Retro Gaming

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For the purposes of this community, "retro" means platforms launched in 2001 and earlier, and games for those platforms released through roughly 2007. This means that the Xbox, GameCube, Game Boy Advance, and PlayStation 2 are the cutoff consoles.

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Older protagonists in retro games? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I just got Strago in Final Fantasy VI (SNES version), who is a playable character who is ~70 years old. Got me thinking that you don't see many older protagonists in games, maybe especially retro games.

I remember the elderly wizard from The Immortal (NES), but I can't think of many more. I guess retro games were largely targeted at children so most characters were very young.

Do any older protagonists come to your mind in retro games? Or similarly, any retro games whose subject matter deals with aging?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Can't remember many either, specially when ignoring characters like Alucard, that don't seem to have the archetype of an older individual, be it emotional or physical, despite the character's actual age.

Now, the few cases of older protagonists I can remember:
One Strike, if you consider games with a simulated old style, has an older playable character among the roster of characters.
And though also not an old game, but heavily inspired by Castlevania 3, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon has an elderly playable character, and his play style reflects that.
And one of Gunbird's playable characters is also an elderly individual, and... (spoiler)

spoiler

in the joke ending, he even wishes to be young again.

Dunno if that'd be too young, but Gall Gruner from Tales of Heart, which according to the wiki is 45 y.o., does give a strong "older person" impression throughout the game.
Final Fantasy IV and V have older protagonists too, and in IV specifically, the character's age plays a role in gameplay.