Vanishing act: 87% of classic video games are no longer available commercially

[Shawn Knight]

In a nutshell: A recent study on the state of the classic video game market highlights a dire situation. According to the Video Game History Foundation and the Software Preservation Network, a astonishing 87 percent of classic video games released in the US are no longer commercially available.

That probably doesn't come as much of a surprise to retro gaming enthusiasts, but those outside the gaming community might not even know there is a problem. A handful of top-tier classics like Super Mario Bros., Final Fantasy VII, and Pac-Man are readily available across a range of systems and / or digital distribution platforms. It is the non-commercial availability of the thousands of other games that is at issue here.

Countless cartridge and disc-based games are now only available through third-party marketplaces like eBay, Craigslist, or local retro game stores. The bigger problem is when digital marketplaces shut down shop. Earlier this year, for example, Nintendo closed its 3DS and Wii U eShops, taking the majority of Game Boy games off the market in the process.

What's the big deal, you ask? Not being able to easily acquire copies of games makes it infinitely more difficult for researchers and historians to do their jobs. Video game history is more than just the bestsellers, and that rings true for the titles we like to play as well. Odds are, you have at least a couple of classic games you really enjoyed that didn't get a ton of fanfare. Examples that immediately come to mind for me include Return Fire on the original PlayStation and General Chaos for the Sega Genesis.

As the study highlights, the commercial market has its own interest. They are in the business of selling games and making money, so it only makes sense that they are going to offer what they think will be attractive to shoppers. Rather, it is up to archives and libraries to preserve classic video games and ensure they do not get lost to time.

Image credit: Controllers by Enrique Guzman Egas, TV by Ivan Rudoy

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/99354-vanishing-act-87-classic-video-games-no-longer.html

 

[m4a4]

Just means they have to use the internet for what it's good for in these cases

 

[kira setsu]

Just means they have to use the internet for what it's good for in these cases

even if you did acquire all those roms another big issue is if theyre actually playable.

do you have the right controller/lightgun/console? even with the meanest pc backing it alot of games just run terribly in emulation.

its why I have a closet of old consoles and peripherals, and shelves full of disc, this is where the darkside of digital only really begins to show, you really think seeders are gonna be there in 20 years when someone wants to get 100 gigs of some game?

 

[3volv3d]

Thats why Rom sites should be free to do as they please and Nintendo should go fudge themselves and stop suing people

 

[Kashim]

Oh those poor researchers, how will they feed their families without being able to write about ancient gaming systems nobody cares about?

 

[Theinsanegamer]

even if you did acquire all those roms another big issue is if theyre actually playable.

do you have the right controller/lightgun/console?

You dont need the right controller/console for emulation, WTF are you on about? I can easily play NES games with a playstation controller, or sega games with xbox. The beauty of emulation!
The only thing you have a point on is the lightgun games, but those are not playable on modern TVs either, so its a moot point. Only dedicated arcade rigs running CRTs will be able to emulate those properly.
The only consoles that cannot be emulated from 2000 on back currently are the nightmare that is the sega saturn and plug and play consoles. Newer stuff is a more pressing concern.

even with the meanest pc backing it alot of games just run terribly in emulation.

Do you use a potato? I was emulating 16 bit era games with no issues on my pentium 4 rig back in high school. A mean PC today (like mine, a 5800x3d/6800xt) can easily handle upscaled PS2 games with out trying.

its why I have a closet of old consoles and peripherals, and shelves full of disc, this is where the darkside of digital only really begins to show, you really think seeders are gonna be there in 20 years when someone wants to get 100 gigs of some game?

So far finding collection of old games for old consoles has been simple.

Maintaining old hardware, not so much. The good quality NES cartridge pins disappeared long ago. Keeping 30 year old plastic in good shape becomes harder every year. Old controllers wear out. My hat goes off to those who can maintain them, but simply throwing them into a box is insufficient today.

 

[Neatfeatguy]

I prefer physical media, tired of the digital crap. I'm one of the minority in this so no one really cares. Take good care of your old games and hardware and they'll work for a long time.

Still have a Genesis and a handful of games that work with it. Thing is over 30 years old, original controllers for it too and they work just fine.

