One of my favourite games is NetHack. It's a modified version of Rogue (also on my computer). Rogue is basically a bunch of alphanumeric characters in 4 colours, which was nigh-on revolutionary when it was released... ...in 1980. NetHack can be run in the same specification (which by 1987 - its year of initial release - was emphatically not revolutionary), but also had a high graphics version added late in its development. It woudn't have looked out of place in a 1994 Windows 3.1 title. Despite the newest version being released in 2003.

It was reviewed in Computer Games World at the same time as Sims 1 came out. The magazine supplied technical specifications in a side box, in a set format obviously designed to accommodate the latest games. By "3D", it had, "Don't make us laugh". Clearly this was not a game that has much in the graphics department.

What it does have is a huge amount of gameplay. Lots of people play it for years without ever finishing it, and people who do finish often try different ways of winning. It is my favourite RPG, partly because the gameplay is such a big part of the experience.

Other games I've enjoyed with behind-the-curve graphics include Turbo Chess (EGA-compatible, but had a monochrome-compatible option), Ski King (fun dashes through rectangular snow and triangular trees - in 1994) and Gazillionaire (a space trader game released in 2000 with graphics resembling a 1994 DOS game).

Recently started playing LucasArt's 1996 PC game, Afterlife.

More than old 2D graphics, which still get the game's message across, it's gameplay reflects some of the same problems and clumsiness of SimCity 2000. Still a lot of fun though, within the limited context of what you can do.

It's half of the game.The other half is gameplay.And if game are not strong at graphics it should compensate it in gameplay. However this thing not applied for strong in graphics,but poor in gameplay games.
I also like to play sometimes old games(like silent hill 2) because they are really good made,and then I don't look at graphical side.

For me, graphics are as important as the gameplay...

i love to play zelda - ocarina of time from time to time.. everytime i start my nintendo 64, the first 10 mins i can't identify anything, it looks like a surrealistic painting, all blurred
but it was my first game ever and to my opinion, it's one of the best games ever made!
for me, atmosphere is more important than graphics.. if it has real good graphics, then it's perfect.

Before Skyrim came out Pete Hiney, I mean Hines, said that "People who say graphics don't matter are lying." Todd Howard backed him ( Hines ) on that comment. And then do you know what they did? They "leaked" four screenshots that were pre-rendered and post enhanced. I can't find those four pictures in Google's pile, but fans compared those pictures with the graphics in game and it was not even close, the game looked absolutely crappy in contrast. For Bethesda as always, it was the newer fans that defended them on the Official Forums while Bethesda gave the silent treatment they usually do.

Edit:
found one

Theme Hospital is a game that can take hours out of my weekends and has shocking graphics (made in windows xp time) and took ages to get it to work on windows 8 however it is great to be able to play now and then to see if I still have what it takes to run my hospital!

Actually, like yin and yang, if you're out to impress both camps, you have to devote time, money and resources.

I admit I find gameplay vital over graphics. But there was one time I was impressed with graphics. Actually three.

First was Sonic the Hedgehog, which was around 1999, when Sonic Adventure was released in North America. Although the graphics look like crap now, The Dreamcast was quite a competitive fighter against the PlayStation 2, which the console for SEGA, although no longer made, has a homebrew cult following.

Second, occurred prior to Sonic Adventure, with the Jazz Jackrabbit series. It was a short lived franchise from Epic Megagames. But the 2D graphics were quite cartoony to the point of resembling an animated film from Don Bluth, a former Disney animator.

Third, was the Edutainment titles when I was young. They were cutting-edge technology for the 1990s. Even though not traditional gaming fare, with the mix of research and fluidity of animation of 256 color images, I was actually rewarded with Role play gaming aspects in the Magic School Bus and Explorapedia of scavenger hunting.

These titles may be simple and outdated as the Edutainment titles are now 20 years old.

Although I'm deciding to, in spite of my better judgement, buy TS4, I need to research fully how it was more substance than style.

Magic School Bus! That game was captivating, and ironically Dad had to upgrade the video card on our PC just for that. It would run in EGA, but...blurgh. And I remember seeing ads for Dreamcast when it launched. I could hardly believe a game could look that good! The march of time is so cruel, lol.

I find it interesting that a lot of responses list older games that still have graphics that are at least somewhat appealing. Back when budgets were smaller and there was less horsepower to work with (and I guess one drives the other), devs really had to do all they could with the limited options available, so good art direction and style seemed more common. Now, it seems like expensive effects suck up way more than their fair share of a game's budget, leaving things like "making it fun" or "more than eight hours long" in the dust.

