RGA - Retro Gentlemen Agreement

About the RGA itself

What is the intention of this?

The Retro Gentlemen Agreement (RGA from hereon) is a sign of goodwill from retro gamer to companies who might own the copyright to a certain game.

We think the emulation scene is divided into people who love retro games and want to enjoy them as pure and authentic as possible, but also people who simply want to pirate even modern games for free and use unavailability of retro games as an excuse to do so.

Even though Remake/Remaster/Re-Releases often can be simply bought in stores, the real thing, the authentic experience of the original console is usually unavailable and sometimes, it isn’t even known which company is holding the rights to this IP and/or simply has no interest to care about it.

But we respect that companies want to protect the rights to these games and hence limit ourself as a sign of goodwill to show our respect for the gaming industry.

Out intend is not to cause financial damage, we want the authentic experience that often is simply impossible outside of emulating ROM.

What is the actual agreement

We, the Retro Gaming Gentlemen, agree to promise the following things

We are only emulating systems up until the 6. Generation. This includes, for example
- SEGA Dreamcast
- SONY PlayStation 2
- Nintendo Gamecube
- NEC PC-FX
- PC Platforms from that era
  - DOS
  - Windows 3.x
  - Windows 9x
  - PC-8801
  - PC-9801
  - X68000
We only play/archive/host official published ROM that have been released for these consoles
- No Remakes/Remasters/Re-Releases, only the real thing
If an re-release can be bought, we buy/support it to show our respect
We do not try to make the process of emulation too easy
- We do not develop/support Hardware that comes with emulators/ROM pre-installed
- We do not develop/support Software that comes with emulators/ROM pre-installed
- We do not make money with retro games
  - No reselling of Emulator/ROM
  - No payed services for installing/setting up emulator/ROM
  - Developed Software must be GNU GPL-compatible
We play the games in their original form with highest accuracy
- No Upscaling of internal resolution
- No Texture Replacement or such patches
- No Adding Quality of Life features like automappers, rewind and such
We commit to maintain open dialogue and strict adherence to the RGA