Games you loved as a kid that aged poorly?

[Ronnie]

Sonic Adventure 2. It was the reason I wanted a Gamecube. I thought the story was really cool and dark. I enjoyed playing every part of the game except Rouge. Now I just think it has awkward animations, mediocre story, and I only like the Sonic/Shadow levels. I'll always love the soundtrack and multiplayer though.

And I know I'm not the only one who would climb to the very top of Meteor Herd and then drill claw all the way to the ground.

[DarkDestr0yer61]

Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly

It wasn't even good back then. I had no standards when I was 8

[Zapp Branniglenn]

The Hobbit (PS2): The Hobbit lends itself well to a video game adaptation. Stealth, adventure, and some light combat. This game's got it all. Unfortunately, lots of major sequences from the book were relegated to cutscenes while a lot of gameplay objectives feel like filler. This game is slow paced and surprisingly difficult. In particular, the lockpicking minigame for booby trapped chests is a series of reflex events that are barely completable on a non-CRT television due to increased input lag of modern screens. Bilbo himself is a wimp, struggling to fight creatures, drowning when you fall into water, and plenty of pathetic death scenes during stealth segments. It's true to the book, but makes me wish there were a checkpoint system rather than infrequent save stations. It would take you over ten hours to beat this game for the first time, but I'd sooner recommend marathoning the movie trilogy. 

Army Men: Sarge's Heroes (N64): I couldn't get far in this game as a kid. But I went for a full replay as an adult and it's pretty rough. Most of the levels are trial and error of remembering enemy positions. Enemies do not move, so a well placed grenade or finding the right angle with your sniper rifle are your greatest tools. While I could still have fun showing off the game to friends as a novelty, I feel like the only way to beat most levels is to abuse the non-existant enemy AI and pray that you have the firepower to take on those deadly tanks. Every level feels like it's a perfect run, and I just don't like that kind of stress and fear of failure since death takes you back to the start of the mission.

[Etrurian emperor]

Sonic adventure 2 is also my choice. I cannot believe I didn't notice those audio problems as a kid. I'm fine with the robot levels but the treasure hunts really didn't hold up when played by an older gamer. 

I'll defend the story though. Gerald is kind of a highlight as far as Sonic stories go. 

[edgelordweeaboo]

1 hour ago, DarkDestr0yer61 said:

Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly

It wasn't even good back then. I had no standards when I was 8

When I first played this game I was like 6 or 7 years old and I really liked it up until a point where I couldn't figured out where to go. I tried to play the game again a few years back and it was pretty bad

[Reality]

S.C.A.R.S. (N64) - I played a lot of this for some reason. I really like it's power up system, and more importantly, it was the first racing game I ever played that ever required use of the brakes due to having real corners (as opposed to the stuff I drifted around in my exclusively kart gaming experience before). Playing it today... It kind of re-uses level themes, and the Daytime Nighttime setting were obviously far to ambitious for the N64, resulting in the. Also it's a progression racer, and you pretty much have to abandon your old vehicles and use new ones (which are better in all categories) which is sad because of the excellent themeing of all the cars. Such a system makes sense in a Forza or Gran Turismo, but considering this game uses powerups and in all other aspects is an arcade-style racer, they should have just roughly balanced them between different accleration/handling/top speed so that every vehicle would at least be playable. 

Lego Racer (N64) - Car customization is far more limited than it needs to be for a Lego game. A lot of the levels have a little personality, but at the same time, they also have awkward and blocky corners. The power up system in this game (especialy the teleport) was not thought out well at all. Having to play the races in Mirror mode in  the entire second half of the Grand Prix is disapointing. 

Billy Hatcher (GCN) - As a 3D platforming game, it has kind of a sloppy physics system which makes it unfun to me. I think that in many ways, it is worse than 3rd string 6th gen platform games like Dr. Muto and Vexx. It does have moments of brilliance in the later levels. A lot of the game's most interesting powerups (the circus hat that lets you ride on top of the egg or the psychic hat that let you remotely control the egg) are only used as a gimmick in maybe 1 level. Needing to ground pound to use your basic double jump  makes the game, very, very slow. The game also loosely tries to incentivice playing for score with Sega's rank system, but it's not really warranted (although it makes the combat a little less stale when you go for combos instead of Katamari Damacy-ing the enemies). The game also has WAY too many levels based around giant slides. 

