Are games to be lost in time?

[anvi]

AI could become useful for finding and explaining dissenting opinions and showing why they are hard to find.

Video games are too technologically dependant.

A written work just requires an understanding of the language, but what will people do finding an old CD with a game on it that was broken at launch and now lacks the necessary patches to make it playable?

Worse in ways are ones like pre-WoW, non-theme park style MMOs that are also culturally dependant.

You can play Everquest classic still today, but you play it without the player culture that existed then. If you remade the PvP servers, few would work to recreate their play cultures that existed on them, like the ardent anti-PKs that roleplayed as zealously noble protectors and would play as terrible PvP classes like Paladins because they wanted to RP more than make full use of the games raw mechanics.

Yeah youtubers get EQ wrong a lot when they do retrospectives. Stuff they don't appreciate even now. Like the fact that the game didn't let you alt-tab, hardly anyone had a second pc, and the internet didn't have much info anyway. And most people seemed to be like me, they would rather explore the world they are paying for rather than find guides. So the first year at least was full of people who didn't know much about the game. But over the years people started using maps and guides and it became more expected that everyone should know what the best item for each slot is and how they should get it and where everything is etc... -.- I hate that human autistic need to discover everything and document it. It's not good for these kinds of games.

Also when people talk about the grind and regen time etc.. A lot of that is just wrong or misrepresented. They try to play it today, solo, with hardly any players. So yeah it drags on no doubt. But you are supposed to have a group of 6 real people including a bard or enchanter pumping everyones mana. The whole thing speeds up about 10x like that. Also the game needed downtime. It is the only thing that makes resource management matter. Mana, health, was important because of downtime. And you can't be scared in a dungeon if everyone is at full health and mana.

Also if something isn't difficult to achieve then it's just boring. Any retard can go to Fjnarnar dungeon and kill Draugr 1 by 1 until they recover the golden claw or whatever. But then think about the Ghoul Lord... All what you have to go through just to reach that guy. A cave in swamp, leads to a dungeon and there's another dungeon within that dungeon. And you have to get past undead skeletons and stuff just to reach the guy. And then he has Harm Touch and 2 badass buddies. Getting those swords is only interesting because it was a real accomplishment and not everyone could do it.

They talk about the endless grind. Again the grind seems worse when some modern soyboy tries playing it solo in current year. It wasn't as bad when you had 6 real people working together. And it was pre 9/11 world when everyone was still chilled as default. So what if you spent all Saturday fighting goblins? And again the grind was there for a reason. Without it, you are max level and you won. Uninstall. The grind was part of the game. Nobody complains about the mass slaughter of mobs in Diablo-likes, or the same fights over and over in Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, etc. Yet they bitch about EQ. I'm the first to admit it was too time consuming in general, but the slow grind to make progress was part of the appeal. And WoWs attempt to fix it by replacing mob grind with quest grind which I found to be far worse. Everyone seems to assume WoW's way was an improvement, nobody ever questions whether it was an improvement or not.

 

[Nutmeg]

Wow OK archive.org not allowing downloading redump images anymore.

 

[Beastro]

AI could become useful for finding and explaining dissenting opinions and showing why they are hard to find.

Video games are too technologically dependant.

A written work just requires an understanding of the language, but what will people do finding an old CD with a game on it that was broken at launch and now lacks the necessary patches to make it playable?

Worse in ways are ones like pre-WoW, non-theme park style MMOs that are also culturally dependant.

You can play Everquest classic still today, but you play it without the player culture that existed then. If you remade the PvP servers, few would work to recreate their play cultures that existed on them, like the ardent anti-PKs that roleplayed as zealously noble protectors and would play as terrible PvP classes like Paladins because they wanted to RP more than make full use of the games raw mechanics.

Yeah youtubers get EQ wrong a lot when they do retrospectives. Stuff they don't appreciate even now. Like the fact that the game didn't let you alt-tab, hardly anyone had a second pc, and the internet didn't have much info anyway. And most people seemed to be like me, they would rather explore the world they are paying for rather than find guides.

Allakazam, EQ Trader, Caster's Realm, etc, were called "spoiler sites" for a reason back then.

Even people's opinion of EQ Atlas had a tinge of disgust at first thinking about people actually printing out maps to use to properly guide themselves.

 

[anvi]

I was only a kid and I felt that strongly. I never even knew about maps until Kunark came along and I went to a dungeon with my guild at the time. One of them had EQAtlas on his laptop and he was leading us while checking the maps. I hated it, felt like we were using cheat codes. I was tempted to make an excuse and bail, then go back myself later so I could explore it properly. I didn't want any spoilers at all. Seemed like within a few years everyone was just using maps and guides and plugins and mods and anything they could get to give themselves an edge rushing through the levels. Madness. And now they just sell xp potions and gear and stuff. So you can just pay to make your own game shorter...