Anyway, games that are super fun even though they're funky looking? Well, I play a lot of older games where the funkiness goes without saying. Most N64 games have weird, stretched out textures that look muddy in a not-so-charming way. I remember Ocarina of Time and Jet Force Gemini flooring me with their beauty when I was a kid, and they look extremely dated now, to say the least. PSOne graphics have polygons jagged enough to cut yourself on. Spyro looks like a pile of triangles in the general shape of a dragon. Draw distance? What draw distance? The endless fog just adds to the atmosphere, lol!

I've been reconnecting with some older PC games lately, like Alpha Centauri, Dungeon Keeper 2, Sacred, etc. I still think they look good, because I lived through the era where they were cutting edge, maybe, but I think younger kids would still have fun with games like those because they're still fun

For something modern, Long Live the Queen barely has graphics, honestly, and what's there is mostly still portraits and painted backdrops. It's quite appealing, but it's nothing a game twenty years older couldn't have done, graphics-wise, other than the resolution of the images. And yet you can spend hours trying just one more strategy, dying just one more time because you've almost got it right...

See also arcade-style games like Vector Racing and Dyad, where they purposefully go for a style that reminds you of an 80's arcade. Super simple, but hopelessly addicting.

I like games with good graphics. It shows more detail. I like detail.

I could stare at my screen for an hour sometimes if there are nice landscapes in my games, especially ones that lean more towards a fantasy setting, as opposed to more realistic.

I can enjoy high quality graphics, but the novelty wears off quite fast usually. I also noticed that it matters how graphics are used. For example, backdrops in SWTOR can look amazing, but for me the moment I became aware that what you see are places you can't go, they become annoying. Showing the restrictions of the game in a very obvious way.The opposite happens in Minecraft. Without texturepack it looks crude and dated. But the game lets you build anything, shape the world and go everywhere. At some point you start enjoying what you (and others in multiplayer) have built and despite the crude graphics you enjoy it.

Some games with crappy graphics I enjoy :
Minecraft
Rimworld
Prison Architect
Crusader Kings II
Mount & Blade: Warband

Personally don't try to judge games based on their graphics, but man games are getting prettier and prettier;
I don't think all these real stylized games will die out because of it though (hopefully they don't).
Heres a short list of games that are good but graphics are either older or different:
-Minecraft (you love it or you hate it)
-Dragon Age Origins & Dragon Age 2 (outdated graphics but golly is it a story)
-Battleblock Theater & Castle Crashers (one of my friends refused to play them because they had 2d hand drawn graphics)
-Oblivion & Skyrim (older graphics compared to today)
-Sims 1 (my aunt gave me her copy because she thought it was an ugly game and I was hooked at the age of 12)

Baldur's gate and the old Tex Murphy games.

Some of the games I like that don't have super graphics include Sims 1, Black and White (another god-game), Haven and Hearth (an online barbarian-life simulator).

It's a pet peeve of mine when people and game companies alike say graphics are the only thing worth judging a game for. Though I admit I lack the patience to sit through an ASCII-graphics game.

NFS UG, UG2 and MW. They got lots of low-res textures but really addictive gameplay.

Of course graphics aren't everything. It would be a shame if that was your only condition in determining what constitutes a good game. Two of my favorite games qualify for the running here...

Driver 2: A game that revolutionized what an open world sandbox game is capable of. The story line cleverly mocked the iconic 1970's criminal underworld from the perspective of an undercover detective with an equal balance of violence and muscle car chases; unfortunately at the expense of any outstanding or mention-worthy graphics. However, despite the notably horrible graphic effects and texture quality, the game makes up for it with amazing vehicle handling and a superb story line that makes it worth playing a hundred times over.

