(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); You must login or register to view this content.

There are already a lot ways to play old games: Download MAME, blow the dust off your old systems, play Flash clones on the internet...and those are just the free ways. If you spend a couple bucks you can download tons of older games from the major consoles’ networks, or pick up an Atari 2600 on eBay for a song. Given the availability of retro titles, Microsoft Game Room has to do a lot to justify its existence.
Thankfully, Game Room tries to do more than just provide another way for you to play hoary “classics.” Instead, it creates a unifying experience around older games by giving players a virtual arcade, which provides both context and atmosphere. Playing arcade games is only part of an entire experience designed to give the feeling of spending a lazy Saturday afternoon at your local video parlor, circa 1987.

Game Room puts your avatar in the middle of a bustling video arcade stocked with around 30 games, and lets you go nuts. Unlike actual arcades, all the cabinets and home video games have a demo feature that gives you about 20 free minutes per title, a generous amount of time to decide whether a game is for you, and a rewind feature: Nice if you suck.

After your free trial, you’re presented with three ways of giving Microsoft your money. You can slip in a couple quarters (40 MS points) for a single play, you can buy the game for use in your personal Game Room arcade for $3 (240 MSP), or you can buy the game for play on your Xbox and Windows for around $5 (400 MSP).

You must login or register to view this content.

I stuck with playing free demos and then buying the cabinets I liked and slapping them in my arcade. Everything that I played was a spot-on accurate re-creation, from arcade cabinet classics to console games from the 80s. Designers resisted the urge to “improve” older games, right down to leaving in the weird black bar glitch on the lower left bottom of the screen for Atari 2600 titles. Everything from the flickery look of old 2600 games to the dead silence of ancient 70s arcade game Lunar Lander seems exactly as it was in the original versions. The faithful portage is a mixed blessing, though. It’s good when you’re playing something like Centipede -- the Game Room version perfectly captures the frantic action, sounds and fun of the arcade cabinet -- but it’s bad when you’re playing anything from Intellivision. I couldn’t figure out the onscreen port of the system’s maddeningly awful nine-button controller and quickly gave up.

It’s also nice to have a place where your avatar can just hang out. It’s a little like a mini-version of PlayStation Home with a key difference: You can’t interact with other people. You’ll see your friends’ avatars in the arcade, but they’re not really there, and you can visit other people’s game rooms, but you’ll be alone. It’s like having a movie of a friend in your arcade -- fun, but not the same as really playing with someone else. Also: This will be creepy when one of my Live friends dies because I’d still see his/her smiling avatar playing Red Baron.

As an attempt to make this more than just another collection of old games, Game Room provides you with a dizzying array of options, from the opportunity to issue challenges to other gamers, to a level system, to medals, achievements, customization options, room themes, mascots, etc..

You must login or register to view this content.

After poking around, though, it was hard not to feel a little manipulated. It’s as if Microsoft lined up a nearly irresistible collection of gamer-carrots, that all ends in you spending money. Like any good pusher, the first taste is free: There are low-hanging medals and achievments you’ll be able to get with no sweat… but that will just make you hungry for more. Want to customize your arcade? Great, you’ll need to unlock the cooler decorations. You do that by leveling up. Level up by earning medals. Earn medals by buying games. Want to get some achievement points? Great! You’ll need to either earn some more medals, or spend a set amount of time playing, and for that you need to buy some games! Or offer some challenges! Then, you can convince your friends to buy a game or two and earn some medals, go up in level, and buy more games!

I understand that Xbox Live isn’t a charity, but there’s something insidious about the way Game Room’s designers obviously carefully and meticulously zeroed in on the best way to get gamers to spend the most money for games they've already played. It’s incredibly effective (I want to go up in level) but it’s, I don’t know, creepy somehow.

Game Room’s manipulation of your wallet reminds me of back in the day when you’d see some flashy game with amazing graphics in an arcade, and you just had to play it. You’d look at the coin slot: What? Two tokens? Weak! Your mom only gave you a dollar! But anyway, you’d plug in fifty cents, and because games used to actually be hard, you’d be done in half a minute. Vowing revenge, you’d sink in another half-dollar. Beg your mom for another dollar, and repeat all day.

The verdict: In bringing back memories of how much of a rip-off games used to be, Microsoft Game Room might be a little too much like old arcades. Obviously your enjoyment depends only on how much you like vintage gaming.