Has the N64 aged worse than the NES?

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

I'm probably the wrong person to weigh in here, but I've always thought the N64 was hot garbage.  There were maybe 2-3 games that I had any fun playing, but primarily because they were only available on that platform (SOTE & Conker's, although in the day a friend and I did have a bunch of fun with a couple of South Park games).  By the time it came out, having a PC was commonplace and, I hate to say it, it had already lost the race in comparison to budget home PCs of the era.

I still enjoy both the NES and the 2600, but just don't understand what people get out of that Godawful controller and awkward "gems" like Mario 64 and Goldeneye.  If you didn't have access to a PC and it was your first console, I can conceptually understand loving it at the time and having some nostalgia for it, but with more exposure to other things (of the era and not) I just don't get it.  The N64 has definitely aged worse than the NES.

[peg | 370]

Is it even a question?  The N64 was bad the day it was released.

[Dr. Morbis | 2,088]

If you have to ask...

Seriously though, this almost seems like a troll post: asking a question with such a ridiculously obvious answer...

Edited November 29, 2020 by Dr. Morbis

[CMR | 518]

Can you really compare the two?  NES has a huge and diverse library compared to the N64. How about has Mario 64 aged better than Super Mario Bros.?

Edited November 29, 2020 by CMR

[fcgamer | 4,719]

The only people that think NES aged horribly are those who aren't playing it as it's meant to be played, on a crt.

N64 generally looks like ass no matter what it's played on, these days

[OptOut | 8,880]

Oh my God you guys are ALL going on mute! All of you, Jesus! 

 

 

[fox | 1,665]

I played Mario 64 and Mario 35 this year.  Both aged fine.  Good games are still good games.

[GPX | 1,369]

I wonder if perceptions here might change if a hypothetical sealed left bros Mario 64 sells on HA for $150,000? 

[fcgamer | 4,719]

57 minutes ago, OptOut said:

Oh my God you guys are ALL going on mute! All of you, Jesus! 

 

 

Maybe if you gave me a good N64 game that aged well, like Mario Photopi, then I'd change my mind

[Webhead123 | 675]

The "fifth console generation", marked by 3-D graphics, disc-based storage and analog controls, was a huge leap both in the technology itself and in the amount of overhead required to understand, evolve and maintain it. It was a very clumsy, experimental time for the industry and, as such, not all of it worked. By comparison, the NES and its packmates of the "third generation" had come out of close to an entire decade of testing and development on gaming in 2-D. The NES had the benefit of learning from many conventions which the N64 simply did not.

Yes, the N64 (and its generational contemporaries) have not aged as well as most of their immediate predecessors but that is the price of being a pioneer into bold, new territory. However, much as Pong, Atari, Magnavox, etc. paved the way for the NES, the N64, PS, etc. would lay out a new path for the future of gaming.

[RH | 4,894]

3 hours ago, ThePhleo said:

I compare the N64 to the Atari 2600. Highly innovative for the time, but just not truly an enjoyable experience today for most people.

This, 100%. My first console ever was a 2600. By the late-90s I had a N64 and PlayStation. ThoughtI had more PSX titles, I'd say I loved both systems about as well as the other. I still love them, but because I was so young, I don't care to relive the 2600 says, but I love the NES.

Regardless, the 2600 was of the era where a lot of experimentation was taking place for home console gaming and the consumer bought a lot of games with a strong appreciation of the current tech that also had a foundation of future hopes and expectation. In other words, the early at-home gamers of the late-70s and early-80s enjoyed their blocky, rough graphics because they had a taste for the future, but there was an unspoken understanding that this was a stair-step you had to accept, but it was still fun due to your hope for future innovation.

Fast forward about 15 years and we move into the 3D age of console gaming. The roughness of early 3D systems and refining of new controllers to match the environments weren't necessarily expected but widely accepted because we were just waiting and longing for the breakthrough into 3D environments. We overlooked a lot on the N64, PSX and Saturn because 3D felt like the future, all the while our favorite 2D gaming studios were having to learn how to program in 3D space AND build fun games, which to me makes Super Mario 64 all the more impressive since if holds up so we'll and was Nintendo's first real 3D game.

