The Past
as the Future? Nostalgia and Retrogaming in Digital Culture
Jaakko Suominen,
University
of Turku,Finland
Introduction
Retro games. Simultaneously with the console and computer
games becoming increasingly impressive both visually and in their dramatics,
the old, simple Super Mario Bros, Pacmans and Donkey Kongs have become hits. In
the rush hour buses, teenagers roll their Rubik’s cube – the one and only.
Sanna Leskinen, ‘Mikä mahtaa olla in?’ (‘What would be in?’),
Yhteishyvä 3/2006.
At the end of the year 2005 the
Finnish commercial TV channel MTV3 freshened their appearance. The owl logo of
the company, which has been in use for a long time, bended again into new
shapes. The owl lived on as a animated figure, who offers services and, particularly,
as a stylized eye in the channel sign logos. The sign themes marking the
beginnings and endings of commercial breaks place the owl eye into new,
culturally recognizable situations, which try to achieve comedy and
inventiveness. The owl eye is not just an eye anymore, but appears on screen as
a figure varying its forms and roles (see Figure 1).
The new owl animations of the MTV3
commercial breaks have, for example, been associated with seasonal festivals
and sports, but we can also find indications of the gaming culture. In one of
the first commercial break signs a Pong game, a sort of electric ping pong, in
which pixel rackets bounce a virtual ball, was being played. Later in the
spring of 2006, the logo chased pills reminiscent of the coin up machines of
the Namco company and the videogame character Pac-Man from the early 1980s.
Figure 1. MTV3 commercial break emblem, referring to Pac-Man, 2006.
Even though both themes have been
drawn away from the original, many of us can recognize their intermedial reference
to 1970’s and 1980’s game classics. [1] Images and sounds from the central
features of Pac-Man and Pong have sort of eaten their way into our retina and
eardrums. This has taken place due to the fact that they are both among the
most recycled games from one device to another. Pong became familiar in the
early 1970s arcade games and the late 1970s TV games that spread into
households.
The importance of Pong has been
acknowledged in research and in (semi-)popular literature. In Joystick
Nation, which praises the history of games, J.C. Hertz (1997: 14) names the
earliest gaming eras as ‘The Pre-Pong Era’ (–1972), and ‘The Pong Era’
(1972–1977), which signifies when the game in question grows to symbolize a
whole era of electronic gaming and appears as a central element in the critical
period of the gaming culture. Pac-Man, on the other hand, is mentioned in many
works concerning the history of electronic gaming as an early personalized
videogame character, followed later by characters such as Donkey Kong, Mario
and Lara Croft. According to some texts, Pac-Man attracted an increasing number
of female gamers into gaming and was conducive to the birth of a whole new game
type, the maze. At the beginning of the 1980s Pac-Man spread from arcade halls
into home computers, became popular on various consumer goods from back-packs
to pillow cases, and was referred to in magazine articles, television shows and
pop music hits (Herz, 1997; Malliet and de Meyer, 2005; Kent, 2001) (See also Figures
2, 3, and 8).
In no time the yellow Pac-Man
character and icon became a sign for the aesthetic digital style of a
particular period. It still remains as such, as it appears continuously in new
game products and popular culture, e.g. in music and cartoons. According to a study
which included a survey concerning the computer memories of Finnish people, it
is Pac-Man that stands out as one of the most familiar and best-remembered old
games among over 30–year-olds (Aaltonen, 2004).
The examples above show how the
cultural history of games is present even today. They reveal how the cultural
history of games is bending into new shapes and how this thematic recycling is
used to gain commercial benefits. Therefore, I argue in this paper that these examples
in gaming prove three things: 1) digital culture as a whole is evolving and
maturing, 2) one future trend in gaming and digital culture is recycling the
past, and 3) for these reasons digital culture as an academic discipline should
become even more conscious of aspects of the cultural heritage of technology.
In this paper I analyze different aspects of retrogaming in the historical
context, looking for answers to the following interconnected questions: Does
the change in the computer user groups and gamers explain why retrogaming has
become more popular, or why retrogaming as a cultural phenomenon has expanded?
Has retrogaming had an influence on the contents of games and the appreciation
of gaming? What sorts of different hobbies are associated with retrogaming? How
has the increasing interest in retrogaming been used, then, for financial gain?
Finally, I discuss how familiarity and nostalgic interest in older technology
is incorporated into technological change and innovation.
