Preserving old games was seen as a non-commercial 'art project' until recently, says Nightdive director: 'They were great then and they're great now, and companies have begun to realize that'

Star Wars: Dark Forces Remaster screenshot - Mon Mothma and Kyle Katarn talking to some guy on a video screen
(Image credit: Nightdive Studios)

The Nightdive Studios website makes its mission clear: "Bringing lost and forgotten gaming treasures back from the depths." And so it has, through outstanding updates of games including Quake and Quake 2, System Shock, Turok 3, and Dark Forces. But it's not just the games that Nightdive aims to bring back from the past: Maintaining the totality of their history is a major part of what the studio aims to do.

"I think the issue of games as art has been answered more than enough," Nightdive director of business development Larry Kuperman said in an interview with PC Gamer at GDC. "But taking it to the next level, if we all agree that games are art, then the people that make games are artists and deserve to be remembered that way and deserve to have their names incorporated into what we do going forward."

Nightdive CEO Stephen Kick said that aspect of the studio's work was "synthesized" while working with Bethesda on the Quake remasters. The updated version of Quake 2, for instance, has a "vault" option in the main menu that gives players a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the game, with material like concept art, early and discard enemies, videos, and even playable pre-release maps.

"They had given us access to archives of past work, and it was kind of at their suggestion that we find a way to incorporate that with the release of Quake 2," Kick said. "So that is where the vault was conceived. And it was received so well by the community."

Nightdive repeated that effort with Dark Forces, which includes a level called The Avenger: It was designed as a playable demo prior to the original Dark Forces release, but wasn't actually included with the game. It took nearly 30 years for people who weren't at CES in 1995 to be able to play it. Nightdive had to make a few changes to incorporate it into the remaster—for one thing, it didn't have a proper ending, so developers had to "clean it up a little bit"—but as much as possible, it was left in its original condition.

Kick and Kuperman think this approach is important because so much historical material has already been lost, in large part because there was no real interest in preservation until relatively recently. The PC source code for the original System Shock, for instance, was discovered in a subfolder of the Mac source code on an old Mac system that Paul Neurath had sent to the team to dig through. "Holy Grail stuff," Kuperman said.

And even when materials are preserved, they're often not preserved properly: As an example, Kuperman cited a source archive of one unnamed but "significant" game that was stored on magnetic tape. "First of all, yeah, sure, let me take a look and see if I've got a magnetic tape reader in my basement," he said. "The second thing is, the tape was actually decayed, it was unreadable."

Nightdive faces similar challenges with supporting materials like contracts, which were printed and stored physically, transferred from one owner to another, and ultimately ended up, as Kuperman put it, "in the box next to the Ark of the Covenant." (Which, among other things, is why we're still not playing a remastered version of No One Lives Forever.)

It was taken as an art project, not a commercial project, because the thought was, well, who would ever buy these old games?

Larry Kuperman, Nightdive biz director

Kuperman said the move to storing documents and development materials digitally is going to be a "huge benefit" for game preservation, but also important is the growing recognition that older games are both "important and commercially viable."

"I was doing remasters even before I joined Nightdive," he said. "One of the earliest ones was Total Annihilation, that I was involved in when I was at Stardock. We had a lot of resistance from people. I mean, it was taken as an art project, not a commercial project, because the thought was, well, who would ever buy these old games?

"They were great then and they're great now, and companies have begun to realize that and certainly we've had a leadership role in that. But we're not the only company doing that these days. Everybody is."

Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

With contributions from
Read more
Shovel Knight key art showing the titular knight brandishing his titular shovel in front of a gaggle of the supporting cast.
Shovel Knight artist says throwback games need 'retro authenticity' but can't coast on nostalgia alone: 'Part of the appeal of the NES era of game making was that everything was a new idea'
Geralt thumbs up
2024 was the year gamers really started pushing back on the erosion of game ownership
A retro-futuristic robot does his rounds in WolfEye Studio's next game, a cannon of some sort grafted to his arm.
Raf Colantonio can’t stop making first-person immersive sims: 'Weird West was a sidestep'
A dinosaur's open jaws lunge towards the camera.
GOG just brought Dino Crisis 1 and 2 back to life, and wants your help shouting at the execs imprisoning your favourite games
sniper elite 5 cover
Sniper Elite CEO reckons Swen Vincke is right to snarl at short-sighted publishers: 'You could argue that their business at senior level isn't making games… their business is managing their shareholders' perceptions'
Shodan, the villainous AI from System Shock
Nightdive's spent 6 years on its update of System Shock 2, so it's now the '25th Anniversary Remaster' and will finally announce its release date on March 20
Latest in Events & Conferences
Nolan North and Jennifer English, who will be hosting the Future Games Show's Spring Showcase.
Jennifer English (Shadowheart) and Nolan North (Nathan Drake) will be the illustrious hosts of the Future Games Show this year
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Rellana
AGDQ 2025 kicks off this weekend, featuring an Elden Ring saxophone boss rush, an 'All Romances' run of Fallout: New Vegas, and some of the worst games ever made
Key art for the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted
How to watch the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted 2024
Golden Joystick awards 2024 banner
The 42nd annual Golden Joystick Awards are live now—watch the whole show here
Promo for the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted, showing host Frankie Ward.
The PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted returns with announcements and reveals galore this December 5
Key art for the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted
Here are the nominees for PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted
Latest in News
Man facing camera
The Day Before studio reportedly sues Russian website for calling infamous disaster-game a 'scam'
Will Poulter holding a CD ROM
'What are most games about? Killing': Black Mirror Season 7 includes a follow-up to 2018 interactive film Bandersnatch
Casper Van Dien in Starship Troopers
Sony, which is making a Helldivers 2 movie, is also making a new Starship Troopers movie, but it's not based on the Starship Troopers movie we already have
Assassin's Creed meets PUBG
Ubisoft is reportedly talking to Tencent about creating a new business entity to manage Assassin's Creed and other big games
Resident Evil Village - Lady Dimitrescu
'It really truly changed my life in every possible way': Lady Dimitrescu actor says her Resident Evil Village role was just as transformative for her as it was for roughly half the internet in 2021
Storm trooper hero
Another live service shooter is getting shut down, this time before it even launched on Steam