I love old games better ...

[BozzerBigD]

The  really good computer games are ones you  play against other people.   Speedball2. That's still fun. Limited, but  unpredictable with a human   opponent.

Agreed. Speedball 2 & Sensible Soccer will always be most  memorable because of the human element. However, co-op games were also  massive on the Amiga including mouse driven games and null modem games.  Settlers was special because you could play with 2 mice both  competitively and co-op! Great pixel graphics with massive personality  of the characters helped a great deal too! Rainbow Islands, Aladdin and  Turrican (II) get special mention despite being single player due to  colourful kid friendly playability, film quality animation and awesome  sound and graphics respectively :afro:

Mid 90s 3D PC games don't hold a candle to these 2D sprite/pixel art Amiga games. I like Doom but I prefer Theme Park and Settlers for the personality and charm.

[BozzerBigD]

I've been playing games since the early 90's (C64, then A1200, then PC), and I actually think now is the best time to be a gamer.

I disagree. Putting StarCraft 2 and BioShock to one side as modern day masterpieces I think without KickStarter the modern game industry would be devoid of ANY games I want to play. Elite Dangerous and Tower 57 had to be crowd funded and to get SEGA to release a sequel to the amazing Alien Isolation (or even a VR version) would require the same method of funding! No risks are being taken and only 4 million people paid for Super Mario Run so mobile isn't the new dawn either! RIGS was a great VR attempt and yet Sony closed the developer Guerilla Cambridge despite great promise. The exonomics no longer add up and the games are suffering unless crowd funded.

[BozzerBigD]

Game development is a lot more interactive these days, vs in the past when a new shiny box just magically appeared one day in the shelves of the local video game store.

The fact the funding of games now needs to be crowd sourced because the industry is so risk averse is not a good thing. It means even respected companies with a proven track record like Frontier cannot get a publishing deal or direct investment unless they pitch safe AAA first person shooter type ideas to their investors. Crowd sourcing has become a necessity to stop the industry imploding.

Q. Should I have to pay up front so new, varied and exciting games see the light of day? Ans: No.

Q. Did companies like Team17 take a punt on Amiga games long after it became clear that the economics didn't automatically make sense. Ans: Yes they very much did and it paid off with Worms and to a lesser degree the new Alien Breed Trilogy.

Heck, Superfrog actually wasn't that profitable despite being a highlight for the Amiga platform and a polished gem of a platformer to compete with the consoles.  Where are the publishers taking risks today? They definitely aren't Sony or Microsoft.

I agree the digital platforms have saved our bacon with Team17 again leading the way in helping other indies stay in profit. Steam and GOG are the other winners. Star Wars fever is again riding high but will there be a new X-Wing vs Tie Fighter game? No of course not that 'flight sim' type game is not as accessible as Assassin's Creed or annualisable like Fifa so why take the risk? We'll be lucky to get a full VR campaign for Battlefront 2!