Raising The Bar

I've been spending some time lately studying old video games.  I have a degree in Computer Science with Games Technology and I develop games in my spare time mostly as a hobby at this point.  I have a love/hate relationship with the games industry as a whole but one area I still find interesting is the indie game scene where developers aren't burdened by politics and commercial constraints when it comes to the choices they make.  Having said that, some of my favourite games of decades past were developed by the heavyweights of the games industry of the time, so I can't dismiss the mainstream entirely.

I've had a particular focus recently on the SNES era of gaming, I did have other consoles of the generation and whilst I do still have great affection for titles from those consoles too, the SNES was really one of the consoles I latched onto most.  There were 3 games in particular that I chose to look at, Super Metroid, The Addams Family, and Chrono Trigger.  Each game is distinct from the other two but some gameplay elements are common to all three.  Nevertheless I tried to create a checklist of sorts that would include the elements I liked most from each game, but in doing so I wasn't able to predict which games I would like based on those elements when I went beyond those games.  One of the reasons I think this turned out to be the case was that I hadn't considered context, by that I mean I hadn't considered what I had experienced up until that point, what else was on offer, and what mindset I approached those games with versus who and what I am now.

In decades passed when you were a games developer, you had to think about gameplay mechanics, story, visual design, soundscapes, and many other elements of composition when it came to the actual creation of the content itself.  Target audience was a lot simpler since gaming was less popular; gaming did have its moments of boom and more than a few moments of bust, one in particular in 1983 became known as the Video Game Crash - something which I think was necessary as gaming had become a commodity and whenever anything becomes a commodity the sense of community dies.  It took many years for the industry to recover from that period and arguably the industry as it is today is showing some of the hallmarks once again as it did before that infamous crash.  I'm not going to speculate as to whether the industry is approaching another moment of shock, ultimately commercial decisions will determine whether that happens, not consumer choice. 

Regardless, gaming whilst it had its moments of peak, still attracted a particular culture that was somewhat uniform.  Today the culture that surrounds video games is much more diverse, which opens up a whole new world of character development, settings, and great swathes of imagination and creativity that the industry cried out for in vain in the past.  Having so much creativity at your disposal however still doesn't translate into success, there are more elements in play today than there once were.  Developers today have to think more like authors, they have to consider who their target audience is, rather than just creating content that they put out there for anyone to enjoy, whilst the latter may be tempting, it doesn't equate to equality as some people think it will, instead it translates into mediocrity as the content ends up being generic. 

Chrono Trigger is an RPG that was created by Square and released in 1995 for the SNES.  Square at the time was best known for developing the Final Fantasy franchise putting aside the adoration and sentimentality attached to Chrono Trigger, part of its success relied on the reputation of Square and the expectations that the Final Fantasy series had placed on the works they produced.  Out of context you might think if you could replicate the elements of Chrono Trigger that people loved the most that you could create a game that would be successful but once again this is where context is key, you have to consider the environment and the ecosystem that these games were released under.

Sticking with RPGs I decided to take a look at some older RPGs of the era and whilst I do see merit in many of the titles, I can't help but feel that part of the reason these games are revered so much is simply nostalgia.  I do not think many of them actually hold up when analysed critically.  I believe the bar has been raised over the years by various titles that it may just be that I can't objectively look at these titles as someone would from that time period.  What I do know however is despite the adoration many of these titles have, if they were re-released today without substantial improvements being made, they would flop.  I can say this with confidence considering how few views many of the playthroughs of these games have on Youtube, despite their legacy being part of the zeitgeist and many prominent gamers referencing these titles with many more titles being released that have been inspired by them.

There's often a hesitation people have with the idea of rebooting a series or remaking old titles; nostalgia is so often the barrier, those who have a longing for these old games want the world to experience them but they don't want them to be changed.  Unfortunately the bar has been raised, if you don't take those titles and rework them to cater to the audience that now exists, they won't succeed.