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potato_hamster on 27 March 2018
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TranceformerFX said:
AngryLittleAlchemist said:
I really don't understand the point in berating people for, or acting like people are less valid for, critiquing games with a modern lense. Most good art stands up to the test of time, and that's the same with video games. You don't see people ridiculing Ocarina of Time for ridiculous reasons, like "the graphics are bad!" or "there's no HDR!". You DO see people critiquing aspects of the game that were always bad, but less noticeable in the past, however.

My only problem is when someone plays a 10 year old game and bases their examination and critique with modern games in mind. Not only is that unfair in a critic sense, but also in a biased sense. The only two mediums where its acceptable to grade a product where 10 years have gone by is Music, and Books. 

Video games, as well as movies - isn't one of them. 

That's why I find it particularly jarring when a 16 year old who's accustomed to playing modern games on a PS4 (or whatever it'd be) and bases their critique from his "modern" taste when he plays a retro game from the 90's.

Not only is that single minded, but it's also unprofessional. That's kinda why paid critics don't pull that crap - because they'd eventually get fired for subconscious bias.

So when ever I see someone saying that Final Fantasy VII is overrated, I literally roll my eyes so far back into my head that I might as well be cosplaying Scorpion from Mortal Kombat.

But that's the thing - it is unfair to judge an older games by modern standards in terms of things like graphics, physics, animations etc. Because they were working with the best they had at the time. But some things like game play mechanics, level design, character design, sound design, story etc.. These things are for all intents and purposes independent of the available technology of the time.

For example, let's say the next Zelda game features gameplay mechanics incredibly similar to Breath of the Wild, with one key difference, they've removed the weapon durability system featured on most weapons in the game and replaced it with the weapon durability feature similar to the one used on the Master Sword. This change is well received, and as a result, most reviewers, critics and fans consider this new game to be better than Breath of the Wild.

Is it then unfair to criticize Breath of the Wild for having a weapon durability system that now again for all intents and purposes demonstrably made the game worse? Is it unfair for anyone to say "well I wasn't too bothered by it at the time, but now that I've played this new Zelda game, I find it really hard to go back to playing BotW and not find it really frustrating".

I would say no. That weapon durability system is not at all dependent on the technology at the time. It's not like there was some hardware limitation that made the game designers decide that going through multiple weapons to defeat a strong enemy was something they had to do. They chose that gameplay mechanic. It wasn't forced on them. It wasn't the best they could do at the time. It wasn't a work around like the blood moon system, for example.