My time at university is bookended by moments that changed my idea of what games could be. When I started my first year, I saw Tomb Raider running on an upside-down PS1 in someone’s dorm and I was stunned and sort of disconcerted. My 2D gaming mind had no idea how to understand a game that seemed so comfortable in three dimensions, but which also – after years of seeing increasingly refined pixel art – seemed so comfortable with being so ragged. The gaps in Lara’s polygonal joints. The clipping of 3D surfaces. The way the polygons around the sides of the screen sometimes disappeared giving the image the perforated edge of a postage stamp. Was this a step forward or a step back?
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