Harvest Moon | SNES Prototype SAVED

[@AshKetchumRawkz]

I have like a burning hatred for Wata, it's nice to have even the smallest news that they might finally be crumbling

[@lolcat]

I hope we get legislation that stops product scalping like we had for GPUs

[@repomanzilla]

I as well have this hatred. They are a scam and a blight on this market. How anyone still uses wata blows my mind.

[@JohnSmith-sk7cg]

​@@lolcat As someone who currently has no GPU, I fully understand where you're coming from. The issue with legislation is that we have two avenues to approach it. It's possible to do, but it would have to be incredibly carefully crafted to work as intended; avoiding two major pitfalls. My fear is that such a bill wouldn't make it through the entire legislative and judicial process without one of the following being impacted from lobbying. The first is to outlaw or limit API-based store transactions. This one risks circumventing the public good that came from the case, Google v Oracle regarding copyrighting API calls. Similar to how the DMCA circumvented Fair Use by placing a legal barrier in front of the Fair Use action, banning or rate-limiting the same use of API calls by 3rd parties risks ceding more power over to the largest companies. Using this legislation would prevent and/or seriously degrade competing alternative apps. They'd lose the ability to make their software compatible with the leading software's files, web accounts, anything. It would produce another hurdle for competing products and ideas to attain critical mass in terms of community and developer support. The second avenue would be to outlaw re-selling something you bought; it would be a reversal of First-Sale Doctrine. This would result in things like Toyota preventing you from selling your car.

[@undamned]

Crumbling?

[@janchristianursuaaguilar7434]

@@JohnSmith-sk7cg capital punishment is the only but last resort or make it felony at the least.

[@kennylauderdale_en]

Anything short of it being online and backed up physically in multiple locations isn't preserved. Great content as always.

[@Aeduo]

It's preserved in so far as a sociopath cares. It's just all for them. They don't care that the rest of anybody else could find joy in something.

[@frankshin401]

Agree 100%

[@user-account-not-found]

That doesnt work either. GitHub shipped our code to a facility in the artic to preserve the work. Internet will get zapped at some point, around same time we go. (it will be the cause) See you guys on the other side.

[@Monkforilla]

@@user-account-not-found wow nothing is forever? Who knew?

[@the1ucidone]

You're a hero of the retro gaming community. Thank you for all you do for us.

[@CommanderWiggins]

I so appreciate people like H4G, DidYouKnowGaming, Nick Robinson, ect who use their platforms as ways to preserve gaming history.

[@the1ucidone]

@@CommanderWiggins they the real ones for sure

[@kuma1388]

The current state of the retro game market is basically beyond broken.

[@ZachAttackIsBack]

How so? It seems pretty popular.

[@kuma1388]

@Tommy yep. I’ve been collecting since my parents bought me my NES in 86. I had allot of fun collecting over the years but it’s not feasible anymore.

[@EmilyCorradino]

@Zach Watch the video Karl Jobst did on Wata. These retro games are reaching sky high prices, well beyond what they're worth. Funny enough, retro game collecting used to be an affordable hobby.

[@Aeduo]

@@ZachAttackIsBack It creates much excess value for a few while gatekeeping it from people who might enjoy playing things using original hardware. Obviously emulation fills the space in a lot of cases nowadays (although N64 and a lot of later consoles are still pretty iffy), but if someone enjoys the physical hardware, it's certainly of more use to someone who will enjoy it rather than someone just using it as an investment to create excess value for themselves.

[@DenkyManner]

It got invaded by criminal speculators who descend on and ruin every hobby to enrich themselves. That's all art collecting is too, but we're led to believe it's natural price rising. It's all very deliberate.

[@GizouGitai]

Was it actually encased with its battery?? Even Button Cells eventually leak acid onto your electronics.

[@hard4games]

Yep! And not a single F was given by the original owner.

[@teh_supar_hackr]

Twice I had a button cell bat pop out of nowhere on me while it was in storage. Luckily none were inside of cartridges when it happened.

