Legendary games you didn't play when they were new, but are rediscovering now

mediamogul

Mine would be 'Snatcher' on SegaCD. I had a SegaCDX as a teen, as well as a light gun, but this title completely passed me by. By the time I had my hacked Wii, I had heard for years about how amazing it was, so it ended up being the first game I really got into. It not only lived up to the hype, but it also ended up being the best emulation experience I've ever had to date.

For the main game, I used my wireless Nintendo Wavebird controller and for the shooting segments, I had a wireless gun at my side as well in the form of a Wiimote housed in a Nyko Perfect Shot casing. Even better, the game had a built-in calibration screen, so I didn't have to make use of the crosshairs, which made blasting all my targets a purely skill-based endeavor. Once all the kinks are worked out of RetroArch's light gun implementation, I plan on going through the game again. Of course recounting the experience here makes me want to boot up my Wii and just play now.

markyh444

@mediamogul I've been tempted to get hold of a modded Wii for a few years now. What's it like for emulation?

mediamogul

@markyh444 said in Legendary games you didn't play when they were new, but are rediscovering now:

What's it like for emulation?

It's really nice. It's not nearly as flexible as something like RetroPie, but what it can do, it does well. For example, the limited number of controller options tend to work without any issues, as they are a known quantity and those control options begin to open up when you consider all the adapters on the market. Light gun games work perfectly in every system they're supposed to because they all use the same method of using the Wiimote as a pointer device. Also, the few GameBoy and GameBoy Advance games that use tilt controls are able to access the G-Sensor without any setup. You can even set the Wii port of Stella to use tilt control for paddle emulation that feels really smooth. Needless to say, you also get the advantage of the hardware running Gamecube and Wii games. All in all, after all this time, it's still one of the strongest emulation solutions available for playing retro games in my opinion.

markyh444

@mediamogul hmmmmm... Think I'm convinced! quickly gets on eBay

BobHarris

@markyh444 Many games! I wasn't allowed a console in the living room, so my first console was a playstation 1 when I was 13 in 1996 for my own little crt tv. Before that, I used to play two player nes and snes games at a friends house, but that was mostly contra, double dragon and street fighter.
Currently I'm on my first ever playthrough of Donkey Kong Country. :)
Also arcade games like Street fighter III as we didn't have much of arcades here and no dreamcast either.

Eldrethor

Pitfall on the Atari 2600. It's a surprisingly fun game for its time, and had a decent amount of hazards and exploration. The graphics also had some fluidity to them too, which you can see in the swinging ropes and the pits that open and close.

drake999

@mediamogul I'd have to agree with you that Snatcher is definitely a hidden Gem. I played through it for the first time in its entirety a couple of years ago. I completed it without a guide so I felt very accomplished after completing some of the head scratching puzzles in the game, lol. I also owned the Sega Genesis CDX as a kid, but mostly only had those crappy FMV games (Double Switch was what I played the most). I would have loved to have played Snatcher back then. I was big into Sci Fi as a kid so I would have ate it up. That intro scene in Snatcher just sucks you right in.

mediamogul

@drake999 said in Legendary games you didn't play when they were new, but are rediscovering now:

mostly only had those crappy FMV games (Double Switch was what I played the most).

I was right there with you. FMV are not great games when you compare them to a most any other type, but I'm still very nostalgic for them. Until I got a light gun, I played 'Mad Dog McCree' so much that I got to where I could headshot McCree himself every time using only a controller.

That intro scene in Snatcher just sucks you right in.

It really is great.

quicksilver

@markyh444 the GameCube edition of Majora's mask is playable on the pi3 using mupen64-rice plugin. It does lag a little in the clock town but so far has been very playable.

I had a TurboGrafx growing up but not the CD attachment. Just discovered Castlevania-Rondo of Blood for pce-cd . It's such a cool game! It's very well thought out and the backgrounds and character sprites are well done. I have been really enjoying it!

MajorDangerNine

Super Metroid. I remember wanting it as a kid when I saw the boxart and my mother said no upon seeing the boxart.

https://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/9/93770/2364836-snes_supermetroid.jpg

I was around 5 or 6.

Also, as side note for anyone looking to play Super Metroid, you should know that having Enable Hotkey set as Start in RetroArch will prevent you from exiting out of the pause menu due to the game's input lag increasing to the point the Start input isn't received before the Enable Hotkey function kicks in.

quicksilver

@eckaji said in Legendary games you didn't play when they were new, but are rediscovering now:

Super Metroid. I remember wanting it as a kid when I saw the boxart and my mother said no upon seeing the boxart.

Haha I can relate to that. There are so many titles my mom refused because of the name of the game or the boxart. Looking back on the 8 and 16 bit graphics of these games, it's almost laughable how tame these games were by comparison to games nowdays. I like to play these games on my pi in front of my mom and show her what games she was so concerned about. She just laughs now.

thelostsoul

One of the biggest classics I missed was Earthbound. It was never released in Europe. A friend of me had it, but I wasn't interested in. That time I imported Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 6 and Earthbound didn't look apealing to me.

Btw, since several weeks, I was planning to start this exact same thread, because of Earthbound.

markyh444

@quicksilver I did have N64 games working on my Pi, but I canned them all off as I've got a 64 and GameCube already with most of the games I'd want to play anyways. Plus, I only have a 2 port N64 to usb adapter which is no good for 4 player Mariokart, Goldeneye or WWF No Mercy!

quicksilver

@markyh444 yea that makes sense. Im not a big fan of N64 controllers personally so I use wireless Xbox 360 controllers with my pi. I have an N64 as well but never play it because composite on my HDTV looks terrible. Plus I'm so used to wireless controllers I have a hard time going back to wired. The pi runs most of the N64 games I care about just fine, the others I am hoping will run better once if/when the pi4 comes out. If it does I'll probably sell my N64. But I'm veering off topic here...

Shadowron

I didn't own a SNES back in the day, but many of my friends had one. None of them introduced me to Pilotwings (quite a shame, lol), although being a launch title. For me personally this was a hidden gem. Had lots of fun playing it.

spruce_m00se

@markyh444 I havent tried light gun games yet, i have a satrun gun on the way and will build a wiimote into it, then try them, but for emulation I have found it to be great. N64 games are still a bit hit and miss, some work perfectly, some have funny textures or transparencies. I also have yet to try ps1 but hear it works fine. Other old 8 and 16 bit systems work as they should. I have literally been spoilt for choice since getting it, my retropie system has been a bit neglected since I got the modded wii. Get one and you wont regret it

Clyde

@spruce_m00se said in Legendary games you didn't play when they were new, but are rediscovering now:

@markyh444 I havent tried light gun games yet

Me neither, but it's on my long to-do list. :)

madmodder123

I also recent played Earthbound (SNES) and Snatcher (SegaCD), and they were AWESOME!

thelostsoul

@madmodder123 Snatcher is on my to do list as well. I even had a Sega CD back then, but never got Snatcher, that legendary game from Metal Gear Solid developer.

XVO

For the Nes I discovered Fire and Ice on emulation, I wish I bought that game back in the day. Not for the sake of the value, but just pure for the gameplay.
It's a great puzzle game if you're interested ;)