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[atyourservice]

Not just graphically, but in any aspect of games.

Physics, multiplayer scale, game worlds, gameplay, genres, sound, etc.

I always figured more genre crossovers would be common. It's more prevalent in the 2020s but I figured by now we would have way more fps + rts games for example.

Also, simulation games turned out just as detailed as I imagined back then. Specifically things like PC building sim, or farming sim, or life sims like the sims (oh, rhyme, cool) or Life is you.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Having grown up on Atari 2600 and arcades, modern games have far surpassed what I could’ve imagined back then.

 

[Schmendrick]

When I first played Super Marios Bros I certainly couldn`t imagine games like TLOU or similar. Ever since the PS3 era though I think games have largey stagnated in their design, just the scope and the graphics are still evolving rapidly.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

Games like Last of Us 2 where real-time cutscenes look close to movie quality and the camera moves to a gameplay angle without cutting have.

That’s about it.

 

[LectureMaster]

In terms of young kiddos imagination "be whoever you want, do whatever you want", Baldur's Gate 3 is getting close to the realization. After all, sheer freedom is the hardest thing to do in any video games.

 

[T4keD0wN]

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 - never imagined we would have games where you can fly across the earth and see actual representation of my home in

Outside of graphics the games are largely the same, going from Witcher 1 to Witcher 3 or Diablo 2 to Diablo 4 doesnt really surprise or impress me, most franchises havent evolved in any ways, ive expected a lot more ambitions and most games are barely as ambitious as GTA San Andreas was. Thought we would have games as ambitious as Star Citizen that actually come out, but it feels like most games are just remakes of old games, but with nice graphics. (i should probably try Half-Life Alyx i know)

Sucks that theres not that many ambitions and creative risks taken because theres so much money on the line nowadays, i didnt think of this problem as a kid.

 

[FoxMcChief]

Of course, years ago too. I think GTA4 might have been the open world game playground that I thought would never exist, when I was a kid.

 

[Guardian Monkey]

lol I’m playing Zelda echos of wisdom and I’m thinking back to the kid version of my self wishing we got to the level of graphics that were in the instruction manual of The Legend of Zelda when I played in in 87’. I think we are there.

 

[Crayon]

Once we got to vr, yeah.

 

[killatopak]

I thought Dino Crisis was realistic as fuck. This was after watching Jurassic Park 2.

 

[Markio128]

Once we got to vr, yeah.

Films like Tron and The Lawnmower man had me first imagining playing games in VR. I never thought I’d see the day though.

 

[Drake]

God of War 3 completely blew me away when I first played it, especially the opening sequence. The set pieces in that were unbelievable for the time.

 

[Big Baller]

Nope, still waiting on that huge Pokemon MMO and Zelda with CGI graphics.

 

[YukiOnna]

Not a specific game, but when they started weaving cutscenes and gameplay seamlessly to create intricate boss battles in a large scale I was quite blown away.

 

[Lootlord]

Crysis obviously

 

[Nitty_Grimes]

Flight Simulator 2000 / Flight Simulator 2024

 

[HerjansEagleFeeder]

Graphically surpassed (easily), in all other aspects I'm pretty unterwhelmed. With regards to story writing and other creative aspects, we're witnessing a degeneration instead of a progression.

 

[Crayon]

Films like Tron and The Lawnmower man had me first imagining playing games in VR. I never thought I’d see the day though.

Same here but I knew it would come one of these days. Seemed to come all at once with oculus, though. That happened fast once it started.

 

[Markio128]

Nope, still waiting on that huge Pokemon MMO and Zelda with CGI graphics.

Yep, I always wanted a Zelda game to push the visual envelope, especially after playing OOT. Alas, Nintendo aren’t interested in pushing technology anymore, which is understandable. What they do with such limited technology is still fairly impressive, but I do wish they had a console that was up there with Series X/PS5. A Zelda game that looked like the Demon’s Souls remake would be my wet dream.

 

[Trogdor1123]

Little bit of both really. The graphics have far exceeded my expectations but worlds have not. I remember running around towns thinking it would be great to be able to go into every room of every house, even if there was nothing there. That is far from occurring and probably isn’t even really needed but I still expected it to happen when I was young. Same thing with AI, I realized pretty quick that even most basic ai would wax most players so I’m glad that never happened.

 

[Big Baller]

Yep, I always wanted a Zelda game to push the visual envelope, especially after playing OOT. Alas, Nintendo aren’t interested in pushing technology anymore, which is understandable. What they do with such limited technology is still fairly impressive, but I do wish they had a console that was up there with Series X/PS5. A Zelda game that looked like the Demon’s Souls remake would be my wet dream.

They teased us with the GC and Wii U tech demo's. Nintendo nailed the pixar look with Mario (and Luigi's Mansion) tho.

 

[Sooner]

Probably 20 years ago.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

When I was a teen, I wished there would someday be a FF where the world was filled with other people.
FFXIV is exactly what I had hoped for.

Also, VR.

 

[grvg]

Last time I was really blown away was the half life 2 e3 tech demo, since then it's just been "bigger worlds, better graphics" for the most part

 

[Sethbacca]

Graphically, I feel like games are great but what kind of kills the immersion at this point is the worlds still feel kind of dead with largely static characters and locations but I feel like we're on track to change that with generative AI and the like.

 

[Radical_3d]

Any game?

Even the most lazy cash grab they release today is NASA tier for GenXers.

 

[HogIsland]

- Baldur's Gate 3 for paying off player choices

- Last of Us Pt 2 and Alan Wake 2 for extremely cinematic gameplay

- Half Life Alyx for transporting you to another world

- Destiny (and Journey) for eliminating the distinction between multiplayer and single player

 

[Tajaz2426]

All of them. I didn’t know anything about games as a kid, as I was homeless a lot. My cousin had the Nintendo with Mario and I was blown away and I think Top Gun. Being the way my early life was I didn’t know many existed outside of school like a computer we got in the sixth grade.