[@ZachAttackIsBack]

Would it have lost data if the battery had been removed?

[@GizouGitai]

​@@ZachAttackIsBack I get why you ask that. And you're right, it's possible: During the period, buttoncells were used for savedata and rarely real-time-clocks (e.g. Pokémon GSC). RAM chips lose their data without power, pairing it with a battery gives you (semi-)permanent, (cheap) rewritable memory. If your PC BIOS ever goes bad, you can pull out the battery to factory reset it, for the same reason. In SNES development, EEPROM were used to flash game data onto the cart, and they don't require constant charge. The battery is probably there for savedata. Some games use it for a real-time-clock function. How valuable that data is, is arguable. Save data from a playtester has historic value. More unlikely: Some games have specific debug save data loaded in, to toggle a debug mode (I've seen games do this). This is more objectively important. When you turn on Debug Mode with a gameshark, it may be toggling values the game would've read off one of these save files, for example. This save data could be dumped with the ROM dump anyway, and reapplied later if the savedata was lost. People do this to preserve childhood saves when dumping their own ROMs. Or we could Gameshark the debug values back in, but that isn't ideal to preservation. Even ignoring that the cell's probably already dead, preserving volatile data doesn't justify the Battery's own destructive volatility.

[@legros731]

No it won't how can a lithium battery leak acid lol it not a nicad battery

[@lateralus92]

Regardless of the pre-release and full release differences, I still believe it is important to preserve software like this. Thank you for sharing, H4G.

[@selph8278]

hopefully more of zack's collection comes to light one day

[@hard4games]

Hope so too!

[@towardstar]

@@hard4games f@#$ zack

[@shards-of-glass-man]

@Philyutuber2022 Poor Indy: The Magical Kid is still lost because someone is refusing to let it out of their hoard and it's just... frustratingly sad

[@PlasticCogLiquid]

@Philyutuber2022 The guy that held onto Marble Madness 2 for 20 years was stupid, I'm glad somebody was able to sneak a rom off of it :D I read all his forum comments a long time ago and what a douche. He'd still be hanging on to it if he could.

[@OriginalMasters]

@@PlasticCogLiquid Are we sure they got the ROM off his machine?

[@worsel555]

WATA are already scum of the, well, everything they touch actually, but when you said it the games were "entombed in acrylic cases" I thought you meant they were pouring acrylic into the case itself so it would not move at all. Not gonna lie, I almost had another heart attack and was about to burn them everyone who did that to the ground, but no, it's just a sealed case. Thank you for what you do for the retro and gaming community, keep up the good work, and get some rest my Internet Friend, you look exhausted; probably from having to talk about WATA ;)

[@Clarkzer0]

Thank you for making this video, and thanks to GamingLegend64 & FoI for preserving this. Seeing proto titles like this encased forever, especially with basic protections like covering EEPROMs not being considered whatsoever is frustrating, so to know more data is safe is a breath of fresh air.

[@zzco]

This is why that practice is so absolutely stupid. You're not "preserving" the ROM, because you have absolutely no fucking idea what you're doing. You're condemning the game to almost certain erasure by participating in that. Go collect fucking paintings of you want to do that kind of thing.

[@Ozhull]

Eeproms being corrupted by light is largely an urban legend. It would take a blindingly bright flash of sustained light for a long time for it to happen.

[@zzco]

Still better safe than sorry. Just because you CAN be reckless doesn't mean you should. Also, why do commercial EPROMs come with covers, then?

[@oliviamartin1203]

Reminds me of the current situation for a Panel de Pon 64 proto cart that's in the hands of a private collector. The longer these things go undumped, the more likely they are to become lost to time due to how old these carts are getting.

[@undamned]

Never heard if that N64 proto! I'd love to see footage!

[@fatfurie]

@@undamned looks like theres a ton of a different one on youtube. @olivia martin are they different protoypes?

