Old games die quietly. A developer stops patching, a new operating system arrives, and a title that once ran fine will no longer launch. GOG has decided to do something about that with a formal Preservation Program, built to keep classics such as Fallout and Resident Evil available and working years after release.
At launch the program covered 100 unique titles, with an average rating of 4.2 out of 5 and more than 500 improvements made by GOG’s restoration team. The pitch is simple: classic games stay playable on modern systems even after their developers have moved on, DRM-free and with dedicated tech support.
What it takes to qualify
A game does not get in on reputation. GOG’s team runs it through a battery of quality tests. If it fails, they update and improve it until it meets the standard, and only then is it stamped with the Preservation Program label and given “Good Old Game” status.
The long-term aim is bigger. GOG says it wants every game on the store, recent or classic, to eventually become part of the program. There is a backlog of older titles that may already qualify, but the team has not yet been able to confirm them, and as the company put it, support is not always entirely up to GOG. It intends to add hundreds more titles by the end of 2025, each one only after thorough quality assurance.
A first showpiece
The company recently released a Resident Evil bundle of the first three survival horror games in a single package that modern gaming computers can run smoothly. It is the kind of release the program exists for: three old games that would otherwise be a hassle to get working, now one purchase that simply runs.
