GameHistoryOrg: 87% Missing: the Disappearance of Classic Video Games

[The_J]

The video game history foundation has posted an article, which is not about Civ2, but still in the current context very relevant. The article describes that 87% of historic video games (range 1960-2009) are currently not available at all. While many games can be bought on online platforms like Steam or GoG, the vast majority, nearly 9 out of 10, are actually not on these platforms. According to the study this is comparable to the survival of American silent-era movies (14%). This means for many old games the only possibility to preserve them right now is to preserve the legacy systems which run these games, and hope that the floppies or other media they are stored on don't degrade.

These facts are very relevant for the Civ community. While the series from Civ3 to Civ6, and also including Alpha Centauri, is available on online platforms, the first 2 games of the series are still not legally downloadable.
Let's hope that these classics will be preserved for the future.

A summary of the study, including further links, can be found here.

 

[rrreese]

This is a really sad situation. I was looking through a "best of" list of PC games pre 1996 (more on that to come) and around 60% of them are no longer available. And these where games rated the most highly in 1996. GOG has shown there is a market for these classics.

The situation on other platforms is significantly worse. How many games from the first year of the iPhone still exist? The situation is very bad.

 

[Blake00]

Wow.. I didn't realise things were that bad! Thankfully a huge amount of lost games have been preserved on the brilliant Internet Archive library site by dedicated archivers however since they were not put there by their owners it's pretty much still unsupported legally grey/questionable abandonware hence why we can't allow linking to such content there sadly. As someone who is involved in some of the archival work going on there (I've mostly been doing some old Aussie video game magazines, and of course lots of lost Civ scenarios/mods) I've seen so much great work going on there (ie old video game mags, tv commercials, documentaries, lost websites and so much more) and hope that rules, systems and legalities around all that stuff will change over the decades to come ensuring far less is lost.

Anyway just a reminder to everyone reading this thread that we have a voting for Civ1, Civ2 and Test of Time to be added to GoG and Steam thread where your votes are very much wanted and needed here:

Vote for Sid Meier's Civilization I and II (MGE & Test of Time) to be added to GoG

SUMMARY: Amazingly the first 2 big Civilization games that started it all are still not legally sold in any digital stores (& can only be found on archive & dodgy warez sites) while other classic Microprose games and all later Civ games are all being digitally sold. Presumably the pre Firaxis...

forums.civfanatics.com

 

[ghost toast]

It is a real shame games are almost being eliminated on the market.

Even games not that old are being removed from markets due to low and non existent sales. It is a Shame some of those games are good but just poorly advertised.

You also have Microsoft removing games from it's market place including it's exclusive games for example
Risk factions
Real steal.

I used to love both of those games. I still have my Xbox 360 hdd with real steal so I still have that game but risk factions is lost to me forever.

Real steal was a very fun robot boxing game with lots of costimization and robot building selling and buying. I'm so glad I redownloaded it right before the purge.

Super fun game lost forever to all those who don't have an installed copy

 

[ghost toast]

Deer hunter
black and white

Battle realms is another old game I used to like playing. You can't buy it anymore.

I heard a while back it's getting a remake not sure if it's true.

I would still like to have both if it ever does get a remake.

I'm also a big fan of ps2 games. There are so many of them out there that are getting hard to find.
I can easily find popular and well known titles but games the more obscure titles are hard to find. There are so many ps2 titles I never heard of until I started really getting into those games.

It would be cool if they brought back all the ps2 titles back. Original and remastered.

Ps1 and ps2 era of games were so unique. So many cool and interesting concepts were created then during that time.
Classic platformer were great on those systems. Platformers are one of my favorite types of games.

The ps1 and 2 had many creative games like

western samurai
Daemon summoner
Dokapon kingdom
Culdcept
The suffering
Super monkey ball
Ratchet and clank
XIII
Spyro crash bandicoot

When I was a kid I used to love playing the luney toons sheep raider game on ps1. You are the luney toons coyote and you try to sneak up on sheep and try not to get caught by the dog.

I also like
wild arms
Ape escape
Kain soul rever
twisted metal.

The kain games are still available. At least all the old PC versions are.

Terrible we are losing these games.
They can still be fun.

I think some older games are more fun then some of the new games out there. Sure those game look great the combat is awesome but they feel lacking on the fun side. Many games now have tedious and not fun concepts. I often find myself grinding away so I can do 1 thing it gets boring after while then more and more games want to be like that.

 

[CurtSibling]

Well since this very site is against abandonware, CFC is doing it's part to eradicate the classic CIV2, which is hard to find otherwise.

 

[Patine]

I still have my Civ2 MGE and ToT CD-RoM's, which have miraculously held out this long. Fortunately, the No-CD patch, and ToTPP mean I only need to use them when I restore my computer, or buy a new one, which should increase their longevity as the antiques they are...

 

[rrreese]

Well since this very site is against abandonware, CFC is doing it's part to eradicate the classic CIV2, which is hard to find otherwise.

This site isn't against abandonware per se, its against dealing with reputational and legal risk.

Its trivial to find a copy of Civ 2 online and will remain so regardless of whether its linked from here. Certainly the idea that CFC is eradicating Civ 2 is asinine. Due to piracy all these games will most likely live for ever.

The issue with them not being on sale is that the games

- Can't be used in classrooms where abandonware is not acceptable
- Cant be easily linked to by sites that refuse to support abandonware
- Some people avoid abandonware due to malware concerns
- The game never gets "packaged" for modern operating systems.