[@oliviamartin1203]

No, there's only one prototype. The owner posted a video of it before going silent on the matter.

[@Dissidia]

The simplistic title screen matches the same one found in the instruction booklet. Great to see this localization prototype rescued.

[@macuser7048]

A lot of video game companies, ESPECIALLY JAPANESE COMPANIES refuse to reveal anything about a game's development or show any older concepts which sucks for video game historians. Leaked prototypes are our only window into the past.

[@worsel555]

Also preservation as a whole is abysmal. 90% of games released before 2008 are missing or have "lost" source code, which is why it's harder to get remasters done, such as when Square had to reach out to the PC modding community for help rebuilding the game Final Fantasy 8 as they no longer had the code. More recently was the Ninja Gaiden: Master Collection that featured the Sigma games because the source code for the original XBox releases are lost, and in the case of Sigma 2 they only had 85% of the code and had to try their best to recreate it. Companies need to save, preserve, archive, and make sure to have multiple backups of code, prototypes, artwork, etc.; it's literally history being wiped out. Major kudos to anyone who works on preserving this stuff, even if it's as minor as one version number change that gets dumped and archived, it still counts.

[@nickk6645]

Prototypes were never ment to be released to the end consumer. If it happens, great, but it's not something we have a right to see and experience

[@macuser7048]

@@nickk6645 Of course, but games can change a lot throughout development too so it doesn't matter if people see it because it's not the final product. It's not really spoiling anything. Take Zelda BOTW for example. For sure I can tell you that game is not the same as how it started out. Going by the interviews and the book released by Dark Horse you can see how it evolved. That stuff is interesting. It's cool!

[@bitelaserkhalif]

The only hope is indie devs, they tend to reveal progress

[@magic1wizard]

@@worsel555 It is just like the early days of movies and TV. They didn't really care about preserving anything and it was up to the enthusiasts to collect, preserve and restore.

[@Rihcterwilker]

Honestly, i feel like the best way of preserving games is have it shared. As you mentioned, if the owner is not present anymore, it all may just become physical junk to however picks it up.

[@SpanishArmadaProd]

how?? pretty sure he says the value of his things in the will...

[@Rihcterwilker]

@@SpanishArmadaProd i'm speaking in a general sense. Not everyone will have a will prepared, and most people that may get it are layman that will just see it as a bunch of plastic and decide to get rid of it. I'm not against collectors, but it only has monetary value for most of them, and the idea of having it forever encased and never shared will lead to it gettinf lost again, sooner or later.

[@damian9303]

Isn’t there such thing as estate sales?

[@Cruznick06]

Thank you so much for preserving this data. I'm not a huge fan of the series, and I know very little about old boards like this. What I DO know from being a toy collector: batteries will leak and shouldn't be left on/in anything you want to preserve. Seeing that button cell on the board when you held up the case immediately set off alarms. I dislike the idea of encasing stuff like this in a permanent tomb. If I got ahold of a cool rare prototype, I'd want a case that kept out moisture and UV light but ALSO was still able to be opened. Prototypes hold historical value. They're artifacts of the design process. You can't use them for research if they are eternally encased. There are ways to minimize risk of damage when handling them (hair nets, gloves, low-humidity, low-light).

[@VieriTheArtist]

I’ve never heard of Wata before, but the private dumping without releasing the data is what bothered me personally. If they want to enshrine those dev roms, whatever. It’s nice to have the physical proof of this prototype’s existence, but I think what is the most important thing is the sharing of the data. I could understand if they wanted to delay the release of the data while they do their inspection, but to not release it at all? It comes off as selfish to me. Thank you Tony, LuigiBlood and GamingLegend64 for securing the rom and dumping the data. Cheers, lads!

[@Bobbias]

Wata games is basically the same people behind the coin collecting bubble getting into game collecting. They are manipulating the market in the same ways they did back then. Karl Jobst has some great investigative journalism on his channel about Wata. Also, lol, thinking the collector actually inspected the ROM data. They don't care what is in the ROM, how it differs from a release cart, or anything like that. They just care that it's a prototype, and therefore rare and by extension valuable.

