What video game ephemera tells us about ourselves

The Guardian

29-01-2025

I just finished writing a feature about the Video Game History Foundation in Oakland, California, and how it is preparing to share its digital archive of games magazines. From 30 January, you'll be able to visit the institute's website and explore a collection of about 1,500 publications from throughout the history of games, all scanned in high detail, all searchable for keywords. It's a magnificent resource for researchers and those who just want to find the first-ever review of Tetris or Pokémon. I can't wait to visit.
While researching the article, I spoke to John O'Shea and Ann Wain from the National Videogame Museum in Sheffield, which is also collecting games mags and other printed ephemera. They said something that really fascinated me. The museum is looking for donations to build its archive, but its focus is not so much on the magazines themselves, but on who brings them in. 'We're particularly interested in fan perspectives,' O'Shea told me. 'We're not intending to develop an exhaustive collection of every video game magazine ever made – we're interested in the full suite of an individual's video game experience … in how games connect to their lives.' Wain continued: 'We're interested in the stories of why – why did they collect these particular things, what were they looking for? It's that kind of social context we're after.'
Collections are about memories more than facts – and this applies to games and the cultural matter about them. I'm writing this letter to you in my little cellar office, surrounded by piles of games, game magazines and game books. There are things in here that I cherish, including a copy of Devil May Cry signed by game designer Shinji Mikami, and my father's Sega Mega Drive; there are also some endlessly useful and fascinating things, such as Steven Kent's seminal book The Ultimate History of Video Games, and an old Sony personal video monitor, for which I bought special cables allowing me to connect very old consoles. What does all this stuff mean in the end, and what does it say about me?
I'm not sure. All I know is, when I happen on TikTok videos of people's games collections I watch transfixed, over and over. I look at the console formats they've bought and the magazines they read. It helps me to picture their journey through games history, which may be very different than mine. I think that's why the National Videogame Museum (VGHF) wants this sort of sociocultural context in its collections: the choices other people make are fascinating.
It's such a shame that museums and academic institutions have only relatively recently been given the resources to collect material about video games. Although classic games are now being carefully archived, the VGHF estimates that 87% of classic video games released in the United States are critically endangered – I'm sure the situation is the same elsewhere in the world. Games discs and tapes deteriorate and become unplayable; the machines they ran on break down. Games magazines were considered ephemeral and throwaway, and are only now being seen as cultural artefacts in the same way as music and movie publications. There's a lot of history to catch up on. If we really want to remember the youth culture of the 1980s, we need to think just as much about Jet Set Willy and Crash magazine as we do about the Smiths and NME.
As O'Shea said in our chat, cultural memory exists in the detritus of our lived lives. Last year, a good friend and I went to the Naomi Campbell exhibition at the V&A. In one area, the curators recreated the model's dressing room – a chaotic explosion of discarded clothes, wet wipes and makeup. It told us as much about her as anything else on display. We are what we surround ourselves with, and what we're passionate about. All my books and games are, in the end, me.
Perhaps this is why I felt emotional when O'Shea and Wain talked about how games mags are important for their social and personal context: I had a very recent experience of their intimate value. A couple of weekends ago, I help my mum clear out a few old things at her house. In a dusty corner, we found a plastic bag that had obviously been safely stored away by my dad, who died in 2003. I discovered it contained a pile of games magazines that I had worked on – Edge, DC-UK and others, as well as some copies of my first stories for the Guardian.
I used to post him these things because he was interested in games and cool new gadgets. I thought he'd have a quick flick through and chuck them out. But there it all was: my career in a plastic bag, as collated and archived by my dad. Those magazines are in my collection now – once they were about me, now they're about him. We all have a natural ability to share and ascribe cultural meaning and emotional value. As well as bringing us joy, the things we collect are a message to others. This was important once; take care of it and you'll understand why.
When is a news article not a news article? Um … when it's a game? Reuters has just run a lovely introductory article about cosy games such as Spiritfarer and Animal Crossing, which have proven mental health benefits for stressed or anxious players.
The Reutuers feature is also an interactive role-playing game, Cosy Comfort, which allows you to guide a cutesy anthropomorphic Radish around the teeny village of Rootersville as you read, customising its clothes and house en route. This is such a lovely, relevant way to present a positive story.
Available on: PC, Mac and smartphone
Estimated playtime: 10 minutes
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Alice Bell has written a beautiful article for Eurogamer about how video game spaces have become memorials to friends we have lost. This makes complete sense in the digital era when so many relationships play out online and in virtual worlds.
Yet more games industry job losses this week as Ubisoft announced it is closing its Leamington studio and downsizing Ubisoft Reflections in Newcastle, Ubisoft Düsseldorf and Ubisoft Stockholm. According to GI.biz, 185 staff will lose their jobs.
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This week's question comes from Martha, who asks:
'My friend and I live together and we are avid gamers. Not into sport or platformers but we love all the modern greats; GTA, Last of Us, Uncharted, Days Gone, Horizon ZD and FW, Spider-Man (and Stardew Valley). You get the picture! A friend of ours – who hasn't gamed since the 90s – wants us to help get her into gaming again. So it needs to be something we enjoy with a good learning arc. What would you recommend? We are PlayStation gamers.'
Of the games you've mentioned, Spider-Man, Uncharted and Horizon are all excellent introductions to modern games – and they all have good easy modes. If they were playing in the 1990s, they might recognise a few of the franchises still going today, so Rise of the Tomb Raider and Resident Evil Village might be a good idea. I also love Stellar Blade and The Quarry, which have quite a 90s gaming vibe to them. Also, as you mentioned, Stardew Valley, which has a real Super Nintendo look and feel, I'd recommend Tunic and Roots of Pacha, which both look as if they've come from that wonderful era.
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