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Why old games never die, but new ones do

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Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#91

Post by Buttons840 »

Uvix wrote: post #66
lesser23 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why shouldn’t old art be permitted into the public domain to encourage improvement and innovation? Draconian Mickey Mouse copyright law has likely stifled more innovation that we could possibly imagine. Much like patent law there should be a strict, non-renewable period where a company can recoup their cost and make profit. Then it is introduced to the public domain. Not “allowing people to play NES games for free” i…

The grandparent specifically rejected letting the Mario IP enter the public domain. So whether or not it should, that's a completely different discussion from the one being held here. You can share a game you own even if it is still under copyright.

I'm saying there's a middle ground--or could be, if the laws were changed--where companies can keep their IP, but reselling and rent-seeking on decades old creations wouldn't be possible.

For example, 20 year old Mario games would be free for all to appreciate and preserve, but Nintendo can still get value out of their exclusive Mario IP, but only if they're making new games--and that's the important part, Nintendo would have to keep making new games, they can't just resell the same decades old games over and over.

That's the trade we make as a society. Copyright is a pretty big infringement on true freedom (think, anarchy freedom), but society gives up freedom to copy in exchange for people and companies creating new things. If companies aren't making new things, but are just rent-seeking, then let's end the trade and just let people be free to copy. Because we're not giving up our freedom to copy so you can rent-seek for the next 150 years, we're doing it so you can create new things.

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#92

Post by rawling »

Discordian93 wrote: post #57
Spivak wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like for example you can play every GameCube game that was ever released for the system. There's readily available archives you can download and well-known console mods available to play them. This kind of thing just isn't possible for newer games. Self-contained, offline, drm free (or at least breakable drm) will probably be immortal but that's a shrinking segment of games.

You can't play Phantasy Star Online for the GameCube anymore.

Even all the offline content?

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#93

Post by parpfish »

add-sub-mul-div wrote: post #15
DarkNova6 wrote: post #3

A good and interesting article, but mimicing old games will simply not work. While it would be admirable to have old features back, some of the largest problem these days is fragmentation. Up until the 2000s, a new AAA game was a shared event. Fewer games were released, magazines acted as moderators for a common understanding of the market and each game tried to trump its competitors. Games these days simply left mor…

That's one of the reasons a future in which everyone watches their own AI generated programming would be so empty. Shared culture is important. It already feels like a loss but it could get so much worse.

i've heard people talk about a future where everybody gets bespoke custom media made by AI. I can see how it would work in theory now, where a machine has a list of my previous media consumption patterns and I can give it some list of attributes/styles that I'm in the mood for and it'd spit out media perfectly tailored to my history and tastes. but things could get really weird once you cross the threshold into a world where people grow up only knowing custom AI-generated content.

if there's no common culture around to immerse yourself in, how would your initial tastes develop? and how would you even come up with the language to describe what you want?

letting everyone chase their own highly idiosyncratic preferences could place people on divergent trajectories that result in the creation of distinct genres and artistic conventions that are unique to each individual. would it get to the point where art made for you would be incomprehensible for everybody else?

would people even be willing to share the bespoke art generated for them with somebody else? seeing the art tailored to somebody else could reveal private, intimate details. art would stop being shared and actual encourage isolation.

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#94

Post by luisgvv »

overgard wrote: post #88

I think another reason might just be: simplicity. A lot of these older games are much easier to pick up and grok. I remember I used to play a ton of Battlefield 1942 back in the day (like, in a competitive clan, going to LAN parties, that kind of thing). I tried picking up Battlefield V but I just gave up because it felt like there was just too much going on. It probably has a host of other great things, but my main…

You just described my experience with MOBA games like League of Legends and Dota. Around 15 years ago there were only about 50-60 playable characters. Nowadays there are more than 100 and more items and customizations.

As for shooters this is the same. Too many weapons classes and subclasses, maps, game modes eventually divide and distract the playerbase from the core essence of the game.

I think this is one of the reasons that you still see Counter Strike still around.

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#95

Post by bitwize »

platevoltage wrote: post #78
bitwize wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the things about the Angry Videogame Nerd that I enjoyed when he first came out (yeah, I'm that old) is that back in the mid-2000s, there was a lot of NES nostalgia, but it tended to focus on big-ticket games that were considered "good" -- Mario, Zelda, Mega Man, Castlevania, etc. -- and shared experiences like blowing on cartridges. The AVGN showcased that there were also a lot of forgotten not-so-great games…

Are you saying you don't fire up Action 52 every few days?

Who isn't down for a round of Cheetahmen?

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#96

Post by dartharva »

Author conveniently ignores the thousands of good indie games in the market currently and just dismisses the entire current generation as "disposable pieces of slop". Only someone willingly spoiling their taste in games will make such a ludicrous claim. Many of today's games are in fact a massive upgrade over past titles; it's just that competition and discoverability is too tough and they don't get enough marketing and reach.

As for why old games are still popular? Same reason why old movies are still popular. Nostalgia and familiarity. That's it.

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#97

Post by foxglacier »

fendy3002 wrote: post #71
CrossVR wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet the obscure forgotten stuff is still playable if you kept a copy of the disc. Those games didn't need a community to preserve them, because they were not designed to be ephemeral like live service games.

beware of using old cd though, the older it is the higher risk it'll shatter and damage the unit.

The unit being a $20 CD-ROM drive? Losing the disk would be a bigger problem than damaging the drive.

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#98

Post by AlecSchueler »

mattnewton wrote: post #2

The article kinda dances around this point, but I think the largest reason "old games never die" is simply the old games mentioned were the good ones of their generation. Similar to the lindy effect[0] where shows that had been around a while were likely to stay around a while longer. The are the games good enough for people to host fan servers and make mods, and behind each good game there is a lot of forgotten stuf…

At the same time you still see projects like Beating Every N64 Game [0], so there's evidence that there's still interest even in the absolute worst games on the old consoles.

0: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrwJXOVKrLbIDAiT9b4Lkyz4d...

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#99

Post by 999900000999 »

I want FOSS alternatives for every genre.

I tried to make a FOSS MTG clone and I keep running into weird edge cases. Anyway, even small games need solid teams to get started.

Even if the games are ultimately monetized , it would be nice to have a FOSS core.

I want to play COD without a bunch of stupid skins and side effects. I would pay 60$ over the base 60$ to disable that non sense, it’ll never happen though. Back during the CS Source days I could just select a no skin server

Re: Why old games never die, but new ones do

#100

Post by whatnow37373 »

tiltowait wrote: post #89
lesser23 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why shouldn’t old art be permitted into the public domain to encourage improvement and innovation? Draconian Mickey Mouse copyright law has likely stifled more innovation that we could possibly imagine. Much like patent law there should be a strict, non-renewable period where a company can recoup their cost and make profit. Then it is introduced to the public domain. Not “allowing people to play NES games for free” i…

Is Mario art? Putting that question aside: why should an artist be required to make their creations free for anyone to use after a certain period of time? Why are their wishes at best secondary? Now, to be clear: I am pro-emulation. If someone is no longer selling a game, I see no ethical problem with pirating it. I don't, however, think anyone has a right to the game simply by virtue of it existing. And you can shar…

I don’t particularly care either way but I can see the argument that any human no matter how brilliant is a product of the society he/she was raised and thus purely personal ownership does not exist. Your work is our work, we just play pretend for a few decades but in the end the pieces return to the box they came from.
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