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Will Classic Games Disappear Forever?
Knightfall writes "Who doesn't remember pumping tons of quarters into games like Joust and Tron? I shudder at the thought of what could have become of that large quantity of money. Well, it seems remembering those games may soon be all that is left. As companies are dropping support, but not property rights to our old favorites, many are in danger of vanishing forever. There are a few trying to prevent this though. An article in Wired tells a little about it. I for one still find these games, on a pure gameplay level, better than most anything out there currently. What can we do to prevent them from no longer being available?"
MAME
MAME is cool
Dig Dug!!
>What can we do to prevent them from no longer being
>available?
Preserve them and actively play/"advertise them".
That's what I do.
And that what's a LOT of people are doing - www.vaps.org
PS. Emulator is *NOT* a substitute for a classic arcade game.
Mame has support for probably every classic arcade game in existence. While not quite legal it does allow us to do a bit more than "remember" these games.
http://www.mame.net
M.A.M.E.
Games live on as long as someone is alive to remember them.
with no mention of M.A.M.E.?
Looks like /. is now the mouth piece of Wired Magazine ?? If wired provides all the stuff for geeks then what are we doing here ?
Species of animals are vanishing forever at a rapid rate, but who cares if we have a version of Plattermania that runs on an Atari 600XL and a Colecovision version of Dig-Dug. That's what is most important in the end.
Mame forever baby, awww yeah
Every game worth playing will be emulated.
There's always a large collection of ROMs on the Internet. I'd say that almost any old game exists on numerous hard drives across the world, whether those people own the actual machine and have a legal right to have those ROMs or not. I guess piracy will preserve these classics.
Of course ROMs for newer games after they went 3D are mostly uncommon since MAME doesn't really support all that yet. There's a gap there I guess that's in danger... somewhere after 2D and before what's currently in arcades right now.
People also tend to hold on to their old console systems. I myself have a CoCo3, Atari 7800 (with 2600 and 7800 carts), Sega Master System (with 3d glasses), Sega CD/Genesis/32X, Super Nintendo, Nintendo, and more. And guess what? They're not going anywhere. Classic games will always live on through garage sales and eBay auctions and emulators. They won't die because people out there still do care about them and enjoy them.
What can we do to prevent them from no longer being available?
MAME?
Who doesn't remember pumping tons of quarters into games like Joust and Tron?
Me.
Shortly after my video game phase, I got heavily into pot.
they will live forever as free brower games
If we forget the classics, how will our great great grandchildren know where "All you base are belong to us" came from?
Business \Busi"ness\, n.;
A scam in which all people involved perceive as beneficial...
Buy one?
Seriously, buy a used machine, learn to keep it repaired and running (or find someone who can), and enjoy!
I enjoy classic pinball machines and that's what I did. I play them almost every day, worth every penny.
Beta sux! Join the Slashcott! http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4760465&cid=46173047
See, I disagree with the argument a lot of people give that older games are superior to newer ones because 'the gameplay was better.' The tech at the time could only support very narrow concepts, like "eat the magic pills." Personally, that gets boring for me after awhile. Additionally, "bells and whistles" like better graphics and sound do make for better gameplay, IMHO, because it helps the player to suspend his or her disbelief. After all, it is pretty hard to think of yourself as a yellow circle, living in a maze, munching on all sorts of yummy powerups.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
Hasn't this guy heard of emulation?....
*Anonymous Coward sighs*
It doesnt provide for new games... personally the whole fun of classic gaming is the interaction, something you just dont quite get with MAME unless you build yourself a standup arcade box. There are a few retrocades here in PDX, OR. It seems that Portland has a thriving market for retro-gaming actually, including consoles. (But try finding a good arcade for NEW games.) Which I do enjoy... but yes, it would be nice to have new fast paced simpled little games to test your coordination. I suppose we could all go out and buy XgameStations and start developing for those. Frankly... this thread fills me with dread. Save classic gaming!
Deltron 3030 - Virus (music video)
Ok, now that you've implied that this is bad, would you care to explain why? Or are you simply criticizing others for the sake of it?
What possible harm is there in grabbing a rom of a game that was on the market 20+ years ago and who's company has not existed for 10+ years?
There are so many copies of old aracade, C64, etc.games already out there, that I don't think it'll make much of a difference whether people are allowed to share them or not.
C64 file trading took off long before the internet was popular and at a time when there was actual money to be made with that software (for the publishers, not the swappers). Nowadays it's easier to share the files and furthermore the target market for those games is so small that most companies probably won't bother paying the legal fees to protect software that won't bring in any money.
Jens
When a product is no longer available for purchase, there is nothing wrong with violating the copyright. Technically, I'm sure there is. Morally, there is nothing wrong at all.
I can sleep at night 'stealing' ROMs for product that is no longer available.
because I have been enjoined by this Holy Office to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the Sun is the centre
do you find these games better than anything from a gameplay perspective because that's the case or because you have the whole 'happy memories while growing up' angle?
For every revolutionary game (think Robotron, tempest, bosconian, pacman) there were many others that we remember fondly only because we have other memories associated with them (like summers growing up, friends etc. etc.)
-- the cake is a lie
If a company decides to drop supportor get rid of a game or console for any reason, in doing so I feel that they should also lose all rights to it, such as distrobution, copyright, development, and marketing as holding on to the rights but not the game is wrong and unrightfully witholds it from the public, as it is no longer around and yet noone else can enjoy it either.
Those who would trade liberty for security deserve neither
seems that many classic games are now available on your phone or pda.
No kidding!! To the rescue!!!
I guess the way it works in the internet age is: if somebody has it, everybody has it.
Start collecting classic games and learn how to repair them.
If nothing else collect the ROM's. I know they're copyrighted, but if they're going to let them die then F'em. What the companies need to do is simply come out and sell the roms they currently own or license someone to handle it for them, stick them on a CD and sell it for $10-20 with a copy of MAME included. I'd pay $20 for a licensed library of SNES or Atari console roms.
Shop smart, Shop S-Mart.
The CAPS project is starting with the Amiga, preserving everything it can. Not just the games, but archiving scans of the boxes and manuals as well. They are also storing the disks in a format which retains the copy protection of the original.
Many of the biggest games companies today started on the Amiga, so this history needs to be preserved. The CAPS project will be moving onto other formats later.
I used to work for one of those companies and I know that these days its heritage has largely been forgotten. It's obvious that the companies who created the games in the first place don't really care very much about anything other than the latest sale. Any attempt to preserve these games should be lauded.
Just look at the situation with the BBC who lost some early Dr.Who episodes and loads of Beatles footage because they didn't see the value in it at the time.
What can we do to prevent them from no longer being available?
Just lay out your yard and your house with moats, mechanical boats, and remote control planes to look just like Air Sea Battle, ignore your neighbor's screaming, and live, eat, and drink, the classics.
Games do represent an abstract reality, if you remove the abstractions...
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
...but it should be illegal for games like Joust of Frogger to ever disappear.
"I for one still find these games, on a pure gameplay level, better than most anything out there currently."
I remember spending countless hours [not mention money] in my local arcade also but I would never say they were better than what we have now. Somebody must agree with me or they wouldn't be becomeing extinct would they?
But if I were to ditch this system, it would be like shutting down the gates to a dozen little worlds: The Infocom* adventures, and the early Ultima games (including Warren Spector's early masterpiece Martian Dreams), and oddities like Hidden Agenda.
On the other hand . . . while it's nice to think about playing these old games again, I never seem to get around to it. If a flood destroyed my old PC and the associated disks, I really wouldn't feel that bad. It would almost be a relief.
If there were a computer game museum, I donate all this stuff in an instant. But I suspect that I wouldn't be alone. They'd probably be overwhelmed with donations.
Oye,gevault . . .
Stefan Jones
* I recently purchased at a flea market an unopened Infocom collection on CD-ROM. But dang it, the installer wouldn't work under Win98!
My roomate is a coinop operator, and has a large collection of old/rare games.
It is very much still an alive community of collectors/restorers.
Many of these machines can be seen at the show they put on each year --
"California Extreme" http://www.caextreme.org/
here there are several hundred pinball games and several hundred arcade games from practically all eras.
I have been thinking of getting an arcade game for quite a while and finally settled on buying a cocktail style Tetris.
Good points: Doubles as a regular table, never truly loses its appeal, multiplayer (2 anyway).
What about the rest of you?
Games will live on because people will still at some level want to play them. If that is through illegal ROMS or they actually maintain the physical hardware they will always be there. Also with any luck the rights will expire in a few countries so that ROMS etc will be legal there
Of course there are people who write there own which also captures the original. Good things won't die quickly. Tetris + Pacman live on. Ultimate Fighter 400 FX Special Edition doesn't (and I just made that name up)
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
The companies that are dropping support for these games are doing so for a simple reason: They are no longer profitable and are therefore supporting them produces nothing but expense. The property rights remain but the game becomes a victim of bitrot and disappears forever.
