Games with graphics resembling PS1 or PS2?

reboot6675@sopuli.xyz to Games@lemmy.world – 80 points –

So recently I was thinking how games with pixel art graphics are popular nowadays, and I was wondering if there are new games being made with other kinds of "retro" graphics, for example, games that look like the PS1 or PS2 eras.

Any recommendations?

60

Any "boomer shooter" is a callback to the 90 early 00s shooters. For example: Dusk, Postal: Braindead and Warhammer 40k: Boltgun

Lots of indie horror games have the early 3d era look to them.

Basically if you want visuals like this, the indie scene is where you should look

Piggybacking off you, Ultrakill (same devs as dusk) is one of my favorites in recent memory. Highly recommend.

Ultrakill (same devs as dusk)

The same publisher, but not the devs.

Same publisher (New Blood), but not the same devs. Dusk is by David Szymanski, Ultrakill is by Hakita.

Pseudoregalia is a 3D platformer/Metroidvania with a low poly art style a la PS1.

Beeny Super Kiwi 64 is a 3D platformer where you play as a kiwi, reminiscent of N64 era RARE games.

Edit: I meant Super Kiwi 64. Beeny is by the same dev but more like an SNES game such as Donkey Kong Country.

There's been a recent boom in retro-style 3D platformers, so there's no shortage of good options to choose from:

Bomb Rush Cyberfunk
Lunistice
Pseudoregalia
Toree 3D and the rest of the Toree series
Frogun
Corn Kidz 64
Cavern of Dreams

Upcoming:

Toree Saturn
The Big Catch
DoubleShake (technically 2.5d)

There are more, but these are the ones I can think of.

Well, Lunistice, Paeudoregalia, Corn Kidz 64, and Cavern of Dreams are now all on my list because the screenshots make them look like fun games to play.

If you like retro styles and don't mind some technical tinkering and manual configuration of games you can checkout the "demake" scene. These people recreate modern games to look and play as if with the limitations of the PS1/N64 (or earlier) era. The most popular and polished I know of is the demake of Bloodborne that recreates the first third of the game entirely as a PS1 game.

Came here to post this, love the Bloodborne demake

Lunacid might be worth checking out. It's an homage to the older Kings Field (Fromsofts flagship series before the Souls games) games from the PSX era and really well done. It had it's full 1.0 release a few weeks back. I had a lot of fun playing through it

If you mean low poly & texture sized 3D games, then I would say BallisticNG, which is directly inspired by Wipeout from the original PSX. Also, while not quite the same, Valheim has a similar pixelated texture style with low poly models (for today's standards at least).

I've been enjoying Signalis. It's a survival horror game with a top down 2.5d perspective and a late ps1-early ps2 graphics style. It's very reminiscent of the older Resident Evil games where ammo is scarce(more or less is available based on difficulty), inventory space is limited(adjustable limits are available in settings), and there are specific rooms with a storage container where you can store items and save your game (there is no autosave or checkpoint system; you have to manually save your game), but it very much feels like it's own thing.

I picked it up on a whim when looking for games with female protagonists to play on a new-to-me hand-me-down Steam Deck, and it happens to run perfectly on it.

Valheim with all the modern shit like bloom, tiltshift and with the vegetation detail at medium is very PS2y, imho

Lost In Vivo is a pretty solid first person survival horror ish title, looks straight off of PS1 pretty much

Prodeus looks like an early 3D FPS like Doom but there are obviously modern day techniques such as lighting etc too give it a modern twist and make it now palatable.

Are you implying doom is not palatable? It's a matter of taste, but of all the old FPS games, Doom is one of the most replayable in my opinion. Even without nostalgia goggles. The gameplay is tight, the weapons are timeless. The only thing that dates it other than the obvious graphics, is the level design can be a little tedious.

No, no, no, I wasn't trying to give that impression at all. I'm saying that Prodeus is an old style game like Doom but with a modern twist in graphics. it's trying to give the impression of an old school game.

Doom is awesome and I even remember being blown away the first time I saw Wolfenstein 3D. Back in those days, it was gameplay over graphics and it was a great time.

Alright. I misunderstood. Might have to give prodeus a whirl then. Thanks!

Thanks everyone!! This is more than I expected. Lots of promising stuff! I will look into each and every one of your suggestions.

(Since it's a bit silly to reply to every single comment the same thing, I'm just putting this one here)

Do we have a !RemindMe bot yet?

I know there was a remindmebot on Mastodon that was accessible from Lemmy. Sadly I don't remember how to call it or know if it's still up.

I've already seen them suggested, but I want to throw out another recommendation for Signalis and Lunacid . Signalis is a sci-fi horror game that takes heavy inspiration from the old Resident Evil and Silent Hill games. Like Resident Evil you have limited ammo, inventory, and points where you can save. Like Silent Hill you have a story that starts out fairly straightforward and then gets weirder as things start to unravel around you. I'm not really a survival horror fan and it still managed to keep me hooked to the end.

Lunacid is a first-first person dungeon crawler that is heavily inspired by pre-Dark Souls Fromsoft series like King's Field and Shadow Tower. That's really all the game sets out to be and it absolutely nails it. The combat can be a bit repetitive, unless you invest in magic which I found to be incredibly fun and versatile, but I feel like the atmosphere more than makes up for it. It also has a ton of secrets and plenty of those ah-ha moments where you open up a shortcut or figure out how one area connects to the others.

Neon White isn’t necessarily low-poly, but it has a dreamcast early-2000’s vibe to the levels

Signalis if you are into survival horror games. Short but good.

This. It even has a built-in CRT filter if you're into that. You can definitely feel the inspiration from Silent Hill/Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, Dead Space, and even some Evangelion in its artistic direction.

Everything by Puppet Combo. Especially in the indie horror sphere, there has been a huge resurgence of PS1/PS2 style games.

I haven't seen anyone mention HROT yet, but it's a other featuring a retro 3D art style.

Check out Pseudoregalia on Steam, came out last year.

Signalis, released in 2022 is a great survival horror with very similar gameplay to resident evil and I feel very successfully recreates the PS1 aesthetic.

Alisa is a great horror game that uses pre-rendered backgrounds and plays very much like an old Resident Evil game. It even opens up with a pretty nice FMV intro.

One big difficulty of it is that there’s one finite currency used for buying upgrades, weapons, health, and ammo; and you’ll likely be strained if you avoid buying the latter.

Signalis is very good. It's an re1-style survival horror but with a more scifi setting.

I’ve not played it, but Back in 1995 has always caught my eye.

The reviews make it sound terrible, and only just over an hour long.

That’s too bad. The first time I saw it was at a bitsummit in Kyoto some time ago. I never actually knew how it turned out.

Not quite what you're looking for but it's fresh on my mind: 2009scape! Its an open source game engine reimplementation of RuneScape circa 2009. The devs aim for it to be purely a time capsule of RuneScape in 2009, but being open source it would be very easy to fork and add content as needed.

The official server is extremely friendly and the client has a single player mode available as well.