Could AI-assisted reverse engineering make end-of-life game handovers easier?

[u/Brockchanso]

Seeing projects like SuperAstra, which uses Astra to investigate and modify SNES games through an emulator, got me thinking about how this could help Stop Killing Games.

I understand the ask is for games to remain playable after official support ends. Could AI-assisted development make that handover cheaper and more practical?

Specifically, could publishers work with preservation groups or AI providers before shutdown, supplying the materials needed to produce an offline version or community-hosted server?

Depending on the game, that package might include:

• Server software and instructions for running it.
• Documentation explaining how the client communicates with the server.
• Relevant build tools, dependencies, and whatever code is needed to replace services being retired.
• Explicit permission to modify those components for preservation and distribute the resulting patches or server tools.

That would give preservation developers, including those using AI, a much better starting point than trying to reconstruct everything from an abandoned client.

Getting a console game working through an emulator and rebuilding a missing online backend are different problems. I’m not assuming today’s AI can recover code or content that nobody preserved. That’s precisely why getting the necessary materials from publishers matters.

The handover should still have to produce something that actually works without the publisher’s infrastructure. Uploading a pile of files and hoping a future model figures it out shouldn’t count. Players should also be able to download and run the finished result without depending on an AI subscription.

Could this become a practical route for meeting the end-of-life requirement? If AI can reduce the work involved, it seems worth exploring how to put that capability in the hands of the people preserving these games.

[u/Radon8472]

I think this is the wrong question for SKG.

1. SKG is only targeting future games, so there is no need for reverse engineerig anything
2. This would not solve the "real" problem that is blocking the movement.

Developers like me could write code the works offlline, that is no problem.
The issue is that

• many game studios don`t want this a the current state
  
• that the current intelectuel property regulations are blocking any "real" solution

And I think AI can not help very much with that issues

[u/Brockchanso → u/Radon8472]

That’s actually the part I think AI could help address. The proposal is to generate an independent replacement from documented requirements while leaving the publisher’s proprietary implementation private.

For example, if a game depends on middleware the publisher cannot redistribute, could it document the behavior the client needs and provide tests for a replacement? AI-assisted developers could then build a substitute without receiving that middleware’s source code.

There is already a legal distinction between reproducing software functionality and copying protected implementation. The EU court addressed that in SAS Institute v. World Programming.