By Lukas Horak
Over the past few years, the gaming industry has seen a rise in studio rereleases or upgrades to older video games through remasters, remakes, and next-gen updates. These enhancements are used to appeal to older gamers’ sense of nostalgia by allowing them a chance to relive the experiences that defined their youth. While giving newer gamers a chance to experience older games with updated graphics and quality of life features. Though this begs the question of which of these practices is the best way for gamers to experience older games.
First there are video game remasters which seek to update older video games to modern standards while still keeping the core gameplay experience intact. The benefits of the remasters are their enhancements, from taking advantage of modern hardware by improving textures, in-game animations, framerate and graphics. Some remasters even go so far as to patch bugs or fix issues present in the original release, or make them playable to gamers on modern gaming consoles without having to purchase them on older hardware. An example of a good remaster would be Metroid Prime Remastered developed by Retro Studios and Nintendo Research and Development 1. This upgrade takes the beloved first person adventure game and enhances it with improved graphics, new controller layouts and released on a modern console.
However, not every update from a remaster can lead to overall improvements to the game. In enhancing the original experience, a remaster could create issues that hinder the gameplay experience through glitches or bugs, or even fail to capture what made the game special to begin with, making it an inferior version to the original gameplay experience. Sonic Colors: Ultimate, developed by Blind Squirrel Games and released by Sega showcases the issues that appear when enhancing an older game for newer hardware. From updated textures that butchered the game’s art style to bugs that hindered people’s progress, they made what was once an overlooked gem released on the Wii into a mess on the modern consoles.
Another form of upgrading older games is video game remakes, which is the practice of taking the original framework of a beloved video game and reworking it from the ground up for a modern audience. What is constituted from a rework can vary from a game’s visuals to a completely different gameplay experience than the original game. The advantages of these upgrades are they can improve upon the original game by adding responsive and tight controls, detailed graphics, smoother resolution and even add, expand or improve content to enhance the overall gameplay experience. A good example of this would be Dead Space remake developed by EA Motive, a game reworked from the ground up with improved visuals and lighting, and added or improved gameplay sections with new levels and areas to explore.
In contrast, video game remakes can offer a shallow experience that doesn’t add or improve upon the gameplay of the original, or even morph into a shell of what it was supposed to be remaking. A game that exemplifies this would be Warcraft Three Reforged developed by Blizzard Entertainment. In its release state, the game delivered so many bugs and changes that made it inferior to the original game.
Finally there are next-gen updates or next-gen patches, which are video games that came out in the prior console generation, released anywhere from 4-5 years ago, that are given minor enhancements and made playable on the newest generation of consoles. The pros are the addition of enhancements that improve game play experience. From ray-tracing to high-resolution texture packs, additions that refine the original game and make it accessible to newer generations. The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom: Nintendo Switch 2 Edition would be an example of a good next-gen update. This upgrade adds quality of life features like improved load times and smoother frame rates while keeping the core gameplay experience intact.
The cons usually boil down to enhancements that introduce problems that the original release didn’t have or don’t add any improvements to warrant this enhanced version. An example of a bad next-gen update would be Fallout 4 . This update promised to refine and update the original gameplay experience, but ended up delivering a buggy mess that hindered many players’ enjoyment of the game.
So, which of these upgrades is the best way to experience older games? Remasters of video games offer updates to older video games but keep the core experience relatively unchanged. Video game remakes take the original games foundation but reworked with modern technology. Then, next gen updates provide the same gameplay experience with minor enhancements from newer hardware.
The definitive way to experience older games is what each individual gamer wants to experience. There is no best way for anyone to play older games, because what gamers want to experience could change at any time. They could want to play a faithful recreation of a classic video game at one moment but change their mind and favor a more modern interpretation the next. Therefore the best way to play older games is what gamers want at that time from an update, rework or enhancement.
Lukas Horak is a fourth-year student majoring in Professional and Public Writing. In his free time, he can be found reading, watching movies, or playing video games.