3 ms·

Between DOSBox (and its various forks) and PCem, it's a great time for retro gaming/app playing and development! I wonder if the games of today will ever get t

Between DOSBox (and its various forks) and PCem, it's a great time for retro gaming/app playing and development! I wonder if the games of today will ever get the kind of aftermarket support that the DOS era has, given DRM and OS hooks and the like. It seems companies would rather games today be disposable and incompatible tomorrow so you can either buy the sequel or re-buy the game again on the next platform.

jbarrs 6y ago
I feel like emulation will always be catching up with the latest systems, though running some modern AAA game in a virtual machine would probably need a super beefy PC (though we could probably expect that to be available by the time that becomes necessary). Hopefully then a virtual machine can satisfy the DRM. However, I do worry about games (or, in some cases, the DRM on some games) that require the player always be online. If the game or DRM servers are taken down in the future and the developer doesn't release a patch to remove the always online requirement, the game could end up being unplayable. If it's popular enough, people may reverse-engineer third party servers, but this can present more challenges, e.g. getting SSL certificates from a CA your device trusts; on a PC you could manually trust the certificate, but on a console you likely don't have that option.
- grishka 6y ago
  Oh, modern consoles and their push for digital distribution combined with effectively unbreakable DRM. Some games are available on physical media, but some are not. Good luck preserving those that are not when those servers go down.
ArtWomb 6y ago
>>> it's a great time for retro gaming/app playing and development It's amazing. The combination of consumer SoC boards, next gen emulation, 3D printing and AI techniques like super-resolution are generating not just archival efforts, but active development. I just love that there is a very active market for RetroPie kits ;) https://www.experimentalpi.com/Retro-Arcade_c_12.html https://www.experimentalpi.com/Retro-Arcade_c_12.html
Narishma 6y ago
> It seems companies would rather games today be disposable and incompatible tomorrow so you can either buy the sequel or re-buy the game again on the next platform. It's not like back then companies were any different.

jbarrs 6y ago

I feel like emulation will always be catching up with the latest systems, though running some modern AAA game in a virtual machine would probably need a super beefy PC (though we could probably expect that to be available by the time that becomes necessary). Hopefully then a virtual machine can satisfy the DRM. However, I do worry about games (or, in some cases, the DRM on some games) that require the player always be online. If the game or DRM servers are taken down in the future and the developer doesn't release a patch to remove the always online requirement, the game could end up being unplayable. If it's popular enough, people may reverse-engineer third party servers, but this can present more challenges, e.g. getting SSL certificates from a CA your device trusts; on a PC you could manually trust the certificate, but on a console you likely don't have that option.

grishka 6y ago
Oh, modern consoles and their push for digital distribution combined with effectively unbreakable DRM. Some games are available on physical media, but some are not. Good luck preserving those that are not when those servers go down.

ArtWomb 6y ago

>>> it's a great time for retro gaming/app playing and development It's amazing. The combination of consumer SoC boards, next gen emulation, 3D printing and AI techniques like super-resolution are generating not just archival efforts, but active development. I just love that there is a very active market for RetroPie kits ;) https://www.experimentalpi.com/Retro-Arcade_c_12.html https://www.experimentalpi.com/Retro-Arcade_c_12.html

Narishma 6y ago

> It seems companies would rather games today be disposable and incompatible tomorrow so you can either buy the sequel or re-buy the game again on the next platform. It's not like back then companies were any different.