Preservation of video games is an 🅰incredibly hot topic in recent times. A declared that 87 percent of classic games (read: released before the year 2010) were “critically endangered”. There are still many games only playable on older systems, and retro game prices have drastically risen since the pandemic. As an artistic medi🍸um, we are letting its history quickly fade away.
As a result, many feel emulation is the only option nowadays for easy access, but there is one area of gaming that I feel is overlooked in terms of its preservation struggle. That is arcade games, a space actively dying right now and where emulation often can’t s🐬ave it. Not all games received console ports, while othe𒁃rs are subject to fading bespoke hardware where no effort has been made to keep them in acceptable condition.
To put things in perspectiv༒e, I lived and grew up on the West Coast of America, an area that thankfully had many arcades throughout. Going to the same places for over two decades, I have seen the literal wearing down of cabinets in real-time. It’s a hard thing to watch when I’m so passionate about the medium, and how we’re heading towards a future de🐟fined by loss.
The biggest problem in arcade game preservation is that they will die quicker than your CDs, cartridges, and game systems. If you own a retro console, you likely use it every once in a while, and this is a good thing. Especially for systems that are almos🌌t 20 years old, like the Xbox 360 and PS3, which due to their hot chips, are almost certainly wearing down quicker than 80s systems. However, arcade machines are used differently.
They’re often powered on for over ten hours a day, seven days a week. This naturally wears out the machine quicker than any other type of hardware. Arcade titles require an incredible amount of maintenance to keep up and running, an element shared with Pinball machines you also see in many a retro location. This is also true even if your arcade games are for home use, which is not how mos𓆉t consumers play them. You also need to be earning a pretty penny to justify collecting them privately.
Arcade units cost thousands of dollars, much worse than even the most expensive games for the PS1 and PS2 and other such retro consoles. Many arcade titles also aren’t commercially available anymore. All of this makes emulation appear to be the only solution. The problem is that with many arcade titles, you can🦋not get the same authentic experience through emulation, unlike console counterparts. It’s a falsehood.
There’s a reason why Sega’s arcade division is called Sega Am♌usements because arcade games, in many ways, are similar to Amusement Park attractions. They often involve many moving parts and, upon release, offer an experience you simply couldn’t find at home. The best๊ example of this is Sega’s most ambitious machine ever created - House of the Dead 4 Special.
It was a full-on attraction with two🌃 massive screens and a spinning seat that required a lowered bar, just like how safety is done at theme parks. This game is impossible to emulate while still getting the original authentic experience. House of the Dead 4 Special was added in the core game’s digital release on PS3, but is missing features.
Obviously, this game is a very special case, but even for other, less eccentric arcade titles, it’s incredibly difficult to replicate the same experience through emulation. The most common offender is the controls. Light gun games, especiall𝓰y older ones, are already a pain to set up through emulation. Then, even when you﷽ get it running, you’ll miss out on some key defining elements. One is the gun’s heft.
Certain light guns can be deceptively heavy, like those used in Crisis Zone or House of the Dead: Scarlet Dawn, and ﷺyou can actually get blisters if you hold them wrong. While you might not realize it, this is a key part of the experience. The gun’s weight adds to the immersive feel and heavily affects the way you aim, shoot, and reload. If you&👍rsquo;re playing Scarlet Dawn through an emulator, you’re likely using a controller only slightly heavier than a Wiimote.
There’s also games like the Silent Scope series with a completely unique control setup. In arcades, the light gun was a mounted sniper rifl﷽e. It waꦆsn’t just a standard light gun experience, as you actually had to look through the scope to blast enemies far away.
This meant you had to alternate between looking at the big ꦑscreen and looking through the scope, giving you an immersive feeling of using an actual sniper rifle. It was such a ꦬcool experience that, again, is virtually impossible to replicate through emulation or even existing home console ports.
Speaking of c꧒onsole ports, those can also be problematic in preserving the original experience. Let’s take an 80s classic like Marble Madness. In arcades, you used a trackball which worked phenomenally. It’s smooth, responsive, and feels way better than most other versions of the game. If you’re playing the arcade version on Xbox, through Midway Arcade Origins or Ant♛stream Arcade, you’re going to be using an analog stick.
Certain arcade machines are h♔ard to come by, and even harder to find in good condition. In 2018, I found a fully working original House of the Dead cabinet. A lot of the time, there are issues with the gun, like it shoots a little bit to the left or right, but not here. It was pinpoint accurate, and the game was a total blast, still holding up in its fun factor.
Years later, when the remake was rele🍨ased, I thought it didn’t look that great and wanted to play the original. But the classic game’s source code is lost, and the only way to officially play an arcade-perfect version is through an original cabinet. I went to the same place as before and was heart-wrenched to learn the machine was not only out of order, but removed entirely.
This is why preservation of arcade games is so important. These machines aren’t something dying in the near future; they’re dying right now. We get stuff like the House of the Dead rema🅺ke, but these classic games should still be preserved.