The solution is to make these games profitable for the companies that own them. One way of doing this is to handle game rights the same way the Blender rights were handled: Get a bunch of people to donate a little bit of money and then make the company an offer to buy the rights, source code, schematics, and whatever other property makes up the games. To the companies, the choice is simple: Either throw away this game that nobody (they think) cares about, or let a bunch of geeks buy it off them for some money.
I think an organization of some sorts could be put together to accept donations and buy the rights to all kinds of old products, not just games. Anything "classic" or still useful. People donating money could specify all kinds of products they would like to preserve. Kind of like those, "We buy old houses!" or, "We buy old cars!" companies.
ah Joust
;-)
;-)
thanks for the flashback
just the tiny pic at wired of those little jousting guys with their little flying ostriches, and my mind instantly had a flashback to misbegotten youth
i can now conjure up the sound effect of hitting one of those little guys in the head, and the sound of one of the eggs hatching... quick! dispatch it before the rider takes perch again!
and the lava and the sky islands?
aw MAN what a great game! thanks for the flashback
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
michael still gets a hard on for big negros.
I shudder at the thought of what could have become of that large quantity of money.
Me too - we could have bought a LOT more beer!
We need to get off our asses and start lobbying congress to pass a bill that forces companies to release copyrights if they aren't using them. Unless you are contributing money or time to some lobbying organization copyrights will continue to be a problem for the foreseeable future. The squeaky wheel gets the grease!
"Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out."
Old video games aren't hard to find, and for that matter, they're not very hard to repair, either. Most of them came with full schematics, etc.
As for me, I'm doing my part. Two coworkers and I took a spur-of-the-moment trip to Cheyenne, WY, one Monday and came home with three games in the back of my truck. Choplifter, Lode Runner, and the true gem of the day - Centipede. We then promptly brought Centipede to work and stuck it in our lab after a little restoration work. A bit expensive, but the best way to preserve this stuff is just to buy it and keep it running.
Never on slashdot have I ever seen so many identical responses.. going to run out of mod points just moddding them all -1, Redundant. Kinda weird...
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
on cd...I bought the collection a few years ago...the emulator and games are arcade perfect. All of the glitched are there, from joust to robotron, etc. These classic games, at least the ones I own, aren't going anywhere.
Spread the RC luvin'
I hate to sound bitter, but I've heard quite a bit about folks who claim to "love" classics and want to keep them alive, and then take minimal to no steps to actually accomplish this. They have fond memories, but their actual love for the games has died away and in truth they're indifferent to the demise of what I daresay is history that is no less valuable than, say, a government document from the 1800s.
In my entertainment center, under my TV, VCR, DVD player, and newer consoles, is an Apple II Plus with one 5.25" drive and a joystick -- all that's needed to play games like Boulder Dash, Galaxian, Joust, Mario Bros., Flip Out, Night Mission Pinball, Miner 2049er, Congo Bongo, etc. I have literally hundreds of games on 5.25" disks and I actually play them at least two or three times a week. I've made redundant copies (some games on as many as three different floppies) just in case a disk goes bad. I love these games, I play them, and I take several steps to ensure they survive, at least until I die.
How many others can say they've done the same?
The coolest voice ever.
Oops, what the hell was I thinking?!!!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
So now i have been dicussing the release of this remake for more than a year with both original copyright holders (ian bell and david braben). In fear of not getting the maximum output from this, they both have expressed their demands on how they want the release to be done. Unfortunately, their different demands just cannot be fullfilled at the same time. The result: They can't agree on a licence and there probably won't be a legal elite remake.
What i've learned from this: Some classic games may be lost forever and a living fan base isn't everthing that's needed to keep a game alive. Emulation can't prevent the number of legal copies of a game to decrease and some of the games may in fact just disappear.
additionally, abandonware only encompasses old software that has been released into the public domain... old software that hasn't is known as "old warez"...
also, a lot of companies don't release the rights to games because, even though they don't have any plans for the games yet, they may have an idea for something they could do with them, later. however, if they don't defend their copyright in the present, they'll have a *lot* harder time defending it in the future...
personally, i think that copyrights over software should only last five years, and can perhapes be renewable for anohter five years after that. anything longer then that, and the company would have a very hard time trying to demonstrate that piracy of that piece of software has been harming them. well, except in the case of microsoft and windows 3.1, since we all know windows 3.1 to be completly surperior, in every way, to windows 9x and beyond, and since no one would buy an inferior OS when they could instead by a surperior one, hehe :)
anyways, we should take the time to thank all the companies that have made their software public domain... rockstar studios for grandtheft auto, and recently, Revolution Software for releasing Beneath a Steel Sky and helping Scumm VM emulate it :)
and speaking of Scumm VM, Scumm VM 0.5.1 has been released (the last slashdot article mentioned 0.5.0): http://scummvm.sourceforge.net/
There is always MAME.
One of my favorites was always Galaga '88.While ROM-ripping and distributing is on shaky legal ground, ROM-ripping and merely archiving is not, as long as you also posess the physical ROM that you ripped from.
I'm afraid that, until arcade corps become more clueful, that is the only completely legal way to preserve these games for posterity until their copyrights expire. You, and whoever you can them off to, will have to be responsible for media-shifting the ROM images in your backup archive as the physical media ages and the standards evolve. Of course, MAME should be a perfectly legal way for you to "verify your backups", as long as you don't redistribute them without the physical ROM chip.
That's the cut-and-dry, and everybody knows it. Unfortunately for us, the current fiasco that we call "US copyright law" makes anything more than that illegal, without permission of the copyright holder ("holder", not "owner"). Go beyond that, and you tread at your own legal risk, regardless of whether you think it's moral or not.
I would never say they were better than what we have now ... or they wouldn't be becomeing extinct would they?
Old games can still be some of the greatest from a gameplay perspective. Keep in mind:
- great gameplay doesn't mean infinite replayability (you'll still get bored eventually and need a break)
- great gameplay in a game you bought 10 years ago doesn't put money into many people's hands today (so someone keeps trying to seduce you into spending another $60 and then another and then another even if those new games aren't 'better')
From an objective point of view it does look like the rights owners are overprotective. But look at it from their point of view. Not only is can the original games be repackaged, but they can also yield sequels. The license for Spy Hunter isn't so another company can put out the same exact game, but a derivative game. There's another Ultima game coming, based on those before. Mario has come a long way from Donkey Kong. Pac Man is still chomping away.
If the rights owners don't assert themselves over the original, they risk losing the rights to control the derivatives. What degree the risk is over old ROMs may seem debatable, but each company/rights owner must decide that for themselves.
And I don't really see the 'vanishing forever' argument. There are plenty of restoration organizations, that watch and pay for older non working games to fix up. Also, have you seen the Ms. Pac Man/Galaga cabinet? Or the 20-in-1 cabinets? I've seen them in Dave & Busters. Technically, not the same controls, but the games are being put out there still. (Obviously, only those that would be deemed to do well. I doubt Stocker will be re-released.)
Irony: An add for the 10-in-1 Atari Joystick on the same page for this story.
R: That voice. Where have I heard that voice before? B: In about 365 other episodes. But I don't know who it is either.
In college in the mid-80's, the 'grill' in the dorm that was open in the evenings had a few machines. Joust was one of them. My roommate, who was a bit Obsessive-Compulsive got hooked on joust. He'd go in there as soon as they opened and play until they shut down. Relatively soon, he could play an entire night on a single quarter. After a few weeks, the machine disappeared and something really lame showed up in its place.
Never confirmed, but my floor was convinced that Cliff was responsible for them pulling the machine.
Classic Movies, Classic Cars, Classic this, Classic That.
Pronunciation: 'kla-sik'
Function: adjective
Meaning : historically memorable
Things die all the time, people, cars, pets, plants, It comes a time for games to die too.
There will always be remakes and such but if things didnt die you and your grandchildren would have nothing to talk about, you would have no stories for him/her because nothing is change. Change is evolution, evolution is a mail client, embrace it, embrace the change.
Besides could you imagine tron on a ATI 9700 Pro?
http://www.shockwave.com/sw/content/joust
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I used to roll the score over as a kid. Doubt I could do that still; 35 has a way of catching up with your reflexes. What a fun game though! I might *possibly* have a ROM and copy of MAME floating around and play it occasionally when no spooks are looking. Maybe. Damn, that game would totally saturate my attention and I'd find myself covered in sweat when I finally gave it over to the next guy. I remember the first Asteroids game in our local pizza shop too. They had a table top set that always had kids lined up to play - and blobs of old pizza staining everything nearby. Heh. :)
These games really do deserve historical archival beyond illegal ROM duplication by MAME activists. I know there are more critical IP issues for the EFF to dispute, but this just tugs at my heart. *sigh* --M
why can't I see other people's karma rating? where do I go to see it?
