I actually hadn't noticed this until very recently, but take a look back in the "good ole days" in the 8, and 16-bit eras. These consoles lasted for five or six years, and the actual market was about half the size in terms of consumer base, and a fraction of the size in terms of actual money flow. What does this mean? It means, essentially, that you would have a console like today, with half or even less of the amount of developers of today. What did that mean, exactly? Less games, or at least less good games on a regular basis. It probably wasn't fun to play through Castlevania four hundred times before the next good game came out for your NES. No, I don't want to know what it was like for the SMS either, considering it had a mere 300 games in its entire lifespan.
It wasn't just that either. For my family in particular, and any other Britons, it was probably murder trying to actually PURCHASE a game. Back in those days, you had cartridges, which as most people know by now were infinitely more expensive than the optical disk media we enjoy today. On top of that, you had the usual inflation of the cost caused by the rather small size of England, increasing land prices and therefore, price of merchandise. That meant essentially that you were dropping around 50 quid on one game. Back then, that'd be about 100 bucks, and that'd be even more today when you factor inflation into it.
So maybe that wasn't so enjoyable, but CLEARLY the games were just amazing back then weren't they? Well yes, but only for their time. You might enjoy a game from back during the 8-bit era more than games from today, but the truth is that the gameplay mechanics are utter s*** compared to today, unless you had a developer that was just way too far ahead of their time.
Okay, but those generations were just oozing with originality, and this generation just has sequels doesn't it? Well, at least we have sequels today that change a significant amount of things. Over the course of the NES generation we had:
- 3 Ninja Gaidens
- 6 Mega Mans
- 3 Final Fantasies
- 3 Super Mario Bros'
- 2 Zeldas
- 3 Contras
- 3 Castlevanias
Fast forward to today. The gaming industry has evolved past the geeky stereotype, it makes 10 billion dollars a year (on a good year), we have twice the user base, far more developers, far more games, and best of all, far more GOOD games. I'd wager that perhaps the good : bad game ratio hasn't changed in the least, but it's hardly troublesome to wade through a few more generic games if it means finding more gems.
1998 was a legendary year. We had Metal Gear Solid, Xenogears, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Baldur's Gate, Half-Life, StarCraft, StarCraft: Brood War, Grim Fandango, and even more! That year was simply amazing, and while we haven't had a year that had that many good games since, every year now has several, maybe tens, of good or great games to look forward to. This year had Psychonauts, Resident Evil 4, Forza, God of War, and Guild Wars. Coming up before the end of the year are F.E.A.R., Quake IV, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time, Mario Kart DS, Age of Empires III, Black & White 2, Kingdom Under Fire: Heroes, and several others I forgot to mention. Most would consider 2005 a rather good year. Nothing mindblowing, mainly because we didn't have the hype of last year's Half-Life 2, Doom 3, World of WarCraft, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, or Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, but still good. Personally, I would consider it great, and chances are it's only going to get better, especially if Nintendo succeeds by bringing even more gamers into this wonderful art form. Sure, we may hit road bumps as next-generation development costs will be significantly greater than those of this generation, but we'll sort it out eventually, and it can even force developers to make better games. Perhaps they would be sequels, but they would have to have some semblance of quality, as evidenced by a good percentage of this generation's popular games (notice I didn't say ALL).
I'm not saying to take Castlevania 1 off of your favourite games list. No, I'm not saying that at all. If you ENJOYED it that much, and still do today, then you can leave it where it is. That said, it's time to be honest, game quality has improved, and be honest with yourself. Don't claim Ninja Gaiden is the best game of all time just because it's hard and takes a lot of skill. If you like Katamari Demacy or Super Mario Sunshine, go ahead and praise them, because we play games to have fun, not to make an image of ourselves.
Having said the quality of gaming has improved, it doesn't apply for everything. There are still games from the past that are better than some games of today. This tends to be genre specific. Adventure games and RPGs are mainly about either a) story or b) character customization. Story telling is something that is hardly limited by technology, and it hit its peak quite a while ago. Adventure games in the early 90s, and RPGs in the late 90s.
Gameplay mechanics are improving, but storytelling is an art we've been improving on for thousands of years outside of gaming, and it has already been largely improved on, even to near perfection considering the limits of speech. As soon as we had the means to tell a story how we wanted in a game, that was the moment that videogame storytelling was perfected.
Mechanics that have to do with actual gameplay, typical in less story driving genres such as Action and Strategy, have greatly benefitted with technology improvement, which is the reason a large amount of focus among gamers switched from Adventure Games to RPGs. Back in the early 90s, Action gaming was limited largely to side scrolling. Those games were by no means bad, but they weren't so much the definition of "action" as Ninja Gaiden Black or Max Payne. Now that we have action games that actually let us pull off crazy stunts akin to our fantasies, the people who would have liked action gaming back in the early 90s but couldn't (because sidescrolling is hardly the definition of being a ninja or crazy movie star) can now enjoy it in all its glory.
On the other hand, Adventure and RP Gaming weren't limited so much by technology back then, and because of that it grabbed a lot of attention. Now that gamers are brought closer to their ninja fantasies with technology and mechanical ingenuity, they have left Adventure and RP Gaming behind and pursued Action Gaming instead.
When you use storytelling as a gameplay mechanic, you gain an advantage in quality, because storytelling becomes a gameplay mechanic, and if you have done it well, which is much easier than getting AI right, you have a well done gameplay mechanic. This is despite the fact that storytelling isn't necessarily a part of gameplay.
One last thing to say is that games with good story or characters are resistant to aging. A good character or a good story tends to be unique, considering how many possibilities and combinations there are. Because of that, there aren't people setting their minds on improving the "save the world" plot line, or at least not on purpose. Even if they do, their characters might not be the same as someone else's. This uniqueness makes most RPGs and just about all Adventure Games from the early 90s and on quite playable today. In short, stories aren't there to be improved on, and as a result, it helps to preserve what they are a part of, which is games in this case. Also, if something hasn't been topped, then it isn't outdated, which doesn't seem to be obvious enough. For example, Symphony of the Night hasn't been topped (unless Dawn of Sorrow does it) because no one has been able to do so yet. This can be due to simple human error, or the fact that 2D Castlevania had to be yet again limited by hardware when it made the permanent transition to handhelds. I know all of this might seem complicated, but that's what I think.