Do You/Have You Used ROM's and What Is Your Opinion? Or Experience With Them?

[sworddude]

I really couldn't care less about "ethics" in grabbing ISO's and ROM's of games since it has introduced me to a ton of games I wouldn't have played ( and some purchased) due to the amount of cost thrown in ( since stuff like a full blown arcade cabinet could require a ton of money especially for part maintenance like the crt screen, capicators, etc. ).

In addition,  the recent Emu paradise debacle have only shown me that a sizable amount of game companies don't care too much about game preservation as a whole, but only care about getting people to rebuy their old popular games again and again ( especially at the expense of other titles that don't even fall under their jurisdiction). Along with the fact that some high-demand games don't have any chance of getting a remake due to lost source code, so i'd rather be able to play it in a emu vs spending $600-700 on the "real thing".

to be fair back in the ds r4 cart era emuparadise was the most easy source for ds roms for the r4 cart. It is kinda suprising that nintendo did not take any actions as far as that goes, Not to mention that the R4 carts themselves were legal to sell since it was just a piece of hardware. It wasn't up until the end of the ds era that Nintendo managed to bann the sales for those R4 carts eventhough they did not have roms inside them at least in europe that is.

Still quite a shame though that such sites are being taken down. i hope it will not become a trend that roms will be impossible to get. That being said I'm pretty sure a large group of people have the roms stored somewhere if one knows the right connections, will be quite a hassle though.

not to mention as far as other consequences go it might stop people to create perfect roms for cd based consoles wich is yet to be achieved 

[turf]

There’s a ton of stuff you can’t get anywhere else but ROMs.
A few years ago, I got into MAME. It’s hard to have a round of Zoo Keeper without emulation.
I’ll keep playing these legally questionable games.  They’re just too expensive to own.

[justin8301]

I'm in the camp that believes if the owner of the intellectually property isn't actively making their product available for purchase, they really shouldn't be too upset if people are downloading the roms. Retro gaming has become mainstream at this point and there is a huge market for old games. There are tons of options for companies that want to revive their old games, like the Nintendo classic consoles or even licensing their games out for legit reproduction carts (like Retro-Bit). If someone wants to make their game available to me and its game I want to play I'll buy it, end of story; but if there's a game I really want to play and its too expensive for me to buy on the secondary market, I'm still gonna play it.

Now modding current consoles to play ripped copies of games that are still on the shelf is clearly pirating and it's something I'm not down with at all.

[tripredacus]

Yet current games are the ones that need preservation the most, especially in this era of digital only games that are locked to specific platforms.

[hoshichiri]

Yet current games are the ones that need preservation the most, especially in this era of digital only games that are locked to specific platforms.

While I agree with you, most current games are still both readily available for sale, and in fact need to be sold so their studios can turn a profit and make more games. We just have to hope that, by the time it's clear they're about ready to abandon them, we can swoop in & get them archived before they're gone. (or some far less scrupulous individual who ripped them day one sees they're in the clear now & brings them out for everyone to grab.)

[tripredacus]

Do not confuse preservation with piracy.

[sworddude]

Do not confuse preservation with piracy.

as far as preservation goes are all games for certain 8 - 16 bit consoles preserved?

I can imagine roms of very crappy unknown games being hard to find or maybe not even preserved yet.

It will be impossible to preserve all those download only games since there is plenty of trash out there, who would bother to preserve those games not to mention that even for old game consoles there might be some crappy games out there that do not even have roms.

[burningdoom]

Yes, the full 8-bit and 16-bit libraries were made into Rom's many years back. It's not in question.

[hoshichiri]

Yes, the full 8-bit and 16-bit libraries were made into Rom's many years back. It's not in question.

I think the only question is: As companies seek to take down ROM distributing websites, how many will survive into the future? We could find ourselves in a position where games once preserved are lost as the means to keep them distributed and archived goes away. We all know many of us have relatives who wouldn't know what to keep in the event of our passing. I seem to recall that's how we lost the masters for the black & white anime Amazing Three- the owner's wife threw them away cleaning out after he was gone.