 

[Beastro]

Now this is annoying me because Alla came along later, like around Velious and overshadowed the previous catch-all EQ info site before it, but I can't think of it's name now...

 

[anvi]

Not sure, I was really anti guides. I didn't even know what half my spells did until after I quit I remember EQatlas and alla, documenting everything, seemed very anti fun. And then there were people buying gear and whole characters on ebay and then playerauctions. Someone ninja looted a Cloak of Flames from a raid and then sold it for about $1000 or something. It all started getting very try hardish.

I have a few sites bookmarked now for re-playing it. Magelo? There were lots of fan sites with good info. Silky Venom and stuff. Some of them get brought back from the archive for Vanguard.

 

[Beastro]

Not sure, I was really anti guides. I didn't even know what half my spells did until after I quit I remember EQatlas and alla, documenting everything, seemed very anti fun. And then there were people buying gear and whole characters on ebay and then playerauctions. Someone ninja looted a Cloak of Flames from a raid and then sold it for about $1000 or something. It all started getting very try hardish.

I have a few sites bookmarked now for re-playing it. Magelo? There were lots of fan sites with good info. Silky Venom and stuff. Some of them get brought back from the archive for Vanguard.

No, Magelo came later after Allakazam and was more focused on allowing you to profile your gear and plan out what you wanted.

This is more a smaller fan site like Caster's Realm that grew but faded as the demand for information expanded. It was the main one that I used and kept using after Alla became dominant until they started neglecting to properly update stuff.

IIRC, the background was black and very Web 1.0.

The disgust people had for bought accounts was massive. Some people would refuse to group with or invite a bought account to their guilds. Worse on RZ was the buying a name change combined with server transfers that had people try to avoid the reputation that they'd built up. I know people would keep track of others stories and investigate to see if X really did come from Tunare and had been in Y guild instead of being some PK born and raised on Rallos trying to hide his past from everyone.

 

[Elttharion]

"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
No thing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Yeah, I've never been able to recapture that legit adventure feeling EQ gave me back in the day. I spent ages doing a class specific quest for a cool looking robe for my mage, I was way underlevelled for it and had to stop and ask strangers along the way for advice, did they know where the whatever monsters were, could they group with me to kill the whatever boss, etc.

I remember joining a party and going to a goblin dungeon with lava pools because someone in the group knew the way and the fact that the goblins dropped steel weapons that sold to vendors for a decent bit of change. I had no idea that dungeon existed before joining that group, none of us seemed to know our way around. I did some scouting for us with invisibility, but was scared of being spotted by a goblin wizard. We found a relatively safe room and everyone agreed to hole up in there and farm the goblins; I used my spell to teleport back to the city and exchange coins at the bank because the coppers were weighing us down to the point of encumbrance. The group was using my summoned food to eat and bags to hold the loot. Everything about the experience felt legit.

Every MMO I've played since then is just numbers going up and at best bosses that test to see which party members are drunk/stoned/retarded and can't follow basic instructions because everyone was supposed to watch the walkthrough video.

 

[Beastro]

Yeah, I've never been able to recapture that legit adventure feeling EQ gave me back in the day. I spent ages doing a class specific quest for a cool looking robe for my mage, I was way underlevelled for it and had to stop and ask strangers along the way for advice, did they know where the whatever monsters were, could they group with me to kill the whatever boss, etc.

I remember joining a party and going to a goblin dungeon with lava pools because someone in the group knew the way and the fact that the goblins dropped steel weapons that sold to vendors for a decent bit of change. I had no idea that dungeon existed before joining that group, none of us seemed to know our way around. I did some scouting for us with invisibility, but was scared of being spotted by a goblin wizard. We found a relatively safe room and everyone agreed to hole up in there and farm the goblins; I used my spell to teleport back to the city and exchange coins at the bank because the coppers were weighing us down to the point of encumbrance. The group was using my summoned food to eat and bags to hold the loot. Everything about the experience felt legit.

Every MMO I've played since then is just numbers going up and at best bosses that test to see which party members are drunk/stoned/retarded and can't follow basic instructions because everyone was supposed to watch the walkthrough video.

The worst part of that was also the best, when that got boring and someone started saying "You know what? I think we should push deeper..." leading to a shitshow happening and a loooong night's CR.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

As with DOSbox and games that can run on it, games from early computer and console systems require an emulator that works on the current operating system but otherwise can fit a vast amount of software into a few gigabytes that doesn't change. Therefore, Amiga games, C64 games, et cetera are relatively easy to preserve; we have only to continue supporting emulator updates.

 

[Ash]

Yeah, it's almost like 95% of this thread has never heard of emulation before. Maybe we should keep it that way. When the masses get involved, the forces of decline are inevitable.

