The Archivist

How to complete The Archivist

This is about rescuing the games, shows, or music of your childhood from dead hardware and discontinued services before they vanish. Whether you rip cartridges, set up an emulator, or wire up an old console, you build a working setup that plays your past on demand.

1. List what you want to preserve: console games, DVDs, cassettes, old PC software, or family media.
2. Choose a path: emulation (RetroArch, Dolphin) on a PC, a dedicated handheld, or restoring original hardware.
3. Source your media legally from your own cartridges, discs, or backups and rip it to digital files.
4. Organize files with consistent names and folders, then back them up to a second drive or cloud.
5. Test that something actually launches and plays start to finish.

Tips

• Dump from your own copies; emulators are legal, distributing ROMs you don't own is not.
• Label cables and take photos before disassembling old hardware.
• A Raspberry Pi with EmulationStation is the cheapest all-in-one starting point.

What counts as done

You can sit down and play or watch a piece of your childhood media on the system you set up.