Guys, you do realize that naming this episode after the poem about Ozymandias is a tad ironic. Just because they were once mighty doesn't mean they really were; context is everything after all. Sure those games were impressive in their own time, but does that mean they would translate into something impressive now? Would we really look at the works of Ozymandias and despair or simply chuckle at how they paled in the light of others.
That does not mean new is always better, hell no. Its just one interpretation.
The thought that the first time someone experiences a game like Chrono Trigger or FF6, it could be one of Square's Geneva Convention-violating "remakes," or that the initials MW now refer to CoD 4, 6, and 8. It's terrible when a game is lost completely, but I don't think the true classics ever will be. If a game is TRULY good, someone will always make sure there is a working copy out there. What really boils in my veins is when gamers won't give older games a chance, either based on how they look, or a bad experience with an older game that nobody considers a classic, but they generalize their limited experience to all old games. If your first gaming system was released in the 90s or later, please recognize that blowing off old games is like any book lover born in the last century blowing off Shakespeare, or any music lover blowing off the Beatles, or in a few more decades, Michael Jackson. Maybe my examples aren't your thing (they're not mine either, they're just ones everyone has heard of), but if you've ever enjoyed something that was created before you were, you should understand why old games deserve to be sampled.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
The thought that the first time someone experiences a game like Chrono Trigger or FF6, it could be one of Square's Geneva Convention-violating "remakes," or that the initials MW now refer to CoD 4, 6, and 8. It's terrible when a game is lost completely, but I don't think the true classics ever will be. If a game is TRULY good, someone will always make sure there is a working copy out there. What really boils in my veins is when gamers won't give older games a chance, either based on how they look, or a bad experience with an older game that nobody considers a classic, but they generalize their limited experience to all old games. If your first gaming system was released in the 90s or later, please recognize that blowing off old games is like any book lover born in the last century blowing off Shakespeare, or any music lover blowing off the Beatles, or in a few more decades, Michael Jackson. Maybe my examples aren't your thing (they're not mine either, they're just ones everyone has heard of), but if you've ever enjoyed something that was created before you were, you should understand why old games deserve to be sampled.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
The thought that the first time someone experiences a game like Chrono Trigger or FF6, it could be one of Square's Geneva Convention-violating "remakes," or that the initials MW now refer to CoD 4, 6, and 8. It's terrible when a game is lost completely, but I don't think the true classics ever will be. If a game is TRULY good, someone will always make sure there is a working copy out there. What really boils in my veins is when gamers won't give older games a chance, either based on how they look, or a bad experience with an older game that nobody considers a classic, but they generalize their limited experience to all old games. If your first gaming system was released in the 90s or later, please recognize that blowing off old games is like any book lover born in the last century blowing off Shakespeare, or any music lover blowing off the Beatles, or in a few more decades, Michael Jackson. Maybe my examples aren't your thing (they're not mine either, they're just ones everyone has heard of), but if you've ever enjoyed something that was created before you were, you should understand why old games deserve to be sampled.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
Oh to see a wisp of the ephemeral. Truth is, even the world's most treasured paintings will one day be dust. It's the nature of things, see also entropy. I'm not entirely certain that preservation is as important as many believe it is. Even if someone today played The Legend of Zelda on an NES console for the first time, would they be able to have the same kind of experience with it that my friends and I did when we were children? I say no. They've now played Halo, Skyward Sword and so many other games that the experience will not compare. I can refer back to Plato's allegory of the cave. For someone who has left the cave and now experiences real objects, shadows of objects on a cave wall just won't be the same. They will feel hollow, reduced somehow. The 8-bit representational art of the time of Zelda's first release just does not have the same impact when you are used to seeing what can be produced on a GTX 560 ti. What's more, the controller will feel dated, the gameplay will be much less accurate than we are used to today and the story told will feel weak. Given this, it strikes me as less important that we preserve the past in gaming. Perhaps more striking is that unlike Plato's cave, when considering the progress of art, we are never out of the cave. We are merely moving into new chambers - and as long as there are new chambers to explore, I have little reason to go back.
Dear Double Fine,
How much will I have to give to Kickstarter to let us all go back to calling it "TRENCHED!" instead of Iron Brigade?
Sincerely, -ZZoMBiE13
What about posted walkthroughs on YouTube of classic games? It's like a biography of a famous historical figure: you witness the game and you have someone else recording the deeds and actions of the game.
