[HN Gopher] Embracer Games Archive is preserving 75000 video gam...
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Embracer Games Archive is preserving 75000 video games and needs
contributions
Author : draugadrotten
Score : 124 points
Date : 2025-05-10 11:19 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (embracergamesarchive.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (embracergamesarchive.com)
| biglyburrito wrote:
| Sorry, but I don't trust Embracer with being a good steward of
| games in any capacity.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embracer_Group#History
| Y_Y wrote:
| Is there something specific in that corporate saga you're
| referring to?
|
| I'm not inclined to trust corporate do-gooding either, but it
| would be nice to have some detail.
| stego-tech wrote:
| The long and short of it is Embracer has spent its entire
| existence as a consumption entity, buying every IP and studio
| it could get its hands on, with the intention of being a
| gaming publisher juggernaut. This was all done on ZIRP-era
| credit.
|
| They then proceeded to run it into the ground. Waves of
| layoffs and studio closures, mismanagement, and a credit
| crunch that ultimately debilitated the company.
|
| In other words, from the outside anyway, it looks like a
| classic Private Equity layup and cashout.
|
| Do not trust the Embracer Group.
| thenthenthen wrote:
| So their name is a hint at " Embrace, (extend), and
| extinguish"?
| stego-tech wrote:
| ... _damn_ , that's a good one!
| nomdep wrote:
| Well, for starters, partially owned by the Saudi state. It
| might be common to take a lot of money from them, but I
| personally think it's morally wrong
| DonHopkins wrote:
| So they embrace game developers, then cut them up into
| small pieces with a bone saw?
|
| Then they disposed of the Pieces Interactive by feeding
| them to Piranha Bytes!
| integricho wrote:
| what does the public gain from them?
| pogue wrote:
| The contributions they're looking for are apparently games and
| not monetary donations.
|
| What exactly they're doing with the archive isn't stated. The FAQ
| doesn't explain, other than vague intentions to have the ability
| to do research and possibly some sort of museum (I think?)
|
| https://embracergamesarchive.com/#faq
| mpeg wrote:
| The archive isn't even open to the public, why should the
| public donate games then?
| rubitxxx wrote:
| It's like the seed bank, except all the seeds are effectively
| dead, because no one can use them. But, they have the seeds'
| pretty shells and can imagine what plants they once were.
|
| Personally, I think there should be a non-profit that works
| with non-profits like this, computer and console equipment
| museums, Internet Archive, and a spacefaring company to
| ensure that history is protected in a logical way.
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| What other archives or museums are there for video games that
| are accepting donations of physical game media? There are
| probably a lot of HN readers with old games in the attic that
| are bound for the landfill once they get around to it.
| dtech wrote:
| I know of one in my small country, I thus assume there's
| many especially in the US
| deaddodo wrote:
| Embracer Games is Swedish, not American.
| failrate wrote:
| https://www.themade.org/
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| > " _To donate items to the MADE, bring your donation to
| the front desk during open hours._ "
|
| Quite a long trip for many. That seems to signify that
| they're not a large enough organization to be an archive.
| SteveMoody73 wrote:
| Not a museum or archive as such but in the UK there is this
| https://www.rmcretro.com/
|
| Has a large collection of old systems and games, magazines
| and anything else they can get hold of. It's also open to
| visitors.
| GauntletWizard wrote:
| https://oldbytes.space/@bloopmuseum
| tronster wrote:
| We'll miss it, now that it's moved from Baltimore to a
| larger space in Pittsburg. I have donated to it, and hope
| it continues on well past my lifetime.
| DonHopkins wrote:
| The Video Game History Foundation is the real deal.
|
| https://gamehistory.org/
|
| Their Library Director Phil Salvador is a serious
| historian, who extensively researched, interviewed people,
| and wrote a comprehensive deep dive into the history of
| Maxis's serious games division, Maxis Business Simulations,
| John Hiles, and SimRefinery.
|
| It was such an widely read, well received investigation,
| that it led to the recovery of SimRefinery when a reader
| discovered an old floppy disk of it that had been sitting
| in a drawer for decades!
|
| https://archive.org/details/sim-refinery
|
| https://gamehistory.org/library-director-phil-salvador/
|
| https://gamehistory.org/ep-11-simrefinery-simulated-by-a-
| ref...
