Video-game remakes: The business of nostalgia

EDITOR'S NOTEfrom Jay Henningsen

I've fallen prey to nostalgia myself. I certainly own enough copies of the older Final Fantasy games. I liked the originals, and updated graphics certainly don't offend my sensibilities. Though I often question the motivations of the publishers, I also can't complain about getting a second chance to play great games that I missed the first time. Perhaps I'm part of the problem, but some games are just great no matter how many times we see them republished.

Nostalgia is a fickle mistress. It’s a concept firmly rooted in that aspect of human nature that finds us dwelling on the past, trying to recapture it -- or at least the feelings that we had. Nostalgia, like everything else in contemporary American society, is a tool that companies use to sell things to us. Familiarity with a product is high on the list of potential selling points. It’s why you shop or eat at chain stores; when you go to Target, it’s the same layout with the same products no matter where you are in the country.

Now, I doubt many of us harbor nostalgic notions of our memories of department stores and fast-food brand names. We seem to reserve the term “nostalgia” largely for entertainment properties. You can complain about it, but it probably won’t matter if you do. Film studios and game developers will continue to remake old classics. They made money before, so doesn’t it make sense that they would make money again? Some of these remakes will be good and some of them will be atrociously bad. There’s only one thing we don’t know for sure: who’s to blame?

Good idea? Bad idea? Somewhere in between?

By my estimation, every Mario title that I’ve owned I've purchased on at least two platforms. I had the original Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 2, and Super Mario Bros. 3 for the NES. I later got these on the SNES in the form of Super Mario All-Stars, which was also my first experience with Super Mario World. Then I owned all of these again in miniature cartridge form for the Game Boy Advance.

Super Mario 64 graced me with its presence on both N64 and Nintendo DS. I played New Super Mario Bros. on DS and the Wii, though I’m aware that they’re not the same game. Mario Kart I’ve played in multiple iterations from NES all the way up through the Wii. If I had my own Wii, I’d probably own some of these titles yet again on the Virtual Console. And that’s just Mario. My father used to own an arcade cabinet version of Galaga. Now I own it on my Xbox. My game library on my Xbox 360 also houses Paperboy, Duke Nukem 3D, Doom, and Doom 2, among other things.

Thanks, Wii, but no - this one still works just fine.

I’ve played every title in the main series of the Pokémon franchise -- which ostensibly has been selling gamers the same basic storyline since its inception. Why? It’s not just for slightly tweaked battle mechanics or new creatures. I’m still trying to recapture those days from my childhood when that game was my world. Nintendo and Game Freak know this just as well as I do.

If Goldeneye 007 ever appeared on Xbox Live Arcade, I would download it on day one without any hesitation whatsoever.The prospect of a 3D remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time enticed me slightly, but what actually sold me on the 3DS was the announcement of the Virtual Console service. If Nintendo puts the original Pokémon up for download, I will buy it. If they don’t, then they are immeasurably stupid.

Why can't these publishers just agree that they'd all make a ton of money?

How do we evaluate this situation? Who is to blame? The fact is that there may not be anyone to blame. Maybe this nostalgia business isn’t a bad thing. That doesn’t mean we should be naïve. I’m sure that a 3D remake of Ocarina of Time launching with a new handheld is a highly calculated business decision. Nintendo knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that many gamers will rush out to purchase their products based on familiarity and memories or an established franchise.

But that doesn’t mean that it can’t be good. I’m going to be honest; I never actually owned Ocarina of Time. Yes, I realize that this is tantamount to heresy. If the reviews are satisfactory, I’ll probably pick it up and experience this classic from beginning to end for the first time. Not all remakes are bad. The reimagining of the first four entries in the Pokémon series (Fire Red, Leaf Green, HeartGold and SoulSilver) were all fantastically fun and stayed true to the originals.

Gamers shouldn’t get mad when companies decide to strip-mine their childhood for cash. That game that you loved when you were younger still exists. If someone decided to remake Star Wars, I would probably fight tooth and nail to stop it, but when I failed, I’d probably still be the first in line. That remake stands a chance of actually being good. It could perfectly capture what you loved about the title as a child and conjure up positive memories. If it doesn’t, let them know and then go play the original.

Tags: Mario Kart, Doom, super mario bros. 3, Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Super Mario Bros. 2, Galaga, Super Mario 64, GoldenEye 007, Super Mario All-Stars, New Super Mario Bros., Duke Nukem 3D, Doom 2, Paperboy, Pokémon HeartGold, Pokémon SoulSilver, Pokémon, Pokémon Fire Red, Pokémon Leaf Green

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Gregory Morton

January 27, 2011

I'm big about remakes, but only if they're done right.

As fun as Metroid: Zero Mission was, I felt like it was doing too much hand-holding like Metroid Fusion instead of the subtle guidance and freedom of Super Metroid.

FFIII, from first glance, seems to be a perfect remake, but when you play more of it, it turns out at times to be rather unbalanced and a boring grindfest(Protip: Increase your job level once per battle by using Guard/Defend multiple times). It felt like Matrix didn't actually do enough to change it.

One of the Most Triumphant Examples for a remake done right has to be Quake Live. All id did was: add matchmaking, include dedicated server support, and just make it run smoothly in a browser amidst the online carnage.

I'm pumped like a bicycle waiting for Ys I & II Chronicles. Once I purchase a PSP, both that game, and Oath In Felghana will be my first purchases.

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Demian Omen Gerli

Actually for me, the main factor in remakes is hoping that, somehow, an already great game can be made even greater. It is actually the same for cover songs, sometimes a band manages to put out a cover song that is even better than the original.
So, it's not nostalgia that drives me but the fun that I can have with the game again, on some other console too. I really can't stress how much I'd love to play many games that I fondly remember from my Commodore64 on the PC or console. Unfortunately there have been some remakes already (like Space Taxi on the C64) remade on the pc by some cheap companies that managed to horribly butcher some very simple and basic gameplay. Like Space Taxi 2. My god, that was horrible. Even the remakes made on the retroremakes forum were better than that. Way better.

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Chase Koeneke

January 28, 2011

Great piece. Nostalgia usually seems to get a bad rap, but I've found it to make things better more often than not.

I've also given some thought to the Game Boy Pokemon games being released on the 3DS' Virtual Console. It sounds like a no-brainer, but I'd be very anxious to learn how Nintendo would incoporate the multiplayer aspects of those games. Obviously, link cables have gone the way of the dinosaur, but do you think Nintendo would go to the trouble of incorporating a wireless link instead?

My fingers are firmly crossed, but I'm not so sure we'll the Red and Blue on the 3DS.

Who here wouldn't want to see the first four RE games(Code Veronica, not RE4) given a total makeover in game mechanics a la RE4. If they just change that aspect, as well as render the entire backgrounds in full 3D(it's possible nowadays anyway), gameplay might turn out infinitely better.