The format of these posts is simple: let’s discuss a specific game or series!
Based on a recommendation I received, we’ll change things up by actually not discussing a game or series like in earlier posts…
Let’s discuss the 8-bit era of gaming. What is your favorite game of this generation? What aspects do you like about it? What doesn’t work for you? Feel free to share any thoughts that come up, or react to other peoples comments. Let’s get the conversation going!
If you have any recommendations for games or series for the next post(s), please feel free to DM me or add it in a comment here (no guarantees of course).
Previous entries: Animal Crossing, Age of Empires, Super Mario, Deus Ex, Stardew Valley, The Sims, Half-Life, Earthbound / Mother, Mass Effect, Metroid, Journey, Resident Evil, Polybius, Tetris, Telltale Games, Kirby, LEGO Games, DOOM, Ori, Metal Gear, Slay the Spire
I’ve been watching Jeff Gerstmann work through and rank the NES library over the past year, and I agree with your sentiment. It seems like there are only like 10-20 NES games that actually hold up, and the rest of the library is either “good for the era” or absolute garbage.
I’d argue that is true of any generation, a few games are must plays and endure as such, then there are many that are just okay even at the time and then a bunch of crap it’s hardly worth playing.
The “floor” for how bad a bad game can be has gone up as the generations have gone on. There’s always a few stinkers, but most PS2 games are objectively better than like half of the NES library.
Better by which objective metric? Amount of content? Total size of game code and data? Got to disagree with you otherwise.
I think the difference is that in the 8bit generation yhe majority of the game were bad relative to each other. The peak of the bell curve for 8bit was between mediocre to kinda bad games.
While there are more games in later generations, it feels like the console manufacturers took more control and regulated what was published. Bad games happen now because of shitty business decisions and bad story writing. You dont see garbage being published just because you can.
