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Video game preservation charity accuses Nintendo of being ‘actively destructive’ to game history

cireza

Member
the entire industry is shit in this category
Microsoft has been making pretty big efforts with Backward Compatibility, but they are definitely the only console manufacturer to invest some real money in this feature.

Nintendo, at some point, were actually pretty decent at this. Wii U was 100% BC with Wii and you could carry all your eShop content through the Wii mode. It wasn't really elegant, but at least, it was 100% BC. 3DS was also BC with DS. The way they forced a complete reset with Switch is unacceptable to me as a customer.
 

wvnative

Member
Microsoft has been making pretty big efforts with Backward Compatibility, but they are definitely the only console manufacturer to invest some real money in this feature.

Nintendo, at some point, were actually pretty decent at this. Wii U was 100% BC with Wii and you could carry all your eShop content through the Wii mode. It wasn't really elegant, but at least, it was 100% BC. 3DS was also BC with DS. The way they forced a complete reset with Switch is unacceptable to me as a customer.

I don't mean to discount the efforts that are being made, I understand it's no easy task.

But the fact remains, from a consumer standpoint, currently, just for example, I can't pop Need for Speed Most Wanted 2005 in my Xbox and expect it to work. An example of a game that will never be re-licensed. And imo, it's a tragedy we as consumers didn't display stronger desire for preservation earlier on. So many games will eventually be lost to time. Emulation will only be viable for so long.
 

assurdum

Banned
Lets just hope fanboys dont defend this crap.
Too late
LOL suddenly everyone cares about Wii U now
A foundation that advocates for piracy. Interesting messaging.
It's not Nintendo's job.

If anything ask developers to publish the source code for their games or engines, which is what some of them do for older games.
I'm asking if Nintendo did it just to prevent the evil piracy why sony didn't do the same.
 
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TheInfamousKira

Reseterror Resettler
BUT there is damage anyway. That's the point.

And there is people that think it's up to THEM to decide what a company does with it's own things.

So I will keep dating a Girl that breaks up with me because it's up to me to decide what she does with her life? Not her decision because I decide how the world should work?

Look don't you think all those dense people whining about it online. Every YouTuber jumping on that wagon to whine about Nintendo does not damage Nintendo in any way?
"Nintendo hates it's customers" blah blah like how about being neutral? And trying to understand and maybe try to explain? NOO let's just spread lies for clicks and attention or because of being to lazy to find out the reasons since whining is easier.
Why are opinions and feelings presented as facts?

Just because grown up children are butthurt or just want to be part of the whine-train so they can SHOW IT to the evil big companies?

It's those damned green and blue rats!
 

cireza

Member
And imo, it's a tragedy we as consumers didn't display stronger desire for preservation earlier on.
People who think preservation is really important have been working around it through other means for ages. Preserving their original hardware, their CRT, making backups of their games, using flashcarts and ODE etc... There are many ways, and big companies don't give a shit about it, let's be real. They won't do anything unless they are forced to, and the vast majority of consumers don't care. They will buy whatever is available, play it, and move on.
 
We're these guys saying this about Sony when they were about to do the same exact thing?

I do think it's too early to close the 3DS eShop at least, and would hope Nintendo would backtrack on that. But the vast majority of Wii U games were ported to other consoles, so unless you like Virtual Console games, it makes more sense to shut that store down.

You have to realize that stores don't go offline because they like making people miserable. Maintaining legacy servers for long periods of time is insanely expensive, and if there's no longer a ton of profit being made from them, then something has to give.

Sure, Sony is letting the PS3 and PS Vita stores stay up, but for how much longer? It sucks yes, but it's the reality of digital distribution, one that people should be looking for a solution to if they actually want to preserve game history.
Everyone was having a shitstorm when Sony dared to do it, but Nintendo usually gets a pass for it, thats the difference.
 

wvnative

Member
People who think preservation is really important have been working around it through other means for ages. Preserving their original hardware, their CRT, making backups of their games, using flashcarts and ODE etc... There are many ways, and big companies don't give a shit about it, let's be real. They won't do anything unless they are forced to, and the vast majority of consumers don't care. They will buy whatever is available, play it, and move on.

I know...it's just...kind of sad.
 

Jubenhimer

Member
Everyone was having a shitstorm when Sony dared to do it, but Nintendo usually gets a pass for it, thats the difference.
A lot of people are being fairly critical of Nintendo doing it as well, so they're not getting as much of a free pass as you think. Again, I'm asking if this same charity was saying this stuff when Sony was planning on shutting down the PS Store for PS3 and PS Vita.

The reality is, if companies don't want people to bitch about games being taken away from them due to store closures, then they need to actually find a cost efficient way to let people access these games.
 

daclynk

Member
And they're right, Nintendo doesn't give a shit about game history. Except when they need to download a rom from the Internet to sell it to the consumers, which would be the first time (and they are so stupid that they get caught).
really when did they do that, got any source?
 
