So... How do I start playing old games?

I was listening to the podcast, and they started talking about the old FF's, and I haven't played them in forever, if it at all.
I'm 20, I held on to my SNES for a long time with shitty movie games, Animanics, and the SMB All Stars Cart. My genesis has Wheel of Fortune and Boogerman. N64 has Mario Party, and.... That's it. I really didn't start "hardcore" til the GameCube era, even then, I was late to the ball, got my PS2 late to the cycle.

Just... All of that has a lot of EMPTYNESS. No SNES JRPGS, Gensis Sonics, I'm playing OOT on the 3DS, but never touched it on the N64.

A) How much does it matter that I don't play these classic games on the original system? (I'm also playing though Triger on the DS)
B) Does anyone have any awesome stories of going back to an old game years later that they never hit up and loved?

Try using your hands

@Confirm4Crit: If you have a PS3, a lot of those older JRPGs are on the PSN store, which is really awesome.

While it's obviously not true for all old games, I've found that it's more often the case that older stuff doesn't age well when I go back to it years later. Games have gotten so much more polished over the years that a lot of older stuff feels clunky and awkward to play.

I tend to play old games on emulators, I suppose its technically piracy but the games are so old and difficult to get that I think its justified

@Confirm4Crit: If you have a Wii, some are on the Virtual Console. If you have a PS3, some are on PSN. Since you have a 3DS, plenty were re-released for the DS. A few are on iOS and Steam. It depends on which franchise you are going for.

I don't think it really matters what system you're playing them on.

I don't worry much about original systems.

A decent computer + an emulator is probably the best way. You can play most disk-based games (PSX, PS2, Dreamcast). There are still a lot of games that won't work, but the majority do. For cartridge games you have to go with roms, which is a touchy subject legally, but not difficult. MAME is great for arcade, but has the same roms issues. I can use all of these emulators by using a wired 360 controller and mapping the buttons for each emulator.

Check out GOG.com for a ton of great older PC games that work on new systems. SCUMMVM will play all the old Lucas games and more. Get DOSBOX for all of your DOS needs. There are also good emulators for Apple][, Commodore 64, Spectrum, Amiga and all that. I also run Windows.3.11 on DOSBOX for a few 90s games that won't run on DOS or modern windows.

You start with Chrono Trigger.

Most of what you want is legally available on the Wii VC/PSN. Anything that isn't... well, it's not hard to find that stuff either.

Emulate everything always. Played some Genesis games and a little Atari 2600 and as long as you can appreciate older games it can be "fun". (2600 Adventure is fucking crazy)

SNES9X (SNES)

Fusion (Genesis, Sega CD etc.)

Stella (Atari 2600)

Dolphin (Gamecube and Wii)

PCSX2 (PS2)

Project64 (N64)

Most if not all of these let you play online co-op games with your friends. So grab a buddy and fucking tear through some old ass games duder. If you need a Streets of Rage co-op partner I will always be down.

Emulators for everything up to an including the PSX era are pretty easy to find with google. I played a ton of them just remapping the keys to my keyboard back in the day, I played chrono trigger that way as well as several other JRPG's I'm blanking on the names of now, or you can even plug in a 360 controller and map it to that. If you have the money to spend and don't mind a limited selection, most of the online stores have some of the bigger name stuff on them. PSN has a crap ton of great PSX JRPG's. So I would start looking there, but I can't speak for Nintendo's side of things as I have never gone on their store to look around. It's my understanding, from word of mouth, that the Nintendo one has a ton of older games but that they tend to charge a lot more for them then what they really should be.

Or you can just go to gog.com and dig into the massive back log of PC games that require nothing to run but downloading them. PC has the largest backlog of games if you don't mind dated graphics and gameplay.

You just kind of have to decide yourself. I suppose you could pick up those JRPG's and Sonic games. Those early Sonic games altogether shouldn't cost more than $30 (That is if you want them complete in box, the loose carts should be no more than $20.) Buying FFIV and FFVI should only cost a little over $60, which is more or less what you would be paying for a regular retail game. As much as people gripe about how expensive older games can be, most of the time they cost less than the big $60 release of the week.