 

[Odoryuk]

Time passes and some works are immemorial. That's why today we discuss Socrates etc.

Nonetheless, while many book writers released their works even (initially) in dozens of copies, they eventually survived, because it's easy to copy letters.

Music? Well, it was first copied with a simple script, then with recording technology.

Movies were kinda similar, but skipping the script tech (otherwise it was a theatre), they could be recorded and then displayed - with better or worse quality - but overall they remained the same.

Games are different though because they are made with specific OS and hardware, which could be emulated but it seems to get harder and harder nowadays.

Do you think games are the most doomed entertainment (of currently known)? Do you think Baldur's Gate or Darkands will be playable in 100 years? I have my doubts. We already struggle with them. For example, Polish version of Baldur's Gate (non-EE) you can get on GOG is alpha/beta and most quests except main one don't work, while original CD version had all quests working just fine.

You think old texts from 2500 years ago survived to our times unaltered? Hate to break it to you...

Before print texts were copied by hand, with all involuntary mistakes and voluntary alterations.

In 3rd Century BC Athens created a commission to clear the texts of old tragedies by Sophocles (written in 5th Century BC, only 2 centuries prior) and his contemporaries from those alterations. The commission ofcourse cut what it considered unfitting and added some more.

The same happened in the community of scholars in the Library of Alexandria - they altered old texts to clear them of mistakes of old.

When the great libraries collapsed and then the Roman Empire fell, numerous written works (probably around 99% in Greek and Latin) were lost. What survived to our times, often in fragments, was problably altered many times in the process.

What we got is an equivalent of remasters, remakes of old games. Faulty, imperfect, granting us only partial knowledge of how those works actually looked like.

They didn't invent emulating old text as they were exactly, but we did learn how to emulate old games with 99% accuracy. As long as there computers, old games will live

 

[mondblut]

Yeah, it's almost like 95% of this thread has never heard of emulation before.

An emulator cannot replicate the soft glow of a CRT monitor.
Or having to wait for something to load for 5 minutes (ok, it can, but who would put up with this nowadays?).
Or having no internet with all the answers in the world.

Or being 16 again.

 

[Grauken]

Or being 16 again.

Would you even want to?

 

[Heroic Liberator]

Or being 16 again.

Would you even want to?

 

[Grauken]

Or being 16 again.

Would you even want to?

You being 16 again, discovering your first big cRPG Veilguard, grand times my man

 

[Heroic Liberator]

discovering your first big cRPG Veilguard

And consequently, ending up not picking up gaming as a hobby. Great success))

 

[Grauken]

discovering your first big cRPG Veilguard

And consequently, ending up not picking up gaming as a hobby. Great success))

You assume your 16 old self would have monocled taste. Most of us were stupid at that time, so likely you would become a stalwart defender of the game, to eventually make a thread 20 years later "great games to be lost in time"

 

[Heroic Liberator]

discovering your first big cRPG Veilguard

And consequently, ending up not picking up gaming as a hobby. Great success))

You assume your 16 old self would have monocled taste. Most of us were stupid at that time, so likely you would become a stalwart defender of the game, to eventually make a thread 20 years later "great games to be lost in time"

Eh, I think that being exposed to progressively worse stuff makes you sort of indifferent ('tolerant' due to sunk cost fallacy pertaining to your investment into the hobby) to it. If you're given that sort of cringe from the getgo, most people - assuming that they retain their original tastes - would probably move onto other stuff instead.

 

[Nutmeg]

I was playing BG2 when I was 16 years old and I thought it was very good but I was also able to see its shortcomings after reflecting on why I had started like 8 games of it but never finished a single one. Now I would say it's "good for what it is". I had started gaming much much earlier tho. My first games were a DOS port of Bomberman, Warcraft 1 and Doom. By the time I was 16 I was already a veteran with dozens of games under my belt.

 

[Konjad]

My first games were a DOS port of Bomberman, Warcraft 1 and Doom.

And look at you now. You wish doom upon quarter of the world, Ukraine to be bombed, and are generally a(n internet) warmonger.

 

[Nutmeg]

My first games were a DOS port of Bomberman, Warcraft 1 and Doom.

And look at you now. You wish doom upon quarter of the world, Ukraine to be bombed, and are generally a(n internet) warmonger.

Uncanny, especially when you consider the next batch of games I played which were command and conquer, red alert, sim city 2000, civilization 2, master of orion and age of empires. Truly the games we play in our formative years form us.

 

[Just Locus]

I'd like to use this opportunity to share some pics from old video game magazines:

Computer Gaming World Issue #113

Game Informer Issue #041

Electronic Gaming Monthly #64

Electronic Gaming Monthly #179 (June 2004)

 

[mondblut]

Or being 16 again.

Would you even want to?

Reloading a save from 1993? Fuck yeah.