As presented at DiGRA/FDG conference 2016

1. Game Preservation
within a Dutch Audiovisual
Heritage Institution
Jesse de Vos
(Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision)
René Glas // Jasper van Vught
(Universiteit Utrecht)

2. 1.Game On: Introduction
The research project sets up the first unified
effort between game research, cultural
heritage institutions and the Dutch game
industry to define, preserve, archive and
exhibit the history of Dutch digital games and
game development

3. 1.Game On: Introduction
“Certainly in order for continued research into
games, it will be essential that digital games
become accepted as an important aspect of
our digital and cultural heritage and institutions
respond with preservation efforts.”
(Barwick et al, 2009)

4. 1.Game On: Institutional Context
• Biggest AV-archive in the Netherlands, with
– 1,000,000h of audiovisual heritage
– 2M pictures
– 20K objects (Take a look in depots!)
– 25 petabytes of digital storage
• Safeguards collections of public broadcasters, organisations and private persons.
• Makes its holdings available to media professionals, researchers, educational users and
the general public.

5. 1.Game On: Institutional Context
National cultural heritage
Audiovisual archive
Users
Policy:
“...starting in 2016 a representative of
new media productions will be
collected. We are concerned with
both physical and digital multi-media
objects that will be archived and
presented in a media, transmedia
and/or cultural-historical perspective.”

6. 2. Game On: Method and results
Dutch games from 80s and 90s
Experimental approach: hardware,
emulation, documentation
●OAIS model: from ingest to access
User survey, exhibition, metadata-
model, collection/selection policy,
white-paper, protocol for archiving
games

7. 3. Collection policy in the making
6 interviews with potential users
User survey among gamers, journalists, researchers, students,
teachers, collectors, producers
Reflect on current collection policy

8. 4. User survey: preliminary results
“Accessibility is key, maximize accessibility”
“Video-registrations of gameplay
already contain a lot of information”
“I want to be able to find video’s of gameplay
mechanics”
“I don’t expect people from the
gaming industry will travel to an
other location to consult old games.”
“Preservation should be on the agenda from the moment of
conception of a game”
“As a researcher I’m interested in the
interaction between man and machine, not
so much in the machine itself”

9. 4. User survey: preliminary results

10. 4. User survey: preliminary results

11. 4. User survey: preliminary results

12. 4. User survey: preliminary results

13. 5. Games as (im)material cultural heritage
National
Networked
Embodied
Events

14. 6. Preserving & Exhibiting GamesPlay
“The capturing of games in and at play could and, I would
contend should be the core objective of game
preservation” (Newman 2012)

15. Geza Illustraties 2014

16. Geza Illustraties 2014
GAME EXHIBITION
GAME PRESERVATION

17. Gameplay recordings as non-narrative machinima;
Let’s Play videos as a form of Direct Cinema “which does not avoid
documenting the effort and emotions of the filmmaker during its
manufacture” (Menotti 2014)

18. “Regardless of whether the viewer shares the same play style
preferences as the LP creator, the combination between ludic
immersion and non-ludic engagement offers an experience of
vicarious play” (Glas 2015)

19. let’s play videos promote “a remediation of [the] fundamental
circumstances” of play - notably its social nature”
“the genre emphasizes the naturally spectacular character of
videogames, reminding us that spectators were always around in
many situations of play” (Menotti 2014)

20. “What about putting up a Let’s Play recording studio in the
museum and inviting game hobbyists, researchers, cultural
historians or complete outsiders to play a game and voice their
reactions to it?” (Nylund 2015)

21. After an investigation of scarce existing paratextual material of
Raharuhtinas (Amersoft 1984), Nylund concludes the preservation
potential of Let’s Play videos for old games is limited.

22. “The biggest challenge is to understand what kind of game it was
when it first was created and published. How was it played, by
whom and why? What kind of genre does it belong to?” (Nylund
2015)
OUR PROJECT: What kind of game is it now: adding new
interpretative frames to these games, potentially highlighting or
negotiating the social, cultural, and technological significance of
older Dutch games from a contemporary perspective.

23. Added value of Let’s Plays
- Alternative form of access
- Additional layers of interaction with past in museum context
- Intergenerational audiences interacting with old media
- Capturing nostalgia
- Direct ties to contemporary gaming practices
- Potential for preservation purposes

24. Questions/suggestions?
René Glas
(Universiteit Utrecht)
E: r.glas@uu.nl
Jasper van Vught
(Universiteit Utrecht)
E: J.F.vanVught@uu.nl
Jesse de Vos
(Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision)
E: jdvos@beeldengeluid.nl
T: @85jesse