The Cultures of History Within Gaming
Pac-Man and Pong bring out some
features of the gaming culture within the cultures of history. The
cultures of history mean the ways of producing and using artifacts, images and
information concerning the past. Cultures of history are a kind of modern
culture, which takes form from the ways of encountering the past, from
traditions, events and the meanings given to the past (Koselleck, 1985; Salmi,
2004; Sivula and Suominen, 2004).
Cultural historian Hannu Salmi (2004)
distinguishes five ways or means by which the past is among us in the
present-day. The past appears as memory, experience, customs, artifacts and
commodities. As for the cultures of history within the games, the past is
present in a person’s own memories of playing, and, among other things, in the
collective memory represented on the Internet and on-line discussion forums.
The experience of the history of culture is present, for example, when we play
both familiar and new games: we take advantage of our earlier gaming
experiences in new gaming situations, because we have learned to recognize the
logic, rules, plots and actions associated with the games. Our earlier gaming
experiences have taught us to act in a certain way when playing. On the other
hand, our earlier experiences have an influence on how we return to familiar
games or how we choose new games to play. At this point we can already talk
about the customs of the cultures of history in gaming. The customs include the
conventionalized habits and routines to play either alone or together, and the
tendency to return over and over again to play old games, especially computer
games from the 80s (so-called retrogaming), or to purchase familiar games for
new gaming devices such as Sony PSP, Nintendo Wii or Microsoft Xbox360. The
artifacts connected with the cultural history of games are, for instance, the
famous and somehow special game devices and games such as the first coin-up
games or home consoles, now presented in museums and private collections. The
line between the artifacts and commodities becomes less clear when old devices
and game software are bought and sold at Internet auction sites. Various music
videos, works of art, books and new editions and revisions of old game products
(for instance being bought in online shops for the new generation consoles such
as Nintendo Wii and Xbox360) – in some degree commercials as well – are also
commodities of the cultures of history (Sivula and Suominen, 2004).
Figure 2. Pac-Man softie toy top of
Atari ST512 computer.
Photo taken in 2007 by Jaakko Suominen.
The past culture of games, in its
many forms, is very central in gaming culture today. James Newman (2004) also
draws attention to this fact in his recently published textbook on digital
gaming. In a chapter on future gaming Newman mentions three modern trends in
gaming: mobile games, on-line games and retrogaming. Thus, a strong rising
trend in future gaming in different situations and platforms is the re-use of the
old. Newman refers to retrogaming at two levels: firstly, retrogaming means
present-day gaming with the genuine, 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s game devices
and applications. Secondly, it means the use of emulators in playing the
games. On the other hand, Petri Saarikoski (2004: 254), who has studied the
history of computer hobbyist cultures in Finland, defines retrogaming somewhat more
broadly as a general term for subcultures that appreciate old computer games.
This phenomenon includes collecting old games and game devices as well as their
active playing. Both scholars see retrogaming as a form of gaming culture that
is partly marginal but which is emerging to become more common. Typically the
current retrogaming refers particularly to the usage of game devices that were
used before personal computers (common since the early 1990’s).
According to Newman, retrogaming
has, among other things, been advertised as a return to pure, genuine or
authentic gaming, and based on Newman’s interpretation one can come to a
conclusion: that the idea of retrogaming is a situation in which everything
superfluous has been eliminated. We have witnessed a return to the origins,
where pleasure and playability are attained with simple facts and where the use
of capacity is maximized. This idea has been crystallized, for instance, in a
fragment of a review by JP Tiira in the Finnish Pelit-magazine (1992): ‘When
we were kids and (Commodore) sixty-four was dynamite, numerous role-playing
games were packed into the memory of the old warhorse (…), the secret lay under
the cover: the games had that something, which created the genuine feeling of
search and adventure, in spite of its usually quite simple graphics’ (Saarikoski,
2004).
The word retro, which originates
from Latin, refers to a return, a comeback, or something repetitive. Therefore
retrogaming hints usually - but not always - at returning, whether it means the
consumer’s return or retrogression to childhood, or an intention to
(re-)achieve something pure or preferable. It means, most likely, both seeking
and yearning for an acquainted set of rules and familiar fictional worlds (Juul,
2006).
As a phenomenon, retrogaming is,
however, more complicated than a particular modern trend or a return to
something, and the aim of this paper is to widen the interpretations of other
scholars concerning the meaning of retrogaming. In the next chapter, I will
begin with a critical transcription of retrogaming by examining questions of
gamers’ ages in relation to their interest in older games and gaming devices.