I definitely remember a MJR pickup video where we went to get some old PC games he found on Craigslist, and discovered the owner also had a massive boxed NES collection. Keyword 'had', as she assumed the console stuff was worthless & had been using those games as kindling. In Nerd & Nintendo Central Seattle, someone was burning NES games believing that's all they were worth! What hope do a few hard drives of ROMs have against a clueless family member if proper boxed games can still be treated that way?

[tripredacus]

It will just go back to how it used to be. Shady websites you couldn't find through search engines.

[burningdoom]

Yes, the full 8-bit and 16-bit libraries were made into Rom's many years back. It's not in question.

I think the only question is: As companies seek to take down ROM distributing websites, how many will survive into the future? We could find ourselves in a position where games once preserved are lost as the means to keep them distributed and archived goes away. We all know many of us have relatives who wouldn't know what to keep in the event of our passing. I seem to recall that's how we lost the masters for the black & white anime Amazing Three- the owner's wife threw them away cleaning out after he was gone.

I definitely remember a MJR pickup video where we went to get some old PC games he found on Craigslist, and discovered the owner also had a massive boxed NES collection. Keyword 'had', as she assumed the console stuff was worthless & had been using those games as kindling. In Nerd & Nintendo Central Seattle, someone was burning NES games believing that's all they were worth! What hope do a few hard drives of ROMs have against a clueless family member if proper boxed games can still be treated that way?

I think it's safe to say that enough gamers have entire consoles worth of game libraries on hard drives, flash drives, phones, etc. in ROM form that we will never fully lose those games.

As was pointed out: I'd be more worried about all those games that are on servers that will be shut down eventually...what will happen to those? The best-selling games will probably be re-released in future generations, but what about those niche titles? Or the ones that weren't marketed well? Or the ones that just weren't very good, but for whatever reason you love anyways?

[sworddude]

Yes, the full 8-bit and 16-bit libraries were made into Rom's many years back. It's not in question.

I think the only question is: As companies seek to take down ROM distributing websites, how many will survive into the future? We could find ourselves in a position where games once preserved are lost as the means to keep them distributed and archived goes away. We all know many of us have relatives who wouldn't know what to keep in the event of our passing. I seem to recall that's how we lost the masters for the black & white anime Amazing Three- the owner's wife threw them away cleaning out after he was gone.

I definitely remember a MJR pickup video where we went to get some old PC games he found on Craigslist, and discovered the owner also had a massive boxed NES collection. Keyword 'had', as she assumed the console stuff was worthless & had been using those games as kindling. In Nerd & Nintendo Central Seattle, someone was burning NES games believing that's all they were worth! What hope do a few hard drives of ROMs have against a clueless family member if proper boxed games can still be treated that way?

I think it's safe to say that enough gamers have entire consoles worth of game libraries on hard drives, flash drives, phones, etc. in ROM form that we will never fully lose those games.

As was pointed out: I'd be more worried about all those games that are on servers that will be shut down eventually...what will happen to those? The best-selling games will probably be re-released in future generations, but what about those niche titles? Or the ones that weren't marketed well? Or the ones that just weren't very good, but for whatever reason you love anyways?

But only very few people will have the unknown games wich are trash even for those 8 and 16 bit libraries.

as far as modern games go certain download only titles will vanish It's plain and simple, old games were physically released so even the crappy games can be found and preserved thanks to full set collectors but as far as download only goes the crappy games might just vanish It's not something that can be found again when servers are gone since no one cares about some titles. in my opinion it might almost be guaranteed that allot of crappy titles will vanish.

[tripredacus]

It's not something that can be found again when servers are gone since no one cares about some titles. in my opinion it might almost be guaranteed that allot of crappy titles will vanish.

Just because you do not like it, doesn't mean someone doesn't. Maybe some kid got to play some dumb game when they were a kid on a website, or as a download only game on a console and they loved it. Without any sort of preservation, that kid wouldn't be able to replay that game 10-20 years from now.

