Coffee Talk: Is Nostalgia More Powerful Than Quality?
After reading a recent Joystiq post highlighting some incredible artwork from various deviantART users, I began to reminisce of the good ol’ days. It was just me, my SNES and my paltry selection of games back then, but boy did I play them until it was time for the rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips.
Being one of the kids who was behind the times on my block (and arguably still is), I was popping in games like Super Mario All Stars and Super Metroid while my friends were rocking it to Star Fox 64 and Tomb Raider. While looking at these endearing renditions of some of my favorite childhood classics, all I could think about was Ardy and his goofy Kirby-knockoff sidekick, Pec. Yes, Ardy Lightfoot for the SNES is one of my favorite games of all time… and it’s absolutely awful. Find out why I love Ardy so much and more importantly, why this is all relevant, after the jump.
Ardy Lightfoot was given to me as on of the many hand-me-downs from a friend of the family including gems like Cybernator – another favorite that is good in actuality – and Earthworm Jim. Ardy’s quirky noises, catchy music and lovable characters are what interested me, but what truly brought me back over and over was the challenge. This game was hard.
Period.
Was it the infuriating homing penguins? Perhaps the fact that Ardy only had two hits in him before death. Maybe it was the games intense platforming sequences and final stage which involved jumping over real and mirrored obstacles simultaneously (particularly sadistic, ASCII).
Nay, nay and more nay. Plain and simple, it was the controls. It’s incredible where black ice can show up in classic video games and Ardy Lightfoot’s world had the stuff lathered on heavy. Not to mention Ardy’s inability to stop momentum in midair, which made platforming delightfully enraging.
Mastering the games finicky jump controls while trying to keep traction had me playing the same levels 20 times over (watch this and you’ll see what I mean). Hey, it was about all I had at the time; I made due. I could probably beat this game through pure muscle memory and if Windows Vista allowed it, I’d probably give it another go. Actually, it probably would be the first game I’d download if this issue was patched.
Why you ask? Because Ardy Lightfoot has such a big place in my heart that even its wire frame plot is exciting for me. It’s incredible how nostalgia can mask even the worst of games (Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers for the NES, anyone?) enjoyable. Have any horrible games of antiquity you just can’t get enough punishment from? Let us know in the comments.
Great post. My quick answer is no. I’ve tried finding joy in the C64 emulator for the iPhone and I can’t understand how these games seemed fun and challenging once upon a time. I have plenty of fond memories for Genesis games, but I can’t imagine how I’d feel about playing Madden ’94 now.
I think that the nostalgia market — echoing Don Draper here — is lucrative because these games are cheap and consumers want to relive those formative moments playing these classic titles.
There are plenty of older games that have redeeming qualities, even if they overall kind of suck. As a collector, I have around 750+ video games total, spanning across NES, S-NES, N64, Gamecube, Wii, Dreamcast, X-box, Xbox360 and all three playstations, not to mention every iteration of gameboy, DS and PSP. Needless to say, I’ve got quite a few games that are pretty terrible, yet hold such a place in my heart form when I was younger that I can’t help but still enjoy them. A few that come to mind- “Time lord” for NES, “Space Station Silicon Valley” for N64, and of course the ultimate frustrating but incredibly awesome game, “Battletoads Double Dragon”.
While alot of these games have their flaws (and trust me, there are flaws a-plenty), they still have lots of redeeming qualities. Having grown up on them, if I didn’t still own the original copies, I would gladly buy a digital copy or a re-issued copy if it were made available. Alot of games I own downloaded digital copies anyway because the games were fun and playing them on a current Gen console seems more convenient than digging out the N64 or S-NES. On X-box live arcade I’ve got roughly 45 digital copy games, at least half of which I own in some other format like “Banjo Kazooie”, “Sonic the hedgehog”, “TMNT Arcade Edition” and various others. I’m actually very excited they announced an upgraded HD version of the N64 classic “Perfect Dark” is coming to the X-box Live Arcade later this month with new online multiplayer features! I think if they keep taking the classics and adding new things without taking away the old, both the mixture of new features and nostalgia will keep consumers buying.
Gozilla, for the Game Boy. I have no idea why I was so addicted to it- and why I loved it! It didn’t make any sense, and if it had a different licensed character, I probably wouldn’t have played it so often…no, that’s not true. Maybe that’s part of it’s enduring appeal to my mind?
Chip and Dale on the NES is still a solid game today… I whip it out for some co-op fun with my friends every once in a while.
Generally speaking though, I try to avoid replaying older games years later. I can’t even describe how disappointed I was when I even went back to try to play Perfect Dark on my N64 a few months back. I never noticed how terrible the framerate was in its “prime”; the core gameplay, style, graphics, etc. all hold up, but the game felt practically unplayable.
But I’m sure that we can all agree, Bad Dudes is one of the greatest games of the last 30 years… just do go and pop it in your NES to relive the greatness.
@manobon YES! I have that game still here somewhere, it sucked so bad but was SUPER addictive! Haha, man I can’t beleive anyone else remembers that game.