Nostalgia as a sell factor

[Mickey Crocker]

I have an idea which has been floating around my head for quite sometime. It is something I would enjoy doing, and have a lot of fun at it. However, I'm not sure there is a market for it.

I grew up in the age of Nintendo and have very fond memories of those old 8-bit games. I remember playing games like Mario as a kid and saying to myself that someday I am going to make Nintendo games :p. Now I'm not making games for Nintendo, but I now have the skills I needed to make the games I want to make on the pc.

Do you think there would be enough interest for a retro 8-bit style game to sell well on the pc? Would people looking for nostalgia and who miss the good'ol days find large enough interest in brand new 8-bit games in order to pay for them?

Or should I let what is dead stay dead?

[Applewood]

If you could find someone, anyone, that didn't have all those things on an emulator for free, you might be able to sell him a copy.

Sorry.

[Mickey Crocker]

I suppose. Just, I have an emulator too... But there are no "new" 8-bit games being made or are available. The ones you get for an emulator are limited to just that.

I myself would love to see more 8-bit games being created... But I'm probably a very small minority.

[Applewood]

I'm just not sure someone with 100 old games for free would want to pay 10 bucks or more for just one more tbh.

I may be wrong though - give it a go :)

[GBGames]

Well, people are making new 8-bit games. Naturally the best way for them to distribute it is for free for the emulators.

On the other hand, if you make a game that has today's quality with yesterday's classic gameplay, that's probably good enough for nostalgia to make a sale.

[Ricardo C]

I don't know... I see plenty of games online that look like the old 8-bit games. I don't think "oh cool, retro!" I think "holy crap, no art budget, eh?", even though I am an old-school console fan.

I WOULD, however, be interested in 16-bit-type games. They have the retro-cool factor, but are also graphically advanced enough to not look like total dogs even today.

[lakibuk]

There ARE "8-bit" games that sell. Like Fitznik which is a remake of the NES' Adventure of Lolo, of course with new stuff and graphics. I am too lazy to think of other examples, but i am sure there are many.
Hundreds of game ideas from that time wait for a refresh.
My game Bound Around is a 8-bit game,too. It's based on a C64 game.

[princec]

The number of nerds with emulators is far smaller than the number of ordinary paying customers who just want to download a nice installer for a game and play it to the best of their machine's capabilities. I've heard the emulator argument many times and it's never had a ring of truth about it.

My games' current gameplay is all "8-bit" but that alone isn't really enough to sell them to the target market of time-pressed nostalgic 30yr olds. Exposure's the biggest problem: the gaming industry always, always, always promotes flashier, slicker productions over gameplay.

Cas :)

[george]

I think it is a good idea. It can make a very good brand image: "yesterday's games today", or something like that. But the games have to be REALLY GREAT. I don't know if you can get away with actual 8bit graphics, I think you should concentrate more on making platform/scrolling games with the "heart" of 8bit (and 16bit) games, but using the technology of today. i.e. high color graphics, excellent sound and music, etc. etc.

It could work... But like I said, the games have to be really great. Something like Jazz the JackRabbit, Sonic the hedgehog, etc. But of course, everything has to be original and new/fresh. No one wants to play the same thing again...

[milieu]

I still play a lot of old DOS games, but it's limited to the ones that can survive under XP. I've tried the DOS emulators, but never found one that really worked (that was a while ago, so they may be much improved now). Getting EMS memory, sound, and controllers set up is always a struggle.

I would love to see new versions of those games that would install and run properly on modern OSes. The gameplay could be the same and I'd be happy. About the only thing I'd want to change would be the screen resolutions (320x240 looks ridiculous on a 19" monitor!). I'd like to be able to run in a window instead of full-screen, so that I can pause and check email.

[papillon]

Old style isn't bad. However, a lot of new game designers try to use nostalgia as an excuse for having no artist and therefore having art that is much WORSE than art from the time period would be, thinking that they can just throw any old thing together with no coherent style at all and then say "Well, it's the gameplay that matters, not the graphics!" And that's true for a small number of players, but most people aren't that open-minded. 8-bit games hired artists too, you know!

