6 ms·

Game Boy and NES were my first consoles, but being an avid retro gamer in these days (hail RetroPie!) I must admit SNES and Genesis is as far back as I'm willin

Game Boy and NES were my first consoles, but being an avid retro gamer in these days (hail RetroPie!) I must admit SNES and Genesis is as far back as I'm willing to go. The 16-bit era is when consoles got really good and there are too many games from this period I'm still discovering. I could only dream about a tool like this for SNES games. There's a lovely scene still making awesome games and cartridges for Genesis (with old tools I guess). Check out Xeno Crisis and Tanglewood.

Agentlien 5y ago
Before the pandemic we had a small group of Nintendo fans at work who would gather each lunch to play through various NES games together and discuss what made them work or not. As a game developer who grew up with SNES it was a very nice way to experience the generation I missed. It was a lot of fun and I hope to get back to it once we aren't all remote anymore. Unsurprisingly, the one I liked the most was the original Zelda. Its sequel, Zelda II: Adventure of Link, is fascinatingly weird.
- daniellarusso 5y ago
  Wow. This is a really cool team-building and morale boosting practice, I think. How would you take turns and decide what games to play?
  - Agentlien 5y ago
    The way we chose which to play was mainly through civil discussion about what we have been wanting to try or revisit as well as which games inspired or were inspired by what we played last. As for who holds the controller: we usually took turns, switching to whomever was most eager whenever we died.
- sodapopcan 5y ago
  As soon as you mentioned Zelda II, I figured an overstatement about how either great or terrible it is was coming. "Fascinatingly weird" is probably the best description I've heard of this rough-around-the-edges game that I love :) I still think the original Zelda is one of the best Zeldas. Yeah, it was the game that got me obsessed with video games as a kid (so heavy nostalgia factor there), but it's still pretty expansive as far as simple games go and the artwork is pleasing while leaving plenty of room to use your imagination.
NortySpock 5y ago
I'll look out for Xeno Crisis and Tanglewood -- can I counter-recommend Micro Mages for the NES? trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFX401vvKTQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFX401vvKTQ
rixrax 5y ago
Pandemic opened up a world of retro gaming to me too. I’ve discovered so many great games that I never had a chance to play when I was a kid / teenager. And my current skillz in Atari 2600 SeaQuest really make my childhood scores look like child’s game! I would also agree about what you say about SNES/Genesis. Raster based games and gameplay really seemed to peak in those years. RetroPie/RetroArch shaders like ScaleFx or Xbrz by the way work miracles on some of these 16bit console titles to make them look slightly more modern (pc / gpu required, I don’t think pi has enough muscle yet). I was learning Godot game engine the other day - It would be pretty awesome to be able to use something like that to output a SNES/Genesis game. Or old skool demo without having to learn snes etc. assembly :D
SilverRed 5y ago
I think its interesting how there is sort of a revival of retro style games and we are now getting brand new games that look like they came out in the 90s. Games like Dusk are awesome fun but don't have all the weird quirks of running old games on a modern system.
pkorzeniewski 5y ago
Game Boy Classic was my first (and only) console and I actually use it quite often nowadays, usually to play Tetris in bed before sleep. I love it because it does one thing only, batteries last a looong time, games are simple but fun and challenging, it's super comfortable to use and I like looking for and buying games in physical form. The only thing I've modded in my Game Boy is the screen, I've replaced it with a modern IPS one and I absolutely recommend it to anyone who would like to use Game Boy - it takes nothing away from the "retro" feel but is sooo much easier on the eyes and games look as good as possible.
- scambier 5y ago
  I've recently taken an interest in modding gameboys. I was planning on reselling them (at cost price) to fund the next ones, but most hardware can only be bought from US or UK. So since the Brexit, it's literally an unsustainable hobby because of all custom fees :(
- WildGreenLeave 5y ago
  Wow, I never even thought about that. Do you have any place where I can read to get started?
  - mattl 5y ago
    The Retro Future is a great YouTube channel for such things. His second channel is much more in-depth on the technical aspects.
- cableshaft 5y ago
  Game Boy Classic has a lot of interesting puzzle and action puzzle games that didn't really get ported to any other platforms. Kwirk, Mole Mania (designed by Shigeru Miyamoto, even! super underrated), Amazing Penguin, Dexterity (kill enemies by flipping tiles Othello style), Catrap (one of the first games with rewind mechanics, predates Braid), Ishido, Quarth, Daedalian Opus, and Mario's Picross, which started the whole Picross line, still going on today. If you include Game Boy Color, then you can add Hexcite (weird rules at first, but once it clicked I started loving it), Rox (drop dice, clear out everything between two matching dice), and Klustar (almost katamari-like, but with tetris blocks, very addictive). I missed most of these the first time around, became aware of them mostly from Jeremy Parish's Game Boy Works retrospectives. It's still on my bucket list to, one day, port my simple strategy game Proximity to either NES or Game Boy (or both). It's just a hex grid and number tiles that capture surrounding lower number tiles when placed, lots of fun, and the flash game went viral a long time ago. Unfortunately most of these NES/GB game making software assume either platformer or adventure games, so to make my game I'll have to do a deep dive into the architecture, but that's okay, assuming I can find the time to do it. Still need to finish my Pico-8 port, first though, which is close enough I really should probably just release it. And I'm working on the third game right now, which I'm planning to add some fun Twitch support to, so hundreds of viewers can play the game along with the streamer.