Rayman Arena (GCN) - I still really want to love this game to this day. Because Rayman 2 was  that good.  The game is pretty unique as a racing game because you play  the levels on foot as an obstacle course. Main mechanics include grappling purple lums (ala Rayman 2) and managing slides (which unlike the above game, is a good thing, because of the amount of control you have on them)  Many of the levels have tons of shortcuts, to the point of feeling like a Sonic game (upper paths=fast, ground level paths=slow). The game also has a bunch of bonus modes which are of a lot worse quality than the basic races (the combat part of the game).  The game is not really good to  introduce to other people as a multiplayer game, because it doesn't equalize skill gaps between players the way something like Mario Kart does, and is a little too dependent on memorizing all the secret stuff in all the levels. 

Steambot Chronicles (PS2) - Steambot Chronicles is a VERY unique game that can be roughly be classified as a sandbox game (ala Grand Theft Auto). However, unlike GTA/Uncharted/Far Cry, it's a lot less over the top with it's physics, and the game stays PG and morally non-threatening. The game has a good setting (steampunk mechs against early industrial era Edwardian-esque architecture) , a good artstyle (cel shading mostly), tons of side content (collecting stuff for a museum, running a band, playing billiards, a stock market, expanding the train line, etc etc), a decent story, a lot of humor (my favorite  being the All Angels Have Wings reference) , and replayability (You have 3-4 options for nearly every conversation, and there are 3 major endings). The game seems to do everything right, but it all comes down due to one thing.... THE CORE GAMEPLAY. Remember when I said that this game uses Steampunk Mechs? Well, they've got non-bindable Tank Controls! This alone wouldn't be bad, but the game's combat engine is very poor- The game creates tons of lag whenever an enemy dies, whenever a ranged weapon is used, and sometimes just because certain areas are way more crowded than they should be. And while Tank Controls in actual tank games where you have ranged weapons aren't too bad, having tank controls in a game with primarily melee combat is so much worse. Finally, the lock on automatically disengages pretty much whenever it wants to and you have to manually re-lock on (and getting hit by many attacks will spin you 180 degrees to make it worse). If I have to look at it in retrospect, Steambot Chronicles is a total trainwreck. But all the non-combat parts of the game are truly great, and the three main towns in Steambot Chronicles are my favorites in any video game. 

Pokemon Stadium (N64) - Thunder Wave + Confuse Ray. A computer Alakazam with Perfect DVs that could 2HKO the rental Chansey. Gen1 speed based crit rate. Trainers with full Horn drill teams. Minimize and Double Team. The amount of hyper obnoxious stuff in Pokemon Stadium is almost impossible to imagine.  I do think that the glorious announcer and the minigames make it fun to revisit occasionally, but if my cart got corrupted, I definitely, definitely, would not bother beating Round 2 again. Pokemon Stadium 2 is less obnoxious because Mirror Coat/Counter/Destiny Bond makes it playable with Rentals only. Even with the addition of the new status move Attract to list of gimmick trainers.

There's probbably a dozen other games I could bring up.Bomberman Hero. But these six are enough for tonight with me losing internet connection constantly. 

[Punished Dayni]

1 hour ago, DarkDestr0yer61 said:

Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly

It wasn't even good back then. I had no standards when I was 8

I can't even say I had that high an opinion when I had it. That game was the first thing I truely disliked (that stuck and hadn't stupid reasoning) and I think is where my cynicism came from.

Pretty much every early pokemon game feels it's rickity age except, oddly and annoyingly enough, the Hoenn titles. You know, the region I liked the least before Kalos happened. 

I came to the conclusion that GTA really only got all that good with SA and VC certainly was good unclean fun between myself and my brother. VC always felt a bit off with its running.

Should I count something like LEGO Loco? I mean, was it a game? Because if so, that might count.

[Dandy Druid]

Harvest Moon A Wonderful Life. Especially the Special Edition, which has some frame rate issues.

[LucarioGamer812]

Ummm, most of my games were fairly decent. I guess probably my oldest remembered game would be Pokemon Firered. I still have it but I find it so tedious to play especially when only the elite 4 is left and all you can do is slowly grind levels.

Also lego star wars 2 on the gba, I haven't touched it in years but I remember it being lackluster and boring even back then. Then lego star wars 3 on the ds and wii kept me better entertained.

I want to dedicate one last slot to a more recent game, Fossil Fighter Frontier. Oh gods how the mighty have fallen. It's not bad but nowhere as good as the original or the prequel. I played the original a lot and got champions a few years ago (still need to finish playing it whenever I decide to) but I got heavily dissapointed by this newest one and I guess this is an example of amazing games as a kid but terrible sequels later in life.

[Moblin Major General]

Gen 1 Pokémon- I shouldn't even have to explain this one.

