I've recently finished Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars for the first time since the late 90's and also the Smoking Mirror sequel which I never got around to playing back in the day. Two excellent games and they've recently released a remaster of sorts called Broken Sword Reforged which preserves the original game but upscales everything. It's £24.99 but as I had the original in my Steam library, I opted to just play that. 

I have also just started the OG Resident Evil trilogy from GOG and playing the second one first as it's practically 25 years since I last played it way back on the PS1 and it's my personal favourite of those games. Actually played the original, RE2, RE3 and Code Veronica all in 1999 and the difference from the 1996 original to CV on the Dreamcast at the time was absolutely insane! 

After those, I am tempted to finally get around to playing the Tomb Raider Remastered titles as they are incredibly faithful versions and currently 50% off on Steam. Had the original on PC around 1997 time and picked up Tomb Raider II for the PS1. They seem to be really solid ports so I'll have to definitely check them out. 

After all them, I will likely be gagging for an FPS title so instead of wasting £70 on Black Ops 6, I need to complete the Half Life trilogy by finishing Opposing Force for the first time in 25 years. I did Blue Shift last year but didn't have a chance to to this one. 

Definitely gonna grab this over the festive period.

I know FG has been pretty quiet for a while, so I’m not sure how much traction this will get — but I’ve been feeling a bit nostalgic lately and thought it might be fun to start a series of threads revisiting some classic games from back in the day.

First up: GTA Vice City — a game I’m pretty sure a lot of us here played and loved. I wanted to kick things off by sharing some of my own memories and inviting others to do the same. Whether you played it solo, with friends, family, or just have moments that stuck with you — missions, music, mayhem — I’d love to hear it.

For me, one of the biggest standouts from that era of GTA was the soundtrack. The 80s music was just perfect — imagine cruising down the strip with Toto or Michael Jackson blasting on Flash FM. I honestly think if Rockstar ever remade Vice City (or folded the music into GTA VI), it’d hit hard with fans.

The setting was on point too — that whole neon-drenched, Miami-inspired vibe. I still remember the first time I flew a helicopter in-game (pretty sure Vice City was the first GTA to have them?) — planting bombs in a construction site, then later storming Diaz’s mansion… total chaos.

And of course, who could forget spawning a Rhino tank just to wreak havoc around town? Or the classic 80s fashion — Hawaiian shirts and pastel suits everywhere. I wasn’t around for the 80s, but between the music and style, this game made me wish I had been. (Still a big fan of 80s rock!)

So yeah — anyone else feel like sharing some Vice City memories? Favorite missions, hilarious moments, radio stations, or just how it made you feel back then? Would love to read your takes.

/dreamlist//apple-touch-icon.png GOG Dreamlist | GOG.COM

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Explore our Dreamlist, vote for games you hope to see on GOG and contribute to game preservation!

I have primarily voted for:-

- Black and White

- No One Lives Forever

- Project IGI

- Diablo II

- Silent Hill 2

- Silent Hill 

- Resident Evil Code Veronica X

- Halo Combat Evolved

- The Simpsons Hit and Run

- Grand Theft Auto

- Civilization II

- The Movies

- Dark Souls

- Grand Theft Auto London

Not every game can be brought back due to intellectual property complexities along with source codes being lost but some PC classics could easily be revived not just to be DRM free, but also be fully functional out of the box thanks to what GOG do with forwarding optimisation. This would also be the original versions and not some remastered garbage. 

This thread is just to discuss some of those experiences and moments and seeing if anyone else here was gaming in the 90s / early 2000s.