You can use any of the Z-Machines available for Unix and Windows to play the Infocom gmaes. Infocom used a sort of interpreter, so you can play them on any computer that has a Z-Machine available for it.
Slashdot is a waste of time. I enjoy wasting time.
I recently purchased at a flea market an unopened Infocom collection on CD-ROM. But dang it, the installer wouldn't work under Win98!
.z5 files (probably named with a .dat extension on the CD).
.z5 interpreter (like Frotz). You'll find interpreters for more platforms than you'd expect, including Palm, Psion, Amiga, Acorn riscOS...
I'm sorry, I know this is offtopic, but...
All you need (at least, for everything except the graphics titles like Arthur and Journey) is the
Just copy them somewhere and find a
[The game companies] label [efforts to make older games available through downloads and emulators] piracy that could undercut future efforts to reissue such games in the form of classic compilations or to update them as remakes.
;)
Ok, so the plan is to bring out a collection of old games for the Atari XL or the ZX 81 or the C64 in the future? And there will be enough potential customers so that releasing the game into the public domain (or publishing the code) is a bad move financially??
I don't think so. And even if it was true, how many collections of old (8-Bit) games do you know? And how many follow-ups to a classic game have hit the market and made money?
I guess the real problem is that the old companies do not exist anymore, or have been bought out by other companies. And now nobody in the gaming industry knows or cares who has which rights to those games.
And with regard to 'remakes': the Duke Nukem 3D source code has been published under the GPL. Ports have been created. Will this hurt the sales of DNF? Go figure
My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
One possible solution to prevent classic games from being lost is to get the copyright holders to donate the games to a charitable organization in exchange for a tax reciept. The charitable organization could then sell the game, or release it into the public domain.
Technology is most abused by the very people it was created to help
I've been keeping my old machines instead of selling them for YEARS. You don't get squat for them anyway. My old Mac Plus is the only machine I have that will run Rogue (Epyx, 1985), one of TEH BSET GAEMS EVAR. I have a room full of old machines, and I keep them running.
I also have my original Atari 2600 (and a backup), NES (on which I recently replaced the 72-pin connector to get rid of the "flashies"), SNES, Oddesy 2 (really), Atari 400 (my first actual computer, with my disk drives and floppies that still boot after over 20 years), and so forth. Cartridges for the games you loved and played are easy to find and cheap.
I also have a Robotron machine in my living room and a Defender on the way.
The point is: no, you can't count on new hardware to run legacy games and software. Support may be gone forever and eventually the disks will stop working, but the best way to ensure that your old games are still playable is to not garage-sale them in the first place. Take care of your old machines and they will take care of you. <dieter>TOUCH THEM, LOVE THEM!</dieter>
-- http://frobnosticate.com
Oye,gevault . . .
The lament of Hispanic Jews everywhere.
"What can we do to prevent them from no longer being available?"
Nothing. You will die. Your kids will not want to play it. The games will die. Maybe they will be in a museum. But that museum will die too.
We had over 2,000 people attend the first annual Austin Gaming Expo two weeks ago, and this was only the show's first year. The show featured a mix of classic and modern games, and all the classic systems on display were getting tons of attention. You can look here for picture galleries and recaps of the show.
Additionally, there is a large groundswell of homebrew development taking place for systems such as the Atari 2600, 5200, ColecoVision, and so forth. Numerous homebrew games are released every year and many of them equal or better the games that were released commercially back in the early 80s. We have a section on AtariAge that lists Atari-related titles in development, and we also sell homebrew games in cartridge form through our online store.
As long as people continue to play classic games (whether it be through emulation or on real hardware), I don't see them going away anytime soon!
http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/waltdisneyworld/p arksandmore/entertainment/entertainmentindex?id=DD DisneyQuestENT&bhcp=1
"Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
Without a doubt, my favorite non-Atari Inc. coin-op of all time...the soundtrack, the graphics, the gameplay. Much better than Galaxian, Galaga, or Gorf... I would follow that up with any Pac-Man arcade machine with the "Zoom" button installed. Or that rip-off game called "Pop-Man" (Pac-Man with a corn pipe like Popeye)... I played that in Arizona (or New Mexico?) at a *7-to-11" convenience store when I was 8 or so... Ode to the glory days of Chuck E. Cheese and Pistol Pete's Pizza...
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
Not as long as P2P is around, sheesh.
I just downloaded Wacky Wheels off suprnova.org by REQUEST! Rock on, I used spend so much time on the crappy shareware version...
As for old console/arcade games, that was before my time. I really don't give a rip seeing as I do not even play modern consoles.
The unofficial
As a geek, if you don't already have your favorite roms and emulators burned to cd, you simply don't deserve to play the classics.
It's like second on the list right after the pr0n get's archived. Geez, what are you guys doing all this time?
But I was hoping that this collection would make it easy to be able to get back into these games. Run a quick install program and bang, I could be touring the mushroom-strewn allegoryscape of Trinity.
But note the irony: This updated collection of classics, intended to make them available to a new generation of players and machines, is already obsolete!
Stefan
whether it is working or not, it should be legal. In fact, having a dead ROM in theory allows you to attempt to reburn it so as to restore the functionality. Yes, you do have to keep that junk (really, only the ROM chips) to make it legal for you to emulate.
Of course, IANAL.
The problem is that the companies have perrpetual copyright on these games, and while it is not profitable to do anything with those games, it is also unprofitable to give away corporate assets (i.e. release the games into the public domain). To do so would breach duties owed to the corporations' shareholders and bring about derivative suits. For example, releasing "Joust" into the public domain would cause the stock of whichever company who owns the rights to "Joust" to drop by 1/1000000th of a point. Likewise releasing "Joust" for the PS2 wouldn't be profitable b/c it doesn't have gangbangers, rap music, car theft, or even the slightest bit of full motion video. Thus, the end result is the game gets shelved and rots away.
Stupid people make stupid things profitable.
Multiple
Arcade
Machine
Emulator
Happy?
I use mame to play my old favorites. I don't give a shit about the SEVERLY abused IP laws. I'm not decompiling, selling or using code in these roms to make other games, I just want to play the games of my teenage years. I used to have a full size Tempest machine but had sold it years ago. But since then I downloaded Tempest, Major Havoc and Galaga roms to name a few. Now if the game companys would just say "Use them but DO NOT use the code any other way" and I would be happy.
SCO should stand for Start Coding Openly
"I bow to no man" - Riddick
Mame Arcade A purchase of the Classic Williams Pack and you are good to go. ;)
30% off web hosting. Coupon code "SLASHDOT".
Ever hear of supply and demand? A company could change supply (ie, make it zero) to manipulate the price of a commodity. That is, if a company deems that it's not worth packaging a game because it won't sell enough to break even right now, and perhaps start selling again 6 months from now, it can. People buying commodities short on supply (art collectors and such) do this all the time.
In your world, all companies have to forever be pumping out copies of all games (and all software) they have ever made or supported, or they lose rights to it. Even if it's still available via resale. WHAT THE HELL RIGHT TO YOU HAVE TO ANYTHING I MAKE?! If I produce something, and sell it, and then want to stop selling it (either because it's not profitable any more, or I don't have time, or just don't feel like it), there is no reason, legal or otherwise, why you should magically gain rights to it. Other than your opinion that it is "wrong" and "unrightful".
And does this apply to books? Movies? Music? If an independant, RIAA-hating musician stops selling a particular song he owns the rights to, should he instantly lose his rights to it, reguardless of how much money he's losing by selling legitimate copies?
Bah. Moderate the above as "insipid", not "interesting".
There are quite a few very successful classic game shows out there - like the Austin Game Expo that happened in late July. Link to Review.
As long as there are people like me, and the thousands of people that attend these shows, classic gaming will never die.
Video Game News, FAQs, etc
Why not just copy the discs to the hard drive of a new computer or a CD-ROM? There are plenty of companies around that will even do that for you.
Blowing on your Nintendo cartridge really doesn't do anything, unless you have a pretty thick layer of dust on it.
:). Long term, dumping game ROMs *is* the only reliable way to save them, unless companies give out the original source, which has often been long lost. Presumedly you could use an FPGA or something to reproduce the exact original circuitry of the game system. Until TV standards change, that is :)
What actually happens is this: the original NES had a 'lock-out' function, wherein only licensed NES games would work on the console. The problem is, if the game wasn't seated PERFECTLY in the slot (a real bitch to get right with the front loading systems), there wasn't a good enough connection for the lock-out chip to be read, and thus, the infamous flashing NES display. Cartridge contacts oxidize/corrode mad fast, and after a couple of years most NES cartridges were a real pain to use. Blowing on the cartridge does sweet diddly for the most part, but what it does do is force you to remove and re-insert the cartridge many times into your deck. Eventually, you'll get it right and the game works.. at least in theory.
