Retro Gamers on the Rise – How Classic Titles Remain Relevant
If you’re the 80s or 90s kid, then you’ve probably spent a ton of time playing Super Mario, Streetfighter, and Sonic. All of these titles are timeless classics—and despite being several decades old, they manage to stay relevant in today’s gaming scene. For the younger generation of gamers, it can be pretty difficult to imagine how these old games continue to maintain a solid following, but for retro gamers the answer is simple: These games look simple but they’re incredibly well-designed.
In case you didn’t know, the SNES cartridge or the Sega Mega Drive only had a maximum capacity of 4MB. That’s virtually nothing these days. If you think about it, the developers back then did an impeccable job creating amazing games despite the small amount of space to work with. Add that to the fact that they also had to deal with limited graphics and audio capabilities and it becomes easier to realize just how well-designed the classic titles are.
Retro games are cheap but fun
One of the reasons why many gamers stick with the classic titles has to do with money. You might be surprised by the huge population of gamers who hold on to their old consoles such as the Nintendo GameCube. The global games market continues to be lucrative, with CD key prices remaining competitive, console gaming generating billions of dollars in digital sales, and mobile gaming accounting for nearly half of the total market. Despite all this, it’s amazing to think how retro gaming manages to attract a ton of gamers. This is largely attributed to how affordable retro games are, precisely because most of them are purchased secondhand.
For many gamers, it’s hard to justify spending money on a game they might not enjoy. And while they can always put their games on the secondhand market, they wouldn’t get a good return on their investment. But aside from money, another reason why retro gamers shy away from newer games is that of their one-of-a-kind gameplay. In fact, many old games prove much more difficult than most of the popular titles today.
The Revival of Old Consoles
Nintendo has always been one of the biggest names in the gaming industry. The company has realized that there’s a growing community of retro gamers who couldn’t get enough of their classic games. Because of this, the company decided to release their older consoles in new casings, packed with a boatload of games in one nostalgic device.
The company brings back the SNES, offering old gamers an exciting opportunity to turn back the clock while allowing new gamers as well to get their feet wet in the world of retro games. The mere thought of collecting older consoles and cartridges is already appealing to the community. And the best thing is that doing so doesn’t require a huge upfront investment.
With retro games making a comeback, it would be interesting to see how big a dent they can make in the gaming market. For a lot of gamers, the nostalgic element of having the opportunity to get their hands on all the games they played growing up is reason enough not to call it Game Over just yet.
