Am I the only one who gets a really weird feeling from all of these games? I was thinking it was something consistent in their stories, but I'm beginning to suspect its something else. Maybe I'm just zoomer brained and the combination of of graphics and music comes together and gives off a weird surreal feeling that. But other games I've tried of the era don't. Maybe its something else.
I can't quite put my finger on exactly what exactly makes me feel they're similar. Oppressive atmosphere? Mystery? I dunno.
Regardless, is there anyone who gets a similar feeling? Do you have anything else that gives off a similar vibe?
Oh another I forgot to include in the image would be the original Xcoms
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The original half life is sort of close to this feeling as well, but isn't exactly the same. Too... direct? I guess. There's less mystery in that game I think.
A game thats not quite in the era that also gave me a similar feeling was the first God of War when you start to get to the top of the temple. The realization that all of that was built by people, that, if it weren't for video game "time" you could spend weeks in that temple and never see the sky. That all came together when I was younger and gave me a similar feeling.
No, I know what you mean.
The old Alien Versus Predator gaems argualby have a similar vibe. The ones from Monolith Soft and Rebellion.
I'll have to check those out. Thanks!
I like this thread.
OG Starcraft also has it. The remaster fricks with the oppressive vibe.
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I never played the campaigns for the OG, maybe I should. I definitely see the similarities though. Thanks.
Any ideas why these feel similar? I still can't really put a finger on what it is.
No, it's hard to define. As an occult head, I could say it would be due to a specific astrological arrangement. But figuring out exactly what astrological alignments resulted in this very specific aesthetic would mean studying star charts to figure out where the planets were located in the 90's/early 00's, to result in this kind of thing.
As a movie/sci-fi fan, Alien definitely seems to be the starting point for a lot of this stuff.
About a decade before Alien there was 2001: A Space Odyssey, which is significant because it showed movie studios there was potential for big budget "serious" sci-fi films, paving the way for Alien to be made (previously it was stuff like Flash Gordon, 60's Star Trek, Forbidden Planet, Outer Limits, etc.). 2001: ASO has a bit of this same oppressive vibe.
But Alien really defined a lot of this aesthetic. While Giger deserves a ton of credit, for designing the Alien, Facehugger, eggs, the space jockey, and the alien mothership, artist Ron Cobb is incredibly underrated for designing the Nostromo spaceship interiors and exteriors, and generally the "human" elements of the movie.
http://roncobb.net/05-Alien.html
Once you recognize his style you'll see it all over sci-fi stuff from the 80's and 90's.
Some artists will directly credit him. I know Paul Russell who did work on Halo 1 credits him.
But his style shows up in Alpha Centauri, System Shock, and Marathon.
Giger definitely influenced Axiom Verge, and Shodan's design is very reminiscent of some of Giger's portraits of his gf.
>As an occult head, I could say it would be due to a specific astrological arrangement
please just call yourself schizophrenic lmfao losing my shit over this
I'm perfectly healthy.
Just go ahead and call yourself a hylic.
no lmao you're the channer equivalent of women that are into astrology and rocks idk how people like you got normalized in here but have a nice day you stupid imbecile all the books you read from charlatains and conmen have irreversibly fricked your brain
Kindly frick off. Its nice you've bumped the thread but this was a nice thread full of good recommendations until you started shitposting.
No. It was an interesting thread until I had to read his schizophrenia. I absolutely despise weak homosexuals that fall for this kind of charlatain bullshit. He thinks he's any better than the charlatains you get on the slums because he's white. Nah, he's even worse than them, because he is white yet believes in that bullshit. I kindly ask him to NECK HIMSELF immediately.
I think youbguys mean like depressing sci fi, but the 80s style sci fi like Aliens.
It's a totally different "genre", but somehow I got this exact kind of vibe from Loop Hero. I've been looking for more like this too.
not op, but that's a good pick yea.
Not sure if these all pass your vibe check, but:
Signalis
SOMA
STASIS
Hyper Light Drifter
Fallout 1
Dark Earth
Alien Earth
Quake 1
I have no mouth and I must scream
Oddworld: Abe's Odyssee / Abe's Exodus
Thief 1
Of those I've only played I Have No Mouth and parts of Soma, Fallout and Signalis. But yeah, I agree, especially for Mouth. Harlan Ellison's voice work really elevates it.
I'm probably far too used to modern games to play Dark or Alien Earth, but especially Alien Earth looks like it would be close.
I have Stasis on a list of stuff I want to try, and I should definitely get around to playing the Thief series. Same with Hyper Light Drifter and Oddworld and Quake.
