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The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

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Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#131

Post by markstos »

Ukv wrote: post #127
markstos wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how you would craft a law to prevent a company from forming sub-companies for specific games to isolate risk? Or make it illegal for a company to go bankrupt? Creating sub-companies is common business practice that even small businesses use. Like if a small company wants to buy a building, they may form an LLC to hold the property to isolate that risk from the rest of their business.

Bankruptcy process already involves identifying and administering the company's assets, so releasing the server software (as-is) to owners of the game could be part of that.

Besides bankruptcy there is also shutting a business down, in which case are no new owners. Lavabit and Silent Circle being examples of businesses that shutdown rather than comply with laws they didn't like.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#132

Post by throwaway85825 »

Akronymus wrote: post #75
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't read it that way. "Free-to-play" games generally include games with microtransactions, and the bill text does nothing to disagree with that: > (b) This section does not apply to any of the following: > (2) Any digital game that is advertised or offered to a person for no monetary consideration. This solely refers to the game being available for free, not for any additional powerups or cosmetics being availabl…

> > (2) Any digital game that is advertised or offered to a person for no monetary consideration. I'd argue buying any form of MTX creates a monetary consideration. Though, I guess it is kind of a gray area that's gonna have to be ruled on. > This solely refers to the game being available for free, not for any additional powerups or cosmetics being available for free. I didn't intend to mean additional stuff being fr…

This is absolutely not a gray area. MTX are monetary consideration. Free games in this case are more likely advergames.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#133

Post by Paracompact »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #76
Paracompact wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume you're actually a gamer, and not just an economist speculating on a market you're not exposed to? Because I don't know how to reconcile your comment with my reality. There are tons of live-service single-purchase games, I would even say they the overwhelmingly default model in 2026 compared to WoW-style subscription games. If you want an answer to your "continuous cost without continuous revenue" riddle, the…

There are a bunch of these, and they are silly/unviable. I see a lot more free-to-play than single-purchase live service games, but the latter is a fun additional exploit in that they get you to pay up front for something that they never have any intention to survive long-term. Currently I'm heavily playing both a free-to-play with microtransactions title (Heroes of the Storm) and a subscription title (EVE Online), b…

Ah, I see your point better now. I agree that free-to-play and single-purchase live service games are essentially the same breed, that free-to-plays are similarly widespread, and would indeed like microtransaction-funded titles to be subjected to the same stipulations in the bill.

> there are single purchase games with an online model, and they fail and get shut down because they were never sustainable to begin with

I still don't think I agree with this (it's the exact same business model, just with an onboarding cost to e.g. be less dependent on MTX, or to cultivate a smaller but more dedicated fanbase, or to shut out bots), but that's beside the above points.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#134

Post by ChoGGi »

kristiandupont wrote: post #41
wagwang wrote: post #3

The reasonable compromise should be to force devs to release server binaries if they are not willing to run the servers themselves.

The backend for a game is not just an .exe file. It can be a mess of a system that relies on all kinds of services that need maintenance and that one dev who knows how to reset the cache. I agree that it's shitty that buyers can lose access to a game they bought, but I really struggle to see how this could function practically.

At the very least this hopefully stops them from suing modders that recreate the server software.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#135

Post by unleaded »

Rapzid wrote: post #102
jnovek wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps they should just write games in a way where they can actually release server code when they it shuts down?

Perhaps "they" can write games however they want? If you don't like it, don't do business with them? This is a weird thing to be legislating on.

It's too late to decide not to do business with them once they've stopped you from using a product you already bought.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#136

Post by stouset »

duskwuff wrote: post #16
bob1029 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think forcing a person or business to divulge their intellectual property, simply because they no longer wish to provide downstream products or services, is reasonable. That said, as a consumer I really don't like when something goes away. Overwatch 1 was probably the most brutal experience for me. In the end, I don't think anyone has any kind of special entitlements here. The server binaries will almost alwa…

> The server binaries will almost always include other proprietary information that the studio will not want to release. Or even information that they are contractually forbidden from releasing. A typical scenario would be a game developed as a fork of a proprietary codebase which was licensed from another company. Forcing the licensee to release material would infringe on the rights of the licensor.

Setting aside for a moment whether or not this specific legislation is a good implementation of the idea, I cannot understand how people don’t comprehend that this only happens because there is currently no obligation to release their server binaries or code.

The second that becomes a legal requirement with associated penalties, developers will stop licensing technology under those kinds of terms.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#137

Post by Akronymus »

throwaway85825 wrote: post #132
Akronymus wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > (2) Any digital game that is advertised or offered to a person for no monetary consideration. I'd argue buying any form of MTX creates a monetary consideration. Though, I guess it is kind of a gray area that's gonna have to be ruled on. > This solely refers to the game being available for free, not for any additional powerups or cosmetics being available for free. I didn't intend to mean additional stuff being fr…

This is absolutely not a gray area. MTX are monetary consideration. Free games in this case are more likely advergames.

Gray area, as in it has to be ruled on in court because that's 100% gonna be an avenue for some companies to try and weasel out of obligations.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#138

Post by pokstad »

ryandrake wrote: post #103
vl wrote: post #61

They are going to do what movie industry is already doing: create shell company for release of each game. Then they will shut down the company when they want, and there will be nobody to come for.

So, CA should get rid of those loopholes, too! We need to culturally accept things like "zero day law patches" for loopholes and unintended consequences. Legislators, don't just pass a law, see it incentivizing something unintended, and then throw up your hands crying "Well, we tried!" Patch the law as soon as the bad behavior starts!

Loopholes are possible from excessive regulations. Regulating everything will never stop. Vote with your money and support game studios that provide the best online support. Or buy games that are standalone purchases that don’t require online services.

Re: The California state assembly has passed the 'Protect Our Games Act'

#139

Post by Ukv »

markstos wrote: post #131
Ukv wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bankruptcy process already involves identifying and administering the company's assets, so releasing the server software (as-is) to owners of the game could be part of that.

Besides bankruptcy there is also shutting a business down, in which case are no new owners. Lavabit and Silent Circle being examples of businesses that shutdown rather than comply with laws they didn't like.

Shutting down operations as Lavabit/Silent Circle did doesn't negate existing contractual obligations. Voluntarily dissolving the company would also involve completing performance of outstanding contracts.
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