The more I go back to last gen, the worse it seems (PS3 and 360)

[chase210]

Maybe we've been spoiled by so many remasters of last generation games, but going back to the last generation consoles and the games that didn't get remasters is not an experience to help your nostalgia. A lot of these games seem to run very poorly, at least on consoles. I don't recall them running so badly when I played them back in the day, so to speak, but coming to them now, they're full of poor frame rates, screen tearing, the HD graphics I used to find so impressive are now jaggy and look awful. It's very disappointing. What do you guys think? Does the PS3 and 360 generation hold up now we're nearly 6 years since the PS4/XBO came out?

[Alex79]

I think it holds up just fine to be honest. I can't really say I have any sense of nostalgia for the PS3 or 360 though, they're far too recent. Although I suppose it's all relative and depends on your age - and that's not supposed to sound patronising in any way.

[chase210]

I think it holds up just fine to be honest. I can't really say I have any sense of nostalgia for the PS3 or 360 though, they're far too recent. Although I suppose it's all relative and depends on your age - and that's not supposed to sound patronising in any way.

Maybe affection is a better word for nostalgia for what I mean.

[Stanshall]

Interesting thread because I've been thinking about starting one pondering the exact opposite.

Considering the amount of time and thought and, ultimately, expense that I put towards 4K HDR gaming, it means absolutely nothing to me and the effect is largely normalised to being virtually non-existent. I play Spiderman or God of War or HZD or RDR2 and I'm struck predominantly by the absolute pointlessness of prioritising graphics to that extent. It's added nothing at all to gaming for me, besides the constant distraction of asking myself if I'm impressed, and once the initial novelty faded, the answer is no. The closer games get to photorealism, the less atmosphere they have, funnily enough. It's almost like through the process of filling in some details with your imagination in older games, you become more emotionally immersed. I'd say that the level of detail in this 4K era is often ostentatious to the point of excluding your imagination and emotional investment. Big call perhaps but five minutes with OutRun 2 this week gave me more joy and longing and warmth than almost any game I've played this gen.

I said a bit the other day about building that amp and modding various elements obsessively and rolling different military grade tubes to alter the sound and adding a separate circuit to change the presentation and so on and so on. You reach a point where you're experiencing the gear rather than listening to the music. That's what 4K gaming is to me. It's an exercise in technical and technological appreciation separate from the emotional connection to the games, and more often than not it's contrary to this emotional connection. Euphony is really the most important thing for me with headphones and stuff, it's just the intangible variable that makes the music sound engaging. It's not about precision or detail or soundstage or presence, it's what takes you beyond that to a more direct and instinctive connection with the music. Whatever the euphony equivalent is for gaming, I feel like the last gen had it. I'm going off topic but hopefully you appreciate my point.

Going back to 360 games recently, I've been struck by how much charm they have and how different the games actually feel. I feel the same about the PS3. There's such originality, personality and a sense of craft to the likes of Demon's Souls, Oblivion, RDR1, Bioshock, Uncharted 2, TLOU, Dark Souls, Drive Club, Portal, Far Cry 3, MGS4, Burnout Paradise, Mass Effect 2, Journey, Deus Ex:HR, Battlefield 4, and Skyrim. I still feel drawn into these worlds, artificial and clumsy as they may appear at times. This is no doubt part of their charm. The current gen has had some fantastic games but the vast majority are on the Switch, and even that library is bulked substantially by last-gen Nintendo titles. The PS4 may as well have not existed for me besides Bloodborne, No Man's Sky and MGSV. On the One X only FH4, Titanfall 2, Sekiro and (curiously imbued with personality) AC: Odyssey have felt worth my time or money. And there's been so so much polished mulch. Where the games haven't been remasters, they've often been little more than shinier reskinned sequels.

All very much IMHO and all that but this era would have been a massive disappointment were it not for the Switch. It's arguably pretty telling that of the top twenty games I've played this year, probably only a few, Sekiro, Cuphead and Rolling Gunner, were released this gen. The others are on the 360.