Middle-Aged Juveniles – Is The Maturation Of Gamers An Explanation For Retrogaming Fashion?
Statistics Finland published a new leisure survey in 2005
which included the consumption of rock music among the middle-aged. Rock,
initially a youth culture, has aged with its performers as well as with its
consumers. While in 1981 only some 10 percent of 35–44-year-old Finns declared
that they listened to rock music, by 2002 this figure rose to 70 percent
(Ekholm, 2005). Increasingly, the older age groups also collect records and are
more likely to go to rock concerts or play an instrument. Old artists and music
records are still popular along with the new ones.
One can find a parallel between rock music and digital
games as forms of popular culture. Similar middle-ageing can be seen in digital
gaming culture, which is probably one reason for the continuous interest
towards older gaming products. A good number of those who started to play
digital games in the 1980s have not, or at least not entirely, given up on
playing games at an older age. According to many statistics, especially the
ones introduced by the representatives of the gaming industry, the average age
of computer and other digital gamers is on the rise. In 2003 the average age of
gamers, according to the organization representing the game manufacturers of
the USA (Entertainment Software Association, ESA), was 28 years, and over 40
percent of the gamers were women. According to the same organization, over
35-year-olds are the most eager age group to play PC games and people under 35
years favor console games most strongly. In Japan, adult gaming may be even
more common, especially in age groups under 35 years. In Finland, the
situation is probably similar to that of the United States and Japan, even
though the national and regional differences should not be overlooked and any
generalizations of the situation should not be done without accurate data.
According to the Statistics Finland leisure survey in 2002, a little over 60
percent of 15–34-year-old people used the computer to play games, some 30
percent played with game devices (i.e. game consoles), and about 20 percent
often played with a computer or a game machine (Melkas, 2005). Particularly
during the past ten years, the devices used in digital gaming have been
established as an essential part of Finnish households.
The previous statistics should be studied critically. As
the game researcher Markku Eskelinen (2005) states in his report concerning the
game industry, observations about the expansion of the field of gamers can be
applied to the game industry itself. In Eskelinen’s opinion, the statistical argument
regarding the equality between the sexes and across generations fits nicely
with the ideal self-image of the game industry. In particular, the statistics
presented by various special-interest groups of the game industry do not exactly
inform us about how gamers differ from each other (Eskelinen, 2005). For
example, according to many independent studies, young boys spend significantly
more time playing games and talking about them than young girls do (Suoninen,
2002; Melkas, 2005). Age and the level of education are also important factors
in gaming. According to Statistics Finland, in the age group of 15–34 among the
higher educated people there are many who do not play at all (Melkas, 2005). Moreover,
according to some studies, it still seems that parents play digital games very
little either alone or with their children. According to Laura Ermi et al.,
there is still a gaming gap between parents and children, which has an
influence on the attitudes of parents. A gamer adult may even be seen as a
threat, being someone who breaks certain limits and forgets his/hers position
as an authority (Ermi et al, 2005; Ermi and Mäyrä, 2003).
Figure 3. The new Pac-Man for PSP handheld console
Photo
taken in 2006 by Jaakko Suominen.
Some interest groups and actors, however, strongly promote
the idea of the maturity of gaming. Markku Eskelinen (2005) claims that the
gaming industry uses such arguments for statistics and calculation, which
justify the image of a big and significant line of industry. Also, according
to Eskelinen, it is in the interests of the game industry to appear as a
socially responsible servant of the needs of the whole family, in a context
where the effects and contents of games still raise suspicions in many households.
Eskelinen (2005) questions the ‘commonly articulated wish or supposedly
observed trend, according to which the contents of games “mature” as the gamers
grow older’.
Therefore, it
is important to separate the ‘maturing’ of the contents from the possible
middle-ageing of gamers. Media culture – also represented by digital games –
comprises a certain infantilism, childishness or juvenility that may even have
become stronger recently. In his book Mediatajun paluu (Return of Media
Sense), Jukka Sihvonen (2004: 17) argues that media culture uses the idea of
juvenility to promote production, nourishment and renewal. Sihvonen states,
without making any evaluations, that in the heart of media culture there is an
individual, defined by ‘boredom, restlessness and egocentricism’. Sihvonen
(2004, 114–115) makes yet another point: if viewed from the perspective of
their usage, games appear mostly as an instinctive entertainment, and a form of
being together based on the drive to compete. Thus, they show the ideological
principal of juvenility in media culture (Sihvonen, 2004: 114-115.
