Death of the D-pad

Don

Don

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I was at a party over the weekend and my friends 8 year old son was bored. He didn't want to play board games or play outside. So, I offered to let him play my PSP.

When I handed him the system, he looked at me and asked, in a nervous voice, "so...how do I operate this thing." I then gave both the kid and his mother a puzzled look. I asked if he had ever played a video game before. My friend kept silent and the mother responded, "Ohhhh of course we have an ipad and iphone that he plays all the time."

Realizing the kid had never played a game with a physical controller; I looked at my friend with disgust.

I then loaded up the PSP and had the kid play Sonic 2 on a SEGA emulator. The kid had never played Sonic or Mario. In his mind they where just cartoon characters. In fact, he had never played a 2D side-scrolling platformer.

The whole experience made me wonder. Are there more kids like this? Just imagine growing up and just playing games on touch screens.
 
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fickmichcommander

fickmichcommander

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My kids will start with Atari and work their way up to the pinnacle of all existence, the SEGA Saturn.
 
Kid Panda

Kid Panda

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Posts
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Well, welcome to the video gaming of today. People don't realize how much gaming has gotten away from the core gamer. Look at consoles now, they cater to the hardcore older gamer who play mostly FPS and over the top action titles. Don't get me wrong I'm not knocking this stuff in any way but we have all grown up and those 2D platformers and vertical shooties are a thing of the past.

Look around at the companies you grew up with, no longer do they make core games such as Strider, Gunstar Heroes, and Super Castlevania IV. Teams of hundreds of individuals without even working in the same room, or hell the same city are pumping out projects that rival blockbuster movies in budgets and advertising.

One of the reasons I'm supporting Sony in the next gen race coming up is plain and simple, I care about the indie games that are coming out, the games made with love and care of really small teams working together with like minded ideas. There will never be games like Metal Slug or DoDonPachi ever again simply cause it's not about making a game that make people reminisce anymore, it's about the almighty dollar.

I'm no longer surprised a kid nowadays have never touched a controller, or heard of a Sega Genesis. I just retreat back into my cave and revel in what used to be my childhood and do the best I can with what I have. Maybe one day a little known dev will put together a little 2D powerhouse system and have games made for that, sounds more like a pipe dream at best though......
 
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Kazuki Dash

Kazuki Dash

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DonMontG said:
Realizing the kid had never played a game with a physical controller; I looked at my friend with disgust.
Click to expand...
Should have followed up that look with one of these.





Famicommander said:
My kids will start with Atari and work their way up to the pinnacle of all existence, the SEGA Saturn.
Click to expand...
Kudos. I fully believe if kids are exposed to these things from their humble beginnings, they can learn to gain enjoyment from a wide variety of games and avoid being lured simply by superficial things like flashy graphics alone.
 
P

psychobear85

B. Jenet's Firstmate
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My 6 year old has been playing with the SNES since he was 3, when he plays neo geo he won't play unless he gets the arcade stick..

About 6 weeks ago I had a party for him and his school friends. When they got to his room he showed them super mario world. They wanted to play so I hooked it up and took the controllers out and one kid asked me "how do you take the charger cable off"!!! :hammer::hammer:

But I guess it just really depends on the parents. To some retro consoles are just junk so some kids are not exposed to them.
 
andsuchisdeath

andsuchisdeath

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kidpanda said:
I care about the indie games that are coming out, the games made with love and care of really small teams working together with like minded ideas.
Click to expand...

Just other side of the same coin. As far as I'm concerned these "indie" games are just as inauthentic and alien as the big budget Hollywood titles are. You're right the Dodopnachi's and Metal Slugs are things we'll never see again. And countless 2D titles will surely come out on these future platforms. But it's pretty fucking clear that those "indie" devs" just don't get it.


EDIT: OP are you seriously surprised by this?
 
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El Maricon Loco

El Maricon Loco

Galford's Poppy Trainer,
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Scoops knows how to wax nostalgic, this shit is gold.

Edit - Not surprised one bit that there are kids that have never held a controller.

kidpanda said:
Well, welcome to the video gaming of today. People don't realize how much gaming has gotten away from the core gamer. Look at consoles now, they cater to the hardcore older gamer who play mostly FPS and over the top action titles. Don't get me wrong I'm not knocking this stuff in any way but we have all grown up and those 2D platformers and vertical shooties are a thing of the past.

Look around at the companies you grew up with, no longer do they make core games such as Strider, Gunstar Heroes, and Super Castlevania IV. Teams of hundreds of individuals without even working in the same room, or hell the same city are pumping out projects that rival blockbuster movies in budgets and advertising.

One of the reasons I'm supporting Sony in the next gen race coming up is plain and simple, I care about the indie games that are coming out, the games made with love and care of really small teams working together with like minded ideas. There will never be games like Metal Slug or DoDonPachi ever again simply cause it's not about making a game that make people reminisce anymore, it's about the almighty dollar.

I'm no longer surprised a kid nowadays have never touched a controller, or heard of a Sega Genesis. I just retreat back into my cave and revel in what used to be my childhood and do the best I can with what I have. Maybe one day a little known dev will put together a little 2D powerhouse system and have games made for that, sounds more like a pipe dream at best though......
Click to expand...
 
