The mission of the National Videogame Museum is to preserve the history of the videogame industry by archiving not only the physical artifacts, but also the information and stories behind its creation.

Videogames have been around in one form or another since the 1950s, and many of the people who first decided to combine interactive entertainment with a graphical display such as a monitor or a TV set have passed-away.

In some cases, the stories these people had to tell are lost forever or only live on in second or third-hand renditions. Rescuing the physical artifacts left behind can be difficult enough, and making sense of passed-on stories can be next to impossible.

The goal of the National Videogame Museum is to document, FIRST-HAND, as much information about the creation and evolution of the videogame industry as possible and preserve as many physical artifacts as possible for generations to come.  The founder of Atari, Nolan Bushnell, felt he was creating something huge and saw videogames as having the potential to become a “billion dollar business.”  There are individual GAMES that make that much today.

Presenting the history and as many of the physical artifacts as possible to the public in an entertaining and informative way, the National Videogame Museum believes that videogames are meant to be played and that’s the thought behind each and every exhibit in the museum. We will do everything in our power to allow our museum patrons the opportunity to actually PLAY as many games as possible during their visit to the National Videogame Museum.