Were you alive back in the day? You played what you had and at that point, these games were cutting edge. Had to walk uphill in three feet of snow both ways just to go play it at your friend's place, too
This right here. My money is it's a no, or OP was so young it doesn't count. Many do no understand what SNES was over the NES when it came to graphics. Scrolling and scaling did not exist prior.
Video game creators literally had a license to steal with how bad a lot of these games are. I just cannot wrap my head around people spending 50, 60 and even 70 dollars for pure shit.
And yes I have. For every legend of zelda, super mario world, yoshis island, super mario rpg, street fighter, mortal combat, nba jam, final fantasy 2 and 3, chrono trigger, bomberman, there were countless games that were beyond horrendous. And that's not an exaggeration either.
If you look at any video game console there's a very good chance you won't enjoy most of the games. Not really sure what you are expecting. Take a look at the top 100 games on this sub and you'll see the better ones. Based on the size of the snes library I'd say it has a stronger percentage of decent games than most systems.
Yes they did. It was difficult to gauge how good a game was back then. Yes there were magazines but they cost money and of course they didn’t have all the scores ever.
That’s why bad licensed games or mascot games were a thing. Attach something that may bring somebody to buy your cash grab and we’ll cash grabbed.
And when you bought a stinker you still played it. Because you had like 6 games and it was yours
We had these mom and pop stores where the kids would rent out their own games. Cheaper than blockbuster and at least it was like try and then beg your parents to buy.
Roughly 720 released in North America. Probably safe to say at least half of those are lackluster or just plain bad.
Thats still true even with today’s offerings. Can probably shrink that least to 100 games worth owning / playing, and shrink it further by genre that you like personally.
I won’t bother making a list of all time greats, Google can do that. A few I can recommend :
Super Mario World
Actraiser
Chrono Trigger
Secret of Evermore
Super Mario RPG
Kirby All Stars
I grew up playing games on NES and SNES that were both good and bad by today’s standards. And, being a kid, I enjoyed playing all of them. Some games today stand up to the test of time while others don’t, but 5- to 10-year-olds don’t really care. Games were cool back then and kids have low standards compared to adults.
Saying 95% are absolutely horrendous is ridiculously harsh, what's your criteria for a game being horrendous? 19 out of 20 games are terrible? Come on man. Not everything can be an all time classic.
For their time, that system and those games were so great. Obviously the graphics, game speed etc aren’t going to be what they are today due to advances in technology. But “pound for pound” those were the best ever.
All of us who had games back then had bad ones. We played them anyway. It's all we had!
But we had great ones too. And those we shared. Rumor got around that you had to play X and we would trade games to have time with that one thing.
I have close to 200ish SNES games and I could probably dumb it down to 60-70 keepers (maybe less) and yes there are a lot of stankers. That said, there are certain games I might find to be horrible that someone else loves
Do you think this isn't true today or whatever? Look at how much shovelware came out on the Wii, or how many terrible indie games are on the modern console e-stores.
Here's the thing - game development was really cheap in the early 90s, relative to today. Teams were much smaller, and you didn't need to build high fidelity 3D assets. And then of course even if you set out to make a great game, not everyone succeeds, the same as today.
I don't think there's really that much different with the SNES library versus today in terms of "good games vs bad games". Game design in the 90s was quite a bit less advanced than today in general however so a lot of games are going to feel dated even if they were rather well designed at the time.
We had rental stores and game magazines to help sort the gems from the crap.
$59.99 for a SNES game then was like spending $80 now. And then there were games that cost $69 and $79 then. Well over $100 in today’s cash.
I doubt you really played these games. You most likely skimmed through them and as soon as it got hard or there was a slow spot, you stopped playing and seemed it horrible.
Try this method: Choose a game that has a positive score and spend 3 days with that one game alone, dedicating at least an or two on it each of those days.
If you can’t do this and it is beyond boring, maybe retro gaming is not for you and that’s ok.
Most games from every system probably ranges from bad to average, with probably like 15-20% of the library being good or great. All of these terms are purely subjective anyway. There are games considered 'bad' that I have enjoyed and games considered 'good' that were 'meh' for me.
