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[Guilty_AI]

I started playing Daggerfall Unity recently and that made me think about how some fairly ambitious old games got held back by their times.

Daggerfall is massive, with one of the largests maps ever in games, complete with even political factions, spellmaking systems, interiors in pretty much every building and interesting takes in quest design. Unfortunately the game was held back by things such as lots of gamebreaking bugs or limitations on the procedural generation tech / hardware of the time.

Using Daggerfall unity along with other mods, we can start seeing how modern-day tech could be used to finally realize some ideas like those in much more fleshed out ways

So, do you remember any overly ambitious old game that has much better chances of being realized nowadays?

 

[HL3.exe]

The original STALKER 2004/2007 comes to mind. Overly ambitious AI systems with it's own ecology and memory (dubbed A-life), combined with Deus Ex style persistent and reactive world. It didn't quite work out in the end (and this before the Ubi formula took over).

But i'm curious what stalker 2 holds, even though i'm glad they halted production due to the war

 

[Fbh]

I played Through Kingdom Under Fire: The Crusaders last year and it left me really wishing we'd get a modern iteration of this type of game (that's not a grindy MMO like Kingdom Under Fire 2).

Game has a lot of cool ideas, it's a combat focused RTS where you control and army divided into multiple squads, and it switches to a dynasty warriors type third person action game when your commander enters battle.
The whole game has some notorious jank, controls are a bit awkward, the camera is terrible, draw distance isn't great, and you can tell they were limited in the types of terrains and level design they could use. But a modern game with more polished controls, bigger armies, more complex environments, and a deeper third person combat would be awesome.

 

[TintoConCasera]

I played Through Kingdom Under Fire: The Crusaders last year and it left me really wishing we'd get a modern iteration of this type of game (that's not a grindy MMO like Kingdom Under Fire 2).

Game has a lot of cool ideas, it's a combat focused RTS where you control and army divided into multiple squads, and it switches to a dynasty warriors type third person action game when your commander enters battle.
The whole game has some notorious jank, controls are a bit awkward, the camera is terrible, draw distance isn't great, and you can tell they were limited in the types of terrains and level design they could use. But a modern game with more polished controls, bigger armies, more complex environments, and a deeper third person combat would be awesome.

Could Mount & Blade kinda fill the space? It lets you control a dude in heavily populated medieval battles.

 

[Guilty_AI]

I played Through Kingdom Under Fire: The Crusaders last year and it left me really wishing we'd get a modern iteration of this type of game (that's not a grindy MMO like Kingdom Under Fire 2).

Game has a lot of cool ideas, it's a combat focused RTS where you control and army divided into multiple squads, and it switches to a dynasty warriors type third person action game when your commander enters battle.
The whole game has some notorious jank, controls are a bit awkward, the camera is terrible, draw distance isn't great, and you can tell they were limited in the types of terrains and level design they could use. But a modern game with more polished controls, bigger armies, more complex environments, and a deeper third person combat would be awesome.

Not too familiar with those types of game, but wouldn't Bannerlord fit the bill?

 

[nominedomine]

Any MMO really. Imagine if a big established studio actually gave it a shot like so many were willing to do in the early 2000s?

The attempts we get these days are a lot less ambitious despite all the advancements in technology.

 

[Fbh]

Could Mount & Blade kinda fill the space? It lets you control a dude in heavily populated medieval battles.

Not too familiar with those types of game, but wouldn't Bannerlord fit the bill?

Always wanted to try one of those but still haven't taken the time.
The thing about KuF is that it's primarily a RTS. So your main focus, specially past the easy initial missions, is controlling your various squads. Then once you have everyone positioned and engaged where you want them you go into the fight with your commander, but as the battle progresses you are constantly swapping back to the more overhead view to reposition squads, have them target other enemies, giving the cavalry a route to follow to crush into enemy infantry, etc.

 

[TwiztidElf]

Almost every beloved modern indie game is this.
Undertale, Hades, Slay the Spire, Hollow Knight, Shovel Knight, Steamworld Dig. The list goes on and on.

 

[_Ex_]

So, do you remember any overly ambitious old game that has much better chances of being realized nowadays?

Utopia the 1981 Intellivision strategy game was amazing for its ambition considering the platform:

"Utopia is a game played by two players on two continents. Players must build their island nation by building farms, housing, schools, hospitals, and factories and making other improvements while also competing against another player. Players are able to sabotage the other player as well, but they must also handle maintaining a fleet of PT boats to protect their fishing fleet, building forts to prevent rebellion, and dealing with the occasional hurricane. The game is played in real time. Each player moves a box shaped cursor around the screen to perform construction and moving of boats."

Now take that concept, add modern graphics and better controls, and make it an online world where every player has their own island.

 

[Guilty_AI]

Almost every beloved modern indie game is this.
Undertale, Hades, Slay the Spire, Hollow Knight, Shovel Knight, Steamworld Dig. The list goes on and on.

hm, not exactly. More often than not a lot of these indie game are just improving on the formula of very successful games. Metroid games for example can still hold up against modern metroidvanias, and technology didn't hold back its concept too much. Same for Earthbound/Mother and its descendants like undertale. In other cases they're just re-interpretations of the genre like with Hades.

I'm refering more to concepts that just didn't do very well on their time due to technological limitations, or that could be vastly improved upon with modern day tech.

 

[brian0057]

Videogame RPGs (JRPGs very much included) peaked with Daggerfall and the industry has been trying to catch up ever since... with varying degrees of success.

 

[01011001]

Jurassic Park Trespasser comes to mind... that game simply was too much for the hardware at the time, on top of being unfinished of course.

but the physics driven Gamedesign would work way better in a modern engine on modern hardware

 

[Stuart360]

Jurassic Park Trespasser comes to mind... that game simply was too much for the hardware at the time, on top of being unfinished of course.

but the physics driven Gamedesign would work way better in a modern engine on modern hardware

Dude i'd die for say a NightDive remaster of Tresspasser, complete with quality of life improvements.
I wouldnt be surprised if it happened too at some point.

 

[Guilty_AI]

Jurassic Park Trespasser comes to mind... that game simply was too much for the hardware at the time, on top of being unfinished of course.

but the physics driven Gamedesign would work way better in a modern engine on modern hardware

Seems like the game would work great in VR.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

.

 

[arvfab]

Black & White with even better creatures AI and modern day tech.

 

[rabbity-thing]

 

[Guilty_AI]

we do have that tho