Aging Gamer: HD Remakes

<p>HD remakes and remasters of classic games seem to be all the rage right now&period; And I&&num;8217&semi;m perfectly okay with this&period; So far I&&num;8217&semi;ve not been as impressed with this generation&&num;8217&semi;s games&period; I long for the older days&period; Games were original and developers were not just pumping them out in order to make a quick buck&period; Since I&&num;8217&semi;m unimpressed with newer games&comma; I have no problem replaying games that I truly enjoyed when they first came out&comma; except with better graphics and sometimes better controls&period; Right now I&&num;8217&semi;m replaying<a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;rockstargames&period;com&sol;lanoire&sol;restricted-content&sol;agegate&sol;form&quest;redirect&equals;https&percnt;3A&percnt;2F&percnt;2Fwww&period;rockstargames&period;com&percnt;2Flanoire&percnt;2F&amp&semi;options&equals;&amp&semi;locale&equals;en&lowbar;us"> <em>L&period;A&period; Noire<&sol;em><&sol;a> on my Xbox One and<em> Shadow of the Colossus&&num;8211&semi;<&sol;em>that says a lot&period; I&&num;8217&semi;d rather be playing a double-digit-year-old game than the current tripe Activision and EA are pumping out&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>When I was little&comma; we really didn&&num;8217&semi;t get any remakes or ports&period; Yes&comma; there were a few&comma; <em>Ninja Gaiden Collection<&sol;em> and<em> Super Mario All-Stars<&sol;em> come to mind&period; But ground-up remakes really didn&&num;8217&semi;t rear their head until the GameCube era&semi; Sega was a big third-party supporter of the GameCube&comma; remaking some of their <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;o&period;canada&period;com&sol;technology&sol;gaming&sol;segas-failed-dreamcast-actually-outsold-the-wii-u">failed Dreamcast<&sol;a> titles&period; Both <em>Sonic Adventure<&sol;em> titles ended up on the Cube&period; But the masterpiece that everyone missed was also ported to the Cube&comma;<em> Skies of Arcadia<&sol;em>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h3>Skies of Arcadia<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>Pirates are huge now&period; And Sega&&num;8217&semi;s developers were somehow ahead of their time when they released <em>Skies of Arcadia<&sol;em> on the Dreamcast&period; In that game&comma; you get to play as sky pirates&comma; battle in the air on a floating boat&comma; and live on floating islands&period; Who wouldn&&num;8217&semi;t fall in love with it&quest; Well&comma; apparently Dreamcast and GameCube owners&period; I&&num;8217&semi;m lucky enough to own both copies of the game&period; When I played them both in tandem&comma; I couldn&&num;8217&semi;t believe that Sega made the exact same game for the Cube&period; It was bittersweet for me because had one of the releases done well&comma; we might have had a sequel&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;137146" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-137146" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-137146" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;04&sol;01235824&sol;38043101335&lowbar;db8d53849b&lowbar;o&period;0&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"360" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-137146" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>Shadow of the Colossus<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; Sony&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<h3>Capcom&&num;8217&semi;s Remakes<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>As the GameCube era progressed&comma; more developers decided to churn out compilations and anthologies and even a few more remakes&period; Capcom holds the crown for remakes and HD upgrades&comma; and it all began on the GameCube&period; The <em>Resident Evil <&sol;em>Remake was a huge surprise to gamers because of how novel it was to get a complete remaking of a game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Now Capcom pumps out remakes or HD re-releases almost once a month&comma; and it&&num;8217&semi;s become a bit of a running joke&period; How many copies of <em>Resident Evil&colon; Revelations<&sol;em> do I need&comma; Capcom&quest; Apparently&comma; four so that I can play them on my 3DS&comma; 360&comma; PS4 and Switch&period; Todd Howard must be studying their business model&period; I do admit&comma; though&comma; I enjoy replaying Resident Evil games when Capcom pumps them out&period; I&&num;8217&semi;m a sucker for classic titles&comma; and I love the nostalgia&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h3>Ports and Remakes &&num;8211&semi; Making Retro Gaming Easier<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>It may seem like I&&num;8217&semi;m knocking HD ports or remakes&comma; but I&&num;8217&semi;m really not&period; They make retro gaming much easier and put less strain my older consoles&period; I&&num;8217&semi;ve yet to get through <em>Okami<&sol;em> &lpar;another Capcom title&rpar;&comma; but I&&num;8217&semi;ll happily get the HD version for my Xbox One or PS4 so that I can play a different game on my PS2&period; The ports or HD Remakes also allow a new generation of gamers to fall in love with a franchise&period; Take <em>Yakuza<&sol;em> for example&comma; for some reason this series has a hard time selling in the States&period; In Japan&comma; they eat it up and usually have their copies long before us Yankees do&period; I&&num;8217&semi;m a huge fan of the<a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;yakuza-6-the-song-of-life-review&sol;"><em> Yakuza<&sol;em><&sol;a> series&period; If anything&comma; the <em>Yakuza<&sol;em> engines for this generation have been phenomenal&comma; and I can&&num;8217&semi;t wait to see the new engine in <em>Kiwami 2<&sol;em> and <em>Yakuza 6<&sol;em>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;137148" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-137148" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-137148" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;04&sol;02001853&sol;yakuza&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"360" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-137148" class&equals;"wp-caption-text"><em>&lpar;Yakuza<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; SEGA&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>You would think that I would be disappointed that there are so many HD upgrades&comma; but I&&num;8217&semi;m honestly not&period; I enjoy replaying classics when I can&comma; and since I&&num;8217&semi;m finding fewer and fewer new titles to enjoy&comma; the old stalwarts are there for me&period; What&&num;8217&semi;s even better is I can get trophies and achievements for besting a game that my muscle memory is certainly prepared for&period; I think I would be more disappointed in this generation if I didn&&num;8217&semi;t have Capcom&comma; Sega&comma; and <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;reddit&period;com&sol;r&sol;NintendoSwitch&sol;comments&sol;bzyynx&sol;what&lowbar;is&lowbar;your&lowbar;most&lowbar;anticipated&lowbar;port&lowbar;on&lowbar;switch&lowbar;and&sol;">Nintendo pumping out all these HD ports<&sol;a>&period; Hopefully one day I won&&num;8217&semi;t feel the need for HD upgrades&comma; because the developers will have gotten back on track with making amazing games instead of just shoveling out annualized crap&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong>Like what you read&quest; Check out more of my <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;tag&sol;aging-gamer&sol;">Aging Gamer<&sol;a> series on BagoGames&period; <&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;