Classic games that have aged poorly

[Prowler]

A lot of games pass the test of time. Others, don't. Which ones aged poorly, in your opinion?

Wolfenstein 3D: The first ever FPS game. Aged dreadfully. The gameplay iss clunky, especially when you try to turn around corners. It came out in 1993 sure, but Doom came out one year later and it's aged much better.

Altered Beast: It's a Mega Drive classic, I know. But God, it's such a pain to play nowadays. The gameplay is so stiff and sluggish. Ugh.

Phantasy Star II: It was one of the first RPG games, iirc. So it's heavily dated. It's incredibly difficult and cryptic. The dungeons are generic looking mazes and you absolutely need a walkthrough if you want to get anywhere in this game.

I have not played Goldeneye and DK64 in 20+ years, so I have no idea if these two aged as badly as people say they did. And I'd rather not know, quite frankly. Don't want to ruin my childhood memories.

Of course, before anyone mention, older sports games aged poorly, but that's expected. Those games get outdated less than a year after they come out.

I have spoken before on how the likes of Ocarina of Time and Super Mario 64 are no longer as magical as they used to be back in the 90s, but I wouldn't say they aged poorly overall.

[Barkworm]

Mario 64 and Tomb Raider.

[Prowler]

Mario 64 and Tomb Raider.

Mario 64 did not age that poorly, IMO. Yes, the camera is wonky(it was already back in 1996 tbh), Mario cannot do a 360 degree spin and you do feel like you're walking on ice often, but it's still a fun game despite those flaws. It holds up pretty well for a 3D game from 1996, in fact. I can still have fun playing Super Mario 64 nowadays.

Haven't played Tomb Raider, so I can't comment. Are the remasters of I-III worth it?

[CyberCubed]

People tend to confuse "age poorly" with "I don't have the same patience as when I was 12 years old" now. Modern games are even easier with checkpoints, saves anywhere, and extra lives, and older games didn't have that.

[Prowler]

People tend to confuse "age poorly" with "I don't have the same patience as when I was 12 years old" now. Modern games are even easier with checkpoints, saves anywhere, and extra lives, and older games didn't have that.

Not my case for the 3 games I mentioned.

We do not have the same time and patience, true. But that's also because games changed a lot when it comes to QOL improvements throughout the years. Games also have become much more respectful of our time.

Also, keep in mind games used to be much shorter. They had to be challenging, or else you'd beat them on the first day you bought them.

You can beat classic NES games like Mega Man 1-6, Excitebike Contra, SMB, Ninja Gaiden, TMNT, Nintendo World Cup, etc. in one single Saturday afternoon as an adult. Especially if you're using save states and the rewind feature. But how many people were able to do that when they were kids? I sure as hell didn't. I didn't first beat a NES game until I was 16(Mega Man 2).

[frank_one]

I would say text adventures are looked as something obsolete and boring nowadays. The ones you have to type in every action like "pick up the book under the chair". Point and click adventures have put them to rest.

[Andrew NDB]

As a kid it was fairly rare for anyone to beat a game outside of maybe RPGs. But stuff like the Mario games and action games... you were king sh** if you could beat anything.

[IMJ]

Pretty much every "textureless" N64 title is pretty hard to go back to at all, at least from a graphic standpoint. I'd honestly rather play Super Mario World than Mario 64.

[frank_one]

The first Tomb Raider has surely aged poorly. Not just the graphics but those complicated levels that require boring exploration and those switches that open a door in a totally different area of the map that you need to find out.
Tomb raider Anniversary is way more enjoyable.

[Andrew NDB]

Pretty much every "textureless" N64 title is pretty hard to go back to at all, at least from a graphic standpoint. I'd honestly rather play Super Mario World than Mario 64.

Play Mario 64 on 3D All Stars. Looks fine.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

The old Pokemon games (especially pre Gen 3) have aged terribly with the enemy AI.

The actual world-building and monster collecting is awesome, but the enemy AI is awful and makes me cringe because it makes the games far too easy. In the past, kids wouldn't have noticed as much as they were still figuring out the game mechanics.

As a competitive Pokemon player, the old games feel unplayable to the point where I've only been able to play them by doing ridiculous challenges like "can you beat Pokemon Red with a Magikarp".

[ToTheNines]

Pong and Custer’s Revenge.

[CyberCubed]

The old Pokemon games (especially pre Gen 3) have aged terribly with the enemy AI.

The actual world-building and monster collecting is awesome, but the enemy AI is awful and makes me cringe because it makes the games far too easy. In the past, kids wouldn't have noticed as much as they were still figuring out the game mechanics.

As a competitive Pokemon player, the old games feel unplayable to the point where I've only been able to play them by doing ridiculous challenges like "can you beat Pokemon Red with a Magikarp".