So to start this off I am going to look at one of the games that came with the computer and led to one of my first experiences of football manager games -

Ultimate Soccer Manager 98/99 -

Now I have opted for this one because I have been going through the abandonware website looking at old games with the hope of getting a few running. This one worked straight away with no faff and the screenshot above is from my machine this evening 😄

The things I always remember about this game was that it wasn't just the coaching side of things but you used to be able to upgrade the ground, look at sponsorship deals and such. We won't forget some of the incredible players back then as well -

But shite in a funny way! We had a bit of a laugh with it. I had not played any of my retro stuff for a while and this has reinvigorated me a little. I really enjoyed just how simple it was, there wern't a lot of mechanics in it if you compare to modern day EA FC and you could literally just jump into playing a tournament within moments which was great.

It is on again in a few weeks over in Bilston and I plan to go. There are some quite big gaming fairs for retro collectors across the country and they seem to be great for finding some more obscure or collectible titles.

Just wondering if anyone on here has ever been to one and if so what gems you have found?

The game itself is great, a JRPG with a lord of the rings skin and though it looks dated today I am still having a lot of fun and taking down a troll for the first time is quite enjoyable. It's funny watching the little film cutscenes as well as visually they look crap through this. Makes me think about putting them on the PS5 at some point (I have them on blu ray) and just re-enjoying the films.

It has me questioning whether or not to get a proper upscaler, I have looked at some reviews and I think it would be worth it but for the price I would be looking at I question build quality.

The other thing I am quite enjoying about it is that when I play on a modern console and I see friends in a group together playing something I feel somewhat obligated to join them sometimes even if all I really want to do is enjoy a video game on my own. Playing the PS2, it's not an issue as it is offline and I just enjoy my game without distraction.

So this month is about Ridge Racer, sadly the series isn't really around today but I do have fond memories of playing Ridge Racer Type 4 way back. I am not so into racing games now other than playing with friends.

So they also explore how the series came about which began with Mazda (their tech demos over in Japan) and this developed into the video games, they were somewhat ahead of their time when they first launched in terms of graphics and such.

GOG is bringing the original Resident Evil trilogy back from the dead, and to digital PC storefronts for the first time | PC Gamer

WWW.PCGAMER.COM

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Feeling pretty itchy tasty right about now.

Resident Evil Bundle on GOG.com

WWW.GOG.COM

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Includes: Resident Evil Resident Evil 2 Resident Evil 3   Resident Evil 2 and Resident E

£8.99 each or £20.99 for the collection. 

I seriously cannot wait to revisit Resident Evil 2 again! 

So, are there any games you remember fondly? For me it'ss the obvious final fantasy games, but in addition to that I always remember fighting force. Spending a lot of time on streets of rage when I was younger I suppose this was the sort of game that evolved from them, walking around 3d levels beating the crap out of people.

So, are there any that you remember fondly?

The classic Toejam & Earl absolutely killer funky jammin!

What's yours? 

If you have any other suggestions please let me know. I won't stipulate how you play the game, be it original hardware or other methods, re-releases or remasters etc.

So yeah the poll provides some options for a first game, let me know if you would be interested?

I am thinking, we set a month to play and then over the course of that month we can chat about the game, aspects we enjoyed, grievances etc etc.

Let's start

Not sure if any of you play Tetris very often but it can obviously get incredibly manic as the difficulty ramps up, if you get a moment have a nose at the video on youtube and take a look see just how quick his reactions had to be!

In fact it seems like there is not much of a future for them considering the power we have in our tablets and mobile phones these days. That said I have quite a growing handheld collection with a nice white psp being added to the collection the past week and it got me thinking about which one's are my favourite.

We have the DS / 3DS consoles where there was an abundance of games and it was incredibly accessible for people, the PSP being Sony's first forray into handheld consoles and it being fairly successful to it's PS Vita offering which I think was maybe the best console but let down by Sony.

So do you have a favourite, do any of them still get a look in with modern consoles, steam decks, nintendo switches being available? Are there any games that bring back fond memories?

For me it is the PSP, partly because I had a PSP Go back when I used to work away and it was incredibly versatile, had an abundance of jrpg's that I loved (Jeanne D'Arc was brilliant as a tactics type game) and I used to sit at the top of 30m stacks just gaming and every now and again taking a reading. It was pretty great.

