It's hard to really describe to younger generations just what it was like.
I'm an elder millennial (1984) and the changes to games within my lifetime has been breath taking and staggering.
The first game I remember playing is River Raid on my brother's Atari. I was a vaguely plane shaped black block.
A couple years later, I find myself playing Super Mario Bros. A few more and it's SMB3 and I'm holding a gameboy in my hands on the road trips to Florida to see my grandparents.
Then the jump to SNES and Genesis. Seeing that depth and life seep into the characters... The music gaining in complexity...
I even had a Sega CD and I remember how mind blowing it was when Sonic turned and ran towards the back to go through a loop instead of just side to side.
Then for it was PS1 with Final Fantasy 7... Graphical cut scenes like moving works of art.
After this point, yes there was still obvious and sometimes bigger jumps... But this is where it all was SO different each generation. Not just seeing extra small details and polishes. Large, discrete jumps forward
I wish I could give my wonder to anyone who never got to experience it. It was an amazing time to live.
I still remember seeing this for the first time, absolute mind blower for sure back then.
I'm still impressed by the way wave race feels, not going to lie.
Wow those waves are GORGEOUS for N64 graphics. Dang! I remember I loved Blue Storm on the GameCube. I spent a while just moving that little bubble around the main menu hahaha. It's still gorgeous!
Water still looks and moves better than most games.
Also…
“FOLLOW THAT DOLPHIN!”
When Sony saw Crash Bandicoot running on a PS1 for the first time, they had no idea how the PS1 actually was able to run it.
When even the developers of the system you are using have no idea of how a program is running on their new system, they you know you have some advanced stuff:
So... This is kinda where I wish graphics stayed. It's probably not the majority opinion, but I wanna feel like I'm playing a video game and not really life. Plus, I feel there was a bit more creativity in making graphics. I'm old, but I loved stuff in Doom and Duke Nukem and EverQuest. Everything now kinda just looks... Brown and dark? Or similar?
I dunno. Might just be the rantings of an old person!
Honestly, it's still impressive that they were even able to do that on the N64.
Honestly, it holds up. Sure there's fewer polygons, but more polygons doesn't mean it looks better.
Here's a deep dive into how the game works:
The waves of Wave Race 64 -MVGThe soundtrack for this game is incredible.
Going from the bleeps and bloops of the 8-bit gaming era to VR is quite a leap. VR was the realm of scifi, and now it exists as a reality. Is it perfect? No, and the steep psychological learning curve can be off-putting to some, but it's really good even as it is now.
Splashdown was the gen z equivalent. Loved those racing games.
Splashdown had like a sea monster that would throw you back if you went outside the map. Was fun
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PlayStationNintendo 64 can produce mind-boggling effects.I really love the atmosphere and ambiance of Wave Race 64
Wave Race!
I remember I somehow owned a Gameshark at one point and figured out how to add in Turbo and Big Head mode. I also dimly remember the title music for the game, which was awesome.
This was shit graphics even back in 1996 because it only uses primary or fully saturated colors. It's "dev art", made by someone with no artistic talent. Or maybe made for 4 year old kids. I missed out on a lot of games with good gameplay because I just can't stand on this abomination of a color palette.
The worst thing? When games actually went with a more pastel or naturalistic color palette, moronic games journalists would say the colors look "drab" or some shit.