A large part of this is a failure of copyright law. Abandonware sites tread thin legal ground - At any point, a rightsholder could appear and sue any of them into oblivion. It's not easy to do the maintenance and preservation of these games without the source code - and with the notable exception of ID, that's something that companies have been traditionally hesitant to give out. The advent of the cash-in IOS port makes that even more unlikely, as does sequelitis; Companies are loathe to give up any control of their IP.
I recently started dusting off my old consoles and encountered just this problem. I'm only going back as far as the Snes, and already, i'm having a hard time getting my hands on the classics from that era.
Megaman X costs around £90 on Amazon! Even re-buying all the games I used to own, and foolishly sold, is getting to be expensive. Super Metroid just set me back by £30.
There's another point here which is that not every book, painting, etc. have been preserved. Maybe the ratio of preservation is higher, but the fact is that the ease of access varies: The best books are easily available online after some time especially if they're public domain, others languish deep in libraries. One has to imagine how many books, paintings, sculptures, and other pieces of art have been lost throughout history. The best games will be preserved by rereleases on the DS/Wii Shop/XBox Arcade and backwards compatibility, emulation, and other factors. Others may well die out.
If a game designer wants to have their game preserved for the future they'll have to release the source code. Without publishing the source code the game will eventually die. Even hackers that can break the code and make it work can only go so far. ID Software has released much of their outdated source code, and as a result their old game work on systems they never were intended to. In the end it's the only option, but with indefinite copyright no one wants to let something go public until no one cares, and by then it's too late. Oh, for the days when Copyright lasted only 20 years so that the original author could see their work actually enter Public Domain. As it stands now it's the designers own fault for not releasing the product to the public in a form that is preservable.
The difficulties exist across all art forms. playing sonic on an iphone isnt the same as the original thing? Do you think watching shakespere at your local theatre is the same as watching it in the globe theatre? And heck, we may remember shakespear, but what about every other playwright of his era? We just need education and museums to preserve videogames, and I'm convinced that will eventually happen.
Great episode. Preservation of the medium is serious business, and you did a good job of bringing to light challenges that aren’t normally addressed, like the requirements for online connectivity. I can draw attention to one solution that is still flying under corporate radars in my home town. http://www.pcmuseum.ca/ I wish I could suggest something else, but the issues you raise are genuine and complicated, and access is pretty much insurmountable failing an industry agreement to form a consensus strategy.
For me this problem runs much deeper than you guys imply. Because while losing what is now gaming history is pretty important losing what happens when we lose the very games making progress today. This problem doesn't just mean that we lose games ancient past but rather that we miss out on ever being able to progress past a certain point. Great Episode. Keep 'em coming.
There are many books and other pieces of art that no longer exists. Losing art is one of the unavoidable, core aspects of the medium. It's why existing art is rare. Games are the same, but you are correct that the hardware aspect of it is a big issue.
I thought this was a great episode. A couple years ago I went back and tried to find an old game I LOVED playing as a kid in the school computer lab, Danger Swamp, and it no longer exists. Anywhere. I can't even find screenshots of it. The best I can find is some other damned soul also asking about it.
This is one of the reasons backwards compatibility was a dealbreaker for me in my console choice. I NEED to go back and play through PS1 and PS2 games now and again, because many of those experiences are core to my fucking being in the same way as Star Wars is to some, or Lord of the Rings (the book). It's not just nostalgia, that shit exists in me the same way any other art does, and being unable to revisit it is heartbreaking.
Huh!, I'm surprised on the presentation of DRM and piracy on this episode. DRM is precisely the main reason why many modern games may become unplayable in the future and piracy is the main reason why so many games will be preserved in the future. Look at the NDS, for instance, there are torrents now that include every single rom on the platform. The NDS catalog will live on the internet forever.
If you want video game preservation, except for the hardware, there are various solutions. DRM-free, open source, copyleft and, my favorite, legal enforcement of the three above. This all comes with a lot of complexities, but people should speak of them more openly in the medium of video games.
When I visited Seattle Center back over my vacation I was lucky enough to stumble upon this: http://www.thesimm.org/
Though currently small, the curated works are growing, starting from one guys collection and then branching out with donations of games, consoles, and peripherals. Supporting it and projects like it are the way preserve what we can of our gaming heritage.