After Matt's @Luseth recent annoyance of reminding me i've been neglecting my older video games for a while, I had a think what i'd like to get hold of and managed to get the following:

I've always loved the film Universal Soldier, so I had to grab a version of the Mega Drive game to check it out. I used to play a lot of a chipped version of Everybody's Golf - it has the best crazy golf multiplayer game on it so looking forward to having a few local matches with wehoever I can get round!

I'm also wanting to complete a few more Mega Drive games so Indiana Jones seemed a perfect one given it has 5 levels within the whole game. Again, another game born off the films I used to love.

What's everyone else been finding?

Looking at 7 on the ps4 and having it in my library I plan to give it a go once one of the games I am currently playing finishes up. What I wanted to ask is your top 5's and recommendations?

I felt retro is more apt as I suppose these day's the games before 7 are mostly retro?

I'm sat watching some gameplay of Mickey Mouse's castle of illusion, this was the only game I owned in another language (Japanese for some reason) so for the most part I didn't have an idea what was going on but it was a platformer so easy enough to play ^_^ On the video I'm watching currently it looks like it holds up fairly well as far as visuals and the such goes.

So any other fond megadrive memories?

So this week I'm going with, what is your favourite retro console? The console you have fond memories of and why?

So there are 2 for me for different reasons -

The main one is the mega drive, the first console my parents got for me and one that I used to even play with my dad despite him not being into video games (we used to play a lot of fifa 96). I don't currently have one (I have some little boxed thing my mom got me a couple of years back that let's me play the games but it's a bit crap!)

The second is the PS1, I played this a lot as my escape from school (I was bullied a bit back then) and the Final Fantasy franchise became a huge escape for me (sadly the series won't be returning to what made it so great I don't think!). I actually have 2 PS1's now though they don't come out often with one being in a rather tatty looking box that I picked up from a car boot years back, though if either of them work these day's is anyone's guess! Typically the PS2 get's used as it can play both.

Off the top of my head, mine would be:-

Dino Crisis - classic PS1 title that was shunted for the Resident Evil series. Grown massively in popularity in recent years and Capcom would be more than capable of pulling it off. 

Metal Gear Solid 3 - a tough one for Konami to pull off especially without HIdeo Kojima at the helm and despite plenty of rumours of the original and this one possibly being remade, still no sign. 

Splinter Cell - confirmed by Ubisoft after relentless fan badgering (supply and demand doesn't compute with them) but still nothing in the works - suppose they are working out how to monetise it to death. 

Red Dead Redemption - As long as it isn't a port by Grove Street Games like GTA Triology, I'd love a rehash of the original with RDR2's engine and world depth. Would be massively successful.

Max Payne - Rockstar have been sitting idle on the brand since 3. I hope Remedy rebuy it back one day and remake the original with the technology they have at their disposal. 3 was just GTA without cars. 

Tony Hawks Pro Skater 3 - they've done 1+2 which were a huge hit but no sign of the third game which was a groundbreaking leap on the PS2 back in the day. Deserves a remake. 

System Shock 2 - Remake of the original releases this month and hopefully they do the sequel too. First game is quite limited but the second offers way more. 

Bully - Surprise hit from Rockstar about 15 years ago. Got backseated by other brands and GTA but they could do wonders with a sequel if they had the ambition away from GTA Online.

Skyrim - just kidding. 27 versions of this decade old game is more than enough. Please no more Bethesda! 