[Combine Hunter]

Honestly, the moment proper HD became an expectation, games kind of stopped aging visually for me. 4K clearly looks the best at the moment, but it hasn't made 1080p or even 720p look worse in the same way those two did to SD. I care more about consistent frame rate than high frame rate. 30 frames per second can have an aesthetic appeal, as long as it is maintained and not jumping all over the place. 60 frames is fantastic for fighting games or anything that requires quick reaction speed, but everything looks a little less cinematic.

[chase210]

The visual difference between last gen and this gen is quite remarkable though. Feels like night and day.

I didn’t include Wii games in my thoughts because they don’t feel like they’ve aged badly at all. Like the best first party Nintendo games, they’ve aged like fine wine. Mario Galaxy is an outstanding gaming achievement still.

[ratsoalbion]

I don't think it's clear cut as being about pixel and polygon counts, one machine or another.
Art direction plays a huge part for one thing. I agree that Super Mario Galaxy (one of my all time favourite videogames) still looks wonderful, but having seen it running at much higher resolutions than 480p, there's no denying it can look even better still.

Also, while the Wii version of Resi 4 may remain my favourite due to the controls - and while it is a slight visual upgrade on the GC version (16:9 and no borders), there's no doubt to me that the 720p (I think) version on 360 is a little easier on my eyes thanks to higher definition textures and pixel density.

However, I do find going back to some 360 and PS3 titles after several years of PS4/Pro and Xbox One/X titles is sometimes initially a little surprising, in terms of games looking less smooth than my brain remembers.

Overall, personally speaking, I do detect a sizeable and welcome visual upgrade between this gen and the last, especially when playing on a Pro or X at 4K resolutions. It might not be the most important thing, but I do continue to appreciate the extra fidelity, as well as poly counts, rendering techniques, post-processing effects, fabric/hair tech and HDR, especially in games which are striving for photorealism.

As you know, I regularly play games from all eras, and I love to jump around from something ancient and 8-bit to something cutting edge, appreciating what was achieved (or not) in each on a case by case basis.

One of the things we've always tried to do with the podcast is move away from the delineation and categorisation of games by fairly arbitrary divisions, which I personally think are ultimately less meaningful.

What I will say is that for those who are truly happy with being on the previous gen, you will always save a huge amount of money. Games for PS3 and 360 are now stupidly cheap.

[KSubzero1000]

It all depends on what you play and what you prioritize in games. For me, technology should serve creative expression (be it in terms of gameplay or narrative). For a lot of players and developers, it's the other way around.

I take your point about performance issues. Playing Halo CE again a few months ago was a rough experience at first after having become used to modern console FPSs like DOOM or Overwatch running at a buttery smooth 60fps. But one hour into the game I was in the zone again, because the aspects that I love about it, like the evocative level aesthetics, sumptuous soundtrack, brilliant enemy AI / encounter design, are and will always remain as great as they were when the game first came out.

But it goes the other way too. When I first played Horizon I was amazed at its graphics and animations. But that initial impression soon faded away because I found very little to be engrossed by when digging any deeper. Spending decades of man-hours on re-creating Colorado as faithfully as possible only leaves you with a realistic-looking Colorado in the end. Nothing more, nothing less. I understand this side of gaming has numerous fans, but I've personally almost completely given up on this kind of design philosophy. To spend such a huge amount of resources on stuff that is so... fleeting and inconsequential seems like such a waste to me.

The same holds true for movies, for example. When directors only have limited technical resources at their disposal, they are forced to get creative and it usually has a positive effect on their work. When they have all the money in the world, they just zoom in on everything and subtlety immediately flies out the window. Just compare what Spielberg was able to achieve with a few rubber dinosaur heads and minimal CGI in 1993 with the special effects extravaganza that Indiana Jones 4 was supposed to be 15 years later. More and better tech doesn't equal higher quality. Chopin, Orwell and Kurosawa haven't become crucial parts of our mutual cultural heritage because they had the latest violins, typewriters and cameras at their disposal, respectively.

A higher resolution is nice in theory, but an inspired and creative art style will always win me over. A higher framerate is usually a better thing, but a surprisingly high number of my all-time favorites run at a native 30fps and are still perfectly playable. I'll take weird cameras, mushy textures and occasional frame rate drops in the service of a higher purpose over the latest motherboard-frying vapid tech demo any day.

I've been using the same 32-inch HDTV for the past ten years without any issue. One of my friends keeps trying to give me his "old" 40- or 43-inch TV and my answer is always the same. "Why would I change it? It would only take up more space without making the actual games any better. I appreciate the offer, but you'd be better off just selling it." He doesn't seem to understand my reasoning so we go back and forth. Like a dog chasing his tail.

I dunno, maybe I'm just weird. None of the stuff that investors, advertisers and PC purists obsessively focus on really matter to me. All I care about are the games themselves. Stick the cartridge into the GBA, turn it on, dive in. Simple as that.

[chase210]

It all depends on what you play and what you prioritize in games. For me, technology should serve creative expression (be it in terms of gameplay or narrative). For a lot of players and developers, it's the other way around.

I take your point about performance issues. Playing Halo CE again a few months ago was a rough experience at first after having become used to modern console FPSs like DOOM or Overwatch running at a buttery smooth 60fps. But one hour into the game I was in the zone again, because the aspects that I love about it, like the evocative level aesthetics, sumptuous soundtrack, brilliant enemy AI / encounter design, are and will always remain as great as they were when the game first came out.

But it goes the other way too. When I first played Horizon I was amazed at its graphics and animations. But that initial impression soon faded away because I found very little to be engrossed by when digging any deeper. Spending decades of man-hours on re-creating Colorado as faithfully as possible only leaves you with a realistic-looking Colorado in the end. Nothing more, nothing less. I understand this side of gaming has numerous fans, but I've personally almost completely given up on this kind of design philosophy. To spend such a huge amount of resources on stuff that is so... fleeting and inconsequential seems like such a waste to me.

The same holds true for movies, for example. When directors only have limited technical resources at their disposal, they are forced to get creative and it usually has a positive effect on their work. When they have all the money in the world, they just zoom in on everything and subtlety immediately flies out the window. Just compare what Spielberg was able to achieve with a few rubber dinosaur heads and minimal CGI in 1993 with the special effects extravaganza that Indiana Jones 4 was supposed to be 15 years later. More and better tech doesn't equal higher quality. Chopin, Orwell and Kurosawa haven't become crucial parts of our mutual cultural heritage because they had the latest violins, typewriters and cameras at their disposal, respectively.

A higher resolution is nice in theory, but an inspired and creative art style will always win me over. A higher framerate is usually a better thing, but a surprisingly high number of my all-time favorites run at a native 30fps and are still perfectly playable. I'll take weird cameras, mushy textures and occasional frame rate drops in the service of a higher purpose over the latest motherboard-frying vapid tech demo any day.

I've been using the same 32-inch HDTV for the past ten years without any issue. One of my friends keeps trying to give me his "old" 40- or 43-inch TV and my answer is always the same. "Why would I change it? It would only take up more space without making the actual games any better. I appreciate the offer, but you'd be better off just selling it." He doesn't seem to understand my reasoning so we go back and forth. Like a dog chasing his tail.

I dunno, maybe I'm just weird. None of the stuff that investors, advertisers and PC purists obsessively focus on really matter to me. All I care about are the games themselves. Stick the cartridge into the GBA, turn it on, dive in. Simple as that.

I can't argue with this, or what anyone else is saying along these lines. I'm replaying Ratchet & Clank a crack in time and although its definitely not as good looking or silky smooth as I remember, its an absolute blast to play, and the performance issues have largely faded into the background. The only game so far in my visit to last gen that performance issues are hurting the gameplay is Max Payne 3.

