Posted April 25, 2015
Windows 95 began an empire that has shaped computing and gaming for the past 20 years. The total dominance of Windows since then has been beneficial to gaming as we have had a largely compatible and stable platform. Hardware has become more powerful, but essentially exactly the same concept as when I was gaming on a 1 GHz PIII & Voodoo5 card. Same, but better.
This time is now reaching its sunset. Other game platforms are showing the 'current' trend -- break early, break often. Games on iOS & Android are trapped in a compatibility black hole in which if they are not maintained every year, they could be gone for good, broken or inoperable on the latest & greatest OS. It's not long before old binaries are not even allowed on the app store.
One day, Windows will break the good old games, for good.
Whether on purpose or just a casualty of progress and not wanting to support 20+ year old APIs, it's bound to happen eventually.
How do we avoid this? I am concerned that GOG is profiting from the work of SCUMMVM, DOSBox etc, but not contributing back. If they want to see a future for good old games, there needs to be investment & support for emulators, source ports and so forth.
It's not just about emulating old games, I would love to see more work being done on making old games easier to play on a wider range of platforms/systems. For example, Tomb Raider 2 - 5 are dependent on Windows compatibility, and TR1 doesn't have gamepad control without complex workarounds. I'd love to see a movement to write a portable engine for the classic Tomb Raiders that gave us widescreen, sharp graphics and gamepad control on Win/Mac/Linux/iOS/Android etc. (PSP for me, personally) to see these games survive well into a future where the Wintel platform may not even exist anymore.
This time is now reaching its sunset. Other game platforms are showing the 'current' trend -- break early, break often. Games on iOS & Android are trapped in a compatibility black hole in which if they are not maintained every year, they could be gone for good, broken or inoperable on the latest & greatest OS. It's not long before old binaries are not even allowed on the app store.
One day, Windows will break the good old games, for good.
Whether on purpose or just a casualty of progress and not wanting to support 20+ year old APIs, it's bound to happen eventually.
How do we avoid this? I am concerned that GOG is profiting from the work of SCUMMVM, DOSBox etc, but not contributing back. If they want to see a future for good old games, there needs to be investment & support for emulators, source ports and so forth.
It's not just about emulating old games, I would love to see more work being done on making old games easier to play on a wider range of platforms/systems. For example, Tomb Raider 2 - 5 are dependent on Windows compatibility, and TR1 doesn't have gamepad control without complex workarounds. I'd love to see a movement to write a portable engine for the classic Tomb Raiders that gave us widescreen, sharp graphics and gamepad control on Win/Mac/Linux/iOS/Android etc. (PSP for me, personally) to see these games survive well into a future where the Wintel platform may not even exist anymore.
