Does EMULATION eliminate the need to COLLECT?

[digitalpress]

Brought on by a previous thread where I asked "if you had to... what would you sell off first?". This question was answered by several people along the lines of "I'd get rid of things I can play on an emulator".

So I wondered. Would I even be a collector had I started after the age of emulation? I mean - would I go out of my way to find the Atari 2600 game Air Raid if I could just play the thing on my PC? Do I only collect now because I have an existing collection?

The answer to that is NO, but that's just me personally. I wonder how you would answer. What I'm NOT asking is if you think emulation can replace your game playing. What I AM asking is if emulation can replace your game collecting.

Ponder. And discuss.

[IGotTheDot]

The actual game is only part of the appeal. There is also the box art the label art and the manual. So no way Jose, er Joe.

[Mr-E_MaN]

Emulation can never replace collecting... unless you are collecting roms I guess...

The reason I collect, and I am sure there are more people like me, is not only to play the games, it's to physically have them and display them. You can't display a CD of roms that well...

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

If anything, emulation has just gotten me in worse trouble! I try out ROMs and think "Ahhh hell, I gotta try that out with the real live 2600 joystick." Or "Crap, the ROM doesn't work. Now there's only one way to find out." (Which was part of the reason I sprung for Odyssey 2 Power Lords.)

Damn you, emulation! Glorious, addictive emulation. You just make me want to track down the real thing that much more.

For me, the two go hand-in-hand in a most dangerous way.

[Bratwurst]

I must say no, because with collecting physical cartridges and the like, there comes the packaging and magazines of that era as well, something that rom sites and packages don't tend to transfer too well with the actual file.

I'm tired of looking at crap mini-reviews that accompany those emu sites as well, things like 'I played this game when I was 10 and in it you are Bonk out to save the princess.' Compare that to publications of the era or even the legal info in the manual, stuff like the publishers, year it came out, interviews with the creators, and industry blurbs etc. The HISTORY, man, the HISTORY.

[orrimarrko]

Unfortunately, this begs the question of why do you collect in the first place (which may spin off to a 3rd thread )...

If your goal was to play every game that you collected, or to only collect those games that you wish to play (or like to play), then I think the question fits.

My answer (if that was the case) would be no - I wouldn't stop collecting, because there is more to the hobby than just to play the games. I actually like the packaging (which is why I don't collect loose items) as well as the physical game itself (although CDs are lame.) So no - even if I had the emulators, I would still collect.

Now, back to what I was hinting at - how many of us collect games that we will NEVER play (some because they suck, some because you just don't have that much time on your hands)??

My point is that collecting and gaming don't always go hand and hand. Emulation (for me) has nothing to do with collecting.

Steve

[YoshiM]

I think I'd still be a collector. Like Mr. Fossils emulators have gotten me MORE interested in getting the real thing due to some sort of glitch in the emu/ROM or just not playing right with PC controllers. Which gets ME in trouble as well (lessee, I've gone through 3 Genesis/Sega CD and 3 TG-16 system purchases and then sales of over the last few years which my wife makes sure to remind me of). And like Herr Wurst it's about the history or more specifically the personal history involved with the systems I've had the longest.

Besides, no matter how good the emulation is, it's just not the same. Anyone who says different just wants free stuff :P

[ventrra]

Personally, I can't see how emulation could replace collecting. It can, and does in my case, supplement collecting. There is a lot to be said about playing games in their original formats. Certainly, few controllers availiable for computers have the same look and feel of most game system controllers. (Just imagine someone replicating the Channel F controller for a PC, for example )

There is also an issue of the availablility and accuracy of emulators, as well. Many emulators don't accurately reflect the abilities of the original hardware. Certainly, you can play some of the games, but the question is: Doest it represent exactly what you would experience playing a real system? Some systems don't have emulators. (I'm still waiting for a Game.com emulator )

As others have said in this thread, playing the games on an emulator usually makes me want the real cartridges (or tapes, or disks, or whatever) rather than to make me inclined to be satisfied with the emulation of those games.

[ManekiNeko]

Not entirely, but I do feel emulation lessens the need to collect. If you've got a small house or a limited income, then you can emulate 95% of what's out there and keep a small amount of games and systems that have strong sentimental value.

JR

[digitalpress]

Personally, I can't see how emulation could replace collecting.

So far the responses here have been pretty much what I expected, but let's keep in mind that we're on the whole a more hardcore vintage gaming crowd, a little older than most forum communities, a lot wiser.

I wonder if I posed this question somewhere else, like at an emulation headquarters forum, if the answers wouldn't be exactly the opposite.

Perhaps an experiment is at hand.

[NE146]

I play emulators ALL THE FRIGGIN TIME these days especially on the Xbox. It 100% rocks having the entire libraries for the 2600/Colecovision/Snes/NES/SMS/etc.etc. on a single compact console ready for play on any tv in the house.

However having said that, do they substitute for the real thing? HELL NO. There's always going to be something 'missing', if not videogame look/sound-wise, then for sure in the physical things people touched on above. It's never going to be 100% the same (although for some things like SNES on the xbox.. it comes damn close )

Rather what I think emulation does, is it allows you that quick game of whatever you want right when you want it, and saves the wear and tear of using your old gear. You can always break out the real deal when you want that pure feel, but you just can't beat that convenience of jumping from 3-5 colecovision games to Mame to Genesis to Sega CD to TG-16 games all in the span of 5 minutes..w/ a nice clean looking entertainment area to boot :P

Now maybe I'm not the best person to ask since again, I've never considered myself a "collector" per se.. I'm just a person who's enjoyed and played videogames since the late 70's up to this day. But to me, emulation and the real deal DO go hand in hand and are just alternative methods to enjoying some videogame action. And naturally, we all know the real deal is best. But the fake stuff works in a pinch

Bottom line..it definitely can't take the place of actual item collecting though. But it sure does go great hand in hand

[Captain Wrong]

Yes...and no. The stuff I've parted with I know I can emulate if I get the urge to play it again. However, through emulation I've gotten into a lot more stuff of stuff I wouldn't have otherwise. If not for emulation, I probably wouldn't own a Neo Geo now.

