cups. I remembered also the Nba Jam, I say when that came out, it was so wonderful! It had a meaning, something, there was a progress. Not only in the graphics and w

hat you did. Now, for example, I don't see any sports games like that Sports Games with violence, like NBA JAM. Yes. The last one I remember was one with, a hockey game that was Blade-something, you could kill the opponent with a cyber blade, I don't remember the name. I THINK that was in 2002 or 2003. I don't remember a violent sports game coming out since then. We are thus going through a, how can I say it, the pacification of Sports Games. They have become very technical. I don't understand R

acing Games at all, I can't play them. I think that you have played racing? I haven't played, I've only seen some screenshots/videos here and there which appear to be super photorealistic, cinematic again and then it has to do with the peripherals. This is what I see. The racing games, since they started being first person (cockpit view) and 3D, already the peripherals were starting to be big You will get the wheel, you would have the pedals. So what about the Wheels since 2000? What new (featur

e) do they have? Once, but you would change the (driving) wheel every two years at least. I don't know, of course. Now, we may not be, since we are of course here in Greece, it doesn't move us that much this sport with the peripherals. But I have seen in various markets here and there, various weird peripherals ones, which are getting bigger and bigger, louder, more and stranger, with lights, with buttons. Of course, I may be wrong and these might be unrelated. The last racing game I played was

in 2002, I think So I haven't played. I've seen Forza 5 (or 7?) on YouTube, which has incredible graphics. So incredible and it has everything: It has racing, it has rally, it has everything under that genre. All that existed in racing, they have put it in this game. I don't know how it could be any better. Really, I don't know. I just don't know. So you think we have arrived at a peak. That, yes. All racing, all sports... I think it's not that games are not good nowadays. It's that we have peak

ed. And you don't easily see something original in itself. The first person shooter games that I play fanatically. There's not really, there's nothing original anymore. All first persons, with the exception of some indie, retro-like, are the same. Let's say Shadow Warrior 3 came out, where they went ahead and copied Doom Eternal. Shadow Warrior 1/2, which came out a long time ago, had quite original mechanics and character for its time. What else, these days I played Serious Sam 4, which keeps t

he old core of the series and has modernized it a bit. This is the way it used to be, nothing was changed. They made Doom Eternal a circus, so to say, I didn't like it AT ALL. But it has a lot of action, I give them that. Call of Duty and those (kind of FPS) I never played them. Wolfstein for some reason they got tired of them starring the the Macho Man, they went with his daughters and it went nowhere. This is probably under the "Woke or Not" thing, we will make another video about it. It's al

so a huge talk, what they say is "Wokeness". Someone might believe it or not. What other genres are there? The RPGs, yes, with the Baldur's Gate they had a (mainstream) revival. Adventure games... If we exclude some remasters (and late sequels), such as Monkey Island which came out last year: when we played it we were blown away. I don't understand why the adventure games died. They had a small revival in the Android devices. On Android, yes, and the Indie games. Very nice Indie Adventures. But

in AAA Industry I don't think they come out anymore. They are dead. The games used to be very popular. I too played them a lot in the late 1990s. Yes, around 2000. 1993-1999. Too much adventure games. Let's talk about another example. Symbiria 4. I think it didn't sell very well. We will play this one too. Yes, we have to say it. We will play all Symbirias. The only high class adventure games were what they did... ...the Life is Strange with time rewind. This was the last so very high-level, hi

gh-class adventure game It wasn't even AAA, double-A that was it, cool. Square's wasn't it? Square was the publisher, DontnoD made it. They went and made Vampyr and went off the radar. They also made a Life is Strange 2 that was underwhelming The one that you could see the auras. Yes. A very long conversation, because of all the well-wishers that came out to say that it sank, because it was Woke. I believe that it sank because simply auras are not as interesting as Time Rewind. Yes. Time Rewind

itself is too broken a mechanic to... It is nice. It's a nice thing. Platform Games come out by the bcketload. Too many nowadays. Sometimes the old ones come out again, sometimes a new Mario comes out, new Crash Bandicoot, new Ratchet & Clank. These are... the only ones these days... They "go like a bullet" (Greek expression: they sell well). And they also used to go like a bullet. But I think now with 3D they go super-bullet. Fighting games too. If you exclude, Street Fighter, Tekken, Soul Cali

bur, which I think... How was Soul Calibur for you? Soul Calibur had a peak until 4, then it fell, now it was up again (with 6). I haven't heard about it for some time. Bloody Roar, let's say, as they call it, haven't heard about it in a long time. The King of Fighters has sequels, but it's got a niche audience. It's not mainstream, like the old King of Fighters. I heard they're gonna make a new Fatal Fury, yeah I'll believe it when I see it. But in general, fighting games are said to be having

a revival, But they have a revival in their audience. That's right too. It's not like they had a revival and attracted a new audience. The ones that really bloomed in the modern era for me and well deserved, as they are much better than the old ones and have spawned many types: The "Action Adventure" as we tell them. Aaah, With some RPG flavouring. What I was about to tell you. I mean, what's going on with Action RPGs, what about… Action Adventure, mostly Yes, or Action Adventure Generally all o

f these... Action RPGs died with Bioware. I haven't seen an action RPG lately. (Edit: Witcher aside). The Action Adventure is much like Zelda, The Zelda style of games. Action Adventures with a small RPG flavouring. These have a huge blossom because we now have the computing power necessary for them to play properly. For example, Zelda on NES. We played it a month ago Yes, that's right, yes, you saw how it was, it didn't have like the new Zelda, nothing like them. Even the one in Nintendo 64 was

