Dirt_Owl [comrade/them, they/them] @hexbear.net

4d ago

Reject overpriced, over produced modern gaming. Return to retro game emulation.

Do it loser, we have weird shit like Mystery of the Druids.

Oh, but you better do it quick 'cause you know piracy is just going to get harder and harder. Mmm mmm I love being arrested for copies of zeros and ones from 30 years ago.

Fucking hell, capitalism ruins everything. I was excited for the Switch 2 'till I saw it was just as overpriced as the others.

It's just sad to see what even was once such a weird and experimental industry become yet another over invested industry.

Fuck shareholders. Fuck Capitalism. Fuck endless growth and the monitisation of fun and creativity.

55 comments

Emulation is absolutely the way to go. For the older cart-based systems especially, even full romsets barely take up any space, so you can just grab the whole thing and decide what you want to play later:
NES - 280 MB
SNES - 3 GB
N64 - 12 GB
Game Boy - 200 MB
GBC - 675 MB
GBA - 13 GB
Master System - 100 MB
Genesis - 1 GB
When you get into the disc-based era things get more into the terabyte range, but even then it's very much in the "cheap HDD" range:
Saturn (US) - 80 GB
Dreamcast (US) - 115 GB
PS1 (NTSC) - 500 GB
PS2 (NTSC) - 2.5 TB
PSP (NTSC) - 500 GB
Gamecube (NTSC) - 500 GB
Wii - 5-6 TB (?)
Nintendo DS - 200 GB
Obviously, about 80% of that (conservatively) is games you wouldn't actually ever want to play, so you can easily store every ROM you'd ever want from every system from the PS2/GCN/Xbox and before (+Wii) on a single cheap drive and run them all on a potato PC (with enhanced graphics for the more modern ones, too!).
- For people reading this to get started 1G1R (one game one region) is a great way to get a set that removes duplicates and prefers the best version of a game. I also remove most sports games from my sets as well
  
  That's an interesting idea. Is there a repository to look at that set?
- I actually went through my 8 and 16-bit ROMs to delete all the crap like sports games I was never going to play plus all the different regional version. Dunno if it was worth it, but it made the lists a lot nicer to scroll.
  You forgot the 16-bit era shmup GOAT, PC Engine.
- Dude, you cannot leave out DOS games like that
  
  Fr the Quest for Glory series was great

Want to waste money anyway? Buy the old systems. You'll definitely not regret buying an Atari Jaguar.
- That way I can have an overpriced console and a 90s green cyber head asking me where I learnt to fly.
- That reminds me that there's a good Jaguar emulator now so you can play Tempest 2000 and...well, Tempest 2000 is great.
- Oh and don't look up how much a physical copy of Panzer Dragoon Saga is now. There's a reason I suggested emulation.
  
  I'm burning my own Saturn discs like god intended tyvm

I am thinking of composing a video essay titled Xenogears Is Probably Not Marxist But You Never Know.
- Gnasty Gnorc is a working class hero and Spyro 1 is about the bourgeoisie putting down a people's revolution Part 1 of 8

i n d i e g a m e s

Why would I play anything besides Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead??
- Because sometimes Satisfactory and Warsim call out.
- Because there's FUN to be found underground.

Who needs COD when boomer shooters/90s FPS are a thing.
- That and only the 360 era CoDs were good lol
  
  They stopped getting that sweet CIA funding after the 360 era

Can I remind everyone of our good and long-standing friend, open source games.

I never got a console after the 360 and Wii lol
Modded Wii might be my favorite console tbh, there's a lotta neat stuff you can do with it
- It feel off after the Wii U
  
  Pretty sure you can mod Wii U to do all the modded Wii stuff too but I never got one