Nostalgia In Product-Making
We can also use another word of foreign origin in relation
to retrogaming – nostalgia. In gaming cultures it refers to a kind of yearning
for earlier gaming situations or games. One can ask, by elaborating upon Jesper
Juul’s ideas of gaming, in which sense the yearning focuses on learned rules or
fictional worlds constructed in earlier gaming situations, or both together
(Juul, 2006).
The word nostalgia is based on a Greek word referring to
the agony of home-coming. The meaning of the word nostalgia has varied in the
course of centuries and it has been used, among other things, to refer to
different physical and psychic disorders caused by moving somewhere else from
the original home area. In its present meaning, nostalgia is not usually
defined on clinical grounds. Melancholy and even actual ‘basking’ in the past
is associated with nostalgic reminiscences.
In addition to the individual psychological level, the term
contains a strong collective – if not even collectivising – dimension (Korkiakangas,
1999; Sallinen, 2004; Koivunen, 2001). In media culture, longing for something
old is a mutual event when it refers to such old moments, situations and
experiences, which have been shared with friends and family, or even with the
nation or ‘the whole world’. Nostalgia has been seen as an explanation to the
success of certain kinds of media presentations, such as historical documentaries
and fiction series on television, and as a trend in modern culture. A scholar
of media studies, Anu Koivunen critiques the above-mentioned explanation for
nostalgia, for which it is common, among other things, to include an individual
or a single event in greater changes or critical periods in world order or
community, or in the differences between generations. These differences are
connected, for instance, with people moving to towns from the countryside or
the structural changes in consumption or in working life (2001: 224-245).
Whether it is a trend or not, the desire for nostalgic
basking can be satisfied with various consumer goods. Markku Eskelinen mentions
the recent products of Japanese game companies, ‘which with the aid of quite
clever pastiche and a slightly increased degree of difficulty attract those
parents who play games with their children and who have played similar games
already in the 80s’ (Eskelinen, 2005). Thus, scholars refer to a certain
consumeristic-simulational product-making of nostalgia, which emerged and
strengthened with the rest of the consumer society in the 1960s. The goal of
product makers is not solely to benefit from an existing nostalgic relationship
of some kind, but also to train towards a nostalgic attitude (Koivunen,
2001). Nostalgia is rendered a tool of consumption, the repetition and
simulation of earlier experiences being the aim of nostalgic product-making.
As far as games are concerned, and also otherwise, the
product-making of nostalgia does not only mean the making of new editions of
Pac-mans, Pongs and Super Marios, with extras and digital remastering, as is
widely the case with the digitalization of records, movies and television
series. Digital cultural production is often, but not solely, about adding
extras, giving additional value and making new versions. Although nostalgic
sensibility might be the central factor that makes a product more attractive,
it is possible to view nostalgia as a much wider phenomenon than retrogaming (Sivula
and Suominen, 2004). According to Koivunen, nostalgia is not an explanation but
a question, which ‘concerns objects, forms, meanings as well as effects’ (2001).
So, we can wonder what kinds of forms nostalgia takes, how it changes and is
renewed, to which products it is targeted, how it is being used in making new
products within gaming cultures, and who the product makers are.
Gaming
Nostalgia in Music Videos
Even in a superficial observation of the gaming culture(s)
we crash into a jungle or a complex web of forms and targets of nostalgia.
Nowadays, the retro phenomenon associated with nostalgia can, in the first
place, be seen as a kind of an aesthetic repetition style of media culture,
which refers strongly to the audiovisual styles of the 1980s, and game types
and classic game icons such as Pac-man, Pong, Tetris and Mario in particular.
These overlapping aesthetic repetition styles are visible in new game products
and websites such as the Habbo Hotel (http://www.habbohotel.fi) (See figure 6.)
and Aapeli (http://www.aapeli.com), as well as in
game literature and academic studies, pop videos, graphic signs of TV channels
and audiovisual representations of digital (dance) music. In this section I
will make a preliminary analysis of several few music videos with a retrogaming
theme.
Figure 4.
Rock’n Roll High School video by Teddybears STHLM.
Besides the songs themselves, the retro aesthetics is
revealed and highlighted particularly with the aid of record cover art and
music videos, with the artists using retrogaming themes in varying ways.
