Are they art? Digital animation that is real and interactive? Do the Da Vincis and Michelangelos of today paint using codes instead of brushes?
Are they a new and important cultural development? The reflection of a modern need to escape the realities of our declining economies and deteriorating environment?
I say YES. With well over 3.6 million Australian households in possession of a game console, I'd say video games are all of the above and more. They are becoming an important part of our cultural identity - marking a certain stage in our technological evolution - and in my opinion, are worthy of historical conservation.
The University of Michigan is not the only institution taking video game culture seriously, back in 2007 the Library of Congress began an initiative to catalogue over 2000 video games that they had collected simply through the submission of developers as a part of the copyright process. (As an aside, it might also interest some readers to know the Library of Congress has "the US's largest comic book collection, over 100,000 comic book issues that have come in through copyright"). You can read more about it here, although in my research (albeit, uber brief) I haven't been able to find a more recent report on this initiative.
I'm interested to hear your thoughts on preserving video games as a historical collection - particularly any heritage buffs out there (makes eyes at Alethea) - and of course Librarians who love to game!
5 comments:
Well of course I'm all for preserving a new generation of historical material. Heritage is something inherited from the past to be kept for the future, so whatever passionate collectors out there keep is a bonus - its something we may not necessarily have without them. It's important for museums and local history collections to constantly evolve, even looking at heritage listing buildings, the 70s are well and truly on the radar as places to keep for the future. Something I love about the computer and video game archive is that the games can still be played, and will influence future game designers.
Most of the value of video games as cultural artefacts is tied to keeping them in working order, because really, without the data on it, a CD is just a piece of useless plastic.
I hope that these archives are keeping digital copies which can be updated/emulated in the future so people can still play them!
Great point, Chelsea! Apparently, the Uni of Michigan archive keeps the games and their original consoles to play on, but I don't know if they have any conservation plan that allows for technological change in the future.
There is no mention in the article of backing up all the game data they have, for example.
In addition, there is no mention of what may happen if these obsolete consoles eventually break down and can't be repaired. Hmm.
I guess it would just mean we would have to wait until future technology could decode the information.
The origninal musical recordings of the American blues were done on wax drums, but due to age and wear they could no longer be played, so essentially the data was lost. Researchers/archivists thankfully just stored them until a few years ago someone worked out how to read them with laser technology, so after 100+ years researchers and the public can rerecord/listen to them again. It's a beautiful example of how technology saves all!
Three cheers for technology!
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