But I think we can all agree that the winner is True Crime: Streets of LA. True Crime is a respectively massive open world free roaming game; although that is no excuse for the painfully awful quality of the graphics. But the only thing worse than the graphics of this game are the game play physics. Words cannot express just how bad this game handles. Everything from shooting, to driving to just simply walking is so incredibly difficult that it is hard to imagine how this game even passed the quality control stage of its development. Either the creators forgot to contract someone to develop the mechanics of the game or they were so shit faced while they were making it that they actually thought they could get away with the pathetic excuse for in game mechanics. The second installment of the series offered slightly better graphics and slightly improved mechanics but in my opinion the game failed to reach its full potential. That being said, True Crime remains to be one of my favorite games because, despite the inferior graphics and mechanics, the story line remains one of the most unique and well organized story I have ever seen. The adventures will never cease to amaze you. Especially if you are playing for the first time--hell even if you play for a second or third time to achieve one of the many different story endings. One minute police dispatch prompts you to retrieve J Lenos stolen car, the next you are fighting ancient Chinese concubines and fire breathing dragons in an underground lava inferno--all cleverly intertwined for the undercover detective to foil a massive Chinese Triad master scheme. In addition to the purely bad ass story line, (both) games are notorious for famous voice actors such as Christopher Walkins, Gary Oldman, Snoop Dog, Laurence Fishburne and Mariska Hargitay. The plot of True Crime: Streets of LA leaves little to be desired and is certainly superior than any other crime fighting (literally and metaphorically) game on the market. The story is enough to support this game alone and would still make the game worth playing even if there graphics were down scaled more than they already are (which I don't think is possible).

Still have the disk for Europa Universalis 2 (2001), and I still play it sometimes. And it's still a lovingly-made game. With terrible graphics and great game play.

I don't mean to be a graphics whore, but it has become increasingly difficult for me to play games prior to the 6th gen. The low-res textures, low-polygon models, lack of ambient occlusion and proper real-time shadow effects.

A game could have amazing game play, but without a detailed world space, the experience is lackluster for me personally. But honestly, the visuals aren't the only problems with older games though. Clunky controls, horrid physics, wonky and unrealistic animations, over-powered "cheaty" AI, glitchy and/or confusing user interfaces, restrictive game designs...

Of course one could argue that newer games suffer from these problems, and there is no denying that, but older games are more prone to suffer from these issues.

I don't care for graphics, i want a story to enjoy!

Even though i could play Skyrim on high graphic settings i don't do it because i love the absolutely gorgeous open world!
And that couldn't be played fluently with my many mods. Of course no graphic ones. I'm not a graphic whore like my brother.

Damn, i love to play older games like Black & White, Stronghold or Cultures (the 2000 or 2001 viking game - don't know, if you know it).

I even play on an old tube tv! My PS3 couldn't care less!

I know that there are many people who think that graphics are very important. But it makes me wonder though. How many keep playing a game that has great graphics but bad gameplay? My point is that great graphics is meaningless without at least good gameplay. This makes gameplay more important then graphics for a game, even if you find great graphics very important.

I can really enjoy great graphics, but there are several reasons why it is still quite far down (not sure if it is even on it anymore) on my list of requirements for a game :

- Without good gameplay, I won't play the game. So it doesn't matter to me how awesome the graphics are.
- Without replayability, there is a small chance I will play the game. A good story could be a nice alternative, but I prefer longevity.
- Budget. Nowadays I don't upgrade a pc anymore for just that one game. So sometimes great graphics can be a bad thing for me, because that is usually what determines performance requirements.

There are so many games out there now, that I can easily cherrypick the great (imo ofc) games out of those that fulfill my requirements. Also because I like many different genres. Also, if a game has great replayability (through mods, being sandbox whatever), I tend to keep coming back to those. Graphics is never a reason for me to revisit a game. So while great graphics can be a nice bonus for me, it is never a requirement.

The original Combat Mission trilogy of games (aka Combat Mission 1). I've been playing strategy/wargames for 30 years and these are hands-down the best I've played. The graphics are 10 years old now, so are considered dated, but the gameplay is unmatched. Check out the demos.

Dungeon Master, from way back in 1988. I just played through this once again last year (WinXP at the time and I would guess it runs fine on Win7 as well) and what memories it brought back. Available for free at the link.

I also still play Railroad Tycoon II Platinum Edition, the best railroad business simulator.

Of course graphics aren't everything!

Take the first 5 games in the Tomb Raider series for example, those didn't have great graphics, yet, they were really good, story wise, especially the fourth and fifth game.

I agree with you about San Andreas! I just started playing it for the 1st time and I love it!!

I don't demand detailed graphics but I abhore pixelisation and aliasing. When people were swooning over Tomb Raider 1 on the PS1 back in the day, I was numbed by how people could be happy with that much pixelisation. Some rock textures looked like chessboards, and that was not good enough for me. I wouldn't have tolerated it in the Megadrive / SNES era, so certainly not in the shiny new 32-bit era.
Likewise with Minecraft. For a game that is less than 6 years old, it looks shockingly bad in my eyes. I could only play that with some serious texture smoothing. I emulate 16 bit games on my PC that look better.