[game_preservation] Value in archive website?

[Jim Leonard]

On 5/29/2013 11:55 AM, Scott Sheppard wrote:

> For several years, I've tossed around the idea of creating a website

> platform that blended the benefits of wikipedia style crowdsourcing,

> last.fm <http://last.fm> style community interaction/scrobbling, and

> imdb style credits and profiles, for video games.


Sounds like MobyGames 2.0.  (ie. MobyGames + Creative Commons)

 From experience, I can tell you that the largest hurdle was determining 
a heirarchy (taxonomy) of job functions (and title aliases for 
equivalents).  There can be five "designers" on a game but they are 
"story consultant", "level designer", etc.

The second largest hurdle was developing a verification system.  There 
are very many people who had only peripheral access to the development 
of a title but try to list themselves in the credits as "associate 
producer" or similar (aka a former employee trying to bolster their 
resume for a job search).  Also junior testers trying to pass themselves 
off as "Lead QA", etc.

Your hurdles will mostly be a large investment of design, planning, 
coordination, and time.  The technology/implementation should not only 
come much later but will be much easier than the former.  Just make sure 
that whatever you come up with can always be expanded or altered at any 
time, since 1. you will likely want the cooperation of most major 
preservation institutions, not all of which will agree on the best 
course of actions, and 2. the nature of developing games changes almost 
as rapidly as the medium itself does.

I wish you the best of luck -- you will need it :-)
-- 
Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org)
Check out some trippy MindCandy: http://www.mindcandydvd.com/
A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.oldskool.org/
You're all insane and trying to steal my magic bag!