Preserving Video Games – and the Right Way to Handle Abandonware?

Posted by Rampant Coyote on June 29, 2011

An interesting article about the problem of preserving old video games:

Grassroots Game Preservation Through Abandonware

The focus is (duh!) on abandonware sites. That’s a gray area with me, though it’s not gray with respect to U.S. copyright laws.  Still, it’s largely tolerated by the industry, so long as the sites will take down games on request by the copyright holders, or automatically when the games become supported again through some means (It’s no fair for the publisher to have to track down every single site and contact them). The copyright owners are no longer receiving any revenue from them anyway, and can’t afford to even try and support the games. But the abandonware sites keep the IP alive for them. So if it’s not a good thing, it’s at least a neutral thing. Chaotic neutral to chaotic good, depending on the site, for those of us who obsess over such things. I’ve yet to meet a developer who hasn’t been pleased that his or her older titles are still kept alive through these sites. Though I guess if their game really sucked and they are embarrassed about it they might feel bad about it.

I absolutely love this excerpt about how GOG.COM handled their “competition” – the abandonware sites that offered free downloads of the games GOG.COM would sell:

“[Abandonware] is something we knew we had to deal with to make Good Old Games a success.” Says Rambourg. “Rather than making them our opponents and thus turning the noble cause of retro gaming into a battlefield where everyone would lose, we decided to team up with the abandonware scene. We got in touch with some of the most famous abandonware websites and proposed that they become our affiliates. [The sites] take down the titles we sign for Good Old Games and ask their visitors to purchase a legal copy from us. We then pay our affiliates for every purchase done thanks to them. It’s basically a win-win situation that benefits the end consumer.”

Rather than treating abandonware sites with hostility, Good Old Games turned potential competitors into allies. In going this route, GOG also acknowledges the continued importance of the abandonware community. The growth of legitimate distributors is doubtless a preferred alternative to the violation of copyright law. But the legal system is frequently too sluggish to be relied on by itself. While Good Old Games’ efforts should be applauded, they’re still a business venture; at some point they have to be mindful of their bottom line, and in turn their focus is more likely to fall on retro titles with economic viability.

There’s even more symbiosis than the article mentions. I know GOG.COM has tested and used some cracks out there to deal with copy protection for older games – some of which simply will not work with modern hardware. I had a copy of The Temple of Elemental Evil that I’d never been able to play on account of that, and re-purchased it from GOG.COM to finally be able to play it. It was worth it to have them do the research and test the crack for safety for me. While they maybe could have created a crack themselves, they took advantage of what was already out there.

Now, this isn’t a broad approach that would be a general solution to pirate (ahem – copyright infringement – douchebaggery – whatever) sites. As noted in the article, many abandonware sites have long made pains to separate themselves from pirate sites. For the most part, abandonware sites (at least the ones I’ve visited… all, like, three of them…) have been good about taking down games at the request of the copyright owner. The sites I’m familiar with make a big deal out of supporting the industry, not cheating it. That’s what makes them work for me.

And once again, I’m impressed with CD Projekt as a whole, and their attitude and approach. So yeah, I guess I’ve forgiven them for the whole GOG.COM fake-death week-long outage joke.

But the point at the end of the article  is also correct. Good Old Games has a focus on – well, good old games. Should only the good / great / popular  ones be preserved? I don’t think so.  Reading the CRPG Addict’s blog, I’m often surprised by titles I’ve never or barely heard of – and which would probably never sell on GOG.COM, particularly those from the 1980s – which have some pretty redeeming qualities and moments of greatness. It would be awful if these games were lost forever.

But there’s also no way to make them economically viable to preserve individually. I mean, how many people a year would pay even a single dollar to buy Scavengers of the Mutant World? Not enough to be worth the time just to track down and secure the rights. But I’m glad it’s available so that some historian out there could at least provide a synopsis of the game for my benefit.

Filed Under: Biz, Retro - Comments: 7 Comments to Read



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