not like the new ones. We are talking about an incredible blossoming of the genre at this time. You see the first Zelda on NES, let's say, then you see the Breath of the Wild. Yes, no relationship. And then you see Tears of the Kingdome, which is the new one just launched. But it's not just The Zelda, it's the games of the type, of that type. Uncharted, let's say, totally action ones, The Tomb Raiders that make a trilogy, then they go off the radar, reboot again with another Trilogy. The new co

nsoles and the power that we have are very favourable to them during this period. It is until people get tired of them, but we have, let's say, the Elden... The Elden series. Elden Ring. Elden Ring, Elden Scrolls, whatever. No, this is the... Okay, it's an Action-RPG. The Elden Ring and the Elden Scrolls, completely different series. I mean the Elden Ring ones, sorry. The ones produced by this company and the likes. Which are in the Action-RPG genre, but brutally difficult like the old days, but

with modern conveniences at the same time. They have found a nice formula, after all. This formula has been selling back town lately. Also impossible to have it in the old days. This, yes. There was great difficulty in the past. They have found a good sweet spot, which you have brutal difficult, but it is also fair. This thing. In the past we didn't have fairness. We didn't have justice, what do they call it? Games were unfair towards the gamer. The phase was: I'm this game and cut your butt (G

reek expression: do anything and everything) to beat me. The challenge you were talking about. The brutal challenge, but the unfair one. Today's games have challenges, but they give you, let's say... The option to simply view the game story. Yes, you can tone the battle down, sometimes I don't know specifically about the Elden Ring but in their similar games that I have played and have seen... If one time one loses fourteen times at the same point... Ah, let's push the AI a bit. No, not boost. L

et's reduce the artificial intelligence, or boost the player, or let you lower the difficulty... That's also great, to lower the difficulty in real time. In the old games, if you start it hard and you get stuck... You are done. You have to play it from the beginning. In the old games, yes. In the new ones, now... You want to turn it down to a little bit for this point... And you can then raise it again. This was not done before. It used to be this one difficulty only... Ah, you got stuck after p

laying for over 7 hours? Game: I am sorry. Let's start again, another 7 hours. On Normal or Easy, Or the other, the other horrible thing Some games were gatekeeping, based on the difficulty. We are talking about very old games, NES / Super NES era. Ah yes, yes. You would finish it on Easy or Normal and it would tell you, ah, you know something? It doesn't have a finale, if you don't finish it on hard. Os some other ones, mainly platforms games, where you had, say, on Easy only some of the levels

. And it told you, for example, after you finished the 5th, "the rest only in Normal". Then you played in Normal and you had 8 out of 10 levels, there. There were those things. Yes, yes, mainly platform. They were telling you: oh, I'm sorry, you have to go hard mode to see the real finale (and last stages) of the game. Oh, wow. However, until recently, the truth is that if this conversation took place a few years ago, we used to say that the older games were made much better. But then Baldur's G

ate came out. Okay, this is for a specific genre, not for all. I think they are doing a very good job, the indie developers in that already. They are taking the old graphics we remember and we like pixel graphics and those stuff, but now they make them much better. And do it with modern gameplay techniques. So for me the Indie games is what saves the retro ones. Indie games are retro-games like you remember them, not as how they were. Oh, I get it. Therefore... Impression is the point. Yes, beca

use we remember them as when we were children, most of us. There were some adults, among others, but most of us were children back then, and we remember them as being wonderful. We saw them and went "ooooh"! Yes, because the graphics were great, because they were great for their time. And the gameplay even though it broke our stuff then, because were were kids we didn't understand it and we only remember, "Ah, Castlevania, I used to jump, hit, what a nice action game it was". Yes, but you were p

laying it for... Castlevania 1 for me to finish it, when I was in summer vacation, I played it every day, for two or three hours a day, to be able to finish it, at the end of the summer. I started it in June and finished it at the end of August. We are not talking about a game that was how much, 20-30 minutes. In the end, 28 minutes. When I got the pure gameplay out of the NES and i cut it off, it was around 27 minutes. But for 28 minutes, it took all summer. Really, that is. Why? Because I was

reaching the Dracula, unbeatable. But the beginning of the whole game the next day, my time was over. My father was turning off the NES. It's that too. Since he didn't break it too, all is fine. We didn't have Save Cards, Save States, nothing. Truly, there was nothing back then. These new ones, let's say, there are some Castlevania clones, a great one, I can't remember its name, dammit. A wonderful Castlevania clone, that came out, basically Metroidvania to be precise. Which has modern convenie

nces. It has a save state, you can start each level from its beginning, you can go and get the items from when you died like that Elden... I think many Indie games do this. Yes, that's what I'm saying: that the Indie games have helped us to play the retro games as we remember them. That's what I am getting at. Indie games are what save the games for me. And the retro games. Especially retro games. Please tell us what you think as well. This was our opinion. We probably forgot some genres. We sai

d nothing of puzzle games. And there's not much to say about them. The truth is that puzzle games are like the platform games. There are some things you can do. You can do some things up to a point. And then just improve the graphics. We left out modern Fallout type RPGs. We left out XCOM-type games. Which had a renaissance of. Only X-COM though as far as I know. They released XCOM 1 and 2, the new ones. But yet, nothing new has been heard for quite some time. Tell us in the comments. What do yo

u think? Older games? New games? Something in between? Indie games maybe? The future? And we'll see each other again. Bye! Bye!