[game_preservation] Frank Cifaldi's preservation article on 1Up

[Devin Monnens]

Well here's a question then: what exactly do we need to get to the level of
a UCLA or ASIFA preservation and archive group? Stanford and UT Austin are
getting there (as is the LoC), but what types of resources and recognition
do we need? I also suppose, how does this compare with film archival after
the first 30-40 of the medium (which is about where we're at in terms of
commercial games).

I mean, you look at commercial films (1890 is a good benchmark) and 25 years
into that there was Birth of a Nation (1914) and then you compare that with
games, we have Super Mario 64 (1996) (and in terms of narrative,
say...Planescape and MGS? And hey, at least none of these are viewed as
racist today!). You know, I think that's a pretty good comparison, but I
think we could do a little better for making games that explore history and
culture (kind of hard since games are made to entertain, part of the reason
why I say Shigeru Miyamoto is more the Buster Keaton of videogames rather
than the Spielberg).

On Sat, Jan 9, 2010 at 12:26 PM, Andrew Armstrong <andrew at aarmstrong.org>wrote:


>  "As much as I wish this weren't true, widely distributing an unreleased

> game in pirated form over the Internet is the only method of preservation

> that I trust, at least for now. There is no equivalent of, say, a UCLA Film

> & Television Archive or an ASIFA-Hollywood for videogames. Certainly we have

> the beginnings of equivalent institutions -- the archives at Stanford and UT

> Austin for example are off to tremendous starts -- but the resources and

> industry recognition just aren't there yet, at least to my satisfaction."

>

> A shame this is basically true still - there just isn't the resources

> around, and the standards and concentrated effort just sadly isn't present,

> at least as far as I know! (if it is present but hidden, that's just as

> bad!)

>

> Interesting reasons laid down to justify it, although I don't think anyone

> here would need convincing. :)

>

> Andrew

>

>

> On 09/01/2010 16:45, Devin Monnens wrote:

>

> Nobody's reported on this here, but there's an article on backing up beta

> and unreleased games.

>

>  http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3177520

>

> --

> Devin Monnens

> www.deserthat.com

>

> The sleep of Reason produces monsters.

>

>

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-- 
Devin Monnens
www.deserthat.com

The sleep of Reason produces monsters.
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