3 ms·

What you need to preserve it are games sold on GOG and other DRM-free stores.

by shmerl 8y ago

drbawb 8y ago
Completely agree. There's no "preserving" a game that requires online-services to run. As an example: I can play CS 1.6 as long as I have binaries for the client & server. (As well as an OS to run them.) Overwatch, on the other hand, I can only play for as long as Activision/Blizzard continue to operate the servers. They won't do that indefinitely: running dedicated servers in regional datacenters dotted across the globe isn't free. Once OW stops being profitable those servers will go dark. The same holds for any number of games that rely on DRM & proprietary online services to run. Videos of the game being played on YouTube may be preserving _one person's experience_ of the game, but it's not preservation of the game. In my opinion a "video game preservation effort" looks more like the communities producing server emulators for now-defunct MMORPGs, and less like people recording their screen in OBS for their ten minutes of fame.
clarry 8y ago
Nah, you need pirates. You need something like what what.cd was, an archive built by enthusiasts driven by quality and the desire to have untampered original copies. (Plus patches & cracks when needed). You need abandonware sites. GOG and other DRM-free stores are subject to the whims of publishers & developers and random rightsholders. They are not in the business of archiving games. They will host censored versions, patched versions that differ from original releases, you don't get original ISOs and you don't get to choose your patch level, you don't get to reject tweaks that break compatibility with the systems the said games were originally supported on, etcetra. And then games get pulled from stores, for any number of reasons. If you want an archive, don't leave it to a commercial entity who aren't and couldn't be in the archival business even if they wanted to. GOG doesn't want it, what they want is a curated storefront and it's notoriously hard to get your game on GOG, because they don't want it. You know all this, I know you do.
- shmerl 8y ago
  GOG is surely quite curated, but for older games they usually don't have many objections. There is also itch.io where there is almost no curation at all. As for preserving in other ways - I agree, you can't expect any specific store to be around in the future. Internet Archive also work on preserving old games.

What you need to preserve it are games sold on GOG and other DRM-free stores.

by shmerl 8y ago

What you need to preserve it are games sold on GOG and other DRM-free stores.

Completely agree. There's no "preserving" a game that requires online-services to run. As an example: I can play CS 1.6 as long as I have binaries for the client & server. (As well as an OS to run them.) Overwatch, on the other hand, I can only play for as long as Activision/Blizzard continue to operate the servers. They won't do that indefinitely: running dedicated servers in regional datacenters dotted across the globe isn't free. Once OW stops being profitable those servers will go dark. The same holds for any number of games that rely on DRM & proprietary online services to run. Videos of the game being played on YouTube may be preserving _one person's experience_ of the game, but it's not preservation of the game. In my opinion a "video game preservation effort" looks more like the communities producing server emulators for now-defunct MMORPGs, and less like people recording their screen in OBS for their ten minutes of fame.

clarry 8y ago

Nah, you need pirates. You need something like what what.cd was, an archive built by enthusiasts driven by quality and the desire to have untampered original copies. (Plus patches & cracks when needed). You need abandonware sites. GOG and other DRM-free stores are subject to the whims of publishers & developers and random rightsholders. They are not in the business of archiving games. They will host censored versions, patched versions that differ from original releases, you don't get original ISOs and you don't get to choose your patch level, you don't get to reject tweaks that break compatibility with the systems the said games were originally supported on, etcetra. And then games get pulled from stores, for any number of reasons. If you want an archive, don't leave it to a commercial entity who aren't and couldn't be in the archival business even if they wanted to. GOG doesn't want it, what they want is a curated storefront and it's notoriously hard to get your game on GOG, because they don't want it. You know all this, I know you do.

shmerl 8y ago
GOG is surely quite curated, but for older games they usually don't have many objections. There is also itch.io where there is almost no curation at all. As for preserving in other ways - I agree, you can't expect any specific store to be around in the future. Internet Archive also work on preserving old games.