Do you prefer your favorite old games be remastered or remade?

[ZedClampet]

"Left alone" is not an option.

In this case, "remaster" will include making basic changes to stuff like UI and controls to bring the game inline with modern games, and the graphics will be slightly improved by repainting the game models, but new, higher poly models won't be made.

And "remake" is starting from scratch. It can be a faithful remake or it can reimagine large swaths of the game. Graphics and gameplay will be up to current standards.

 

[Alm]

I prefer remakes. Current engines are very capable and I love to see good old games in modern game engines.

 

[Pifanjr]

I have favourite games that are good and favourite games that are bad. A remaster is fine for the good ones, but the bad ones should get a remake.

For example, I think Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-Earth 2 would be fine with a remake that just polishes the graphics and maybe a bit of QoL stuff.

Lionhead's Black & White however would need a full remake. There are a lot of bad parts in that game and really the only reason that I still consider it one of my favourite games is because no one has made a better version yet.

 

[ZedClampet]

I have favourite games that are good and favourite games that are bad. A remaster is fine for the good ones, but the bad ones should get a remake.

For example, I think Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-Earth 2 would be fine with a remake that just polishes the graphics and maybe a bit of QoL stuff.

Lionhead's Black & White however would need a full remake. There are a lot of bad parts in that game and really the only reason that I still consider it one of my favourite games is because no one has made a better version yet.

Black and White looks okay to me:

Black & White on Steam

"Black & White" is a dystopian visual novel + war chess game: black and white, sensibility and reason, freedom and order: follow your beliefs and join your camp.

store.steampowered.com

I never got to play the ACTUAL B&W, but I've heard good things about it from you and, I think, @Colif and I found a Steam group dedicated to wishing there was a sequel. It looks like it isn't available anywhere anymore. Someone who still has an old copy ought to pretend they are the publisher and upload it to GoG. What's a little jail time when you are performing a public service?

 

[Colif]

He played it more than I did, I don't remember playing it for very long. Right now, I don't know if the images in my head are from playing it or just watching videos about it since it was out.

 

[mjs warlord]

Like everything else in life remakes can be good or just an exercise to turn a game into a cash cow with no real difference. 20 odd years ago i got the original eso/microsoft version of age of mythology and must have played thousands of matches way back then. In 2014 skybox released age of mythology extended , i watched the promo videos and thought hey thats good so i got it. When i ran it i thought i had booted up the wrong game , IMHO the older version was better. Now we have age of mythology retold ... kerching !!!

Sometimes i download spectrum remakes just for fun and then i go on you tube and show my wife what they looked like in 1982.

 

[neogunhero]

I prefer a well done remake. It allows the developers to go back and recreate the game they wanted to but were constrained by hardware and technical limitations. A good example of this to me in the RE4 remake. I haven’t played it but watched lots of videos on it. The remake seems to have nailed down the cinematic feel of the game way better than the original, which I would assume was the original intent.

I don’t play make remake games, since most that come out aren’t of games I was originally a huge fan of, but I can see where a good remake could turn out better than a simple remaster.

 

[ZedClampet]

I prefer a well done remake. It allows the developers to go back and recreate the game they wanted to but were constrained by hardware and technical limitations. A good example of this to me in the RE4 remake. I haven’t played it but watched lots of videos on it. The remake seems to have nailed down the cinematic feel of the game way better than the original, which I would assume was the original intent.

I don’t play make remake games, since most that come out aren’t of games I was originally a huge fan of, but I can see where a good remake could turn out better than a simple remaster.

I agree with this. I guess the my one exception are these weird remasters people are doing of games that really aren't that old.

 

[neogunhero]

I agree with this. I guess the my one exception are these weird remasters people are doing of games that really aren't that old.

Again RE4 is a good example of being a good remaster. The GameCube was the weakest console of its generation, so to come back nearly 20 years later and utilize all the technological improvements since the original games release really allowed the team to reimagine the game they wanted to make the first time with new tools.

Then there are games like Like A Dragon Ishin. This one is a weird situation, but still falls under “unnecessary remakes”. The game was originally released in Japan only back in 2014, re-made to release worldwide in 2023. Instead of just localizing the languages, they “remade” the game with an updated engine and a lot of questionable changes. One change was they changed the cast for more recognizable characters. Instead of keeping the new original characters, they swapped them out for recognizable characters from previous Yakuza games, but they don’t actually play the same characters as previous games, just use the same character models. Huh?? I love the Yakuza series, but the changes to this game were totally unnecessary. I’d prefer they kept the game the exact same and just localized it. It had to have cost them a decent little chunk of change to do all the things they did when they didn’t need to.

 

[Zloth]

"Left alone" is not an option.

Both!! Ain't my money, so I'm going to ask them to do both and then I'll pick the one I want.

OK, really though...

If I've played the game before, then Remake for sure. Just making the game UI look good on modern monitors and updating the textures is nice for getting me to buy an older game, but I don't think I would bother to replay a game just for that.