This is by far the episode I disagree the most with to date :S You guys are way off!
First off, the gaming medium is being preserved a lot better than any previous medium. We have not experienced book burnings or truly misunderstood geniuses with big collections being lost.
Also, you even point it out in your video, LeeLee didn't get to see starry night, becuase access to it is very limited. Most people have seen copies. If there is video game museums in the future which takes a fee to allow us in and experience the old classics and make a business out of keeping them up and running, things are brilliant! We are way ahead of everyone else!
But let's just take your dream, let say we somehow made it so all games which are more than 20 years old automatically was made available for free and would always run on modern hardware. Would people even make use of that? I know I wouldn't! Actually, the museum setting is the right context. These classics often need the experts next to them, the texts explaining why they are special, and to be experienced together. We have moved forward faster than any medium before us, and for the new generation, I don't blame them for not enjoying MULE. They should still experience it, but not for the pure fun, but for the history.
On the specific note of MMOs, I give more credit to your concerns. However, preserving the empty world is doable. It is hard, but allowing people to enter Azeroth in our future video game museum should be possible. It would be an empty place, but so it should be. What you are asking to preserve otherwise would be the culture surrounding the game. While that might be a beautiful thought, I do not personally think it is a very good idea to forcefully preserve cultures. These evolve, and it isn't a digital file anymore, it is a human.
I would really like for you guys to get back to this at the end of another episode :S This episode was very odd, and sounds more like a result of nostalgia than any actual arguments. We need (and are going to get) great museums of digital culture.
Seeing a 3.5 floppy shown when discussing a 5.25 floppy makes me want to shake my head.
There is something else to consider. We haven't preserved every painting, drawing or book in history. For film, we select some of the most important to preserve through time because it just isn't feasible to try and preserve every reel on the planet.
The fact that many classic games are re-released to run on modern hardware is a great first step and I'm a big proponent of software preservation, but not every single video game of your generation will be played by everyone who comes after because there are always new games. Only a select few will hold up and become part of the zeitgeist over time. That is just the way the world works.
I encourage more publishers to open up and release their games for free without DRM over time after their commercial window has ended to help preserve their heritage.
Publishers could get in on this, after a certain amount of time release the code for the game or something. EA released Command and Conquer for free for it's 10th anniversary, and just released Battlefield 1942 for free as well. If the publishers and developers cooperate with their fans that want to preserve the games, it would be a lot easier.
There's a bit of a gap in backwards-compatibility, one that can't be addressed by DOSbox, as much as I love that program to bits. I'm talking about 16-bit windows games.
I used to play an old shareware game off and on for years, finally scraping together the means to purchase it (this was before the days of Steam folks, and hey, some of us were too young for credit cards). This game was Stars!, and the company that made it no longer exists.
It won't run on any operating system that doesn't support 16-bit windows, due to Microsoft no longer supporting the format in 64-bit operating systems. I can only play the game on an old laptop, and it's a very mouse-driven game, so I have to plug in a peripheral mouse to play it. I have to fish out a laptop that should be on its way to the recycling heap, and plug in a special mouse, just to play this game.
This game was very formative for me and, despite a core group of fans trying to keep this game alive, it's been steadily slipping away. So yeah, I feel a bit like I'm losing a piece of my childhood here, one I shouldn't have to lose.
This is going to be a problem for some time to come. I always felt that there should be a repository for old games, like a government library of software. Unfortunately, it may be some time before anyone ever gets into a position of power that both acknowledges the need to preserve creative works against loss, and is a lifelong lover of games. In the meantime, we're probably going to lose a few treasures along the way.
I feel that expecting a medium that's been around a half century tops to have several great works of art in everyone's shared language is expecting way too much, and even MORE than that, you can't expect that list to span 100s of games. Already people can talk about some of the hallmark games such as the original Mario brothers, Mario 64, Sonic games, Metal Gear Solid, Goldeneye, Halo, Kingdom Hearts, Chronotrigger, Zelda, (the list goes on and on) as shared language. Even people who aren't video game connoisseurs know most of them and may have played them. But we still have to wait for time to judge which ones are the "Mona Lisa"s. Right now, we have the "Beowulf"s, the things that have done something in the art that breaks through to a new medium. We still have people alive who were around when they were made, even more so the people who made them. Give it some time.
