High Dynamic Range Lying

We hear it all the time from our enthusiast gaming friends. We see it everyday on the gaming forums. We can’t avoid it in the game stores.

“This game has aged badly.”

As if it were a fine wine, gamers talk about older games as if their properties were somehow different in today’s gaming environment than the moment they first jumped onto shelves. These games do not change. Some mold, or break, or crack; but they never age. Electronic media is binary: it works or it does not. Why then do we speak of games as if they each grow thick white beards over time?

What does it mean for a game to age? When we pick up Dragon Quest III years after its release, what makes it still so much fun to play, while games like Shin Megami Tensei can seem grueling, trying, and even painful?

Most gamers likely eventually settle on the preferred definition of a game’s good age:

A game that has aged well is one that retains the properties that made it so enjoyable when it was first released.

If we were to accept this as the be-all end-all explanation for what it means for a game to age well, then the opposite of such a definition would obviously be that a game that has not aged well is one that is somehow missing the properties of features that once made it great.

Yet, how is this possible? We have already accepted as truth that a game does not change. One could muddy the discussion with talks of revisions and patches, but as any well versed gamer knows, none of these largely PC-centric features were ever available to classic console games. With that in mind, we find ourselves at what seems to be a contradiction.

That is, of course, if we completely ignore perception. Fans of famous French philosopher Descartes will tell you that he was an expert on the concept of perception. His theory was largely that what we perceive is not the same as reality. As Descartes himself deduced in his unnecessarily titled book Meditations on First Philosophy in Which the Existence of God and the Distinction Between the Mind and Body are Demonstrated:

“[P]erception … is neither a seeing, nor a touching, nor an imagining. … [R]ather it is an inspection on the part of the mind alone.”

To take this entire article on a tangent to prove the existence of consciousness will probably do nothing but confuse all of us. Instead, this simple quote provides some simple illumination into the concept of game aging. Our perception is a function of the mind, and not necessarily an interaction with reality.

Could it not then be said that what changes over time is not the game, but ourselves? It would certainly clear up our initial contradiction.

Now, the average forum poster will probably read the last 4 paragraphs, and think me an idiot for going through the trouble of digging up Descartes’ work in order to prove what we already knew. Indeed, if this were the only reason to quote a long-dead French philosopher, it would be a waste. It does serve another purpose, though.

A week back, I happened upon a Twitter post by a friend who could not understand why people say they cannot play a specific set of games anymore. She asked herself and her friends what impeded their enjoyment now that did not years ago?

Naturally, if we follow the words of our French friend, it is a modification of our minds that has made our perception of the material to alter and contort. What can possibly be powerful enough to change our very view of a static object? Everything, potentially. Lifestyle changes, age, differing gaming taste, and even contemporary game design improvements can all contribute.

Shin Megami Tensei as a series is possibly one of my most beloved. Despite jumping onto the gnarled and demonic wagon rather late when I picked up a rare original print of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment, the game was so captivating in mood and gameplay, that I was determined to play through it and its siblings in their entirety if need be.

At the time, I was a college student with low demand job and and even lower demand class schedule. The majority of my spare time was spent drinking with my friends and playing video games until red blood vessels were practically invading the whites of my eyes. I played Persona 2 for sinfully long hours until its epic conclusion, and enjoyed every moment.

Skipping a few years until the months before Persona 3’s release, I went back to Persona 2 to get in the mood. I probably should have chosen a newer game in the franchise to play. To my horror, Persona 2 was just not that much fun to play anymore. The battle system was frustrating to navigate, the game relied too heavily on grinding, and while the story was fantastic, its pacing left a bad taste in my mouth.

“How could this happen?” I screamed to myself. Had my beloved gateway drug been nothing more than a sugar pill placebo? It took some time to realize that my feelings when I first played the game were indeed true. At the time, I had enjoyed the game fully, but circumstance, the refinement of systems through other games, and my own change in lifestyle all played a part in changing my perception. To me, the game had indeed aged badly.

So then, what does it mean for a game to age well? Chrono Trigger is a prime example of an RPG that, despite the passing of years, is still not just playable, but downright enjoyable. In Chrono Trigger’s case, it was its refreshing world. Not only did the game have time travel, but it had its fair share of variety in both environments and characters. It also had a streamlined and simple battle system that, after years of convoluted and overcomplicated Playstation era RPGs, was a joy to return to.

Our mystery has been solved in a most ceremonious manner. We know more now about the games that we play, and the ones that we once enjoyed. Perhaps some are best left in the past, and enjoyed via our memories than anything else. After all, it is not the game changes, but you.