In recent times, we've seen a flood of games being ported to consoles that they were never on back in the day.
Games like Metal Gear Solid, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, GTA3, Virtua Fighter 4, and many more have been shown running on platforms which, once upon a time, would never have been deemed worthy of hosting them – and although it's worth pointing out that many of these are little more than tech demos, it goes without saying that the people behind these ports are seriously talented individuals.
However, two such developers – Dreamcast expert Falco Girgis and NES-to-SNES port master infidelity – have taken to social media to contest the perspective that such ports are a waste of time and effort.
"Someone said that our Sega Dreamcast ports were a pointless waste of time today and that nobody will play them," says Girgis, who then shows a photo of his son playing Zelda: Ocarina of Time on a Dreamcast.
"Meet my son, who was the first kid to ever play Mario 64, Doom 64, Mario Kart 64, Starfox 64, Sonic Mania, Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice City, and now The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time—some of my all-time favorite games from childhood—on my favorite console, the Sega Dreamcast, for his first play-throughs… and his little sister plays with us as well."
Girgis adds that "despite the fact that we actually do have a thriving homebrew scene of people playing and supporting us, I could not give less of a shit if anyone else plays them or appreciates the work… This is all the validation I need."
It would seem the trigger for this post was Girgis sharing footage of Esppiral's effort to get the PS2 version of Final Fantasy XII running on the Dreamcast, an endeavour that led one Twitter user to quizzically describe the homebrew scene as "a creative abyss."
His post is then re-shared by infidelity – who has ported NES classics like Mega Man and Castlevania to the SNES – who adds:
"I've gotten the "pointless/waste/underwhelming/etc" comments, with my NES to SNES ports over the past 5 years. Do whatever makes you happy, brings you joy. You can't please everyone, not everyone will see eye to eye with you, with anything you do in life. If people like the work you do, that's great, if not, well, that's fine too. I'm a family man as well, and my kids have played every single port, and play them over their original NES versions, heh."
What are your thoughts on these ports? Are they a waste of time, given that the games in question are available already elsewhere, or do you find them an interesting new way to reconnect with classics in unexpected ways? Let us know with a comment below.