The reality is, if companies don't want people to bitch about games being taken away from them due to store closures, then they need to actually find a cost efficient way to let people access these games.
I can't disagree with that. As much as i love my Playstation consoles, i do wish Jim Ryan and Sony would pull their heads outta their asses and put full backwards compat on PS4 and PS5.
 

Astral Dog

Member
Nintendo has been running those shops long after they started losing money for lack of activity , its sad but that's the reality of business, most people complaining probably haven't even bought a game for the old systems in years.
 

lukilladog

Member
I can believe how naive and fake some users are here.....

"If it's not legally available then piracy is ok"

What do you do when a 1950s car is not made anymore? Just steal it? Make it yourself without licence?

Entitled kids I swear...
Your analogies are terrible and you dont seem to realize whats the point of copyright laws, but nowadays you can build yourself a 100% new '65 mustang with just after market parts just so you know.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
I hope everyone's been boycotting pretty much every company just the same as they all have TONS of now unavailable games in their history, from the arcades or previous consoles with the odd retro collection barely scratching the surface of what would be lost if not for piracy and emulation. Or is it not really about the principle of it all but just who has the most unavailable, with the company among the oldest a likely candidate? Just pirate what you want folks, no reason to try and justify it, it's always one thing or another, as if anyone was buying these games on the old systems rather than go meh, it's not available on a new system so I'll pirate it instead. The same way folks are pirating stuff that aren't available on their platform of choice, PC or otherwise, because hey, it's x company's fault for wanting to (not) sell (on) specific platforms. The same way others justify buying stolen or ripoff content because hey, the original is not yet available officially on my platform or in this way, so what am I to do? Even if there's actual pressure on Nintendo and they backpedal like Sony backpedaled (likely merely postponed) on PS3/Vita stores closing folks would still opt for the convenient way to play these games that doesn't require owning any device from the platform holder at all (or paying), if they want the content at all, which most don't, which is why old things are no longer supported, because the industry and more importantly the consumers themselves keep moving forward like time. Even on PC and even the best digital platforms games get delisted or official forward compatibility is no longer a thing with paradigm shifts like DOS > Windows > Command Line evolving out of DOS itself, deprecated DirectX versions, etc., but where's the same outrage for the companies that still exist, whether original or reborn, for not patching all games for modern OS and platforms or releasing them on all the consoles to be fair to every consumer since it's apparently anti consumer to not sell stuff exactly how some want (like Nintendo going third party)?‍️🤷‍♂️
 
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jufonuk

not tag worthy
renews cbs GIF
 

Fare thee well

Neophyte
So frustrating. Many times the needs of business run opposite to the benefits of art and preservation. It boils down to a few things: if you believe video games are art; if you think art eventually transcends private ownership; what you think about copyright laws and how they are enforced.
 

nush

Member
People who think preservation is really important have been working around it through other means for ages. Preserving their original hardware, their CRT, making backups of their games, using flashcarts and ODE etc... There are many ways, and big companies don't give a shit about it, let's be real. They won't do anything unless they are forced to, and the vast majority of consumers don't care. They will buy whatever is available, play it, and move on.

Games are no different from other media in that sense, many lost movies and TV show episodes. Some have only been recovered due to "Piracy".
 

MomsNewBoyfriend

Neo Member
I'm pretty sure nintendo was keeping source code for their games from the jump, whilst chuckleheads like Square were just losing it right and left
 

jaysius

Banned
So many random shmucks claiming to be historians of a thing, it's really hilarious. Good job on getting a little bit of attention for no reason though.
 

Solarstrike

Member
Nintendo doesn't abandon anything, they merely remove things in order to resell them back to you in the not too distant future. Kinda like what Bungie does with Destiny 2 content.
 

Modrot

Member
Terrible time to buy a 3ds. At least Samus Returns was good.

This is why people emulate but Nintendo will keep making silly decisions like this.
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
I don't mean to discount the efforts that are being made, I understand it's no easy task.

But the fact remains, from a consumer standpoint, currently, just for example, I can't pop Need for Speed Most Wanted 2005 in my Xbox and expect it to work. An example of a game that will never be re-licensed. And imo, it's a tragedy we as consumers didn't display stronger desire for preservation earlier on. So many games will eventually be lost to time. Emulation will only be viable for so long.
honestly the best solution to this whole licensing thing is for Microsoft to opensource their internal xbox/x360 emulators so people can put that shit in retroarch. plus it'd be a massive boost to the xbox emulation scene which desperately needs a boost seeing how shoddy it is compared to the nintendo emulation scene
 

SF Kosmo

Al Jazeera Special Reporter
If something is out of circulation for more than 20 years, it should automatically and permanently lapse into the public domain. This will not only solve the problem of preserving digital media, it will encourage companies to re-release content digitally, license it, or even publish it for free in order to maintain the copyright.
 

Lunarorbit

Gold Member
How can Nintendo be accused of destroying video game history?

