PRESERVATION

The GAMM museum in the heart of Rome shows that preservation is coming of age

Videogames have long been drawn to the concept of mainstream acceptance, to put themselves on an equal footing with film and music in popular culture, but nowadays those aspirations feel more realistic than ever before. From the success of TV and film adaptations such as Fallout and Sonic The Hedgehog 3 to the awards buzz for Grand Theft Hamlet (see p26), videogame-related stories are in the spotlight like never before. Fittingly, 2024 also saw videogames become further enshrined in a key pantheon of cultural appreciation: museums.

In the past six months alone, three notable videogame museums have opened their doors to the world. Nintendo stole the spotlight in October by opening its career-spanning collection in Kyoto, and the Science Museum in the UK now also has a permanent wing dedicated to the world of interactive entertainment. Videogames and related technologies have been part of museum exhibits for years, but vintage consoles, Pong cabinets and cardboard Marios are often fleeting attractions, staged among popup exhibitions to amuse families during half-term breaks. What we’re seeing now, however, feels different, as this fledgling artform is finding more permanent institutional homes.

GAMM museum director Marco Accordi Rickards and Milestone development director Michele Caletti

There’s no better place to be immortalised, perhaps, than in the birthplace of western civilisation, Rome. Situated on Piazza della Repubblica, nestled between the National Roman Museum and Palazzo Massimo alle Terme (a Renaissance palace dating back to 1883), the GAMM videogame museum resides in a city that is naturally sceptical of its existence. “Italy didn’t have a super-strong case history that immediately showed the power of games to build economic resources like The Witcher did in Poland, or Ubisoft with France,” says Marco Accordi Rickards, GAMM’s museum director. “With the automotive industry in Italy, we always had Fiat, which then became Fiat Chrysler and then Stellanti, so everybody in Italy always knew that automotive is an important economic field. For games, though, we missed it.”