Sony announced last week that it will cease production and sales of physical video games by January 2028. This is seen as the end of the era of physical video games after decades of enjoyment.
Recently, a German video game preservation organization known as the Internationale Computerspielesammlung (ICS) is reported to be closing soon, as funding from public bodies of 1.5 million Euros has been used up, and the German government seems to be withdrawing its funding.
This is seen as very sad because the ICS organization currently owns 60 thousand copies of video game titles on physical media including floppy disks, CDs, DVDs, and cartridges across various gaming platforms, making it the largest physical game repository in the world to date.
Although these games are registered under the ICS, they are kept by their original owners, including institutions such as the Computerspielemuseum Berlin, the Game Video Game Association, and the University of Potsdam.
The ICS project has been underway since 2019, with the project set to be completed by the end of 2025, with the Berlin Senate providing funding of 1.5 million Euros. However, at that time, it was already known that the project would probably not receive any additional funding after April 2026, and that is exactly what happened.
A request for additional funding was made, but as expected, the request was not approved, and as a result, the project will be terminated, even though it was only just completed.
As a result, the ICS project will be buried, with new physical copies of the game no longer being archived under that name, but it seems that the existing ownership will still be held by the institutions involved in the project.
Media preservation projects are a noble act, as they allow future generations to see for themselves how old technology worked and was used before it became as advanced as it is today, where video and computer games are more commonly enjoyed as digital downloads, and no longer require physical media.
However, if no one is willing to invest money to cover the costs of collecting and maintaining this media, or to turn it into a successful business, it is seen as a difficult endeavor to sustain in the long term.
