Serious Sam made many a LAN Party simply BAD ASS... oh and theirs nothing like modding triple spawns with 10 people playing ^_^

Darnit! Always someone above!

And here I am with my beloved Dell P1110 (21" Trinitron), but it only hits 1800x1440 at the most.
How do you get 2048x1536? It seems that the only way to go higher is to get my hands on one of those Sony GDM-FW900s, and in that case, most of the resolution boost would be width since it's a widescreen CRT.

I agree. The original's graphics are still very pretty. Hell in 2001, those graphics were like WHOA, and they've aged very gracefully even till now.
Still, I admire Croteam and their perseverance, and I hope my money can convince them not to produce shit like Serious Sam 2, and instead go back to doing games as awesome as the First and Second Encounters.

I really, really enjoy this game. $20 sounds perfectly reasonable for a graphical update, and all the modifications you can make to make a 16 player game hectic as hell. Also, Steam achievements, and controller support if you're that kind of crazy.

Now you might (possibly, but i doubt it) have a point on all the others, but i thought the sound design on Serious Sam was amazing. Upon playing a superficially similar game last month (Painkiller from GOG) I realised quite how important that was.
Almost all the enemies had totally unique sounds, which allowed you to be aware of their position even when they weren't in view... essential in the midst of 1000 enemies. Plus the sounds told you about their distance, approach speed, etc.
The screaming of the headless bombers, the clippity-clop of the skeleton horses, the thundering hooves of the charging bulls, the mechanised noises of the walkers... it was VERY well done, imho.
It got to the stage where i could usually sidestep horses, bulls, etc.. just on sound alone.
Then painkiller tried to do the same thing, but they totally got the rhythm, pacing and most of all SOUND wrong. I'd find that somehow 50 enemies were right behind me and attacking me, but i'd never heard them come. Or i'd get hit by projectiles from behind that i'd never head launched.
I guess that's when i realised quite how important sound was to that kind of game.
(I'd also say that the graphics and environments were pretty WOW, at least the first time i saw them. And while the animation wasn't great, several of the enemies are iconically awesome, and the arenas actually have much better pacing and flow than you'd think. (again, something that the poor execution in painkiller highlighted). )
Some of the later battles are heart-stoppingly frantic and impressive too.... chaotic, but rarely out of control. I think it's harder to do that than you'd expect.

I just can't really stand the "humor" and the whole vibe of the game. The only thing that it head going for it was the swarms of enemies onscreen at once, but even now we have Left4Dead which gives me hordes of mindless zombies to shoot.
There are a lot of flaws in Serious Sam. It needs to be paced better, more varied and interesting environments, and the weapons need to feel more substantial. I'll likely pick the remake up eventually if it gets a price drop. I want to like it a lot, but it has issues I can't overlook.

L4D is a snore fest. All the zombies are the same and it's essentially just stand still and hold down mouse button 1.
At least SS has varied enemies and more than 3 guns. I'd fall asleep playing L4D if the sounds didn't give me a headache after 10 minutes of listening to it. I'll play it on mute one of these days...

You're right about Serious Sam having more varied enemy types. That's what it does have over L4D I admit. Also that's why I'm so disappointed about it not executing the concept better.
As for L4D I didn't like it much at first either, but it really grows on you when you play on Expert with a competent group of people. Expert is the only way to go. Zombies hit harder, health packs become a lot more important, and you can't make many mistakes before you go down. It's quite an accomplishment to stick together to cover your sectors of attack and coordinate firepower accordingly. Good stuff.

The real charm about the game requires a knowledge of its history. Around when it came out, people began dismissing games like Duke Nukem, Doom, and other classic shooters because they wanted a more sophisticated gaming experience with the dawn of much more powerful technology. Croteam said "Fuck that, here is a game using that new-fangled technology to make those classic shooters even CRAZIER". It's made to look like a shallow experience, but just read some of the bios you get after killing an enemy or picking up an awesome weapon. It goes into detail with all sorts of useless trivia, like how the headless soldiers were executed Sirians and how the female one-eyed things are tougher than the males.
Also, I think a HUGE deal of the charm comes from co-op. There's nothing like getting together with a buddy, each grabbing a controller, and blasting through levels together. Playing online takes some of that out, but it's still fun to play with a group of strangers on the internet.
Sure, the humor makes more misses than hits with the one-liners, and Sam's voice can become grating after a while, but at the heart of it all lies one mad adventure filled with circle-strafing and one horde of enemies after another. In the end, Serious Sam proves a game can be fun without being taken Seriously.

I know exactly what it's going for. Loved Duke Nukem 3D and Doom and other oldschool shooters where you mindlessly mow down enemies. And Serious Sam was a chance for the developers to revive the genre. Unfortunately Croteam just doesn't have the aptitude to create the experience with any flair and polish. I can still enjoy the game, but it could be so much more.

Serious Sam HD Second Encounter is coming in 2010 too.

And the question is will the next SS game, SS2, follow the HD route?