The solution? Dip a Q-tip in rubbing alcohol (isopropyl) (probably other solvents work too), and scrub the living hell out of the cartridge contacts. The end of the Q-tip will be almost black, that's how much crap is preventing you from playing your game.
I've ran through a dozen decks and over 400 games in the past 2 years, and I have yet to encounter a combination that doesn't work perfectly (and I do mean, on the first try) if the cartridge is cleaned enough.
Also contrary to popular myth, every other cartridge-based system is also suceptible to this. I've seen it with SNES, Genesis, Colecovision, Atari VCS, and even N64 games. It's just not usually so bad because the cartridge fits better - but once the contacts are all gunked up, you have the same problem. Yes, the same solution works.
Having said this, ROMs do unfortunately suffer from bitrot (the eventual loss of bit data from the ROM chip itself). Some estimate we're about to start seeing it on a large scale with the VCS, as it's approaching 30 years for some of its games. Eventually, the original ROMs simply won't be readable. Could be in the next couple of decades, could be a couple of centuries (it's kind of hard to test that length of time reliably
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Well if they were smart, the arcade game makers would bundle MAME with some of their older ROMS on a CD-ROM and sell it for $30 - $40 USD as Arcade Classics or something. They would have to modify MAME to encrypt and decrypt the ROMs so someone wouldn't just copy them and upload them via a File Sharer to some friends.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Has anybody made an effort to contact the original manufacturers and see if they'd make a deal to license the ROM code? All they'd need to do is set an arbitrary price and then the whole vintage gaming industry could likely experience a rennaissance as people start plopping MAME cabinets in various locations.
I know some manufacturers that make MAME peripherals such as Hanaho have managed to license some of the classic game roms and allow for redistribution. It would be great if a more aggressive, more complete effort was made to see to what degree the companies that own these rights would be willing to license them.
... still exists, albeit in new forms. Go to their website and find the "Play Classic Games" links (sorry about not posting a direct link, but I'm tired and they're doing lots of JS popups) and the info on their "Midway's Greatest Arcade Hits" pack for the GameBoy Advance. Sure, it's not the same as playing on a real arcade machine, but the games are at least still around.
It's 19:11:42. Do You Know Where Your Meat Body Is?
I grew up during the 70s and 80s, and played most of the classics when I was a kid. Needless to say, I'm rather fond of them compared to most new games.
As an experiment, I gave a decent MAME set to a bunch of the kids I'm currently in school with. Most of them are about 20 years old, and in fact most had never been into an arcade (they simply no longer exist here). The odd pinball game, or Ms PacMan is about as much as they've seen. To them, it's all about 3D.
It took a bit to get over the low-res graphics, but it's amazing: they're ALL playing these games now. In fact, several have actually uninstalled newer games from their laptops (like Battlefield 1942 and Warcraft III) to free up space for more MAME roms. These kids have no 'happy memories' of the old games, yet love them as much (and in some cases more) than the new stuff.
I find this same argument comes up every time Star Wars is mentioned: the whole 'the first movies actually sucked, the only reason you think they're any good is that you were a kid then'. Bullshit. Most adults at the time (my 50's-era parents included) enjoyed Star Wars back then. Lucas didn't make his millions off of just 8 year old boys.
Again, I use some of my schoolmates as examples, because many of them are simply too young to have ever seen the original Star Wars movies. Guess what? They think the new movies are pretty bad, for the most part. People my age seem to actually like them BETTER than people who've never seen the first trilogy.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Sidestepping entirely the practical, if technically illegal, path of playing those superior (yes they *are* superior) old games using MAME....
1. We're still seeing compilations of older games sold commercially as a kind of shovelware. In a couple of months there will be Midway Arcade Classics, which will include an unprecedented number of emulated classics, including some that have never been sold before outside of an arcade. This includes the godly design of Rampart, ever-popular Marble Madness, unequaled twitch masterpiece Robotron 2084, Joust and the very rare (in the arcades) Joust 2, and there's an equal number of other classics in the mix. Easily twice as good as Namco's compilations, which I'd say are a little overrated.
2. If you like the style and play values of the older games but bemoan their absence from the modern marketplace, *make* one! They're harder to make than you'd think, because the thing about the old games is that they often created their play mechanics from whole cloth instead of copying fifteen other games, but it's still doable. That's the path I and a friend of mine are following.
The classics will stay alive, as long as there are people out there who care about them.
This is evidenced in the dozens of emulators out there. Here's a small sample:
Stella (Atari)
FCE Ultra (Nintendo)
Freeze SMS (Sega Master System)
Gens(Genesis)
and, of course:
MAME (Every arcade game we know and love)
On the PC side, we have some very interesting projects:
AGI/SCI Remember all those old Sierra games? Well a few people were able to reverse engineer the interpreter language. The result is that you can now make your own Sierra games, and even take apart existing ones, look at the code, screens, etc, and even modify them if you want. Truly and old schooler's paradise.
SCUMM VM So times have changed, and you can't play your LucasArts games on whatever OS you happen to be running now? ScummVM will fix that. Compatibility is not 100% but give them time.
The people behind these projects are very dedicated to saving the classics. With these kinds of people around, we should have no worries about the games we loved so much fading into obscurity.
-R
I think this demonstrates one of the biggest problems in copyright law, that the 95 year expiration date assures that nothing released within our lifetimes will ever become part of the public domain.
If most software is becoming abandonware within 25 years of its release, wouldn't that say that the complete economic value of a computer program gets soaked out within that timeframe? Isn't that the point of having copyrights expire, or have we forgotten that already?
With Open Source being so popular, people can write a program to act like a Classic program and even look like it, but be a totally differnet source code frm the original. Then port it to different platforms. So we get a Classic Rewrite.
Take for example Telengard for Windows a Windows re-write of the Classic C64 game. See how the game looked like and played on a C64, but on Windows instead.
We just need more people to re-write the classics to save them.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Part of Disney's business model is the carefully scheduled re-release of their "classic" films. Buy withholding the films for a period of time and re-releasing them, they get a whole new audience that isn't yet jaded by the films.
Similarly, many classic video games are being re-released as web games or cell phone games.
Why not just copy the discs to the hard drive of a new computer or a CD-ROM?
Modern computers can't even LOAD half of these games, let alone run them correctly. Many old games had timing routines linked to the clock rate, for example. Imagine playing a racing game, ONE THOUSAND TIMES FASTER. Never mind the sound support. Non-existent for any new sound card, and Windows won't let the games talk to the hardware anyway.
Short of someone writing a full, usuable x86 emulator (no, vmware isn't a good option for emulating MSDOS 3.12 on a 286) there is no way to play most of these games on a new PC.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Lets see how many paranoid stoners (and former stoners) respond to this parent with funny comments and tales, but all as AC. ::)
Come out come out wherever you are stoners, don't be afraid our president was a cokehead you didn't do anything nearly as bad.
-- taking over the world, we are.
Wow, what a pathetic attempt to Troll. Next time please read the Troll FAQ before you try to be clever.
So are you for or against allowing such "great" games to continue to exist?
Won't someone think of the children?
Ben
Work Safe Porn
This will probably be modded down as a troll, but I think this needs to be said.
No one cares whether you think old games are better!
"Pure gameplay"? The vast majority of old games have 1 or 2 buttons and endless repetition. I enjoy these types of games (I own 5 arcade boards of various old games and my own cab to play them), but everyone who waxes nostalgic for the "good old days" of videogames needs to take a hard look at what they're saying. The power of modern consoles opens up genres that never could have existed before. Look at RPGs on the PSX and SNES vs the offerings on NES and its ilk. You can call FF1, DQ1, and DW1 classics all you like, but the NES was too constrained for decently varied location graphics, orchestrated soundtracks, or even a decently realized storyline.
Similarly, Joust, Defender, Pacman, and others have their place, but to claim that they are gaming in its "purest" form is denying the possibility that the advancement of technology has improved gaming at all. Blends of multiple genres were not possible in the past. FPS, RTS, and more simply didn't exist! If gaming was purest in the 70s and very early 80s, why does anybody play Starfox, Xenogears, Metroid, Zelda, Final Fantasies past 3, Metal Gear Solid, Counter-strike, Baldur's Gate, etc?
Remember, technology is a tool to allow the developer to more fully realize the world he/she desires to create. Older is not necessarily better.
The problem, as usual, is that we "geeks" are almost ignored by politicians and lawmakers.
Sort of. The _bigger_ problem is that there exist consortiums of corporations which hate abandonware. Despite the size, organization, and good intentions of the abandonware community (check out this webring, for instance), there are stubborn corporations that will see practically no profit but want to retain their copyrights on silly-but-fun games forever. Slashdot has covered the IDSA's legal maneuverings in the past; Mobygames has an excellent feature that discusses some of the issues around the legal status of abandonware.
