Will the older games eventually be forgotten?

[BettyNewbie]

As each new set of games come out, another fade into the background. Most people turned their attention away from B2W2 and Gen 5 as soon as XY were announced, and many even turned away from XY as soon as ORAS were announced. Most fans only care about the newest games, which is normal and understandable.

But, this often means the older games fading away to the point of semi-obscurity. Many people openly admit to not playing any of the older games anymore, not even the DS ones, and discussion has slowed to a crawl in even the 4th and 5th Gen boards, let alone the 1st/2nd and 3rd Gen ones. The fact that the older games lack many features people now take for granted, like pretty graphics (Gens 1-3), a P/S Split (Gens 1-3), reusable TMs (Gens 1-4), functioning wi-fi (Gens 4-5), or even, 3D models instead of sprites (all previous Gens), can make them unplayable for many people.

Remakes can be a short-term solution to this problem, as we've seen recently with ORAS. RSE were old and mostly unplayable, and many had all but forgotten Hoenn and its story, but then the remakes came out, and suddenly, Hoenn's a hot trending topic again.

But, remakes themselves can eventually become old and outdated, as we're starting to see with FRLG. They're the last set of games to lack a P/S split, last to not have any kind of 3D, last to not have any kind of wi-fi (disconnected or not), last to not even have any kind of clock, and most importantly, last to not be playable on modern hardware. With the games so hard to play nowadays, their story and setting are quickly being forgotten, especially those locations and characters unlucky enough to have never made it out of FRLG. If it wasn't for FireRed being such a popular base for hackers, Gen 1 might be completely dead now.

Is it inevitable that older games will fade into the background? Do you think there's anything that could be done about it (besides remakes)? What do you think?

 

[Pendraflare]

To be honest...no, I really don't think this. And part of the reason for that is because I know that back in the days when RS were new, people were always getting controversial about it and saying that they sucked. But in the days of Generation V, we had people raving about how great RSE were. And likewise with DP - I don't know how many people there are here who liked DP back when they were new, but again around the time of Generations V and VI, we had people saying that DP were low points based on how lackluster they are now (due to things like slowness, and some people not liking the region now), but most importantly, since Platinum exists, that left them little point to play DP.

What i'm saying is, I feel like how much people don't like the newest games is what's making them go back to liking the older ones. Does any of this make sense to some of you?

 

[Nah]

Not played, yes, but not completely forgotten. As the series ages there's little reason to play the older games when there's new ones and remakes with all the updated stuff, but so long as there remains us old people who did play the older games, they won't ever be completely forgotten.

I'm sure that Game Freak will keep doing remakes anyway. They'll probably do Kanto re-re-makes again sometime in the next few years, and I wouldn't be surprised if 10 years after that they did Kanto remakes for a 3rd time. Despite the kiddie label Pokemon is often slapped with, a very significant portion of the fanbase is people who grew up with Gen 1 or 2, and they'd certainly like to cash in on the nostalgia there at least, maybe even introduce younger players to the series' beginnings on newer and much easier to obtain devices.

Or something

 

[BettyNewbie]

To be honest...no, I really don't think this. And part of the reason for that is because I know that back in the days when RS were new, people were always getting controversial about it and saying that they sucked. But in the days of Generation V, we had people raving about how great RSE were. And likewise with DP - I don't know how many people there are here who liked DP back when they were new, but again around the time of Generations V and VI, we had people saying that DP were low points based on how lackluster they are now (due to things like slowness, and some people not liking the region now), but most importantly, since Platinum exists, that left them little point to play DP.

What i'm saying is, I feel like how much people don't like the newest games is what's making them go back to liking the older ones. Does any of this make sense to some of you?

It's seems like there's a pattern that whenever a new Generation comes out, people will start hating the previous one and liking the one that came before it. Back when Gen 4 was current, Gen 3 was widely bashed for being a low point in the series, while Gens 1 and (especially) 2 were semi-worshiped. Then, when Gen 5 hit, people suddenly started getting nostalgic over Gen 3, while Gen 4 became the new "low point" (and Gen 1-2 fans were widely bashed and ostracized with a certain G-word), a trend which has continued into Gen 6.

