In 1998, Stanford University's Henry Lowood began preserving video games and video game artifacts. Lowood, along with a four member committee, has announced a game canon, for the Library of Congress. Japan begs to differ.
According to
the New York Times, the canon is: Spacewar! (1962), Star Raiders (1979), Zork (1980), Tetris (1985), SimCity (1989), Super Mario Bros. 3 (1990), Civilization I/II (1991), Doom (1993), Warcraft series (beginning 1994) and Sensible World of Soccer (1994).
"We have to be really careful here because the technology is just going to make this harder for us," said Warren Spector, a member of the four person committee.
"The game canon is a way of saying, this is the stuff we have to protect first."
Taking Issue With The Ten Most Important Video Game List - Nintendo - Kotaku