Oddworld is so great. I need to replay them. I played New n Tasty as an adult but it wasn't the same. Stranger's Wrath is kind of cool too though the vibe there almost reminds me more of Psychonauts, it's a different kind of thing.
Yeah the OG Abe's Oddyssee and Exoddus are really good, but unfortunately the remasters suck ass and I have genuinely come to believe OWI just managed to catch lightning in a bottle twice in a row
I played 3 of the 4, didn't play Axiom Verge. I think you just like slightly hard sci-fi with interesting ideas and believable characters. System Shock maybe isn't especially hard sci-fi, but voice logs and emails sound like actual real people and not hollywoodized nonsense so it counts.
On that note, does Darkwood give you that feeling too OP?
Haven't tried it. I know its highly recommended but I've never been able to get into most isometric games that aren't RTS. It definitely looks interesting.
>I think you just like slightly hard sci-fi with interesting ideas and believable characters
I think thats definitely part of it. Which is why I first thought that it was mostly story that united things. But I think there's another part of it. Unsettling, like this anon said
, is very likely the right word. Older graphics definitely lend a lot to giving off an unsettling atmosphere, which maybe is why so many of these are older. Playing through the System Shock remake is definitely giving less of that feeling than I had playing the original (although that might be partially because its not new anymore too)
Worth mentioning Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis if you're looking for unsettling retro graphics games.
Something that's been totally lost since the 90's and early 00's, there was kind of a sense, played into by both software developers and hardware designers, that we were moving "into the future" and videogames sort of represented for people on some level how technology was moving forward into what we all dreamed of as the future.
What I mean is that the physical design of Computer monitors, Desktop towers, TVs, and game consoles themselves like the Sony Playstation or N64, were sort of meant to feel like a bridge between the physical world and the digital world we were creating.
This is something people really thought about at the time, from a design/aesthetics standpoint.
The entire experience from the physical side of media to the stuff that happened behind the screen was meant to draw you into the sensation that you were playing with a high-tech bridge into an alternate future world.
This is totally lost with cellphones and modern computer monitors.
This video is kinda gay, but I do think he's making a worthwhile observation.
https://youtube.com/shorts/YeXrKOgYXCI?feature=shared
I can see what you and him are getting at. And I could definitely see that being a factor in why there's not a lot of modern examples of this sort of unsettling scifi feeling. Digital Apocalypse is an interesting term.
Also the video showed Galerians, which is definitely something that could be added to the list here. I routinely forget that game exists despite it being one of the few games I owned for the PS1.
Modern tech aesthetics have gone to shit across the board. Look how bad cars look now compared to ones from the 80s.
yea it hurts.
BUT, I think there is room for optimism. It might take 50+ years, but things might change for the better.
I wish Alien Isolation wasn't 5x longer in the exact wrong spots than it needed to be.
If it's just unsettling sci-fi, try the citadel and see what it makes you think.
That one's been on my radar for a bit. I keep waffling on getting it because there's a lot of mixed reviews on the actual gameplay. I'm fine with gore.
Not OP, but I don't think anime stuff really does it. The characters are too cute.
The original Unreal
Alien: Ressurection for the PS1
Armored Core 2
Maybe look into retro adventure games. Hellnight, Juggernaut, Cosmology of Kyoto, Drowned God
Maybe also more recent indie adventure games like Strangeland, Unavowed
Strangeland looks great. Unavowed maybe too grounded to evoke the right feeling.
How, uh, "moon logic" is it though? Point and Clicks are usually on a spectrum from reasonable to "you have to read the devs mind to even guess at the right solution," where does this land?
I don't remember it being too bad. I'm pretty sure I beat it without a guide.
I only played Axion Verge out of these and I can say the lack of humanity in the scenario objects makes it feel way more alien than anything else these days. There are barely any visual assets that truly have been built by human hands, it's all either naturally organic or so metallic and advanced it's from an entirely different culture.
Enemy designs also help stablish the distance.
maybe a weird answer but Ace Combat 3? Specifically the JP version.
I love the PS2 era ones, some of my favourite games. Never played 3. How easy is it to get running nowadays? Specifically in a way I would know whats going on?
if you can get PS1 emulators running, it's easy. the pre-patched version is up on cdromance. make sure it's by Load Word Team.
it's a very oppressive game.
I just recently started playing Underrail and I think it gives this vibe. However, you don’t really feel it until mid-game, where the beginning just feels normal. A curve ball game that gives me the same vibe is halo CE on old gen hardware.
Halo CE has moments of that oppressive atmosphere I would argue. Its not through the entire game though, like System Shock or Alpha Centauri. More "under it all"
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One that's been on my radar for years. Not my usual genre but its extremely highly recommended.
What a weird looking game. I've never heard of this before. Definitely will check it out.
