The main victory is that Publishers can't really hide behind a nebulous "this game may or may not be available forever"
Meaning that games will at the very least have a contractually obligated end of service date.
Which is a huge win because now players can (hopefully) know what they are buying.
Something else worth noting is that we can keep the momentum going by transitioning to electing representatives that will pass legislation. (I'm not in the EU but the concept applies to any democracy). Wars are not won over a single battle, they are long and drawn out conflicts. This was simply the first of many battles and we need to treat the outcome as the first stage of many stages yet to come.
They'll probably go with "End of service in three months, this estimated date is subject to be reevaluated in case of changes in the game's economy" and get away with it
And players will - rightfully - go with "Yeah, I'm not paying for a game that might shut down in three months, I'll just play the game I already have and like, which has been online for thirteen years."
Yeah - because nobody's buying a live service game with an expectation that it is going to shut down in six months or even two weeks, people expect them to last longer. Mandating "use by" dates on games would make it clear which companies have faith in their products and which ones are trying to play it safe by skirting the rules and saying "yeah, three months, then we'll see!"
I think you are missing the very real point that they will all say "three months" but then they will remain running as long as they are profitable.
If everyone says "three months" then gamers will ignore it because it's not actually indicative of how long it will run for, except that it will definitely be up for 90 days.
I don't think anyone actually spends AAA money on a game they believe will only be up 90 days, but if they all say that, regardless of whether they intend to stay up longer, then gamers really will have no distinguishing terms to go by.
And you might think that game companies would try to use that as a selling point, but I think they all realize that promising to maintain a game longer than the minimum time necessary is a financial risk they will not sign on for.
They'll all standardize on some short period of time, and then just do what they've been doing already.
I've worked with corporate lawyers before. They talk to each other and they are very good at making sure that their company can't be forced into an arms race with other companies based on some government or consumer regulation that has no financial upside for them.
If everyone says three months then a niche will exist for indie developers to make games with greater than three months. Gamers will ignore it for major games with good reputations but if enough Concords happen, gamers will take notice and the use by date will be a useful metric which benefits developers who have greater trust in their product.
And large game developers aren't a collective who will unilaterally adopt the practice of putting "three months" when they can guarantee longer and stand out from competition.
But then one day one of those companies thay guarentee they will last longer will flop, and then the company will be driven under by maintenance costs for a dead game, resulting in companies going back to a "three monthx standard
Then you obviously don't understand what the initial push was for. Its not for companies to maintain those servers, its that the game has to be playable for that amount of time. Meaning as long as they give players the means to run a server in a playable condition for that amount of time i.e. not pull a Concord and pull the game completely, then they have fulfilled their obligation.
Probably not. The reason for this is that what you're trying to do is get an indie developer to commit to operating a game that might fail to the point where keeping the servers on is a millstone around their neck. This is where brute-force cash reserves are a bigger deal than willingness to try new things. Running servers costs money, and that tends to be something that an indie developer might be less able to absorb.
An indie developer who guarantees a certain service period could do that, but it puts them in a precarious position if the game fails.
They don't have to commit to operating a game. They have to commit to the game being able to be operated. Huge difference. They could release enough code to let people run their own servers and it would still be able to be operated without any costs to developers.
Sure, they could do that, but it's not necessarily as simple as just releasing code. A lot depends on how much of the backend code is theirs and not licensed, for one thing. They'd probably have to commit to either doing a post-failure legal review or ensuring that they didn't write their backend with any dependencies or things they would consider proprietary that might be used in a later project.
And what if someone doesn't want to operate their game with their code on their own dime? Do they still get held to making sure that servers exist if they dump the code and no third party wants to run a server? Maybe, maybe not.
For indie developers, as long as the means is realistically possible I assume that would be enough. Bigger developers should have to factor their obligations as part of the game's winding down costs which is a process that already exists.
Basically: if you pay for access to a game, you should have access to that game for as long as what was quoted or a minimum length of time. Just like consumer protections gives people a minimum standard of product/service.
people expected live service games to lasts atleast 2 years. knowing the game will die within a year will put a huge damper on its longetivity and sales. unironically self-fulfilling prophecy
Except they don't know the game will die within a year. They know that the game is contractually obligated to include a potential EOS date. They know it's stupid. Ironically, this change would actually give wrong information and that wrong information would actually be more likely to kill a game.