 

[CrisisDog]

For the moment, Microsoft and Sony are still the good guys for keeping their digital storefronts open for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 consoles. I can’t say the same about Nintendo, who seem to purposely close their services as soon as possible. No more game downloads for Wii, Wii U, or 3DS. As such, I will never buy a Switch and hold on to my GameCube very dearly along with a Sega Dreamcast.

 

[Achaios]

I play a 2004 game even today.

It is a MMORG and I play it together with thousands of other EU players on multiple servers- mostly Germans - Scandinavians - Dutch - Frenchmen and a few Britishers.

It is called World of Warcraft Vanilla. The game is thriving even today.

Not only that but we forced Blizzard to update the game's graphics and even add Ray Tracing to it.

My take: the games that really matter they are still accessible.

 

[hwertz]

Researchers and historians, yo ho ho, it's time for a pirates life for you! But seriously, a relatively large percentage of those no longer available commercially games are trivially available non-commercially.

 

[gamerk2]

do you have the right controller/lightgun/console? even with the meanest pc backing it alot of games just run terribly in emulation.

Putting aside Arcade titles (mainly due to MAMEs refusal to allow Hardware Acceleration), pretty much most everything through the PS2/Wii era can be run "good enough". N64 titles stick out like a sore thumb here, but now that we have a good performing low-level RSP/RDP plugin even the N64's weird architecture is pretty much a non-issue.

Now, I will say there are legal barriers to releasing classic libraries via download/subscription, since I doubt the publishers (Nintendo/Sega) own the rights to re-distribute basically forever without giving the developers a piece of the pie. And lets face it, a lot of those developers no longer exist anymore, making that issue even more murky.

I would happily shell out $1.99 per title for legal access to a classic gaming library. But that option does not exist, which is why most people simply download a ROM image of titles that simply are not available anywhere else.

 

[adamada72]

Copyright should just expire in 25 years or so.

 

[magisys]

This show the importance of emulators, roms and digital archive for all those games that will and has become abandonware. we games of the last decade that are already not playable today without the physical copy (not sold anymore) and the console (not sold anymore). even recent and modern games like Xenoblade Chronicles X, are going to die with their platform, in this case the unlucky Wii U. And we are talking of a 2015 game!!!

 

[Puiu]

I suspect that in just a few years we'll see that number go above 90%.

 

[lazer]

Interesting, yesterday I had to clean out a storage space and I found my oooold large floppies, remember them? and they had these old games on it. I was tempted to heave them, who has a large floppy drive reader on their computer? But since I am a person that can't part with old stuff, so I saved them.

Who knows?

 

[Neatfeatguy]

Interesting, yesterday I had to clean out a storage space and I found my oooold large floppies, remember them? and they had these old games on it. I was tempted to heave them, who has a large floppy drive reader on their computer? But since I am a person that can't part with old stuff, so I saved them.

Who knows?

I wouldn't be surprised if the data on them was gone. I've heard 10-20 years is around the max. If you were really curious about if they worked, you'd look into obtaining a proper drive for them and seeing if they still hold their data.

Last time I used a 5.25" disk had to have been in the mid 90s and that's back in the day when Windows 95 still let you boot into DOS. 3.5" disk was maybe a bit later, closer to the turn of the century. It's been 25+ years since I used a 5.25" floppy and close to 25 years since 3.5". Thanks, now I feel old and I'm only 42.

 

[colossusrage]

I play a 2004 game even today.

It is a MMORG and I play it together with thousands of other EU players on multiple servers- mostly Germans - Scandinavians - Dutch - Frenchmen and a few Britishers.

It is called World of Warcraft Vanilla. The game is thriving even today.

Not only that but we forced Blizzard to update the game's graphics and even add Ray Tracing to it.

My take: the games that really matter they are still accessible.

Lol, that's not retro/classic dude.

 

[Mielie Blaar]

All of a sudden I feel like playing Duke Nukem II

 

[Mielie Blaar]

More coming to mind... California Games, Lotus III, Hyperspeed, Ceasar II...

 

[p51d007]

Dang it! My old 2600 just isn't useable these days LOL

 

[MaestroIT]

Dang it! My old 2600 just isn't useable these days LOL

I want to power up my 2600 to show to my nephews, but it can't work with modern TVs, it needs adapters to convert the UHF signal to composite.