How many of us "geezers" are down with the Retro VGS?

[Keatah]

I haven't made it yet. When I get off my document scanning kick I'll be sure to do it.

 

Added:

It would be a dark story full of mental illness and crazies.

Edited September 12, 2015 by Keatah

[cybercylon]

I think that's why you want stuff in digital form, because there's a greater chance of it lasting due to the ability to easily replicate it and move it about versus something on a one-off physical item that can degrade, be stolen, get damaged, etc. Unless someone finds a way to back up these RETRO cartridges, it's still a single point of failure.

I have always worried though when support ends and the servers are shut down, your digital purchase may get blown away like a toot in the wind. I know there is some BC coming to the Xbox One, but what about games that were digital only or the license to distribute has expired and then your 360 breaks. Same thing goes for PSN games that were PS3 only and will never get moved over.

 

So digital is not invincible, though I guess since Sony, Xbox, iOS, Android are going anywhere any time soon, perhaps this will only happen to a small population of games.....

 

That said, I have even less interest in this retro VGS if the games are going to be that much.... plus, I have way too much clutter already.....

[Keatah]

Huh? I can take a TV, my PS4, a stack of games and hook them up to a generator in the middle of a forest, if I so desired. I think you phrased that wrong.

 

What about network connectivity and updating? Isn't that a requirement for PS4 gaming?

 

What about backing up the hard drive with an industry-standard imaging program from like Acronis or Norton? And can that newly cloned HDD be swapped into any randomly purchased replacement of the same model?

Edited September 12, 2015 by Keatah

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

And other causes too. Mine was destroyed by a satanic curse and ritual. Not of my doing. Details in another thread.

 

Please elaborate. (grabbs popcorn)

 

 

 

Nope. You cannot easily replicate something when half of it is on a server 2,000 miles away and contains DRM.

The server goes, the license expires, a corporate decision gets made, POOF! All gone. All of modern gaming is tied into something (multiple things) beyond your control.

The modern generation of today does not understand the value of a complete self-contained local copy of everything necessary to get a game running. This begins with the hardware, os, bios, and all. It then extends to all of the game code, the ability to install it and run it.

DRM is the problem with digital distribution. You cannot copy or backup data and existing backups are encrypted such that they only work on the console or device that created said backup.

 

Anyone who claims the games available now are perpetual and that 20 years from now you will be able to log in on an old device with your old username and password and reclaim your old games, is delusional. Digital games cannot be resold so they have zero monetary value. Companies, both software and hardware, go bankrupt. Intellectual Property changes hands. Licenses expire. Changes in hardware and manufacturing create issues with backwards compatability. If the original developer is no longer around to port the original game code over to new platform to make it compatible, it will simply cease to exist. We already have numerous instances of servers being shut down or games being pulled permanently from stores.

 

Heck, we don't even know for sure if Apple, Google, Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo will still be around or producing hardware/software in 20 years. I guarantee at least two of the five companies will drop out of the hardware/gaming industry, most likely three or four of them will drop out. The mobile phenomenon is expanding as rapidly as Atari did during the late 70s / early 80s. Cheap rubbish free-2-play games abound and are choking out quality releases. And I am almost positive one of the three industrie pillars will crash in the coming shakedown: PC, Console, or Mobile.

 

Call me back in 2020, 2025, or 2030 and see where our industry is. None, goose-egg, zero of the currently available platforms will still be able to retrieve digital games downloaded in 2015. Some may be reissued or ported. Services like GOG or Virtual Console may still exist. The one or two percent or so of old games still licensed and available will likely need to be repurchased. RetroVGS games, should it ever come to fruition, will be plug and play just like Atari and NES, and continue to work for decades. Digital platforms, not so much.

[Keatah]

Totally agree.

 

And an emulation collection is as timeless as the original hardware that plays the true genuine classics. All you need is duplicate hardware of the PC. Easy enough. And it doesn't even have to be exact. And everything is on physical media you can control yourself. None of it has to call a server, none of it is locked to the hardware. You can organize, rebuild, repair, replace to your heart's content. And the security of the emulation material is guaranteed through standard backups. Backing up PC based emulation material is far easier than stuff locked into console. If that can be done at all. Especially with the integration of the disk's SA and overlay typically being matched to a console's serial number in firmware. I'm sure it can be hacked and done. Sure. But I could teach any idiot how to back up standard PC stuff in an afternoon.

