Retro Video Game Blog

PlayStation just announced that new PS5 games will no longer ship on disc starting in 2028. Here's why physical games matter more now than ever.

The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is more than just a console.

Video games weren't always meant to be finished. You didn't "complete" Pong; you played a match and moved on. But somewhere between the arcade era and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth's 90-hour average playthrough, the purpose shifted: games became something to finish. So how did we get here, and is longer actually better?

Raya Systems made SNES games about diabetes, smoking, and asthma for hospitals. They weren't good games. The research behind them was.

Before home computers were common, most kids encountered gaming on classroom computers. For a generation of students, that meant Oregon Trail, Carmen Sandiego, Reader Rabbit, and a few titles so strange they got pulled from schools entirely.

From King's Quest to Baldur's Gate 3, the RPGs I keep coming back to share one thing: they make your choices feel like they actually matter. That's harder to pull off than it sounds.

What makes a game stick in your memory? What are the early games that defined, for you, what games could be and how they could make you feel?

Kart racing hooked me in the early 90s and never really let go. Here's how the genre followed me from high school through adulthood, and what my kid and I have been playing together now.

Old-school games were brutal by design. Here's why that might have been a good thing.