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jp's Atari Classics Evolved (PSP)

[February 23, 2012 06:30:58 PM]

After the (surprisingly) positive experience I had with the Space Invaders Remix (Evolution? Redone? Whatever it was called), I was looking forward to this collection. I knew most of the games and thought it would neat to try them out in both their original and evolved forms.

Evolved is probably the wrong way to describe most of them. By default I began playing the evolved versions and found that I was confused and having a hard time with the games. So, I switched over to the original and whoa, it was now ok! The evolved versions of the games felt more like graphical re-skins that, often, made it harder to play the game due to additional visual noise. I couldn't see what was going on in the game which was not only annoying, but infuriating because it showed how little the "evolved" word meant. Same game, new clothes, worse overall.

I guess I expected there to a real sense of engagement with the original games, perhaps tweaking some gameplay, re-imagining some ideas, and so on. Not that I think "evolved" should always mean "improvement", but I was expecting something less superficial. They just changed the look and (inadvertently?) screwed up the feel. The experience was almost souring of some of the original games, not that I was particularly fond of all of them. But I do respect them!

Ultimately, I think the most I've gotten out of this experience is:

1. Played Warlords. I don't think I'd played it before

2. Was surprised by how many of the games required the (rotated) tall PSP screen. I'm sure the aspect ratios aren't exactly the same as the original arcade games, but I hadn't really thought about the fact that many of them might have been taller than wider.