Games from before 1999 that still look polished and graphically appealing...

even by today's standards?

I can think of: Starcraft, Fallout, Heroes of M&M 3

Geez, I admire the effort people put in to make things beautiful in 2D era.

Reaching 2 generations back is a little bit of a far stretch. I don't think by today's standards that any games from back then look good.

I still love Grim Fandango's graphics, but you wouldn't confuse them with new graphics.

Crash Team Racing has ages surprisingly well.

The longest Journey.

Creature Shock.

Crash Team Racing has ages surprisingly well.

_Teron_

Diablo, Warcraft II

Yup this is Homeworld from 1999. Sure not "before 1999", but this game still looks great...

The Curse of Monkey Island and Riven come to mind (both from 1997):

full throttle

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (still the best mario ever)

Neverhood (I really liked this game.)

Honestly it's not that games age badly, it's more that people become accustomed to the newer graphical effects seen in each new generation. Are you willing to remind yourself that these games are over 10 years old and might still contain replay value?

I can go back to NES, SNES, Sega Genesis and find games that are exactly the same as when I played them the first time, and it seems most 2D games age better than 3D. if you want specific 3D-based games that still look polished, you'll have a hard time really finding any, other than those games given extra credit due to nostalgia.

Zelda: Link to the Past, Ocarina and Majora, Super Mario 64, Super Metroid, Age of Empires, Super Mario Bros games, Final Fantasy VI.charizard1605

all 3 of those games aged horridly :?

also my own chime in:

Pokmeon Stadium/stadium 2:

1080 snowboarding

and pretty much any game that used pixels and not polys.

Broken Sword. Still so pleasing to the eyes after all these years. :)

I still love Grim Fandango's graphics, but you wouldn't confuse them with new graphics.

hellhund

Star Fox 64/Lylat Wars (1997)

A bit blocky, but still looks very good.

Tekken 3 (1998 )

Still plays very fluid.

I'm currently playing Outcast from 1999 thanks to GOG.com and I marvel at the tech they had over ten years ago.

Nothing from then looks graphically appealing or polished by todays standards.

i"d say Starcraft comes closest, as RTS's have never been about graphics (except maybe some Total War games which get a lot of fame from the massive battles you watch). Basically, when you play SC, you don't notice the graphics much, so in that way I think it holds up moderately well to today's standards.

I'm currently playing Outcast from 1999 thanks to GOG.com and I marvel at the tech they had over ten years ago.

theSADmafioso

you got me all excited man I thought that site was one of those freeware sites where the devs put out there old hits for free, sorta like what happened with the first 2 elder scroll games.

freespace 2 (think that was made before 1999 or at least in 1999)

I'm currently playing Outcast from 1999 thanks to GOG.com and I marvel at the tech they had over ten years ago.

theSADmafioso

Total Annihilation, 1997:

Simply a beautiful game for it's time, and still one of the best RTS games I've had the pleasure of gaming through.

It had hundreds and hundreds of full 3D models clashing together and 3D interactive terrain instead of layers (starcraft). In it's release, your average gamer back then simply didn't have the hardware to run this game on the lowest setting.

I can't think of any single one, and don't agree with any single one that has been posted. Maybe just Yoshi's Island but I'm not very convinced.

I remember Free Space 2 looked great for it's time. I know the spaceship models must look terrible now, but I remember the colorful nebulas that really made the vacuum of space come to life. Age of Empires 2 looked great (and still does) but that was released in 2000.

Curse of Monkey Island

[QUOTE="theSADmafioso"]

I'm currently playing Outcast from 1999 thanks to GOG.com and I marvel at the tech they had over ten years ago.

osan0

BTW, Quake looks better than most today's games:

Banjo, Spyro, Crash & Sonic Adventure still look playable.

1999

Homeworld

Close Combat: Invasion Normandy

Neverhood (I really liked this game.)

frankeyser

at the time of release Gamespot hailed Heretic 2 as one of the most beautifull games ever.

So as far as technical graphics go for pre-1999 games it isn't going to get any better than this:

As far as consoles are concerned,a ton of games from the SNES/Genesis era look great while pretty much everything from the PS1/Saturn/N64 era is now a hot mess visually speaking.

As far as consoles are concerned,a ton of games from the SNES/Genesis era look great while pretty much everything from the PS1/Saturn/N64 era is now a hot mess visually speaking.

GreySeal9

agreed. graphics-wise the pinnacle of the 2d era > the start of the 3d era.

from the pics so far in this thread the curse of monkey island is the best looking game for me

There is nor particular order

Super Mario RPG (SNES)

Ocarania of Time (N64)

Yoshi's Island (SNES)

Kloana (PS1)

Super Mario 64 (N64)

Chrono Cross (PS1)

Dino Crisis 2 (PS1)

Yoshi Story (N64)

Super Metroid (SNES)

A Link To The Past (SNES)

As far as consoles are concerned,a ton of games from the SNES/Genesis era look great while pretty much everything from the PS1/Saturn/N64 era is now a hot mess visually speaking.

GreySeal9

And my vote would go to unreal. altough there is no real 3D game that looks graphically appealing in this day and age from that long ago visually its another story. 2D games rely on visuals not graphical tech so you can't apply them to topics soley around graphics.

The only game I can think of is this

Castlevania Symphony of the Night

Daytona USA 2. Still the greatest racing game ever made.

This one was beautiful, especially animation

[QUOTE="_Teron_"]

Crash Team Racing has ages surprisingly well.

Richymisiak

Mario Kart is better! :P