The Entertainment Software Association wants to prevent the preservation of old games because it believes the process of restoring them is illegal 'hacking'.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s anti-circumvention provisions (Section 1201) prevents users, including communities, museums, archives and researchers, to legally modify games to keep them playable after publishers shut down the servers.

EFF staff attorney Mitch Stoltz says Section 1201 presents serious issues for academics, museums like Oakland, California’s Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment and non-profit organisation the Internet Archive.

Last year, the Internet Archive launched the Historical Software Collection, a collection of classic console and computer games and software. The organization recently added nearly 2,400 MS-DOS games to its growing library of classic titles, including Bust-A-Move, Commander Keen, and Metal Gear, along with 900 classic, coin-operated arcade games late last year.

Loading

“Thanks to server shutdowns, and legal uncertainty created by Section 1201, their objects of study and preservation may be reduced to the digital equivalent of crumbling papyrus in as little as a year,” Stoltz wrote. “That’s why an exemption from the Copyright Office is needed.”

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is asking the Copyright Office to give academics, museums, and archivists an exemption from Section 1201 and some legal protection to preserve older video games and keep them playable.

However, according to the EFF, the ESA, MPAA and RIAA have contacted the Copyright Office to oppose the exemption, saying it will send a message that “hacking—an activity closely associated with piracy in the minds of the marketplace—is lawful” and undermines “the fundamental copyright principles on which our copyright laws are based.”

The ESA also proposes to reject research bodies from exemption, essentially barring them from modifying consoles as tools for research. The ESA suggest that researchers should use cloud computing to conduct their research, rather than hacked PlayStation consoles.

Jenna Pitcher is a freelance journalist writing for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter