3DS & Vita are Retro now?!

[Jeff]

Stop making me feel old.

 

[qw90700]

Stop making me feel old.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Yes.

 

[Overlight]

Sadly for us they're both and now like many i feel old

 

[Sumea]

If it ain't 20 years old yet, it ain't retro.

And 10 years later you say stuff needs to be 30 years old to be retro.
Historically, 10 years was enough age for a system to be considered retro. Heck, some systems could be classified as "Living retro" or retro on launch, such as GameBoy Color that while a powerful handheld, was still a retro system in it's power and graphics compared to what existed otherwise.
We used to call systems that were far less than 20 years old retro, like NES and SNES in 200X where neither were that old, SNES especially which was still getting new games up to early 2000's in Japan. Of course, with this, the times and more rapid evolution in technology than today helped to solidify this. Of course NES looks outright retro compared to PS1 even if there has not been even 10 years yet. Of course PS3 does not feel retro when last PS3 games looked way more comparable to PS5 games than NES did to PS2. And yes, PS3 is old enough now to give NES vs PS2 comparisons. But, if we are honest, Switch 2 as a handheld makes both Vita and 3DS look outright retro, 3DS especially but even Vita is graphically much weaker than it's "PS3 grade" marketing promises.

Overall, if we were honest and not trying to deny our aging and remind us of the fear of that aging and impending death, we 25-35 year old gamers would be honest and ready to say that Vita and 3DS as 14 year old systems have entered retro or fresh retro territory. Both are more than less discontinued and dropped in support though the fact PS3 fans as collateral continued support for Vita PSN game sales is funky. Though, most online games and other online support is long gone with vita, as they are with 3DS.

TL;DR "Who told you 20 years is the requirement for retro? Used to be that 10 years was enough, and if not 15 was more than enough."

 

[Leon]

I put retro as released 20+ years ago, 30+ as vintage, same as cars.
The reason is while modern gaming is well....shit, you can still see it was inspired by the mid 2000's, vintage is things that were forgotten or rarely mentioned, a entirely different experience.

 

[ThatOneLum]

Came to the thread to talk 3DS/VIta and see that it's mostly devolved into people arguing over what retro is and whether or not you can count either of the aforementioned consoles into the category

I keep both a 3DS and PS Vita loaded up with softmods because they both have fantastic community projects that support them with insane QOL features we'd never have gotten from Sony or Nintendo.

So far, I've been using my Vita for every "Nostalgia Society" game because it's so versatile. (no one point out we've only done PS1 game so far. That's not my fault :P )

 

[DjQuick2008]

Next year the ps3 should be classed as retro at least it would be hard to deny after 20 years

Post automatically merged: Thursday at 10:59 AM

I put retro as released 20+ years ago, 30+ as vintage, same as cars.
The reason is while modern gaming is well....shit, you can still see it was inspired by the mid 2000's, vintage is things that were forgotten or rarely mentioned, a entirely different experience.

i find myself playing offline classics rather than online nowadays ploughing through need for speed most wanted 2012 at the moment dosent really need an online connection for the single player mode

 

[solnK!]

Im planning to "revive" my 3DS very soon, I don´t know if I should consider it retro/vintage.
Maybe in like 5 years?

 

[Nebulon_Galaxy]

I refuse to think anything that is PS3, 360 and Wii as old. They just came out right? im not crazy?!

 

[tuesday]

shhhhh lol

 

[Egg (McMuffin) Man]

3DS and Vita will never be retro. They're just old.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

3DS and Vita will never be retro. They're just old.

In the 2030's I'd hardly consider them not retro.

 

[Egg (McMuffin) Man]

In the 2030's I'd hardly consider them not retro.

Whether or not they are retro has nothing to do with the age of the games and everything to do with the era in which they were released. They were released during the current era of gaming, and they will always be a part of this era.

 

[Lena CE]

Language is fluid and the fun part is no one will ever fully agree on definitions because words change and adapt with the times.

 

[Sumea]

Whether or not they are retro has nothing to do with the age of the games and everything to do with the era in which they were released. They were released during the current era of gaming, and they will always be a part of this era.

By that logic nothing is retro. NES is current, SNES is current, Dreamcast is current and so on.
People have generally agreed for decades now that console generations are a shorthand for an era in Gaming. I have no idea how you could say "Vita and 3DS released at current era" since they released slightly before PS4. The two systems are still, technically, from last years of PS3 and Wii being current systems. No idea what logic dictates PS3 and Wii as "current" consoles but the same logic needing to apply, we would need to just call everything current era that just breaks any conventional understanding of words and how they have been applied historically in niche of video game hobbyists.
How do you even claim "Something will be always part of the current era"? That is not how time works you need to start calling pyramids and lead plumbing current inventions by that logic.

 

[Juiceala]

Just a reminder, Wii got commercial releases up until the 2020s while the WiiU was commercially discontinued around 2018.