I love Final Fantasy because one friend I would stay with when my parents would disappear ,was FF1 on the NES. After that I didn’t play anything till I met my wife as an adult. In middle and high school I don’t remember kids talking about PC gaming, but they would talk about MK coming to the consoles and bring the booklets to school and I was fascinated by them.

So, since really 99 when I met my wife and she had a Nintendo 64 I have been blown away by games and what they can do. It seems like voodoo magic to me as I am 43 and I still know jack about technology. My oldest son has been building my gaming PCs since I believe the 780 cards, he buys me a new iPhone every year, and he installed a damn security system with cameras everywhere and I had to disconnect them because my wife and I were tired of seeing my penis shrinking throughout the years!


Anyway, yeah I’m always blown away by what people have accomplished with my hobby.

 

[yurqqa]

First games I saw had ASCII-based graphics and very simple gameplay.

So on one hand yeah, but on the other hand all the best impressions for the last years were from very niche indy games.

Last games that left huge impression for some aspect were Disco Elysium, It takes two and Astrobot in VR (newest one is a lot of fun and a lovesong to PS, but not that breakthrough as VR was).
And these games were some years ago.

P.S. Physics is a a complete disaster. Last game that really impressed me was Half-Life 2. There was some regress in PS360 era, and evolution after that but no revolution.

 

[GnomeChimpsky]

Spoiler

Graphics wise we're pretty much where I dreamed we would be. Gameplay wise it's feels like we've stagnated in many ways, although there's a lot of good stuff in the indie space.

 

[Clear]

Too many times to count. But then I was gaming in the late 70's.

 

[Parazels]

These screenshots went me crazy in 2000 and I'm not sure whether we have such beautiful cars in modern games.

 

[mayham2199]

Mass Effect. The choices carrying over, the world building. Incredible really. Still my favorite game\series.

 

[Edellus]

I was awestruck at FFIX cutscenes regarding summons. I was awestruck at FFXVI letting me play them.

 

[Hawk The Slayer]

Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart
Space Marine 2
GTA VI

 

[kevboard]

 

[Digital-Aftertaste]

outer wilds for me far exceeded my expectations

 

[Represent.]

TLOU 2

that’s it

 

[DirtyBast8rd]

Cyberpunk 2077, never walked around in a game just to see the world and all that's going. First time I walked around in Nightcity felt like I was on vacation in the future. And that was on my One X. Did it again plenty of times on my everything maxed out 4090 pc.

 

[rm082e]

Some stand-outs:

• FF7
• FFX
• Gran Turismo 3
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Halo: CE
• Ninja Gaiden (and Black)
• Bioshock
• Dead Space (2008)
• The Last of Us
• Elden Ring

For me, those are the games that have really felt like a leap forward at the time they came out. There are tons of other games I love, but they felt more like iterations of existing paths we were already on.

 

[RPCGamer]

Definitely.
I think one thing that has surprised me is just how during the race to push graphics, how little I'm concerned for them now. Games big and small are surprising me.

 

[atyourservice]

GTA VI

a little early, no?

There's still time for the greatest disappointment in gaming history to happen, as unlikely as that is

 

[unclbenn]

After playing mgs2 I thought one day we'd get to play a game where you shoot up everything in a grocery store. I'm still waiting for that kind of destruction.

 

[SHA]

My younger self wanted any special game with infinite level generation like AI but level 500 of what we already have, I mean genuinely, not the stuff we see from doom mods, I mean an endless game, graphics are just tools, tricks exist to close the gap.

 

[The Cockatrice]

Cyberpunk 2077 is certainly a game I always imagined playing when I was young, although it didnt reach some of my expectations(such as all megabuildings free to explore, entering ppls apartments, etc.) it's no doubt the only futuristic game that became a reality. Every other game still just feels stuck in the past. There are a few others like Uncharted 4 being the best indiana jones game I have ever wanted to play and a few others but sadly not that many out there. Outside of Mass Effect, the space opera like some of our favorite tv shows from 20-30 years ago, there is nothing.

 

[Complistic]

I imagined way cooler Pokemon games, Arceus is probably the closest they've gotten to what I pictured.

 

[rm082e]

Definitely.
I think one thing that has surprised me is just how during the race to push graphics, how little I'm concerned for them now. Games big and small are surprising me.

Same here. Once we got to 2012-ish high quality graphics, I stopped caring as much about cutting edge fidelity and got a lot more focused on resolution and frame rate. Once I built a gaming PC and played everything at native 1080/60fps, graphics kind of became whatever.

Now I look at stuff like Cyberpunk, Hogwarts, and Elden Ring and think "It's real nice that these games are so pretty, but they don't need to keep pushing." Especially if the high level graphics are inflating costs and killing their margins.

 

[Holammer]

Never imagined Pixel-art games would return. I really thought SotN on the PS1 was the last of its kind. The end of an era.
Now it's an embarrassment of riches with new games coming regularly from great indie devs, sometimes with art surpassing the best Capcom ever made in the 16-bit era.

 

[Johnny Concrete]

Surpassed by a long shot. And they keep surprising me, especially presentation wise.

 

[GrayDock]

Some games sure have, like the freedom in MGSV, the cinematic experience in Uncharted 2 and then TLoU after it and visually in Kena, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart and FFVIIRebirth.
But those are exceptions, not the norm...
I still want a Zelda with Kena/R&C visuals, a remake of MGS with MGSDelta visuals and a remake for the NES Ninja Gaiden's, like the one we got for Shadow of the Ninja Reborn. Or maybe a new 2D Ninja Gaiden with modern visuals, if it's true to it's roots.