[Keatah]

But I disagree on a another shakedown or crash as it were. I think it will slowly deflate in a managed fashion if it happens. Why? Because we have an absurd amount of metrics and statistics gathered umpteen million ways. And parents will just hand their phone to junior to babysit him while she looks at something on shelf at the supermarket. Unwittingly training him for future digital purchases.

 

Most of these skinner box games send back data where you play and how much your phone has moved while playing, car, plane, walking, sitting on the toilet. They track to millisecond how many times you press on the screen, where, how hard. They look at if you called someone before or after playing, what your temporal proximity behaviors are. What parts of the game do you work through quickly, how long it takes to complete a level, did you swap activities and pause? They look at what time you bought the game, how you paid for it, or didn't. And more. Demographics, past purchase history, it's all been looked at and analyzed to better tune that skinner box.

 

With that sort of overarching reach into how you peck away they're going to do everything in their power to keep it going.

Edited September 12, 2015 by Keatah

[phoenixdownita]

....dunno I can play the old classics just because someone dumped them from their physical form to a file, uploaded it "to some cloud" and someone else made a flash cart that I can use to play said "dumped" games ..... if we could cut the middleman with the RVGS and simply use SD/USB media to host the games as files I am pretty sure we can make them last forever.

 

What you guys are complaining is the lock-in mechanism by which they force DRM unto you ... that's it.

Nobody is advocating anything like that, just let me download the damn thing and put it into my SD card/USB thumb or whatever we will have in 20Y.

Edited September 12, 2015 by phoenixdownita

[PlaysWithWolves]

Digital cloud vs cartridge / DVD / CD

Digital cloud vs paper books / newspapers / comics

Digital cloud vs vinyl albums / CDs / cassettes / 8-track tapes / etc.

Digital cloud vs baseball-style collector's cards

Digital cloud vs bluRay / DVD / video tape / 8mm

Digital cloud vs photo albums

Virtual reality vs reality

 

Discuss.

[Andromeda Stardust]

Totally agree.

 

And an emulation collection is as timeless as the original hardware that plays the true genuine classics. All you need is duplicate hardware of the PC. Easy enough. And it doesn't even have to be exact. And everything is on physical media you can control yourself. None of it has to call a server, none of it is locked to the hardware. You can organize, rebuild, repair, replace to your heart's content. And the security of the emulation material is guaranteed through standard backups. Backing up PC based emulation material is far easier than stuff locked into console. If that can be done at all. Especially with the integration of the disk's SA and overlay typically being matched to a console's serial number in firmware. I'm sure it can be hacked and done. Sure. But I could teach any idiot how to back up standard PC stuff in an afternoon.

Except that sharing ROMs is technically illegal. Game companies are spending millions on DRM schemes and copy protection. Don't think it will be so easy to dump and emulate PS4 or Xbone or Wii-U ROMs. 1.7Mhz systems like NES are easy as pie to emulate on Ghz+ systems literally 1000 times faster. Modern CPU based on silicon tech have hit a roadblock around the 5Ghz neighborhood in terms of speed and it is likely that speed will not increase unless industry moves to radically new fabrication technology. Diamond semiconductors and nanotube traces could potentially exist. Quantum computing is probably a pipe dream however.

[cybercylon]

Except that sharing ROMs is technically illegal. Game companies are spending millions on DRM schemes and copy protection. Don't think it will be so easy to dump and emulate PS4 or Xbone or Wii-U ROMs. 1.7Mhz systems like NES are easy as pie to emulate on Ghz+ systems literally 1000 times faster. Modern CPU based on silicon tech have hit a roadblock around the 5Ghz neighborhood in terms of speed and it is likely that speed will not increase unless industry moves to radically new fabrication technology. Diamond semiconductors and nanotube traces could potentially exist. Quantum computing is probably a pipe dream however.

This is a good point. Unless you have the physical copies and dumped them on your own, then whatever you are playing on that emulator is illegal be it an NES game or a PS4 game. I know some look the other way on this issue, but that doesn't make it right.

 

Even if one is comfortable looking the other way, I suspect that most of those sites these days are full of nasty javascript malware things, etc that will munch away at your computer.

 

But yes... as another poster pointed out, DRM is an issue with digital distribution, so you will have no guarantees that you can access the content later even though you paid for the right to use it. And in many countries, breaking DRM is illegal. Yes... there can be a moral question here... "I paid for it, so I am going to back it up for myself, even if I have to break DRM". Morally, most would probably okay with that, but the law doesn't see it that way.

