Even back in the 90's...

[Manhattan Sports Club]

...I always noticed how blocky and ugly most 3D games of the 32/64-bit era were.
The bad camera angles, blurry textures, and other nuances were very appearant.

Sure, I still loved games like Mario 64 (which has aged quite nicely, I might add) but 2D games still struck me as much more stunning and engaging, especially when done on the modern systems. This is why I loved Klonoa and Mischief Makers so much back then. I was always shocked and appalled by kids saying, "This game looks like shit!" or "This game is stupid because it's 2D!" because, being an artistic person, I couldn't really see the effort or artistry in tacky 3D environments or models.

So do you remember your first impressions of the early 3D games? What were they?

[tom]

Atari's Star Raiders (1979) on A8, I thought wow, really flying in space here.....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_raiders

I, Robot (Atari, 1984 Arcade), great sci-fi game, a failure in the arcades as people didn't know how to handle the game, so ahead of its time, true masterpiece......http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot_(arcade_game)

Koronis Rift, Rescue on Fractalus (A8), great 3D shoot em ups of the time. Also The Eidolon, another Lucasfilm masterpiece....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus!

Hunter (Acitivsion) on Amiga, although blocky you could go anywhere do almost anything....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_(computer_game)

Alone in the dark (PC), that was another 3D title which had good gameplay + good plot.....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alone_in_the_Dark_(video_game)

Ultima Underworld series, very good RPGs in 3D, excellent plot, great gameplay, two Origin masterpieces actually.....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultima_Underworld


Played and loved all the above

[wiggyx]

At age 6, arcade vector Star Wars blew. My. Mind.

The next 3D game that left any sort of impression was Star Fox. Loved it. But, there was little to nothing on the home gaming market at that time to compare it to, so it wowed me pretty good despite being really crude.

Wipeout. Played it for 5 minutes at a friend's house, hopped on my bike, rode to KB toys, bought a PS1.


Nothing really impressed me again until the Dreamcast. I grabbed a JP DC on launch day along with all the miserable launch titles including Pen Pen Tri-Icelon. Terrible game, but ran at 60FPS and looked amazing when compared to almost everything that came before it on the N64, PS, or Saturn.

Most every 3D game between Wipeout and Pen Pen was pretty much an eyesore IMO. I look at the 5th generation of consoles as the transition period, sort of how the 80's was the transition period for cars. Lots of new tech to learn and implement all at once while essentially abandoning all the parts and know-how used before made for a steep learning curve.


I really thought 3D would ruin games for a long time, but it's really given birth to so many new genres and ideas. As much as I LOVE 2D gaming, I can't complain about games when they pull off 3D as well as titles like Okami, SOTC, Journey, Forza, Portal, etc do. Without 3D, those sorts of games just wouldn't be possible.

[Shriek of the Mutilated]

My very first pseudo-3D experiences on home computers and consoles with games like Stunt Car Racer, or those first-person sections that were abundant in many 8-bit titles, were actually quite positive, probably due to the novelty. However, the mid-nineties trend to completely abandon 2D sprites and backgrounds in favor of poorly textured, low-poly 3D models admittedly pissed me off to no end. I found many Playstation and PC games of that time to be grotesquely ugly, especially those that, perspective-wise, *could* have very well been done in detailed 2D, like certain side-scrollers, point&click adventures, isometric RPGs, fighting games, or all those RTS/management/city building games that made leaps to 3D for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Hell, even some early polygon-based first-person shooters seemed much uglier to me than their sprite-based counterparts like Blood, or Doom.

Things obviously changed over time. The technology matured, games started to look more and more acceptable again, with only occasional instances of me going "I wish they'd done this in 2D", and the number of 3D titles increased that utilized their engines to realize gameplay that would be incredibly difficult, maybe even impossible to do in 2D, rather than to just have 3D graphics for the sake of it. I still think those early/mid-nineties titles are sinfully hideous, though.

[NayusDante]

I remember being somewhat unimpressed with the polycount of the Super Mario 64 models (silly in hindsight). I liked Star Fox because the low polycount seemed to fit the art style, but it was harder to accept Mario because of the existing reference point. It wasn't until I played Quake II on a Voodoo 2 that I really accepted where 3D was going.

