How the fuck do devs lose the source code to treasured classics?

It depends on the company. Archiving source code and assets were very hit or miss, especially with Japanese companies. Backup technology was also a lot more crude, and took up a lot more space then modern equipment. A lot of games were also sometimes done in weird ways that is pretty much unusable by modern standards.

You also have companies being bought out, moved, downsized, etc. Hell, with Konami they printed their goddamn source code on paper for whatever reason. And yes, it was common for smaller companies to wipe shit.

Naughty dog didn't lose the Crash 1-3 source code, it was just a complete mess and basically unusable (hence why they only used the crash 1 models and not animations in uncharted 4), they only got the level geometry because sony gave it to them.

>>383034825
>let's keep using PS1 code
that's not how game development works

Japan has this tradition of destroying old shit to let go of the past, which bit them in the ass hard in the generation of remasters

Western devs were much smarter about this, especially if they were PC focused like say ID & Blizzard, they knew they would need it around for future PC config's & such, while Western console devs assumed people would just play say PS1 games on PS1 & threw shit away

Older games weren't even written in source code, you'd write them in assembler for a specific CPU architecture and it made full use of all of that console's quirks, meaning you'd require an emulator for it to run on any modern CPUs.

Writing games in compiled languages like C wasn't even feasable up until the 16 bit era, because compilers were SHIT and produced much worse asm code than something a skilled programmer of 30 years ago could write by hand

Of course, this was literally a lifetime ago, now nobody knows assembler anymore except for compiler writers.

>>383035680
>Japan has this tradition of destroying old shit to let go of the pas
>Source: My Ass.

>>383034825
The Japanese aren't keen on keeping back-ups of their games for some reason

>>383035858
It's true, Nintendo threw away OOT's code early on, the devs they outsourced Master Quest to didn't get the source code

>>383034825

I'm not sure they actually lost the source code. The problem was that they tried to design the game using the Sonic Advance engine, which had shitty memory optimization. SA's engine allowed maybe 1 or 2 enemies to appear on the screen at a time, whereas Sonic 1 had enemies all over the place. Lag was inevitable.

I have no idea how they fucked up the physics so badly though.

>>383036191
>>383035680
No, it's so that the Yakuza can't steal it

>>383036359
What I find funny is a group of homebrewers showed that Sonic 1 could run on GBA just fine and ported the first level over.

It was also released at literally the same time as Sonic 06, so it was clear Sega did not give a fuck about quality.

>>383036479
Source?

>>383034825
>Live in Japan
>Make game company
>Make great game
>Store source code
>Live in Japan
>Tsunami every 3 months
>Earthquakes every 2
>Lose all our archives every once in a while
>Live in Japan
>Have to start from scratch all the time
>Rest of the world doesn't preez undelstrand
>Live in Japan

>>383034825
>the majority of PS2 compilations are nothing but emulated games
>The Mega Man compilations are based on the PS1 releases

>>383037959
Reminds me of how Sega released a game compilation on the day the dreamcast "died", and it was essentially an emulator that helped open a huge backdoor for the console.

There was even a textfile with the name of a huge cracker group.

>>383037863

Code?

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>>383038215

https://tcrf.net/Sega_Smash_Pack_Volume_1_(Dreamcast)

>And don't forget to pay your respects to Uncle Sonic.
>Sony just doesn't get it.

>>383038215
I thought it was a demo disc

>>383037959
Isn't MM8 on the Anniversary Collection based on the Saturn version? The music was much better than my PS1 copy.

>>383038215
>>383038446
Based Gary's now VP of Game Technology at Warner Bros.

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>>383035268
>A lot of games were also sometimes done in weird ways that is pretty much unusable by modern standards.

I'd like some examples of this, please?

I'm still holding on to a shred of hope which says Sega didn't actually lose the source code to JSRF and they're just holding on a HD port due to corporate bullshit.

>>383039074
no because the exclusive Saturn bosses do not show up.

>>383039074
Came to slurp on some more semen Toady?

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>>383040371
The dream is dead, just let it go

>>383036359
>I'm not sure they actually lost the source code.

They did. It's the reason they had to hire Taxman to rebuild Sonic 1, 2 and CD from scratch instead of a quick mobile port.

>>383034825
>Sega lost the source code to Sonic 1 which led to the shit GBA port
Didn't they just slap the old assets into the Advance engine just to get a quick buck?

>>383042827
Knowing Sega this is a definite possibility

IMO it's the same as losing the master recordings to a song.

Shit just happens. Data backups fade, shit gets misplaced when you move to a new office, or things are improperly labeled.

