I hear often that games can’t be remade because the source code is lost. Silent Hill 2 remake had only partial source code. Wouldn’t any old physical CD have the entire code on it?
In: Technology
No. The final version that consumers get is something that has been run through a compiler. That compiled code is what your computer/console is running, not the raw source code.
It is absolutely possible to lose the original source code that was used by the compiler. This is normally because the company did not keep it around through complete lack of care to archive their own creations or if the original coding techniques just fell out of general programming practice and/or favor. It can also just be stuff like merger and acquisitions in the industry over the accumulative years just had the original code lost due to the shuffle of people and computers. Companies are like the people they employ and can lose things when they aren’t well documented or taken care of.
While it can be possible to reverse engineer the original source code, it is very time consuming to do so.
Other people have made a cake analogy, which I think is pretty apt.
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