This also applies to series collectors and historians/archivers of series. I already know there are at least a dozen Transformers online games that are lost or will be lost. No matter how dumb or crappy the game was/is. It is a part of the history of the series that no one can play, watch, or even really know what it looks like. Same goes for a lot of phone games. There are some people who are active in attempts at asset retrieval, so far I have participated in and seen being done. So far, I am not aware of anyone being able to archive them completely, even in a state where they are playable or not-playable requiring modification.

This activity is in the legal gray area, and falls under the umbrella of piracy for certain. But it is because of the understanding that companies are not interested in retaining this information or releasing it. The instances where even a physical client media was available and the publisher had released server netcode to allow the program to be used after official support has died is extremely low. If you want to make a console comparison, think about SegaNet, Satellaview, and Fujitsu's WorldsAway just to name a few.

[sworddude]

It's not something that can be found again when servers are gone since no one cares about some titles. in my opinion it might almost be guaranteed that allot of crappy titles will vanish.

This also applies to series collectors and historians/archivers of series. I already know there are at least a dozen Transformers online games that are lost or will be lost. No matter how dumb or crappy the game was/is. It is a part of the history of the series that no one can play, watch, or even really know what it looks like. Same goes for a lot of phone games. There are some people who are active in attempts at asset retrieval, so far I have participated in and seen being done. So far, I am not aware of anyone being able to archive them completely, even in a state where they are playable or not-playable requiring modification.

Your confirming my theory . It's impossible to preserve everything especially with download only , I'm pretty sure that allot of games in other online shops not to mention pc are already lost forever. Things that the general public find trash will have a way higher chance of being lost It's just the reality if a games does not have a solid fanbase people who care It's kinda hard to preserve there are very few people who care. With the download only games the chances that 100% of the library will be preserved is pretty much non existant if you would like to have my opinion.

The only reason why the entire snes nes etc libraries have been preserved is due to the simple fact that there are physical copies out there and that the consoles have a huge fanbase. Not that much of a hurry really not to mention plenty of people who are dedicated enough. BTW as far as entire 16 bit libraries go I'm pretty sure there are some games wich are lost wich were in the online servers of nintendo

as far as 16 bit preservation goes I seem to remember that certain download only titles from back in the day have not been retrieved yet.

Sega channel and nintendo channel in the 16 bit era download only, Heck even some kirby games are still lost as far as that goes. They just found a bunch of the kirby mini games last year if i am not mistaken but there are still multiple missing, let alone the crappy games wich are on there wich have yet to be preserved.

[burningdoom]

Yes, the full 8-bit and 16-bit libraries were made into Rom's many years back. It's not in question.

I think the only question is: As companies seek to take down ROM distributing websites, how many will survive into the future? We could find ourselves in a position where games once preserved are lost as the means to keep them distributed and archived goes away. We all know many of us have relatives who wouldn't know what to keep in the event of our passing. I seem to recall that's how we lost the masters for the black & white anime Amazing Three- the owner's wife threw them away cleaning out after he was gone.

I definitely remember a MJR pickup video where we went to get some old PC games he found on Craigslist, and discovered the owner also had a massive boxed NES collection. Keyword 'had', as she assumed the console stuff was worthless & had been using those games as kindling. In Nerd & Nintendo Central Seattle, someone was burning NES games believing that's all they were worth! What hope do a few hard drives of ROMs have against a clueless family member if proper boxed games can still be treated that way?

I think it's safe to say that enough gamers have entire consoles worth of game libraries on hard drives, flash drives, phones, etc. in ROM form that we will never fully lose those games.

As was pointed out: I'd be more worried about all those games that are on servers that will be shut down eventually...what will happen to those? The best-selling games will probably be re-released in future generations, but what about those niche titles? Or the ones that weren't marketed well? Or the ones that just weren't very good, but for whatever reason you love anyways?

But only very few people will have the unknown games wich are trash even for those 8 and 16 bit libraries.

Some people that pick and choose will be like that, sure. But plenty of people just download the entire libraries. You can get library packs off of torrent sites and such.