This shift in opinion, more specifically, seems to occur in the next Generation after a remake is released. The Gen 1-2 nostalgia shifted to Gen 3 nostalgia after HGSS were released, and since Gen 5 finished without any remakes, Gen 3 nostalgia continued into Gen 6. Now that ORAS are out, could that mean a shift towards Gen 4 nostalgia (and Gen 5 hatred) in Gen 7? Will Gen 1-2 nostalgia also see a revival, or are those fans too old and too gone to matter anymore?

Not played, yes, but not completely forgotten. As the series ages there's little reason to play the older games when there's new ones and remakes with all the updated stuff, but so long as there remains us old people who did play the older games, they won't ever be completely forgotten.

Yet, new games and even remakes will eventually become old games, themselves. (Again, look at FRLG and DP. They were the latest and greatest 8-10 years ago, but now, they're ancient relics, especially the former.) Plus, some people will always prefer some settings over others. There are still people who have never left Kanto/Johto or those who don't think any story will be able to top Unova's. Unless they're into competitive, Gen 6 doesn't offer much but pretty graphics and a few new toys for them.

I'm sure that Game Freak will keep doing remakes anyway. They'll probably do Kanto re-re-makes again sometime in the next few years, and I wouldn't be surprised if 10 years after that they did Kanto remakes for a 3rd time. Despite the kiddie label Pokemon is often slapped with, a very significant portion of the fanbase is people who grew up with Gen 1 or 2, and they'd certainly like to cash in on the nostalgia there at least, maybe even introduce younger players to the series' beginnings on newer and much easier to obtain devices.

Oh, I'm definitely sure of that. {:3} It's only a matter of when it happens, at this point.

 

[Lycanthropy]

It think the older games will indeed fade to the background eventually, but the oldest ones will never be forgotten. They'll still be famous being the first few games in the entire series.

 

[Stormerbuzz35]

I really don't think so. They are more challenging in many ways and there are many who play it to feel that wave of nostalgia they get. It's also more fun to do challenges on the old games with the original mechanics and there's always fun rom hacks when the originals need some extra spice.

 

[Cerberus87]

To be honest...no, I really don't think this. And part of the reason for that is because I know that back in the days when RS were new, people were always getting controversial about it and saying that they sucked. But in the days of Generation V, we had people raving about how great RSE were.

Nostalgia makes people say such absurd things. {XD}

Also the people who started with RSE started having a more proactive role around the time 5th gen was released, while older fans are few and far between.

 

[Hiatus]

I have to agree that they will not be forgotten completely.

Although we might not be playing these games any longer, I'm sure GameFreak and Nintendo will continue remind us of that they had existed before, in some way (one example of that being release of Pokémon Origins), and so long as they do this, I believe many of us will still manage to keep ourselves aware of these older titles.

As far as playing goes, I'm not so sure about others, but personally, I haven't put my hands on them in ages. They were fun, yes, but if I go through with them again, they don't seem to provide as much fun of experience as newer games. One of the only reasons I do consider playing is for nostalgia purposes; if it weren't for that, things would have been slightly more different.

 

[d4rk]

I cannot really judge about this because I'm trapped in a faraway time.

I did not have any mean to buy "newest" game platforms, such as NDS, and my computer is still too slow to run an NDS emulator with DP on.

So I've never hit the chance to play DP and further gens, I know them a bit thanks to RomHacks.

Still, Gen II has my preference over Gen III due to more playing and nostalgy and all, but I'd like to actually play the most recent games and experiment all the features I missed :'(

To answer the main question, I'm not physically able to forget older games because I still play them.

 

[BettyNewbie]

I cannot really judge about this because I'm trapped in a faraway time.

