Thoughts on Remakes

[A.G.]

How do you feel about old games being remade? The notion of updating old games with new tech has always been around. I remember during the MGS1 days people wanting the MSX games made for the PS1. And with each new system that list grew. We did get Twin Snakes, for what it’s worth. But would you want to see more Metal Gear remakes?

I personally would not. Each game was crafted a specific way during a specific time. To me that’s valuable. Much like putting MGS1 into an MGS2 game engine did not work, I feel that we would lose the essence of the early games if they got remade with modern tech.

[fgdj2000]

I'm a little late for the party, but here it goes.

I am not really a fan of video game remakes, since quite often a video game sequel is already kind of a remake. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the Metal Gear series: Metal Gear 1 up to Metal Gear Solid 2 features many similar scenarios that are updated for the new hardware. For instance, each game has a take on the Hind D fight (in MGS2 it's a Harrier, but still functionally similar) and of course its own take on the Metal Gear Mech. Metal Gear 2 Solid Snake and Metal Gear Solid 1 in particular share a lot of common ground.

I'd rather see more proper game preservation, which means, porting the games on better systems, making minor tweaks and remastering the visuals, but (depending on the extend of the changes), give the gamer the option to experience something fairly close to the original version. Mostly, this has been done for the MSX2 games, but I still crave an option to use to original character transceiver artwork in MG2, even though I like Shinkawa's redesigns. There are many examples of this done better: Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix for instance featured completely redone character sprites, but gave you the option to go back to the classic ones at any time. The Halo 2011 remake also gave you the option to choose between "new" 7th generation graphics and classic 6th-generation graphics.
What aggravates me are games like the Crash Bandicoot N-Sane Collection, which faithfully recreate the classic levels, but still only let you use 8th gen graphics, when the old PSone graphics were really charming.

I don't hate video game remakes though. There have been examples of good ones in the past: Tomb Raider Anniversary, Resident Evil, apparently Resident Evil 2 from what I hear. However, they can and should never replace the original. Ideally, they are treated like completely new games, which means, it's okay to build in some major surprises or redesign the environments for a completely different control scheme. Make people who know the original inside out experience the world for the first time again.

So bottom line, I'm not against remakes, so long as 1. they are treated with the same energy and creativity as new games and aren't afraid to tweak the material and 2. the original is still around properly preserved, ideally on the same disc.

But I still prefer remasters or new games to remakes. An occasional remake can be fun though, but it will never replace the original.