You guys are all right (and giving me perspectives on it I hadn't considered), I just find it really interesting. In my head, these games were all incredible looking 60 FPS games in their day. Maybe thats the remasters talking. But like I say, I wouldn't want it to come across as though I just hate an entire generation of games, cos I don't. Even Sonic 06 is still a lot of fun for me to play!

[Simonsloth]

Just compare what Spielberg was able to achieve with a few rubber dinosaur heads and minimal CGI in 1993 with the special effects extravaganza that Indiana Jones 4 was supposed to be...

I get all your points but Jurassic Park had a huge budget, cutting edge technology and it was his love of practical effects that made me choose to add those. It’s all the better for it but not because of budgetary constraints.

If a product was judged on its sparkle alone then it will surely fade with time but sound core mechanics or a unique aesthetic will be timeless.

I do think that the current games which aim for photo realism are so close that when we do look back on these they will fair much better.

[Alex79]

I think games are just getting better and better. Every generation is a leap to more immersive, better storytold experiences, and I love that devs are pushing themselves every year and producing works of brilliance that surpass last years offerings in terms of scale and ambition. I just love games, and every generation has at least a few I could argue for the top spot in my all timer list.

[Simonsloth]

I think games are just getting better and better. Every generation is a leap to more immersive, better storytold experiences, and I love that devs are pushing themselves every year and producing works of brilliance that surpass last years offerings in terms of scale and ambition. I just love games, and every generation has at least a few I could argue for the top spot in my all timer list.

In some respects I agree but you only have to look at the desert island console thread you made to see the modern consoles very underrepresented. We are a bit of microcosm though so hardly indicative of the entire community.

I don’t think games are getting incrementally better I think that there is more variety so an individual’s tastes are more likely to be satisfied. There’s multiple factors but I think the main reason is that the barrier for entry into games development has been lowered. More creative vision, more variety and greater chance you will fall in love with something.

[KSubzero1000]

Just compare what Spielberg was able to achieve with a few rubber dinosaur heads and minimal CGI in 1993 with the special effects extravaganza that Indiana Jones 4 was supposed to be...

I get all your points but Jurassic Park had a huge budget, cutting edge technology and it was his love of practical effects that made me choose to add those. It’s all the better for it but not because of budgetary constraints.

True, but what I mean is that there is a tendency among directors to become creatively complacent over time. Spielberg was forced to become better at his craft due to the budgetary restrictions and technical difficulties of Jaws, and I think it's that same creative touch that elevates JP. A creative touch which I think he has lost over time.

Plenty of other example, like Alex Proyas, the Wachowskis, or even Peter Jackson which would indicate that higher production values aren't always the solution. And I think there is a very clear parallel to be made between Hollywood and modern AAA gaming in that regard.

[KSubzero1000]

Btw Simon, I just looked it up and Jurassic Park had a production budget of $63 million, whereas Indiana Jones 4's was $185 million. Even adjusted for inflation that's a huge difference and I believe it had a direct impact on each film's directorial style.

[Simonsloth]

Btw Simon, I just looked it up and Jurassic Park had a production budget of $63 million, whereas Indiana Jones 4's was $185 million. Even adjusted for inflation that's a huge difference and I believe it had a direct impact on each film's directorial style.

Completely agree with you on Jaws. If you’d said Jaws then Indy 4 I wouldn’t have picked up on it at all. JP had a huge budget for the time and film budgets don’t follow inflation so I’m not surprised he was given more cash for subsequent films. Indiana Jones was bad for so many reasons and although we will never know I suspect the same outcome would have been the case irrespective of budget. I also agree that his name is less a guarantee of quality as it was.

Wachowski’s are a great example as would be M. Night Shyamalan. Give me auteur on low budget over Michael Bay with a blank cheque.

