Why is it bad when a game developer has lost the source code to game it wants to rerelease/remaster? Isn’t all the data needed in the original retail copies?
In: Technology
Games created from the mid 90s onwards will most often than not be written using a high level language. These languages are easily read by the developers but not by the computer/console, therefore it will need to be translated (compiled) into a computer readable form called machine code. The downside is that machine code is hard to understand compared to the original source code. This is due to the fact that many useful features from the source code are missing, like comments and named variables.
When a game is released, only the compiled machine code plus any extra files that the game may require are present. The source code could potentially be used to aid piracy so it usually isn’t included. Some games may contain files that can be decompiled back into the original source code, though finding these files can be quite rare.
If a developer loses the source code and wants to rerelease or remaster the game, they only have the compiled machine code and any decompilable file they can find (which in most cases will be none). They will have to run the machine code through a disassembler which will turn it into assembly language (low level programming language), then work through it all and see what everything does. This process could take months or years depending on how big the game is, and is generally not a task worthwhile doing. So when a company loses the source code, their best option is to remake it from the ground up which will cost precious time and money that could have been saved had the original not been lost.
As for my analogy, think of it like building a house. An architect will have a blueprint for a house which will be used to build said house (compiling). If the blueprint is lost then the architect still has the house as a reference point (machine code) but it will be easier to draw up a new blueprint (starting from scratch).
TL;DR: People translate sentences into a foreign language, they lose the original words and the foreign version won’t easily translate back exactly as it was, so they recreate the sentences from scratch.
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