On a couple of occasions I've gone onto the web to read up about an old game (for example on Wikipedia) only not to find the system requirements for that game.

So, yes. I'd definitely be interested to have such a "centralised" list.
It's definitely useful, from a retro hardware perspective, to know what hardware your game was meant to be played on. In some cases, it will help to avoid "issues" on newer or faster hardware.

Doesn't Mobygames already have this?

PCGamingWiki was doing this as part of their pages, but then they had a little argumental debate whether they should use their real canonical requirements or some gog/steam rerelease bullshit requirements (leading to horrible misleading requirements like 1ghz and 1gb of ram for Anachronox)

Also requirements can be very subjective. it's usually a 'tolerant minimum' and not technically requirements (Half-Life requires a P166, though it can technically run on a 486DX4)

Errius wrote:

Doesn't Mobygames already have this?

You're right, I never noticed that Specs tab. It seems fairly accurate, though for example, it lists an 8088/8086 for Wing Commander. Could that be right?

Regardless, it would be nice to have a sortable list rather than searching for each game on its own page.

And having so many big box game collectors on here, it seems like a great source of verifiable info. Another source could be CGW reviews.

It would be nice to have an official minimum and (if given) recommended, as well as a more subjective maximum, especially in the case of speed sensitive games. All on one sortable list.

clueless1 wrote:

It would be nice to have an official minimum and (if given) recommended, as well as a more subjective maximum, especially in the case of speed sensitive games. All on one sortable list.

I fully agree. This list would really be helpful for our retro projects here.
Plus, it would end (well, kind of end) the debate whether a specific game will *run* on an 8088/286 PC or not.
Back in time I almost had to fight with my friends about those facts. For example, others wouldn't belive that a specific game
would also run on a Pentium 75 or 133 with 16MB RAM (they already had GHz PCs back then).

I haven't looked at mobygames but yes, it would be very convenient to have this info collected somewhere. I'll try to remember mobygames in the future. Many times (including just a few minutes ago) I've gone looking for requirements for games from the 90s and it's not as easy to find as I expect.
Wikipedia is always at the top of search results, so I always end up skimming those articles before moving on. I'm constantly amused that wikipedia articles drone on for pages with every second of the plot, the life story of everybody who made it, which retailers did and didn't sell it, political controversies surrounding it, which developer got mad about something, which one didn't, but for all that history somebody apparently wanted to store, those articles never have a section called "System Requirements".

With early 3D games, sometimes I'm wondering what type of graphics hardware it was primarily intended for and best played on. Official requirements might not always make this clear but I still want to read them.

Probably the most common question I have is whether a game was written for DOS or requires Win9x. That lets me speculate on the tangential topic of how easy it would be to transfer a GOG/Steam version of that game to a native system. Just knowing that a game was released for Win95 also tells me that it's requirements might be quirky.

A word for word copy of the original requirements would be easy enough, but if people feel like it there could be modern annotations added such as a game's sensitivity to fast CPUs and such. I'd try to avoid subjective opinions about "how fast is too fast", but any obvious compatibility issues could be reported.

Ideally it should have four sets of requirements to mildly reduce arguments (there will still be arguments over what is 'playable' though)

Minimum requirements as per original box
Recommended requirements as per original box
Actual requirements to play well on original platform
Actual requirements to play re-release/DOSBox

I seem to remember that Wing Commander will technically 'run' on an 8086, but it'll be glacial. I ran WC2 on a 286 12MHz and it was a tad slow. Still enjoyed it though.

leileilol wrote:

Also requirements can be very subjective. it's usually a 'tolerant minimum' and not technically requirements (Half-Life requires a P166, though it can technically run on a 486DX4)

Well, it wouldn't be hard to add 'technical minimum requirements' as point.

I would like to see an actual requirement list also extended to common applications.
A typical issue goes like this. The developer states that a application software runs e.g. on Win95+.
Now Win95 requirement is a 386 CPU. As logical consequence one would expect that the application software runs as well on 386+.
However reality shows that this is often not true and one has to start to make educated guesses on which CPU might be required.

ynari wrote:

Ideally it should have four sets of requirements to mildly reduce arguments (there will still be arguments over what is 'playabl […]
Show full quote

Ideally it should have four sets of requirements to mildly reduce arguments (there will still be arguments over what is 'playable' though)

Minimum requirements as per original box
Recommended requirements as per original box
Actual requirements to play well on original platform
Actual requirements to play re-release/DOSBox

I seem to remember that Wing Commander will technically 'run' on an 8086, but it'll be glacial. I ran WC2 on a 286 12MHz and it was a tad slow. Still enjoyed it though.

