What's so retro about retro?

1. What is it about retro games that keep us coming back for more?
2. What do we mean when we describe a game as retro?
3. When does a game become retro?

These were the questions that sparked off riotous but friendly debate amongst an abundance of games people in the function room of O'Neill's last week, Our two speakers of the evening, Oliver Hume and Paul Scargill, both Audio Programmers from SCEE, moderated these debates amidst the beer drinking that was donated by Climax, and the previous function room occupant's Halloween decorations. The plan of the evening was to allocate each person to a table (six tables in total). The idea behind this was not only to evenly allocate people, but also for games people to meet others in the games industry. Olly and Paul set the evening off with humour and style, and the three questions that would, unbeknownst to us, spark off said friendly riotous retro debate, and even more questions!!

This was everyone's chance to thrash out ideas, thoughts and opinions on the subject of retro games with fellow gamers. And they certainly did! Amongst the crowd were those who loved retro games so much they'd been collecting gadgets, consoles and games as a hobby (Hello Derek!!). It was great to see the enthusiasm, excitement, and concentration in people's faces as they talked about what they liked and didn't like about retro games.

After the individual group discussion period ended, Olly and Paul took over once again and invited one person from each group to come to the front and provide a synopsis of what their group had been discussing. As the summing-up from each group progressed, there was more and more friendly heckling and shouting from the audience, which again, sparked off even more debate about retro games and games in general.

Guests were still hanging around and chatting long after the bar went dry. An indication of a successful evening

The opinions expressed by the speakers do not necessarily represent the opinions of their respective companies.
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