I did not have any mean to buy "newest" game platforms, such as NDS, and my computer is still too slow to run an NDS emulator with DP on.

So I've never hit the chance to play DP and further gens, I know them a bit thanks to RomHacks.

Still, Gen II has my preference over Gen III due to more playing and nostalgy and all, but I'd like to actually play the most recent games and experiment all the features I missed :'(

To answer the main question, I'm not physically able to forget older games because I still play them.

I still mostly play older games, myself. I still consider RBY/GSC to be my favorites, as old and outdated as they are. They've held up well enough for me, although others think differently.

(As an aside, have you checked out the Platinum Red and Blue hacks? They're Platinum demakes on a FireRed base, so they can be played on VBA. Unfotunately, they're far from complete and the most recent demo is very buggy.)

 

[Sydian]

I don't think they'll be forgotten, but I think they'll be sought after for collecting purposes and played by those that enjoy older games or want to get a feel for what they missed. If you look at video games collectively, people still enjoy collecting and playing games from older systems, including those that were released before they were born. Collecting for NES and SNES is insanely popular and these games are obviously old. I think with a popular franchise like Pokemon, the old games in the series won't just die out. People are going to want to play the originals at least for novelty just like people will want to play the original Legend of Zelda, Contra, or Metroid.

 

[BettyNewbie]

I don't think they'll be forgotten, but I think they'll be sought after for collecting purposes and played by those that enjoy older games or want to get a feel for what they missed. If you look at video games collectively, people still enjoy collecting and playing games from older systems, including those that were released before they were born. Collecting for NES and SNES is insanely popular and these games are obviously old. I think with a popular franchise like Pokemon, the old games in the series won't just die out. People are going to want to play the originals at least for novelty just like people will want to play the original Legend of Zelda, Contra, or Metroid.

I think that's already true. Have you seen how much RBY/GSC and even RSE/FRLG carts are going for on eBay? Yellow, in particular, seems to be worth a literal fortune. o_O

 

[Meganium]

It's sad for me that some of the younger Pokemon fans might not have experienced the core of Pokemon gaming, which was the original Gameboy/Gameboy Color games. A lot of us have played those, and grew up with those games, which really solidified our childhood. But that's fine, I mean...there will be times that I'll probably buy a working Game Boy off of eBay and grab my physical working copy of Silver and play it again as if I'm 10 again. This, and other older Pokemon games will never be forgotten.

 

[Orithan]

In the scope of this forum, maybe. In general sense, my answer is "No". Why? Nostalgia. Just because we don't hear much about it on forums like here and Serebii doesn't mean it doesn't get heard a lot of the time elsewhere, especially on social media and Youtube and even on other non-pokemon related forums. The forum I come from has a lot of Gen II fans who express their love for GSC and their remakes on a semi-regular basis and quickly try to shoot down any hate for them. When you take into account the fact that I am the only one who publicly expresses hate for those games over there; it sends a pretty strong message, especially when a good portion of them hate Gen V.
I guess what I am saying is that there are still very vocal fanbases for each of the older games (read: Gens I - III), especially Gen I. With those fanbases being vocal, I doubt that the older games would be truly forgotten.

 

[BettyNewbie]

It's sad for me that some of the younger Pokemon fans might not have experienced the core of Pokemon gaming, which was the original Gameboy/Gameboy Color games.

This is very true. There is literally NO way to experience any of Generation 1 (either RBY or FRLG) on modern hardware, so anyone entering the franchise on the 3DS will never experience the Gen lest it gets remade again.

Even if you don't consider stories to be important, that's still a pretty gaping hole, especially when you consider that HGSS (which are still accessible on modern hardware) are supposed to be sequels to these games. It's hard to appreciate a sequel when you know nothing about its prequel.

(And, this issue, right here, is probably one reason why GF stopped making cross-Generational sequels (as opposed to intra-Generational sequels like B2W2)--There's less of a guarantee that the prequel will be equally as accessible and familiar as the sequel, which ruins continuity. Although the original RBY/GSC were released close enough to work as a prequel/sequel pair, FRLG/HGSS weren't, and that mucked up continuity as a result.)

