Your childhood video games are literally rotting away in storage
Retro gaming and retro game collecting are all the rage right now, but there are those among us for whom there has never been a disconnect between “retro” gaming and modern gaming. Their retro collections simply come from never getting rid of old games, but keeping them.
If this is you and you have a collection of old games from your youth in a box somewhere or (worse) in your parents’ garage, I’m sorry to say that unless you check them out, there may no longer be any point in storing them.
Our nostalgia has an expiration date
Video games are computer code, and computer code must live on some sort of physical medium. Games have appeared on all kinds of media over the years. The first video games I played were available on audio cassettes and floppy disks. We’ve seen memory cards, small disks, cartridges and everything in between.
The companies that created these media did not design them with long-term longevity in mind. When a company like Nintendo releases a game like Super Mario Bros.it wasn’t with the idea that you would hang on to this game for twenty or thirty years and still play it. It’s actually quite surprising that games from the days when they were simply considered children’s toys have lasted this long.
So if you have games from your childhood, or even if you acquired them from someone else, it’s a good idea to familiarize yourself with the weaknesses of your games.
Cartridges are not immortal
There are many variations between what we call “game cartridges”, but in general they are circuit boards that have a connector on the side, some sort of ROM storage, and in some cases a battery for save game storage.
Since designs differ, exact failure points may vary. However, in general, actual ROMs may get damaged and corrupted due to their age, the metal components may corrode. For trucks equipped with batteries, these batteries have a limited lifespan and when operating, it is possible for the battery to damage parts of the surrounding circuit board.
The good news is that replacing the battery is usually pretty simple, provided you don’t mind erasing the cart’s backups. If you want to keep them, you’ll need to acquire a ROM dump device, but you may want to have one for reasons I’ll get into a little later anyway.
Optical discs slowly decompose
Nintendo was the last holdout on game cartridges, and we could argue with the Nintendo Switch, the company has returned to it. However, for most in the gaming industry, optical discs were the best solution. Current generation consoles still use this format, although disc drives are now optional.
The longevity of optical discs is impressive. I personally own video game discs that are over 25 years old for the original PlayStation and in mint condition. So, overall, your CDs, DVDs, and Blu-rays containing games should work fine if stored in a cool, dry place.
If storage conditions are good, the main risk is “disk rot”, where the data layer of the disk degrades because it is exposed to the outside world. This may be due to a damaged disc or a manufacturing defect. Unfortunately, once booted, the only thing you can do is make a copy of the disk to back up the data or replace it with a new disk.
We tend to focus on the game media, but that doesn’t mean much if you don’t have anything to play on. Ironically, optical game discs will likely outlast real console optical drives. Well-maintained cartridges might last longer than retro consoles like the NES.
Getting those consoles working or finding another way to play your games is the hardest part of maintaining your old game collection. The good news is that there is an industry of new consoles designed for playing retro games and, of course, excellent software emulators. It’s not a perfectly authentic and original experience, but it’s a way to continue discovering your own collection.
The gray area between preservation and piracy
Dumping ROMs, ripping your discs, and getting new emulation consoles to play your original physical media are all essential to keeping your old game collection alive. To many people, this might sound like hacking. However, in general, making backup copies of your legitimate games is legal, as long as you don’t need to bypass copy protection for them to work. Likewise, emulation is not illegal at all, so using it to continue playing your legally purchased games is fine.
Some of the games in your collection may be impossible to find anywhere else today, and the memories are worth more than their weight in gold. So maybe open that old box of games and consoles and see what still works, what doesn’t, and what you can save.