I think this would be good starting point.
However, with "actual requirements to play well on original platform", one has to provide a fair and realistic platform from that era that will provide "smooth" game performance. For example, a Pentium II 400 to play Doom 1 or 2 with is way above "actual requirements".
I think that with re-releases/DOSBox, this will probably have be based on user input and experience.

Here is a mock-up. Please critique. Not enough info, too much info?
On acceptable sources of info, here are my thoughts:
Acceptable sources should be limited to:
1) original box sticker (ebay.com photos are a good source if you don’t own the original box)
2) original documentation (Install Guide, Reference Card, readme files in install folder, etc—www.replacementdocs.com is a good source for these if you don’t own them)
Only consider the following if the above is not available
3) Computer Gaming World review with Issue # (http://www.cgwmuseum.org)
4) Moby Games “Specs” tab (provide link)
5) PC Gaming Wiki (provide link)

Some potential things that could be added:
-minumum conventional memory
-EMS/XMS requirements
-video modes
-HDD space
-more sound options (GUS, PAS, seprate SBPro 1.0/SBPro 2.0, etc)

Some potential things that could be removed:
-developer / publisher
-minimum OS

It just depends if we want this to be Everything to Everybody, or we prefer it to be concise and easy to read with minimal scrolling.

Edit: other information I think should be included:
Speed sensitivity comments:
1) audio issues can be specific to sound cards, so may or may not apply to your system
2) “runs too fast” issues are estimated and to be used as basic guidelines only

If you see a result you do not agree with, right-click the cell and insert a comment along with any supporting evidence so a revision can be considered

If we're going to do this, we might as well put as much info as we can, no? Here's another mock-up. Working on it offline at the moment, I'll add it to an online spreadsheet soon. Added graphics, hdd, conventional, upper mem, "Sane CPU Recommendation" to cover leileilol and elianda's comments, added PAS and GUS, and Vogons Member. The idea being, if a member adds a game, they are the "owner" of that entry. If someone else thinks something needs to be edited, they can add a comment to the cell and the "owner" can decide whether to implement the edit.

Thoughts?

I'm really confused by this thread, I thought MobyGames was reasonably dependable for this info. Oh well, don't let me stop your fun. 😀

Moby just takes what's read on the box or from the publisher which may/may not be completely reliable in the post-Pentium age.

I think Moby is user-editable so if there's a mistake you can log in and change it.

...and then prepare to wait 5 to 24 months for it to be rejected.

Okay, guys. I've uploaded the list here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1iroEn … dit?usp=sharing
Have a look and let me know if anything should be changed. Feel free to right-click and Comment on cells if you wish. If we agree it's what we want, go ahead and start adding games. 😀 I've pre-loaded with a few to get the ball rolling.

It would also be helpful to list which games have OS or hardware limitations that can be fixed by using a patch, e.g. the original PC version of Cyber Troopers Virtual-On won't run on systems with MMX technology without a patch. A later Japanese rerelease of the game has updated files right on the CD-ROM and doesn't require the patch.

What also would be interesting is listing which Asian (welll, Japanese) games can be installed on Western versions of DOS or Windows without encountering font-related trouble (which may or may not affect the installation process or gameplay). For example, the aforementioned rerelease of Cyber Troopers Virtual-On has a Japanese-language installer but will install fine and also is entirely playable as the game itself is in English.

yawetaG wrote:

It would also be helpful to list which games have OS or hardware limitations that can be fixed by using a patch, e.g. the original PC version of Cyber Troopers Virtual-On won't run on systems with MMX technology without a patch. A later Japanese rerelease of the game has updated files right on the CD-ROM and doesn't require the patch.

What also would be interesting is listing which Asian (welll, Japanese) games can be installed on Western versions of DOS or Windows without encountering font-related trouble (which may or may not affect the installation process or gameplay). For example, the aforementioned rerelease of Cyber Troopers Virtual-On has a Japanese-language installer but will install fine and also is entirely playable as the game itself is in English.

I wasn't quite sure how to integrate that into the spreadsheet in a concise way that would make sense, so I added a "Comments" field at the very end. Do you think that will do?

I've got this spreadsheet up. See the link a couple of posts up. Should I create a new topic with a more definitive title and the spreadsheet linked in the OP, or leave it here? I don't want to clutter the forum if there's little interest. I count 6 people who seem interested in this. BTW, thanks to leilelol for contributing. 😀