Honestly, Diablo 2. It’s a classic, it set the standard for the entire genre and it was a brilliant game. Playing it recently, it feels quite shallow compared to modern ARPGs and lacks a ton of quality-of-life features. Games like Grim Dawn, PoE, Torchlight 2 are way better.
Action RPGs, especially the ones with a heavy focus on loot, suffer the most for me. Trying to play through Vagrant Story now is brutal. MP for fast travel!
This is kind of the opposite for me. I didn’t try the original Diablo until long after playing plenty of more modern arpgs. While it’s very rough around the edges compared to current titles, I feel like it has something unique that later games lost - even D2. I think it’s the combo of your character feeling underpowered, like not much more than a normal person immersed in a world of otherworldly horrors; the way the darkness and aesthetic really comes together to create an atmosphere; and the slower, crunchier gameplay.
Pretty much all newer games put way too much emphasis on letting you play essentially a Marvel-style superhero who fills the screen with bright lights, and more more more numbers go up.
But then again I guess I have to admit I still spend more time playing the newer games.
Diablo 1 is like actually scary. I love all those other games but they are farther on the Halloweeny/spooky/edgy spectrum, if that makes sense. I mean so was the original, but in that one I felt like an insignificant little mote, a pathetic ember of humanity, up against overwhelming evil.
The PoE aesthetic definitely comes closest to capturing that feeling. But like you said, it’s more of a power fantasy once you get going.
Completely agree. I almost said something about PoE, but then I remembered how within a few areas explored I had quickly turned my character into a flying meat grinder who could bonk explosive materials out of monsters.
Diablo I was indeed unsettling, the soundtrack really assisted in that feeling well throughout the game. The enemies are done well and the bosses are intimidating to boot.
Diablo II kept up the horror but you could tell the action overtakes the theme a bit, because you're clearing mobs of enemies.
Diablo III is completely all action than horror. I've got a character that just mowed through enemies with barely a thought so there wasn't much time to sit and think of the theme.
I agree in principle, but it's a crutch that shouldn't substitute good code. It's like having a powerful car that runs sluggish, and then someone suggests that removing a couple seats could improve things.
Totally agree though would say it’s more along the lines of needing premium gas and newer performance air filters and tires when you’re thinking it should be capable out of the box
Meh, I’d rather play at lower settings than upscale. DLSS just looks like muck and the rest of them are indistinguishable from just turning down the resolution to like 480p for funsies but also with added artifacts.
I don’t know any game my RTX 3090 can’t crush GPU wise at 1440p at decent settings. I even turned off path tracing in 2077 because I didn’t want to ever use DLSS until I found the mod that drops a few casts for enough performance to hit the mid 40 FPS mark.
But there is one situation where I support the brainrot and that’s on portables. Steam Deck did the right thing by having a nice OLED 1280x800 16:10 screen instead of chasing resolution, it looks great, but if they do up it as most g*mers seem to want them to for mostly nonsensical reasons, FSR could work there, and something like DL DSR could help for games with small details if they go for an 800p screen again which I certainly hope they do.
One thing I won’t miss for sure is TAA, fuck TAA so much all my homies hate that shit. DLAA is at least better but never forget they took SMAA and MSAA away from you for this absurd world where consoles advertise themselves as 4k, 8k while they run games at barely 720p via checkerboarding and what have you and have ray tracing comparisons that you’d swear are satire
I have Grand Bazaar on the ds and I agree its hard going back to that from Stardew Valley. I managed to play through Knights of the Old Republic once and man. Loved it, can’t do it again. (I also had to cheat to make it through the end because “force powers? Nah sniper rifle is fine” turned out to be not fine)
I think upscaling is a good idea. Most of the time I’m running around while dodging bullets, arrows or fireballs, so I don’t really have time to examine the details of the foliage around me at the pixel level. I also will not buy an overpowered space heater so that the grass in my game looks more realistic. I don’t want a triple fan monster sounding like a turbojet near me.
Upscaling an old game on fixed hardware that can’t output at high resolutions is good.
Upscaling a new game as part of the graphics pipeline instead of optimizing it is terrible and shouldn’t be accepted by gamers that have to spend $1000+ on a GPU
A lot of strategy games fit this bill to me. Mainly the Paradox ones like Europa Universalis or Crusader Kings. I’d much rather play the most recent version (EU4 and CK3). However, it’s interesting that I feel the exact opposite about the Total War and Civilization Series, where I’ll prefer the original Rome Total War and Shogun 2 Total War over many of the more-recent games, as well as Civ V over VI and VII (though I haven’t played VII yet, to be fair).
The Football Manager series also comes to mind. There’s little tweaks and improvements each year (this year being an exception where they are redesigning the entire engine) so I prefer playing the most recent one (even if I still boot up a few of the older games for some nostalgia every now and then).
Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition is basically worthless if you have Dark Souls: Remastered.
60fps, better graphics, better performance, QOL enhancements, and even better multiplayer features (up to 6 total players instead of 4, just like DS3).
Probably true of most remasters/remakes, outside of speed running. I do know that PTDE is still a popular version to speedrun due to certain glitches that aren’t present in Remastered.
Dark Souls never even needed a remaster. The original could be released today and probably still be the best game of this year. The improved performance is the only thing worth noting, and even that only really matters in Blighttown, which everyone skips after their first playthrough anyway.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone say that upscaling OPTIONS are bad but I’m worried about games like monster hunter where upscaling and frame gen is used to make the game playable in most cases.
Thanks for posting these! I’ve caught nearly every one since you started and have given me motivation some days to start up something and play for a bit. And I’ve never regretted it because I do enjoy gaming. On those blah days seeing someone being excited about a game lifts my mood enough to do it myself and end up feeling pretty good and having fun
I hope you don’t forget anytime soon! I appreciate your enthusiasm for your games and following along with your progress is very wholesome as well
That’s awesome to hear because getting people excited to play a game is my entire goal with these (along with introducing people to new games or just reminding them of old ones)
This is pretty obscure, but the Game Boy Advance remake of Mario Bros. (Not Super Mario Bros.) is more fun than the original.
You can run, for one thing, and the controls are more responsive in general.
It’s one of the games on Super Mario Advance, and one of the main reasons I originally wanted a GBA when it came out! I had the original Mario Bros. for the NES and thought it would be fun to have a portable version. I was right.
Yeah the controls in the OG Mario Bros (and even the OG Super Mario Bros, to a bit of a lesser extent) are very clunky compared to modern entries. I’d say SMB3 holds up well though.
Literally if you’re playing on the original NES controllers made in a time before Nintendo understood the importance of erganomics. The corners dug into hands and even the buttons wore at fingers and I say that as someone who has naturally thick callouses.
Iirc, they didn’t even have the satisfying button press mechanism most buttons have these days where the button resistance drops as you pass the threshold of a “press”. And many games involved mashing or holding buttons. Like it was painful to watch my daughter try playing SMB and not just hold the B button to constantly run.
They were iconic but I prefer to see them than use them.
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