@Kerned: While its true there are quite a few games that dont hold up well there are a few that do some interesting things that are well worth experiencing

@Confirm4Crit: While I dont think playing on the original system is necessary some of the charm does seem to get lost playing with an X360 controller on a computer. While the older FF games and the like are certainly great I think your time would be better spent looking for older games that do something unique. For example, while I liked playing through FF4 recently one of my favorite experiences with my old SNES was playing Super Mario RPG which I had somehow passed over all those years ago. Its just so much different than anything I had played in the past few years and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. So yea, there are a ton of great and weird things on those old systems; look for em

@kalibr said:

@Kerned: While its true there are quite a few games that dont hold up well there are a few that do some interesting things that are well worth experiencing

I agree completely. That's why I was careful to point out that my statement was "obviously not true for all old games." :)

The discussion on how to run/play the games on modern systems is an easy one to solve but can include methods not allowed to be discussed on Giant Bomb's forums.

How to choose the games that you play is more subjective and interesting. I've been in the same predicament as you and I still haven't covered all of my flaws yet. Keep in mind that most of the lists you find are completely blinded by nostalgia. You need to look at why a game is good and not just what people thought about it at the time.

One strategy you may find helpful is jumping from genre to genre (or franchise to franchise), finding gameplay that you like. I found out I liked games that mix exploration and combat so games like Metroid Fusion and Cave Story are great for me.

The trifecta of SNES RPGs is Chrono Trigger, FF 6, and Earthbound. Of those, I've played Earthbound and Chrono Trigger. CT seems alright but Earthbound really grabbed me with its unique style. The cart is very expensive though. I don't think it's worth the ~$150 asking price, but that's just me.

Sonic love, as you may know from the bombcast, is 99% nostalgia. Sonic was never great and most people just didn't realize it at the time. You can play Sonic the Hedgehog 2 or Sonic 3. (Sonic 1 is especially bad, Sonic CD is ... different and I didn't like it either. Note that S1 and SCD were made by JAPAN SEGA and S2 and S3 were made by AMERICAN SEGA so they are different.)

Super Mario World is either the best or second-best 2D Mario game, depending on who you ask. Either way, it is a must-play for anyone who loves video games. You can play Super Mario 64, but it's not mandatory like World is.

Zelda Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time are great, but OoT's graphix are better on the 3DS. It's absolutely a better game for that reason and a few other technical issues that the original had. Again, nostalgia and not knowing any better means we overlooked some flaws while these experiences were fresh.

Beware of games that were difficult simply because that's how games were designed back then. Old Castlevanias and Zeldas may have been fun back then but are probably better served by their more recent counterparts (Symphony of the Night and Link to the Past).

Donkey Kong Country sucks. Its graphics suck and its gameplay isn't great either. In fact, everything Rare has ever made for a Nintendo platform has been superseded in gameplay by something else. Yes, even Goldeneye (say hello to TimeSplitters 2 for a re-imagining of that style of game that's slightly more modern).

I found Metal Gear Solid 1 (PS1) to be worthwhile even when I played it for the first time back in 2007. However apparently newer games like Mark of the Ninja and Dishonored handle stealth "better." If you want to get "into" the MGS series, you won't ever want to go back to MGS1 after playing the sequels, so you should start here if anywhere.

Crash Bandicoot and Spyro come from prestigious developers, but I played them when I was very young. People talk about Nintendo games being classics far more than Sony games...

Mostly it's trying stuff for yourself. Jeff's been going on an Amiga vision quest and not having much luck. Problem is that fond Amiga memories are caked in nostalgia just like everything else.

If you want to play the old classics, then play em. If you want to play an old Final Fantasy's, there is at least 3 devices you can play them on. Chrono Trigger on the DS (Just got it myself but played the hell out of the SNES and PS1 Version) and it's exactly the same, the core game experience is still there, you just get as much touch screen support as your willing to use.

Whatever device, console, handheld whatever you want to play a classic game on; Just do it. If you want to play Mario Bro's on the NES, do it. If you have the 3DS version of OOT just got with that, your just changing the controller and the graphics.

As for going back in time and playing games I missed? I missed the entire N64 catalog! I STILL HAVEN'T PLAYED MARIO 64 IN ANY CAPACITY! And I've been playing games for more than 20 years. So every time I find an interesting N64 game it's a blast.