They let me buy super mario bros 3 on four different consoles so they can't be that bad...... /s
 
Lol I don't agree with Nintendo and the other day I was talking shit about them because of this, but this is a bit too much. Just buy yourself a potato PC (even your phone can be your "preservation" machine) and you can literally have every Nintendo game ever,
Ohhh you sweet summer child, there's still loads of content Nintendo has made, licensed or published from the 80's and 90's that's still not properly preserved and playable today.

Like, good grief, I was at one point trying to keep up-do-date a list of undumped Satellaview content and got overwhelmed by the sheery quantity of stuff that's not recovered.

Then I mentally died when I learned Satella-Q, a series of Satellaview quiz games spanning about 20 or so episodes, was stored entirely in the BS-X's PSRAM, not in any proper digital-storage saved form, and thus is completely unrecoverable unless Nintendo has stored master copies in a vault somewhere.
 
If something is out of circulation for more than 20 years, it should automatically and permanently lapse into the public domain. This will not only solve the problem of preserving digital media, it will encourage companies to re-release content digitally, license it, or even publish it for free in order to maintain the copyright.

Thank Disney/etc. for making that an impossibility.
 

SeraphJan

Member
To be fair Nintendo wasn't always like this. Only after Switch's success, both critics and gamers start simping the company.

Have you ever wonder why Switch game never or rarely went on sales, or even drop price over the years? Not even for a game release like 6 years ago on last gen console that's ported to current gen?



Imaging if Microsoft and Sony does this? People would probably went crazy.

They seriously need some competitor in the handheld market. How Steam Deck turns out to be successful, at least third party game could be cheaper.
 
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theclaw135

Banned
Microsoft got a free pass for closing servers. The original Xbox Live shut down in 2010, and "journalists" only cared about people trying to stay connected to Halo 2.
You can't redownload any of the first-generation XBLA games.
 
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Kataploom

Gold Member
So frustrating. Many times the needs of business run opposite to the benefits of art and preservation. It boils down to a few things: if you believe video games are art; if you think art eventually transcends private ownership; what you think about copyright laws and how they are enforced.
Then should they run and store the system for ages even if it's reporting more expenses than earnings? lol.

Also, it's not Nintendo nor any owner shop business to keep legacy of games that are not theirs... Why are Nintendo responsible to keep "legacy" afloat and not developer's? Aren't they the ones that should be putting their games on people hands?

Oh, sure, it's business and many will probably see no more return of investment since nobody cared about their games on the eShop anyway.

I can believe how naive and fake some users are here.....

"If it's not legally available then piracy is ok" so what do you do when sex with minors is not legal? Have it anyway?

What do you do when a 1950s car is not made anymore? Just steal it? Make it yourself without licence?

Entitled kids I swear...
In those examples, someone is getting damaged and that's why clearly they crimes, let me explain:

- I don't even have to comment on child cases...

- If someone is selling the car pieces and you steal them, it will obviously cause harm, but if you take from abandoned sources that no one will get benefited or harmed by it, then what's the problem with it?

In Nintendo case, if they're not selling the games and there's literally no way to get them unless you download them from a random source on the internet, they are literally not being harmed for your actions since they wouldn't be getting money from it anyway... It's an actual conflicting argument when determining if doing that should be even considered piracy and why they use the IP missuse when sending their C&D to these sites owners... The case of the guy that was recently jailes was totally justified because he was providing a way to bypass purchasing Switch games, their literally current console.

These forgotten games/IPs should be made public including source code. I understand that re-releasing many of these isn’t profitable and therefore companies don’t care. However, at the same time, if you download/share a rom you risk yourself being prosecuted by a multi-billion dollar company trying to grab some money from you.

That's not Nintendo business, ask the devs of those games to do so or to port them to a current platform.

IDK How is any of this so dificult, damn...
 

Chastten

Banned
While I agree with some of you that it would be awesome if everything stayed the same forever and backwards compatibility is a good thing and all that stuff... I'm really not bothered by stuff like this at all.

I haven't played my 3DS or Wii U since probably 2018. I own all games I want for those systems, and have backups of all files on my computer if I ever wanna hook them up again.
 

Rykan

Member
I don't mean to discount the efforts that are being made, I understand it's no easy task.

But the fact remains, from a consumer standpoint, currently, just for example, I can't pop Need for Speed Most Wanted 2005 in my Xbox and expect it to work. An example of a game that will never be re-licensed. And imo, it's a tragedy we as consumers didn't display stronger desire for preservation earlier on. So many games will eventually be lost to time. Emulation will only be viable for so long.
I don't understand why Emulation will only be viable for so long?

Why would it be?
 

nkarafo

Member
Heh, they haven't seen anything yet. Wait until streaming completely replaces local hardware. I bet they will be thrilled.
 

nkarafo

Member
I can believe how naive and fake some users are here.....

"If it's not legally available then piracy is ok" so what do you do when sex with minors is not legal? Have it anyway?

What do you do when a 1950s car is not made anymore? Just steal it? Make it yourself without licence?
I would not steal it but if i could download an exact copy of it, i would.
 
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