[Ro-J]

The original King's Quest (PC) was amazing. Imagine, you could actually walk BEHIND the rocks. Right then, right there, I fell in love with Sierra adventure games.

I can't think of any other 3D experiences that had an impact on me, but I did wonder for the longest time why 4D Boxing was called 4D....but that's a question for a different thread.

[Orion Pimpdaddy]

Over the years, I've come to enjoy the look of the early 3D (mostly Playstation) games. They certainly don't look realistic, but got their own art style that is no longer being used, for the most part. Some blurry textures are still hard to look at, but if the gameplay is good it doesn't matter.

At the time, however, I was sickened by the almost total abandonment of 2d games by developers. It actually caused me to leave gaming until the Dreamcast came out.

[genesisguy]

I saw Sonic 3D Blast at a Toy's R Us on one of those demo consoles. I thought it looked awesome. That was late 96 maybe early 97. I was hoping to get a PS1 at that point and had pretty much moved on from the Genesis. My little sister would later get a N64 with Mario 64 and that was my first real home experience with 3d graphics. I thought it looked great at the time. What else would I have to compare it to?

[Gerald]

I believe the very first one was Virtua Fighter. I thought the 3-d blockiness was cool in a gimmicky way, but it was not a very fun fighter to me. Then I tried Battle Arena Toshinden which was better.

Mario 64 had really great 3-d graphics, much more smoother and cleaner than the Playstation games. I also played Panzer Dragoon and that had nice detailed graphics.

But I always preferred seeing well done 2-d games on those systems, like Castlevania.

[SpaceHarrier]

Honestly I've always been very impressed by polygon graphics, and whenever I see a review that knocks visuals as 'not holding up' it kind of bugs me. I still think Virtua Racing looks fantastic, and find Playstation graphics charming.

[wiggyx]

I saw Sonic 3D Blast at a Toy's R Us on one of those demo consoles. I thought it looked awesome. That was late 96 maybe early 97. I was hoping to get a PS1 at that point and had pretty much moved on from the Genesis. My little sister would later get a N64 with Mario 64 and that was my first real home experience with 3d graphics. I thought it looked great at the time. What else would I have to compare it to?

That's no a 3D game technically. Isometric view, sprite-based.

[treismac]

I could rant on and on about this period of gaming and how it lead gaming away from the beauty that is 2D gaming. There were some incredible games that emerged from the early 3D game period and there continue to be great 3D games that come out today, but I strongly believe that the video game companies of today have turned their backs on the greatest platform video games can utilize (apart from some wonderful exceptions), which has left the state of video games in a mediocre state. Let me quote from Orion Pimpdaddy, for he echoes my experience:


At the time, however, I was sickened by the almost total abandonment of 2d games by developers. It actually caused me to leave gaming until the Dreamcast came out.

I, too, checked out from games for a while as a result of this shift in video games. The polygon graphics, for the most part, assaulted my eyes. Fighting camera angles and by extension the programmers of the games made me ill, as I no longer felt like I was merely playing a game- I was now fighting its design. There was and still is something about the majority of 3D games that feels "stale" to me, as if the were slightly more advanced hardware demos where the main objective is to just "run around" and any other goals or action were secondary. As regards FPS, I've had my fill years ago.

Anyway, there's my $.02 for all it's not worth.

[Kyle15]

Honestly I've always been very impressed by polygon graphics, and whenever I see a review that knocks visuals as 'not holding up' it kind of bugs me. I still think Virtua Racing looks fantastic, and find Playstation graphics charming.

This to infinity! I'm still calling PS1 games pretty and some people don't really know what to think.

[Aussie2B]

As much as I love 2D, and probably favor it to some degree, I have absolutely no problem with simplistic 3D. Some games from the 32/64-bit era had great design back then and still look good now, while others had bad design and look bad now, just as they looked bad back then. Games don't magically change as they get older. They don't "age". They are the same as the day they came out, so the only thing that can change is your own perspective. If you thought the game looked great in the past but looks awful now, you can only blame yourself for that, not the game. If you let yourself get wrapped up in hype and impressed by the latest technology just because it's the latest, then, yeah, when all those things fade away for you, you may find the game less appealing over time.

