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

[Andrew Armstrong]

Cool, nice website, thanks for pointing it out :) that kind of 
information (along with the dumps and so forth) as Frank has said needs 
mirroring. Perhaps some nearby archive would be willing to help in that 
regard. Nice work by Matt and Curt! :)

Don't we just know companies don't have archives - but they also don't 
have the working relationship to start archives or actually preserve any 
material they have in the future. :( We should seek to change that 
whenever possible, but it costs money of course...

Release dates are basic information you'd hope they keep records of 
(shipping accounts, store release dates, marketing posters would all 
have it right?). I think we'd find more reliable information going to 
the shops and stores and asking them sometimes, in fact it's something 
I'd not mind trying on stores in the UK. I'm sure they keep release date 
information better then manufacturers/producers of things do.

Andrew

On 09/01/2010 22:05, Martin Goldberg wrote:

> Well, I can say on the Atari related front there's a number of people

> making efforts to those route.  Matt Reichert is probably the most

> well known and active - http://atariprotos.com/.  He routinely dumps

> and archives protos, unreleased games, and such and is someone I'd

> consider an expert in those regards.

>

> There's also my partner Curt Vendel, who has the largest Atari related

> archive including mainframe backups, engineering schematics, internal

> documentation, protos, source code, artwork, etc.  In fact the current

> Atari has him on retainer for resources whenever they need it.  He

> just provided all the cabinet artwork and other related resources for

> the Atari games in Microsoft's just announced virtual game room.

>

> That brings to mind another issue with regards to preservation - when

> you're talking about older companies and brands, a lot of them simply

> don't have the proper archives or their own material either,

> regardless of 3rd party.

>

> A related historical example - I remember a recent research spat

> getting down the actual US release date of Super Mario Bros.  The

> current Nintendo (where almost nobody is left form the "old days" had

> it listed as 1985 and a US launch title.  This contradicted direct

> interviews with Minoru Arakawa, Howard Lincoln, and Howard Phillips

> were they stated it was not ready for the New York test market launch.

>   I worked my way through NOA (both through the PR dept. and tech.

> support) and nobody could give me an answer for the discrepancy other

> than "that's what's listed here in the databse".  Apparently they have

> a company wide database where they defer to for any historical

> information.

>

>

> Marty

>

> On Sat, Jan 9, 2010 at 2:28 PM, Andrew Armstrong<andrew at aarmstrong.org>  wrote:

>    

>> I think (and I don't want to second guess him, he's on this list I think)

>> but it's the scope and size of the institution, and the rigor of preserving

>> the materials, and the fact that almost no game company actively preserves

>> anything they make with a 3rd party, whereas film places I bet have

>> agreements for providing a copy of their films when they are released into

>> the archives properly, as well as the archives having copies of their

>> digital and non-digital film stocks as necessary.

>>

>> I also think the game archives are a lot smaller, just the way it is really,

>> and without a large amount of money there's not much that could change that.

>>

>> Andrew

>>

>> On 09/01/2010 20:09, Devin Monnens wrote:

>>

>> 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.

>>>

>>> _______________________________________________

>>> game_preservation mailing list

>>> game_preservation at igda.org

>>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation

>>>

>>>

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>>>

>>>        

>>

>>

>> --

>> Devin Monnens

>> www.deserthat.com

>>

>> The sleep of Reason produces monsters.

>>

>> _______________________________________________

>> game_preservation mailing list

>> game_preservation at igda.org

>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation

>>

>>

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>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation

>>

>>

>>      

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