Awesome game story: Perfect Dark! Buddy of mine found his N64 while cleaning out his basement and told me what it was like, however mentioning Golden Eye didn't help because .. I also hadn't played it! But sadly we couldn't play it because the power cord was trashed. So I went out and picked up an N64 for $15. I hit up ebay (the only place I could find Perfect Dark) and got a copy for $20. Going totally on his stories I slapped the cartridge in, picked up the weird N64 controller and... was told I needed an expansion pack... So I bought the expansion pack of eBay, I waited three weeks. Not having the tool to remove the old black pack I had to use a fork to take it out! I jammed in the new red pack, picked up the controller and started my decent into Perfect Dark. I fell into that game hard. Blew through the campaign and started my multi-player training. Every day after school/work I jumped in. Learned the maps, learned the guns. For weeks. After my training was done. After the Dark Sim had been destroyed. I got all my friends together and had some 4 player death match. They were all psyched to play some perfect dark, not knowing that I had been training. I butchered them. It felt... great... and then we played some other games and all was well. I should also say I got an N64 like 3 weeks before the PS3 launched. So I came in way late.

Play games and have fun. If your willing to pay a lot for some of the older classic games, then dig in. Otherwise play em on a modern system via port, remake or in console emulation stuff like PSN classics and Wii ware. Just have fun man. If video games move you like they do the bomb crew and a bunch of us (if not all) on the forums then just do it man. Just do it.

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

@paulwade1984 said:

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

I played SimCity on the SNES this past Sunday for 14 hours straight. I will do the same again this Sunday.

You can find some of the old FF games on the DS. Hell, even the iPhone. I just got Final Fantasy on my phone after listening to the Bombcast.

Not the ideal way to play, but it gets the job done.

Maybe consider Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection? That'd at least give you a taste of what the Genesis has to offer. Though I find the system's biggest strength to be in the endless amount of hidden gems in its library; that disc is full of notable classics.

For the SNES RPG's, I'd check out the Wii's virtual console. Get yourself a Classic Controller Pro and go wild!

If you wanna go further down the rabbit hole, playing on the original hardware is even more fun. You also might wanna read up some articles on Racketboy, or Hardcore Gaming 101. Playing older stuff isn't only fun, and [usually] cheap, but it helps shape your perspective on the industry as a whole. Just some food for thought.

@Doomed said:

The trifecta of SNES RPGs is Chrono Trigger, FF 6, and Earthbound.

Sonic love, as you may know from the bombcast, is 99% nostalgia. Sonic was never great and most people just didn't realize it at the time.
Donkey Kong Country sucks. Its graphics suck and its gameplay isn't great either.

1. There's tons of great RPG's on the SNES, and there really is no "trifecta". To state that, you're forgetting classics like Secret of Mana, Illusion of Gaia, Lufia II, or Super Mario RPG.

2. Old school Sonic is awesome. I have no idea what you're talking about.

3. Same goes for the DKC trilogy. Especially parts 1 + 2.

@paulwade1984 said:

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

BS. I play my older consoles even more than my curent gen stuff.

@Confirm4Crit said:

A) How much does it matter that I don't play these classic games on the original system? (I'm also playing though Triger on the DS) B) Does anyone have any awesome stories of going back to an old game years later that they never hit up and loved?

A) That really depends on the game. In many cases though I'd say it doesn't matter. (at least not any more than it matters that you played it when it was new, which is of course impossible because time travel does not exist) Things like control scheme and visual emulation are much more important. These 2 things of course can be affected by playing on a different system, but often not in a bad way. (edit: The FF titles suffers on PSN due to added loaded times. Chrono Trigger has this too. So this is one example where platform does matter.)

It's not a big deal, you can get most classics these days somewhere on digital releases. Most classic PC games, for instance are on GOG.com, Nintendo has a ton of their stuff on the WII shop (genesis and others are on there too) and playstation store has a lot of the classic PSone stuff if that's what you are looking for. 
 
If there's something you want to check out, just look for it. It's probably released somewhere unless it's evaded everybody's consciousness or is in some kind of weird business limbo- or maybe more obscure.

If you like publishers who are winning to make accessing their old content easy and litigation risk free, support them by purchasing them through legal avenues. The Wii Virtual Console interface is clunky and poorly surfaces the goods, but is functional. Steam has a great selection of Sega games, which are also available on a ton of disc compilations for most modern systems. PSN has a wealth of PSX role-playing games, including the Final Fantasies and the Personas that people rave about so much. Personally, I'd consider what genres I like today and go back to find some of their roots. I'd also just grab random shit and see what works for me. You're not wrong in liking things, so try it all out and see what fits.

Oh, and you could save yourself a lot of work by grabbing a Gameboy Advance, the best platform ever.

