Every time I left school and walked to the square where my father picked me up, I passed in front of a cyber. I don’t remember its name, but I do remember seeing it full when it was time to leave class and in the afternoons. I never got in because playing on PC wasn’t my thing (who knew…), but I do remember looking out the window and seeing the screens. Back then I had no idea what I was watching, but today I know it was ‘Counter Strike’, ‘World of Warcraft’, ‘Starcraft’ and, of course, ‘Unreal Tournament’.
A lot has happened since then and these games have been relegated to memory. They have no official support or servers, but the community has taken care of keeping them updated and alive. Well, with the permission of Epic, from now on ‘Unreal’ and its online brother, ‘Unreal Tournament’, can be downloaded for free in a move that represents a great initiative for the preservation of the video game.
A bit of history. ‘Unreal’ is an FPS (come on, a shooting game) created by Epic MegaGames (today Epic Games). It dates back to 1998 and was the first game to use the Unreal Engine. Already at that time it stood out for its graphics and enemy AI. It was programmed by Tim Sweeney (the name may be familiar) and designed by Cliff Blezinski (who would later give life to the ‘Gears of War’ saga). At the end of 1999, ‘Unreal Tournament’ was published, which is its online multiplayer version (and offline with bots).
Both games are history of the medium.
In the video above you can see ‘Unreal’ in its entirety and without comments. Nine hours of video, not that bad.
Missing games. These games were available for a long time, but Epic Games showed no mercy when in 2022 they removed them from the face of the Earth without warning. The priority was ‘Fortnite’. Titles like ‘Unreal Gold’ (the original version), ‘Unreal II: The Awakening’ or ‘Unreal Tournament’ are not there, they cannot be obtained, plain and simple. They disappeared from all digital stores, without exception.
And that’s where the community comes in.
OldUnreal. That’s the name of a group of fans who have dedicated themselves to preserving ‘Unreal’ and ‘Unreal Tournament’. It is a non-profit project that today is the protagonist thanks to good news: as explained by OldUnreal on its Discord server and confirmed by Epic Games to Polygon, the group has obtained permission from the company to keep ‘Unreal’ and ‘Unreal Tournament’ on Internet Archive.
That means two things: that the games will not be lost and that anyone can download them completely free. They are versions prepared to work on current Windows, Linux and macOS systems. Here is a list of interesting links for fans:
Image | OldUnreal
Video game preservation. While it is true that, on this occasion, Epic Games has not done anything beyond giving permission, this initiative shows that it is possible to preserve video games, preserve them and maintain them for posterity. There are movements underway, like the one GOG announced just a few days ago or Xbox initiatives, but it is still a pending issue in many aspects.
On many occasions, preservation depends on the fans and is complicated, especially in online games. A solution could be what the developers of Spellbreak (Ploretariat, a company that was bought by Blizzard) or Knockout City (Velan Studios) did. Although the games are no longer available, versions supporting self-hosted servers were released to at least give players the option to keep them alive.
Cover image | OldUnreal
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