[@VieriTheArtist]

@@Bobbias I maybe should have clarified a bit, what I meant by inspection is the physical inspection of the hardware itself. I’m not 100% sure how they would go about inspecting the hardware, but with the way it sounds (especially Tony mentioning bootlegs) Wata doesn’t do great with that either.

[@PlasticCogLiquid]

Imagine if civilization had a big reset, and 500 years from now an archeologist dug that thing up. They would think it was some kind of alien technology or part of a tool used to make pyramids or something. Nope, it's just a video game. You get to play a farmer kid :]

[@Vormund]

Thank you for saving this. I hate the whole idea of so called preserving something and not letting anyone see it. Imagine if no one was allowed to make a copy of the Mona Lisa or take photos of it.

[@goldkirby]

It’d be one thing if “Zach” had written out in his will that his executor uploaded his collection of ROMs in the case of his death; anything less than that is not preservation in my book. If the public doesn’t have access, then it’s just another copy with a finite life

[@FelipeBudinich]

I hate those stupid boxes. They only add to the possibility of the cart getting damaged.

[@rollinburket]

genuinely asking out of curiosity: do they really? how so?

[@FelipeBudinich]

@@rollinburket they break in a dangerous way. If one of those gets shipped, and during transit the box gets banged, it will crack, and the acrylic will pierce and scratch the contents. No one stores or displays valuable art pieces like that, they are usually behind layered plexi that is a lot more flexible than acrylic (that way the first layer can shatter and the pieces fly outwards), and they are framed in such a way that you can unscrew the thing instead of shattering it on purpose. And for shipping, it's done with softer materials after safe removal from the display case; you don't see curators taking pliers to the acrylic case of an invaluable painting.

[@FelipeBudinich]

The reason these things can't be openened is because allegedly they grade and authenticate the contents, it allegedly is a measure to avoid counterfeits. Of course it is bollocks as there are Wata graded counterfeits circulating.

[@rollinburket]

@@FelipeBudinich ah that makes sense, thank you for the explanation! the whole thing definitely comes across more as a way to keep something away from the ‘commoners’ than genuinely caring about preservation, interesting to know that it’s also really dangerous for the board itself

[@FelipeBudinich]

@@rollinburket np. You asked a genuine question. In my opinion more than "keeping away from commoners" it is a plain pump and dump; one of the things I do is to advice investors in tech, and these things (just like nfts) kept being "sold" at insane prices and made the news, so of course one of my clients asked me if it was a solid alternative investment. I said no. At the height of the "tulip mania" they wanted to punch me in the throat. Now? They call me more hehe.

[@ArcadeTheatre]

Acrylic Tomb would be a good band name

[@AMDRADEONRUBY]

Harvest Moon is a nice game I really likes the ROM videos you make especially ones about prototypes

[@noodledood12]

You look like the main preset for the male fallout 4 character. kickass video btw

[@jddeluxe2242]

Tony love your channel man! You wouldn't happen to know anything about the long lost prototype of Zero Racers (formerly G-Zero) for the Virtual Boy? They had an indepth preview of it in an old Nintendo Power, then shelved it at the very last minute. Such a shame...but It's out there somewhere I know it! 🤞

[@workthrowaway8430]

One of the few game series I go way to hard on collecting. If I was aware of this I probably would have spent thousands on this. Thanks for saving it. Now if only Marvelous could have saved their Harvest Moon naming rights from Natsume being a jerk

[@markclifton859]

Right? I avoid anything with the Harvest Moon name on it that has released post-2013 split. At least we still get localizations in the form of Story of Seasons, though.

[@VideoGameShadows]

I Wish one day "Piko" released ALL their prototypes on "Hidden Palace"

[@Negius]

Despite it being basically the finished version, it's still cool to see this. I'm happy it got preserved.

