I guess that’s where we differ. To me, it’s not a novelty to be the ones who push beyond the limits of what’s capable at the time. Goldeneye was a practically flawless game for what they had available at the time. If anyone claims they played Goldeneye and were thinking how much better it would be if they added a 2nd joystick to aim, I’m calling bull****. Similarity to modern design isn’t what makes things great.
To continue with the car example, what’s the greater automotive accomplishment, the Ford Model T, or the Cadillac Type 53? I’ll give you a hint. The correct answer is the one that doesn’t hold up to today’s standards.
That’s the thing. That car is Goldeneye. In today’s terms, that’s not a great car. A jaw droppingly gorgeous car, absolutely (not that Goldeneye looks good). But it’s slow and doesn’t handle well. It would be laughed at if you tried to release that today, because it’s slower than a pickup truck. Despite being beautiful, it’s severely “flawed” by today’s standards. Yet when you look at it for what it was in 1964, it’s truly special.
Any car comparisons between models will completely go over my head I'm afraid. They're all just boxes with wheels to me.
I would consider "pushing the limits of what's possible in a manner that will not hold up" a mere novelty, personally. It may be a novelty that can be fun, is historically significant and should be appreciated for leading to greater things, but to me, none of those things affect how good something was or is.
There are certainly changing standards and expectations in the medium over time that affect how good these games are perceived to be in their respective eras, but I would argue that these differences should be considered largely irrelevant and insignificant compared to more timeless, universal, and ultimately TRUE standards that become more obvious with added perspective. Pushing the limits of technology, alone, isn't a significant factor in that evaluation, IMO-- What's significant is whether or not doing so ACTUALLY results in something that works well-- the degree that it does or doesn't is how good or bad the game is, was, and will always be. If it doesn't result in something that works all that well, to me, that points to an overrated game that relied too heavily on pushing limits and too lightly on lasting substance.
I agree that similarity to modern design isn't necessarily what makes things great, but only because modern design isn't always superior, or may only provide a superficial benefit that ultimately doesn't matter that much. The way I see it, either the game was flawed at the time because modern iterations needed to add all the missing pieces to make it truly effective, or the game was not flawed at the time and the significance of advancements in modern FPS standards are merely minor quality of life improvements that are overblown and are not critical to a game's effectiveness (which would mean that holding it against the game for not living up to these standards would just be a case of recency bias). You can land somewhere in between those two extremes of course, but I don't think you can have both at the same time-- there has to be a trade-off when more meaningful and lasting standards are used to evaluate both, and I think that's how they should be evaluated, personally, but YMMV.
I think the same is true of great movies, music, television, or whatever. It might be the same with cars (that's trickier and not really the exact same thing because there's a primary practical function to it that objectively gets better and better), but I wouldn't know.