Now, the NES and maybe SMS are more comparable to the GameCube/PS2/Xbox era. The major dev studios have now learned how to make 3D games and all they were waiting for was competent hardware coming into the new millennium. The NES was enough of an upgrade that the well experienced devs of the earlier generations could breakthrough the many walls they struggled with on the limited systems like the 2600, Commodore or Intellivision. The NES actually allowed for graphics that were getting close to being cartoony, much rather than blocky.

I assume you chose the NES vs the N64 because they are Nintendo consoles but it's just not a fair generational comparison. The NES built off of the zeitgeist of the crap we accepted from early home gaming systems and Nintendo lucked out by finding a way to elbow into a closed, and declared dead, market space. The N64, however, had to forge new ground with the rest of its competition and I think it did well.

Still, you can't expect any system to age well when it's breaking such a major barrier. I love the N64 and can still play it, but I understand why it can feel rough to a younger generation. 3D gaming on the whole simply needed further refinement, which it really gets in the generation that came around 2000.

 

 

[a_profile_name | 230]

I play the n64 every day, and I think the graphics are still beautiful.

As far as gameplay goes, there are some general design flaws that repeat themselves in games (most notably camera angles and landscapes way too large in platformers). But thats understantable because these were the first games of this kind. So Mario 64 is amazing no matter how much it makes me feel sorry for Laikatu and his camera handling skills.

Also, the controller is great and I don't see any problem with it. They don't break if you don't play MarioParty1.

I think the graphics get hate because they do look awful on modern screens. Also, it's sort of an uncanny valley that makes it worse to have 240p with 3d graphics that kind of look like what games look today. I guess NES games get more grace from people given their age, and the N64 is expected to be modern. Even though the n64 launch is closer to the NES launch then to present day.

[a_profile_name | 230]

23 minutes ago, RH said:

I assume you chose the NES vs the N64 because they are Nintendo consoles but it's just not a fair generational comparison. The NES built off of the zeitgeist of the crap we accepted from early home gaming systems and Nintendo lucked out by finding a way to elbow into a closed, and declared dead, market space. The N64, however, had to forge new ground with the rest of its competition and I think it did well.

 

 

I disagree. For me a lot of it has to do with the design language of the games and how much of it stayed relevant. In these terms, both the n64 and the NES introduced game design elements that were innovative and hence unrefined. But the ideas stayed relevant up to this day.

Part have it has to do with technology. Take graphics for example - in 2600 games you hardly have any real effort to make the sprites look like what they represent, and you can only guess it from the game title (are these two squares cowboys shooting at each other or spaceships? ect.). Much of this has to do with the technology available, and people could forgive the limitations on the NES because e.g. the gameboy had the same limitations and had games coming out up to 2001.

However, it's not only technology. One of the biggest changes in the NES era is that they satrted putting designers in charge of making games (instead of programmers). Before that, good games were probably just a happy mistake. In the n64 era this was already the standard that games need design and just programming, so non-shovelweare games were made with the player enjoyment and experience in mind.

[Tulpa | 3,488]

N64 has a pretty diehard fanbase made up of mostly those who played it back in the day, but I think it's a pretty hard sell to those who didn't. I think its main disadvantage is the reliance on 3D games, and most of the library, aside from the small handful of timeless games, have simply better options today.

 

 

 

[Tanooki | 4,929]

Infinitely so the N64 has aged far worse and it is far more obvious.  The only two good reasons, early 3D and early 3D control.  It was the pre-NES of 3D era in gaming where you really had to a point use your imagination.  And then of course in that era everyone played with joystick configurations and ways things controlled in games trying to find for years the right way about things.  Nintendo stuck with it, Sony made a dual shock controller aping again the SNES design and adding to it.  N64 like PS1 and Saturn they all visually compared to just a couple years later stink, just like how the pre-NES vs NES era stuff is obviously worse.

[fcgamer | 4,719]

5 hours ago, The Strangest said:

You’d be surprised how many young people are out there these days that I want to beat up and steal their lunch money that say the NES is “too far back” to be enjoyable, basically how people our age talk about the 2600. They’re wrong of course, but they’re out there.

I'd love to see some evidence supporting this, as all the evidence I have seen supports the opposite.