>>383034825

I think it really depends on how much devs valued the projects themselves. I have a few of my older projects, but most of it gets thrown out as languages and frameworks evolve.

>>383038254
Veronica?

>>383035680

Nah, the oldest pokemon games for example were refurbished and rereleased. Unless you're talking about languages that weren't compiled, that's just not how it works.

>>383041627
Why have't they done Sonic 3? Can't they just use the PC music?

Nintendo lost the original code to SMB1 so they just "re-obtain' stolen roms from of the internet and give the finger to pirate hosts

>>383044767
there was no source code to SMB1
The assembly code was written by hand, so you only had to run it through an assembler to turn it into a binary executable.
You can disassemble it again and only lose out on label names and comments.

>>383044767
Haha, look at this post-millennial who isn't even aware of what a source code is.

>>383034825
>all those obscure Xbox HUEG games stuck in limbo

>>383034825
>>Konami lost the source code to the first 2 Silent Hills leading to the atrocious gen 7 remakes
Im tired of this stupid meme. It wasn't because they used an older source code, its because they didn't reverse engineer a normal copy like everyone else who does remasters.

>>383035796
Assembly may not count as a source code but at least all the variables and subs are properly labeled and commented, which can make porting to any other systems or converting to higher level languages far more easy.

How did they get achievements in the XBLA ports?

>>383044686
>Can't they just use the PC music?

I think most Sonic fans would riot if they did that.

>>383048150
I don't think they've ever given a shit about sonic fans.

>>383045327
Can you explain a bit about what goes into reverse engineering a game for remasters? I've always been fascinated but I can't find anything educational about how they do it.

>>383048249
Basically every game can be disassembled with the right tools, expertise and motivation, third one being money. I doubt more than 10% of remasters are made like this.

I always knew SH remasters were ported from beta source snapshots, but apparently that's not true? According to Square-Enix, KH1FM was also reverse-engineered from a copy and rebuilt.

>>383045327
Literally only Bluepoint do this

>>383043996
Another possibility is outright theft, whether by (ex-)employee, licensee, or what have you. By proxy there's willful destruction by someone who doesn't actually have the legal authority to make that call. Those have happened in music, I'd be surprised if they never happened in video gaming.

>>383036191
Anon Nintendo is perhaps ken co the Most insanely competent video game companies when it comes to archiving.

They were able to just pull out ancient design documents for the original Mario and Zelda games for Iwata Asks.

>>383047585
iirc those are run in custom emulators. The emulator is what is awarding the achievement; the game itself has no idea.

>>383050648
You can just embed system calls to the xbox api to assign the current user the achievement.

>>383047585
Checking the memory locations of the emulator for specific values and awarding achievements when they occur. Just a guess but not too difficult to implement and there are probably smarter solutions.

>>383048249
If its a retro game, old enough to be on /vr/, they run the binary of the game through a re-assembler, port that to a modern language (usually C#) and then compile for whatever modern console they're targeting. Assets are the easy part; they can just rip them with a game genie.

More modern games are harder; the binary is obfuscated so it can't be cleanly re-assembled, to prevent piracy.

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>>383038215
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoQp5uNSXKE

>>383036976
Not even a group, it was one guy. And he even included a spindash, knuckles, and Tails.

And this guy was Christian Whitehead, the mobile port/Mania guy

>>383035382
Its more for reference reasons. A game would be easy to remaster if you can check back on old code and figure out what made something work the way it did. Like Crash Bandicoots jump speed and height or hitboxes.

>>383034825
Its more much more common with Japanese developers. Sega has lost the source code to a ton of games which is why a lot of games we have no seen remasters or re-releases of like Skies of Arcadia, Panzer Dragoon Saga, and JSRF to name a few. Has happened with Square as well the Kingdom Hearts remasters had to be completely rebuilt from the ground up because of lost source code for KH1/2.

>>383035680
Blizzards a really good example of holding onto shit. Back when the whole thing with Nostalrius was going on people speculated one of the reasons Blizz will never do Vanilla servers is because the source code is lost. Wasn't the case and they said they have many copies of older WoW versions.

>>383052505
>And this guy was Christian Whitehead, the mobile port/Mania guy
no that was Stealth, Whitehead doesn't do romhacks and homebrews his thing was making engines

>>383039730
For a start, before CDs became a standard a lot of cartridge based games worked more like firmware extensions of the main system than neatly packaged applications. Making use of programming shared across both the console's board and its own.

>>383051296
>Assets are the easy part; they can just rip them with a game genie.

What did he mean by this