|
| https://obscuritory.com/
|
| https://obscuritory.com/sim/when-simcity-got-serious/
|
| https://obscuritory.com/sim/simrefinery-recovered/
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ6Cqn5rTfs
| Jolter wrote:
| They do state that researchers are welcome to visit and use the
| material. I think that makes the collection not-entirely-
| useless to the public. Presumably any research they enable will
| be published.
| merbanan wrote:
| Doesn't seem like they are digitising the media.
| dlundqvist wrote:
| No, only cataloguing. I asked them this when I was there
| January last year. They didn't do this then and if I remember
| correctly it was because of licensing concerns and also not
| wanting to open boxes. I know Royal Library in Stockholm
| digitally archive various media, not sure what Embracer would
| need to be allowed to do that.
| RetroTechie wrote:
| _also not wanting to open boxes_
|
| What?!? How can one preserve games without opening boxes?
| Physical media don't last forever.
|
| Unless they're interested in preserving the boxes themselves?
| (or other goodies inside)
|
| Reads like they're looking for donations to enlarge a private
| collection. Or perhaps obtain some physical copies for stuff
| in their IP portfolio?
| Jolter wrote:
| I think you're right, they would need some kind of copyright
| exemption in order to properly preserve the games by
| migrating them to new media regularly. I'm not sure it's
| possible to get such an exemption for a private corporation
| under Swedish law?
| Jolter wrote:
| Ah, found it. Only some government and municipal archives
| have such an exemption.
|
| https://riksarkivet.se/utforska-och-bestall/vad-du-har-
| ratt-...
| nrb wrote:
| Is it too cynical to think they're just building this to train AI
| against your donated games?
| blharr wrote:
| It looks more like they're just hoarding a massive personal
| collection of games... No mention of if this is open to public.
|
| Or if they're even digitizing the games for some use of
| preservation. I always feel like when you hoard things in one
| location like this, one fire or other natural disaster and the
| entire collection is gone!
| Jolter wrote:
| They would be violating Swedish copyright law if they did, so
| they better not!
|
| Much easier to get away with such things in the US (it seems).
| kmeisthax wrote:
| You don't need a physical archive to do that; a torrent of a
| bunch of SNES games would be good enough.
| forgotTheLast wrote:
| Isn't that the company that bought the IP to a bunch of games
| franchises just to kill all ongoing development? Ironic.
| beloch wrote:
| Embracer group has been around for a while but, in recent
| years, they acquired far more companies than they could
| realistically do anything with because they thought they could
| flip them for a profit. They failed and had to take a hatchet
| to much of what they acquired, pissing off fans of companies
| that were either completely obliterated or hollowed out and
| outsourced.
|
| >* Our mission is to have an archive of physical games as
| extensive as possible. With the purpose of contributing to the
| joint preservation of video game culture and history.
|
| Now they're looking for donations to a private collection that
| will not be open to the public. They likely plan to sell the
| collection the highest bidder at some point. If they can't find
| a buyer, they'll bin the lot of it rather than continue to pay
| storage costs. The employees working for them may believe in
| what they're doing, but Embracer group now has a history of
| pulling the rug out from under such people.
|
| --------------
|
| Edit: The archive is based in Sweden, which has a really
| hopping museum scene. They could make a for-profit museum with
| these materials and a few talented museologists and it would
| likely do well. They mention no such plans and that's very odd.
| moogly wrote:
| > Sweden, which has a really hopping museum scene
|
| Citation needed. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/arti
| cle/2023/09/25/s...
|
| https://swedenherald.com/article/tough-economic-situation-
| fo...
|
| For-profit museums aren't really a thing in Sweden either,
| because you won't be making a profit, unless you're the Vasa
| Museum, but even that is struggling.
| beloch wrote:
| Museums are sort of like farms in that you can lose money
| every year for entire lifetimes and still have a
| tremendously valuable farm. Like land, the past is an
| appreciating asset. That's big, traditional museums. I
| suppose it should be no surprise that the smaller museums
| are still struggling in the post-covid era. I based my
| opinion on visits prior to the pandemic, so I'm out of
| date. Hopefully the popularity of museums in Sweden will
| rebound.
