Monday, March 11, 2024


Retro Reflections: How 80s and 90s Game Design and Controls Shaped Difficulty in Gaming.

Also, it wouldn’t even matter since most of us played these games by ourselves. If you let someone borrow a game, it still didn’t matter because you just had the time record and that friend’s initials. I mean, it meant something if you really didn’t want to be ranked lower on the time records and were willing to play the game over again.

What features or design decisions from the 2D era of the 80s and 90s added difficulty to you? Let us know below!

Game Changers: Four Features That Revolutionized Gaming in the 80s and 90s.

The skip scene button was something I first noticed in Final Fantasy X-2 at a time when FF really needed them. From FFVII onwards, Square Enix really got more and more into its cut scene bag and those cut scenes became longer and longer as well as popping up more often. It could be frustrating when you’re really enjoying the action in the game and want to get back to building your character up and whatnot only to sit through three-or-four minute cut scene number three.

Where Does Bowser Come from and What’s His Deal?

Is this thinking to deeply into Super Mario lore? Sure, but we’re in a time where everything has a strong backstory and cartoonish evil or—in Bowser’s case—well-financed mischief isn’t as applauded across the board. At this point, only a handful of series can get away with a character who is evil just because.

Bowser is one of the last of a dying breed in that respect.

Let’s Check Out for Pirate Game Pioneers.

The perfect pirate game belongs to Pirates! Gold. I’m certain I touched on this game before in passing but it’s definitely the greatest pioneer on this micro genre. You start as a citizen of France, England, the Netherlands, or Spain but as in all mentioned games—besides Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag—you can turn against your country, align with another, and either get a letter of marque to operate as a privateer or go full pirate.

You’re also able to assault town and forts, claim them for a country, attack treasure ships and big merchant hauls, and improve your ships—or get new ones. Of course, you’ve got to split the loot after lengthy voyages and you’re able to move up in society in the colonies.

There was a lot going on in a game made in 1987. I play the 1993 remake on the Sega Genesis as I was really into games like this and Aerobiz early on. They were just different from the more action-oriented titles I normally played.

If You’re Unfamiliar with Roleplay: It’s Basically Pro Wrestling.

I’d been roleplaying in some sense since 1996. I started in play-by-email, message boards, and on wrestling e-federations. All had an application process and actually, the early days of text roleplay encouraged my love of writing and creativity. Whether it was making a vampire, a ninja, or a psychopathic wrestler, it was fun to sit, come up with a backstory to fit into this new setting and do the sample roleplay.

3 Questions for the ‘Legend of Zelda’ Franchise.

How Did Nintendo Decide On the Timelines for ‘Zelda’ Games?

The Hyrule Historia has the entire canonical timeline of the franchise and shows where each game fits in with different timelines. Now, the timelines each make sense once the games are put into place and explained by the developers. Remember, some of these games dropped when the technology wasn’t as flexible as it would become for storytelling.

5 Video Game Franchises with Awesome Stealth Gameplay.

Let’s say this was part one of our stealth series. Did any of your franchise picks make the list? Also, what games do you think will make part two? Let us know down below!

5 Questions for the Pokemon Franchise.

The Pokeworld is massive and Ash and Pikachu have run into many trainers while with their constantly changing traveling party.

3 Classic Competitive Games That Should’ve Been Bigger Franchises.

The comparisons came from the design of the mutants/monster gods in both games. So, if you were a youngster in the 90s, didn’t get Game Fan regularly, and saw ads for Primal Rage, you wouldn’t be blamed for thinking it’s the same franchise at all.

5 Head-Scratching Observations of Donkey Kong Country.

Is there a dark side to that story? Nintendo tends to be on the lighter side of things but this leaves it open to some dark theories floating between the Manky Kongs being addicts or—even worse—eugenics.

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