And yes, we will lose games along the way. It happens. Most of the memorable games (like, Mona Lisa level memorable) will stick around. And for the interface concerns, I'm sure when there are museums of video game art, there will be near perfect replicas, if not the exact same system, running these games. Super Mario Bros. will most likely have a replica of the NES controller so young people centuries from now can experience exactly what we did when it first came out.
Making the comparison to art is a bit disingenuous. I view video games more similar to books. A person can easily look at tons of art (or pictures of said art) in a day. Easily. Books, not so much, and video games, even less so for many of them. You can't expect someone, even a literary critic, to read every single slightly significant book that came out.
And don't kid yourself, there are a lot of really good games, but as far as significant ones, that's a much smaller number. Saying System Shock 2 and Earthbound are equivalent to the Mona Lisa and Hamlet is absurd. Time is going to make a lot of these games fade off to obscurity, and there's NOTHING you can do to stop it. Being able to actually store the game in a way that is easy to play is not going to make it significant. There hasn't been enough time for our Mona Lisas and Hamlets to become what they are.
Granted, actually keeping as many games AVAILABLE is very important. We have libraries devoted to keeping around books that maybe two or three people may read in their lifespan at that library, but having them available allows the great works to find their way into culture. Many literary classics of today were considered horrible by their time's standards, so ensuring that people can rediscover games from a more civilized era is vital. Fortunately, video games are in a time where storage is much more secure than previous and distribution and copying is much easier. I see video games as the best recorded art forms yet.
I feel that expecting a medium that's been around a half century tops to have several great works of art in everyone's shared language is expecting way too much, and even MORE than that, you can't expect that list to span 100s of games. Already people can talk about some of the hallmark games such as the original Mario brothers, Mario 64, Sonic games, Metal Gear Solid, Goldeneye, Halo, Kingdom Hearts, Chronotrigger, Zelda, (the list goes on and on) as shared language. Even people who aren't video game connoisseurs know most of them and may have played them. But we still have to wait for time to judge which ones are the "Mona Lisa"s. Right now, we have the "Beowulf"s, the things that have done something in the art that breaks through to a new medium. We still have people alive who were around when they were made, even more so the people who made them. Give it some time.
And yes, we will lose games along the way. It happens. Most of the memorable games (like, Mona Lisa level memorable) will stick around. And for the interface concerns, I'm sure when there are museums of video game art, there will be near perfect replicas, if not the exact same system, running these games. Super Mario Bros. will most likely have a replica of the NES controller so young people centuries from now can experience exactly what we did when it first came out.
Making the comparison to art is a bit disingenuous. I view video games more similar to books. A person can easily look at tons of art (or pictures of said art) in a day. Easily. Books, not so much, and video games, even less so for many of them. You can't expect someone, even a literary critic, to read every single slightly significant book that came out.
And don't kid yourself, there are a lot of really good games, but as far as significant ones, that's a much smaller number. Saying System Shock 2 and Earthbound are equivalent to the Mona Lisa and Hamlet is absurd. Time is going to make a lot of these games fade off to obscurity, and there's NOTHING you can do to stop it. Being able to actually store the game in a way that is easy to play is not going to make it significant. There hasn't been enough time for our Mona Lisas and Hamlets to become what they are.
Granted, actually keeping as many games AVAILABLE is very important. We have libraries devoted to keeping around books that maybe two or three people may read in their lifespan at that library, but having them available allows the great works to find their way into culture. Many literary classics of today were considered horrible by their time's standards, so ensuring that people can rediscover games from a more civilized era is vital. Fortunately, video games are in a time where storage is much more secure than previous and distribution and copying is much easier. I see video games as the best recorded art forms yet.
Games are not unique in this problem, just think of now many painting, sculptures and stories have been lost to history.
Game have a different problem than other media, a lot of old games just haven't age well. Look at the original Castlevania, compare it to modern side scrolling adventure games and modern platformers. In the age of precision platformers and fair difficulty a game like Castlevania will not be seen as a good game by those who do not have nostalgia for it. Even Castlevania 4 - a game praised by the AVGN for it's controls - has crap controls compared to many sidescrollers today and even in the SNES days.
Many games - while good in their time - didn't age well and as a result will be forgotten.
