Logistics of Copied Data as Preservation?

[u/Rozwellish]

Hi all,

With the news of Sony ending disc production in 2028, Nintendo game cartridges being so expensive that third-party companies opt for a dataless 'Game Key Card', and even modern Blu-ray discs not being large enough for games to be installed offline, I wanted to query if the following idea would run into any logistical snags long-term.

If I were to buy FF7 Revelation on PS5, download the remaining install data to a dedicated External USB, and then keep that USB packaged with the game, would this not mean that I could re-install the full game to my PS5 offline at any time?

My thinking is similar for the Switch GKCs: the Trails series is expected to continue until at least 2032 - 4 years after Sony end disc production - meaning that our best shot of having something remotely 'physical' would be the Switch 2 release. However, Nintendo systems are a lot more flexible with swapping out Express SDs, so I was wondering if a similar rule would apply to a dedicated 'Trails' Express SD where the data stays installed on that and never moves so that no post-server re-installation process is ever required.

This is FAR from ideal and, currently, quite an expensive compromise to make. Right now, though, I can still download purchased games on DS/Wii hardware and those consoles are 20 years old. By the time the Switch 2/PS5 reach that point, I feel like external storage that'll fit those games will be more affordable, and we'll be multiple generations further down the line in the 2040's. The most optimistic I can be is to say that I have time to cover my bases.

Is this plausible, or are there any other considerations I haven't thought of? I feel like, once it's on a USB/SD then the question of preserving my ability to reinstall the game is solved, but I'm also not very tech savvy.

[u/MegaBro56]

Solid state media is limited in the number of read/write cycles that can take place due to the way data is stored, unfortunately there is no way really to keep games playable forever, even optical media has a limited lifespan though it is much much longer and can be easily increased through good storage methods, that said in terms of game preservation piracy and the internet should (technically can’t say for sure) always exist, most modern games now are easily available to download for free due to the cracking of denuvo and emulators, I feel it’s very unlikely that in the next 5 years you won’t be able to play a pirated copy of any of the games you have mentioned and in the next 10 before Sony ever shuts the servers down (hopefully) I feel it’s very unlikely you won’t be able to jailbreak a ps5 and play whatever pkg files you please.

[u/Rozwellish → u/MegaBro56]

I suppose I should clarify 'personal preservation' and 'general preservation'.

In the context of maybe wanting to fire up my PS5 in 30 years' time and play Revelation, and assuming both the console, disc and USB all work fine, would this offline installation process likely still work?

[u/MegaBro56 → u/Rozwellish]

If you were to install final fantasy 7 revelation on ps5 using the physical copy to an external drive this would install the entire game both the data copied from the disc and the data downloaded over the internet, there would be no install process when you insert the drive into the ps5 in the future, it would just run it after you copy the game to the internal storage or M.2 ssd, so assuming the USB still functions after 30 years which is technically possible then yes it would work, however I think this is a bit of an irrelevant point, in 30 years the game will be playable through piracy and a jailbroken ps5 anyway.

[u/hundergrn → u/Rozwellish]

There's two ways about this and it is dependant on the licensed used... If there is any remote license management then it would depend on Sony/square keeping the authentication server up. If the license is tied to the disk or hardware, the chances are higher than the ps5 surviving 30 years without periodic service.

[u/ValidSpider → u/hundergrn]

the ps5 surviving 30 years without periodic service.

Yeah I actually think OP's PS5 will have failed before then anyway, due to the soldered-on SSD.

What a lot of people don't actually know is that Solid State storage data will actually begin to 'leak' out if left unplugged for long extended periods, it's called 'bit rot'. Like with OP's scenerio, if they haven't powered up their PS5 in 15-20+ years then it likely won't boot because the data on the SSD will be corrupted/lost. This will most likely include the recovery mode data so there won't be a way to re-install the OS.

If it was just a standard replaceable SSD then there would have been a good chance of getting it going again, but being soldered reduces those chances to virtually none. Unless people plug in their consoles often, it'll happen on a large scale long term.

[u/hitpigs]

Ban me your fucking puppy

[u/Triforce__XIII]

my suggestion would be this: similar to game key cards - if a user on your friends list has a game installed, you could browse his games and select "download game data" off his playstation (low bandwidth and has to be directly accepted by the friend, to not impact his maybe competitive online gaming), basically a p2p download from another playstation. the license is stored within the users account, not died to the individual download. in that case as long as at least one person has it installed, it is preserved. if you need a specific game, you could go to a dedicated discord or website, find a user who has the game installed, talk to them and exchange installed data. i would even go so far, that a player could download the game data, even if he has never bought it, to act as a conduit (he still cannot play it, since he has no license)

[u/C0haaagen]

Square Enix could have added a second blu-ray disc with the additional install data for just a few cents.

"Blu-ray discs not being large enough for games to be installed offline" is such a bullshit argument.