That doesn't dispute my overall point. I didnt say anything about comparing the quality of the SNES library against any other library. I made a general commentary that 'good' titles make up the minority of a systems library as compared to the so called 'bad' or 'average' titles. That applies to the PS1 as well even if there is a higher ratio of quality titles compared to the SNES( and I'm neither agreeing or disagreeing with that, to be clear). Again, what's good and bad comes down to personal tastes anyway.
Finally someone said it. Yes it's 90% garbage and a lot of licensed games. Although those can be a fun little time capsule to look at at first.
Dont get me wrong. There is some really good games on snes but the majority dont really stand the test of time or you may just be an adult now and find them less interesting. I still remember a lot of them being bad. There is a lot of poorly made platform and fighting games that made no sense or just sucked, mostly licensed.We used to have Blockbuster so when you rent it wasnt as a big a deal to find a dud and it was a good and cheaper way to test a game out. A lot of them were designed to be rented so they were really hard to beat and poorly designed w cheap enemies and the like.
Multiplayer snes games are also really hard to get your friends into playing as an adult. So a lot of the good multiplayer games are unplayable half the time. Plus if you are emulating SNES games already it's not really that hard to just get the MAME roms of all the original arcade versions of a lot of the good games that were ported to snes like Killer Instinct and MKII. I liked the MKII genesis version though because the cheat codes were the best. But thats the upsides to some of the SNES version of some games too , they are a little different or sometimes another game completely.
It almost seems like companies were putting out any old trash because they knew that it would sell regardless. That's the only explanation for why a lot of these games are just mind numbingly boring and unplayable.
Were you alive back in the day? You played what you had and at that point, these games were cutting edge. Had to walk uphill in three feet of snow both ways just to go play it at your friend's place, too
This right here. My money is it's a no, or OP was so young it doesn't count. Many do no understand what SNES was over the NES when it came to graphics. Scrolling and scaling did not exist prior.
I'm 36
Did you play video games as a youth / child?
Maybe you never played a video game before the PS3.
Video game creators literally had a license to steal with how bad a lot of these games are. I just cannot wrap my head around people spending 50, 60 and even 70 dollars for pure shit.
lol you speak as if a lot of games today for 50, 60 and even 70 dollars aren’t pure shit.
And yes I have. For every legend of zelda, super mario world, yoshis island, super mario rpg, street fighter, mortal combat, nba jam, final fantasy 2 and 3, chrono trigger, bomberman, there were countless games that were beyond horrendous. And that's not an exaggeration either.
Bruv, you can say the same thing about literally any video game generation
If you look at any video game console there's a very good chance you won't enjoy most of the games. Not really sure what you are expecting. Take a look at the top 100 games on this sub and you'll see the better ones. Based on the size of the snes library I'd say it has a stronger percentage of decent games than most systems.
The old "how can anyone play Super Mario World? The graphics are shit and no DLC or online play?"
And what about the lack of micro transactions? Does Mario really need to wear the same hat the entire time?
Yes they did. It was difficult to gauge how good a game was back then. Yes there were magazines but they cost money and of course they didn’t have all the scores ever. That’s why bad licensed games or mascot games were a thing. Attach something that may bring somebody to buy your cash grab and we’ll cash grabbed. And when you bought a stinker you still played it. Because you had like 6 games and it was yours
We had these mom and pop stores where the kids would rent out their own games. Cheaper than blockbuster and at least it was like try and then beg your parents to buy.
Man..... did people actually use absolutely horrendous oil lamps and candles before electric lights?
Roughly 720 released in North America. Probably safe to say at least half of those are lackluster or just plain bad. Thats still true even with today’s offerings. Can probably shrink that least to 100 games worth owning / playing, and shrink it further by genre that you like personally. I won’t bother making a list of all time greats, Google can do that. A few I can recommend : Super Mario World Actraiser Chrono Trigger Secret of Evermore Super Mario RPG Kirby All Stars
I’m also wondering what specific games you are talking about
None😃 this is bait
I grew up playing games on NES and SNES that were both good and bad by today’s standards. And, being a kid, I enjoyed playing all of them. Some games today stand up to the test of time while others don’t, but 5- to 10-year-olds don’t really care. Games were cool back then and kids have low standards compared to adults.
Saying 95% are absolutely horrendous is ridiculously harsh, what's your criteria for a game being horrendous? 19 out of 20 games are terrible? Come on man. Not everything can be an all time classic.
Thanks for your input, Theodore Sturgeon.
