In fact it is part of GOGs "game preservation" program.

My point is that you're probably old. I've played a lot of old games. Some older than me. I have struggled with but managed to get Diablo II to work from an original CD-ROM on a Windows 11 PC. I've played games in DOSbox.

If a game is so old, it struggles to run on modern hardware, it's an old game to me. I didn't say it was "retro".

I think there is a nebulous point where people collectively agree a game feels old. If I go back to the Witcher 3, it feels a little old graphically but otherwise it's fine.

A friend of mine was once going to run a D&D game heavily inspired by dragon age, so I bought all the games in a sale. I couldn't get through the first one, many hours in I realised that the dated mechanics actually blocked my engagement entirely.

Nostalgia also plays into this. I've replayed the assassins creed games before and I'm basically blind to the early jank because I played them when they were brand new, same with many wii games. But these games definitely feel old.

Not every game starts feeling dated, early mario games were so well polished that the intended experience still shines through playing them now. Minecraft came out closer to Quake than to today and even with updates, it's pretty similar to when it was new.

At some point I'd place near the early 2010's (although it didn't happen overnight) innovation in gaming, particularly AAA games stagnated. Most genres: 4X, Multiplayer FPS shooters, open world adventure, survival horrors, etc found a formula which has largely only been iterated on since. Different genres found this at different times, there isn't a huge noticeable difference between a 2009 Call of Duty lobby and a 2024 lobby. The Witcher series is a good example of this, the games are overhauled in almost every way in the 8 years since between their first and third installment, yet modern open world exploration games feel pretty similar to The Witcher 3.

Games from before this decline of innovation were far more wild west in their development, and sometimes you play a game from then which was beloved and it feels incredibly dated. When I think of an old game, I think of one which feels older, rather than a strict timeframe.