[glazball]

Digital cloud vs cartridge / DVD / CD

Digital cloud vs paper books / newspapers / comics

Digital cloud vs vinyl albums / CDs / cassettes / 8-track tapes / etc.

Digital cloud vs baseball-style collector's cards

Digital cloud vs bluRay / DVD / video tape / 8mm

Digital cloud vs photo albums

Virtual reality vs reality

 

Discuss.

 

Don't trust "the cloud"! Every time I hear the term, it makes me think of that Stephen King story "The Mist" where a nebulous fog engulfs a town and bad things happen to the local folk.

 

Anyways, I agree with stardust and cyberclon - ROMs are usually illegal but I know, commonplace. So many people are quick to "get an everdrive" but I appreciate that there are some of us that still want to simply buy and own our own games. Or books. Or movies. Or records. Or 8-track tapes. Or whatever you enjoy.

 

Us cart lovers can hopefully still have our carts if we speak with our money, like vinyl lovers have done over all these years. Let's just hope Mike and co. can really give us something nice, because no matter what, they've certainly touched a nerve. Even though you can take your PS4 and TV out into the forest, what about the next gen of consoles that may have no physical media whatsoever? Sounds like no fun to me, and that will be when I probably quit playing new games. If the RVGS takes off well enough, hopefully when that time comes those of us who want a physical game will have an outlet.

[PlaysWithWolves]

 

Don't trust "the cloud"! Every time I hear the term, it makes me think of that Stephen King story "The Mist" where a nebulous fog engulfs a town and bad things happen to the local folk.

 

 

There are pros-and-cons to each, I think, and all pretty similar. For example, Amazon can't just show up at my house and burn (or edit) my copy of 1984, but they did it with ease, en masse, on users' Kindles back in 2009. On the flip side, there's a whole lot of convenience and space-saving with eBooks.

[+madman]

I'm against the digital stuff and updates as much as you guys, in fact there have been many times I've sat down to play a PS3 or Wii U game and it takes 30 minutes to download a bunch of garbage. But, I think one thing we have to keep in mind is that games are a little more complex than they were 20-30 years ago. Gone are the days when a single person does an entire game, including the art. Gone are the days of small teams turning out high quality games. More complex games with more moving parts, why not have the ability to fix things down the road? Look at computer operating systems. Back in the day you bought DOS 3.3 (or whatever) and that was it. It was pretty basic and didn't need updates. Not to defend Microsoft (I'm a Mac user), but today Windows is a lot more complex than the old versions of DOS. Thus requiring updates. Heck, even OSX and iOS get regular updates. I hate to break it to you guys, but technology moves on and complexity increases.

 

Having said that, I've never paid for any digital content. The first thing that has intrigued me is the new tracks for Mario Kart 8, but I've never made a virtual console purchase or anything else of the sort. Never downloaded a digital game in my life other than stuff on my ipad for free. Most of the gaming I do is first-gen 3D systems and earlier. When I bought my Wii U and some games I actually had to email Nintendo asking if they forgot to include manuals or if that's how the games came. So I certainly prefer physical media, but at the same time I understand that times change.

[xenomorpher]

I'm against the digital stuff and updates as much as you guys, in fact there have been many times I've sat down to play a PS3 or Wii U game and it takes 30 minutes to download a bunch of garbage.

Whenever I want to play a game but don't want to update, I just stop or cancel the update from downloading and go offline. If it's a patch that fixes a game breaking bug, then I download it right away.

 

I've noticed updates for Xbox One and PS4 games can be ridiculously big compared to last gen. I usually then go offline instead of downloading a 2-3GB patch. Dead Rising 3 on Xbox One had a 13GB patch I think.

[Keatah]

..But, I think one thing we have to keep in mind is that games are a little more complex than they were 20-30 years ago. Gone are the days when a single person does an entire game, including the art. Gone are the days of small teams turning out high quality games.

 

Well why does that have to be? There is no rule or regulation saying you must use a bloated expensive design team. It happens because the internet digs up incompetence. And that is why you need 20 people to do the work of one. fully 90% or greater of the games out there just shouldn't be.

 

 

More complex games with more moving parts, why not have the ability to fix things down the road?