[Chopper]

Give me bad taste and braindead

Get out

[Magical_Isopod]

I think it depends largely on what you're playing. Like, once upon a time, Batman Forever on the Sega Genesis was said to have "realistic" graphics for its digitized assets. Now it looks like rancid arse, while something like Sonic 3 still holds up super well.

*In general*, low framerates and screen tearing were normal for PS360 games that tried to prioritize horsepower over aesthetic. Especially the earlier games, like pre-2009. But I also had a miserable time trying to play Evil Within on 360 - absolutely atrocious port, ran at like 20 fps.

It should also be said that aesthetic plays a big role - as a rule, anything going for "realism" is gonna look like shit a few years on. Call of Duty Whatever is going to age poorly, while something like Catherine or Valkyria Chronicles is not - hell, in the latter case, VC4, released 10 years after the original, doesn't look markedly different from the original, because the art direction and cell shading techniques are just top tits.

And finally, I'm mention that early HD textures are very much... Fumbling around in the dark. Like, go and play 360 launch title Condemned. It's this really awkward phase between Gen 6 and Gen 7 where character models still have this chunky PS2 look, every texture looks like glossy plastic, geometry still uses chunky polygons... It's really a testament to how significantly the tech changed in that generation leap, and how many lessons had to be learned even before a graphically stunning game - of its time - like Gears or Uncharted were possible.

Also wanted to note -- I find the 360 has aged much worse than the PS3, strangely. It has this really washed-out desaturated look with lots of jaggies over HDMI that the PS3 just... Doesn't. It's the damnedest thing. I find the games run a little better on 360, and the image is sharper, but I definitely prefer the PS3 by a country mile. I don't recall having this opinion during the console wars, it's only recently that I've noticed this.

[Chopper]

Hehe, aw, are they rubbish? It's ages since I've seen them. I picked bad taste from the video shop based solely on the cover and my dad rolled his eyes, he was laughing as much as me by the end though, especially the cliff scene with the hammer and the scene with the puke bowl "Ooh, I got a chunky bit!", and the last half hour of braindead was just an endless stream of lawn mower gore, so much fun!

I actually had no idea they were directed by Peter Jackson, I thought you were slipping in an obscure reference there. My response was the internet equivalent of tapping the side of my nose with my finger, I'm ashamed.

Upon further research, I see Bad Taste has made several 'best film' lists, so not obscure at all really.

[Scrustle]

I don't have a problem going back to games from the last generation, but it does depend on what game it is. I guess I can see how some games would be a bit of an unpleasant surprise to discover how badly they ran in retrospect, but that's only true in certain cases. The games I tend to go back to are ones that tended to run okay at the time. At least when it comes to the games that I actually still play on consoles. Most of the old games I've replayed I've picked up on PC, so that clears up the technical shortcomings. But even still, I'm fine with a game running at 30fps in 720p if it can maintain that without serious issue.

I think there certainly was a trend back in the day of developers trying to push those consoles further than they could really deal with though. Some managed to make it work, while others did not. Mid 20s frame rates were not rare. I remember hearing at some point that those old consoles were made with components that were never originally intended to push HD level graphics too. Given the struggling performance, and the fact that some or the first run of 360s didn't even have an HDMI port, would make that sound plausible, but I don't know for sure. Maybe Flabyo or someone else with insider industry knowledge could say more.

In general I'm also in the camp of preferring aesthetic and performance over fidelity, but I don't outright reject the idea of more detailed graphics. I see that as enabling better realised aesthetics. You just have to hope the developer uses that extra power to do that, rather than just needlessly pushing polygons and small incidental details that you don't notice. One example I like to give is Bloodborne. Even though that struggles with the performance, the atmosphere the aesthetic creates is fantastic. And it's an atmosphere that is built upon things like the detailed, twisted architecture; the thick volumetric fog; and the material work on various surfaces. It's a really well realised aesthetic that was never captured so well before in any game, and was only possible through having enough computing power available to do that stuff.