[@BoosterTheRooster1]

The mental gymnastics that guy did to think preserving a game means keeping it to yourself is hilarious. Because when he dies it will just be lost again or thrown away and that's generally what happens when these idiots with that mentality do that

[@BoosterTheRooster1]

@Philyutuber2022 Even if the company died it wouldnt happen. It would either get lost among whatever else they had, thrown away or who ever gets left in charge of it wont know what it is or probably even care about it's significance to gaming and just keep putting it off until they forget about it too

[@brodude3709]

It's true. When they die their family won't know what to do with them and will be thrown away because they won't know what it is.

[@Mike-or2cv]

I'm always amazed that this game was released so long ago, it really is great even today. The main drawback is the lack of a backpack, but other than that it has aged well.

[@MaestroColby]

So glad you got a hold of this!

[@NQQTNQQT]

The new title screen was likely a very last minute change, the games manual has a screen shot of the title screen using that old logo, and also when selecting continue to load your save file the old logo also scrolls in the background.

[@memegasm8972]

We need to crack these things open one by one

[@macuser7048]

I don't think it's right to grade prototypes before preservation. Having a rare video game is one thing, but a prototype that was never official and basically only good for historical documentation being graded sold for insanely high prices is just evil. Not EVERYTHING has to have a price. I heard they're even grading repros! NUTS!

[@Solaceon]

The thing is, they didn't even grade it! Why even bother?

[@ArcRay20]

preservation for all to see makes more sense than preservation for none to see. if its horded away from the public eye, then does it really exist? these kinds of collectors are "dragons hoarding gold" until the day they die and then their hoard is lost to time. unfortunately this story did involve someone's passing.😞

[@brodude3709]

It's true. When they die their family won't know what to do with them and will be thrown away because they won't know what it is.

[@goatbone]

Honestly if there is very little difference between the prototype and retail release, I can see why a collector may want to retain it's value by not releasing it publicly. It is probably worth more when the differences are a mystery.

[@Larry]

Those cases are a complete waste of time and money. Aside from knocks and scratches, they offer absolutely zero protection to oxygen or water. All they do is stop you playing the game.

[@Link_240]

there is UV resistant acrylic. but something tells me if this company falls for fake games...they arent smart enough to get the good stuff.

[@EffySalcedo]

2:00 RIP Zack, may he be in the land of peace and joy 🕊

[@Kosackk]

Can't you contact "Zacks" parents and explain what you guys are doing and what his collection means for alot of collectors? Maybe you can work out a deal with them?

[@mortemincarnatam2836]

Zack is probably just an aliase they mostly likely don't know him.

[@Kosackk]

@@mortemincarnatam2836 Well, it is, he said so in the video, but they seem to know who they are atleast, if not its easy for him to find out these days

[@Xeire]

We need more games preserved imagine if someone found the final builds of Silent hill 2 and 3 man that would be so damn incredible.....

[@damian9303]

The grade for prototypes should be determined by how many notable differences the dumped ROM contains, there would be so much less inflation if people were paying for the differences rather than just the discretion that it’s a prototype board. No other reason to send them something that isn’t NIB

[@js200gb]

Thank you for rescuing this game!

[@RabbitEarsCh]

Thank you both for doing this. While I fully trust the people doing dumps for Wata of these prototypes in order to verify, it's just sad that it's come to this, that we entomb prototypes and raise their value dramatically even when the actual differences aren't much. What's even sadder is that I would expect that some prototypes that are confirmed to be really good, do end up being valuable once people know what's on them. It's all a scam made out of fear. Also WOW the beta logo SUCKS. I'm so glad Natsume put in the extra work to get the iconic Harvest Moon logo worked out; it really ties everything about the game together.

[@ultimateman55]

I wouldn't fully trust WATA with anything...

[@RabbitEarsCh]

@@ultimateman55 I don't trust WATA. I do trust Frank Cifaldi's foundation, who are doing the dumps, however.