Agentlien 5y ago

Before the pandemic we had a small group of Nintendo fans at work who would gather each lunch to play through various NES games together and discuss what made them work or not. As a game developer who grew up with SNES it was a very nice way to experience the generation I missed. It was a lot of fun and I hope to get back to it once we aren't all remote anymore. Unsurprisingly, the one I liked the most was the original Zelda. Its sequel, Zelda II: Adventure of Link, is fascinatingly weird.

daniellarusso 5y ago
Wow. This is a really cool team-building and morale boosting practice, I think. How would you take turns and decide what games to play?
- Agentlien 5y ago
  The way we chose which to play was mainly through civil discussion about what we have been wanting to try or revisit as well as which games inspired or were inspired by what we played last. As for who holds the controller: we usually took turns, switching to whomever was most eager whenever we died.
sodapopcan 5y ago
As soon as you mentioned Zelda II, I figured an overstatement about how either great or terrible it is was coming. "Fascinatingly weird" is probably the best description I've heard of this rough-around-the-edges game that I love :) I still think the original Zelda is one of the best Zeldas. Yeah, it was the game that got me obsessed with video games as a kid (so heavy nostalgia factor there), but it's still pretty expansive as far as simple games go and the artwork is pleasing while leaving plenty of room to use your imagination.

NortySpock 5y ago

I'll look out for Xeno Crisis and Tanglewood -- can I counter-recommend Micro Mages for the NES? trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFX401vvKTQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFX401vvKTQ

rixrax 5y ago

Pandemic opened up a world of retro gaming to me too. I’ve discovered so many great games that I never had a chance to play when I was a kid / teenager. And my current skillz in Atari 2600 SeaQuest really make my childhood scores look like child’s game! I would also agree about what you say about SNES/Genesis. Raster based games and gameplay really seemed to peak in those years. RetroPie/RetroArch shaders like ScaleFx or Xbrz by the way work miracles on some of these 16bit console titles to make them look slightly more modern (pc / gpu required, I don’t think pi has enough muscle yet). I was learning Godot game engine the other day - It would be pretty awesome to be able to use something like that to output a SNES/Genesis game. Or old skool demo without having to learn snes etc. assembly :D

SilverRed 5y ago

I think its interesting how there is sort of a revival of retro style games and we are now getting brand new games that look like they came out in the 90s. Games like Dusk are awesome fun but don't have all the weird quirks of running old games on a modern system.

pkorzeniewski 5y ago

Game Boy Classic was my first (and only) console and I actually use it quite often nowadays, usually to play Tetris in bed before sleep. I love it because it does one thing only, batteries last a looong time, games are simple but fun and challenging, it's super comfortable to use and I like looking for and buying games in physical form. The only thing I've modded in my Game Boy is the screen, I've replaced it with a modern IPS one and I absolutely recommend it to anyone who would like to use Game Boy - it takes nothing away from the "retro" feel but is sooo much easier on the eyes and games look as good as possible.

scambier 5y ago
I've recently taken an interest in modding gameboys. I was planning on reselling them (at cost price) to fund the next ones, but most hardware can only be bought from US or UK. So since the Brexit, it's literally an unsustainable hobby because of all custom fees :(
WildGreenLeave 5y ago
Wow, I never even thought about that. Do you have any place where I can read to get started?
- mattl 5y ago
  The Retro Future is a great YouTube channel for such things. His second channel is much more in-depth on the technical aspects.
cableshaft 5y ago
Game Boy Classic has a lot of interesting puzzle and action puzzle games that didn't really get ported to any other platforms. Kwirk, Mole Mania (designed by Shigeru Miyamoto, even! super underrated), Amazing Penguin, Dexterity (kill enemies by flipping tiles Othello style), Catrap (one of the first games with rewind mechanics, predates Braid), Ishido, Quarth, Daedalian Opus, and Mario's Picross, which started the whole Picross line, still going on today. If you include Game Boy Color, then you can add Hexcite (weird rules at first, but once it clicked I started loving it), Rox (drop dice, clear out everything between two matching dice), and Klustar (almost katamari-like, but with tetris blocks, very addictive). I missed most of these the first time around, became aware of them mostly from Jeremy Parish's Game Boy Works retrospectives. It's still on my bucket list to, one day, port my simple strategy game Proximity to either NES or Game Boy (or both). It's just a hex grid and number tiles that capture surrounding lower number tiles when placed, lots of fun, and the flash game went viral a long time ago. Unfortunately most of these NES/GB game making software assume either platformer or adventure games, so to make my game I'll have to do a deep dive into the architecture, but that's okay, assuming I can find the time to do it. Still need to finish my Pico-8 port, first though, which is close enough I really should probably just release it. And I'm working on the third game right now, which I'm planning to add some fun Twitch support to, so hundreds of viewers can play the game along with the streamer.