In terms of frame rate, I'll always prefer it to be higher. At least when the game is based around controlling or reacting to moving objects, the higher the frame rate, the better. But 30fps can be fine as long as it's consistent, and the game doesn't ask too much from you that the frame rate actively make it harder to play. Some good motion blur can go a long way too. But the issue of frame rate speed vs. consistency is sort of a false dichotomy in a way. Because of TV/monitor refresh rate, those things are linked. You're not really supposed to view something at a different refresh rate than your device puts out. Having something between 30 and 60 always feels bad, even if it's consistent. Something to avoid. So it only really comes down to 60 vs. 30, both consistent. Or 120 etc. if you can display it. But also, frame rates outside of the device refresh feel worse at lower speeds than higher too.

I don't feel much desire for 4K either. I guess it would be nice for the purposes of brute-forcing away the little remnants of aliasing you get in 1080, but it's definitely not necessary to create a detailed or pleasing image. I also think there's an issue of viewing distance and field of view that is very relevant to this that I don't see people bring up. There tends to be a specific field of view (in terms of what your eyes see, not what is shown on the screen itself) that is the most comfortable for viewing. Having a screen take up too much space is overwhelming, and you can't see the whole picture. Too little and you can't get immersed or see what's going on. The size of your screen needs to be balanced with your comfortable FoV, through viewing distance. Smaller screens need you to be closer, larger screens need you to be further away. So no matter how big the screen is, the picture itself should take up roughly the same space in your vision's FoV. And so because of this, increasing pixel count past a certain point becomes kind of useless. If you're closer to the screen, the screen should be smaller, and thus the pixels are smaller, reducing the need to use more pixels to get rid of aliasing. The pixels are small enough already. If you're further from the screen, even though the pixels themselves will be bigger, they will still only take up the same space in your FoV, meaning that you would need to move closer to the image to notice any difference, which would then of course move you out of your comfortable viewing distance. So pumping pixel counts to 4K and beyond is a waste of resources. It would be nice, if it was done as a secondary thing to stuff like frame rate, but it should be pretty far down the list of priorities.

[Scrustle]

You're not really supposed to view something at a different refresh rate than your device puts out.

Gonna disagree with you on that, unless you're talking about having vsync on.
I play shmups that are locked to 60fps at 144hz all the time, I force off vsync to lower the input lag and then crank up the refresh rate to hide the tearing

I was talking with sort of an assumption of including vsync, yeah. And part of what I mean when I said you're "meant" to play games at the refresh rate of the display is that the display is expecting to get a new, complete frame in sync with its refresh rate, whether that be on every single refresh, or every other, etc. Even though it can improve responsiveness, going above that rate isn't "supposed" to happen. Which is why tearing is a thing. Ideally games would be able to deliver a frame rate that is locked exactly to the refresh rate of a display without needing to have vsync to make sure that happens, giving no input lag. Although obviously that's not practical.

But as I said, the higher your frame rate, the less distracting a difference between frame rate and refresh rate is. I've haven't done much messing around with playing games above the refresh rate of my display, because I absolutely hate tearing, and the amount of lag vsync introduces is imperceptible to me. I definitely find the tearing of a game running at above refresh rate way more distracting than any improvement in input lag has made up for, at least in any game I've played. It sounds like it would be pretty hard to brute force a game to run at a frame rate high enough to get rid of tearing though. I guess it's easier with a graphically undemanding game like a shmup.

Also when I'm talking about my own experiences, I mean with a TV that can only go up to 60Hz. That's what I put my PC through, and I basically treat it like a powerful console. And of course actual consoles are designed with the assumption they are being hooked up to a 60Hz TV as well. In those cases you only really have two options for a consistent frame rate, and to keep consoles affordable, going above 60fps isn't really practical either.

I'm a bit confused at what you're talking about in this example though. So you play a game locked at 60fps through a 144Hz monitor, but you unlock the frame rate of the game, yet it's still somehow 60fps? Is there a difference between the rate of the game logic and the frame rate it actually puts out?