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Kid Panda

Kid Panda

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Posts
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andsuchisdeath said:
Just other side of the same coin. As far as I'm concerned these "indie" games are just as inauthentic and alien as the big budget Hollywood titles are. You're right the Dodopnachi's and Metal Slugs are things we'll never see again. And countless 2D titles will surely come out on these future platforms. But it's pretty fucking clear that those "indie" devs" just don't get it.


EDIT: OP are you seriously surprised by this?
Click to expand...

I should have been more specific, the "new" indie guys don't get it, you're right, but I've seen some stuff for long time game industry veterans that I'm looking forward too mostly. Stuff like Braid and Fez didn't grab me like I thought they would. Here's to hoping ;)
 
N

Neo Ash

NG.com Audiophile, Club Member,
Joined
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Just think about all the stuff that most people under 20 and certainly those under 10 have no concept of.....

- Blowing in NES carts to make them work.
- The blinking red light on a NES telling you to blow into the cart.
- Inserting a cart.
- Waiting on slow ass single speed CD drives.
- Writing down code so you can pick up where you left off.
- Using a telephone line and a modem to dial up for multiplayer games.
- Booting a PC with a floppy that loads less shit into memory so you'll have enough system resources to get the damn game to load.
- Real arcade style sticks as the norm.

The list goes on...and on....
 
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fickmichcommander

fickmichcommander

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kidpanda said:
I should have been more specific, the "new" indie guys don't get it, you're right, but I've seen some stuff for long time game industry veterans that I'm looking forward too mostly. Stuff like Braid and Fez didn't grab me like I thought they would. Here's to hoping ;)
Click to expand...

I had a completely unreasonable amount of fun playing VVVVVV, and I highly recommend it to any old school 2D platforming game fan. Super Meat Boy is likewise outstanding, but is more about reflexes and timing whereas VVVVVV is more of a brain bender.
 
cdamm

cdamm

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Neo Ash said:
Just think about all the stuff that most people under 20 and certainly those under 10 have no concept of.....

- Blowing in NES carts to make them work.
- The blinking red light on a NES telling you to blow into the cart.
- Inserting a cart.
- Waiting on slow ass single speed CD drives.
- Writing down code so you can pick up where you left off.
- Using a telephone line and a modem to dial up for multiplayer games.
- Booting a PC with a floppy that loads less shit into memory so you'll have enough system resources to get the damn game to load.
- Real arcade style sticks as the norm.

The list goes on...and on....
Click to expand...

my favorite was putting a cd into a separate cd cartridge then putting the cd cart into this autoloading door on my first cd-rom.
 
Castor Troy

Castor Troy

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There are plenty of little dipshits who play using a controller. You just need to play some CoD or Halo on the 360.
 
hyper

hyper

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get your kids a laptop and a wow account, recipe for success
 
fickmichcommander

fickmichcommander

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Have you guys ever seen an RCA CED Selectavision? Absolutely blew my mind:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitance_Electronic_Disc
Ced_cart2.jpg


Movies on vinyl, with weird caddy things that are ejected from the player when you put the movie in.

Some guy on Craigslist had an ad where he was selling a bunch of movies and the ad described them as Laserdiscs. There was no picture but I answered the ad and met the guy. He hands me a CED of Rocky III, and I'm like, what? This is not going to play in my LD player.
 
T

trenog

Gai's Trainer
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Dec 15, 2011
Posts
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I remember hearing from one person on a podcast where they said that they slowly got their son into video games by going up the bit progression tree. From NES on.

That sort of thing sounded amazing as it meant that they could understand the legacy of video games without a bias. Games would just get better for the kid over time without a need for console wars, release date fervor, or difficulty barriers discouraging one generation over the other.
 
El Maricon Loco

El Maricon Loco

Galford's Poppy Trainer,
Joined
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Posts
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trenog said:
I remember hearing from one person on a podcast where they said that they slowly got their son into video games by going up the bit progression tree. From NES on.

That sort of thing sounded amazing as it meant that they could understand the legacy of video games without a bias. Games would just get better for the kid over time without a need for console wars, release date fervor, or difficulty barriers discouraging one generation over the other.
Click to expand...

You gotta catch them young, once they get that outside influence they're going to want the new toy. Doesn't mean you have to buy it for them, or you can't force them to play old shit, but chances are they'll be at the neighbor's house playing on the new stuff.
 
S

SNKorSWM

So Many Posts
No Time
For Games.
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Joined
Feb 5, 2010
Posts
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Neo Ash said:
Just think about all the stuff that most people under 20 and certainly those under 10 have no concept of.....

- Blowing in NES carts to make them work.
- The blinking red light on a NES telling you to blow into the cart.
- Inserting a cart.
- Waiting on slow ass single speed CD drives.
- Writing down code so you can pick up where you left off.
- Using a telephone line and a modem to dial up for multiplayer games.
- Booting a PC with a floppy that loads less shit into memory so you'll have enough system resources to get the damn game to load.
- Real arcade style sticks as the norm.

The list goes on...and on....
Click to expand...

These days, when a game stops working on your 360, you need to send it back to M$ for repairs. Wonder how long of a wait that takes compared to a single speed CD drive. XD
 
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