I have our Super Nintendo console at home - bought in 1993 and owned by the family since then.
In addition, 60 games, some with saved scores from back then - Now I have asked myself how the scores lasted in time or could last as long.
How are these scores saved in these games?
For me, it's a little miracle.
In the cartridges of SNES, N64, and Gameboy games, lithium button cells with spot soldering tags are soldered on.
If these are used up, they must be soldered and replaced with new equivalent ones which must be soldered in again. If the battery is removed or if it is used up, the memory levels are gone.
The console does not have its own memory. All scores are on the game modules. With some games there was never a battery and you could not save in them and with original games it can happen that the batteries are now empty and the memory levels disappear again as soon as the console is switched off.
The games are saved in the Sram. There's a button cell in the module that generates a constant voltage. If it is empty, all saves will also be deleted and you can't save a new one.
