I think there is an implication that if you buy a game which is online by nature (e.g. an MMO) that the servers can and will shut down eventually. My cupboard is filled with defunct MMOs. And people do not “own” any commercial software per se, they run it under licence.
So I don’t see that Ubisoft has any legal obligation here. But as a good will gesture they really should put the server code in escrow, or open source chunks of it so that games can continue to enjoy life after the company itself has no economic incentive to continue running it.
I really hope that something gets done about games not being playable anymore. This is really important for the sake of our hobby and clearly not acceptable.
I could understand how multiplayer games would be harder to maintain 20 years after their release, but there is no excuse for solo games.
Wouldn’t be surprised if stop servicing/selling a game came with a tax write-off (small due to deprecation). If that were the case, I strongly believe they should, at least, release the server and remove all DRM. Let the community make it work again.
Who preserves historical artwork? Who makes sure it is available for all to enjoy?
I think governments and nonprofits (like museums) need to consider that archival of an interactive artwork means allowing it to continue being accessible and interactive. That’d be the real preservation.
Laws that say if you create something like this and it reaches some metric, then you are required to turn over all resources regarding it to open source public consumption once you are done actively maintaining it.
Art restoration is actually sort of similar to cracking games. (A difference being those games are still protected by copyright so it’s technically illegal.)
Going by US laws (life + 70 years), all of Picasso’s art is all still copyright protected in the US until 2043, so it’s even less of a difference than you may realize.
I don’t know where the line is because with art restoration you’re actually modifying a physical object. I guess a better comparison would be modifying an arcade cabinet or something.
It’s not the most robust analogy, but I actually really like your comparison to painting restoration; to do it well, one must understand the techniques and materials used in the original (even stuff below the visible surface).
Not a lawyer, but I think the original work is still copyrighted, and that restoration wouldn’t (or certainly shouldn’t) constitute a new artwork. Though now I’m wondering about that terrible Jesus painting restoration from a few years back — it’s certainly different from the original, and whilst it might not seem reasonable to call it a new piece of “art”, it’s certainly inspired a great many people(to make memes)
Whats funny is that most 20 year old multiplayer games today (at least on PC) are still perfectly playable because the server tech was given to the community, at launch. Battlefield 2 hasn’t been available for purchase anywhere officially in well over a decade, there’s still a dedicated, albiet small community.
I understand that with large, persistent worlds, it’s hard to release that server tech, but at least some form of it should be published. Ie, a smaller variant that maybe just lets a couple people join up as a co-op party, rather than dozens of people running around a large map at random, like in The Crew.
Oh cry me a river. These hacks don’t deserve the pity they’re clearly trying to win because they have already proven they don’t know how to make a technologically sound game. Every single one of their games has suffered from save-breaking glitches, and yeah I might be one of the unlucky ones to have experienced at least one in all of their games but I can count the amount of developers that have given me a similar experience on one fist (yes, I mean “fist”, not hand).
I have an up-to-date system, more than meet the requirements for this flaming turd of a game and even among the insane amount of loading screens, there are still frequent hang-ups from the game needing to load while walking through a plaza while the game is running on my SSD. That’s simply not good enough. The last time I experienced such behaviour in a game was when I was playing on a potato over a decade ago or playing online with abysmal internet.
Critics don’t have to be developers to be able to spot in what ways a game is bad and neither does the general public. This is very different from “I don’t like this so it’s bad.”. This is a case of “It runs like ass, the writing is boring and the traversal of their mostly-empty crafted universe is little more than a lag-hung menu with a stupid amount of layers to access what you’re actually looking for and a whole ton of loading screens and thus it is bad.”. They haven’t crafted some grand open universe like they advertised, they made a bunch of levels, added a slow fast travel system and a standard fast travel system and called it quits. They’re now finally being called out as the bunch of half-asses they really are and they have more than earned it.
“We were riding the limits of what was possible” is a common excuse given. Then maybe don’t bite off more than you can chew. “Overcome technology itself”. A bad craftsman blames his tools. Maybe stop using an engine that isn’t fit for purpose. The “Creation” engine - or as we might as well call it, Gamebryo - has long been cited as the cause of many problems and barely workable. Take time to retrain your developers to a user-friendly engine and you’ll quickly make up the lost time in efficiency but they insist on holding on to that dinosaur of an engine.
As a member of the general public, I can’t say I know how to make a game, let alone a good one but given the constant stutters, mostly empty world, boring writing, frequent instances of forcing grind to pad play time and ever-increasing tedium in their gameplay loop, I have to assume that Bugthesda doesn’t either. The fact they saw to set team members on reviews instead of fixing all the problems with their games, I have to say their priorities aren’t in the right place and the ones who are “disconnected” are Bethesda who seem to be under the delusion that they’ll get nothing but praise just for releasing a game, no matter the state it’s in.
