Starting Jan. 30, the Video Game History Foundation (VGHF) will be opening its digital archives to the public. Still a work-in-progress, these archives will be one of the largest repositories dedicated to the study and preservation of video game history, and will feature over 1,500 issues of out-of-print game magazines, in addition to promotional material and other game development assets.
An accessible digital archive has been a goal of the VGHF since its founding in 2017. While it would be one thing to simply scan everything in their library and drop in the Internet Archive, the VGHF was intent on making its digital archives a resource that adds value to the games that they’re preserving and is tailored to the aid in research of video game history. To that end, the digital archive will allow you to search for mentions of specific games, publishers, and authors in addition to the ability to search for oddly specific terms. Want to learn the first mention of Metroidvania? You’ll be able to find it within the archive. Because uploading and cataloguing everything into the digital archive is an ongoing process, you’ll have the ability to sort through a collection of unprocessed material from the VGHF as well.
While the physical archives of the VGHF maintains a vast library of playable titles, the current anti-circumvention rules of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) prohibit remote access. Meaning that unless the US Copyright Office grants an exception to this rule allowing the VGHF to break the copy protection on these titles, the digital archive will remain limited to visual assets.
As a reminder, the Video Game History Foundation is a non-profit organization, and is reliant on donations from the public. If you’d like to support the important work of preserving gaming history, you can check out the VGHF website to find the best way for you to contribute.
The post The Video Game History Foundation opens its digital archives to the public next week appeared first on Polygon.
