An important online hub for ROM hacks is no longer in the news after two decades

ROMhacking.net, a veteran of the online classic gaming world, turned off its lights on Saturday. Nightcrawler, who created and runs ROMhacking, said, announced that the sitewhich hosted community-created modifications to classic games, has stopped taking entries and will only post news going forward.

Nightcrawler said the site’s archive can be found on the Internet Archive (Where, incredibly, all of 20 years of hacking and other files are concentrated into a single 11.7 GB zip file.) He said the forum will remain up and downloadable content will remain available; otherwise, the site is read-only.

Nightcrawler blamed “24/7 usage, endless queues and endless inboxes” as well as “legal burdens” for the site’s closure. He also accused members of a group, who had offered to take over administration of the site, of doxing him and conspiring to remove him from the site. A member of the group denied his allegations in a statement. Series of posts on X,