You may have heard of the word ‘portability’ before, it’s defined as the ability to implement a program at 100% efficiency on a computer system foreign to the machine it was created on. Port-ability then is what I like to think of as a new term, a new phrase if you will, to rate the difficulty of being able to work older games on more modern systems.

Have you ever noticed how games companies do this so much? It all makes sense really, if you can release a ‘new’ game for your system which actually doesn’t require much work at all, then why not? It most probably already has an established user base so there shouldn’t be much in the way of R&D costs; all that’s left is marketing. Releasing old games on new systems is a huge money maker for the industry and it’s happening all the time.

Games companies have been able to do this since the creation of the industry due to the life expectancy of consoles. If a system can last around six years before a new and upgraded version is released, that means that there is a high chance that in a few years, someone out there will be interested in replaying a game that they played a long time ago but may have lost it, traded it in or simply gotten rid of their old console in exchange for the newer, more modern upgraded version.

A great example of this is worldwide favorite, Kyoto based Nintendo. Earning around four and a half billion US dollars in 2006, it’s fair to say they know what they are doing in the industry. Throughout the lives of their many games consoles they have seen it fit to rehash many titles from previous generations into their newer consoles. Lets take a look at the 1985 smash hit ‘Super Mario Bros.’ I’m sure pretty much all of you reading this site has already played Super Mario Brothers to the death, so I’ll spare you the gory details of savage mushroom splatting and the dunking of eight giant Kappa’s into lakes of lava. Super Mario Bros has been ported to many different systems. As well as the best selling original NES version a reworked version was made for the Super Nintendo with better graphics and a save game feature. Hudson also designed a version for the NEC PC-8801 which had drastic graphic and sound changes as well as messing up the unique side scrolling system. There was also a port to the Game Boy in 1999 which featured a challenge mode as well as a multi-player function. Finally, there are also unaltered versions of the original game available on the Game Boy Advance and the Wii’s ‘Virtual Console’. That’s six different ways that you can play, essentially the same game, all on different systems and with very similar control schemes. Clearly Nintendo make quite a lot of money out of rehashing old games, they keep on doing it and show no signs of stopping. It’s also something that helps us out, the fans, by allowing us to play our favorites again without having to fuss around with old systems, albeit for a small fee.

There is a problem in this love story though, something that could perhaps put an end to this little money-making plan many game designers and publishers find so attractive. The problem lies with inputs. Let me explain, remember last year when Nintendo decided to revolutionize the games industry with their unique and innovative new venture into video game control? The Wii remote represents perhaps the biggest risk ever made in the games industry to date. Reggie Fils-Aime, now president of Nintendo America said last year “Nintendo’s way is to challenge conventional thinking. Not just for the sake of doing things differently, but to do things better.” Fils-Aime wasn’t wrong when he said this, not only have Nintendo changed our perception of what it is that makes us enjoy video games, they’ve also had a huge impact on the actions and implementations of their rivals (I’m looking at you SIXAXIS). If Nintendo truly plans to break with convention starting with Motion sensing, what’s next? I’m not here to debate what is next, but whatever it will be, there’s a possibility it’s going to be something completely new and original. Something quite unlike the industries love for rehashing old games then?

What happens when the big wigs unveil their next generation of gaming? What happens if their newfound ‘innovative’ controls truly do break from convention and allow much more immersion and involvement with the game in front of you? Where does the old D-pad and A, B buttons fit into all this? With the advent of new technologies we must inevitably say goodbye to the old. At the moment Nintendo as well as Sony have opted to include options to play all of their older games on their newer machines for a price. Okay, so we may have to buy an extra controller just to replay Ocarina of Time but that’s no big deal right? What happens when we have to buy three, maybe even four new controllers just to play these old, rehashed classics? Clearly, in ten years, someone will have the urge to replay Double Dragon again. I see a big fork in the road at this point. If games companies still want to carry on sticking to convention and releasing old games for easy income, that’s fine, but it probably won’t be as easy as it is now. Drastic changes to input controls clearly have a large impact on what can and can’t be done on a games system. With blue tooth and wireless controllers, future systems will be able to negotiate with older controllers and acknowledge that it’s used to play older games so this may not be such a big problem after all. Hopefully this will mean we can use our older controllers to replay these classic games either via emulation or back compatibility. I want to be sure that if I’m going to upgrade from my Wii, that I can still go back and run around as a wolf in Twilight Princess if I really want to. There is always a chance that such drastic changes to input will deter companies from rehashing old titles. New and drastically different controllers will either put an end to the rehashing of games, or consumers will just have to fork out large amounts of money to get hold of the input systems to play these old games on newer systems.

Rehashing could be seen as conventional now that it has been happening for such a long time. So will Nintendo stick to their word and part with such accustomed thinking? Not entirely, the system is too convenient for games companies and consumers. The way I see it, the port-ability of older games will be harder in the future due to rapidly changing control schemes. Who knows, maybe the next generation of controllers won’t even have buttons? The best thing to do is just to simply keep hold of your older games and consoles and treat them as antiques because one day they very well might be.

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