Ironically many of the oldest games (Pac-man, Asteroids, Space Invaders, Defender, etc) will survive the longest because of their simplicity. They are easy to program, easy to clone and if you want something simple they as simple as they come.
Something didn't click for me, as from a programmers perspective I know that DOSBox definately supports 16-bit executables. Following that path I came to a conclusion (something that you mention in your post - shame on me) that the game actually requires Windows environment.
But, since DOSBox provides MS-DOS, and Win3.11 (Stars! was made for this version) is basically a MS-DOS overlay, it should be possible to run it. So I dug a bit more.
Next episode. Please do one on games in our history that aspiring designers should play. I never even thought of going back to play earthbound or xcom for ideas.
If it is possible, a good reference list for all aspiring designers of games that they should play would be helpful.
Off the top of my head, games that stick to my mind are
Missile Command
The Secret of Monkey Island
Grim Fandango
Xcom
Super Mario Bros
EarthBound
Xcom
Wolfinstein 3d
Origan Trail
and these are just popular ones and ones listed. More obscure games would be batter.
On another Note, another problem Gaming has that is mostly unique to the genre (movies are seeing this problem now alot to) is loss of content.
Look at games on the SNES or PS2. For the most part, I put in the game and everything related to the game is there. I can go back and play Okami, or Final Fantasy X with no worries of missing out on any of the experience.
With DLC and the way the market has shifted, In 5 years, I will not be able to buy a copy of a game and experience everything. Look at the games on the Original Xbox. All the DLC has been lost and if I decided that I wanted to use the Special DLC costumes for DOA3 or even the maps from Halo 2, good luck in getting them. Atleast those DLC had disc releases, many games do not even do that.
We have incomplete games everywhere for the sake of profit and when people look back at the history of a franchise, they will only get to experience part of what was completely offered. Super Mario 3 on the GBA had this silly card swiping system to create levels. The idea was poorly implemented, but the content would have been fun to try. That has been lost to history and Mario fans can only read about it, not experience it.
Gaming is treated to much like a business and is not treated enough like art.
Great episode guys and a really interesting topic this week. Coincidence has it that i stumbled upon this guy’s YouTube account, where he has over over 900 videos with gameplay of old 80s and 70s games. There is even an Ultima 1 full playtrough that is 10h long, and many many more cool ol' games i never heard of. I don’t know if he played them all himself, but a collection of videos like this is quite impressive.
I don't think it's a problem that has a solution, beyond sealing old technology in a vault. The loss of media is just an inevitable fact we have to deal with. Even the things we preserved cannot be experienced in the same context, we can't use the colloseum the way we used to.
Rather than lamenting this, we should just learn to enjoy what we have while it lasts.
Even if we did preserve our games, would it make a difference? The degredation of film happened regardless of the oldies being available to all.
@Flapp
Wow. This is AWESOME. There was so much I've forgotten! I can almost smell the sweaty arcade where I'd waste my summers, taste the candy I ate for the sugar rush at the one gas station where they had Gyurus, and hear the pins being knocked down at the bowling alley after I ditched my family to play the misconceived yet amazing game of Journey. Thanks for the link, these need to be archived.
I strongly disagree with the assertion that online requirement would be a good way to fight piracy. This is a *terrible* way if we are talking about single-player games. Like "I don't even want to play for free this game if it uses this" terrible. An internet connection can be down, or you can be on a laptop without internet access - and then what ? you can't play your games (while someone who pirated the game can) ?
Fighting piracy is a matter of convenience. Make playing your games legally more convenient than having to look for a working pirated version, and people will stop pirating games (well, if the product isn't overpriced) ; make your games infernal to play legally, and then people will pirate to be able to play in good conditions. It shouldn't be that hard to understand...
The hypothetical solution is incredibly simple:
Commission a group/studio to develop a machine that contains hundreds of the old games at once. Just like those junk cheap consoles containing the same game with different difficulty setting, claiming that they were all different games. Except it's not a scam.
Basically, it would mean hiring a team and supporting it to create dedicated emulators.
Realistically, however, you need to go against ownerships, even for titles that would be abandonware (correct me if I'm wrong).
The copyrights law should be modified, so that it accomodates abandonware even if said material is copyrighted and used in the modern time by other videogame titles/merchandise.