 

[cloudsets]

I find the amount of distress expressed in this thread confusing. I think of anything that is no longer being made as “retro.” It's not that big of a deal.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

By that logic nothing is retro. NES is current, SNES is current, Dreamcast is current and so on.
People have generally agreed for decades now that console generations are a shorthand for an era in Gaming. I have no idea how you could say "Vita and 3DS released at current era" since they released slightly before PS4. The two systems are still, technically, from last years of PS3 and Wii being current systems. No idea what logic dictates PS3 and Wii as "current" consoles but the same logic needing to apply, we would need to just call everything current era that just breaks any conventional understanding of words and how they have been applied historically in niche of video game hobbyists.
How do you even claim "Something will be always part of the current era"? That is not how time works you need to start calling pyramids and lead plumbing current inventions by that logic.

Well, technically post-Video Game Crash is the current era in the same way Anno Domini (aka after the birth of Jesus) is also called "Current Era" (to disconnect from any religion and have a more objective naming for historians).

I'd probably agree that console gens is more objective than retro because to some rare people even the PSX/N64 is "modern" since it has brought up 3D which we still use today.


I'd also say that the PS2 era has added modern elements we're still witnessing to this day in games and polished things up. It will be easier for a kid who grew up with a PS4 to play PS2 games than a kid who grew up with the PS3 to play PS1's.

Perhaps we could talk about the early days/prehistory with the first two generations, the 2D era with the NES/SG-1000 to the late SNES, the 3D era with the 5th and 6th gen, the HD era with the 7th gen onwards and we'll either get the VR or the "immaterial era" with Games as a Service, Cloud gaming and digital only consoles (I kinda shudders as the thought).

 

[Juiceala]

Doom is modern, we still use these visual techniques to this day, also Atari is modern because pixelart is still used today, vextrex however is retro because nobody cares for vector visuals anymore

Also fun fact, the video game crashis only an American thing, for us here in Asia and the rest of the world is just a myth, a bedtime story, we never had such a thing.

 

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Doom is modern, we still use these visual techniques to this day, also Atari is modern because pixelart is still used today, vextrex however is retro because nobody cares for vector visuals anymore

And Street Fighter II is modern because fighting games are still using it as a groundwork.

Also fun fact, the video game crashis only an American thing, for us here in Asia and the rest of the world is just a myth, a bedtime story, we never had such a thing.

I'd still argue that since the USA has a bigger influence over the world it's still very relevant and that Nintendo + Sega rising from the ashes of Atari and Coleco was a turning point of video game history.

 

[Egg (McMuffin) Man]

By that logic nothing is retro. NES is current, SNES is current, Dreamcast is current and so on.
People have generally agreed for decades now that console generations are a shorthand for an era in Gaming. I have no idea how you could say "Vita and 3DS released at current era" since they released slightly before PS4. The two systems are still, technically, from last years of PS3 and Wii being current systems. No idea what logic dictates PS3 and Wii as "current" consoles but the same logic needing to apply, we would need to just call everything current era that just breaks any conventional understanding of words and how they have been applied historically in niche of video game hobbyists.
How do you even claim "Something will be always part of the current era"? That is not how time works you need to start calling pyramids and lead plumbing current inventions by that logic.

Try thinking about things before responding to them.

How do you even claim "Something will be always part of the current era"? That is not how time works you need to start calling pyramids and lead plumbing current inventions by that logic.

I can see that reading comprehension isn't your strong point. The claim I made is that the 3DS and the vita are part of the era of gaming which we are currently in, not that they will always be part of whatever era we will be in at any given time.

There is a lot of room for discussion regarding the different eras of gaming, but if we group gaming into two eras (Modern and Retro) with smaller "micro eras" within, than the split happens during the sixth gen. The dividing point would be arcades and the internet: The Dreamcast was the last console where games were still designed with an arcade approach before arcades started morphing into halls for music games, UFO catchers and horse betting simulators.

On the other hand, the Xbox marks the birth of Modern gaming with Xbox live which introduced paid DLC and online updates. That was all cemented in 2006 as we hit the point-of-no-return when the horse armor released.

Retro games were largely designed around arcades (outliers exist, and arcade approach or arcade-style approach became less common as we got closer to the modern era. Types of games changed, high scores disappeared, difficulty dropped, etc). Modern games are largely designed around the internet (outliers exist, especially in the early days when the transition was still taking place).

The Vita and 3DS are part of that internet-bases generation of gaming, which is the modern era. Not retro. They are very different than actual retro consoles. Retro consoles all have arcade games as a significant portion of their library and those games were built around the idea of practicing at home and setting scores in the arcade, or bringing the fun of the arcade game home later on. everything social happened in and around arcades. But modern consoles are designed so that everything social happens through the internet or internet-like features (Street Pass) and have little or no arcade games in their library (not including virtual console downloads).

I would argue that gaming has many, many, many more eras than just Retro and Modern, but you and everyone else seem to focus on those two so the easiest way the separate the two eras would be internet and arcades. So as I said, 3DS and Vita are not retro. They are modern. Modern gaming began over 20 years ago, and this will continue until the gaming landscape changes enough to define a new era. It's no different than how eras work in fine art, for example.

 

[RebelofDaNeonGod]

The sands of times escape your worn hands faster and faster, each grain an unrecoverable second, minute, hour, day, week and year. Age will ravage your languid body until you are naught but ash and bleach white bones. Tick tock tick tock, old man