[Mickey Crocker]

Old style isn't bad. However, a lot of new game designers try to use nostalgia as an excuse for having no artist and therefore having art that is much WORSE than art from the time period would be, thinking that they can just throw any old thing together with no coherent style at all and then say "Well, it's the gameplay that matters, not the graphics!" And that's true for a small number of players, but most people aren't that open-minded. 8-bit games hired artists too, you know!

I'm not using nostalgia as an excuse for bad art. I consider myself a good artist and capable of designing great graphics for my games. I truly love the games of the past, and the idea of creating great games with outstanding graphics as far as the limits of the 8-bit consoles would allow the artist to go really intrigues me.

This is something I would want to do from pure love, not for an excuse because I'm not capable of producing anything better.

I think many might be picturing an amateur website with some screenshots of really bad graphical games claiming to be retro 8-bit, that looks like a sorry attempt of the developer trying to make easy money.

However, I want you to picture a site with the professionalism in the design and artwork of that of such sites as PopCap Games, BigFishGames, Retro64, etc... However, with a real twist of releasing games that “really” feels like the games of the past. The movement in the simplistic gameplay, the beauty in the great pixel art that had to stay within the limits, yet still looked great, even some of the lost cliches.

Now what I described is what I really have in mind. I don't know for sure whether this idea would be a success or a flop and all I can do is make an educated guess with taking your opinions into the equation.

[Yossarian]

8-bit remakes sell well enough on the gameboy's, so there are definately buyers out there. Heck, the latest mario on the gameboy advance even goes back to the style of the old two tone handhelds games where the image just moves from one cell to the other...

Of course, that is geared towards a mobile market on a small screen, and may not be completely applicable to the PC crowd, but at least you know there are still people out there playing the stuff.

I actually visit Puppygames.com just to play stupid space-invaders game...

[Anthony Flack]

You love games of that era so you know what makes them tick. If you can capture the energy, addictiveness and simplicity of the best of the 8 bit games, I'd say you'd have a perfect candidate for a downloadable game.

Do it.

As an aside - for a game designer, playing loads of old 8 bit games is extremely enlightening. They are packed full of interesting game ideas that never really evolved any further. A lot of them will have aged terribly, but occasionally you'll find one that you just can't stop playing. It'll look terrible, sound terrible, be simple as anything, and yet you'll be hopelessly hooked on it. Study and learn.

[BedroomCoder]

SHAPESHIFTERS (freeware) uses old 80's nostalgia graphics + sound. I thought it would be a good look for a simple game... get Shapeshifters here if you want it:

http://www.freewebs.com/bedroomcoder/shape.htm


Oh, and heres some nostalgia for ya...

http://www2.b3ta.com/heyhey16k/

:P

[DangerCode]

If you could find someone, anyone, that didn't have all those things on an emulator for free, you might be able to sell him a copy.

Sorry.

Emulators are not hurting Nintendo's sales a bit when it comes to these old titles.

I remember when we released a high-profile Xbox title in the summer of 2003. We were the fasting selling Xbox game of that time. We were also getting killed by Nintendo software that was 10-15 years old in retail (Mario Bros. 3 and Zelda: A link to the Past). We nearly killed ourselves making this new and exciting product and look what Nintendo did! There's a lesson in that.

Also, I'm sure we can think of at least one (I can think of two) indie developer(s) making a fortune selling solitaire PC games. I often wonder how many people scoffed at that idea. ;)

Man, you don't even need an emulator to play that for free!

Mickey, I say do it. If you make a great game that brings me back to the good ol' days then I can guarentee my sale.

[Mickey Crocker]

I'd like to thank everyone for there input, I can't respond to everyone personally, but I've taken everything that you have said into thought and am looking forword to this new project of mine. :)