Comments on: Underdogs, Ho

By: skel

skel — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 15:54:19 +0000

The end of Underdogs is terrible, i serching on the net about 50hours for old submarine PC game S.T.O.R.M and i found only one site where i can download this game for free(this is extra rare game). I have downloadet it, but many extra rare games is in this time not exist on the net…it is ubelieveble, but it is true. Games like S.T.O.R.M or Animal is for all people on the world forever lost, becouse the HotU is death. R.I.P HotU… and than you…

(sorry for my english :-D )

By: mooncalf

mooncalf — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 08:46:46 +0000

I shall raise a glass to HotU tonight, it is a sad day for the internets, long-loved site that it was.

By: Clovis

Clovis — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 03:08:33 +0000

@Helm: Ya, I didn’t intend to demean the discussion. I was just inaccurately describing my own hopelessness about he topic. It doesn’t really matter if the Pirate Bay wins or not; I don’t live in Sweden. The internet will prevail either way. I can’t ever imagine seeing a “locked down” internet. OTOH, I also can’t ever imagine seeing sensible copyright laws being created. So, we’ll continue to do whatever we want, but most of it is illegal, so there is this tiny chance that the MAFIAA will decide to come and extort money from you. Ahh… so depressing….

@pepper: great links!

By: Bret

Bret — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 02:40:36 +0000

Actually, I read the EU was funding something of that sort.

So, if that works, great.

By: sinister agent

sinister agent — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 21:54:08 +0000

This actually demonstrates very well a major irony of our times. There’s a common conception that we’ll have more information about this era than we’ll know what to do with given the rates of literacy and communication technology, but whether that’ll actually prove to be true about the next 20 or 50 years is seriously questionable. Digital storage is fantastic and can be produced and stored at a ridiculously greater rate than manuscripts, but a piece of paper in a box that was locked in 1350 will still be in readable condition a thousand years later, and can be read and translated by anyone with eyes and enough patience to decipher and learn the necessary language. A server with thirty years worth of company reports and correspondence might be rendered useless in ten years, given a big enough advance in storage technology. If industry standards change and it’s too expensive to rejig the old archives, we could lose uncountable billions of files and documents.

Video games are arguably the most trivial potential loss, much as we love them, but it’s possible too that their popularity might lead to the development of systems and processes that effectively archive and update even the most obscure and awkward programmes and games. And that effort could conceivably be modified to preserve our wider history and thus SAVE CIVILISATION ITSELF.

At least, that’s what I say to my boss when she catches me playing Darklands in the office.

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:28:21 +0000

I didn’t know HotU had died, and I am saddened immensely. As so many others have said, not just for the shady downloads available (because they were a pig to get going), but just for the nostalgia that a brief review, a few screenshots and the downloaded MIDI theme would fire up in me. Tears often welled alongside those electronic symphonies, a forgotten ode to a halcyon childhood hunched in the bedroom.

I might cry now, actually.

By: David

David — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 14:31:52 +0000

As for the ‘copyright solution’, how about infinite copyright… at a price that doubles every year. The first year is free, the second is $1, the third is $2, etc. 20 years is half a million bucks. 21 years is more than a million. Discuss.

By: malkav11

malkav11 — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 14:09:39 +0000

HOTU was never really an “abandonware” site. It had some, of course. Perhaps more than most such sites. But it was really about shining a light into the dustier corners of the gaming scene, picking out games that for whatever reason didn’t get everyone’s attention right out of the gate, ranging right up to the present. It could still perform this function if it had no download links at all, provided that the games in question were available one way or another. GoG is unlikely to ever perform that function, because that’s not the point. The point there is to sell you older games nicely packaged for inexpensive prices.

As to the whole game rights issue – I’ve always favored a simple solution: you can’t just sit on a creative work. You have to be making it available for purchase and/or use to hang on to it. I have no issue with companies and creators wanting to hang on to the rights to the work they’ve done and poured money into, as long as I can still access that work through regular channels. There are way too many games that I can’t do that with. System Shock 2 being a notable example. And I don’t see any benefit to the public in the rights remaining with the current holder in a situation like that.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 12:42:30 +0000

Abandonia? I know it doesn’t have nearly as many games, but it seems like the #1 ‘go to’ site for abandonware these days, even with nice reviews for each game.

Oh, and it was actually updated since 2006 too, another thing going for it. :)

By: Helm

Helm — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:54:34 +0000

Clovis, I would suggest that you do not state that a part of a conversation people are actively participating in is meaningless. I understand your point about the impracticality of a lot of the approaches/wishful thinking exhibited here but active, critical communication such as this is never meaningless.

The pirate bay trial results will tell us a lot about what the future of digital information distribution soon. The actual games will not be lost as long as people share information online anyway. The legality of the whole process will slowly but surely shift towards representing reality, not what knee-jerk lobby groups want. What’s important in the case of HoTU (or any site like it) is that if it is officially embraced as a valid historical archive and the stigma of ‘WOO PIRACY!’ is washed away then it will grow and flourish in ways that for anyone that has a love for videogames, will be amazingly practical.

Want to check out the rpg tactical combat system of Magic Candle 3? (it’s quite good) to get inspiration for your modern rpg? Just click here and the game will load right in your browser (optimally) in some dosboxian plugin. Want to compare modern adventure games with say, a Tex Murphy game of yesteryear? Just click here (things haven’t changed much!). So on. This will help raise awareness of the history of the medium and also clue people in on what actually makes an enduringly great game. This is only a good thing for all involved. Well, perhaps all but the huge companies that actually don’t want people to codify what exactly a great game is about and have the common standards raised, but let’s not shed any tears for them.

By: pepper

pepper — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:47:42 +0000

Here are a few resources that might help in this discussion:

http://www.thepublicdomain.org/download/

http://www.free-culture.cc/freeculture.pdf

These books discus the place of copyright, where it came from and where its possibly going, and also how skewed the current copyright system is. I found them very interesting to read.

By: David

David — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:34:31 +0000

GoG is fine, but it’s a business, with business interests. What we/I want is a public archive for games, similar to the Internet Archive (archive.org).

Here’s what the ‘about’ page would look like (based on the Internet Archive’s *actual* about page):

“The [Gaming] Archive is a 501(c)(3) non-profit that was founded to build a [gaming] library, with the purpose of offering permanent access for researchers, historians, and scholars to historical collections that exist in digital format. Founded in 2009 and located in the Presidio of San Francisco, the Archive has been receiving data donations from [the public and publishers]. In late [2010], the organization started to grow to include more well-rounded collections. Now the [Gaming] Archive includes texts, audio, moving images, and [related] software as well as [manuals and marketing material] in our collections.”

I’d love to read that on a website one day.