@jeffrud said:

Oh, and you could save yourself a lot of work by grabbing a Gameboy Advance

^ This is very true.

I was listening to the podcast, and they started talking about the old FF's, and I haven't played them in forever, if it at all.
I'm 20, I held on to my SNES for a long time with shitty movie games, Animanics, and the SMB All Stars Cart. My genesis has Wheel of Fortune and Boogerman. N64 has Mario Party, and.... That's it. I really didn't start "hardcore" til the GameCube era, even then, I was late to the ball, got my PS2 late to the cycle.

Just... All of that has a lot of EMPTYNESS. No SNES JRPGS, Gensis Sonics, I'm playing OOT on the 3DS, but never touched it on the N64.

A) How much does it matter that I don't play these classic games on the original system? (I'm also playing though Triger on the DS)
B) Does anyone have any awesome stories of going back to an old game years later that they never hit up and loved?

@paulwade1984: It's sad that you carry that mentality.

Get some alcohol. Lots of alcohol.

@Dagbiker said:

A. Hnoestly it doesnt matter that you never played these old school games. People are fond of old games because they bring back emotions burned into their mind. I spent days on end playing Super Mario 3 and to this day think it is the best mario ever. But go back and play it now and it kinda sucks. You will never have the same fondnes they have for Final Fantasy 3. But im sure you have that same fodness for other games.

@paulwade1984 said:

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

How can you two even say that? You're telling me that every old game doesn't hold up? Do you apply that logic to paintings, movies, and books too? At what point does a game become old and stop "holding up"? Believe it or not, Ocarina of Time is pretty fucking good. Confession: I played it several years ago and never got very far at all -- don't even think I finished the Deku Tree (first dungeon). Finished it for the first time last year and it absolutely holds up.

@dekkadekkadekka said:

I played SimCity on the SNES this past Sunday for 14 hours straight. I will do the same again this Sunday.

Why? I'm not familiar with the SC series, though I know the SNES version has some Nintendo-exclusive goodies. However, wouldn't it be better to play a PC version of SimCity 2000?

@nintendork666 said:

If you wanna go further down the rabbit hole, playing on the original hardware is even more fun.

@Doomed said:

The trifecta of SNES RPGs is Chrono Trigger, FF 6, and Earthbound.

1. There's tons of great RPG's on the SNES, and there really is no "trifecta". To state that, you're forgetting classics like Secret of Mana, Illusion of Gaia, Lufia II, or Super Mario RPG.

I know that there are plenty of people who think this way about original consoles, but I completely disagree. If I can emulate on the Wii and not have to fuss with finicky cartridges or worry about my save data dying, I'll do it. Bonus points if the controller is good and the original controller was not as good (Atari 2600, NES controllers are a little archaic, no?).

I mentioned FF6 despite me never playing it. "Those three games comprise the SNES JRPG trifecta!" That's what I heard all across the Internet when I asked what old games were good. Of course there are other games on the SNES.

Just play stuff where you can, man. If you have the funds to go absolutely bananas and buy boxed versions of all of this stuff, then DO IT. I still want to buy boxed copies of some old ass cRPG's, but that'll have to wait a few years at best. Make sure you hit some of the high notes for systems at the very least.

@paulwade1984 said:

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

This is some hot bullshit.

If you actually enjoy games for the game part, and not other aesthetic reasons or some kind of weird zeitgeist, then the best games will always hold up as long as you have some sort of tolerance. I wasn't alive in the 80's, but a ton of those mid-late 80's RPG's for the PC and it's many variants are incredibly enjoyable and hold up better than many modern games. I want to go back and play Betrayal at Krondor despite that game having some pretty hilarious geometry and character portraits (Locklear? Hi-larious), but it's so highly regarded as a great story and game that it's worth it to me to experience that for the first time after 20 years.

@Doomed: Because my best memories of SimCity are with the SNES version. I also appreciate the simplicity (oh christ that could be taken as a double pun, sorry) of it compared to 2k and beyond. I didn't actually have my own PC until around the time 3k came out so I didn't play much of 2k, but I do own 2k on the SNES also. I really enjoy playing 4 a lot too, and Societies. But I will keep going back to the SNES version because it is a solid game, regardless of platform.