 

Why not get it right before you ship your product?

 

 

Look at computer operating systems. Back in the day you bought DOS 3.3 (or whatever) and that was it. It was pretty basic and didn't need updates. Not to defend Microsoft (I'm a Mac user), but today Windows is a lot more complex than the old versions of DOS. Thus requiring updates. Heck, even OSX and iOS get regular updates. I hate to break it to you guys, but technology moves on and complexity increases.

 

..and we got good serious work done. Well why does it have to be like that? There is no reason except for incompetence and greed using technology to get into your wallet. Both you and I know there are people working in the industry that have no right to even touch a keyboard.

[PlaysWithWolves]

Why not get it right before you ship your product?

 

 

... because Indie game studios will be rolling in the vast sums of money from pre-sales of their up-to-7000 RVGS carts and can afford a dedicated RVGS QA team.

[Andromeda Stardust]

This is a good point. Unless you have the physical copies and dumped them on your own, then whatever you are playing on that emulator is illegal be it an NES game or a PS4 game. I know some look the other way on this issue, but that doesn't make it right.

 

Even if one is comfortable looking the other way, I suspect that most of those sites these days are full of nasty javascript malware things, etc that will munch away at your computer.

 

But yes... as another poster pointed out, DRM is an issue with digital distribution, so you will have no guarantees that you can access the content later even though you paid for the right to use it. And in many countries, breaking DRM is illegal. Yes... there can be a moral question here... "I paid for it, so I am going to back it up for myself, even if I have to break DRM". Morally, most would probably okay with that, but the law doesn't see it that way.

Ignore the usual ROM repositories. My recommendation used to be avoid IE and keep your AV up to date and avoid any site that suggests using a download manager to retrieve files and be wary of fake malware urls disguised as "download" buttons. But that is all in the past now.

 

You can now download clean No Intro sets virus and ad free from a certain Internet Archive. I'd post some links but it's against TOS. Google is your friend. And yes, I have "fully loaded" flash carts for every retro cartridge system I own sans 7800 and GBA. 7800 Concerto is coming soon...

 

 

There are pros-and-cons to each, I think, and all pretty similar. For example, Amazon can't just show up at my house and burn (or edit) my copy of 1984, but they did it with ease, en masse, on users' Kindles back in 2009. On the flip side, there's a whole lot of convenience and space-saving with eBooks.

Or just go to Barnes & Noble and buy a physical copy. Or get free digital copies onPDF with a 15 second Google search...

http://msxnet.org/orwell/

 

I need to read Animal Farm. I read 1984 as a senior in high school and actually enjoyed it. Scary how true it is with the proliferation of the internet, Facebook, and even Windows 10. Apparently they are public domain in Canada and elsewhere.

Edited September 12, 2015 by stardust4ever

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

Having said that, I've never paid for any digital content. The first thing that has intrigued me is the new tracks for Mario Kart 8, but I've never made a virtual console purchase or anything else of the sort. Never downloaded a digital game in my life other than stuff on my ipad for free. Most of the gaming I do is first-gen 3D systems and earlier. When I bought my Wii U and some games I actually had to email Nintendo asking if they forgot to include manuals or if that's how the games came. So I certainly prefer physical media, but at the same time I understand that times change.

Dude, get the $11.99 MK8 DLC pack. It's totally worth it. And the manuals can be viewed from the home menu, not like anyone actually reads them. I'll admit though, breaking open a new PS3 or Wii-U game and waiting 30 minutes to 3 hours before I can play it is pants. With PS4/Xbone mandatory installs, it is even worse but Wii-U and Ouya are it for me regarding 8th gen home consoles.

 

9th gen is rumored to be digital only.

[phoenixdownita]

Both you and I know there are people working in the industry that have no right to even touch a keyboard.

You don't say

Edited September 12, 2015 by phoenixdownita

[jaybird3rd]

9th gen is rumored to be digital only.

Well. In that case, I'm glad I have enough games from the late 70s through the early 90s to keep me busy for the rest of my life, because it looks as if I'll need them.

 

I'm not exactly an active participant in modern gaming anyway (my newest console, with the exception of my NVIDIA Shield Portable, is a Sega Dreamcast), but the move away from physical media only strengthens my conviction as a "conscientious objector."