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire- I really sucked at this one when I was 6, but I went back and played it and realized that it wasn't just me that was the problem, as the controls took getting used to, and there are some stages I still really haven't finished.

[Rezzy]

Dragon Warrior 3 or pretty much any RPG from the NES or SNES.  The ports add so many quality of life improvements that it's hard to go back and play the originals.

[Elieson]

Phantasy Star 2 (Sega Genesis) and Lufia Fortress of Doom (SNES). The overworld is soooooo big and you walk soooooo sloooowwwly. I also never realized how broken the leveling system in PS2 is...you basically gain no stats outside of hp/mp but the game doesnt care, so you cant even comfortably grinding

Edited February 2, 2018 by Elieson

[Will O'Donnell]

Star Fox, when Adventures and the one in the DS had released. Period.

[henrymidfields]

+1 with the sprites of Pokemon RBY. That is all.

[Water Mage]

I’m going to chose to the Sonic Adveture 2 as well. And the first one as well. It’s interesting because when compared to it’s “counterpart”, Super Mario 64 doesn’t feel dated at all. Actually, I don’t think there is such a thing as a Mario game that feels dated. Even most of the spin-offs don’t feel as dated.

[Tamanoir]

2 hours ago, henrymidfields said:

+1 with the sprites of Pokemon RBY. That is all.

If only the sprites was the only problem... Yellow Sprites (the front ones at least. NBAcksprites didn't change) are somewhat good (they looks like their official arts at least).
Absolutely nothing works. The system is clunky and slow as hell, events happened one after another with no rhyme nor reasons, and you have absolutely no clues where to go next. Pokémons are all incredibly broken (Psychic Type anyone). Add that the really limited movepool with Pokémons keeping Leer or Sand Throw until late game.(something that won't be fixed until gen 3 at least.)... And the epilleptic animations... And the fact the game is freaking short. l. C
apturing 400 Pokémon in USUM is far less tedious than 150 in Gen 1.
The best thing  about those games are the glitches (and the glitches are really amazing).

The worst thing is that gen 1 became outdated as soon as Gen 2 appeared. Gen 2 is far from perfect, but it added so damn much it's not even funny. And Gen 2 really makes the Pokémon world feel like a real place. I played recently Yellow while waiting for Crystal, and the gap is really impressive.

I still like Gen 1, mainly because of the translation, but there's nothing wrong with liking bad things. And Gen 1 wasn't even that good to begin with. The concept is great, but that's about it.

[Hawkwing]

If this thread was about movies, we'd all have longer lists.

Anyway, as for the actual topic:

Atari Games (yes, I had an Atari, despite being born at a time that 3D games were considered commonplace. Heck, most of my gaming library consists of old games):

Spoiler

Robot Tank: I like the idea of a day/night cycle, and that getting hit by an enemy won't automatically kill you but will instead remove a function of your tank. However, the night stages get ridiculously dark, last longer than they need to, and your radar and visibility, which help out during said stages, can get destroyed when you take damage, so a fun tank game can easily become "shoot blindly in the dark and hope you hit something while you hope you dodge a bullet you can only track through sound in time."

Firefly: It ain't trippy, but I wonder what the heck is going on during this game. I think the only reason I enjoyed it as a kid was the music and the fact that it repeated while increasing the difficulty.

Berserk: You can die by running into walls, and so can your enemies, which you can also trick into shooting each other, all while trying to traverse through a maze. Honestly, the games cover art and my imagination helped make the game seem more awesome than it was as a kid.

Army Men: Major Malfunction (XBOX)-This game is painfully average at best and sloppily workable at worst. The storyline's fine, all the weapons are fun and useful in their own way (and in true Army Men tradition, the flamethrower doesn't suck) and many, in not all, of the levels are aesthetically creative:

Spoiler

The basement has you maneuvering across shelfs filled with paint and tools, fighting on of a crafting table, and escaping from a prison made literally of cardboard boxes. The kitchen is decorated with halloween decorations, with cereal boxes and food as platforms, zombie toys bursting out of a cake. The bathroom is a weapon supply base, with toothbrushes and toothpaste being made into cover, and you blow up an oil tanker in the bathtub. Needless to say, they take great advantage of you being the size of a toy with the level design.

However, the game has a lot more stealth sections than they needed to have, despite them being surprisingly well done, and you have to restart the level all over again whenever you die or fail an objective. The controls have the "work fine in normal gameplay, but not for precise platforming" problem, and the tan soldiers are replaced by expy's of toys (such as lego's, GI Joe figures, a tank enemy is based of a transformer, etc.) as enemies, which adds to the variety but removes some of the charm. The game also had an extremely annoying escort mission, with the person being slow and weak, and every enemy targeting them, which isn't helped by the mission starting off with one of the games few boss fights.