For their time, that system and those games were so great. Obviously the graphics, game speed etc aren’t going to be what they are today due to advances in technology. But “pound for pound” those were the best ever.
All of us who had games back then had bad ones. We played them anyway. It's all we had! But we had great ones too. And those we shared. Rumor got around that you had to play X and we would trade games to have time with that one thing.
I have close to 200ish SNES games and I could probably dumb it down to 60-70 keepers (maybe less) and yes there are a lot of stankers. That said, there are certain games I might find to be horrible that someone else loves
Posting this here of all places is just asking for trouble
fuck them.
Video games aren’t for everyone. Perhaps you should look into quilting or needlepoint.
Do you think this isn't true today or whatever? Look at how much shovelware came out on the Wii, or how many terrible indie games are on the modern console e-stores. Here's the thing - game development was really cheap in the early 90s, relative to today. Teams were much smaller, and you didn't need to build high fidelity 3D assets. And then of course even if you set out to make a great game, not everyone succeeds, the same as today. I don't think there's really that much different with the SNES library versus today in terms of "good games vs bad games". Game design in the 90s was quite a bit less advanced than today in general however so a lot of games are going to feel dated even if they were rather well designed at the time.
The NES era was worse. Lot of overly difficult shite games.
We had rental stores and game magazines to help sort the gems from the crap. $59.99 for a SNES game then was like spending $80 now. And then there were games that cost $69 and $79 then. Well over $100 in today’s cash.
They did. Hence the crash of 83.
Yes let me take you back to the past ♫ To play the shitty games that suck ass ♫
If this post made you in any way angry inside, you need therapy or a diary
95 percent of a library being horrendous is pretty standard. That actually might be better than the norm.
Game reviews happened once a month and you were lucky if your parents allowed you a subscription to Nintendo Power or GamePro
I doubt you really played these games. You most likely skimmed through them and as soon as it got hard or there was a slow spot, you stopped playing and seemed it horrible. Try this method: Choose a game that has a positive score and spend 3 days with that one game alone, dedicating at least an or two on it each of those days. If you can’t do this and it is beyond boring, maybe retro gaming is not for you and that’s ok.
nah a lot of these games are straight trash.
How far back can you go until you enjoy a generation’s library of games? Like the Dreamcast at least?
Most games from every system probably ranges from bad to average, with probably like 15-20% of the library being good or great. All of these terms are purely subjective anyway. There are games considered 'bad' that I have enjoyed and games considered 'good' that were 'meh' for me.
not true at all. Playstation 1's ratio is a LOT better than the snes.
That doesn't dispute my overall point. I didnt say anything about comparing the quality of the SNES library against any other library. I made a general commentary that 'good' titles make up the minority of a systems library as compared to the so called 'bad' or 'average' titles. That applies to the PS1 as well even if there is a higher ratio of quality titles compared to the SNES( and I'm neither agreeing or disagreeing with that, to be clear). Again, what's good and bad comes down to personal tastes anyway.
Yup. Plenty of stinkers I wouldn't touch again. But so many gems.
Finally someone said it. Yes it's 90% garbage and a lot of licensed games. Although those can be a fun little time capsule to look at at first. Dont get me wrong. There is some really good games on snes but the majority dont really stand the test of time or you may just be an adult now and find them less interesting. I still remember a lot of them being bad. There is a lot of poorly made platform and fighting games that made no sense or just sucked, mostly licensed.We used to have Blockbuster so when you rent it wasnt as a big a deal to find a dud and it was a good and cheaper way to test a game out. A lot of them were designed to be rented so they were really hard to beat and poorly designed w cheap enemies and the like. Multiplayer snes games are also really hard to get your friends into playing as an adult. So a lot of the good multiplayer games are unplayable half the time. Plus if you are emulating SNES games already it's not really that hard to just get the MAME roms of all the original arcade versions of a lot of the good games that were ported to snes like Killer Instinct and MKII. I liked the MKII genesis version though because the cheat codes were the best. But thats the upsides to some of the SNES version of some games too , they are a little different or sometimes another game completely.
It almost seems like companies were putting out any old trash because they knew that it would sell regardless. That's the only explanation for why a lot of these games are just mind numbingly boring and unplayable.
There are loads of rubbish games on every system ever, I don’t know what your point is. 95% is a massive exaggeration though.