Comment on Here's why modern gaming suuuuucks.
EvilBit@lemmy.world 2 months ago
You’re getting so many responses that are just “have you tried indie games?” or trying to dispel the rose-colored glasses. I suspect it’s because of the headline saying modern gaming sucks, which I think can be pretty objectively disproven.
That said, I can tell you about my experiment. I’ve instituted a program with my 12 year old stepson where he can earn marbles through chores and other tasks, and he can trade those marbles in for retro games I find in local stores and flea markets. One of the things he can also buy for a very low price is a downloaded retro magazine from retromags.com - he can ask for an issue with a particular topic in it and I’ll find one and send it to him. He isn’t really very internet savvy yet, so he’s not likely to hit up IGN for info or anything.
The result of this so far (only a few weeks in) has been serious excitement and engagement. He has access to Xbox Series and PS5 consoles, but getting to own physical games and accessories (we play them on a Retron 3 HD console) has motivated him more than I’ve seen almost anything else do. He keeps asking me if Street Fighter 2 will come to the “store” anytime soon because of my stories of how badly I wanted that game as a kid his age. Little does he know that for Christmas he’ll be getting an excellent condition, complete in box copy of Street Fighter 2: Special Championship Edition for the Genesis. He’s gonna flip.
The upshot of all this is that I really do think there was a certain magic to the experience back then. I’m doing my damnedest to recreate that magic for him, and so far it’s at least kinda working!
Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 2 months ago
This is a nice story. I like this. My parents would occasionally buy me games, but it was mostly once or twice a year, and they never got excited for my excitement. They would just complain that all I do is play video games. Meanwhile all dad did was watch sports, and all mom did was watch news.
But somehow I’M an asshole 7 year old for not playing outside, and being glued to the tv all day! I’m ranting, but yes, 40 year old me is still pissed at my parents.
Getting back on track, I think it’s adorable how you not only engage with your kid, and teach him the value of earning things. And participate with your kid.
Makes me wonder if you were a fan of the aki wrestling games on N64. There’s a definate depth to those games that you don’t find in todays wrestling games. AEW tried…but I feel like their third game they might start getting it right. For reference, they’ve only made 1 game, and it took 4 years to make.
EvilBit@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Same same. I literally have hundreds, if not thousands, of games in my digital libraries. The absolute entertainment value of that is astronomical, but at the same time, the experience of receiving any given game has become devalued to the point of meaninglessness in some cases.
I wanted to try and recreate that feeling of reading about a game, falling in love with every screenshot and drop of info, and working hard (or begging hard) to get it as one of the 2, maybe 3 games you’d get in a year. You read the manual twice on the car ride home, you save the box, you learn everything about it. I’ve told him about pausing the NES because you just got farther than you ever got before, you only have one life left, and you need to go to school. The idea of having an experience like that is being lost in today’s culture in my opinion.
Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 2 months ago
That’s the first of the US released Aki games! It went in order of release:
WCW/NWO World tour
WCW/NWO Revenge
WWF Wrestlemania 2000
WWF No Mercy (considered to this day to be the greatest wrestling game of all time).
I only mentioned them because I had fond memories of couch co-op with my friends. It’s one of those games that started with a starting point (the one you played), and each new game they added more and more content to the new game, while keeping everything from the old game.
I was just hoping with your son getting that appriciation for anticipating a new game, that you could start him with the first game, and end with the 4th.
But it’s one of those games that new people tend to struggle with, due to not holding your hand at ALL. It was just assumed you knew what you were doing…and the fighting system is sooooo complex, yet simple once you “get it”.
Short tap A, weak grapple. Long hold A, strong grapple.
Same with B and punches.
You CAN try to just so strong punches, and strong grapples, but if your opponent hasn’t been weakened they’re likely to reverse. They MIGHT still reverse a weak punch or grapple too, but they need much more precise button timing. The worse they’re beaten up, the harder it is to reverse. And eventually you might land a strong punch or grapple. You can taunt to raise your spirit meter. Your spirit meter also raises as you do well in a match, or lower if you do worse.
Throw your opponent down and do a short taunt before he gets up to stop your taunt, and you get an instant small boost in spirit. Do a long uninterupted taunt, and get a big boost in spirit.
But if you attempt a taunt, you leave yourself open to an easy attack against you, and if that happens you lose spirit proportional to what you were attempting to gain.
Its a very balanced game where every action has an appropriate reaction. It’s up to you to time those actions, and choose what you think you can get away with.
It’s such a weird game that an experienced player vs a rookie will result in an unfun lopsided match. But evenly matched players might have 1 match last an hour.
EvilBit@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Oh, haha I thought I’d heard of Aki in the context of wrestling games, but assumed I must have been thinking Yuke’s.
Currently we’re sticking to 8-bit and 16-bit, though we’ll eventually start graduating into PS1 and so on. He doesn’t really have any awareness of or demonstrated interest in wrestling yet, but I’ll keep it in mind. I always did envy WCW/NWO Revenge when it came out…