Nobody is going to pay absurdly inflated (probably price-fixed) shelf prices of $40 or so for old games. If the companies won't sell their copyrighted software, these games -- good games, like Civilization or Colonization or Wolfenstein 3D -- will gravitate towards an open trade on the Internet. They're often smaller than MP3's, and they're considerably more fulfilling. This kind of "copyright infringement" is usually ignored and not typically prosecuted; the situation's more or less fine as it is. But it's damned annoying trying to find a safe venue for sharing what is, in a way, cultural heritage. oh, and:
The problem, as usual, is that we "geeks" are almost ignored by politicians and lawmakers. It'd be interesting to see a future article describing why that's the case...but who really knows the answer?
IDSA=money
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
If you were sane, you'd have archived all those floppies on a cd-rom. It's disquieting how many boxes fit on a single cd :)
BTW, there exist many free PC emalutors:
I have a snotload of modern PCs sitting around, a PS2, XBox and GC, with just about every worthwhile game either available to me here or upon request (I write for an IT web site).
I also have a Tempest, Robotron 2084, Gauntlet II, Xevious, Ms. Pacman, and Smash TV.
The new games, those that are worth opening the shrink-wrap on, a suprisingly small number, get boring really quickly, and that is by design. Read the content restrictions for Sony, MS and Nintendo for a real eye-opener, they mandate that games lose their appeal. Gameplay has become secondary to eye candy.
When we want to have fun in this house, there is nothing like an hour long Smash TV session, or seeing if you can get to the yellow boards on Tempest. 20+ years later, these games are still fun. How many PS1 games are worth the $5 you can pick them up for?
-Charlie
There's a lot of talk here about emulators, but can they handle the really obscure stuff that uses EGA graphics, and audio hardware like the Ad Lib or original Sound Blaster? My limited experiences have not been encouraging.
Last year, I bought an "Ultima Collection." All the games from 1 - 8. But the Ultima 7 games wouldn't run under Win98, and the third party emulator specifically made for the job crashed something awful. I eventually gave up; I had a writing project due and couldn't spend the time troubleshooting the emulator.
I suspect I may eventually just give up and be satisfied with my memories of playing those fine old PC games. After all, I did manage to survive getting rid of my Atari 800 and its collection of worlds (M.U.L.E., Seven Cities of Gold, Archon, et al.)!
Stefan
* I occasionally have to read files off of old floppies. Old WordStar files with RPGame manuscripts and such. But I use the drive so infrequently that I have to blow it out and clean the heads each time!
You want Dosbox.
Stuff like this really ticks me off. Of *course* the gaming industry isn't gonna say, "Hey, don't forget to add in a few (some amount) bucks so we can preserve our history.
Gaming companies, or any company, really, has little interest in supporting games where there is 1) no more money to be had, and 2) it would seem a lack of investment.
That doesn't mean there isn't a solution though. The Internet at large is picking up the slack on its own. The geeks who want to support these games so they don't die out, will, and it won't cost the "industry" any more than letting go of their pride, and in some cases, just creating a link somewhere on their page that says "Download this deprecated, unsupported, game that is now freeware, available to all."
At least that way, the game is alive and kicking, and it would be even better if they released the source code.
This can't be a serious issue, either. When they release patches on a regular basis that are 40+ megs or so, how is a 46k file going to cost them *anything* comparable in bandwidth?
It doesn't take much to support one game, by one fanatic fiend out there on the web. Throw up a homepage, post your memories, screenshots, and the game. Gee, that'll really kill Geocities.
The gaming industry is just too lazy, but if they got their act together, it would be a great PR move for them. "Wow, Company A is so cool, becuase they released their old 80's computer game on the web!!!" Seems to me, that something like that would generate a bit of brand loyalty, and actually *stop* pirating in the process, because then people would respect their decisions, instead of circumventing the law solely to preserve history.
If some of these games would get a proper re-release I would gladly pay for them, but honestly who besides me cares about(let alone has heard of):
Blacktiger
Speed Rumbler
1943 Battle of Midway
Solar Warrior
Rygar
Time Soldiers
Tiger Road
Ahh the good old days, Everytime I smell fabric softner I remember all the games i used to play at my local Econ-O-Wash.
Until they do I guess i have to be a criminal.
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
Companies would rather you put that $20 (or whatever) they could charge you for a "classic" that's paid for itself over and over towards their new million dollar project that hasn't.
It doesn't seem so difficult to just post the old games on a company web-site and charge per download with a notice that the software has no warrenty. If you pay for it and it doesn't work, too bad. They just need to post the original min and recommended specs on the game info page and let you know that if you computer exceeds them then the game may not run properly if at all.
Unfortunatly, the theory sounds simple but when doing professional work it takes money to set up such a system and most people aren't going to accept "no warrenty." If Joe Blow pays $20 to download a game and it doesn't run he's going to demand money back or some form of technical support.
So there's really no simple way for companies to offer them. They'll have to do marketing and tech support and everything else that a new product needs so why bother? Mass market is looking in the shiney things department and isn't interested in old games to make it worth it.
Might as well focus efforts on the new stuff that needs to recoup costs.
On a related note; Alpha Video is selling really old movies on DVD for cheap. But movies don't need tech support.
Ben
Work Safe Porn
Let me see if I've got this straight. One word: Mame. But emulation just isn't the same. So buy the console and restore it. Better still call up all your beer buddies to throw in some quarters and buy the rights. Ah, joust. Tempest. Lest we not forget the C64 Lode Runner era.
OK, next article.
MAME will suck as long as that fag santeri has anything to do with it.
"Does anyone remember Tron?" "No"
However, before you get your hopes up too high, read the introduction to the Videotopia project: "VIDEOTOPIA explores humanity's first giant leap into interactive electronic media - - the videogame. As the industry grew, its influence on developing technologies grew as well. The goal of this exhibition is to communicate the dramatic impact these games have had on our lives and our culture."
There are nonetheless some VERY remarkable games in the exhibit, including one of my personal favorites, the 1983 "3-D" Star Wars game!
Losers choose to abuse the use of "loose".
Gridull has little to do with MAME, other than typing the work 'make' and j4x0ring to the latest mahjong drivers. Gheyze on the other hand can be seen fisting NiceCola whilst R. Belmutt provides lubication.
Kthxbye
I asked him if he knew what Pac-Man was and his eyes lit up. "You have Pac-Man? Can I play it?" He had played all the old-school games I mentioned, Joust, Spy Hunter, etc.
The staying power of the 80's arcade games is incredible. Being constrained by such small amounts of memory and processor power forced the programmers to innovate and squeeze every bit of playability out of the limited resources they had.
Modern game designers should take note. You can learn a lot about PLAYABILITY from the 80's arcade games.
Moments later I was eaten by a grue.
will ship anywhere in the bay area of california.
Off Road (3 player)
Space Duel (Atari vector graphics)
each $450.00 OBO.
No Job = No Toys. Perhaps an H1B worker can afford it.
email: general at picputer dot com.
Toaplan's Zero Wing had the "All your base" cut scene only in the Sega Genesis console port. Either the original coin-op didn't have it, or MAME has some major bugs in its emulation of Toaplan hardware.
Will I retire or break 10K?
While these games are now essentially out of print, they are still considered to be the high standard for military gaming. Few games in print now can reach them and it is unlikely few will survive the changes in tehcnology the way these games will.
Since the release of SP3, three more modifications of the game have been released, Steel Panthers World at War (SPWAW)( a rewriting of the code for running on Windows (which, as it happens, runs rather well on Linux under Wine)), Steel Panthers WWII (SPWWII) (essentially a modification of the SP2 code with WWII only changes) and Steel Panthers: Main Battle Tank (SPMBT) (a rewriting of the SP3 code for modern combat only with mods promised out to 2020) All of these games install and run rather well under dosemu.
All these games should have died out when MS killed DOS, but they continue to be very popular with the military wargaming crowd as we speak. Scenarios are constantly being written to these myriad games all the time.
My own website, http://www.rkka.org is dedicated to wargaming using the Steel Panthers series. I have even have a section which allows all the SP series of games to be run in Linux under dosemu. The advantages are very clear to me. These games no longer require anything but simple hardware and software to work well. This basically opens the genre to nations with people who cannot afford the latest and greatest, but who just simply need something that will work well. SP under these conditions (running under Linux) fits( Even WinZip will open gzipped files)
I do not know if these games, as popular as they are, can be considered classic games, since they are still very much alive in the miltary wargaming community. The simple fact is that no one has been able to top these games since 1994. In my most humbled opinion, that is these games' true legacy.
One other note: The Steel Panthers series are a basic rewrite of a series of computer wargames written by Gary Grigsby beginning in *1984*. That is quite a record.
Dawn of the Dead
... we should see if we can dump the ROMs to these games and then work on an 'emulator' that would allow us to play them. Hmmm... if only we had such an emulator today we'd be ahead of the game.
Nothing you read on Slashdot is legal advice.
There have been occasional suggestions that anything that goes out of production (or support, for computers) for a year becomes public domain.
