I did a discussion on, like, sincerity in creating media before. This, therefore, gives me carte blanche to do another article on a vague topic found in many works of art and or media: Nostalgia! It’s everywhere you have been at some point previous to where you are currently. Ate catfish as a child? Maybe eating catfish now will remind you of those good times! Liked watching Terminator? Well here’s a sequel hoping to recapture that old memory! Got spanked as a child? That’s probably why you have your sex partner spanking you nowadays! You bad boy. You probably deserve it too, you naughty naughty child 😉
Yes, nostalgia can be a powerful force, however, like a lot of forces in creation it can be for good or for evil. The obvious deflector being that it’s some intoxicating force that blinds millions, making them more willing to consume garbage. It’s not entirely wrong. As a child, one’s judgement of quality is not fully formed yet. In such a state, you’d accept anything. That doesn’t mean the thing you’re given is good, but making your fun with what you have using something like Bubsy is probably going to be remembered far more fondly than the times Bubsy got sexually assaulted by a spider sliding in from off screen. But it’s also this kind of focus on a particular artstyle that can really help with things like theming or even putting one’s own spin on something that was loved a long time ago. It’s nostalgia for the past that gave a lot of older stories a new life. The initial success of Kickstarting got started entirely because of that idea. “Remember the past? This thing is like that past thing!” basically. But nostalgia can only get you so far, and like a lot of things creators can lose all meaning to appeal towards it. In video games, however, this is a far more abundant problem than it is in other mediums. Video Games have had decades during which it struggled to break its own limitations and as such there is an obvious “generation shift” for each advancement in technology. That also means people are not afraid to make games that appeal to the times before each shift. Sometimes it creates a style that fits the gameplay, and sometimes its a crutch that attempts to mask the creator’s lack of skill and shoot for an audience using pixel art.
It’s kind of like the “Sword and Sworcery” style where almost everything is simplified down to single line pixels, except in that game there was enough effort put into the simple style that it was made to work by force. But that takes a lot of effort and not every game manages that. I’m sure I don’t have to say this but an inability to handle an important part of your game, like graphics, can result in an utter disaster… and it doesn’t help when your game is an utter trash fire it its entirety (I’d like to think slowbeef and Diabeetus aren’t going to ruin the experience of what I’m showing here). But there’s games like Shovel Knight that take styles from past generations and make a game that would work at any time in the history of video games through its solid game design. That’s going beyond nostalgia, seeing what made the old games work and putting what we’ve learned into the present, adding quality of life concepts or new ideas to freshen up older concepts. Playing something like Shovel Knight or A Hat In Time, you wouldn’t really think “Why would I play this when old game exists?” In a world where something like Ducktails for the NES can be bought off Disney’s Afternoon Collection from every storefront known to mankind, a game like Shovel Knight needs to stake its own claim and not bank on most people settling for a lesser design. I feel like that’s something I’ve said for a lot of subjects though.
Still, nostalgia and a love of the past in general can work on creators as well as it can be used by them. Either to show their love of the times or their love of a particular piece at the time that really resonated with them. New creators appear all the time wanting to put thier own spin on what they loved as children, or returning to old favorities and bringing them to a new generation. Keep in mind, that normally a game like The Warriors, a Playstation 2 brawler based on the 1979 movie, would never have been made by anyone but those that loved the movie at the time. The Warriors is a cult classic thanks in part to its premise based entirely on an era of New York that the city would rather forget and sort of went away immediately after the film. New York City was at a severe low point thanks to the 1970’s recession with gangs and crime at a severe high, a time when President Gerald Ford went on record declaring he would not bail out the city if they asked for it (he would later relent on the statement). Shortly after the movie, there was various changes made to fix these issues that were successful, so you can’t exactly have a sequel where the Warriors reform and rebuild Coney Island for little kids to play (well not unless you have some massive gentials to pull it off). So, a video game based off a cult classic is interesting but its not exactly a slam dunk for sales nor was Rockstar pretending this was anything but a passion project. However, that does mean the team put everything into it and capture the essence of the movie’s style all on its own. There’s a lot of original content, but the game still follows the events of the movie in the end and setting all that up isn’t something a team making a licensed game would usually bother with, but it’s that sort of passion that can really make something special, that will go beyond the usual consciousness of mainstream and become a true classic. If we’re really going to have things like franchises then by all means you need a group that cares enough to keep up said franchise’s quality.
Truly, in that respect, and for the sake of creative medias everywhere, a love of the craft and nostalgia are vital necessities. Nostalgia can blind, and can even be intoxicating in the most minor way but perhaps it is also a force that should not just be thrown aside. Feel free to confront such feelings sometimes, but if you find them valid by all means continue to embrace them. Enjoy the good, hell enjoy the flawed. You, as a consumer and a creator, will be a lot happier for it.
Tazy's Corner 
I thought you would be full on roasting some games here, but color me surprised.
Good read.
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