Anyway, I agree with SpaceHarrier that the simplistic 3D of 32/64-bit games is quite charming (when the design was good, that is). Some may think I'm absolutely bonkers and backwards, but I actually prefer those early 3D games over the super detailed, shiny 3D games of today. I feel they had a lot more soul, and they look and feel a lot more "game-y" too me. Because of the limitations then, I think developers made purer gaming experiences, while modern games are more about being "experiences", if that makes any sense.

As for my impressions back then, Super Mario 64 totally blew my mind. It was a completely new, fresh experience for me. Playing it was like entering a little magical world. It felt alive and true in a way unlike almost everything before it. I also bought Pilotwings 64 based on how the descriptions captured my imagination, of sailing over the ocean and seeing whales pop up and the like (but I ultimately didn't like the game much). Later on, when I got Ocarina of Time, I was floored once more. As embarrassing as it is to admit now, my mind couldn't fathom graphics getting any more realistic than that. Those were the impressions of significance, but throughout that whole era of gaming I was picking up games. Some I thought had great 3D graphics, some not so much, but in the end I was just seeking fun games.

[Steve W]

Games like Mercenary on the Commodore Amiga let you wander through a 3D wireframe world, explore, battle, and eventually escape the planet once you procured a ship capable of getting you offworld. Robocop 3D was also another early 3D game that impressed me, although it was pretty choppy. Starblade, the Namco arcade game, blew me away with its "Last Starfighter" feel. When I bought an Atari Jaguar in late 1993 and played Cybermorph I knew a new era was dawning, with fully 3D environments without being on rails. It's just when games started to try and texture things that everything got ugly, especially with the PS1's texture-warping problems.

[sloan]

I, Robot (Atari, 1984 Arcade), great sci-fi game, a failure in the arcades as people didn't know how to handle the game, so ahead of its time, true masterpiece......http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot_(arcade_game)


I, Robot is and was video gaming art at its best. It is a sad shame that it never received a home console port. 32X, Jaguar or Saturn could have done this masterpiece justice.

Regarding the OP: I was never impressed by 3D games just for the sake of 3D. I differ from some, though, in thinking 2D platformers were the apex of video gaming. I play NES and genesis games today and notice how the gaming "engines" in most of those were sickeningly similar. Too many similar platformers, just using different sprites and backgrounds. The sameness set in with 3D as well. So many FPS and Metal Gear clones. The thing I learned to loathe through it all was the lack of originality among developers.

[tom]

Games like Mercenary on the Commodore Amiga let you wander through a 3D wireframe world, explore, battle, and eventually escape the planet once you procured a ship capable of getting you offworld. Robocop 3D was also another early 3D game that impressed me, although it was pretty choppy. Starblade, the Namco arcade game, blew me away with its "Last Starfighter" feel. When I bought an Atari Jaguar in late 1993 and played Cybermorph I knew a new era was dawning, with fully 3D environments without being on rails. It's just when games started to try and texture things that everything got ugly, especially with the PS1's texture-warping problems.


Wow how could I forget Mercenary on A8 or C64, great 3D games, both.
On C64 is also Castle Master (and CMII) , but it's so sloooooww.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

I was born at the end of 1992, but I did have a Sega Genesis as my first video game console. I got into video games in October 1998 after I had an asthma attack and the hospital had Super Mario 64. When I got the Genesis (it was one of the 150,000 Genesis 2's that Majesco sold before releasing the Genny 3), I was disappointed. I got an N64 for my 6th birthday, but it didn't last long, unfortunately; somewhere, we discovered the PlayStation, and I got that a few months later. I was impressed with the 3D graphics, especially with later PS1 games like Crash Bandicoot Warped, Crash Team Racing, and Spyro. I could tell the difference between an early release PS1 game and a more recent (1998 or later) release and remember the later releases impressing me and the earlier releases being less appealing. So the early 3D games (1997 and earlier) usually dated quickly, with some exceptions.