It’s weird to me that game devs don’t experiment with alternative organizational structures more often, kind of like Motion Twin; or how they’re only just beginning to unionize in some places. The “capital” in game development is a little bit computer hardware, but otherwise the vast majority of value in a game design studio is the human beings and their talent and skills.
I cannot think of any other industry where the workers are more essential, and management more superfluous and replaceable.
Support your local libraries. My city’s library system is so good that I borrow games on release day all the time. You get them for 1-2 weeks, Most games that are older than a few weeks you can keep for up to 3 weeks, which gives me plenty of time to knock them off my list. Im sure I’ll get this one soon enough, im currently playing AC Shadows which I borrowed
There’s these things called consoles, that let you put a disk in, they both contains the game and a license to play it. Though these days some games just sell an empty box with a code to download the game.
What a bizarre concept. I doubt they’ll ever catch on. We already have computers, and you don’t need any fancy “discs” or “empty boxes” to play games on them, either. Just download what you want straight from the internet.
It’s great, I can lend my friend the games he doesn’t have, and I can do the same with his games. In this way, we can play many more games than we have the money for. Especially useful since we’re in the US, and internet infrastructure is still poor here, his only option is satellite, which takes far too long to download anything.
Yeah but who needs friends when you have millions of random strangers on the internet to talk to? The infrastructure issue is a problem that I’m too urbanized to understand. My neighborhood alone gives me the choice of cable, DSL, fixed wireless, and fiber. Move to a place like this, and you won’t need friends or these newfangled “con-souls”.
Some games, some are on cart too. Switch 1 is actually probably the best because just about every game is fully playable unlike ps and Xbox which require patches often to run alright. Switch 2 I hear cyberpunk is fully on the cart, but I doubt many publishers are willing to pay for the bigger carts, so we’ll probably see a lot of third parties be just the key, which is ridiculous.
Not sure how it works nowadays, actually! As a child I would borrow PC and PlayStation games from the library. They were physical copies of course. But with Steam keys and all I’m not sure!
It was deliberate choice by them to make even the single player campaign online homie. It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
Don’t even play like that wasnt fucked up, ok? If your actual argument is “i think companies should get to do what they want” them say that, with your whole chest, not this Weak socratic-method-bootlick-bull…
Take that stand and defend it. Or you could also stfu
It was deliberate choice by them to make even the single player campaign online homie.
As one would expect from an online racing game. Anyone buying it would know in advance that single player offline modes do not exist when they bought the game.
It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
It kind of was and it was intended to work as it did by the company that made it.
If your actual argument is “i think companies should get to do what they want”
My argument us that this is a game designed to be played online only. When you bought the game the packaging/materials do not talk about offline play so you shouldn’t expect it to work in a way it expressly isn’t designed to do. Adults should be aware of what things do when they buy them.
It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
It kind of was and it was intended to work as it did by the company that made it.
Adults don’t dance around semantics in debate when they’re called out. I told you to stand up and this is your response? Mebbe you’re not even hidin! Maybe it’s the only way you can talk?
I guess you disagree, but I find your speech pattern embarrassing and tiring.
Your perspective seems to be you should get whatever you want regardless of the actual product you were sold and the terms of that sale. That’s not rational. You bought an online only game. If you wanted a single player offline mode to exist then you should have bought a game that had one.
My perspective is quite clear. I’m calling you a liar and (because liars are such) a loser, in no uncertain terms. Pretending authority is your only tactic. As the likely old-head here I deny you my permission to “be the adult in the room”
Eh, the argument was never civil. I don’t like the whole schtick of “showing immense disrespect buuut not actually name-calling” i see so many lowbrow edgelords employ. That sulky teen shit makes me maldy as all get out. I get there’s gotta be lines somewhere an i crossed em, but i gots to call a spade by its name.
I put wheels on my car which are a cheap copy of a very popular wheel because they were $500 not $2000 and I dont race. Every car meet someone has to comment that Im running “fakes” and try to give me a hard time about it. Yeah, Ive got a mortgage and a kid. Fuck off with your Supreme snapback ass hypebeast bullshit. I’m building the car I can afford.
People are toxic, even communities who preach peace and love as their doctrine have people who will whip out the moral-cock ruler and start shit over who is more peaceful and loving.
I am safer by not giving my information to a company that can’t stop hackers from revealing all the details about the people who have PSN accounts. Sony just throws our data and privacy into the void and doesn’t actually care about the loss. They either need bigger fines on a more consistent frequency levied against them or they need to drop the PSN account requirements and learn how to make money like they did before PSN.
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