Holding on to the past

How is Japan's Game Preservation Society doing in its mission to preserve its own future?

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We touched on the efforts of Japan's Game Preservation Society, a volunteer-run organisation committed to preserving physical copies of Japanese games, in E377. It was concerning, then, to read in April that it was in dire straits. A Time Extension report indicated that, without more financial support, GPS would run out of cash by September.

Fortunately, when we meet the society's president and co-founder, Joseph Redon, at its headquarters in Tokyo's suburbs, he has some better news for us. "We are not bleeding any more," Redon says. Since the news broke, GPS has had an influx of supporters, mainly from the US, almost doubling from the 400odd supporters from Japan.

Redon admits this is a short-term victory, as the additional funds are only estimated to sustain the organisation for another year. It nonetheless means it's been able to restart its mission, which includes digitally migrating tens of thousands of Japanese physical games from the '80s and '90s, including their packaging and instruction manuals, plus volumes of game publications from those periods. (These specific tasks enable the non-profit organisation to apply for subsidies from the Japanese government.) Of course, more funds are required in order to keep a physical archive running.