Cloud gaming has risen in popularity over the last decade, with companies like Xbox, PlayStation, and NVIDIA rushing to become major players in the market. Another type of gaming that has been growing extremely fast over the last decade is retro gaming. Could one benefit the other, or is this all just a pipe dream?
The Demand for Classic Games is Increasing
Let’s start by defining “retro games” since everyone has a slightly differrent idea about what this means. I’m going to use the term “retro” to refer to game consoles and platforms that are no longer officially receiving new game titles. Games that originally released for these consoles, I consider “retro.”
What we are noticing here is that there is high demand for such classic games from Sega, Capcom, Konami, SNK, and Nintendo to name a few. Given the demand, there would definitely be a benefit to putting games like Street Fighter 2 or classic Sonic the Hedgehog titles onto a modern cloud gaming service. This would also be beneficial to gamers who want to get started by checking out game series that have always interested them, but didn’t know which game to start with.
Running these Games in the Cloud is Relatively Easy
Cloud gaming is a method of transmitting video game input and video output over the internet to a device with an active connection. Older games can often be run on the very cheapest servers in the cloud.
Many earlier games for systems like the Nintendo Entertainment System or Atari 2600 are only a handful of kilobytes in size and require very low compute demands to emulate – meaning the games should be able to be streamed relatively easily. Antstream Arcade already does this. Controls for games on platforms like the Atari Jaguar, ZX Spectrum, or Intellivision would need some work via controller mapping or an onscreen keyboard. But, besides these few small quality-of-life improvements, the games should run perfectly.
The Preservation Aspect Can’t Be Understated
On July 10th 2023, the Video Game History Foundation put out a damning article claiming 87% of video games released pre-2010 were no longer available to play in an official capacity. Since that statement, we have seen companies such as Atari, Piko Interactive, PlayStation and Nintendo move quickly to add more of the classic games they own to modern platforms.
However, there are still tens of thousands of games from platforms like the ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro, etc. that are unplayable. It’s also notable that companies like Sega, which owns a gargantuan library of games, are working on rebooting many classic franchises. Howeer, they don’t seem to be releasing many of their classic games outside the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. The more of these retro games that are added to platforms like GeForce NOW or Antstream Arcade, the better the chance that more people will experience them.
While many people think that “physical” game releases are key to game preservation, it often offers it’s own problems. Requiring a specific disc that can only be played on a specific box can really limit the practical ability for most people to enjoy a game decades after release.
Maintaining a game in a container of virtual machine that is continually accessible and playable via the cloud is a great way to not only preserve games in theory but also in practice!
What do you think? Do you think Retro Gaming could benefit from Cloud Gaming? Let us know on social media.
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