Five old games worth your time
Spencer Hunt staff writer
There are tons of games out there, some new, some old. We always focus on the new and never really stop to look back at the old, albeit for good reason. After all, history has already happened, so it’s not often we talk about it. Today, we take a dive into the past, as far back as the ‘80s and ‘90s, to look at all the greats that simply go unmentioned. They could be worth a try, if you’re curious.
DOOM: The original First Person Shooter. One of the greats, and pioneer of the genre, the original DOOM is played by many to this day. There are more ways to play it than ever,
to the point that if a piece of tech can’t run DOOM, then there is something deeply awed within the device. Don’t like that you can’t look up and down? You can get a source port, which takes the source code of DOOM, and ports it into another kind of code, allowing it to go far beyond its original limits. Don’t like the monsters? There are mods for that. Don’t like the levels? There are mods for that. Don’t like the weapons? There are mods for that. But the original set of demons and maps are finely tuned, I don’t see how you couldn’t like it. It’s an amazing game, that began the renaissance of a genre.
Final Fantasy VI: Released on the Super Nintendo, or SNES, Final Fantasy VI was the last set of three Final Fantasy games released on this console, before the famous Final Fantasy VII was slated to come along. This game is often considered one of the best roleplaying games released, featuring a massive story spanning years, with the world itself being destroyed, and a mad villain the likes of which had never been seen before.
It’s a hell of a romp series, Megaman 2 is considered the best in the series. In this NES era platformer, the premise is simple. You’re the titular Megaman, and eight Robots are being lead by a mad scientist. It’s your job to hunt all eight of them, steal their powers, and use them against the other robots to discover their weakness, and take them down in an intense game of Rock Paper Scissors. Of course, you have to get to the boss first, as each robot has their own personalized stage with obstacles unique to them. It’s a fun time, but be warned, Dark Souls has nothing on this one.
Punch-Out: Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out! Everyone loves the story of the underdog, and Punch-Out is just that. In the classic NES game, you play as Little Mac, a newbie boxer who wants to become the world champ. Fight a cast of colorful, if slightly racially sensitive, fighters as you work your way to the top to take down Mike Tyson himself. Every boxer has their own unique behavior patterns, and you’ll have to memorize all of them to become the very best.
Castlevania, Symphony of the Night: Symphony of the Night is a game that spawned a revolution of an entire genre, known only, as Metroidvanias. In these side-scrolling platformers, you explore massive interconnected areas, slowly obtaining new abilities as you explore that allow you to enter even more areas of the world you’re dropped into. Rinse and repeat until the end of the game, these are a tried and true formula, and one that Symphony of the Night forcibly slammed itself into the name of the genre. Though it was started by the Metroid series, Symphony of the Night perfected it, and there will be new things for you to find in every playthrough. This game is endlessly entertaining, with gorgeous music, and art for you to explore, all the while fighting the horrid monsters of the night. It’s a game well worth your time, no matter when you play it.