By doing this, you would give the emulating scene a way to make money for their work; make working for modern emulation less desirable, since that's a bad thing for the industry, and let them have a chance to make some money by letting them preserve old games if their products are good.
Creating a whole new market for legal emulation, so to speak.
Not like it will ever happen, I don't see any company willing to make random people use their IP, even if it is merely emulating abandonware, as long as they believe that will lose them even a single cent due to it.
In short, we are fucked. Games will be lost forever (infact some of them already are, notable mentions being rare arcade games), that's pretty depressing indeed.
Xellos speaking of pirates, one reason I hate seeing torrent sites go down is that they can be a great place to find old games. I had a game of Clue I got for free off a cereal box, I lost the disc but I now have a pirated version up and running on my computer. I doubt I'd find the game easily without it.
Edit: And another thing, I tried playing a really old PC game on Windows 7 and it wouldn't install off the original disc. A pirated version worked fine though. So yeah piracy will help with the preservation of some games (as well as TV, music and movies).
Posts
That does not mean new is always better, hell no. Its just one interpretation.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
This a great place to start: http://www.gamesradar.com/best-games-ever/ I've personally played 66 of them, every single one deserves its place and there is not a single game among the 34 I haven't played that I do not have an interest in trying when I get a chance.
Well said. You are quite eloquent friend.
How much will I have to give to Kickstarter to let us all go back to calling it "TRENCHED!" instead of Iron Brigade?
Sincerely, -ZZoMBiE13
Megaman X costs around £90 on Amazon! Even re-buying all the games I used to own, and foolishly sold, is getting to be expensive. Super Metroid just set me back by £30.
PSN: astronautcowboy 3DS: 5343-8146-1833
I have Sega, Nintendo and Xbox games and systems for sale. Please help me buy diapers.
If you want video game preservation, except for the hardware, there are various solutions. DRM-free, open source, copyleft and, my favorite, legal enforcement of the three above. This all comes with a lot of complexities, but people should speak of them more openly in the medium of video games.
http://www.thesimm.org/
Though currently small, the curated works are growing, starting from one guys collection and then branching out with donations of games, consoles, and peripherals. Supporting it and projects like it are the way preserve what we can of our gaming heritage.
First off, the gaming medium is being preserved a lot better than any previous medium. We have not experienced book burnings or truly misunderstood geniuses with big collections being lost.
Also, you even point it out in your video, LeeLee didn't get to see starry night, becuase access to it is very limited. Most people have seen copies. If there is video game museums in the future which takes a fee to allow us in and experience the old classics and make a business out of keeping them up and running, things are brilliant! We are way ahead of everyone else!
But let's just take your dream, let say we somehow made it so all games which are more than 20 years old automatically was made available for free and would always run on modern hardware. Would people even make use of that? I know I wouldn't! Actually, the museum setting is the right context. These classics often need the experts next to them, the texts explaining why they are special, and to be experienced together. We have moved forward faster than any medium before us, and for the new generation, I don't blame them for not enjoying MULE. They should still experience it, but not for the pure fun, but for the history.
On the specific note of MMOs, I give more credit to your concerns. However, preserving the empty world is doable. It is hard, but allowing people to enter Azeroth in our future video game museum should be possible. It would be an empty place, but so it should be. What you are asking to preserve otherwise would be the culture surrounding the game. While that might be a beautiful thought, I do not personally think it is a very good idea to forcefully preserve cultures. These evolve, and it isn't a digital file anymore, it is a human.
I would really like for you guys to get back to this at the end of another episode :S This episode was very odd, and sounds more like a result of nostalgia than any actual arguments. We need (and are going to get) great museums of digital culture.
There is something else to consider. We haven't preserved every painting, drawing or book in history. For film, we select some of the most important to preserve through time because it just isn't feasible to try and preserve every reel on the planet.
The fact that many classic games are re-released to run on modern hardware is a great first step and I'm a big proponent of software preservation, but not every single video game of your generation will be played by everyone who comes after because there are always new games. Only a select few will hold up and become part of the zeitgeist over time. That is just the way the world works.
I encourage more publishers to open up and release their games for free without DRM over time after their commercial window has ended to help preserve their heritage.
There's a bit of a gap in backwards-compatibility, one that can't be addressed by DOSbox, as much as I love that program to bits. I'm talking about 16-bit windows games.
