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Comment by Illniyar | Hacker News Reader

"As part of my University of York Archaeology PhD thesis, I conducted a case study into what is now called the “Legacy Hub ”. The goals of the project were not only to determine if (and how) archaeology could be conducted on human settlements within a digital environment, but also delved into 3D-printing human-made architecture, creating a new kind of map, undertaking photogrammetry of sites past and present, recording epigraphic evidence, and working hand-in-glove with the Hub’s leadership, which included an ambassador for the community’s heritage. "

Wait, what? I don't know if it's insane or groundbreaking to do a PhD Thesis on archaeology in a video game.

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> Entombed: An archaeological examination of an Atari 2600 game

One type of archaeogaming research is digital excavation, a technical examination of the code and techniques used in old games' implementation. We apply that in a case study of Entombed, an Atari 2600 game released in 1982 by US Games. The player in this game is, appropriately, an archaeologist who must make their way through a zombie-infested maze. Maze generation is a fruitful area for comparative retrogame archaeology, because a number of early games on different platforms featured mazes, and their variety of approaches can be compared. The maze in Entombed is particularly interesting: it is shaped in part by the extensive real-time constraints of the Atari 2600 platform, and also had to be generated efficiently and use next to no memory. We reverse engineered key areas of the game's code to uncover its unusual maze-generation algorithm, which we have also built a reconstruction of, and analyzed the mysterious table that drives it. In addition, we discovered what appears to be a 35-year-old bug in the code, as well as direct evidence of code-reuse practices amongst game developers.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.02035

Anything where people operate for a decent duration of time, and able to modify their environment, seems a viable choice of study. But some options are more reasonable than others -- eg Minecraft has heavy modifications, but lacks the relationship with the environment that makes it closer to studying artwork than a "culture". No Man's Sky seems acceptable, but imo there are better/more interesting game options out there, like Eve or Ultima Online, which both offer a much more advanced simulation than No Man's Sky, and a much more storied set of human interactions and societies.

> imo there are better/more interesting game options out there, like Eve or Ultima Online

I'm unfamiliar with UO, but with Eve, sadly, much of the most innovative and interesting parts of the game are done outside the client.

> sadly, much of the most innovative and interesting parts of the game are done outside the client

This is also true for the other examples (Minecraft and No Man's Sky) where the games basically become what the player base uses it for. I think this happens to most freeform games where without the multiplayer aspect, the game basically is nowhere near the same experience as with.

Single player games can be greatly satisfying as well, but they need a story that keeps the player interested. If we could have a game the size of No Man's Sky with a compelling story plus subplots and complex non player characters, such as the first 3 Mass Effect games (best games ever played in my entire life, ME3 lame ending aside), that would make a masterpiece even in single player mode. ME Andromeda apparently tried and mostly failed (I still didn't play it but watched hours of gameplay to get an idea), let's hope the next one will learn from past mistakes. NMS, which I still have to play, looks like to me a great online experience that could become also a killer single player game once enhanced for that purpose. One thing however I don't like much about NMS is the graphics which although truly beautiful artistically speaking, seems to me a bit too cartoonish.

I partially agree. The reason I disagree is that single player games with compelling story, although my favourite, eventually run out of content, even if it's compelling and if the world is open and freeform. But multiplayer games evolve as the player base is what provides the story and dynamics. In many online games there is potentially limitless gameplay and content, the game engine and environment serve only as the playground for players to build from.

An example is GTAV. Where there are lots of structured things to do yet the players constantly make their own meetups, car shows and other shenanigans.

A notable exception could be Minecraft, where you could have your own single player world and so long as you are interested it can keep evolving.

"The reason I disagree is that single player games with compelling story, although my favourite, eventually run out of content, even if it's compelling and if the world is open and freeform"

That is true, and that alone would make the necessary development not economically viable for any game whose life is measured in few years, but what if, along content provided by players, the game creators could insert new environments with NPCs and new stories without ditching the game? In a few years/decades probably AI could also generate characters that develop themselves according to the environment they "grew" into or events happened during their "life". Dreaming too much maybe:)

I am wholeheartedly hoping for that to happen with Fallout76. Permanence gives a lot of the stuff you do in Fallout a bit more purpose. Like crafting good weapons and building a settlement you like. In non permanent versions the story was the main point so you could skip the looting and crafting if you wanted as you didn't really need it. But in a perfect world F76 you have a reason to build worthwhile settlements and gear and collect resources and so on. I have been playing it as if it were a singleplayer game, so although it is multiplayer that doesn't affect my play through that much.

In actual archeology, most of the innovative and interesting parts were probably also done outside of the client (the physical earth). Piecing together what wasn't recorded based on the few things that was recorded is the whole game :-)

As an ex Eve Online player, who's also spent hundreds/thousands of hours in NMS, WoW, and now SWTOR, I absolutely love these "IRL" projects that archive/study virtual worlds, like the financial studies of the Eve economy, the huge write-ups of major WoW events, stuff like that.

To those that were involved in the games/events, they're a major part of their life (in a hobby/entertainment aspect), so having this sort of in-depth study is seriously cool to have as a record of it all.

https://evetravel.wordpress.com/2015/11/08/unidentified-slee...

> I was so entranced by it that it took me a few minutes to notice that the spindly structure was not all that there was to see. Both directly above and below the structure (relative to the system’s ecliptic, of course) were two large, swirling maelstroms of energy.

https://evetravel.wordpress.com/2015/11/24/massive-debris-fi...

> As if a giant hand had hand-picked pins out of a pin cushion, the debris field stretched almost as far as the eye could see. The various sticks, originally arranged in circular fashion, now are laid out in a serpentine pattern, as if it were a winding path. Lightning crackles between the various posts: the flashes of light that originally caught my eye.

> Wait, what? I don't know if it's insane or groundbreaking to do a PhD Thesis on archaeology in a video game.

I used to work at Archaeology Data Service and it is a pretty groundbreaking place :)

I suppose traditional archaeology also involves groundbreaking. :)

As persistent user-created online worlds become more relevant, they become a study in themselves. We already study Internet trends and pop culture, so why not study this?

Really cool example was the Aladdin ROM that had unreleased sprites that shipped till on the ROM image. All of the development tools are intact so one can explore the source code for some of the unreleased material. https://gamehistory.org/aladdin-source-code/

Thought the same thing while reading that line.

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