| awkwardpotato wrote:
| Yes, they're also currently $2 billion dollars in debt and are
| attempting to split into 3 separate companies.
|
| "Middle-earth Enterprises & Friends" - The legal successor to
| Embracer. For their triple A studios and major ip rights (they
| currently own the rights to LOTR-based games)
|
| "Coffee Stain & Friends" - For their indie studios. (Named
| after their most successful indie studio, the people behind
| Goat Simulator and Satisfactory)
|
| Asmodee - Their board and card game group. They took out a 900
| million euro "financial agreement" with Embracer to pay back
| part of their debts. Officially a separate entity as of
| February.
|
| [0] https://embracer.com/releases/embracer-group-announces-
| its-i...
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| They killed Deus Ex :(
| zabzonk wrote:
| > Embracer Games Archive is a part of Embracer Group - the parent
| company of businesses led by entrepreneurs in PC, console and
| mobile games, as well as other related media.
|
| very unclear who these people actually are
| shakna wrote:
| Embracer started out as Nordic Games.
|
| They ran around buying and gutting every IP they could get
| their hands on. Nordic became THQ Nordic, whilst continuing to
| eat everyone around them, whilst also nearly going bankrupt
| multiple times, before eventually ditching the name because
| investors didn't like people noticing just who they were.
|
| They are the group that ate Dark Horse, CoffeeStain, Gearbox,
| Square Enix, Saber Interactive and so many more.
|
| Today, they are majority-owned by Saudi Arabia's Public
| Investment Fund.
| bitwize wrote:
| Square Enix is still independent. They've got their fingers
| in so many pies, they're almost in the "too big to fail"
| category.
|
| The SE-Embracer connection is that SE spun off Crystal
| Dynamics and its properties like Tomb Raider, selling them to
| Embracer Group.
| mzajc wrote:
| From their FAQ
|
| > Can I visit the archive?
|
| > The archive is for everyone, and we welcome all inquiries.
| However, we prioritize requests that support gaming culture,
| gaming history, and the games industry. /../ While the archive is
| not open to the public, we hope /../
|
| The archive is for everyone, but it's only for these groups of
| people, and it's also not open to the public... Yikes.
|
| I'd much rather support initiatives that _actually_ make the
| games and software required to run them open to the public, like
| GOG.com and Internet Archive. This feels like a one-way
| transaction - society puts games in, society gets nothing back.
| rasz wrote:
| >The archive is for everyone, but it's only for these groups of
| people, and it's also not open to the public...
|
| Its Lars Wingefors private collection.
| DonHopkins wrote:
| Embracer CEO Lars Wingefors: "I'm sure I deserve a lot of
| criticism":
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1cb93xy/embracer_ceo.
| ..
|
| https://www.gamesindustry.biz/embracer-ceo-lars-wingefors-
| im...
| arp242 wrote:
| This is how most archives work. You can't just have a stroll
| around for the craic. And there's no point really, because it's
| not a museum - most people would be bored quite fast, unless
| you have a specific reason.
| mzajc wrote:
| Exactly, and you shouldn't have to visit the archive to play
| its games in the first place. That's why I mentioned IA and
| GOG.com in particular - both let you download games remotely.
| arp242 wrote:
| That's like saying that a digital scan of the book of Kells
| is identical to the authentic object.
| johnnyjeans wrote:
| It is. I have very little respect for artists with
| sentimentality over such trivial bullshit. Speaking as
| someone who makes games. The jewel case doesn't matter.
|
| It detracts from the thing-itself, like a showroom car
| that travels everywhere in a hermetically sealed
| container. That's not a car anymore, it's waste. Just
| because it gets driven 5 miles a year doesn't change
| shit. If someones spending money to preserve my games,
| I'd rather it'd just be a tarball in a well maintained
| magnetic tape vault available on-line than some
| aristocratic funko pop collection for a tiny amount of
| people to pog at in person.
| EA-3167 wrote:
| The issue here is that a picture of a book is not a book,
| a copy of a game is the same game. Barring people with
| excellent and well-adjusted monitors looking at
| uncompressed images, the pics we see are (potentially
| excellent, but still) approximations of the original.
|
| With software the notion of an original is meaningless
| though.
