There has long been a sub-group of folks who have said that they want to go back and play the old version of (whatever game) with new graphics. Keep the AI, keep the gameplay, keep the rulebook… change nothing except for a re-rendering of the graphics. (Indeed, sequels that tried to say “we’ll update *EVERYTHING* have tended to, in a word, suck.)
X-Com. Master of Orion. Final Fantasy Seven. I’m sure that you have a game that jumped into your head just now.
Well, there was a recent release of the Prince of Persia Trilogy that had been HD remastered and, so far, it’s very, very good. The gameplay you remember from 2004, graphics that look like remastered graphics from 2004. (They still have to iron out a couple of kinks before making it perfectly up-to-date, mind.)
Well, I had thought that this was a very good development but unlikely to lead anywhere… then I heard a rumor about a remastering of Ico/Shadow of the Colossus… and, today, I heard (from Giantbomb) that Konami is remastering three *HUGE* chunks of its back catalog.
Metal Gear Solid 2, 3, and Peace Walker will be remastered for a new collection.
Zone of the Enders and Zone of the Enders 2nd Runner will be remastered for a new collection.
And, get this, Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill 3. (Silent Hill 2 was a mind, erm, it was a trip.)
I hope we can do this for more games… call it cynical attempts to cash in on work already done, if you must. I see it as similar to releasing a classic movie on Blu-Ray. The story is unchanged but the clarity is better than ever.
What game are you hoping to see?
Zork!
http://thcnet.net/zork/index.php
Play it online! Of course, the graphics have not been upgraded…
I’m waiting until they release it with variable-width font
I loved the Super Mario All-Stars cartridge they came out with for the S-NES and still haven’t figured out why they didn’t keep up with that concept.
I’d love to see a remastered Earthbound, or Faxanadu.
I would like them to remaster Jade Empire. Since they are never going to give me a #@(&@ Jade Empire 2, the least they can do is make the original prettier.
Um, we can still play the original on Arcade though, right? I may not get through my 1st semester of grad school w/out being able to beat up bad guys….
We can just play the original discs on the 360. They’ve got an XBox emulator in there.
Oh good.
I would like to see the first MOO remastered. You are right that MOO2 and MOO3 were not as good as the first. Two was better then three, but two’s diplomancy was terrible (three was not much better). I loved how in the first MOO, a race that you were stomping into the ground would come and grovel to be allowed to live. The two and three they would rather die than give you any satifaction. Sigh. I also liked the incomplete tech tree you were given in the first.
Even space combat had a more tactical feel with movement being more important because weapon ranges were so low.
Sigh, those were the good old days. I blew off many a college class to play MOO….
Tactics Ogre was just completely remade. It doesn’t quite fit, because the gameplay and rules are a tad different, but it is still an *excellent* remake.
Dungeon Keeper 2. Hell yes! I would sacrifice several relatives into an open volcanoe to get that game redone with modern graphics and interfact technology. Oh my agnostic god I would be so happy!
Warrior of Rome.
It was a nice little real-time strategy game that didn’t have the same sort of map-linked resource limitations that became the standard with Dune and then followed through Warcraft, Command and Conquer, etc. It had unit advancement and specialties (the longer you kept ’em alive, the better they got, the more they moved around, the faster they got, etc.)
But it was on the Sega Genesis which didn’t have the horsepower to run a RTS game with 20+ units per side, and it was so slow we used to play other games while we were playing *it*.
That reminds me, Herzog Zwei, which was a lot faster paced RTS. Man I loved that game.
Herzog Zwei was *awesome*. Oh, man, now I need to hook up the Genesis again.
X-COM. And maybe…X-COM. Oh! How about…X-COM?