On VJA several months ago, Axem Rangers wrote:
Quote:
So I was playing NiGHTS Into Dreams... earlier today and I couldn't help noticing that, despite being bitterly depressed in recent months, that I was enjoying myself quite a bit. Later, I hopped online to find some NiGHTS wallpaper, and this led me to come across the path of wallpapers for Burning Rangers, Sonic Adventure, Eternal Arcadia, Shenmue, and other older (mostly Sega) games I'm rather fond of.
While sifting through these various pictures, sites and resources, I began to feel both nostalgia and an intense longing. These were all games I loved, games I love, many of which I hadn't even thought of in a long while. But I realized that recently, in the past few years, there have been very very few games (other than Bemani) that I have actually cared about.
And it's not even just that I don't play videogames as much or as obsessively as I used to. It's that I almost don't play videogames. At all. I don't follow videogame news anymore, I don't know about new releases until they come out (sometimes long after), and I spend much more time looking around my basement, filled with hundreds of games wishing I had something to play rather than playing anything. Nothing new excites me anymore. Nothing new even warrants my attention. Barely my acknowledgement.
People will often accredit such feelings to "growing up;" that in my maturity I don't care for videogames anymore. But that, I think, is bullshit. I can't really explain why I can say that with such conviction, but I can. I am still excited by videogames- it's not just that I want to be. But the only games that really excite me I've played- beaten- hundreds of times. It feels as though the games I own now will be the only I will ever play for the rest of my days as a gamer.
But the new games don't excite me anymore. Nor the systems. Nor the fantastic new technology that is desperately trying to keep the industry alive. And it's depressing.
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Also, I had better quickly clarify something before it gets brought up against me. One reason people often think I don't like newer games is because I grew up with older games, so I like them for their fond memories and nostalgia. This would make sense, except that
the majority of the "retro" games I love now I never played when I was younger. When I was a child, the only system I had was a Game Boy until the N64 came out (I got it probably a year or so after it came out). The only PC games I ever played when I was little were Commander Keen 4, Doom, and Gobliins 2.
Sure, I played Genesis or NES at a friend's once a month or so. But I was formerly introduced to Master System, Genesis, NES, and SNES games through emulation. I got my Sega Saturn (<3) probably a year and a half ago. Very very few classic/vintage videogames, for me, can be written off as "nostalgia."
I wish it were that simple.