"Stop Killing Games" is a new campaign to prevent publishers from taking their titles offline

[atomicgirl]

Online-only games are never sustainable. Bound to go off one day.

Nothing like going back to single player offline games. How games used to be previously. As for multiplayer games, there's nothing like playing with your friends using your own server or hosted by friends, via TCP/IP.

How is it that people on a "tech site" don't know anything about this issue?

There is no such thing as a single player offline game anymore because all the major publishers dropped support for standalone hard copy games long ago. Almost all games, even the ones that are technically supposed to be offline single player, are distributed and connected via a third party client like Steam, Epic Games, EA App, etc. In many cases, you won't be able to play or access key features of this single player game without logging into the client, and the publisher or distributor are free to remove it or cripple features at will.

 

[amghwk]

How is it that people on a "tech site" don't know anything about this issue?

There is no such thing as a single player offline game anymore because all the major publishers dropped support for standalone hard copy games long ago. Almost all games, even the ones that are technically supposed to be offline single player, are distributed and connected via a third party client like Steam, Epic Games, EA App, etc. In many cases, you won't be able to play or access key features of this single player game without logging into the client, and the publisher or distributor are free to remove it or cripple features at will.

Maybe you never heard of GOG?

Anyway, I still have my boxed games from yesteryears up to the days of DVD releases. So...

And I'm not fan of current games or those that require internet connection to play even single player games.

 

[atomicgirl]

And I'm not fan of current games or those that require internet connection to play even single player games.

Again, people are not seeing the scope of this issue, so I'm going to be as explicit as possible using a real life example.

Once upon a time, you could've bought any EA game on a disc, right? I used to play The Sims. You'd pop in the disk, run and install, no problem.

I bought The Sims 3 in 2012 or so. It came with the option to install an update manager called EADM. When you logged in, it would download patches. You didn't have to install it. It was optional.

Then EA put out an update to EADM called Origin and pressed new hard copy versions of The Sims 3, but making the installation of Origin mandatory and making it unable to run the game without logging in to EA. So, players got this physical case and disk, but it was an empty gesture. All they were buying were the keys to install the game via Origin. Once it put out this Origin-only version of The Sims 3, EA was able to start removing copies of expansion packs from people's libraries. (In all fairness to the company, it was going after scammers that had victimized Sims 3 players, but hopefully, you see the implications.)

Then EA put out an update to Origin called EA App. With EA App, The Sims 3 is completely tied into the client. You cannot run and play this game offline unless you have the pre-Origin version of The Sims 3.

The point is that the major gaming companies forced a transition between owning hard copies of games and only being able to access them online through a client. Nobody chose this. It was sneakily forced onto gamers in increments and over the span of several years.

 

[bexwhitt]

It is if they can make it profitable, as with all economic activity. The issue is that it may not be as profitable as other uses of the staff's time and a team might not be willing to hire juniors to delegate to.

Opportunities for user run servers before taking stuff offline should be the minimum.

 

[Fastturtle]

Maybe they should sell the game with a fixed amount of years included. At least you know what you buy, and it makes sense to continue supporting the game they could sell yearly subscriptions. It is not reasonable to expect the game developer to support online play forever.

What I dislike is companies deciding that the pre-orders for a game aren't sufficient to even offer it. To me that's fraud. I'd rather see them offer a yearly subscription that has a declining cost (gets cheaper) the closer to the end of the year's support period.They can easily come up with a number and offer a discount to those who are willing to pay for a year but then they'd damn well better keep the game up for that period. If they don't they have to refund the monthly cost for any period that's after the game is shutdown and that money needs to be in "Escrow" and not available for bankruptcy proceedings of even a class action lawsuit to touch. Means players can safely purchase a year of play and know that if the company goes boom and fails, they'll get their money back for what's no longer available.

Nothing says that escrow account has to be no interest. Heck with the right funds, it's possible that money can earn some serious income from investments to keep the game up and running, offer new content and even updaates for a very long time. It just means they have to watch what they do so they're still able to take advantage of that money should it fail - as I said, they'd have to refund any remaining subscriptions unless folks are on a month to month like WoW.

 

[Endymio]

I think a solution that could work (But that will be fought pretty hard by publishers)...

..and also fought by anyone interested in maintaining the rule of law. Nor does your "lose the copyright" solution address the root problem. What if you purchase a game that never sells well, and the publisher cancels the servers after a mere 90 days? You're out the purchase fee, and absolutely no one's going to be interested in the time and effort of recreating and maintaining a server.

This appears to be a simple issue with contract law and disclosure. If online content is sold, then it must be done either for a fixed period, or in perpetuity. In either case, that period must be disclosed -- and if the publisher fails to meet it, they're open to a tort claim.

 

[i like foxes]

That s why I ll either never buy The Crew Motorfest or buy it when its price falls as low as 5 bucks .

 

[m3tavision]

BF2142 still is better then everything after it from DICE. They shut down the servers bcz diehard BF-Players kept playing and keeping BF2142 alive... didn't like the trash DICE started making for consoles/couch players.

They could easily bring that game back.

 

[scavengerspc]

BF2142 still is better then everything after it from DICE. They shut down the servers bcz diehard BF-Players kept playing and keeping BF2142 alive... didn't like the trash DICE started making for consoles/couch players.

They could easily bring that game back.

But they did exactly what they wanted players to do.
If people would stand up and ignore the new(er) games until they are ready, fine.
But buckling under never gets anyone anywhere positive.

 

[Sauce]

I don't know how all this works but I believe publishers either own part or all of the rights of the games?

I would think that if legislation is passed more than this will need to be changed in terms of ownership, copyright and licensing. This will not only affect games but other media as well. And it will take a long time and probably not a priority for Governments. Of course costs may go up too.

But then they should also clearly state that you subscribe to their game and not buy it but because then they would need to cleary state for how long you have thouse rights.But then alot less people would "buy" games.

 

[magisys]

Nobody rented anything.

if you pay for have the rights to use something, but someday, someone can stop you from use that thing even if you are willing to pay for it and continue to use it, well, that's similar to a rent.

 

[saRDdine]

THAT TITLE IS A LIE! Please do your research. Ross talked that they can take the games offline at any time they wish. Endless support was NEVER a goal of the campaign.
The goal is to make the game playable AFTER publishers / devs decide to shut down the servers, or stop supporting them.

 

[user478318]

Gaming industry is one of the worst on the planet last years, but all the things they get away with, they do only because most of their audience are kids with no money or knowledge to pursue legal actions. This came way too late, and every single gaming company is in the grey area by this or something else...