I had my first PS1 for 3 years, and loved it. In June 2002 it was shoved aside for a PS2, which kept me happy for many years.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

I was born at the end of 1992, but I did have a Sega Genesis as my first video game console. I got into video games in October 1998 after I had an asthma attack and the hospital had Super Mario 64. When I got the Genesis (it was one of the 150,000 Genesis 2's that Majesco sold before releasing the Genny 3), I was disappointed. I got an N64 for my 6th birthday, but it didn't last long, unfortunately; somewhere, we discovered the PlayStation, and I got that a few months later. I was impressed with the 3D graphics, especially with later PS1 games like Crash Bandicoot Warped, Crash Team Racing, and Spyro. I could tell the difference between an early release PS1 game and a more recent (1998 or later) release and remember the later releases impressing me and the earlier releases being less appealing. So the early 3D games (1997 and earlier) usually dated quickly, with some exceptions.

I had my first PS1 for 3 years, and loved it. In June 2002 it was shoved aside for a PS2, which kept me happy for many years.

I'm about to address this but I wanted to share something with you that I wrote in my blog:


As a longtime gamer since the age of 3 or 4, where I was introduced to gaming through Super Mario Bros. on NES, I have watched the gradual evolution of video game technology taking place more so than many of today's young gamers since that marked a significant transitional point. Atari was before my time, but then you would've considered the leap from Pong to Zelda a huge step for the industry, but sometime after what we call the 'fifth generation' of video game consoles (this included N64, PS1, Saturn, and 3DO) that change stopped being as obvious. Xbox may have introduced us to brute force gaming on our TV, but even before it came on the scene, PC gaming was long ahead of the console circuit. And yet it was around this time that the transitions became more superifical. Back when Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo were competing fiercely on the market, each console had it's own ups and downs; some that were so pronounced that you couldn't simply judge them by their shape or controllers, but by their own merits. Nowadays, with PCs mainstream, most consoles simply recycle components from popular manufacturers and the template laid before by the early systems.

Sometime during the N64 era--all I had then as I didn't own a PS1 until much later--a game called Mischief Makers hit the scene. We gawked for a bit about how the game, a rare 2D offering for a notoriously 3D console, was leaning towards a somewhat 'archaic' style. However, still an active SNES player, I took the game to heart as I continued to appreciate 2D aesthetics and the accessible gameplay. When you look at games during this era, I would say the 2D titles of Genesis/SNES have aged better. Most of the early 3D titles were a product of their time, attempting to emulate whatever was considered realistic the best they could, and this resulted in games that today look like absolute garbage. The ones that held up the best often relied on an artistic presentation that did not rely heavily on realistic symmetry, stuff like Mario 64 with its cartoony tone and Spyro the Dragon, among others. Regardless, there were many amazing games that came out around this time and this would be the last era of mainstream gaming that I welcomed with open arms.

I was also an adopter of the prematurely doomed Dreamcast, the Gamecube (the second least popular of its era) and later the Xbox and PS2. I can't say much about these consoles except that they have had certain titles stand out to me while mostly pummeling me with watered down, style-over-substance games exempt of any challenge that I would've been up against in the earlier days of gaming. However, we are living in a golden age of indie games as I write this, and they only continue to get more brilliant, plenty of them paying homage to classic video games in the process. I look forward to watching the future unfold for these games and their developers.

People who have no taste for artistic renderings, which tend to represent abstract or accentuated visuals (in other words, depictions of certain things like a cat, in a particular style) tend to disrespect retro gaming. Those who embraced it for the mechanics and not because of how realistic it is, tend to continue playing those games years after the machines they were published for go obsolete. You seem to mention that your interest with PS1 was temporal. I will add that anything that you like simply because it is the most realistic at the moment, will likely be surpassed by whatever you find more realistic in the next generation of consoles. Madden and it's audience are centered around this philosophy. We are still progressing towards the 'virtual era' but most games that rely on realism to impress or motivate gamers to play, usually end up forgotten later on unless they have some kind of gameplay mechanics to stand out. Of course, you might notice that even Crash and Mario hold up better than many older games of their era because they didn't rely purely on visual gimmicks. They found a style that could hold up years later by not trying to mimic realism.

[FlyingSpacePenguin]

I think early 3D graphics look fine as long as they're stylized and aren't aiming for realism. Games like Crash Bandicoot, Banjo Kazooie still look pretty good today thanks to their cartoony visuals which work around the limitations of the time. NiGHTS also looks good thanks to it's unique art-direction (heck, I'd even argue that the early polygonal graphics almost add to it's surreal dream-like atmosphere), though the pop-in is distracting. On the other hand, games like Tomb Raider and Goldeneye and look pretty bad years later. It's not something that will ruin a game for me, but it's noticeable.

