Wanted to post this here as I felt that retro gamers have a good feel for the whole of videogaming, rather than console war fanboyish behavior.

This has been kind of bugging me for a while now when I see it crop up in reviews or other forum topics. "Open World" has become such a buzz-word for gamers lately, and I can't really understand why. I get that it is nice to interact with so much in a game, but I can't help feeling like sandbox and open world games are 10% game and 90% game lengthening fluff.

I play games for the fun of playing them, but part of that fun is having an engaging story. I feel that the impact intended in the story is damaged or completely destroyed when I can spend in game (or real world) days lost out in the woods fighting brigands or whatever just to find that some little secret society was placed way up in a back woods shack and I am now their king for whichever reason. This kind of thing kills the feeling that the main "quest" is really worth all your trouble.

Games are an interactive medium, but most non-casual have a story that the game is attempting to tell (wether the story itself is any good is another question). Stories have beginings middles and ends and a usually consistent arc to follow along the way. This would lend to a linear experience from the get go. I understand that making the experience interactive is more than having "Press X to not Die" (in the words of Yahtzee). But there is a point where it becomes too much.

An example of this would be the Fallout games. I love these games, the setting is great with the retro-future apocolyitc stuff, but I go off exploring and completely lose track of what the game is supposed to be about. I honestly stop caring about the story. I still like the game, but I'd rather be doing the other stuff than remembering what I'm meant to be doing.

This goes 10 fold against games that require me to "grind". I understand it in MMO's they have to do something to keep people wanting to play and give a goal to work towareds. But in a single player experience it just slogs everything down. and exists for no more reason than to artificially lengthen the game.

So after that long winded bit basically what I was wondering is what opion you guys/gals had about Linear play Vs. Open World. What makes a good balance, and when is does a world become too open to be considered enjoyable.

Personally I prefer to play through a story with just a few well developed side-quest like things as long as they add to the overall story, and a handful of tactics to choose from to get through a level/senario (Uncharted games, Myst games, and others of the sort). I dont like a wide open play-space where things have been more or less sneezed out onto it and then a vague quasi-story links a few of them together (GTA titles, Minecraft, etc).

The first time I played this was when i was like 12 +/- I remember that I tried it for probably less than an hour and took it back to the rental store to swap for something else (mom worked at the store, huzzah for free rentals). I just didnt have the attention span for RPG's, and wanted some flashy button mashing platformer/beat-em-up. Same thing happened a while later with FFVII (which I had bought, then re-sold to gamestop. Makes me almost cry now...) was die-hard into PC FPS gaming at that point. Once my taste matured I actually played Chrono Cross first, and liked that enough that when the Chrono Trigger/FF combo pack thing came out I snatched it up and loved it. Have since gotten a SNES copy for the collection. Although the save battery is starting to crap out. :(

For me retro gaming is about the old graphics and music. "Updating" and giving it a graphics overhaul is not for me. If I want to stroll down memory lane I would rather it be the same "dirt path" I walked in my youth. Biggest example is the new "HD" Halo CE remake (although i still have a hard time calling Xbox retro). I love(d) Halo and all of it sequels, but I will not be buying this. Might snag the map pack, but even then it just wont be the same. Halo CE multiplayer was all about being crammed in the same room with as many TV's as you could fit for an all-nighter LAN battle. Playing them online just won't be the same

This:

http://www.amazon.com/MadCatz-8202-PlayStation-2-RetroCon-Controller/dp/B0000DG9SI

beyond all the best PS2 RPG controller I could have ever asked for.

But for "real controllers":

SNES and honestly the atari 2600 sticks. to this day there is just something about those little boxy things that screams "videogame!" to me.

do you have it standing "on end" with the little stand thingie or laying flat. I have heard that putting it "on end" has a tendancy to scratch the discs similarly to the "unbalanced" drive scratches (again this can also happen if the console is sitting at an angle). cant confirm because I always lay my consoles flat. I would imagine that the marks are being caused by something like this. for it to happen at regular intervals would indicate some sort of wobble. Sorry that I can't offer any more proven advice, but these are the things I have always heard.

**Edit** Just found this (be warned I don't endorse stabbing your disc drive with a butter knife, but it might work):

The piece the CD sits on/clicks onto has been smushed down its axel. Grab a pen or a bread knife and try to pry/slide it back up again, but just enough where it stop grinding against.... whatever its grinding against to scratch your cd

Honestly i have never used the goodwill website (have browsed it but never bought from it). But both of my gensis's (first and second gen) were bought from the brick and mortar stores. Got them both boxed with everything, even the plastic bags the controllers come wrapped in, for around 15. The first generation one I got was even "bundled" at the store with the arcade stick (again boxed and near unused). I see them in there fairly often in the ones around here, and at some other thrift stores (although the other stores tend to strip them down and sell all the bits seperately.

ahh the ever elusive top loader. I want one too. I have 4 original NES's and have at this point worn them all out (the little spring thing). I am reduced to using one of the little clone NES boxes (wife wouldnt let me spend anymore on the frontloaders hehe). Just doesnt feel right. I can never find the things and usually run into the same problem you do. find them in retro game stores or flea-markets and people want stupid amounts of money because "This here's one a dem rare nintendahs!" same problem I have with the Atari 5200 people want a mint for them and the console ain't that great to begin with.

In no particular order:

Battletoads

Super Mario Bro. 3

Blades of steel

TMNT: The Manhattan Project

Air Fortress

[QUOTE="Eikichi-Onizuka"]Lunar 2 Eternal Blue CompleteJessey-Stone

I asked my grandparents to get me a videogame for christmas the year this came out I just told them something not sports/racing. I was expecting spyro or something of the sort and low and behold I open my christmas gift and there was that box set. they asked if they picked a good one but I already had my nose burried in the book and wearing the freaking necklace. Still to this day one of the best christmas gifts they have ever given me.

And to the other poster about why people like Breath of Fire IV. I like it 90% for the art. Open world "grind-exploration" is not the be all end all of gaming. I like games that tell a story and if that means as I play I am "rail-roaded" through I really don't care if the story is good and the gameplay is fun. Honestly I think these games where you are meant to wander the world for hours on end, just to get that last Crystaline Dragon Dropping or whatever, tend to detract from the overall experience.

lol legend of dragon, chrono cross, and breath of fire 4 are original jrpgs? tab134