- Grand Theft Auto 4

- Metal Gear Solid 4

- Gears of War 2

- Fallout 3

- Burnout Paradise

- Dead Space

- Far Cry 2

- Fable 2

- Spore

- FIFA 09

- Mario Kart Wii

- Rainbow Six: Vegas 2

- God of War

- Mirrors Edge

- Crysis Warhead

- Battlefield: Bad Company

- Need For Speed: Undercover

- Call of Duty: World at War

- Left 4 Dead

- Little Big Planet

- Saints Row 2

- Silent Hill Homecoming

- Tomb Raider Underworld

- C&C Red Alert 3

- Devil May Cry 4

- Valkyria Chronicles

- Persona 4

GTA IV's launch was absolutely massive from what I remember and MGS4 was a huge system seller 10 years from the original's release. Fallout 3 took the RPG into 3D and Gears of War 2 continued to build on the Xbox's important exclusive. FIFA was really turning a corner as PES was fumbling its generation transition and Burnout Paradise was great fun on all systems. I probably only picked up a quarter of the list but even that was a huge amount. The PSP and Nintendo DS were really popular although I didn't have neither but the Wii was also selling masses of units and offered something different in terms of audience and interactivity. Spore didn't really live up to its ambitions but was still decent and Mirrors Edge pushed visual and mechanical boundaries. WAW to finish the year off was also nice but many at the time felt the series played itself safe after IW made huge strides after their Modern Warfare gamble with COD 4. 

Gamers were also spoiled with many having plenty of games from 2007 on the back-burner or still being played such as Halo 3, Bioshock, Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Portal, Crysis, Uncharted, Super Mario Galaxy and The Orange Box plus many more. I honestly don't know how I managed to squeeze so many in during this era! 

this game just going to make me depressed?  I have 3 littles and I don’t need added drama in my life because that’s just not fun for me.  Seems like Last of Us is the same way which is why I haven’t

tried that one either.  I like games for fun and don’t mind some drama but I don’t want to play through an experience where my kids die and shit.  Is this game worth continuing or should I pass?

PS3 is the new retro btw.  We’re old now, gotta accept it.  

Yet what they put out on the likes of TikTok shows them dealing with each order with precise care and attention. Most of the time you can't even get a real controller with the machine either because they are selling those separately at an insane rate and then instead give you some crappy 3rd party one with your $400+ purchase. 

I know a few people love these types of games and its probably within reach for some if you have the following elements:

1. A CD version of Championship Manager 3
2. A CD disc reader (ofc!)
3. A patch (v3.04e) to be downloaded from here
4. Windows 10

I found some great advice from another website that told me to download the patch otherwise you get a compatibility error when it tries to run. Once the patch is downloaded, unzip the file and run the Setup.exe file in there. It will do what it needs to do and remove some quick files which leaves you to finally just right click the shortcut on CM3 and enter the Properties.

Once in there, select the Compatibility below for this game and click Apply.

Then run the game to sit back and listen to that crowd noise at the start and cheer along with them! A few pics below of the game and installing! Can't beat some nostalgia...and Marcelo Salas on the Home Screen 😄

PS1 pad was amazing for its time and influential for many years to come. Loved the D-pad and buttons. Start and select were a bit weird to press but it did the job perfectly.

N64 was very advanced at the time especially with the 3D stick, a solid D-pad, shoulder buttons, Z-trigger along with the two standard plus yellow directional ones. Didn't use the d-pad much from what I remember but the 8-direction stick was really ideal for the likes of Goldeneye and the array of platformers.

Dreamcast controller was pretty awesome - fit nicely in the hands and much smaller than it appeared in pictures. Full 360 degree stick with solid grips too. D-pad was a bit too tight and raised for my liking though but was fairly under-used in most games plus the coloured buttons also felt a bit cheap. The VMU/memory card aspect was also pretty interesting but devs didn't make much use out of it in the end sadly. 

Microsoft Sidewinder - got this for Christmas around the early 2000's. Bit weird on the face of it but it worked surprisingly well. Had a strange 3D-type D-pad that was slanted slightly which was fairly unique even to this day. My only gripe was the lack of coloured or clearly marked buttons. Very comfrotable though. 

Playstation 2 pad was just amazing - expanded upon the original with pressure-sensitive buttons and twin sticks - these didn't have much grip and were perhaps a bit large but they worked pretty well. 

