Those experienced with emulating older games are likely aware of community-made texture packs. Emulators can use these to improve the textures of older games, giving them an unofficial remaster of sorts. Older 8-bit and 16-bit sprite games lack that ability to load in improved textures like that, though we have seen modernization attempts in the form of widescreen and 3D enhancements for retro emulators. Mesen NES Emulator, however, has the ability to load "HD packs", which take the original NES ROM, and use custom-made graphics packs that make them look more like SNES games, such as Mega Man 2 using the art from Mega Man 7, or Castlevania 1 using sprites from Super Castlevania IV. ROMhacking.net features many of these, uploaded to their site, featuring some standout releases such as:

Zelda 1: Remastered
Contra: Remastered
TwinBee Remastered
Castlevania HD Trilogy

There's also a group effort to creature an HD pack for Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link, which is currently a work in progress. You can check some of them out for yourself at the source below. Would you use any of these, or do you prefer to play the games in their original format?

Source

 

[urbanman2004]

I don't really use Mesen and never have been big on mods aside from rom hacks.

 

[Chary]

I guess this article could be considered 'old news' in a sense, but a lot of people still haven't really heard about this, so...

Yeah, Foxi linked it to me and it seemed fun. It's hard to justify it as news when it's old, but I feel like not many people are talking about it, and it's just cool to throw on the front page for the weekend imo

 

[osaka35]

My opinion: a lot of these packs do pretty much look like your average Flash game like some have said above me, but the others with a lot of effort put into them do look very nice. It does still beg the question of if it's more worthwhile to stick with the originals though, since that 'retro charm' of the original graphics could be lost.

(I do wanna see that Zelda 2 pack on the PC port/remaster/whatever though, ngl)


Version 1.3 of the pack was released at the end of 2020. lmao
I guess this article could be considered 'old news' in a sense, but a lot of people still haven't really heard about this, so...

yeah, i agree. making good pixel graphics isn't easy, and it's not without talent to reach this "looks good but kinda like a flashgame" threashold. But updating graphics so they have the same feel, the same vibe, and produce the same atmosphere and readability? no simple task.

I think they did a brilliant job with the spyro upgrade, for example, and they could have easily messed that one up. Which isn't pixels, but is the same kind of "upgrade" requiring a deep understanding of the games graphics to update them properly. Generally in projects like these I see a tendency to copy the style of a more graphically equivalent game in the same series, as a bit of a crutch to keep it feeling like it belongs in the series. But the tradeoff is it loses the unique charm of that particular game. It's not a simple task.

 

[JuanMena]

Personally I think using a CRT filter is better, but that's just me

No, no... I'm with you in this one.

CRT scanlines + hq2x or EPX or Scale2X + Color Palette option + RGB Output in RetroArch.

The Zelda 1 pack looks so wrong mixing multiple art styles and games like that you're better off playing many of the Zelda classic art overhauls or just play bs Zelda.

Snowflakes be snowflakes.
Actually was thinking that BS Zelda looks better than this. Glad to know I'm not the only one.

 

[tabzer]

Yeah, Foxi linked it to me and it seemed fun. It's hard to justify it as news when it's old, but I feel like not many people are talking about it, and it's just cool to throw on the front page for the weekend imo

Not every editorial has to be "news".

This site needs more of this, instead, imo.

 

[Deleted member 194275]

It's awesome that the possibility to do that is there, but the results as of now are disgusting.

Maybe modders need more time to iron out those graphics, or maybe this tool is yet to arrive on the right hands, but for now, ugh!

 

[Noctosphere]

big question mark
Since when is SNES graphics quality considered HD?

 

[Foxi4]

Yeah, Foxi linked it to me and it seemed fun. It's hard to justify it as news when it's old, but I feel like not many people are talking about it, and it's just cool to throw on the front page for the weekend imo

I like the concept of swapping sprites on the fly regardless of what the original machine could’ve handled at the time, from a technical standpoint. It’s effectively no different than an HD texture pack for games that don’t use textures.

