I replayed Kingpin Life of Crime and Clive Barkers Undying a couple of weeks ago.... I'd forgotten how hard they were, especially Kingpin, but still good fun and well put together games.

I played Throne of Darkness recently and a bit of Darkstone today and yeah they look rough, but, there was something refreshing about their simple gfx, compared to the luxurious gfx we have today, maybe I should have taken off the rose tinted glasses :)

On saying that, they all were great games in their day and still quality games and very playable now, I'm happy to say.

Most of the old games I've experienced I've played within the last 5 years or so. So I have very little nostalgia, and yet I find that the vast majority of classics are quite enjoyable. The problem is that it takes some mental adjustment to be able to appreciate them. And it also takes a time commitment. We'll use Thief as an example. If you were to play through the game in little chunks while also playing, say, Call of Duty, then it's going to be hard if not impossible to get yourself into the right mindset to enjoy all the things that Thief does well. It's not that your expectations need to be lowered... rather, they need to be changed. This doesn't necessarily hold as true if you're playing another action game... it's not terribly difficult to go from Far Cry 2 to Shogo. Visuals, however, can be a barrier too. "unjading" yourself to them is important. If you're playing games like Crysis and Bulletstorm, you can't expect to start up Thief and NOT feel like there's something missing. Time needs to be taken to get reacquainted with low polycounts and blurry textures. If you've got a collection of increasingly older games you want to play, doing them in descending order would work. But that would require someone a lot more disciplined and organized than I am.

I'm not trying to sound like I'm the expert on appreciating old games... but these are a few things that I've observed in my own experience. Back when I had a halfway decent computer, I regularly went from new games to old games (I think that I was actually playing Crysis and Quake at around the same time). It just takes a little work. Well worth the effort, in my opinion.

I have problems with antiquated / overly complex interfaces and game designs, but not graphics.

Its true though that nostalgia adds a lot to old games. Duke Nukem 3D may not be as fun to someone encountering it for the first time without the WOW factor.

Same here probably. SNES games hold up extremely well, in my experience, on this basis.

I guess I can understand that. That's one of the reasons I haven't played nearly enough of XCom. And until the mouselook patch, the reason that I haven't finished System Shock 1 (although that might change now!)

I have this problem occassionally with an old game, but generally I don't.

The older generation is different in a number of ways:

1. Most obviously, the graphics aren't as "good". I put "good" in quotes, because sometimes I like old school graphics better, it just depends on what they did with what they had, but it is true that even the best looking of older games had lower resolutions, less detail, fewer lighting/shadow effects, etc. To get over this, I have to remind myself that I am playing this game for either the gameplay or story, not the graphics.

2. Everything I said in point 1 also applies to music and sound effects.

3. Older games often have clunkier user interfaces. Particularly if it's a game that is DOS-based and expects you to use a keyboard for everything that now you would more easily do with a mouse. With this, it's really a matter of patience. You have to forgive the UI for its place in the evolutionary history of UIs and just gain a proficiency at using the older UI.

Sometimes a new game just can't hold up over time though, no matter how you approach it. I can usual appreciate them from a historical context, but that doesn't necessarily mean I enjoy them or want to play them for long given how many great games have come out since. In that case, better to just cut your losses and move on to a different game (even if it is a time-honored classic).

I don't believe one bit in the whole "it has to be appreciated from a historical perspective" argument. Classics in any other medium are defined by their ability to speak to audiences of any era, not just in the time they were written. I don't see any reason why games should be different. And honestly, there are very few cases in which this isn't true--most games that are held up as classics still deserve their status, if you make a point to try and understand why they are so good. I mean, sure... if for example you start up System Shock 2 and expect it to play like Bioshock, then you're going to be disappointed. But if you take the time to understand what it's trying to do, get used to elements that might require more patience, and look past the outdated visuals, then you'll find the game has a wealth of things to offer that you simply do not get in newer games.

Not that I blame anyone for not wanting to take the effort to do this. Some people just want to play games to relax, and don't want to "work" for their entertainment. And that's perfectly fine, and perfectly understandable.

I'd challenge anyone who never played MoO2 or Lords of the Realm II and not fall in love with them (so long as they actually like those kinds of games).

I think it depends on the game. Sacrifice or Giants: Citizen Kabuto both have aged pretty well, as well, imo.

In my case, I've always had a certain fondness for the Quake-era muddy, gritty, blockiness. Don't know why :P

Ultima Underworld! Haven't had the chance to play it years ago. And i'm loving every inch of it, and no, the controls don't bother me.;) Actually, You just click the unit, press M, and click where You want it to go. I've finished Dune 2 a thousand times, without knowing the keyboard controls. Anyhow, with those shortcuts, Dune 2 is playable even today. ;)

Kinda similar to my friend, who finished Quake 1 and 2 without saving, simply, because he didn't see the option in the menu, because he was playing it on a minimal window size. You should have seen his facial expression when he learned about the saves. ;)

UU is awesome

On the Amiga?

Depends. Some games I can get into quite well, some games I cannot, and the age is not always the problem. I really enjoy Might and Magic 3~8 and TES1&2, but at the same time, I can't really get into those Bioware and Black Isles classics like FO, BG.
BTW, I started playing western RPG (excluding Diablo) at around 2006~2007. There's really no nostalgia here.

I never played Mega Man until about 2004, and didn't play several of the classic console RPGs until, well, a year ago, and now I own almost all of them (all the core Mega Man games, anyways - the second category's a bit vague and infinite), because they are all amazing. Really, I wouldn't say I have to "remind myself" that I'm playing a game for different reasons, as jungletoad said - simply that being familiar with how the game works tends to be good enough, and I can enjoy it (for example, IF has a deep slog of conventions you have to get used to, but after that you can play any of them).

That said, certain old 3D games, like Descent, make me motion sick. I do like Descent until I want to throw up, there's just not much I can do beyond that point.