References to older games is a fashion in popular videos (especially
popularized around the year 2000), but it also holds potential for a more
critical or ironical evaluation of the gaming culture itself. In music videos,
retrogaming themes are also used to promote some political issues. (For more
complete list of retrogaming music videos and TV commercials, see my web-page, http://www.tuug.fi/~jaakko/tutkimus/retro-game-videos.php).
Examples of retro aesthetics in music videos include: Junior
Senior’s ‘Move Your Feet’, where viewers can identify elements of the colour
scheme, speed and images of 8-bit computers (e.g. Commodore 64), or the graphic
adventure games for PC by Sierra Online from both sides of the mid-80s; or the
video ‘Rock’n Roll High School’ by Teddybears STHLM (see Figure 4) which refers
more strongly to the somewhat later game aesthetics of the 16-bit Commodore
Amiga. It is also essential, however, how different people divergently place
and identify the references of origin through their own experiences; a single
origin, be it a certain game or a computer, is not necessarily to be found.
Press Play On
Tape (see Figure 5), on the other hand, whose name comes from the tape drive
starting command shown on the Commodore 64 computer screen, matches confessions
of computer love and clashes of boybands in their video ‘Comic Bakery’ (larger
than Pop Boyband mix). The clichés have been picked especially from the
performances of the Backstreet Boys, but also from other boybands. The result
is an intentionally comical pastiche, where the delicate theme of teenage love
has been twisted; instead of a girl, the object of emotions is a computer. The
video also parodies the use of the auto tuning – the singing-voice converter
effect, which became familiar in the performances of Cher, Pet Shop Boys, Daft
Punk and various other artists.
The piece
from Press Play On Tape is an arrangement of the music for a known 1980s
Commodore game, Comic Bakery (composed by Martin Galway). On the video,
there is a fragment where the artists are wandering in the atmosphere of a
1980s karate game, ‘Way of the Exploding Fist’. Supposedly, this video has not
been widely distributed in music channels, unlike the videos mentioned before,
some of which have even been awarded. According to the homepage of the Danish
band, the video had its premiere in a local pub and has since gained attention
in Commodore 64 forums (see http://www.remix64.com/tune_137100.html).
Figure 5. Press Play on Tape: “Comic Bakery”.
How can the examples above, and the Press Play On Tape video
in particular, be analyzed? It is possible to categorize the latter video as a
manifestation of fan culture, which highlights the juvenility mentioned above.
Jukka Sihvonen (2004, 174–175) cites the seven theses of juvenility presented
by Henry Jenkins in his book Textual Poachers (1992), which seem to be applied to many forms of the
consumption and performance of retro culture. Jenkins’ theses, based on the
study of Star Trek devotees, are ironic and meant to describe the general view
of the social limitations of juvenile fans. Sihvonen notes, that according to
Jenkins’ theses, a typical fan is devoted to ‘(a) mindless consumption, (b)
cherishing worthless knowledge, (c) idealizing trashy culture and (d)
worshipping his/hers idol without having a life. This kind of lack of one’s own
experiences makes the fan (e) “feminine” or even asexual (f) an emotionally and
intellectually handicapped human being, who has (g) perpetual difficulties in
separating reality from fiction’ (Sihvonen, 2004; Jenkins, 1992). The Press
Play On Tape video could well be presented as such a product, a mindless
consumption and a waste of time, which represents the emotional, sexual and
intellectual juvenility and alienation of its makers.
Thereafter, however, Sihvonen enters a dialogue between the
previous statements and the counter-characterisations made by Jenkins at the
end of his book, which aims to refute a stereotypical view of fanhood.
According to Jenkins and Sihvonen ‘being a fan requires special (a) forms of
receiving and usage, (b) means and equipment of critical and interpreting
action, (c) principals of activism that is founded upon consumption and (d)
reproduction of traditions and customs. All these put together mean that
fanhood concentrated on a particular phenomenon forms (e) a unique, alternative
social community” (Sihvonen, 2004; Jenkins, 1992). Indeed, the Press Play On
Tape video is actually directed to a certain alternative audience, which reacts
to the very many forms and products of media culture with criticism and new
interpretations. Moreover, the video exemplifies the potential of spontaneous
production, performing and distribution of media.