 

[Marc_LFD]

Mark Hammil once recommended Schwarzenegger to drop his Austrian accent. Later he admitted it to be the worst advice in the history of advices.

Funny you mention Schwarzenegger. That guy can try to apologize much as he wants, but the people will never accept his apologies. lol

 

[LightBeam]

Some of them look drop-dead gorgeous compared to the 8-bit source material.

View attachment 365152

Screenshots do look nice, but when I tried it (and even tried Metroid HD), well it still had NES animations. So very few frames etc. Just gotta keep in mind it's still a NES game, so I don't think it's something that'll convince people who don't like « too old » games to play these

Still so cool to have those

 

[J-Machine]

people dunking on this when its a per game community led project. it's super cool to have a simpler time replacing textures and not having restrictions of the hardware limiting you. this is no diff than msu-1 patched games for audio. some are gonna suck, some are gonna rule. if it's not for you it's not being forced

 

[Foxi4]

Screenshots do look nice, but when I tried it (and even tried Metroid HD), well it still had NES animations. So very few frames etc. Just gotta keep in mind it's still a NES game, so I don't think it's something that'll convince people who don't like « too old » games to play these

Still so cool to have those

Yeah, it’s my understanding that you can do some funky things with animations and inject some extra stuff compared to the original game (see: Megaman, Iceclimber), but by default you are very much limited in the number of frames of you’re just injecting a tile set.

 

[JuanMena]

big question mark
Since when is SNES graphics quality considered HD?

 

[Radius4]

I only like the ones that retain 1x resolution...
the rest make scrolling horrible

 

[raxadian]

Yeah the texture pack for the firsr Metroid game makes it look really good; but you still need a darn guide.

 

[hippy dave]

Fun I do like playing with the original graphics for the authentic vibe, but this kind of thing could be good to shake things up for a replay.

 

[tabzer]

People want to dunk on web-browser games, but newgrounds was the shit. SWF player was a necessary evil to escort us into this age of enlightenment.

 

[Foxi4]

People want to dunk on web-browser games, but newgrounds was the shit. SWF player was a necessary evil to escort us into this age of enlightenment.

A lot of it is performative - a race to prove who can be the most vanilla of all. There’s a lot of good-looking NES games out there, but Zelda 1 isn’t one of them - objectively speaking it looks like scrambled egg next to stuff like Crystalis, which happens to be a Zelda clone. Nostalgia glasses aside, these packs look pretty neat, and it’s interesting that we can use emulation in this manner. You can keep the game logic exactly the same as it was in the original while updating graphics or sound without being shackled by the platform’s limitations (within reason). It’s definitely not for everyone, but it’s interesting nonetheless. Certainly better than running the game through some horrid smoothing filter - those are just inherently yuck. Realistically, if I wanted to play the game as I would’ve played it back in the day, I’d do it on a NES anyway. Emulators are meant for shennanigans.

 

[hippy dave]

A lot of it is performative - a race to prove who can be the most vanilla of all. There’s a lot of good-looking NES games out there, but Zelda 1 isn’t one of them - objectively speaking it looks like scrambled egg next to stuff like Crystalis, which happens to be a Zelda clone. Nostalgia glasses aside, these packs look pretty neat, and it’s interesting that we can use emulation in this manner. You can keep the game logic exactly the same as it was in the original while updating graphics or sound without being shackled by the platform’s limitations (within reason). It’s definitely not for everyone, but it’s interesting nonetheless. Certainly better than running the game through some horrid smoothing filter - those are just inherently yuck. Realistically, if I wanted to play the game as I would’ve played it back in the day, I’d do it on a NES anyway. Emulators are meant for shennanigans.

You seen how much a NES costs these days? Wish I'd picked up one of every console from charity shops before they all got retro value.

 

[spkatsi]

Will play the Zelda pack if it ever gets on Switch.