Not exactly "public domain" per se, but still possibly fair use under 17 USC 107. It wouldn't be completely inconceivable to have a judge rule that if a copyright owner takes a work out of print, that counts as an admission of a lack of "potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." Though copying an out-of-print work without authorization loses on fair use factors 2 and 3, it can still win on 1 and the doubly-important 4.
Will I retire or break 10K?
And all the while, FagB will sit for two years on his four line I,Robot driver change. And when he's done, he'll kick back, surf to a tranny pr0n site and simply say one word:
Re
kthx
p.s. Hello David
MY NAME IS FATILA! MY NAME IS FATILA! MY NAME IS FATILA AND I LIKE TO EAT!
Hey now, don't diss da mame. Where else could i fidn all those jap mahjong pr0n games to get my jollies? And of course CPS2 Fighting games toO!!!
8==w==D ~
Greetings to all my gay lovers like mutefag, pinball breaker hype, and gaylord metaldick
Similarly, many classic video games are being re-released as web games or cell phone games.
When blocking a fair use defense to distributing abandonware, it's the copyright owner's responsibility to show a preponderance of evidence that the work has a potential market or value. It'd be pretty difficult for the copyright owner to prove this without public documentation of a re-release plan, and any responsible distributor of abandonware would cease and desist upon notification of such a plan.
The difference with Disney is that Disney routinely puts home video titles back in print within ten years, and the "vault" TV commercials that I've seen usually have a disclaimer to such an effect.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Hey now. I think everyone is forgetting the greatness of Richard Bannister, aka slimyqueer, for all the great work he does on the Mac port. NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Of course theres always FagB, and his 2 lines of code in 5 years.
Re Brian.
Given the number of clones and workalikes that are popping up left and right, I doubt this is a big concern. Perhaps you might be worried about losing the bad games, but the good ones will certainly live on in some fashion, copyright infringing or not.
I had a real Qix in my appartment when I was still a bachelor. My wife thinks it does not look good in her living room (bummer). She thinks a 50" plasma screen doesn't either anyway... If you have any tricks on how to convince a wife, please share.
I would like to mention that I work for NASA and our supercomputers are not capable of running Mortal Kombat at full speed in MAME. I am thoroughly disappointed that the MAME team is unable to optimize their emulator at all.
Games are no different than any other medium. If someone wants to archive them, open a library or museum. That individual would buy an individual copy off ebay (accept donations, find them in the attic, etc) then archive it under the fair use rules provided for libraries and museums under copyright law. They could legally make backup copies for archival purposes to avoid bitrot. Think microfilm and magazines. They can allow people to come into the museum and play the games. They can even loan out the legally aquired instance of the game to other people in the same way a library checks out a book. If any individual on /. truly cares about this issue, that individual should do this. Sounds like a genuine not-for-profit business opportunity in this weak job market.
Outside of that, this thread is about justifying copyright infringement, and I'm not buying it.
Awwwww, j00 completely forgot Santeri Sadcunt
btw, my00t am not ghey, not even they want him.
oh, SPICS MUST DIE or smth for all j00 #postmodern d00dz
Funny with all this MAME talk that Dave's Classics (now Vintage Gaming Network) is still alive and kicking everyone else's ass in the emu scene. http://www.vg-network.com. Even the narcers like fatila, gridull and emulimted couldn't kill it off no matter how hard they tried!
you are a rocket scientist? Damn best get Fatila to recruit your ass to retrogayers or smth like that wonderful Griking/Caffiene guy
If we forget the classics, how will our great great grandchildren know where "All you base are belong to us" came from?
They won't, and they will be grateful.
wtf happened to Dave anyways?
:P
I only go to VGN now for the ritual abuse etc I get from DamianMoron
Bring back the r00bangers or smth!
While people go nuts over MAME, I'll stick with my Joust cocktail in my living room. I plan to be playing it decades from now and as long as I can replace the ROMs when they die, I can't see why I wouldn't be. Same goes for my Gyruss, Super Sprint, etc.
Nothing beats the real thing.
Seriously, the copyright system was designed to promote the arts with the evental intent that the works would go into the public domain. If the work will be destroyed because it was abandoned under the copyright system, then I bet if you took a company to court to get their ROMs released into the public domain, the court would stand a reasonable chance of seeing things your way.
If course, I'd do this with some company that's still out there, teetering on the edge of death and hasn't sold its IP to Microsoft. Get the precident established first, and it'll be a lot harder for the big companies to employ the Chewbacca defense later on.
Oh, obIANAL, so YMMV.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I just want to know what I'm supposed to do besides sink five dollars into the pac-man machine while I'm waiting for my pizza?
As companies are dropping support, but not property rights to our old favorites, many are in danger of vanishing forever.
Itellectual property law is on the one hand there to encourage creators by giving them protection, on the other hand to benefit society directly by codifying the passage of that work to the public domain.
Sitting on intellectual property indefinately is anathema to the intent of the law. It seems to me that if support and publication (availability) of a work is dropped, that should mean the owner of the rights is relinquishing them, after a short period that should be no longer than a few years - enough for a business cycle or two.
Of course, what with the crazy copyright laws today, I wouldn't expect this sort of sane position from today's corrupt and out of touch judiciary and legislature. But its something to campaign for...
DVGC used to be a site worth visiting, but seriously how can anyone see it anymore though all the pop ups? There is a site under all that isn't there? I use a pop up stopper so it keeps me out so I have no idea if there is or isn't by now.
I bought over a dozen neogeo mvs carts off ebay. I used the same method you described to clean them. They can get pretty messy!
People think of this as a home cart solution; it also works on arcade boards or anything else with similar contacts.
DVGC used to be a site worth visiting, but seriously how can anyone see it anymore though all the pop ups? There is a site under all that isn't there? I use a pop up stopper so it keeps me out so I have no idea if there is or isn't by now.
go visit emulation9.com or something, it is partly japanese but it does what that sad site doesn't do anymore, straight news.
Visit the site that champions the Public Domain Enhancement Act (HR2601) and write your Congresspeople (House, Senate) to support this bill. If these games are no longer commercially exploitable, the proponents of this bill believe it is unlikely the copyright holders will file the form and pay the low tax to retain copyright on the work. Maybe these games will eventually enter the PD where we can all legally share and modify them so we can play them on MAME.
Here's a FAQ, previous /. discussion, and another /. discussion.
Digital Citizen
You'd be shocked how poorly the videogame companies who own these rights have taken care of archiving and preserving their own intellectual property.
Even for commercial emulator rereleases there have been times where they've had to take advantage of things like MAME or the general collector community to piece back together their history.
This seems to be mostly a problem with American videogame companies. I haven't heard these same kinds of stories related to, let's say, Namco.
In many cases the owners have changed hands multiple times so something gets lost in each iteration. (Atari is the best example of this).
So it's more than possible that old artefacts can literally rot away, get thrown out, or forgotten entirely so that by the time these companies do decide to do something it might be too late.
The industry in general is so future-oriented that they just don't value the past enough to prioritize the preservation of their history.
It's the collectors who have to pick up the slack, and unfortunately, this involves stepping beyond the letter of the law.
Luckily we're at a point where most of the important arcade history and pre-crash console history is well preserved.
I don't think games for 8-bit home computers are as well preserved because there isn't as much interest from classic game enthusiasts and the libraries are much larger.
I also think there is a lot of work to do to improve emulation. For instance, what about all the early TTL-based arcade games that didn't have microprocessors? If you don't have a physical unit you'll never see the game run unless someone writes a simulator of some kind. What about sound emulation on things like the Cinematronics games? Sound in MAME is still a little rough in places.
It is not entirely cost prohibitive to purchase an arcade upright or cocktail table. i bought crazy climber, discs of tron (upright), and ms. pacman. Total cost about $1900.00 (incl. shipping + truck rental with a liftgate, storage, labor since my friends are skinny geeks, pizza, beer, rope/straps, and a handtruck.) if you have the space, i.e. living in your parents basement, garage, or for the lucky few, their old room. it is not such a bad idea. you could get rid of your bed and practice for the world record on your game of choice. you could also build your own arcade emulation upright, but that is illegal. i am still looking for nice and working upright or cocktail tables of journey, joust, gyruss, donkey kong, spyhunter, and tron.
a slut did tulsa
Last year I was trying to reason with one of the higher level Managers at Nintendo USA regarding emulation and emulators. I was trying to persuade him to sanction the sale and development of an emulator that would allow the old Nintendo and N64 games to be played on a different platform.
He told me video games revenues are going to surpass Box-Office sales in the future and ONLINE gaming will probably become its own religion. This video game entertainment industry is worth billions and no one wants to see the old games around anymore since you might stop buying new games for a few weeks and revisit some of the classics. Can you imagine that? Someone might actually want to play an sweet classic game instead of a newer lame game? Think of all the new games you've tried/rented and how bad most of them suck. Most of the new games end up costing $20 or less within a month after release because they are so lame.
