A video game remake is a video game closely adapted from an earlier title, usually for the purpose of modernizing a game for newer hardware and contemporary audiences. Typically, a remake of such game software shares essentially the same title, fundamental gameplay concepts, and core story elements of the original game.
A remake typically shares very little of the original assets and code with the original game, distinguishing it from an "enhanced port", partial remake, or remastering.
Remakes are often made by the original developer or copyright holder, sometimes by the fan community. If created by the community, video game remakes are sometimes also called fan game and can be seen as part of the retrogaming phenomena.
A remake offers a newer interpretation of an older work, characterized by updated or changed assets. A remake typically maintains the same story, genre, and fundamental gameplay ideas of the original work. The intent of a remake is usually to take an older game that has become outdated and update it for a new platform and audience. A remake may also include expanded stories, often to conform to the conventions of contemporary games or later titles in the same series in order to make a game marketable to a new audience. For example, Sierra's 1991 remake of Space Quest, the developers used the engine, point-and-click interface, and graphical style of Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and The Time Rippers, replacing the dated graphics and text parser interface of the original. However, elements that had not become dated, like the narrative, puzzles, and sets, were largely preserved. Another example is Black Mesa, a Half-Life 2 mod that improves in-game textures, assets and models, and facial animations, while taking place in the events of the original Half-Life game.