When is a console retro?

[Flame]

Modern games just last longer and they don't feel old even when they are. In 2000 if you played a game like Super Mario World (1990) it felt ancient. Today if you play Super Mario 3D World (2013) it feels still good and fresh. That's why today I feel pretty comfortable playing the current generation but also one or two generations behind at the same time.

That's a good point. Tech improvement is slowing down. The jump from SNES to N64 was big. Big in that you can see it. I mean if switch 2 is 1080p handheld mode at most people wouldn't bat an eye.

 

[JaapDaniels]

That's a good point. Tech improvement is slowing down. The jump from SNES to N64 was big. Big in that you can see it. I mean if switch 2 is 1080p handheld mode at most people wouldn't bat an eye.

Nah, nintendo makes it 640x490 28FPS for sure.

 

[Anxiety_timmy]

Modern games just last longer and they don't feel old even when they are. In 2000 if you played a game like Super Mario World (1990) it felt ancient. Today if you play Super Mario 3D World (2013) it feels still good and fresh. That's why today I feel pretty comfortable playing the current generation but also one or two generations behind at the same time.

That too, most games from the 7th generation still hold up decently well graphically and a case can be made for games from the Gamecube era like Wind Waker or Luigi's Mansion.

 

[AkikoKumagara]

I think 15 years has been the answer I objectively agree with the most. Arguing about fidelity and games "holding up" feels very much irrelevant to me when it comes to determining when is the right time to essentially call something "old".\
Feeling modern and relevant is great, but it doesn't change the reality that many of the consoles we grew up with are getting old. Based on my own experiences and the measure of time I've seen past generations be considered retro, I think the 15 years answer is closest one yet. We'll probably eventually start calling early gen consoles "classic" if we follow the pattern of most other industries, as the mid gen consoles gain their retro status.

 

[Anxiety_timmy]

That's a good point. Tech improvement is slowing down. The jump from SNES to N64 was big. Big in that you can see it. I mean if switch 2 is 1080p handheld mode at most people wouldn't bat an eye

I mean take a look at the jump between the PS4 and PS5 compared to PS1 to PS2. Sure you could make a case for resolution slowing down the progress of pumping up more polygons on screen since 2160p (4k) is 4 times more intensive, but in short its not that drastic leap people expected.

 

[Marc_LFD]

Simple, NES was ~20yo in 2005 when the PSP came out, now it's almost ~19 years since that, makes sense to call it "retro". However, as others have said, we might need a new name to easily separate between the two, old "retro" (~20 years) and really old "retro" (+30 years).

Classic Retro and Modern Retro. That'd work.

I listen to Country Music and I tend to separate it to two groups: Classic Country and Modern Country, the latter sometimes not being that great because it's more like Pop music, but that's beside the point here.

Anyway, PSP is an awesome Modern Retro handheld.

 

[CoolMe]

Classic Retro and Modern Retro. That'd work.

Sounds good.

the latter sometimes not being that great because it's more like Pop music, but that's beside the point here.

I can't stand country-pop music.

 

[Deleted member 681657]

That's a good point. Tech improvement is slowing down. The jump from SNES to N64 was big. Big in that you can see it. I mean if switch 2 is 1080p handheld mode at most people wouldn't bat an eye.

Improvements are indeed slowing down but when games like Tears of the Kingdom struggle to maintain 900p 30fps in 2023 it's clear the Switch's hardware has become too old.

 

[Flame]

Improvements are indeed slowing down but when games like Tears of the Kingdom struggle to maintain 900p 30fps in 2023 it's clear the Switch's hardware has become too old.

I meant when Nintendo releases the switch 2.0 it will still not have great improvements compared to past generations.

 

[DAZA]

pmsl retro is a console you played when you were a kid and 20-30 years later you still hanker to get your hands on the real thing and play the sh*t out of it even if you play current handheld emulation in between...

or.. when someone comments that the item in question is older than you are lol thats retro

 

[Deleted member 194275]

The question is: why does it matter?

There are games that born retro, like horizon chase or Celeste, there are old games that still feel modern, like GTA 4 or GTA 5, so again, why does it matter?

 

[Flame]

@lokomelo

That's a philosophical question. What you are saying is no?

If today, Nintendo started making SNES consoles again, and Earthbound went into reproduction again. A part of me would be pissed but happy at the same time. The price would go down, but we might get new Earthbound games again. My point was more in line, does what people think of a console affect the price of a retro console?

There is this funny time in gaming when a console is not new or "retro" so collecting for it is easy. PSP is in that point in time imo.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

GameCube/PS2/Xbox are retro.
The Wii might even be considered retro, I'm kind of tied on it.
But I can't consider the Xbox 360 or PS3 retro.