Here is Nintendo's Position on emulators they say it's ILLEGAL even if you OWN THE ROMS. Nintendo is really a sentimental bunch when it comes to retaining pieces of our childhood. I'd like to see someone test this in court, but they would probably lose.
Here is an excerpt from their LEGAL FAQ
Can I Download a Nintendo ROM from the Internet if I Already Own the Authentic Game?
There is a good deal of misinformation on the Internet regarding the backup/archival copy exception. It is not a "second copy" rule and is often mistakenly cited for the proposition that if you have one lawful copy of a copyrighted work, you are entitled to have a second copy of the copyrighted work even if that second copy is an infringing copy. The backup/archival copy exception is a very narrow limitation relating to a copy being made by the rightful owner of an authentic game to ensure he or she has one in the event of damage or destruction of the authentic. Therefore, whether you have an authentic game or not, or whether you have possession of a Nintendo ROM for a limited amount of time, i.e. 24 hours, it is illegal to download and play a Nintendo ROM from the Internet.
How Does Nintendo Feel About the Emergence of Video Game Emulators?
The introduction of emulators created to play illegally copied Nintendo software represents the greatest threat to date to the intellectual property rights of video game developers. As is the case with any business or industry, when its products become available for free, the revenue stream supporting that industry is threatened. Such emulators have the potential to significantly damage a worldwide entertainment software industry which generates over $15 billion annually, and tens of thousands of jobs.
What Does Nintendo Think of the Argument that Emulators are Actually Good for Nintendo Because it Promotes the Nintendo Brand to PC Users and Leads to More Sales?
Distribution of an emulator developed to play illegally copied Nintendo software hurts Nintendo's goodwill, the millions of dollars invested in research & development and marketing by Nintendo and its licensees. Substantial damages are caused to Nintendo and its licensees. It is irrelevant whether or not someone profits from the distribution of an emulator. The emulator promotes the play of illegal ROMs , NOT authentic games. Thus, not only does it not lead to more sales, it has the opposite effect and purpose.
How Come Nintendo Does Not Take Steps Towards Legitimizing Nintendo Emulators?
Emulators developed to play illegally copied Nintendo software promote piracy. That's like asking why doesn't Nintendo legitimize piracy. It doesn't make any business sense. It's that simple and not open to debate.
People Making Nintendo Emulators and Nintendo ROMs are Helping Publishers by Making Old Games Available that are No Longer Being Sold by the Copyright Owner. This Does Not Hurt Anyone and Allows Gamers to Play Old Favorites. What's the Problem?
The problem is that it's illegal. Copyrights
SHUT UP NIGGER!
My understanding from studying articles on several game copyright and trademark lawsuits is that you can copy the idea of a game as long as you call it something different and produce everything yourself. Copying bitmaps and such from the original is definitely not allowed.
In that sense we'll always have the classics, legally.
Although some game companies, such as Hasbro, have been known to bully clone makers, by taking them to court, losing, and appealing over and over until the defendant is bankrupt.
In one bullying campaign, shareware and freeware sites were spidered for names containing "tris" and threatening emails were sent to webmasters telling them to remove the software or be sued, despite having lost every court case against every author they sued.
I've forgotten what I was replying to. I hope this isn't off topic.
And they are archived as well - in a way that really counts, on tens of thousands of PCs or more worldwide, and in dusty CDR collections for decades to come.
It'd be nice to see some kind of official project which legally provided historical archives of these programs. Hell, it goes beyond just games and to the very heart of compsci archival. Who archives old copies of VisiCalc, RT-11, or PRIMEOS? It's mostly gone, and to historians that's a damn shame. --M
Copanies should contribute back to the Open Source Community and declare the ROMs and the Games open source. Let's integrate all into the Linux kernel and it will never perish.
It's really time for CONFIG_ARCADE and Alt+Sysreq Asteroids!
-Tino
First of all, companies have an incredible mess in their records. For example, as of last year, an Electronic Arts representative was trying to convince me that Dune 2000 was the first ever game inspired by the book series (for the record, EA doesn't hold the rights for Dune or Dune II, so it may be understandable). To make matters even worse, until abour 1985 the rights to the games lied with the developers and not the companies. Some publishers continued this trend into the 1990s, and figuring out who actually holds the rights is tough. Home of the Underdogs does a decent job at tracking the owners of the copyrights, but even at several thousand games they are only scratching the surface of gaming.
Second, many of the developers don't exist anymore, and the law has no provision for "abandoned" copyright. These works are simply locked in a hiatus until the copyright protection expires, no matter that the owner of the copyright doesn't exist anymore. (Lessing's proposal that the cipyright law be changed so that owners will need to pay a nominal fee to keep their copyrights would solve this problem.)
Third, many games are locked to still profitable franchises. For example, no matter that Atari dumped several million cartridges of unsold E.T. games. You won't ever be able to buy the rights to this otherwise disastrous game because of trademark issues. Same goes for classic adventures, games based on books, games with characters or items that may be copyrighted by someone else or games with franchises that still go on, at least on paper.
As a consequence, you'll face a huge problem in trying to hunt down the real copyright owner (it wouldn't do you any good to pay the company if it turns out they don't hold the rights at all), and the selection of games you'll be able to buy the rights for would be very limited.
No Text.
I put together many PDP-11 (both Q-BUS and a few HEX BUS) systems in yesteryear and have many fond memories of RSTS, RT-11, RSX, and Venix (A SYSIII Unix clone which ran on the 11 at the time). Thanks a bunch for your links! --M
The illegality of mame is nothing compared to the carelessness and empty void of the IP holders just doing nothing with the fun games of yesteryears.
Many Thanks,
Luke
MAME is in my opinion the way to preserve these classics. The likes of Atari and other game manufactures should finally give back to the people who made them what they are today; it's the consumers who made these companies not their management. Try getting some of the old IC's for the boards in video or pinball machines some of them are non existent only available by cannibalizing other boards it will only get worse.
But that link made me laugh so hard! I swear, I came *that* close to spewing all over my powerbook!
What possible harm is there in grabbing a rom of a game that was on the market 20+ years ago and who's company has not existed for 10+ years?
What possible harm is there in running over a homeless person? They gave nothing to society, they were probably going to commit crime, you've done a good thing right?
The issue is that you're breaking the law (copyright law) and its not up to you to decide which laws to follow or not.
Why not build your own cab and slap MAME on it. It's what I'm doing. It's very easy to do.
Arcade Controls Everything you need to know about creating your own Arcade Game.
MAME
Lucid's Arcade Cabinet DesinGet your cabinet plans here.
I am quite sure that preserving ones cultural heritage must go over IP and patents. I can't claim that I want to preserve my hertiage by pirating a copy of Doom 3 (when it is released), but I sure can with a game that nobody takes care of anymore. It would be different if there was a company who lived on these games.
Something equal to the library of congress (I hope I got that one right) should be created for digital games. And not just the game but the blueprints/source code as well.
Hey, if you want to revisit the classics, get to Vegas quick for CGE '03!
http://www.cgexpo.com/
How to build a MAME cabinet in 24 hrs
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
They'd bundle their old games with new games and continually force you to buy a new game to play the old one. That way they could always port it to the new hardware and force you to buy it again!
That sounds horrible, but lots of people would probably dance at the idea of getting a retro game with every new game they bought.
These games still exist in arcade board format somewhere. Get a supergun and then you can play it on your tv as long as the board is good.
I have an early 90's TMNT Board myself, purchased here,, and it is sweet. It also makes it fairly legal for me to play it on MAME (It would be more so if I dumped it myself).
With digital storage becoming exponentially cheaper, stuff doesn't have to be worth much to be "worth preserving!" I'd think there are probably enough people interested in the Dr. Who and Beatles footage to, between them, get enough money to buy a few gigs worth of hard drives!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Martian Dreams at 6 MHz? Torture.
Fun game, but I played it at 12 MHz and almost quit -- then when I got my 486 (50 MHz, woo!) I replayed it all the time.
That's one of the most interesting games I've ever played.
I am not Herbert.
You're romanticizing the past here, I remember Tron but I'd rather waste money playing online strategy or mmorpg games than waste money playing decade old arcades. Both the games and the gamers have changed a lot/moved on from the time Tron was played.
I've played Snow Bros much less than I've played Warcraft 3. I'm sure most people have/would have done the same too.
This sig was cut off by the sla
There not pirating, just sitting on them so they can get squatter's rights.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
it doesn't have any "classic arcade games", but the underdogs is a nice "classic" computer games repository (the majority of the games being for PC). and they claim all the games that are available for download are legal (the copywrite holder's are no longer ISDA members or something like that -- IANAL)
The only classic game I care about: PACMAN, will live on forever! PACMAN is still being sold today, and my 21-28 year old group of friends still play it every friday night on an Atari 7800 with beer mixed in.
