The visual power of the next generation consoles is certainly impressive, but nowhere near as powerful as many expected. With that in mind, rather than focus on visual power, we here at Old School Gamer are going to do the opposite- and reimagine some of this generation’s top franchises as retro ones.
The Last of Us: Utilizing the stealth elements of the original Metal Gear, the combat, Dialogue and level-up systems of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and the camera of the original Diablo, Last of Us would be an excellent PS1 game.
Fallout series: Take the original Doom engine, slap on a coat of post-apocalyptic paint, as well as an inventory system and less linear gameplay, and it would certainly be a fun SNES game. While you probably wouldn’t be able to switch to a third-person view, you’d still be able to have plenty of story.
Super Smash Bros: Who wouldn’t love to see Smash reimagined as a pixel-art based, 2D fighter? It probably would require too much firepower for a 16-bit console, especially considering some of the special moves, but would totally work on the DS.
MLB: The Show: It’s the prettiest baseball game ever, but what if you just took the core gameplay to visuals inspired by the original RBI Baseball? Wouldn’t that be a couch co-op dream come true?
WWE 2K: The end of the Yukes era of WWE games has gamers salivating at the thought of a wrestling game that is simply fun and authentic and not a graphical powerhouse. The Nintendo 64 era of wrestling games was where the genre shined brightest. A return to that type of gameplay and immersion would be a wonderful return to form for the WWE and its hardcore gaming fan base.
Patrick Hickey, Jr., is the founder and editor-in-chief of ReviewFix.com and a lecturer of English and journalism at Kingsborough Community College, in Brooklyn, New York. Over the past decade, his video game coverage has been featured in national ad campaigns by top publishers the likes of Nintendo, Deep Silver, Disney and EA Sports. His book series, "The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult and Classic Game Developers," from McFarland and Company, has earned praise from Forbes, Huffington Post, The New York Daily News and MSG Networks. He is also a former editor at NBC and National Video Games Writer at the late-Examiner.com