Retro is more about the style of things from a particular time period, rather than the age of things. When we look at older consoles like the SNES or N64/PSX, they're obviously retro even to someone who has never heard of them before and doesn't have much experience with videogames (like a young kid) because the design of both the consoles and the games dates them.

When it comes to the Xbox 360 and PS3, the same can't be said.
They don't feel dated, they still look and feel like modern consoles. Graphics haven't gotten that much better since, controllers haven't improved in any major way, and even the design of the consoles and the UI still looks modern.
An experienced gamer would be able to tell the difference in graphics fidelity, only because they're used to modern AAA games. Even so, that only applies to realistic graphics as those tend to age poorly. Stylized graphics can look really good on the Xbox 360/PS3 and it might be hard even for an experienced gamer to tell the difference between a stylized game running on the PS3, and the PS5, and that difference often has more to do with the skill level of the developers, and the choice of engine, rather than the raw horsepower of the hardware.

The Wii is kind of in a weird spot though because it's mainly the lack of HD that causes it to look so dated. It has some quite visually impressive games on it that are capable of looking great, as evident by playing them in Dolphin, and if it weren't for the lack of HD on real hardware, the graphics of those games would still hold up well. But there are a lot of lazy games as well with GameCube-level graphics (or worse)

 

[SylverReZ]

Usually 20-years later when they stop supporting it.

 

[Hayato213]

Usually 20-years later when they stop supporting it.

20 years + is a good length, typically you would consider consoles like NES, SNES, PS1, PS2, GB/GBC, GBA, etc.

 

[Xzi]

Retro is more about the style of things from a particular time period, rather than the age of things. When we look at older consoles like the SNES or N64/PSX, they're obviously retro even to someone who has never heard of them before and doesn't have much experience with videogames (like a young kid) because the design of both the consoles and the games dates them.

When it comes to the Xbox 360 and PS3, the same can't be said.
They don't feel dated, they still look and feel like modern consoles.

I have to disagree with that, X360/PS3 games definitely have a particular style that dates them, grey-brown shooters being the most common offenders. 360 had way too little RAM, so that kept view distances low and jagged edges obvious on big screens. Slow hard drives date the hardware, as well as widespread overheating issues for both consoles. They probably feel more recent because their libraries have become available on so many other platforms since, but the games are better played on anything other than their native hardware.

Not to say there weren't a few cult classics and timeless gems to come out of that generation, but they were the exception and not the norm. The indie scene in particular was very limited and rough/experimental. 3D graphics just weren't quite "there" yet. With PS4/XB1 the graphics feel fully baked, it's only the performance that's lacking.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I have to disagree with that, X360/PS3 games definitely have a particular style that dates them, grey-brown shooters being the most common offenders. 360 had way too little RAM, so that kept view distances low and jagged edges obvious on big screens. Slow hard drives date the hardware, as well as widespread overheating issues for both consoles. They probably feel more recent because their libraries have become available on so many other platforms since, but the games are better played on anything other than their native hardware.

Not to say there weren't a few cult classics and timeless gems to come out of that generation, but they were the exception and not the norm. The indie scene in particular was very limited and rough/experimental. 3D graphics just weren't quite "there" yet. With PS4/XB1 the graphics feel fully baked, it's only the performance that's lacking.

I don't see how grey-brown shooters are unique to that generation, they're still the norm for realistic shooters.
Can't say render distance has ever been something I noticed in games, then again I don't tend to play open world games, so maybe this just doesn't apply to me.
Slow hard drives - yeah. Then again, that's not something we're entirely rid of these days, with SSDs still being so limited in size, and games being hundreds of gigs, most people with a decently sized game library don't have the luxury of storing their entire game library on SSD. Also, with games often being 50 times the size compared to back then, most of the improvement to load times of a SSD is lost anyway.
The overheating issues were a design flaw which doesn't really have anything to do with the age of the console, they just fucked up. It can and will happen again.
Experimental is certainly a good word to describe the indie scene back then. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, it brought us such classics as Braid.

 

[Kioku]

I suppose I could call the 6th gen retro once the 10th gen is here.
Idk, ~20-25 years orso.

20 years is a fair assessment, and a stern wake up call for my age.

The 360/PS3 era are next and if you were to take say COD 4 and place it next to a more recent COD title, it looks and feels very dated. That’s not to say that they look “bad”, but to call something retro is to acknowledge it as being older.

 

[Jayro]

To me, "retro" gaming stops at the 16-bit era. The 32-bit and 64-bit generation (Saturn, PS1, N64) to me is not and never will be considered "retro gaming". These consoles that focus on polygon rendering vs 2D sprite rendering just don't scream oldschool for me.

 

[mrmagicm]

For me, RETRO means backward, so the generation before is already backward. So somewhere, PS4 is already RETRO to the ps5.