Ok so it's Ms. PACMAN for the 7800, it's the only one close enough to the arcade on the Atari to bear.
Why do I spell PACMAN with all uppercase? becuse it deserves it!
No. I was just the reading comments here, and heard the sounds of asteroids, thats right asteroids coming from the tv. turned around, and saw just what i expected, there was a game of asteriods being played on tv. just as normal, until i heard the sound of a ufo comin. i waited, but no ufo came. instead an suv drove onto the screen and chased the spaceship off of the screen. it was a hummer commercial. these games are very much a part of our culture.
LONG LIVE THE CLASSICS.
"oh! the sky is falling! the sky is falling!" blah, blah, blah, blah...
Mame, MAme, MAMe, MAME!
'nuff said
Furry cows moo and decompress.
the key to preserving endangered data is to duplicate and distribute it as widely as possible. those with access to historically valuable data, be it roms of the first arcade games or iso images of linux installation cds, can take advantage of the low prices of cd-rw drives and cd-r media to ensure it survives this dark era of corporate oppression if they so choose.
Dell Optiplex GX100, Celeron/700, 64MB RAM, Red Hat 8.0 Linux, FVWM 2.4, XMAME 0.69.1
MK2 runs full speed @38 fps, no problems.
-uso.
Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
I apologize for being redundant, but I feel it's important enough that it's justified.
As at least one other person mentioned, your stats are kinda skewed because some old games lend themselves to multiplayer more than others. I doubt there'll be a long line to play Zoo Keeper on the 'net anytime soon...even though it does allow two people to take turns playing.
Perhaps if you had a *meta*-server--something that let a group of people cycle through a list of games like Zoo Keeper... or maybe you already have something like that, I don't know.
Furry cows moo and decompress.
What is this lim mit of which you speak? I am aware of no such attribute on copyrights. Well, I remember learning of them when reading your history files, but if I remember correctly, they were abolished in the early 21st century, before you even had warp, hyoo-mon!
AHHH!!! Flashbacks!!! AHHHH!!!! Make it stop!!! AHHH!!!!!!11
Is a piece of crap. Over at KungFoo you'll find a review of it, the Activision Classics, and (coming soon) a review of an arcade all-in-one with PacMan, Dig Dug, Bosconian and a few others.
Some good info there.
I've heard of DOSEMU and used Bochs but those others are new to me.
I own a Class of '81 - manufactured in 2000, a cocktail style video game with Pac Man, Ms. Pac Man, Galaga. Last weekend, I bought a Centipede/Millipede/Missile Command/Let's Go Bowling!(Yuck) in upright format.
Exactly like the originals, 3 (or more!) games in one. These games are extremely compelling in my game room, and are very popular at parties. Nostalgic adults and kids love them equally.
And if you want the originals, plenty of refurbished games are available, or you can wait a couple of weeks for the Joust/Robotron combination.
By the way, I don't work for TNT Amusements where I bought these games.
Phones :- my mobile has laods of games on it that were once arcade classics. There will always be low end markets to buy these games until they end up PD.
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
Slightly offtopic, but what the hell: I'm always on the look out for new games that use quite old-school concepts and designs. Because they often hold my interest more than most "modern" games.
Take a look at Shantae. Capcom's newest answer to Castlevania? Well, it's probably closer to Popful Mail. Excellent script, perfect platforming gameplay (with some RPG elements not just thrown in, but well integrated). Incredible graphics AND music, probably best I've seen and heard on GameBoy Color, ever.
Upcoming GBA-version shots here. Nice to see it's from an independant dev...
MONEY
How much do you want to play these games? Do you want it enough to offer cold hard cash in return for a non-exclusive license? Have you considered offering advertising links? Do you have anything else that the rights owners might like?
If the question is "How can we persuade rights owners to give us the rights for nothing", then you can't be that interested in playing them.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Sorry, but anyone that thinks that hasn't tried the latest games.
Even if we only stick to games that existed in the 80's vs. their modern counterparts, the older games aren't 1/10 as creative, fun or educational. There is simply no comparison.
"Pole Position" vs. "Gran Turismo 3"
Pole position was fun but it's just lame compared to the realistic simulation of GT3. This game is deep enough to keep you entertained for years.
"Football" vs. "Madden NFL 2003"
Do you remember the old X/O football game w/the trackballs? Well I do miss the trackballs, but if you've never seen Madden you just can't appreciate how far games have come since then. Nearly every team and player from the history of the game. Live commentary, tutorials, strategy -- it's truly amazing. And you can play people all over the world from the comfort of your living room.
There are many more examples and there are so many new and interesting games that couldn't even have existed back then. If you liked the older games and have some free time in your life, you owe it to yourself to get a PS2 and let out the child within!!
there's a serious point here, which is that it's daft for computer software to be covered by copyright for 70 years. That kind of time period makes some kind of sense for literary works (which is of course what copyright was originally intended to cover) but is stupidly long in comparison with the reasonable commercial life of computer software.
I doubt it. Any copyrighted work intended for commercial distribution is likely to make the few dollars it would take to register the work well before the first payment is due.
When you come up with a bill and get it in front of Congress I'll consider it. Until then, the PD Enhancement Act is reasonable, it's here now, and it has support from organizations with real political power.
Digital Citizen
The heading says "classic games". Not classic arcade games, not classic computer games.
...
/. ?
To me, "classic games" without any other adjective means games like Chess and Go; maybe Bridge, Reversi,
Am I too old to read
Companies could be fiercely guarding their IP because games STILL have value, even if the original equipment is obsolete. With increasing use of handheld devices (color screen phones), with limited resolution and processing power, there is a new market for simple games.
+AndyJ+
thank you for the excellent link/ en_US/ support/catalog/productDetail.jsp?id=83-3785
here is the part
http://mcm.newark.com/NewarkWebCommerce/mcm
nohup rm -rf ~/. >& zen &
So sell some of the old stuff then. Put together good collections, and don't try to charge me $40 for stuff that was developed 20 years ago. There was no R&D cost to recoup, just distribution. They'd at least be making *some* money, instead of *none*.
creation science book
I have played computer-games since I got my Commodore 64, then Amiga 500 and for now the PC-generation. My favorite games on the Amiga was "North and South" and "A-train", which I enjoyed to play for a very long period. I actually just remembered how much I loved those games, when I installed UAE on my Gentoo yesterday and seing them in action again (I own the games, but was to lazy to convert them, so I downloaded them). A-train has still one of the best simulations for train and economy, eventhough it looks so simple (but it is quite hard to succeed). North And South may look like a Risk ripoff, but the graphics sure are fun. The same counts for Civilization, which I believe still have the best graphics (Inventions, starting a town, riots), eventhough Civ2 had better units-graphics (but the rest sucked, Elvis, please!).
Back on the topic: I believe that these projects can only exist if the companies give the license free and other people can develop on them further (I would like to see a A-train 2, but don't tell Maxis *ahem* EA/Maxis, they are more interested in "realism" than fun graphics).
Many game companies believe that the only solution to develop further on their games is to make them 3D. Look at Railroad Tycoon 3 in planning, Simcity 4, CC:Generals. These games maybe *look* good but the gameplay really gets deprecated when your computer has to simulate all the 3D-graphics, and you feel it isn't more to it.
Nuff said: Start developing!
(yes this can be compared with sex)
I have a lot of modern games at home, but at some point I got tired of each and every one of them.
But I still enjoy Tetris, Breakout, the Rogue-like games, and those kinds of games.
Since I haven't played the games you mention, I can't say anything about them (who knows, they might be the exception :-) ), but I think generally those 'simple' classics beat almost all of today's games for longevity.
Meep.
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
Twelve years ago this was a valid question. Now you have:
1. Archived ROMs for almost every arcade and 8-bit home computer game ever produced, including rare and unreleased games.
2. Freely available emulators for running the majority of these. Many games suffer because they don't work well with a mouse and keyboard, but at least the games are preserved.
3. Commercial emulated versions of many old games, which aren't in the gray zone that most ROMs images are. The Namco Museum series is a good example. It even includes lesser known games like Toy Pop and Bosconian.
4. Rabid coin-op hobbyists producing new versions of marquees, control panel art, and so on, for classic arcade machines.
Can google cache those?
What are "quarters"? I remember using nickels at Wunderland, but I am not familiar with this term "quarters".
What about the option of an emulator for your PC? I'm not too sure if they're legal or not, but if they are, that's a great alternative.
There have been efforts, over the years, to address some of the issues. I just saw a special on G4 TV recently relating to intellivison - there actually is an owner to most of the mattel created games and they sell msdos and macos based emulators to play those games.
And back a half dozen or more yrs ago, some of the non pirates in the Apple II community did research to locate copyright holders of a variety of games to try to get rights to distribute them.
But it is a lot of work.
URL: http://xanga.com/lvirden > Quote: Saving the world before bedtime. Even if explicitly stated to the contrary, n