[PizzaKat]

My first time seeing 3D was Alone in the Dark from the Panasonic 3DO. It was in late 1993 I think. They had this kiosk demo and it had demo versions of a bunch of games that were released or going to be released. I thought the game was amazing, since I was brought up on NES and SNES looking now the graphics pretty dated. I thought the 3DO was the future of gaming, that price tag $699.99 holy shit! What were they thinking? They also had a Star Fox display to play. Not sure if its considered 3D but that blew me away. Still one of my favourite games, got it for Christmas that year.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

StarFox is one of my all-time favorite SNES games, and would definately be another exception to this. In fact, mentioning Goldeneye and many fifth generation 3D games, there was alot of charm in the camp factor that dominated them. It's like Altered Beast, in that the campiness adds to the fun. So yeah, even ugly games can still be playable.

[chriswy27]

Some 3D games hold up great but others that I went back and played now such as Burning Rangers on the Saturn were just a mess of polygons that are hard to navigate. I also don't know how I ever got through controlling Goldeneye with a single stick.

[Tanooki]

I think with the 'good' 3D the user would consider it an expression of art more than a limitation. Starfox was decidedly low polygon, but the designs they use gave it a pretty edge that works well even now. But if you get into the PSX era take two heavy hitters like FF7 and FF9. For the day 7 looked pretty decent but not phenomenal if you ignore the static pretty drawn backgrounds, super low polygon with little detail but it worked, today looks like complete and utter shit, hell it did 10 years ago. FF9 though fares better being on the back end of the systems very active life as they put a lot more detail into the 3D models and upped the polygons, they're just better looking and more expressive and look like dated because they took an artistic license in an almost goofy SNES sprite era style to the bodies.

[Daria]

I thought 3D games were ugly in general until the XboX/Ps2 era rolled around.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

I thought 3D games were ugly in general until the XboX/Ps2 era rolled around.

That and most 2D games were never as choppy as the early 3D stuff. There was one game on 3DO that I played where you built and navigated a virtual house. Thing had one of the longest intro FMVs I'd ever seen, and when you finally got to 'play' the game, it was so laggy and choppy that it makes me sad to know people actually bought it. Lucienne's Quest also comes to mind as being guilty of this. Atari and NES, as ugly as they were at times, were generally very playable compared to these abominations.

[8-Bit Archeology]

Thunderforce III had the coolest effect. You flew behind vines and the backround on gorgon i think was the coolest 3d looking effect. Especially when the level sped up. Also vectorman showed me how games where evolving that title screen looked too cool.

My first 3D though on games was doom. Having hallways to walk down blew my mind. But also the sprites freaked me out. I tried to walk around every item to see the back. I felt like one of those movies where the paintings eyes are following you.

[WCP]

The first "real" 3D game that I played was Cybermorph for the Atari Jaguar. Sure, Starfox was out earlier in 1993, but it wasn't really a "true" 3D game in my opinion. The game was on rails, so I don't think it fully qualified. Cybermorph wasn't on rails, and you could go anywhere you wanted.

I was truly blown away by Cybermorph in late 1993. I know this game get's a lot of shit from people who were expecting it to be Starfox on Crack. Cybermorph wasn't really a hardcore action game like people were expecting, and it disappointed them. Cybermorph was more of a puzzle game in which you have to find these pods. It wasn't the space / flying adventure that people were thinking it would be.

However, if you accept the game for what it is, instead of being disappointed by what it isn't, it's actually a fine game. In fact, it's better than that, it's pretty extraordinary if you ask me. In the game your ship could travel in any direction. Smoothly. Also, you could go very, very fast in your ship if you set it to top speed. If you fly low to the surface, at the highest acceleration, it's pretty amazing the sensation of speed that you get from it. Remember, we are talking about late 1993 here. Maybe people didn't experience it till much later, but in late 1993 Cybermorph was pretty amazing. I also really love the flat polygonal look to the game. It's quite beautiful on a nice RGB monitor. You get to see all the interesting hues of color that are displayed on the surfaces of the various worlds that you fly over.