[@Clozof]

Tombs are not Preservation!

[@Underqualified_Gunman]

despite my only experiance of harvest moon being spiritual successors glad to see more of history preserved.

[@mushie8447]

For anyone who wants to open without hassle....iron saw blade, or band saw/table saw with a fine tooth blade.

[@adamsfusion]

My comment keeps getting deleted, that's so weird: Anyways, if you're the only one who holds something of value and there's no plan to pass that on to ensure it's taken care of, it's not actually preserved. Rather, it's just a matter of time until it's lost to history all over again.

[@robintst]

Beyond the collectors who selfishly hold onto such things, I wonder how many more veteran developers out there than we've seen who worked on these games back in the day still have old hard drives or floppy disks tucked away in their closets containing prototype and in-progress data they have no idea might be worth preserving. I'm sure some do but they're maybe afraid to share any of it because of some antiquated NDA they signed decades ago that probably doesn't hold up anymore.

[@InfiniteLoop]

I rode a 1977 Honda CB750 20 miles in the rain to get the only copy of this game to come to my town the day it came out, unfortunately almost my entire collection was pawned while I was at work by my now ex wife because "you've got a PS3 now and don't need all these old crappy games."

[@Nathan-rb3qp]

I hope you've found a new wife.

[@stwawbewwy]

When I was little my older brother and I had a copy of the og Harvest Moon (don't know what ever became of it) and I've been a fan ever since. My favorite entry is easily HM64. I actually own Japanese copies of both og Harvest Moon and HM64, haven't had a chance to plug them in and see if they work unfortunately.

[@farmingsim9813]

Chances are they work fine, cartridge games are normally reliable and they likely just need cleaned with some IPA and q-tips if anything

[@haunter8201]

it's eerie how many times an owner of a prototype or unreleased game ends up dying an untimely death. games are only preserved when they get put online!

[@brodude3709]

It's true. When they die their family won't know what to do with them and will be thrown away because they won't know what it is and they will be lost to time.

[@NintenDub]

It was harvest moon!? That's cool as hell

[@TheGelatinousSnake]

It was a charming game. Proof? Remade so many times, even recently on Nintendo Switch. Mineral Town is just too good

[@SerabiiBot]

Wata Games more like Wata Waste. Wata Scam, even.

[@Drake9X]

The day Wata gets shut down, my depression will be cured

[@tsukakoto]

speaking of saving media preservation some guy is selling an unreleased version of Decathlon for the 3do on ebay rn for like a grand. i'd buy it to save it but I'm broke af so rip.

[@TerraWare]

It's interesting how big collectors define game preservation, it's usually from selfish perspective like this copy of Harvest Moon for example. The original owner wanted it preserved for himself which is fine, considering he owns and the fact that it's not dumped makes it more special to him to games and even these early demos are meant to be played and experienced. It's what games are, they're not defined by the box art or a PCB it's the content be made available for people to experience.

[@vtubersilvionimbus7542]

As a former collector myself, I can't understand the mindset of people like Zach. How does releasing a digital copy of a prototype game onto the internet, for others to observe and document, devalue the unique physical item you have? That's like saying the Mona Lisa is worthless because I can print out a picture of it from Google Images and tape it to my wall. 🤦‍♂

[@Chris-zc7xj]

Yea it's basically just being selfish that's all 😤

[@CircleOfTheSeptagram]

Man, dumping ROMs with WATA is like some serious monkey's paw, deal with the devil tier stuff. This is such a weird situation that doesn't really have an analogue in any other media.

[@zacharymendola1251]

you are a legend tony lol good stuff !

[@randchuck2492]

Imagine paying WATA however much money (any amount is too much) just for them to send you a plastic box and "No grade" lol.

[@nickolaswilcox425]

to be fair, what is there to grade? a bare prototype board doesnt exactly comply with typical condition remarks, but yeah its a bit of a joke

[@damian9303]

@@nickolaswilcox425 by how much unique data not present in the retail game exists.

