The Manchester Game Archive

Genesis

Video game hardware and the games themselves are forms of cultural heritage that require preservation. Recent years have seen increased attention paid to this issue by cultural and heritage institutions, both as examples of technological development and of contemporary play and games. Consideration of their preservation is important as games have a limited life span before new hardware renders older games obsolete. The MGC Archive currently comprises computers, consoles, and games from the 1980s to 2000s, primarily founded on the donations of the personal collections of Gerald Cromwell (Birkenhead) and Gareth George (Manchester) in early 2024: Commodore 64, Amiga 500 (and 500+), Amiga CD32, as well as Nintendo and Sony products. This is not, though, to the exclusion of more recent material. Rather than simply preserve this material, the principal goal of the Archive is to serve as a resource for research, teaching, and public engagement. Jennifer Cromwell (history) is the lead curator of the Archive.

Investment

To begin curation of the Archive materials, the MGC funded two student interns, Samuel Jolly (History) and Tyler Winslow-Gaughan (Game Design), to sort, test, and catalogue the hardware and games. The resulting catalogue will be available for public consultation via the MGC website from late 2024 to early 2025. As well as donated materials, the MGC will continue to grow the Archive through investment in materials that are important to the history of video games, which will also support research and teaching objectives.

Launch

The Archive was launched on Wednesday 12th June at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation in Manchester, at an event co-curated by Cromwell, Jolly, and Winslow-Gaughan. Restored consoles were provided for play, alongside which accessories (notably joysticks from the 1980s and 1990s) and game boxes were displayed, presenting the range of the Archive’s collection to an audience of representatives from game research labs across the UK and members of the public.

Future Directions

It is still early days for the MGC Archive, with exciting plans to develop and promote the history of video games and games as cultural heritage. The future for the archive includes:

  • Completion of a publicly accessible Archive database;

  • Continual investment in the Archive to incorporate other gaming materials, from throughout the past 40 years, including contemporary products before they become obsolete;

  • Development of a physical home for the archive that can serve as a space to facilitate research by both Manchester Met staff and PGRS and visiting researchers, which will further consolidate the MGC as an internationally recognised centre for gaming research.