I remember the first Remnant had some cool environments but was painful to play solo. Is 2 better for that?
I was stuck on sony when Halo came out, now I'm on PC. Is the masterchief collection worth it, or is it a case of shitty port/remaster?
>I remember the first Remnant had some cool environments but was painful to play solo. Is 2 better for that?
it's still a Souls game but with guns. It's a lot less jank and that overall makes the experience a little easier though. You can also just look up where to get the engineer class and just cheese the game with that fairly effortlessly though. It's fun, pick it up if you can get it on sale/pirate it
>Halo and the Master Chief Collection
I am biased as a Halo fan. Also a Bungie fan (original Halo devs).
The most offensive thing to me about the Master Chief Collection is that they've cut out the credits sequences from each of the games. This really fricks with the flow of some of the endings: like Halo 3 and Halo: Reach I always enjoyed watching the entire credits sequence, and then you get a scene at the end. In MCC it's a hard cut from the last level to the ending sequence of each game, and the pacing is all off.
On top of this: they link to "credits" on an external site, and the last time I checked the credits page on the Halo website for the MCC doesn't list anybody from Bungie who actually developed the games. Which is deeply offensive and arguably ethically questionable/possibly illegal (but who is going to frick with a big corp like MS? Welcome to corporate dystopia)
Second biggest complaint is probably the loading screens: loading between each mission in the original games had this cool mysterious vibe to it, with a cool animated graphic and a little ambient sound, and the loading screens in MCC are blunt force in comparison.
But
It's actually a pretty ok way to play the multiplayer from each of the games. The servers are pretty active.
And it's not a bad way to play the campaigns either. It's forced 60fps (from the original 30) which fricks with some of the physics, but you can play with the original graphics and sound (it defaults to remastered, but you can change this in the menu: Halo 1 and 2 are the only ones that are remastered), and you can buy each game individually for like 5 bucks a pop
it's hard to complain when the multiplayer is active.
tl;dr: It's not terrible, but some things about it make me sad
Underrail ESPECIALLY with the expedition dlc is fricking amazing in terms of atmosphere and soundtrack— plus its a decent game too. Don’t get heavy duty unless u rly love the artstyle and combat— it’s a must buy for me but a ton of ppl fricking hate it because they expected it to be as long as expedition.
On my first run and I fricked up my character. Tried doing a Jack of all trades, but realized at Level 2 that it wasn’t happening. Saved it and now I’m doing a stealth crossbow build. The atmosphere is great, though going through caves to get oddities gets to be a slog, especially with the amount of prep each combat encounter requires
Nice. Shockbolts are epic. But yeah almost always better to focus on 1-2 combat skills in underrail. 1 for 1v1s and another for crowd control usually. Rare case you can make a decent build with the versatility feat and be kinda good with more weapons or a rare weapon that has scaling from multiple combat stats.
My first playthrough was metal armor w/ assault rifles (tincan AR) back when the build was stupidly overpowered and easy to understand— now it’s just still OP lol aside from the gun durability. It’s usually the first build I see ppl try. That or smgs and grenades with tac vest for more mobility.
If u end up liking the combat, there’s quite a few builds to try out. But the atmosphere of the game is what brings me back tbh.
Also the soundtrack composer, Josh Culler, did the OST for Neoscavenger— not sure if that would be up your alley. The ost of that game is nowhere near as good as underrail’s, but there’s some interesting visuals and ideas from that game worth looking into even if u just read the wiki and look at playthroughs. It takes place in a post apocalyptic michigan.
Check out Worlds.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/304850/Worlds/
Remnant II has a whole area with this theme
I had similar feelings about the early parts of The Dig even if it's a bit more cartoony and falls apart by the end. It also shares a similar theme with System Shock 2 and Alpha Centauri of humanity's first interstellar travels, and the mystery of discovering a new world.
Speaking of that; I always found the psionic annelids from both System Shock and Alpha Centauri to be strangely compelling and unsettling.
unironically Dark souls 1 for that empty alien world feeling.
true
baroque (sega saturn)
Perhaps?
Good call, Flashback too
They evoke where other things state. There's a delicacy to their methods that seems quaint but puts them ahead of others. Maybe it's quotes from three of the games that illustrate the underlying point.
"Eternity lies ahead of us, and behind. Have you drunk your fill?"
"We are going upstream - to the Filter, or whatever lies beyond - for answers."
"How can you challenge a perfect immortal machine?"
"Somewhere, in the heavens, they are waiting..."
There's a deep and true sense of wonder in the settings, the stories, the systems, all of these games are meant to allow you to run away from the day-to-day into the truly fantastic. Swim freely with delight in the same waters where the psychotic drowns.