[@nickolaswilcox425]

@@damian9303 such a score would be nice for prototypes, get an idea how different they are, but a variance score isnt a condition score which is what wata does, they screw up enough as is, no need for them to enter fields they are even less familiar with

[@Gelgoog]

God I hate collectors for that sole reason. Betas and Protos deserved to be dumped, quite literally "It belongs in a museum". Hoarding them for some make believe monetary value when the market is so small for them is heinous

[@summerlaverdure]

you're a real one H4G

[@jakesteel2423]

The mentality of I have it so it's preserved is so stupid. Dump it, share it. If your "preserved" copy can't be played and can be destroyed by a house fire or natural disaster, is is NOT PRESERVED.

[@SinKillerJ]

I really hate this practice, it is hard enough to find some of these games as it is. Even outside of this new collectors market, hording has been a huge issue in the arcade scene for years.

[@SuperDuperVision]

You got a new fan and sub from me, I look forward to more content

[@hard4games]

Thank you!

[@Glacier_Nester]

Friendly reminder that WATA has an outstanding agreement with the video game history foundation, to privately have the contents of the cartridges they're sent backed up. They're not available to the public, but the cart is not the only copy. Don't get me wrong, I've never understood the whole tombing "collectable" games culture, and I don't love seeing a game trapped like that, but there's not nearly as much risk as one would expect of complete loss.

[@michaelstevenson5044]

Toggle with the switches on the board? Maybe that will change things

[@brodude3709]

That's true

[@RougeOrange]

Another Hard4Games banger

[@ricanteja]

Can you imagine Zack's family just throws his collection away and it ends up in a land fill somewhere. People who do this, do they understand the potential for data to be lost forever?

[@Jenisonc]

I'm no "real" gamer but I love playing my retro games on my OG hardware. Wata can suck a tailpipe. They have made that way to hard to continue to do. Glad to see them slipping.

[@corsegerspwnd]

I will never ever get used to this channels name

[@barowt]

Everything must be opened and verified now... Verified to be real and working.. and clean..

[@TeddyBelcher4kultrawide]

lotta boyz got harvest moon

[@cabbusses]

Let's hope we find more of "Zack's" Protos someday.

[@mamaharumi]

Well, now I need to know what was in and what happened to Zack's collection, lol

[@ItsTeezoUBZ]

In the beginning the Chick 🐥 was in a Different position. It matters

[@InazumaDash]

Don't wanna mock a dead person but anyone who is still alive should be criticized for sending games to Wata. Wata should be laughed at for grading Pokémon rom hacks. Please never buy graded games either. You may be able to find a nice copy that you can actually play and still keep it in a protective box. Or at least have the option to. The only reason I see why people buy graded and sealed games is for people to sell them and make profit. Absolute dorks. Stay selling baseball cards or something that doesn't have a function. Leave our hobby alone.

[@NatnatGaming101]

Whenever I heard of preservation in gaming term, it keeps reminding me of hi-ten bomberman (NOT charabom) osts not being released because copyright is holding a gunpoint at it from what I heard

[@supyo1]

Entombing it isn’t your issue. It’s code hoarding. How it’s stored isnt your problem. This was specifically a video to bring up wata and vga. If I keep it in a closet it’s the same as a wata case. Or if I dump it and release it then put it in a wata case, where it sits after that doesn’t matter. Your issue is the decades long prototype collector argument. To release or not. It literally doesn’t matter where it sits.

[@hard4games]

Agree. But entombing it makes it more difficult to dump. It also sets a pretty clear intention: this and everything contained within is closed off.

[@korngod]

Much love for hard4games

[@babbygremlin]

H4G storytime!!!!

[@derpderp4415]

Can we get a super scenic metal jesus collabo?

[@RenegadeX28]

WATA has made acquiring games at fair prices impossible..screw them.