[AB Positive]

If anything, emulation has just gotten me in worse trouble! I try out ROMs and think "Ahhh hell, I gotta try that out with the real live 2600 joystick." Or "Crap, the ROM doesn't work. Now there's only one way to find out." (Which was part of the reason I sprung for Odyssey 2 Power Lords.)

Damn you, emulation! Glorious, addictive emulation. You just make me want to track down the real thing that much more.

For me, the two go hand-in-hand in a most dangerous way.

I completely agree with this. It's the emulation of the Neo Geo Color Pocket game SNK v. Capcom: Cardfighter Clash that's made me personally want to hunt one down so I can play it for real. Emulation makes me want a Duo more so I can play Bomberman '93 on the REAL pad. To me, emulation is only a temporary fix. To use an inappropriate analogy, it's methadone when I really want smack. There's no replacing playing a game on the system it's made for with the contoller it's made for.

...DAMN I need a TG-16

-AG

[zektor]

For me emulation has always been a great way to try a game before I go and buy it (IE: The $102 I just spend on a TG16 Bonk 3 hucard) and I think it is great for that purpose. But, depending on the system, some things are just better emulated. Take the Amiga for example. I have alot of great games for the system that just "died" because of the format they are on: floppy disks. At least with the emulation, the floppies have been backed up to files that can be loaded any time I want, without a floppy error. I can still play Menace And finally, some games I just CANNOT afford, but love to have the ability to play. Neo-Geo games for example. I sure as hell cannot afford to buy Metal Slug, but love the fact that I can play it if I want to. I don't think anyone should be deprived of playing a great game just because they don't have a ton of cash to buy it. Emulation will never kill game collecting, but if it weren't there I think there most likely would be ALOT more people buying vintage games...and the prices of these games would be off the wall.

[Charlesaway]

You know what the weird thing is? I started collecting emulators and roms before I started my collections. I have almost every game for every classic system out there, but I found it just wasn't the same experience.

It's all about the experience for me I think, and you just can't get that with an emulator. Plus, it gives me a warm, fuzzy feeling inside when I look at my collection of games. I don't get that looking at a directory of files.

[Nature Boy]

I personally don't consider the emulation scene collecting. It's acquiring. You don't really care what you get, you just grab whatever is available because it's there.

True Collecting involves rarity. Pricing guides. Regional differences. Buying a second copy of something to swap for something else. And it's these things I enjoy so much and can't explain to an acquirer.

[kainemaxwell]

Of course not! Half the fun of collecting is looking in the wild or the darkc orners of eBay for those elusive titles for your collection. Then when you bring it home you can play it ont he actual system and stack them with the others of that collection.

With emulation you can play the games you have without having to hook the system up (if it's not) or test drive various games you want to find or can't play in the U.S.

[IntvGene]

I think that emulation serves me to save things that I normally couldn't save.. like Zektor said. Emulation is great for the C64, Amiga, Atari 8bit, etc. These things were not going to last long because the format. So, it's great to play those on my DC or whatever.

I also think that collecting is great for ease of use. I don't want to drag out my NES every time I want to play something. So, I just do it on my DC. What's also great about emulation is that I can use the SAVE STATE features instead writing down those crappy passwords on some old games. But, it does not stop me from buying the old games. They are part of my collections.

There is also one more area, emulators like SCUMM. Now, I can play games old Lucasarts games on my DC (and I believe GP32). It's great playing those classics on my huge TV compared to my PC monitor.. it's even better than before. These are actually improvements on the old games, and I would prefer to play them. SCUMM requires that I have the original discs, so I have to add to my growing collection!

[Ed Oscuro]

A loser--freeloader type--would probably not care about buying games if he could emulate them. A collector will collect whether or not a better, more convenient version of the same game may be had on his PC.

Ah, the joys of precise language.

Emulation actually got me into a couple game series, and as a result different game companies can chalk a couple sales up to emulation. Here's one: After playing the (damned HACKED Eurasia version >( Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow ROM a couple days after its release, I went out and bought the actual game, even though I don't own a GBA--or any GameBoy, yet. I also decided to get a couple other games for the GBA on that trip, so if you ask me I'd be liable to say that emulation can be a publicity tool.

Now if only everybody else would be like me, and actually support companies that make games they like :(

[Ed Oscuro]

I personally don't consider the emulation scene collecting. It's acquiring. You don't really care what you get, you just grab whatever is available because it's there.

True Collecting involves rarity. Pricing guides. Regional differences. Buying a second copy of something to swap for something else. And it's these things I enjoy so much and can't explain to an acquirer.

Quite true. I always laugh whem I see the term "rare ROMs" used, because it's such an idiotic oxymoron (the user never has a clue why it's so stupid). When a file gets on the 'net, it only takes one person to make it available to the public as a whole.

The difference between collecting and acquiring is a mindset, dedication, and simple market forces compared with the free-for-all that is the Internet.