Though console video game backup devices and the concept of dumping ROMs — copying the contents of a cartridge to a computer storage medium as a ROM file — go back to at least the early 1990s, they weren’t exactly well-known at first. Aside from occasional advertisements snuck into mainstream video game magazines like Gamepro, it’s not like they were easy to learn about. But with the internet boom of the mid-to-late ’90s came emulators, computer programs that, well, emulated console and arcade hardware, letting gamers play ROMs on their home PCs.
Older hardware was the easiest to emulate, with smaller ROMs that were quicker to download over slow dial-up internet connections. Naturally, emulators for Nintendo’s iconic Nintendo Entertainment System were very popular. As NES emulation was booming, GiantBomb reports, a prototype of an official, unreleased English translation of the NES game “Mother” — the prequel to what ended up being released as “Earthbound” for the Super Nintendo — was discovered and dumped. There was never an official version of that game: If English-speaking fans wanted to play the highly desirable official prequel to a game widely considered a classic, they had to pirate it.
Easily playing backed-up and/or downloaded ROMs on the original hardware was still a ways away from being an affordable reality, though.
