98-2005 was the gaming golden era.
this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2025
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'98 was definitely a high point. I would argue PS2/Xbox had a really bleak period between '01 and '03.
Also, gotta say, the indie era didn't really pop off until '09. The Obama Era was fantastic for gaming.
thanks obama
"Balatro's fun, but if only the cards were more realistic, it'd be a much better game" said nobody ever
Not to mention nickel-and-diming the customer.
Call PS3 and Xbox 360-era army slop what you will, but at least it had functional graphics, no noise, no visual bugs, no temporal smear, and most of the time it worked on release.
IMO, most modern games are so bad that Brown Army Slop™ looks good in comparison.
This seems like the kind of conversation we were having 10-20 years ago. Are we not a bit beyond that now? Over the last few days I played:
- Anno 1800 (AAA, highly regarded, more-of-the-same sequel)
- World of Goo 2 (Indie, highly regarded, more-of-the-same sequel)
- Valheim (indie, highly regarded, one of any number of survival/crafting games)
- PlateUp! (indie, highly regarded, fairly unique concept except for Overcooked)
- Elden Ring (AAA, highly regarded, more-of-the-same sequel)
- Blue Prince (Indie, highly regarded, unique)
- BF6 (AAA, so-so regarded, more-of-the-same sequel)
And I enjoyed all of them.
I don't give a toss if you aren't impressed by graphic quality and fidelity. Elden Ring is a beautiful game and it does impress me. Somehow people will praise the soundtrack of games but it's still faintly taboo to want high-fidelity, beautiful graphics. I have absolutely zero issue with paying good money to buy a sequel which is giving my similar content to what I've already played: improved graphics, tweaked gameplay and a couple of new mechanics, and my friends all joining in on the latest thing are all worth it.
ROM hacks are even better…
I'm not impressed by ripping off Pokemon and giving them machine guns. ^\s^
It's closer to ripping off ARK, but removing all the misery-inducing wastes of time so it's actually fun to play casually. The Pokémon stuff is there, but 90% of everything else is ARK with the serial numbers filed off.
The only games I really care about graphical fidelity are racing simulators, and that's because I'm in VR in a simrig and looking to be as immersed as possible. Even then, frame rate is more important that just about everything else.