| kmoser wrote:
| An archive of physical media serves a very different
| purpose from a bunch of computers loaded with the games
| from those media that are available to be played. It's kind
| of like a film vault that stores original movie film, vs. a
| place like YouTube that lets you play copies of those
| movies. And playing the game is not the same as examining
| and handling the original media
| (CD/tape/cartridge/manual/inserts/box).
|
| Sure, archives often permit you to actually view their
| original media in person, but that's not always part of
| their mission. Sometimes the best they'll do is give you
| copies for a fee. Other times they may lend their original
| media (or sometimes copies) to qualified entities (spoiler
| alert: not everybody qualifies). There really is no single
| "right" way for this to work.
| tough wrote:
| why not process digital backups and allow anyone donating
| to the archive to request those digitally?
| kmoser wrote:
| That takes time and effort, and has legal implications
| that the archive might not want to deal with.
| giancarlostoro wrote:
| Better off going to 'myabandonware' which provides games you
| simply cannot buy anywhere. No nonsense, just games.
| Zardoz89 wrote:
| Here is an actual video game archive worth donating to
|
| https://library.gamehistory.org
| voidspark wrote:
| Archive, library, and museum are three different things.
| pathartl wrote:
| GoG makes games available for purchase, but on multiple
| occasions they've sold games where functionality has been
| stripped out, or they sell something that straight up doesn't
| work.
| jasonlotito wrote:
| > The archive is for everyone, but it's only for these groups
| of people, and it's also not open to the public... Yikes.
|
| That's a lie. That's not at all what the FAQ says. You wouldn't
| like it if someone did that to you, would you?
|
| > I'd much rather support initiatives that actually make the
| games and software required to run them open to the public,
| like GOG.com and Internet Archive.
|
| So you hate game archives, and want to see games destroyed?
| Yikes.
| devwastaken wrote:
| this will be demolished before 5 years time. physical archives
| dont work, theyre inefficient and costly. people get bored. the
| best archive is torrent seeding.
| Jolter wrote:
| Physical archives have literally worked for thousands of years.
|
| You do have a point in that commercial ventures like Embracer
| don't tend to last for very long. Presumably the collection
| would not be auctioned off piecemeal if the company goes under,
| but rather sold as a unit to some other entity.
| jll29 wrote:
| At least part of the collection, preferedly a rotating part,
| should be a public exhibit. They can charge an entrance fee, and
| they will get way more support if there is public awareness
| compared to a 100% closed shop.
| Keyframe wrote:
| now, I have a full SNES collection (without boxes since cardboard
| is hard to keep up), almost full N64 collection, and on my way to
| complete Mega Drive and Master System (with boxes) and probably
| more than halfway through NES games.. bunch of amigas,
| commodores, spectrums, SGIs, monitors, some exotics like Sam
| Coupe, Tatung Einstein, Schneider CPCs, etc. but this is on
| another level.
|
| Future collectors beware though, even though I collected a whole
| bunch as you can see, at the end of the day I still play either
| on Analogue's with Everdrive or original machines (RGB of course)
| with Everdrives. Sometimes even, yes, emulators. If anything, I'd
| honestly donate to a digital archive and emulator development.
| Only thing right now that really can't be emulated are CRTs - but
| I am honestly convinced we're soon close enough if not already
| 98% there with great 4k OLEDs (like sony A95L series) and some
| pre-processing. I can tell by the pixels when I'm looking at both
| A95L and BVM20 and/or B&O TV which I also have, to my wife's
| disapproval.
| Keyframe wrote:
| this talk with acquisition manager there illuminates a lot of
| things, including how it started. Back of the envelope calc it
| looks like to be anywhere between 5-10m euro swing to get it
| where it is at right now (including space and people).
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKXEUG_tKks
| MyPasswordSucks wrote:
| > We aim to assist and grant access to people within the games
| industry, researchers, schools, and other institutions. While the
| archive is not open to the public, we hope our website and social
| media channels will offer insight into the work being done by our
| team. [1]
|
| Then maybe people within the games industry, researchers,
| schools, and other institutions can provide those needed
| contributions. Very poor form to be coming to the public, hat in
| hand, asking them to help finance your private vidya collection.
|
| 1: https://embracergamesarchive.com/#faq
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