n. (re’mak’) – To make again or anew

There exists a time when games made the premature leap into the third dimension, a stumbling, hesitant leap that resulted in giant polygonal graphics, draw distances shorter than your arms could reach and campy CGI cutscenes. Not to mention single analogue stick control and a frustrating reliance on single-point cameras that made games like Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid exercises in spatial frustration.

Yet this time period, which encapsulated the entire Nintendo 64, Playstation and Sega Saturn era, bore witness to some of gaming’s most popular, celebrated and important games – Tomb Raider, Half Life, The Ocarina of Time and Final Fantasy VII, to name a few. Games that plague “best game ever” lists, sprouted franchises and inspired legions of copy-cats.

It makes an almost impregnable time capsule of games, only accessible by the strong-of-stomach and hopeless nostalgics. I’m currently trying to finish Grim Fandango, one of LucasArt’s final adventures and their first in 3D, but controlling Manny’s lumbering trot is more like driving a tank than manoeuvring a skeletal travel agent. Even the 1988 Maniac Mansion is more accessible than its 10-years-wiser cousin, not to mention playable on a variety of devices and platforms rather than the Windows XP dual-booting headache of Grim.

So it’s here that I make my rebuttal to Duncan’s excellent first post, where he asks “why must we wait” for high definition gaming remakes? I’m all for his zesty old-school attitude, and am known to dust off the odd Super Nintendo controller should the occasion present itself, but trying to play the original Tomb Raider on Sega Saturn is like trying to play Operation during an earthquake – excruciatingly frustrating, and makes you reassess your priorities in life. Lara must be moved like a chess piece rather than a human, the tombs are filled with thick grey fog and my Saturn controller digs into my palm like barbed wire, it’s almost unplayable.

Yet Tomb Raider still retains some of the most imaginative and creative levels of the entire franchise – that vertigo inducing scramble down St. Francis’ Folly, the terrifying T-Rex of Qualopec and the submerged sculptures in the Valley of the Kings – all locked away behind archaic graphics and primitive 3D control.

Enter Tomb Raider: Anniversary, Crystal Dynamics’ brave and successful attempt to reinterpret Lara’s old haunts with a contemporary shine. By borrowing Legend’s engine, giving Lara some new moves and oiling some squeaks, Miss Croft’s classic playgrounds were reinvigorated with style. It was meticulously faithful to the source material but without succumbing to the original’s problems, offering a brand new game to greenhorns without alienating or offending the veterans.

I don’t think I’m alone in my condemnation of this polygonal era; a great deal of these early 3D games have seen Anniversary-esque remasters. The Gamecube saw remakes of Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid, Xbox received a Conker’s Bad Fur Day update and a fan team is hard at work on Black Mesa, a remake of the original Half Life.

Remakes are a dodgy business, with every change going under the scrutinising eye of the hardcore fanbase and the quick-cash-in accusations of sardonic bloggers, but if they can make aging legends relevant again we should keep an open mind.