The first Xbox pad was way too heavy for my linking - I didn't really like the white and black buttons as they were too small and dug into your finger. The vibration also made a buzzing sound and the coloured buttons felt a little elevated and cheap. Can't remember how the D-pad was but the sticks were solid enough. Seemed a little over-engineered but with tweaks, future Xbox ones were spot-on. 

Gamecube controller was very strange - every button was bizarre and the D-pad and right stick was just so oddly placed. It didn't really have a detrimental effect on the games and the main 3D stick was fine but it just seemed a bit of a mess. 

I don't quite consider the Wii, 360 or DS3 pads retro as of yet - all excellent and highly reliable controllers. The Wii was really unique in what was a bit of a fad of the era despite monumental success. The 360 and PS3 controllers were both excellent and remain the key foundations for pads today. 

Electronics Boutique - first exclusive one I remember and picked up Super Mario 64 pre-owned for £35 which was a steal at the time.

Toys R Us - this was my local store and it served me well through the Gameboy, N64 and Dreamcast era. Also the game slips were just such a glorious shopping concept - cannot beat taking that ticket to the till and then collecting the sealed game from the desk. So oddly satisfying.

HMV - not my typical videogame shop but still a good all-round electronic entertainment store. Sometimes they'd accidentally get in some great stock or sell way under the expected price particularly on PC games around the early 2000's. 

Comet - once sold me ISS Pro Evolution Soccer 2 but charged me for the original instead so I saved £20 on a new game just released. They will go down in some weird hall of fame just for that!

Dixons - they always did a nice range of electronics but really neglected their gaming space and were very middle of the road. 

GAME - pretty much the most established on the high street at the last one standing. This was a fantastic brand from the early 2000's until around 2013 but digital gaming has really put the final nail in the coffin and it is quite surprising the company is still going. Many locations have shut down though and a few have even merged into concessions of other stores to reduce overheads but maintain a presence. There's only one left in my City which operates within a Sports Direct store on a shitty retail park on the outskirts. In its prime there was one in our major Town shopping centre and another sitting within a flagship Debenhams Store. Both were excellent and offered everything gamers wanted. Pre-owned was a big focus back then too. I last visited GAME in Bournemouth this year where it was hidden within a shopping arcade on its last legs along with Sports Direct and HMV and there was not one thing worth buying as it could all be got cheaper or online. Really struggle to see any future viability within the company.

What stores did you used to shop at back in the day before digital took over completely? Also be interesting to hear from people outside of the UK. 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B7BDN73B?tag=i0e25-21&ascsubtag=01tRy1iT6BPBN6YlgGGbmYZ

Nice unit but quite pricey at £105.

- I am due to go on a caravan holiday, start of July and I plan to take my GPD XD so that I can play some older games without having to lug the original hardware away with me!

- English translations, there are a couple of games I always wanted to play but never could because they never got released outside of Japan so there was never an English version. Since the original release however there have been fan made translations which have allowed me to enjoy the games. One of these for me being shining force 3 parts 2 and 3.

- The other thought that often comes across is cost, playing and collecting older games is certainly not an affordable hobby these days and it's only going to get more expensive with some games becoming rarer or more sought after. So I can appreciate there will be people who won't ever get the opportunity to appreciate some games without emulation which would seem a shame.

Max Payne (2001)

Max Payne 2 (2003)

Alan Wake (2010)

All these are Remedy titles who are a popular developer of the past two decades and have really unique titles that have really stood the test of time. Next on my list is Condemned: Criminal Origins (2006) which was title from the early Xbox 360 days which I've picked up on PC. Didn't get around to playing it back in the day but it's made by the same team that did FEAR so I'm definitely looking forward to it despite its age. 

Anyone got any old games on the go that they are working through right now or recently? I'm enjoying doing this than forcing myself to play some generic new release. 

But just thought I would share a couple of the games in my PS1 collection -