The pop video examples mentioned inform us about a sensitive
and versatile relationship with old digital games. Various references to the
world of older games and also different ways of narration have been well used
in the videos. Although the forms in which the digital game relationship becomes
apparent could be criticized, the videos tell particularly about the potential
to renew customs and tradition. That ability is not limited to a making of
retrogaming music and music videos. In many cases, the question is not so much
about seeing and seeking commercial potentiality, but about media producers and
certain groups of consumers sharing the gaming experience (or a part of it),
and reworking it by using the resources of nostalgia. As Henry Jenkins argues,
the fan community does not clearly separate artists from consumers. All fans
are potential writers or other kinds of artists, whose talents just need to be
noticed, nourished and introduced. Even the most unassuming works enrich the
cultural heritage of a wider fan community (Jenkins, 1992). Fans (or devotees
of the 80s micro computer cultures in this case) form a social community,
outside which the works also have their value, for a common subjective
empirical ground is not necessarily needed between the producers and the
audience. The 1980s style for other generations, older and younger, is familiar
as a fashionable repetition style in particular. In addition to a subculture,
retrogaming thus becomes part of the mainstream of popular culture.
Games,
devices, watches, clothes…
Figure 6.
Habbo Hotel’s Snow ball fight advertisement 19th January 2007
http://www.habbo.fi/games
The
aesthetics of retrogaming can also act as an inside joke or a source of
inspiration. This seems especially to be the case with the popular virtual
environment of the Habbo Hotel. Mikael Johnson (2006) has observed how in
research interviews some of the designers of the Habbo Hotel-environment have
made references to Commodore 64 games as their central source of inspiration.
The interviewed persons have stated that the Habbo Hotel looks retro compared
to other web environments (Johnson, 2006). The Habbo Hotel users are young, and
for them the 1980’s digital graphics and game perspective do not primarily work
through nostalgia. It rather offers a clear, easy and attractively different
game environment, without remedial and intermedial references to earlier game
aesthetics. The designers, on the other hand, seem to share a nostalgic
attraction to the 1980’s game aesthetics, whose isometric perspective
originates among others from Knight Lore (1984) for Sinclair Spectrum, Head
Over Heels (1987) for Commodore 64 and other devices, and from other
similar games (see: http://www.mameworld.net/retroview/spectrum/knight_loreuser.htm and phttp://linkchecker.stacken.kth.se/c64/06top.html).
Those consumer
goods, which are marketed with the aid of earlier games or as their actual
copies, have a different commercial tone. As a long-term computer hobbyist
working with digital culture, I am also personally a splendid target for these
kind of products. In addition to a DigDug -t-shirt and an Atari Centipede-watch
by Fossil, I have in my collection a Plug & Play TV game by Jakks Pacific,
which contains five coin-up game classics. This product has many versions,
which have all proved commercially successful. Many companies have followed the
example of Jakks Pacific. Edge, a central publication in the field of
gaming, took notice of this in their October 2005 issue (see Figure 7); Edge introduced dozens of game products, which have sold millions of copies worldwide
in places out of the ordinary, such as discount stores. Anson Sawby, marketing
director of Jakks who was interviewed by Edge, refers particularly to
the middle-ageing of the gamers behind the marketing potential: ‘The market was
initially fuelled by people in their 30s or 40s or even 50s… They grew up
playing games, but aren’t prepared to splash out on a PlayStation’ (Edge,
October 2005). Gamers miss old, well-known games and are not necessarily
prepared to adopt new, more complex games. From the previous utterance one
could also derive an interpretation that old games suit older gamers better,
also in their use of time. Gaming fits the fragmentary, momentary and hectic
lifestyle of the information and mobile society in which, as suggested by Jukka
Sihvonen and other researchers, there is just not enough time to concentrate on
gaming over a long period.
Figure 7.
Plug’n Play retro devices presented in Edge Magazine October 2005.
The previous
examples show that a whole new line of the game industry, which uses a notable
marketing segment of the gaming nostalgia in its products, has been born. This
line of industry includes new enterprises, but also those (such as Nintendo,
Microsoft and Sony) who have been involved longer and have taken retro products
into their product-making. And, time after time, there is always something to
recycle; after the 1970s and 1980s, the early 1990s products will be targeted.
On the other
hand, working on and recycling gaming culture themes based on amateur work,
which is not primarily about commercial benefit but also about respect to and
maintenance of older gaming culture, should be acknowledged. In this case, the
idea is not about testing the limits of the marketing potential, but about
subjective cultural production and being a ‘true amateur’.
Figure 8.
French gaming stamps. 2006.
Will to Preserve
According
to the Edge, some of the retro game products have been commercialised
based on device or programme adaptations made by computer amateurs. Actually,
the role of active amateurs or hobbyists in preserving and renewing the retro
culture is quite central. Petri Saarikoski has noted that the nostalgia of
gaming culture began in the late 1980s, right after the hobbyist computer
magazines started to write about the ‘death’ of 8-bit home computers (e.g.