@Confirm4Crit said:

A) How much does it matter that I don't play these classic games on the original system? (I'm also playing though Triger on the DS)

It doesn't matter. If you prefer handhelds, you can use them. I like larger screens. If you have a console and the money, there are many classics you can download. There are still many not available through such avenues, though. There have already been many suggestions for emulation in this thread, so I won't waste your time there. I'm a big fan of it, and I feel that it's the best way to preserve the video games of the past.

B) Does anyone have any awesome stories of going back to an old game years later that they never hit up and loved?

I don't really have any awesome stories, but there are many games that I didn't get to experience during my childhood that I hit up more recently and enjoyed. I just finished up the original Metroid on the NES. Great game, though I think I still prefer Super Metroid. I started playing the original Resident Evil on the PSX, and I'm really enjoying it. Of course, there's Seiken Densetsu 3 for the SNES. It was never released in the US, so it's only practically available through emulation and fan translation. It's easily one of the best RPGs on the SNES.

Try searching the web for top lists of games for different systems. That will give you a good knowledge of most of the memorable classics that you may have missed. Some games don't hold up as well, some games do. Part of that depends on your personal tastes and how much you're willing to allow for the context and history behind the games.

@Confirm4Crit: It depends what kind of games your into, if you happen to enjoy 2D Platformers a lot of the SNES stuff still holds up and is really cool.

@Confirm4Crit

Just pick up these hot new devices...

And you'll be good to go!

Boogerman... god help you son.

Its tough to go back if you don't have the nostalgia. you might say you want to go back to say an old FF. until you get random battles every 10 seconds. Its adifferent era of games, particularly those JRPGs for the SNES. They are good in their own right but when you but up against 100 hours of FF 3 random battles or something vs. playing a new current gen game, it gets tough. If you have the time though go for it.

@RenMcKormack said:

Boogerman... god help you son.

Its tough to go back if you don't have the nostalgia. you might say you want to go back to say an old FF. until you get random battles every 10 seconds. Its adifferent era of games, particularly those JRPGs for the SNES. They are good in their own right but when you but up against 100 hours of FF 3 random battles or something vs. playing a new current gen game, it gets tough. If you have the time though go for it.

About seven years ago, I beat FFI on my GBA. It was a glorious victory, indeed.

You may not like what you find. Most of what make these games "great" is that they were great back then. Plus there's the nostalgia factor. If you never played them you won't get the same amount of satisfaction as others.

I emulate a lot of my older games. I have ran through games like Mega Man 3 so much. The NES catalog is some of my favorite games of all time. There are some great websites that allow you to emulate with Java which is cool tech mixed with great games, though I am pretty certain posting such places is against the rules.

@paulwade1984 said:

Nostalgia does crazy things to people. Nothing holds up. Anything you play will be a curiosity vision quest Lasting an hour at most

Nope. Quite a few games have held up to my nostalgia, and I thoroughly enjoyed playing them to completion, sometimes repeatedly.

The original system doesn't matter, but a CRT television and a handful of gummy cola bottles is a good start.

I think you need to ensure you are comfortable with the controls and the screen you are using (I say this with the mind that you may choose to use an emulator), other than that go for it. Old games are for life not just for christmas, Super Mario Bros 3 has and will always be amazing. Once a year for a few weeks i'll play some of my SNES games and not just for nostalgia but for the simple fact they are great and challenging games.

I've been eyeballing the SEGA Genesis packs on Steam. Just cleared though Boggerman and Adventures of Batman and Robin (http://www.giantbomb.com/the-adventures-of-batman-and-robin/61-12434/), and that was a trip.

I think what I'm trying to do is just see what was cool "then", just for research and experience sake. If someone asks me in 10-15 years what influenced me, I'm gonna say Bioshock, Tales of Symphonia, RE4, etc.

I just wanna see what I missed, I guess. I don't even have a real reason why. I just wanna, so yay.

What I'm burning though now, however, is:

Chrono Trigger and OOT (3DS)

FreeSpace 2 (GoG)

Syndicate (GoG)

Toejam and Earl (Steam port)

How do you start playing old games?

Usually by blowing into the cartridge.

@Triumvir: Touche

@paulwade1984: I don't think that's really true dude. I play monkey ball on the n64 and mario kart on the snes with my friends a lot. And I just finished Majora's mask the other day, really enjoyed. THere's still a lot of good stuff on the older machines that they don't really do now. Also Mario Kart runs way faster when you do 4 player split screen for some reason so it's fucking great craic :) I suppose it's all a matter of what you enjoy about the games.