This is one of the reasons not all gamers support stop killing games - it results in stupid rules like this one where the company has to say "we might kill this game in 3 months" every 3 months, even if the game is healthy and doing fine.
Ah yes, I'm sure gamers will absolutely stop buying new games because of a nebulous statement in the ToS. Because gamers have historically been so succesful at boycots!
Well, like I said below - I fully expect that a legal requirement mandating publishers to provide end-of-service dates for their games will include a provision that this date needs to be clear and prominently displayed as a factor that may affect the purchasing decision.
If somebody sees "The publisher guarantees support for the game until September 30, 2026" and still decides to buy it, it's their call - they knew what they were getting into.
I mean, even if it was literally the most prominent thing on the store page, you'd see a dip in sales at best, and then a return to normal, once everyone realizes that the companies are posting it only to fill a legal requirement, while continuing to support their games as per usual. You are seriously overestimating people's ability to stop buying new games over principles.
Pretty much this. Labels like this could become useless. Just look at the California cancer warning labels. They all became useless since they slapped them everywhere to fulfill the legal requirement causing everyone to ignore them.
This isn't meant to stop people from buying games. It is meant to help people make more informed decisions. If that "only a legal requirement" means I know the game will still run for at least 6 months, that's fine by me and a major improvement to the current situation.
The game companies will just informally talk to one another and determine the right amount of time to ensure that the statement is useless. They won't say six months, they'll all just set it to one month or three months. That way they are covered, but everyone buying games will be faced with the same warning which is so short that they can't really make any decisions based on the warning label. Gamers know a successful game won't be closed after one month, so no one expects that will happen.
Yeah, well - it still lets me make an informed decision. I'm still yet to buy a single game protected by Denuvo. I'm yet to buy a single game with kernel-level anti-cheat. I'm yet to buy a single game that sold out to become an Epic exclusive. I might as well not buy games whose creators claim they are going to support them for a month or three - on principle.
That's my choice as a consumer - I can decide what to consume. There are enough games out there that I can enjoy for several consecutive lifetimes. ;)
Nah. I'm expecting decent platforms to put that information in a visible spot on the product page, so that the consumers can review crucial information before making a purchase.
What's more, if it becomes a legal requirement, I fully expect the legislation to state that the planned end of service life needs to be displayed prominently and be accessible without placing undue burden on the consumer.
No they won't, because all online games (including games that only use online services for things like activation) are likely going to default to the same terms which will be something along the lines of "this purchase guarantees a minimum of 30 days of access to online services from the date of purchase" and guarantee a refund if the game closes less than 30 days after your date of purchase (which it won't, because they'll take it off sale 31 days before the game closes and announce the game is closing in 30 days). The only exception is if the company goes bankrupt, in which case you'd be an unsecured Creditor and very low on the list meaning you'll get no money back.
This basically maintains the current status-quo and does nothing to address the issue of games being destroyed.
Let's say I want to play a new MMO. Guess what I'm more likely to play? The upcoming Guild Wars 3, given ArenaNet's track record, the fact that they still support Guild Wars 1 and their commitment to support Guild Wars 2 for like ten more years? Or whatever new MMO Amazon pumps out only to shut it down in a year?
If gamers were responsible customers they would stop buying repainted slop like Madden, Fifa and CoD year after year and yet they don't. Nothing stops until people stop buying games.
You understand that these games get shut down because not enough people bought/played them? Your argument is basically that people will keep spending money on these games, but they literally get shut down because they aren’t.
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u/Gamebird8 Ryzen 9 7950X, XFX RX 6900XT, 64GB DDR5 @6000MT/s Jun 17 '26
The main victory is that Publishers can't really hide behind a nebulous "this game may or may not be available forever"
Meaning that games will at the very least have a contractually obligated end of service date.
Which is a huge win because now players can (hopefully) know what they are buying.
Something else worth noting is that we can keep the momentum going by transitioning to electing representatives that will pass legislation. (I'm not in the EU but the concept applies to any democracy). Wars are not won over a single battle, they are long and drawn out conflicts. This was simply the first of many battles and we need to treat the outcome as the first stage of many stages yet to come.