Last week I started playing a rom hack of Pokémon red called purergb which has QOL improvements and bug fixes and lets you catch all 151 Pokémon without trading! I haven’t played a new release game in probably 2 years lol.
I thought even pricing aside the switch 2 announcement was a real wet fart. I’m sure there are some people out there really excited for multiplayer bloodborne but I have never been a from software guy.
The only exclusive that enticed me was Metroid prime 4, but even then I much prefer the 2D Metroid games (dread was incredible).
- I actually was really impressed by the Switch 2 games coming out, the Donkey Kong game in particular showed Nintendo has really upped their game as far as character models and animation is concerned. But then they got to the pricing and I was thinking like "You guys have already killed so much good faith with your crusade against emulation. You used to be the guys that refused to stoop to greedy shit like micro transactions and DLC. You already have been super scummy with making your virtual console a subscription service and now this greedy pricing?"
  The problem, of course as always, is capitalism. The eras where Nintendo was experimental were their least profitable, the GameCube was a failure in their eyes. The first Switch did away with extras like themes and the virtual console store, and it was their most successful console in ages. Couple this with the success of the Mario Movie and now you have a lot of shitty investors wanting a piece of the pie.
  It really does feel like capitalism has killed modern gaming, with this and Sony doing shit like making overproduced Marvel tier slop like Concord it looks bleak. Monster Hunter Wilds looks great and I love Monster Hunter, but even that series has become plagued by microtransactions and advertising. The whole industry is going the way movies and music has gone. Capitalists smell a creative industry they can exploit and set to slowly carving away it's creative soul for profit.
  The sad part is like I said, the actual games look like some of Nintendo's best work in years, but it's all poisoned by that greed.

I just learned that modern phones can play ps1 games. Some ps2 games maybe.
I am going to get a Bluetooth controller for my phone and just enjoy myself.
- I really like the slide on clip controllers that make the phone factor roughly PSP/switch form.
  Also if you share the phone model I can tell you if even awesome stuff like Winlator is possible
  
  A buddy of mine got the 8bitdo one and it seems like it has a really nice build quality and short of figuring out how to pair like an actual Xbox controller that might be my favorite option I have seen so far.
  I got a galaxy 22

thinking of starting Deus Ex soon.
- Recommend the Revision overhaul.

games peaked in the gba era don't @ me

I love playing older games. And even though they’re a lot of fun, technical issues can be frustrating sometimes.
Right now I’m playing Divine Divinity and I’m really enjoying it. But I get random crashes occasionally, and after getting 2 crashes back-to-back I have to take a little break now. Like, I don’t want to go through the stinking sewers again for the third time. Why can’t I just skip that?

Were there other games released after Sonic Adventure 2 ?
- No that was the last game
- Only Sonic Adventure 2: Battle as far as I'm aware

Decompilation and PC port projects are also pretty cool.
OpenGOAL
sm64
N64Recomp

No new games are allowed until everyone has beaten Super Mario Bros. Special for the NEC PC-8801.
You've got the right idea. Old games through like the GC/PS2/Wii era can now run on most hardware and there is an absurd amount of incredible games to be played.

Real heads are still out there refusing to play another game until they beat Heroes of the Lance on NES.
- Maybe I'll give it a shot after beating the water level in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
  
  End of the sewer level in the MS-DOS version

master list of low spec games: https://pastebin.com/MTCXZxCN
i was actually playing ZORK (1982) and paper mapping on my desk while i played. even though it wasn't the most insane game experience i've ever had, was really fun to learn/experience a part of gaming history. it also holds up REALLY fucking well to today's standards. being gameplay and not graphic based will do that.
- Those old text games had a certain charm, but I don't miss the "You cannot get ye flask" moments
  
  but then you get to imagine why ye cannot get ye flask
  
  Strongbad's text game was pretty fun

I crave weird experiments like Seaman on the Dreamcast.
I also regret that I live on this side on the revolution. That I would have to live and most probably die through the revolution I am failing everyday to help organise.
Despite all this "learn to code" rhetoric my whole adult life, it feels like a desert of actual software. So much of society still perilously runs on software relics that only proliferated because it was dangerously easily to make them in access and VB6. Games are just asset flips or repackaged nostalgia. The latter will lead to a crack down on game emulators and ROMs, the open distribution of which are hiding the obscurity of people's lack of curiosity.
- "learn to code", asset flips, nostalgia
  finmaxers ruining society at every layer, in every possible way
  
  Seriously socialism will look like a technological renaissance just from a some actual investment.
  Would love to have the free time to write weird games with nim. Advanced meta programming for all kinds of experiments. Push old hardware to its limit while being portable.

55 comments