I used to play an old shareware game off and on for years, finally scraping together the means to purchase it (this was before the days of Steam folks, and hey, some of us were too young for credit cards). This game was Stars!, and the company that made it no longer exists.
It won't run on any operating system that doesn't support 16-bit windows, due to Microsoft no longer supporting the format in 64-bit operating systems. I can only play the game on an old laptop, and it's a very mouse-driven game, so I have to plug in a peripheral mouse to play it. I have to fish out a laptop that should be on its way to the recycling heap, and plug in a special mouse, just to play this game.
This game was very formative for me and, despite a core group of fans trying to keep this game alive, it's been steadily slipping away. So yeah, I feel a bit like I'm losing a piece of my childhood here, one I shouldn't have to lose.
This is going to be a problem for some time to come. I always felt that there should be a repository for old games, like a government library of software. Unfortunately, it may be some time before anyone ever gets into a position of power that both acknowledges the need to preserve creative works against loss, and is a lifelong lover of games. In the meantime, we're probably going to lose a few treasures along the way.
And yes, we will lose games along the way. It happens. Most of the memorable games (like, Mona Lisa level memorable) will stick around. And for the interface concerns, I'm sure when there are museums of video game art, there will be near perfect replicas, if not the exact same system, running these games. Super Mario Bros. will most likely have a replica of the NES controller so young people centuries from now can experience exactly what we did when it first came out.
Making the comparison to art is a bit disingenuous. I view video games more similar to books. A person can easily look at tons of art (or pictures of said art) in a day. Easily. Books, not so much, and video games, even less so for many of them. You can't expect someone, even a literary critic, to read every single slightly significant book that came out.
And don't kid yourself, there are a lot of really good games, but as far as significant ones, that's a much smaller number. Saying System Shock 2 and Earthbound are equivalent to the Mona Lisa and Hamlet is absurd. Time is going to make a lot of these games fade off to obscurity, and there's NOTHING you can do to stop it. Being able to actually store the game in a way that is easy to play is not going to make it significant. There hasn't been enough time for our Mona Lisas and Hamlets to become what they are.
Granted, actually keeping as many games AVAILABLE is very important. We have libraries devoted to keeping around books that maybe two or three people may read in their lifespan at that library, but having them available allows the great works to find their way into culture. Many literary classics of today were considered horrible by their time's standards, so ensuring that people can rediscover games from a more civilized era is vital. Fortunately, video games are in a time where storage is much more secure than previous and distribution and copying is much easier. I see video games as the best recorded art forms yet.
And yes, we will lose games along the way. It happens. Most of the memorable games (like, Mona Lisa level memorable) will stick around. And for the interface concerns, I'm sure when there are museums of video game art, there will be near perfect replicas, if not the exact same system, running these games. Super Mario Bros. will most likely have a replica of the NES controller so young people centuries from now can experience exactly what we did when it first came out.
Making the comparison to art is a bit disingenuous. I view video games more similar to books. A person can easily look at tons of art (or pictures of said art) in a day. Easily. Books, not so much, and video games, even less so for many of them. You can't expect someone, even a literary critic, to read every single slightly significant book that came out.
And don't kid yourself, there are a lot of really good games, but as far as significant ones, that's a much smaller number. Saying System Shock 2 and Earthbound are equivalent to the Mona Lisa and Hamlet is absurd. Time is going to make a lot of these games fade off to obscurity, and there's NOTHING you can do to stop it. Being able to actually store the game in a way that is easy to play is not going to make it significant. There hasn't been enough time for our Mona Lisas and Hamlets to become what they are.
Granted, actually keeping as many games AVAILABLE is very important. We have libraries devoted to keeping around books that maybe two or three people may read in their lifespan at that library, but having them available allows the great works to find their way into culture. Many literary classics of today were considered horrible by their time's standards, so ensuring that people can rediscover games from a more civilized era is vital. Fortunately, video games are in a time where storage is much more secure than previous and distribution and copying is much easier. I see video games as the best recorded art forms yet.
Game have a different problem than other media, a lot of old games just haven't age well. Look at the original Castlevania, compare it to modern side scrolling adventure games and modern platformers. In the age of precision platformers and fair difficulty a game like Castlevania will not be seen as a good game by those who do not have nostalgia for it. Even Castlevania 4 - a game praised by the AVGN for it's controls - has crap controls compared to many sidescrollers today and even in the SNES days.
