Quest for the Packard Bell, Chapter VII (Post No. 20)

 Quest For The Packard Bell

Chapter 7

Modern vs. Vintage Games, why the latter have been surprisingly holding more of my interest.

   I'm going to now talk about why I've been wanting to play more vintage titled games as many of the more modern titles haven't been holding so much of my interest. Like, a long session in Overwatch or Minecraft (I haven't even really touched Valorant yet, it's undetermined if I will) would more than likely be three hours to three and a half hours a week at absolute maximum. 

    Of course, some may think I'm conveniently ignoring technological progress by refusing to play many games that have more and more recent release to the public dates, instead preferring titles that are mostly accessible by the Internet through means of emulation, or requiring in some cases to be installed using software such as Virtual PC on Windows versions from XP to 7, and VirtualBox, VMWare, and DOSBOX on operating systems from Windows XP to 11, and other non-Windows operating systems that are as simple as Windows to use day-in, day-out, such as MacOS, (both PPC and Intel, I'm not even going to touch hardware that has the Apple Silicon M1 or M2 chip, even if this type of computer chip is actually superior in performance than the competing cellular Android chip or anything AMD or Intel has in terms of microprocessors), or distributions of Linux such as Ubuntu, Linux Mint, and Peppermint Linux, more commonly released after I think either version 9 or 10 as Peppermint OS, which although based on Ubuntu, is more lightweight versus Ubuntu, and likely more heavily based on Lubuntu (but other desktop environments such as my favorite desktop environment, KDE Plasma can be used as the default environment, and the Windows 3.1 skin can be used in Xubuntu.) 

    But, without further ado... Here are some reasons I heavily favor the older titles more than I do modern ones.

1. The Update Screens.

    One of the main reasons that I'm not that into more modern games is because they take a very long time to update. Like seriously, a long time. True, you might not become a skeleton and have spiders & cobwebs go on the wall due to how long the update takes, and of course many modern games do tend to have this as a feature, not a bug. 

   One potential reason that newer games always tend to have all these updates is likely due to the fact the developers had to publish them and get them out of the door as fast as they possibly can. This is much unlike the 1990s, when an updated version of the game would be later re-released as an "Ultimate" version of the same game, due to the fact that then vs. now, there wasn't an "always-On" internet connection in most people's homes. In fact, not everyone and their dog had a PC, and PCs back then for those individuals that did have them, were, big, beige, expensive, and sometimes slow, and never having enough hard disk space - plus the majority of stuff that people saved on their computers back then they likely just kept on floppy disk anyway so the hard drive wouldn't get cluttered up. 

2. Graphics < Story. 

   This might not necessarily always be the case; but the graphics of a game aren't always an indicative of the game's story quality. (If your game in question has a predefined storyline, that is.) Usually, the worse the game's graphics, the better the story was. You can disagree with me if you want, but if you're just going to say that I'm just an old man yelling at clouds:

 

    OK, now that I got that out of the way... I just have to say that the worse the graphics of a game are - the less bits it has. And the more it ends up leaving to the imagination. Probably why I'm not too fond of the current generation, since the games (the majority of, anyway - I mean, Minecraft you can build almost anything you want provided it is in your imagination to, anyway) don't really leave much to the imagination. 

    Basically, I am preferential toward 16-32 bits as the peak of gaming technology, 64 bits being the absolute cutting edge provided of course it doesn't annoying update every random time you want to just jump into the game and play. "BuT tHe GaMe IsN't sEcUrE iF i DoN't UpDaTe iT eVeRyDay." you say. No, the older titles are secure enough, since most of them don't have online capability. And some titles from the 1990s and 2000s that did have online capability, the server shut down for the final time over 20 years ago, so chances are even if you did have a title with a supposed "online capability", you would still be able to play the offline modes, even if the game has offline modes, which it actually should. I suppose that's the case. 

    Also, bits are what make the graphics look either photo-realistic or blocky. Of course, since 64 bits have been the standard since the turn of the millenium, if not the 2010s decade, most games that are released & in existence today, and probably for the foreseeable future will be 64-bit. It likely will not be upgrading further to 128-bit, 256-bit, 512-bit, 1024-bit, 2048-bit, 4096-bit, 8192-bit, 16384-bit, or Infinite-bit any time at all soon, since the technology (1.) doesn't exist, and (2.) It's probably for the best that bit technology stays at 64-bit from now on, despite the possibility that 64-bit may become dated and primitive in future decades or centuries. 

3. Sometimes, new games get released for older platforms. 

    Although it's not entirely common, new games do occasionally get made for older platforms which have long since been regarded by most of the consuming public as abandonware, and not worth putting much money or time into tracking down older examples of hardware just for playing older games, since that's simply the equivalent of not buying a newer car, and going for buying a classic instead. So, to put that into perspective --- Instead of buying a new car off the dealer lot at driving cost, that is, the list price + license + tax + title, you would be instead buying an older model for private sale. 

      So, say, instead of getting yourself a 2022 Chevrolet Bolt EUV for example, which is complete with all the bells & whistles...

     You could be getting a 1969 Camaro, which is less practical than the 2022 EV, and probably doesn't have the creature comforts, but probably have more character vs. the newer car. Oh, and if you're a smother-mothered kid of the 2020s era, you probably won't ride in one, since your stupid parents will probably prefer you steer clear of screaming metal death traps that cars from the pre mid-1990s era all were. 

    But, those things are besides my point. What I'm saying, is that sometimes, newer games do get released for older platforms, and not everyone will be going to be putting any money down on getting  a new game for an older platform that the manufacturer of said platform doesn't support or offer warranty or repairs for anymore, likely going to end up having the third-party console market being the ones that get used instead. Basically, mainstream isn't exactly what I exactly aim for in life. I mean, I guess I wasn't really encouraged when I was younger to follow the mainstream gaming trends that most of my peers at the academia institution did. 

    Of course, this had two effects on me. One, it actually didn't really encourage me to always try to get the latest AAA games, since some may think that wasting money on the latest and greatest isn't such a good idea. Probably getting on a popular bandwagon while it's still popular as opposed to --- well, let's just say I never toiled for popularity since I was never encouraged to, and I feel that nonpopularity is something that I regret every day. I mean, sure, in life, living with the attitude of "**** popular opinion" I have made probably a few genuine friends, in retrospect. Of course, this doesn't mean I didn't make any foes --- No, no. Far from it. 

    I've made plenty of foes, so many so, that there are times I feel like I want to crawl into a hole. Or, rather, disconnect myself from the majority of the outside world, and tell them all that I've left home, for maximum effect, probably self-exile myself in some rural community where the nearest anything, be it grocery-store, doctor's office, and/or other services are more than a half hour away.