Commodore 64, Spectravideo 328, Amstrad CPC, Sinclair Spectrum) (Saarikoski,
2001). It is noteworthy, that at the same time game journalism was also established,
and it produced a discourse of the cultural heritage of digital gaming. Game
critics showed their expertise by linking the new games along the cultural
continuum of the games and, among other things, by comparing these games to
earlier ones.
The
feeling of disappearance and loss of old games brought about a cherishing old
gaming culture, and Saarikoski sees this even as an effort by certain amateur
groups to separate themselves from the mainstream of amateur work which
concentrates on success (Saarikoski, 2001; 2004). The older game types and
styles had already been recycled earlier, and the nostalgization of the
idealistic early stages of computer hobbyism had begun. Steven Levy (1984), for
example, in his well-known book Hackers – Heroes of Computer Revolution,
claimed that enthusiastic computer amateurs were enthroned as heroes of the
computer revolution. Levy also divided hackers into generations, whose central
developing trends at the turning points had been the disappearance of idealism
and commercialisation. Besides the idealisation of hackers, the late 1980’s
games recycled elements and game types from the 1970s (Saarikoski, 2001).
More
recently, there have been at least three of four forms of preserving and
performing electronic gaming culture: websites, hardware and software
collections, exhibitions and historical works. We observe the different forms
of preserving particularly via the Internet. There are several sites devoted to
old games, containing game histories, timelines, interviews, technical
descriptions, downloadable emulator adaptations, pictures and other material.
There, amateurs also present their collections of games in a kind of virtual
exhibition. Similarly, collecting game products has become apparent in e-mail
posting lists, forums and on-line marketplaces (e.g. ebay.com, huuto.net).
Conclusion: Nostalgic Discourse And The Appropriation Of ‘New’ Media Technology
Although
‘nostalgic attitude’ is used for different sorts of commercial purposes, the
nostalgic discourse of electronic gaming contains a lot of (self-)critical and
(self-)ironic forms of action. It is not just a way of talking, but at the same
time both a uniting and separating form of action, a practice interlaced with
digital technology.
The
nostalgic discourse of electronic gaming can also usefully be compared to the
nostalgic discourses of other media technologies; it can now be observed that
the nostalgic discourse is not necessarily associated with a particular media
or decade. Anu Koivunen, for example, has characterized television as a memory
machine, whereby referring to the reminiscence of the past that has continued
for decades in televisual media.
According
to Koivunen, nostalgic television series are not examples of a certain
post-modern phase, but instead a particular ‘ontological feature’ in the
essence of television. In the first place, Koivunen refers to the content of TV
programmes, but this ontological feature can also be seen in the design of
television sets. Central in at least some models has been an association with
something familiar and traditional; furniture, materials or devices that are
already familiar from earlier times. This issue could be analysed within a
framework, which Andrew Blake (2002) in his analysis of the Harry Potter
phenomenon, has named retrolutionarity [24]. According to Blake,
retrolutionarity means production of the materials of the future with the
methods of the past.
Instead
of television, the Internet seems to be a kind of a central processing unit of
the memory machine in today’s retrogaming. In addition to recollection
narration, the Internet also makes many other forms of nostalgia possible. A gamers
personal work and their consequent ‘inside’ position are central in this kind
of action. However, they are not necessary in a nostalgic experience, although Sihvonen
(2004: 13) emphasizes the relationship between the personal work and media, particularly
when media is considered as a phenomenon.
Articulating
some of Koivunen’s ideas, and after presenting a number of examples in this
paper, I want to conclude that retrogaming can not simply be described as a
phenomenon of some particular phase or as an explanation of the middle-ageing
of gaming culture. The nostalgic discourse associated with electronic gaming is
rather a resource, which is introduced whenever needed; it is used in time and
space in various ways depending on the usage point. Nostalgic discourse can be
used to stand out (sub-, counter- and alternative cultures) or to be identified
with. The means of standing out and the objects of identification are various
as well. Retrogaming thus does not refer only to gaming, but for example to
listening and producing music, to clothing or, say, to graphical design.
Possibly in the future the 1980s world of electronic games will again become a
more marginal hobby, to be replaced by some other more modern forms of
retrogaming.