 

I find myself increasingly out of step with the modern game industry. Whatever makes perfect sense to me with regard to games is always the exact opposite of the way modern gaming works. For instance, I think it makes sense to have games on physical media so they can be preserved for future study and enjoyed in perpetuity without being tethered to an Internet connection. The modern game industry doesn't want you to be able to keep anything any longer than they decide you should be allowed to have it. I think it makes sense to ship games in their final form, so the player does not have to download updates which add up to many times the size of the original game over the course of its life. The modern game industry seems to think that games should be "living documents," shipped in buggy rough-draft form and "finished" later. I think it makes sense to be able to pay money up front for a game, and to be able to enjoy the game thereafter, without being constantly pestered to buy more. The modern game industry is in love with giving games away for "free" and subsequently nickeling-and-diming players to death with DLC, unlockables, and other in-game purchases, not to mention embedding ads in the games. And so on.

 

Unfortunately, despite the seemingly good intentions that the Retro VGS started with, I don't think the new directions they're taking with it will remedy any of these issues for me. As I said in the other thread, I think it was a mistake for them to generate so much publicity while their plans were (are?) still in flux. They can claim that they were merely being "transparent," but they succeeded only in making themselves look like flip-flopping amateurs who don't know what they want or how to make it happen. I'll be watching to see how (and if) their fundraising campaign works out, and what the final specifications of the system will be, but I can't say I'm optimistic. Their last Kickstarter campaign wasn't exactly a resounding success.

[Mord]

The modern game industry is in love with giving games away for "free" and subsequently nickeling-and-diming players to death with DLC, unlockables, and other in-game purchases, not to mention embedding ads in the games. And so on.

 

To be fair not all modern games are like this. Some of them make you preorder before they're ready to ship it to get more of the base game, charge you full price, patch it later, then nickel and dime you with 100 bucks of DLC. It's simply a gross exaggeration to say they're all in love with giving the game away for free.

[jaybird3rd]

To be fair not all modern games are like this. Some of them make you preorder before they're ready to ship it to get more of the base game, charge you full price, patch it later, then nickel and dime you with 100 bucks of DLC. It's simply a gross exaggeration to say they're all in love with giving the game away for free.

True enough. The "giving away for free" part is most applicable to tablets. That's probably my closest contact with modern games, mainly because my nephews are always bugging me to buy mods and skins and other crap for their favorite tablet games.

[cybercylon]

I think there will be at least one more generation before it is all digital, at least for the big games. In the US some big issues are relatively slow internet connections and there are still a fair number of providers that cap usage. 50 gigs is still a pain. Quad layer blu-ray has been around for awhile, so can you imagine how hard distribution will be with 100 gigs.

 

If Ultra HD becomes really mainstream.... even bigger downloads. For the time being anyways, some form of physical distribution still makes sense be it optical or some form of cheap flash memory.

[Mord]

I think there will be at least one more generation before it is all digital, at least for the big games. In the US some big issues are relatively slow internet connections and there are still a fair number of providers that cap usage. 50 gigs is still a pain. Quad layer blu-ray has been around for awhile, so can you imagine how hard distribution will be with 100 gigs.

 

If Ultra HD becomes really mainstream.... even bigger downloads. For the time being anyways, some form of physical distribution still makes sense be it optical or some form of cheap flash memory.

 

If this generation is any indication, broadband access isn't even going to be the -biggest- concern for a console being stupid enough to try to go all digital.

 

Consider this generation, where games are already in the range of 30-40gigs - EVERY game needs to be installed to be played. That's a heck of a lot of storage space going to be needed in a few generations time if they start ending up with 100gig games - but only having 1-2 TB drives or less. Even giving the player the generous ability to apply external storage - that's a lot of external storage the player is going to be expected to buy in addition to paying a lot for the game itself. And if they can't do that, it means they'll be swapping around their games on the internal harddrive - redownloading things as needed. but a part of me expects them to attempt streaming games only in the future with the consoles you buy still costing a mint but otherwise being dumb terminals to uncompress data sent from the cloud.

 

Yeah I don't have much faith in modern gaming trends.

[SIO2]

Maybe some people won't consider it modern but I recently came across a copy of GTA SA for PS2 at a yard sale. So I remember hearing some buzz about that game a while back and I thought I would check it out finally.

 

So I am in game in my underwear driving an elcamino around Liberty City flipping stations on the radio and laughing at the country music channel when I realize this is not a game. It is a life.

 

Amazing but who has time for this stuff?