Many games - while good in their time - didn't age well and as a result will be forgotten.
Ironically many of the oldest games (Pac-man, Asteroids, Space Invaders, Defender, etc) will survive the longest because of their simplicity. They are easy to program, easy to clone and if you want something simple they as simple as they come.
Something didn't click for me, as from a programmers perspective I know that DOSBox definately supports 16-bit executables. Following that path I came to a conclusion (something that you mention in your post - shame on me) that the game actually requires Windows environment.
But, since DOSBox provides MS-DOS, and Win3.11 (Stars! was made for this version) is basically a MS-DOS overlay, it should be possible to run it. So I dug a bit more.
And indeed - you can run Win3.11 on DOSBox, and run Stars! on top of it. Some people have already done it: http://wiki.starsautohost.org/wiki/Stars_vs_OS#DOSBox.
If it is possible, a good reference list for all aspiring designers of games that they should play would be helpful.
Off the top of my head, games that stick to my mind are
Missile Command
The Secret of Monkey Island
Grim Fandango
Xcom
Super Mario Bros
EarthBound
Xcom
Wolfinstein 3d
Origan Trail
and these are just popular ones and ones listed. More obscure games would be batter.
Look at games on the SNES or PS2. For the most part, I put in the game and everything related to the game is there. I can go back and play Okami, or Final Fantasy X with no worries of missing out on any of the experience.
With DLC and the way the market has shifted, In 5 years, I will not be able to buy a copy of a game and experience everything. Look at the games on the Original Xbox. All the DLC has been lost and if I decided that I wanted to use the Special DLC costumes for DOA3 or even the maps from Halo 2, good luck in getting them. Atleast those DLC had disc releases, many games do not even do that.
We have incomplete games everywhere for the sake of profit and when people look back at the history of a franchise, they will only get to experience part of what was completely offered. Super Mario 3 on the GBA had this silly card swiping system to create levels. The idea was poorly implemented, but the content would have been fun to try. That has been lost to history and Mario fans can only read about it, not experience it.
Gaming is treated to much like a business and is not treated enough like art.
Have a look, it's a veritable encyclopedia of retro games: http://www.youtube.com/user/oldclassicgame/videos?flow=grid&view=1
This guy deserves a medal in my opinion.
Rather than lamenting this, we should just learn to enjoy what we have while it lasts.
Even if we did preserve our games, would it make a difference? The degredation of film happened regardless of the oldies being available to all.
Wow. This is AWESOME. There was so much I've forgotten! I can almost smell the sweaty arcade where I'd waste my summers, taste the candy I ate for the sugar rush at the one gas station where they had Gyurus, and hear the pins being knocked down at the bowling alley after I ditched my family to play the misconceived yet amazing game of Journey. Thanks for the link, these need to be archived.
Fighting piracy is a matter of convenience. Make playing your games legally more convenient than having to look for a working pirated version, and people will stop pirating games (well, if the product isn't overpriced) ; make your games infernal to play legally, and then people will pirate to be able to play in good conditions. It shouldn't be that hard to understand...
Commission a group/studio to develop a machine that contains hundreds of the old games at once. Just like those junk cheap consoles containing the same game with different difficulty setting, claiming that they were all different games. Except it's not a scam.
Basically, it would mean hiring a team and supporting it to create dedicated emulators.
Realistically, however, you need to go against ownerships, even for titles that would be abandonware (correct me if I'm wrong).
The copyrights law should be modified, so that it accomodates abandonware even if said material is copyrighted and used in the modern time by other videogame titles/merchandise.
By doing this, you would give the emulating scene a way to make money for their work; make working for modern emulation less desirable, since that's a bad thing for the industry, and let them have a chance to make some money by letting them preserve old games if their products are good.
Creating a whole new market for legal emulation, so to speak.
Not like it will ever happen, I don't see any company willing to make random people use their IP, even if it is merely emulating abandonware, as long as they believe that will lose them even a single cent due to it.
In short, we are fucked. Games will be lost forever (infact some of them already are, notable mentions being rare arcade games), that's pretty depressing indeed.
Edit: And another thing, I tried playing a really old PC game on Windows 7 and it wouldn't install off the original disc. A pirated version worked fine though. So yeah piracy will help with the preservation of some games (as well as TV, music and movies).