[@yeolemillinial8295]

hiding an undumped game so that no one can ever experience that version of it is hoarding not preservation

[@yeolemillinial8295]

seriously, if it was hoarded like that, it is as much as preserving the game as it was when Martin Shkreli bought a single wu tang album that would only get the one copy just to never release any of its music (cept like 1 minute of bootleg quality sound from it on youtube)

[@JelloFluoride]

HOW do you keep doing things like this?! I feel like people stumble upon gold more often than these lost prototypes. But here we are. Impressive.

[@damian9303]

He has the money and connections

[@MarioMadness1]

I kinda liked the harvest moon game. use too play all the time on emulators (never seen in stores tho)

[@ButcherGrindslam]

WATA? You spell "Fraud" wrong.

[@user-lt8cs3yk1n]

RESPECT

[@momar678]

I love it when people leave stuff to their kids putting the burden of selling it on them. Off to goodwill!

[@brodude3709]

It's true. When they die their family won't know what to do with them and will be thrown away because they won't know what it is and they don't care. The games will be lost to time.

[@kenh6096]

Love it!

[@johntorn]

Love this

[@david3199]

Watch Karl Jobst's video on the prices of games that are rated.

[@Reaperman4711]

1:52 Exactly right. ROM safely backed up, cart in protected case. That's extremely well preserved. One of the big complaints against proto collectors were that their games were rotting on chips, and dumping solves that. They can even be written back on need be (aka restoration). It's a stretch for public release to be considered any part of preservation.

[@Solaceon]

The files are obviously deleted by next of kin after their deaths, not shared, and definitely not used for restoration. The problem remains.

[@Reaperman4711]

@@Solaceon would having them privately on file in the archives of one or more video game museums even satisfy? If I had to guess, it's the desire for public availability driving a set of moving goalposts.

[@jironamos7650]

@@Reaperman4711 Public availability is true preservation, if its not in the internet archive, then its not preserved.

[@meetoo594]

With backups you need redundancy so if one source (watas servers or some knobhead collector) gets compromised there are still others to restore and preserve the game for people to study and enjoy. The best way of doing this is to offer it for download on multiple sites/torrents etc so tens of thousands of backups exist worldwide on everything from a home pcs to multiple servers. The chances of it ever being lost are then almost zero, barring total society collapse.

[@niospartan]

I can understand collecting prototype games, but I'll never understand hoarding them without sharing the backups but keeping personal ones for "preservation". It just sounds like an exploitative way to make money.

[@zigzagzarf]

hate the sealed grading scourge...cant believe the idiots didn't cover the chips

[@MarioKartSuperCircuit]

I wonder if Zach had a Prototype of Mario Kart Super Circuit in his collection?...

[@BCosby423]

Entombing a prototype and hoarding the ROM isn't preservation. It's trying to make a profit off of the mystery of what's on it. And potentially endangering the prototype if you entomb it with its battery, or in a case that someone has to BREAK OPEN to get inside of. But, they just see that it's something people value. Not realizing that the value is what's on the chips, not the chips themselves. The board isn't the important part, the data is. Also, I feel like if they're describing themselves as a "high end collector" then they're doing this more for the ego and the money rather than actually caring about the games. It could be old bottles of dish soap that are worth the same and they'll think the same thing about it.

[@RyukyuShin1997]

Pretty sure if the rom is dumped, the physical prototype would still have it's value

[@ZachAttackIsBack]

Yeah, I don't really get the whole thing where they won't release the rom. It's not like the new owner of the prototype can dump it and then sell the software. Game collecting is all about the physical item rather than the software, anyway.

[@Solaceon]

"Lost media" unfortunately comes with its own premium.

[@kombi9648]

Im sorry I cant find mu bookmark for the good site that has al the dev and rare and disks for sail. I just cant find it. I know it was a forum. But just cant find. Likes its info

[@_calejon]

HANDSOME Tony ❤️❤️😍😍

[@ibapreppie]

Ah stuff thats been incased in the sham of WATA