So many modern games are filled with stuff, I wish they had more limitations
A few days ago I finished listening to Games of the Decade 2000-2009, a bonus episode from the Into The Aether podcast, and since then I’ve my fascination with gaming has grown quite a bit.
Even before then though, I’ve had this question in mind for quite a bit. Modern games for older consoles, why not? Modern games today have grown to unimaginable heights. Stuff like Breath of The Wild or Elden Ring are incredible achievements of game development.
But, you know, I kind of miss some of the charm that came with the older consoles and the limitations they had.
During a time where the PS2, Xbox and Game Cube competed to see which one had the best graphics, the GBA was basically a portable Super Nintendo with quite a bit of power for the time and size, but still very limited in comparison. Back then a lot of games were ported to every possible platform. Games with amazing 3D graphics, big worlds and tons of content, were turned into level based platformers, topdown view shooters, visual novels, etc.
Of course, many of those were rushed cash grabs, made for kids and parents who didn’t know better, but many others were made with more care in mind. Games that knew their limitations and used managed to work around them and create games that took advantage of them.
When a friend gifted me a GBA SP, he bundled it with a couple of carts, including Tony Hawk Underground 2. The game does not have the same 3D world of the tabletop console games, but it is still really fun, featuring almost the exact same controls, but favoring an isometric view instead.
Some other ports like Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the Dragon make similar sacrifices and managed to succeed. They kept the essentials in a trimmed down the experience.
Nowadays, there are demakes of so many things, most of them fan games. Since ancient times stuff like Ocarina of Time has been rebuilt by fans with a topdown structure, as romhacks or complete rewrites. Breath of the Wild’s prototype looked and played like the original NES game, and I can’t help but love it. Dragon Quest XI actually features a dual mode where you can play with the 3D graphics or try to a topdown perspective with SNES sprites, and it looks amazing!
Now that Metroidvanias and Roguelikes are more popular than ever, I wish many of them were on the GBA, Genesis or SNES. Games like Into The Breach, Gato Roboto, Undertale or Balatro would be a dream! They really look like something that could’ve come out back then, by removing a few of the fancy effects and compressing its sountrack.
We are also starting to see another jump among indie devs. The generation that grew in the PS1 or N64 era is making games now. The early 3D style, the high-res pixel art, they are coming back, with games like Signalis or Crow Country, and I’m here for it, but, I would also love it if those games actually ran on a PS1, you know?
Obviously, I’m not going to force any developers to rewrite the game from scratch like that, it’s not feasible. It just would be nice.
Thankfully there are indeed some great modern games being developed for old consoles from scratch, I found some great homebrew in the works last month, and I’m definitely buying some of them to emulate on my Miyoo Mini Plus, or my RG35XX SP, which I somehow haven’t mentioned in this blog until now—review coming up soon!
After writing this I realized Kyle wrote a very similar blogpost quite recently, so check out his article as well, it’s awesome.