I used to let my students play Game Boy / Game Boy Color as a reward sometimes after class, they'd always try harder so they could play (10-12 year olds)

I have had many kids recognise and start talking to me about old games (i.e. Famicom), along side PS4 and what not. Their parents had both, they played both, they loved both.

I even spoke to a local guy that used to bootleg Famicom stuff in the early to mid 2000s. I asked if he were a gamer , he said no, but said that his products offered an affordable gaming machine for children who couldn't afford a modern machine, and since it was being sold alongside the current gen machines in stores, children wouldn't feel embarassed that their parents were poor.

As he mentioned himself, the NES games are timeless classics, look great, yet are simple and fun - kids of any age and any generation will enjoy them.

So from what I've seen and heard, NES and similar stuff is still popular even now, among young kids. I even have a student of mine begging me to invite his family over to my apartment, as he wants to play the original Donkey Kong Country game.

With N64, never really saw the live today, nor with Atari 2600, at least from the children I interact with.

[elprincipe | 142]

I still love the Atari VCS (aka 2600). If you don't mind short games, blocky graphics and no music, you can have a lot of fun. If you have 10 minutes to play something Cosmic Ark or 2-player Air-Sea Battle is always a blast, for example. There are plenty of amazing games for the system to choose from as well, it's just that most of them are fundamentally different than many of the most popular NES-era games.

As for the NES-N64 comparison, honestly, I love N64, but NES graphics were always better. The foggy blocky polygonal worlds of most N64 games always looked awful to me. There are a few sprite-based games that look good and some polygon-based games that are better than others, but to me SMB3 graphics>>>SM64 graphics any day.

[Jeevan | 8,909]

Paraphrasing here, but you all need to take a step back and realize.........

Some of you shit the bed when Mario 3d all stars was released, and you know what?????

Mario 64 was the top of most of the people who bought the damned thing!!!!!!

[Jeevan | 8,909]

Can't wait till the Zelda 35th comes out next year and you all lose your shit for majora's mask and ocarina of time and then I will reference this thread for all to see   

[Jeevan | 8,909]

N64 4 Life

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

3 minutes ago, Jeevan said:

Can't wait till the Zelda 35th comes out next year and you all lose your shit for majora's mask and ocarnia of time and then I will reference this thread for all to see   

Not me, lol, I couldn't stand the controls on the system and never messed with either.  I technically own a copy of Ocarina of Time, but only because decades ago I took it and an N64 from a guy I worked with as collateral on a loan he needed and we mutually decided it was better for both of us for me to just hang onto it.  I figured I'd have it for trade bait and later as something to play Conker's on when I eventually got a copy, but I've ended up touching neither after all these years.  I didn't bat an eye at Mario's 35th anniversary and won't when Link's comes up either.

[Jeevan | 8,909]

2 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

Not me, lol, I couldn't stand the controls on the system and never messed with either.  I technically own a copy of Ocarina of Time, but only because decades ago I took it and an N64 from a guy I worked with as collateral on a loan he needed and we mutually decided it was better for both of us for me to just hang onto it.  I figured I'd have it for trade bait and later as something to play Conker's on when I eventually got a copy, but I've ended up touching neither after all these years.  I didn't bat an eye at Mario's 35th anniversary and won't when Link's comes up either.

You sir, need to get some friends together and play the shit outta that system.........

Let me just tell you this, yes I was in middle/high school when the n64 came out, but my god that system brought about the actual friends coming over and having a party when you wanted to get together to play games!!!!!!

IMO the N64 was the pinnacle of multiplayer.  It introduced 4 players without the need for an additional hookup and it sure did have a lot of party games that were ACTUALLY enjoyable.  

[a_profile_name | 230]

9 minutes ago, Jeevan said:

Can't wait till the Zelda 35th comes out next year and you all lose your shit for majora's mask and ocarnia of time and then I will reference this thread for all to see   

True. I'm playing oot again right now and obviously anyone dissin' the n64 is a culture-less barbarian.

[Jeevan | 8,909]

Just now, sg17 said:

True. I'm playing oot again right now and obviously anyone dissin' the n64 is a culture-less barbarian.

Thanks so much for that post!!!!! 

You sir have good taste!!!!!

[Jeevan | 8,909]

Also,

Whoever complains of joystick drift.......

I still have my original controllers and see nothing wrong with my joysticks.......

GIT GUD!!!!!!!