The magic of classic era graphics

[u/Foreign_Storm_7484]

I recently played an old version of World of Warcraft and then I played the new version of Classic Wow, with some graphical improvements, and something bothered me in the new version. I messed around with the options a little and realized that what bothered me most was the current shadows. I was only satisfied when I set the shadow to low and it looked similar to the original version of the game, with vibrant and highlighted colors, and lighting that, despite being less realistic, makes the atmosphere more fantasy-like. I noticed that the modern shadows make the game lose its magic and dull the colors, and it looks like a strange middle ground between something realistic and something fantasy.

I've noticed this because no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to like almost any current game. I feel extremely bored and sleepy after just a few minutes of playing, or I get lost in so many menus and intense camera movements that I become stressed and anxious. On the other hand, old games capture my attention as always and have a relaxing and calming effect on me. This satisfying effect is the combination of low-resolution textures, subtle camera movements and epic soundtracks. This is the well-being I seek. That's the feeling I want to have.

I think this combination causes an effect on the brain that is as if the mind completes the image, as if it stimulates the brain to look at a castle with textures in low resolution and the mind is forced to use more imagination, something different from seeing something ultra realistic and full of details but it will stay on the screen for 10 seconds and you will walk and change to another scene with a lot more details. There's something different about how the mind processes old graphics compared to modern ones. It's as if the first causes relaxation, as if you were sleeping and having beautiful dreams, and the second causes exhaustion, tiredness and stress.

[u/Foreign_Storm_7484 → u/[deleted]]

I expected a lot of people to point it out as nostalgia, but I know a lot of people would identify it too. And that's what you said: if I want to stay in an ultra-realistic room where I can open all the drawers and doors, well I can get up and do it in real life. The same if I want to see the sky on a beautiful day, a bit of nature

[u/xansies1 → u/[deleted]]

... I don't know how old you are. I'm 33. Final fantasy 9 was a AAA game. Final fantasy 9 pushed the PS1 to its limits graphically. It was incredibly advanced in that department. I mean, maybe you think AAA then are better than now. Ive honestly played most games that have come out since 1995. Most games are forgettable. The exceptional ones are the ones you remember even if they are AAA or Indies by one guy. Like I still remember og kid Icarus and I still remember braid. Kid Icarus back in 1986 would have been considered AAA based on publisher and budget. Braid is definitely not, but I still remember it. But there are probably 100 Indies that I fucking forgot existed.

A better example would be something like trails series. I've played 11 of those games now and even for games now released just on current gen they still look like garbage. Hell half of the cold steel series also kinda played like garbage and I still liked it

[u/xansies1 → u/[deleted]]

Maybe not forgettable, but I haven't thought about perfect dark or bloodrayne until I was trying to remember a game I never once thought of after i played it. The point was the example you gave was a AAA game was preferable to newer AAA games. Which is cool, some people think old games are better, but it sounded like you thought final fantasy 9 didn't have absolutely amazing graphics for its time. Like, if the PS1 could have done ray tracing and dynamic shadows and 4k, square would have done it for ff9. It's like saying you prefer games like tales of phantasia or Chrono trigger to games with good graphics now. Sure you can prefer sprites compared to 3d, but you picked literally the two best looking SNES games as an example when they would have been contemporarily in the same category as like cyber punk 2077 in terms of graphics. What I'm trying to say is these games never looked bad, they were the best the hardware at the time was capable of. These were the cutting age graphics of 25-30 years ago