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

When they all first came out, I was into the PS1, way into it, and I remember being way into some of the games, but other games were just nasty looking. I remember the controls on some just feeling horrible. To this day, I can't play the early Tomb Raiders cuz the controls r so stiff, and even Resident Evil. I know they're all classics, I played a lot of RE2, but the controls in that first game is r just so awkward to turn the character around, it drives me insane.

This really was a case of hind side is 20-20 for me, tho. I was in middle school when the N64 and PS1 were popular, and I loved em. I remember playing Tony Hawk Pro Skater, and that game has aged well for me, but there are a lot of those platformers that don't play well at all, cuz of camera angles, in particular.

Even Mario 64 has the camera issues. Yea. Even Mario. I kno cuz I'll move across a platform, and the camera will pan all oddly, and then suddenly I fall somewhere I can't see, can't adjust the camera around to find him, and I fall and die.

Crash Bandicoot holds up for me, tho. These were done right, I think. Cuz ur moving forward, the games were still linear like a 2D platformer, and therefore didn't suffer from those issues.

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

I will say I was blind to it at the time, but look at it this way, they'd been trying to make 3D games for years before the 5th gen, and they were way worse. Ever play Sonic 3D Blast on the Sega Genesis? Or some of the 3D games on the Sega CD? A good example of godawful 3D graphics is Star Wars Rogue Squadron on the Sega CD. In comparison to these, the Playstation graphics were a real step up.

My roommate though noticed it back then, he's always been a big Nintendo guy, and the only system he never had any interest in was the N64. He never played thru Mario 64, he loves Zelda also and the only one he's never been into was the most popular one, Ocarina of Time.

[BlastProcessing402]

So do you remember your first impressions of the early 3D games? What were they?

About the same as yours.

"WOW these are ugly. FF7? Why does it look so much worse than FF3/6 (outside of FMV cutscenes)?" Not that there weren't a lot of fun very playable games, just that era was to 3D graphics what Atari was to 2D.


I still loved games like Mario 64 (which has aged quite nicely, I might add)

I think part of why, as you say, Mario 64 holds up better (and maybe n64 in general) is that they didn't have so many ugly textures slapped on everything. They couldn't pretty much, thanks to using carts. So instead they get a colorful cartoony look.

[Gentlegamer]

I felt the same way back then. Even though I enjoyed the expansion in game play potential with 3D games, most of them looked worse in over all presentation than 16-bit games. You had 3D games that also used ugly digitized scaling sprites like Twisted Metal... while I liked the game, it really looked ugly to me compared to F-Zero, or even Road Rash. I generally thought of 3D games at the time as similar to early 2D games on Atari VCS, primitive looking, perhaps a necessary step, but wishing for something better looking.

[The Adventurer]

I thought 3D games were ugly in general until the XboX/Ps2 era rolled around.

Its funny (not really haha funny though) but the PS2/XBox* era of 3D is easily my least favorite visually. The late 16-bit and PS1/N64 era seemed to be pushing the envelope in terms of style and technology. Once you hit PS2/XBox 'realism' started to take over, and things like lighting and particles started to take precedence. These crude attempts don't hold up at all compared to the next gen stuff, and they don't have the soul of the previous gen stuff.


*funny enough Gamecube holds up the best over time, its progressive scan graphics often still look great.

[megasdkirby]

I thought 3D games were ugly in general until the XboX/Ps2 era rolled around.

And even then (for me) they looked odd. Some games looked fantastic, like Dead or Alive 2 and 3, but many others looked...generic. Its really hard to explain, but it was as though the graphics felt forced or just not natural. It was way worse in the PSOne/Saturn days, though.

Most games today look great, though a few still look odd like the previous generation! :)

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

I really think it depends upon the game. There's some ugly looking 8 and 16bit graphics also. Plenty, actually. For me tho, its not so much the graphics looking ugly or primative, cuz many games from this gen look very nice, it just the poorly designed 3D games like Bubsy 3D that just have horrid camera angles and don't play well that bother me the most.

For me it's not the graphics, but the gameplay. I'll play Crash Bandicoot on PS1 over a lotta 16-bit platformers that play like shit. Yea, some of the graphics look ugly but if the game plays well, I'm in.