87% of classic video games are ‘critically endangered.’ As a millennial, I’m worried it means a huge chunk of my childhood will disappear.

• Almost 90% of classic video games are critically endangered, according to a new study.
• Restrictive copyright law and games fading from distribution means some might never be played by future generations.
• As a millennial, I’m worried a huge chunk of my childhood will be gone forever.

My first video game console was the Game Boy, a portal to many hours of adventure and excitement.

I got it when I was nine. For every test I did well on in school, my reward was a new game. I spent many evenings glued to it with my brother, immersed in a colourful new worlds.

But today, much like other gadgets that have gone out of style, the Game Boy is a relic mostly kept by collectors and those with the know-how to maintain it — a representation of how fleeting video game culture feels.

For the first time, a joint July 10 study by the Video Game History Foundation and Software Preservation Network puts a number to that feeling: About 87% of video games released in the US before 2010 are “critically endangered.”

The Game Boy’s days are limited

Games released on the Game Boy or the historic Commodore 64 are especially vulnerable, per the report. The study was conducted by checking the availability of 1,500 randomly selected video games released before 2010 across every type of console and PC.

The reason behind this doomsday prediction is that games don’t stay on store shelves forever and are constantly falling out of commercial distribution. Only the most popular games — like Pokemon or Sonic — get re-released, per the study.

Copyright laws also prevent cultural institutions like libraries from preserving and sharing games the same way they do with books and films, the report said.

That means a large swathe of classic games — like Metal Gear or Unreal Tournament — are now inaccessible.

The study’s author says the availability of these classic video games is even worse than the survival rate of silent-era films.

Bidding farewell to my millennial childhood

The video game industry is bigger than both the film and music industries, the Federal Trade Commission said in a report last year. Globally, video games raked in $170 billion in 2022. The industry is valued at $180 billion today, per the July report.

And despite raking in more than five times the revenue of global box office sales last year, video games are still treated as a class of their own under copyright law — without the exemptions needed for us to preserve them.

While a huge chunk of the video game industry is at risk, for me, this feels like an important part of my millennial childhood could be gone forever.

The next discussion over video games’ copyright law is slated for 2024, and the clock is ticking. Our cultural history of play is too precious to let 87% of it slip away.