Tak 2: Staff of Dreams (XBOX)- It's not aged per se, it's just that it's more questionable design flaws become more apparent as I grow older. Not to mention the beginning half and latter half of this game are very different from each other, and not necessarily in a good way. The first half of the game is very well balanced between providing cutscenes for the story and getting back to gameplay, and the transitions between the levels in the real world and those of the dream world make sense from a story perspective. It also helps that the story is simple yet interesting, and the humor and cutscenes are very well done, and it really does seem like you're watching a one of the better Nickelodeon cartoons. However, at the halfway mark, the game focuses almost entirely on gameplay, switching between the real world and the dream world at a whim, and it feels as if the cutscenes appear at random intervals (though thankfully, their content IS always story or gameplay related, and the humor is still strong). They also pull a mean move gameplaywise at the halfway mark, as you can choose a single animal power to have as an extra attack, with the game hinting that there is a "best" one. What the game doesn't tell you, however, is that your choice is permanent, and you have no way of knowing exactly what said attack is or does until after you've made your choice, as all you have to go off of is the name of the animal to make your decision.

[Omegaprism]

When I was a kid I was really into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If I could have, I would have themed my entire life around those green boys and their colorful masks. Instead of getting a SNES for Christmas one year, I got a Sega Genesis, and that was fine. It had a few TMNT games, such as the Hyperstone Heist. One of these Genesis turtles games was TMNT: Tournament Fighters. I loved it with all of my being, and I played the hell out of that cart just trying to beat the final bosses. While many people got into fighting games because of Street Fighter, I learned to be a fighting games guy from the ninja turtles.

Decades later I found another copy and, afloat on nostalgia, booted it up to see how it had aged. The verdict: terrible. Everything I had learned about fighting games in the intervening years bashed against the incredibly stiff controls and harsh design decisions, and I suffered that fate that all people who grow up and develop taste know: I knew I could never recapture those good times as a boy in the early nineties, and I knew that it was because I was a dumb kid, and ignorance is bliss.

[Ronnie]

45 minutes ago, Omegaprism said:

When I was a kid I was really into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If I could have, I would have themed my entire life around those green boys and their colorful masks. Instead of getting a SNES for Christmas one year, I got a Sega Genesis, and that was fine. It had a few TMNT games, such as the Hyperstone Heist. One of these Genesis turtles games was TMNT: Tournament Fighters. I loved it with all of my being, and I played the hell out of that cart just trying to beat the final bosses. While many people got into fighting games because of Street Fighter, I learned to be a fighting games guy from the ninja turtles.

Decades later I found another copy and, afloat on nostalgia, booted it up to see how it had aged. The verdict: terrible. Everything I had learned about fighting games in the intervening years bashed against the incredibly stiff controls and harsh design decisions, and I suffered that fate that all people who grow up and develop taste know: I knew I could never recapture those good times as a boy in the early nineties, and I knew that it was because I was a dumb kid, and ignorance is bliss.

Try tournament fighters for SNES. MUCH BETTER game. Plays like Super Turbo.

https://youtu.be/syJzAxxC56Y?t=5m30s

Edited February 5, 2018 by Ronnie

[Azure Sen]

On 2/1/2018 at 8:22 PM, Hylian Air Force said:

Gen 1 Pokémon- I shouldn't even have to explain this one.

Seconded. I'll always be happy for what Gen 1 started, but in terms of actual gameplay their age shows badly. I'd actually say GSC have aged poorly too, personally; while they did add some stuff to the series they have a huge number of equally dated and poorly functioning mechanics, and arguably even worse Pokemon distribution and moveset balance than Gen 1.

[Shoblongoo]

On 2/1/2018 at 8:22 PM, Hylian Air Force said:

Gen 1 Pokémon

still classic 

_____________

N64 Goldeneye. I love you. The modern First Person Shooter would not exist without you.

You gave me some of my earliest multiplayer gaming memories.

But omg--you've aged worse than Ron Jeremy. 

[John Denver Fan]

Super Mario Galaxy, I got it when I was 7, it was too hard for me to progress, the Hungry Lumas was a major roadblock for me because I didn't know how to feed them, other than the hard gameplay it was good. So yeah, the Hungry Lumas made the game bad for me.

[Sentacotus]

Ocarina of Time and MM on N64 especially after the 3DS remake their polygonal textures did not age well at all.  Plus the touch screen to switch those damn iron boots is a life saver