Bionic Commando

Port or Conversion? An Ontological Framework for Classifying Game Versions

"Port or Conversion?" argues that the term "game port" is conceptually vague and historically inconsistent, yet indispensable for game analysis and preservation.

• The paper argues that 'game port' is a conceptually vague and historically inconsistent term, yet indispensable for game analysis and preservation, and that existing definitions based on names, platforms, marketing, legality, or literal code transfer fail to yield a stable academic category.
• To fix this, it proposes a Carnapian explication built on a three-layer ontology (physical, structural, and presentation layers) paired with a graded scale of sameness, similarity, resemblance, and difference for classifying game versions by fidelity.
• Case studies such as multiple Pac-Man versions, Thunder Blade's Atari ST and Amiga releases, and Marvel vs. Capcom on PlayStation 1 show the same title can differ dramatically across platforms, with fidelity expectations focused far more on mechanics than on audiovisual presentation.