r/RetroGaming is very strict about retro. They say the Nintendo 64 is retro while the PlayStation 2 is modern. This despite the fact the PlayStation 2 is now 25 years old.
So I got to wonder about this community deems as “retro”.
Or a better question: what’s considered retro and not retro? What’s the fine line between retro and modern?
Retro is a style and astetic as much as a function of time or technology.
Even mathematicians struggle with dividing things into precise and consistent sets and categories. Try to relax.
Retro means new things that look like they’re old. As in “looking backwards” for inspiration. Like pixel art. Prime example: VVVVVV.
I’m mostly being pedantic, but it’s a pet peeve of mine that gamers (and only gamers) use “retro” wrong. Every other type of collector correctly uses the word “vintage” instead: Vintage clothing, furniture, coins, wine, etc. And they use “retro” to mean new things that look old, like retro clothing. Only gamers call vintage things “retro”.
In my experience when I point this out, gamers just get mad. I don’t understand that. But I’m kind of a language nerd who watches linguistics videos for fun. And yes, I know language changes and evolves, and words mean how people use them, and dictionaries are not prescriptive, etc., etc. It’s still wrong, damnit! It’s a niche use by specific group of people that confuses everyone else because of its wrongness.
Anything that isn’t HD and on a console that’s designed to be always online. So PS3 and 360 aren’t retro to me, but Wii is, as are most portables prior to the Switch. It’s not the age of the game that makes it retro to me, but its design philosophy. And of course any new game intentionally designed to look or feel old is retro, the original meaning of the word.
2 console generations.
After PS3? modern. On or at PS3? retro.
20 years is a good cutoff, in my opinion. That puts the original God of War in retro territory, and I’m ok with that. I’m also ok with vanilla WoW (up to patch 1.8 or so) being retro. These things are old, we’re getting old and pretending games from 2005 and before aren’t retro is just wishful thinking.
To me, “retro” just means something that is now only possible for consumption through the previous, now impossible or highly impractical, acquisition of said medium. PS3? Retro. 3DS? Retro.
This seems like a good line to draw. Does it play natively on current consoles? Not retro. If you have to use an emulator or pull out an older console then that’s retro.
/r/retrogaming’s definition doesn’t work anymore now that there are multiple generations that grew up with video games. Just because it doesn’t feel retro to the 40 year old who remembers playing the PS2 as a teenager doesn’t mean it’s not retro. The PS2 is absolutely a retro console, and the PS3 is very much getting there.
If it can purchase alcohol it’s retro
If it can be emulated on a potato it’s retro. If it’s it’s old but not trivial to emulate then it’s classic.
anything that came out before 2011
Around 2 generations of consoles ago, or around 10 years, whatever comes “first”.
10 years seems a bit short, that would mean Hearthstone, GTA5 and Sims 4 qualify.
Yes that’s what I said. PS3 era games and at this point, early PS4 start yo qualify for me. Although still actively developed games aren’t “fully” retro, clearly. I’m still on the fence about calling Bloodbkrne retro, for instance.
the ps3 is retro then?
Anything pre ~2000, graphics came on incredibly in the years at the end of the 90s start of the 21 century. The difference between FF7 (1997)
and FF10(2001)
is vast
Anything that needs to be played on a CRT.
I’d say, at 50, imo anything 32 bit and below is retro but there needs to be a new name for the “old” stuff that is 64bit
Old games don’t need to be played on a CRT any more than modern games need to be played on an OLED/LCD flat panel.
Then how about anything that plays better on a CRT vs a modern flat screen? Older games were absolutely made with CRT artifacts in mind and look worse on newer screens.
They’ll lag if you don’t.
So Gameboy isn’t retro?
Playing Super Mario Bros. on Switch = “not retro.”
It goes on vibes. Historically I’d have said anything with an 8- or 16-bit CPU (NES/SNES, Megadrive, the surfeit of home computers before everyone standardised on beige-box Windows PCs). Nowadays I’d say anything slow enough to be emulated reasonably using present-day technology could be said to be retro, so PS2 would count. If video output is analogue PAL/NTSC, that probably also counts.
Anything before the GameCube, PS2, and Original Xbox.
So PS1, Sega Saturn, and Nintendo64 and older are “retro.”
The Atari 2600 and Colecovision are “vintage.”
Pong and the Magnavox Odyssey are “antique.”
What about Dreamcast? 🤔
Just “old”
Original Xbox, GameCube, PS2, Dreamcast - “old.”
PS3, Xbox 360, Wii - “modern.”
PS4, Xbox One - “previous gen”
PS5, Xbox Series - “current gen”
Nintendo Switch - “2015 smartphone”
But the PS3 / 360 are coming up to 20 years old. Hell, one of my adult colleagues was born after the 360 was released. Can they really be considered modern anymore?
“Modernism” is a term used to refer to art and culture from 1930s-1940s America. Searching for something like furniture or architecture in that style would mean you use search terms like “modern furniture” or “modern architecture.” Can that really be considered “modern” anymore?
When the PS4 and Xbox One are no longer the “previous gen” I will be calling them “next gen,” as that is the term most associated with those consoles. Even after the consoles were released and well into their lifespan they were still called “next gen.”
I call future consoles that haven’t released yet “upcoming gen” or “future gen” interchangeably.
