Video Game History Foundation Urges ESA to Find 'Meaningful Solutions' for Digital Preservation

Sony has announced it will wind down physical disc production for its games by 2028, alongside the closure of the PS3 and PS Vita digital storefronts planned for July 2027. In response, the Video Game History Foundation (VGHF) publicly challenged the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) on July 1, 2026, urging it to finally offer concrete solutions for legally preserving games that only ever existed in digital form.

Speaking through its director Frank Cifaldi, the VGHF pointed out that most games released over the past two decades were either born digital or received a day-one patch, making a simple disc insufficient to preserve the experience players actually had. "Everyone agrees this is a serious problem, but the ESA has repeatedly opposed the efforts of cultural heritage institutions to reform digital copy protection laws," Cifaldi said.

"Asking museums to download a copy of Grand Theft Auto VI and hope it'll run in 50 years is not a preservation solution," Cifaldi added, calling on the industry to seriously engage with the issue. For its part, the ESA had previously told the US Copyright Office, through legal representative Steve Englund, that preservation organizations wanted "a great deal of discretion to handle very valuable intellectual property."

The VGHF says it has repeatedly tried to work with the industry's trade body to find a legal path forward, without success. Source: Time Extension