They're all like that though, if you're talking about the random trainers you fight on routes through the game. They all usually just have 2-3 pokemon and weak attacks, or the same pokemon over and over (like two Zubats or something on the same team, lol), they really only exist to give your team exp. to be strong enough to face the Gym leaders and Elite 4. Even the modern games like Scarlet/Violet are like that. Nobody expects to lose against the random Bug catcher boy or the swimsuit girl on a surfing route.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

They're all like that though, if you're talking about the random trainers you fight on routes through the game. They all usually just have 2-3 pokemon and weak attacks, or the same pokemon over and over (like two Zubats or something on the same team, lol), they really only exist to give your team exp. to be strong enough to face the Gym leaders and Elite 4. Even the modern games like Scarlet/Violet are like that. Nobody expects to lose against the random Bug catcher boy or the swimsuit girl on a surfing route.

I don't mind the random trainers so much but even the Gym Leaders and Elite Four suck in early generations.

For example, the champion's Pidgeot knows Whirlwind in Gen 1 which is basically just splash because Whirlwind had no effect in trainer battles then.

Their Exegguttor also sucked because despite being a great Pokemon, it didn't have psychic. Same for Rhydon which has no Rock or Ground type moves.

Many of these issues were fixed in FireRed and LeafGreen.

[Prowler]

The old Pokemon games (especially pre Gen 3) have aged terribly with the enemy AI.

The actual world-building and monster collecting is awesome, but the enemy AI is awful and makes me cringe because it makes the games far too easy. In the past, kids wouldn't have noticed as much as they were still figuring out the game mechanics.

As a competitive Pokemon player, the old games feel unplayable to the point where I've only been able to play them by doing ridiculous challenges like "can you beat Pokemon Red with a Magikarp".

Gen I aged poorly in terms of graphics and gameplay. The latter due to Psychic types being ridiculously OP. They even are super effective against Ghastly's line, and the the Ghost type was meant to counter the Psychic type!

Gen II games at least fixed that and also added Dark and Steel types. Plus the whole night and day mechanic. But the level curve in those games is broken.

I haven't played FRLG yet, but HGSS is a bit overrated, imo. Good games sure but not better than ORAS or BW and BW2 imo. They don't fix the issues the original Gen II games have with the bad level curve and Gen II Mons being limited to Kanto.

Pong and Custer’s Revenge.

LMAO, I only know of Custer's because of the Atari Porn review by AVGN. Was it even good back then?

As for Pong... eh, I think it can still be entertaining for a few minutes these days. But you're probably right.

[Mad Dog McMutt]

I can't believe somebody said Mario 64 aged poorly. It aged gracefully and I just did another 100% run about a month ago. It is a super fun game. I think that the first Mario Kart for the Snes has aged poorly. All of the Mario Karts after the Snes one are so much better. The drift mechanics are hard to use in the Snes version and I was never able to beat the hard mode races or whatever they were called. I loved it as a kid, but as an adult I just can't get into it.

[ToTheNines]

@Prowler I was just joking about Pong. Also never played Custer when likewise only know about it from AVGN :lol:

As for you guys talking about early Pokemon, it’s basically impossible for me to enjoy Gen 1 anymore. This was a long time ago, but back in college I went to revisit Yellow and was absolutely crushing it but hit the wall when I got to the Elite Four. I had basically won every single battle and didn’t really get lost at all so my lineup wasn’t even level 80 lol.

I didn’t feel like grinding for days to get my levels up, so I just quit. Pretty funny that my 8 year old self could have beat my 18 year old self. But I basically hadn’t forgotten a single path to take, and having the sense and patience to incorporate defensive moves into my battles made the first 99 percent of the game too easy.

[Prowler]

I can't believe somebody said Mario 64 aged poorly. It aged gracefully and I just did another 100% run about a month ago. It is a super fun game. I think that the first Mario Kart for the Snes has aged poorly. All of the Mario Karts after the Snes one are so much better. The drift mechanics are hard to use in the Snes version and I was never able to beat the hard mode races or whatever they were called. I loved it as a kid, but as an adult I just can't get into it.
Super Mario Kart became outdated fast. Mario Kart 64 was a huge improvement over it. i'd rather even play Super Circuit over it, as far as 2D games go. You can even unlock all SMK tracks in it, in fact.

@Prowler I was just joking about Pong. Also never played Custer when likewise only know about it from AVGN :lol:

As for you guys talking about early Pokemon, it’s basically impossible for me to enjoy Gen 1 anymore. This was a long time ago, but back in college I went to revisit Yellow and was absolutely crushing it but hit the wall when I got to the Elite Four. I had basically won every single battle and didn’t really get lost at all so my lineup wasn’t even level 80 lol.

I didn’t feel like grinding for days to get my levels up, so I just quit. Pretty funny that my 8 year old self could have beat my 18 year old self. But I basically hadn’t forgotten a single path to take, and having the sense and patience to incorporate defensive moves into my battles made the first 99 percent of the game too easy.
Red will always be a special game to me, and I had a yearly tradition of replaying it every summer until I was 17 or so. But I don't wish on doing it anymore. i've gotten back to the series as an adult with ORAS and also played BW, HGSS, Platinum and others since then. They're all better games. Perhaps I should give FRLG a try...

[neatoman]

Well, Elder Scrolls Arena may have started one of the most important game series' ever but sure as hell ain't that fun to play.

[IMJ]

I saw a snippet online were someone rendered the original Ninja Gaiden through the Unreal Engine. It looked awesome.... I would replay it like that in a hearbeat.