Retrogaming
(action, practise) and gaming nostalgia (the mode of recollection and
recollection discourse itself) are a central part of a more general culture of
technology and the cultural adaptation of technology. In many cases the making-nostalgic
of a technological device, adaptation or form of action begins right after its
introduction, or immediately after design has been launched. Actually, the making-nostalgic
– or at least some sort of romanticization – begins even at an earlier stage, when
the user considers a novel product in relation to the older one. Highlighting
technological renewal and revolution can be seen as a bipolar contrast to
nostalgic discourse. Both discourses have their reverse side, and their fears:
the fear of revolutionary discourse is technical retrogression and depression;
the fear of nostalgic discourse is perhaps the difficulty to control change.
In
practice, the stages introduced above overlap. It seems that when new
technological innovations are introduced, the change and their effects are
softened with a sort of rhetoric or discourse of safety: the revolution and coming
of the novelties is under control. Different kinds of nostalgic elements are
used in representing the revolution (Suominen, 2000; Suominen, 2003). The above-mentioned
term, retrolutionary, refers to the same phenomenon, in which there is an
effort to control the threat and possibilities of newness by binding them with
pleasing experiences of familiarity and related emotions. The new and the old
are in constant dialogue in both technological use and discussion (see figure
9). Therefore, (the cultures of) history is a new trend in digital culture and
gaming – and at the same time, it is not new.
Figure 9. The
Nintendo Wii console is a good example of combining new and old gaming
cultures. The Nintendo Wii Classic Controller pad is targeted for the players
who purchase old Nintendo and Sega console games via the Internet and play them
with the Wii.
A
Swedish historian Peter Aronsson (2005: 13) describes the cultures of history (historiekultur in Swedish) as sources, artefacts, rituals and habits which provide obvious ways
to form links between the past, the present and the future. With the uses of
history or practising history (historiebruk) Aronsson refers to how
bytes or elements of the cultures of history are activated to form particular
meaningful practise-oriented entities. The uses of history create meaning,
legitimate and ‘handle’ change. The consciousness of history (historiemedvetande)
is one’s conception of the nexus of the past, the present and the future.
Therefore, in the use or practise of history the cultures of history are stages
for the formation of historical consciousness (Aronsson, 2005). In this
paper, I have tried to articulate the different forms of the cultures, the uses
and the conceptions of history within digital gaming, as a way to show the wide
range and importance of this phenomenon. The paper can potentially be used as a
base for more empirical or theoretical and focused analyses of the cultures of
history in digital gaming. For example, an analysis could make more detailed
observations, studying the sources or interviewing gamers and game designers in
particular contexts where retrospection appears to be an essential part of the current (and future)
gaming culture.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Salla-Riikka Vesterlund for major
parts of English translation of my text and to Erik Rosendahl for some
corrections (errors, however, are made by me personally). Many thanks to Anna
Sivula, Petri Saarikoski and Riikka Turtiainen for comments on this paper, and
special thanks to Tanja Sihvonen for the French gaming stamps.
Author's Biography
Jaakko Suominen is Doctor of Philosophy, Acting Professor of Digital
Culture and Director of the School of Cultural Production and Landscape
Studies at the University of Turku, Finland. Suominen is an author of
two monographs on the cultural history of computing. He has co‑edited
five academic books and written about 40 articles. In his studies
Suominen has concentrated on the cultural history of information
technology and the history of media and technology. Lately, Suominen has
released a weblog book (in Finnish,
http://jaasuo.wordpress.com/tietokoneen‑takapuoli/) focusing on several
cultural historical aspects of digitalisation such as retro‑gaming,
history of computer love and remediation. Suominen works in a
multi‑disciplinary academic community at the Pori University Consortium,
which consists of units of five different universities. Suominen has led
many co‑operative projects with companies as well as with municipal
bodies and non‑profit organizations on different aspects of digital
culture. Email: jaakko.suominen at utu.fi. Web:
http://www.tuug.fi/~jaakko/
Notes
[1] Intermediality means an
interaction between two or more media, which can be realized in both the level
of media performances and their production. Juha Herkman (2005) divides
intermediality in three components: the introduction of other media
technologies (e.g. the use of television in a movie), the introduction of
persons known from a certain media (e.g. interviews with TV persons in
magazines) and the search for synergy in production (e.g. displaying the same
news in different media or, say, marketing several products together).] Also,
one can call this phenomenon remediation, which means process of
refashioning older or familiar media forms (Bolter and Grusin, 2000). [back]
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