 

[DyingWillFlareon]

Well, I for one had only a Sapphire version and a GBA for maybe 5 years, so I stopped paying attention to some stuff, but always wished to get 'a black version and get that victini event' or 'buy a HGSS game' but I had no DS at the time due to the DS Lite corner crack thing. It got to mine too.
I got into Rom Hacks and such so I had a lot of appreciation for Gen 1-3.
I do now have all gens on DSi and 3DS as well but I just can't imagine how people could forget the first few Gens, or even the new ones. And yes there does seem to be a pattern here concerning that, I was surprised to hear so much love for DPPt(mostly Platinum) a few weeks ago and people saying 'I can't wait for the Gen IV remakes!' When just before I had heard everyone saying they were the worst games of any Gen.

On the topic of Kanto re-remakes, I'm torn. On one hand, Kanto in 3D. Yes. I would buy.
The other..... It seems that there would be too much demand. The games originally only had the current Region in their Gen, say Gen II everyone knows you mean Johto, but say Gen IV you'd have to listen for either Sinnoh or Johto. Then the third Gen brought back Kanto and the games became a 'two games/remakes/third version' or 'two games/third/remakes' lineup. Which of course is all fine, but too much of other Regions would take away. If there were Kanto games this Gen it could be 'XY/OrAs/Z/Kanto'. Kalos would go underloved. And then people would start to expect it.
FRLG wasn't really expected(I assume), but then people thought about Johto remakes. Then Gen IV gave HGSS. Then people got hyped for a Hoenn remake set. When Gen V said they were going back to the basics and change everything, most fans got upset about no Hoenn remakes, some even saying it was never going to happen. Now the hype is up for DP's remakes next gen or the gen after. Every Gen is EXPECTED to have a remake.

Oh but maybe a 'Delta Yellow'. Yesss. Remake the third versions pleeaase. Everyone's already whining about Emerald remakes anyways.

 

[Sydian]

I think that's already true. Have you seen how much RBY/GSC and even RSE/FRLG carts are going for on eBay? Yellow, in particular, seems to be worth a literal fortune. o_O

That's completely sealed, though. Like. Mega sealed. Those are always going for a lot. For box, manual, and game, it's not going to be nearly that bad. I know game only is like $25 at my local store and they've been common lately. It's a shame more people didn't keep their boxes back then. I still kick myself, haha.

Also, and I know they're not quite THAT old yet I suppose, but I got a huge steal on a French Sapphire last year. Box, game, manual, all the little papers and such for $30. I don't know how I got away with that. Completely legit too.

 

[BettyNewbie]

That's completely sealed, though. Like. Mega sealed. Those are always going for a lot. For box, manual, and game, it's not going to be nearly that bad.

Oh, really? Well, I guess $350's pretty "cheap" in comparison to $700! {XD}

You can also get an empty box for the low, low price of $300...

I know game only is like $25 at my local store and they've been common lately. It's a shame more people didn't keep their boxes back then. I still kick myself, haha.

If it's just a plain cartridge, then it's probably either A) a bootleg or B) a worn-out game with a dead battery. And, $25 is still kind of pricey when you remember that you can get a brand new copy of OmegaRuby for only $40.

 

[Cerberus87]

The irony is that the remakes might play a role in making the old ones forgotten, since the remakes tend to be superior, or rather, have less outdated mechanics. If FRLG had P/S split it would be basically the same as B2W2, for example.

Still, it's pretty hard to find a "forgotten" game. You'll find all sorts of obscure things on YouTube, for example. And particularly Red and Blue are quite fun to manipulate with their glitches.

 

[Pendraflare]

^ That is kind of true - there are people who plain flat-out prefer the remakes to the 8 or 16-bit original versions of the games, and i'm basically one of them. Not to mention Generation III didn't have reusable TMs, so there's that.