Before the age of digital media and online conveniences, distributing gaming news and the latest screenshots were a little more ornate. From mailing promotional tape cassettes to taking a photo of your computer monitor, distributing these images could be deceptively convoluted. Now one of the relics of this era are popping up in online auctions, with the potential to divulge new information for gaming archivists.
The preservation channel Hard4Games has noticed an increase in listings for 33mm film slides from the ‘90s. These aren’t just any vacation photos. Judging by the information on these film slides, they originate from Nintendo of America’s media strategy firm Golin/Harris International. They contain images from Super Mario 64 and given their apparent legitimacy, it’s likely these were official images distributed to publications.
Gamers of the era probably encountered these same images in magazines, sales flyers or on the back of the box, but never in such high fidelity. Hard4Games says that these slides, despite being so tiny, would equal a 4k to 6k in digital resolution. That said, they are still images of Nintendo 64 games, so pristinely captured fidelity from a console that’s somewhat muddy by nature. The auction listings for these small bits of gaming ephemera are already listing for hundreds of dollars, and the channel has already come across listings for games so recent it calls their authenticity into question.
If these listings continue to emerge, they would present an opportunity beyond just being nostalgic in high definition. Many early prototypes of classic games, or games that never made it to the finish line, still received coverage, previews and occasionally even reviews in the specialty press. For some, their only records are postage-stamp sized screen shots reprinted into even lower quality. If there are more film slides out there yet to circulate, it could bring with it undiscovered gaming secrets. Though promotional in nature, the high resolution versions of these materials could have great historical significance. And even if you don’t believe that in earnest, indulge in the hundreds of visual assets the Video Game History Foundation recovered from GamePro’s vaults.