The Internet is the ultimate compendium of digital media, containing a record of nearly every piece of content placed on a public server — for better or for worst. At the forefront of preserving this monumental amount of content is the Wayback Machine (Archive.org), an accessible database established by the nonprofit firm Internet Archive. To date, Internet Archive preserves about 10 to 12 petabytes of computer history in the form of websites, music, images, and books belonging to the public domain. But now, The Internet Archive’s efforts have expanded to include a collection of 900 coin-operated arcade games from the 1970s through the 1990s along with retro home computer systems.
The Internet Arcade , as the collection is titled, spans hundreds of games across multiple genres and gameplay styles that are playable right in your browser. Simply click on title of the game you wish to play and the subsequent screenshot to load the game. A control scheme will be posted above, but in some cases, very few instructions are given, forcing you to experiment on your own. Typically, pressing “5” is synonymous with inserting a coin, whereas the arrows keys translate to directional movement, and the ALT keys to the action button.
The games are emulated in JSMAME, a multiplatform arcade emulator that runs within the JSMESS software package. JSMESS (JavaScript Mess) was created by a team led by Jason Scott as a means of emulating retro computers and converting them into a cross-platform language that allows them to run on browsers. This effort is part of the Internet Archive’s mission to transcribe old, defunct operating systems onto the Internet. Never has the barrier of hardware been so lifted.
The Texas Instruments TI-99/4A home computer seen running above
JSMESS is capable of emulating over 50 retro computer types including Commodore computers, Tandy computers, Atari Computers, classic Apple computers such the Apple IIe or Macintosh SE, and even classic consoles like the Atari 2600 and Atari 7800 to name but a small fraction. Regardless of whether you’re interested in classic gaming or classic computing, JSMESS is an interesting piece of software that brings history to life without the hardware barrier.
Source: The Verge/JSMESS
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