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Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

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Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#71

Post by Mindwipe »

LocalH wrote: post #18
dijit wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s more complicated than that. I work in games and in my last workplace I was CTO of a racing simulation; that means I was working with brands that were not only my own in a pretty big way. The stipulations that were put on us was pretty strong. For example (and it’s not just these guys), Mercedes will not permit you to allow the logo to fall off; If you have a damage model in the game this is annoying. Some won’t…

The answer to that is simple, and has been used by other media (to the chagrin of fans of course). When it comes time to "kill" the game, make a final update to strip all such licensed material out of the game. The companies that develop and publish games amortize plenty of things out into multiple years. That's why live service is so increasingly common. The same developers and publishers should also factor in that…

So if they strip the libraries out and the server cannot run id that okay?

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#72

Post by Mindwipe »

chithanh wrote: post #49
bpfrh wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The licenced design seems to include the front part of the car per the above comment, that would mean creating seperate models for EOL games.

No, even if the licensing agreement between the developer and the car maker ends, then according to first sale doctrine, the game buyers keep the licensed content. Removing it from user systems would be undue (but admittedly has happened such as with the in-game music in GTA).

There is no first sale doctrine in Europe, and nor does the US one apply to digitally distributed content.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#73

Post by stathibus »

tehbeard wrote: post #30
hmry wrote: post #4

> Private servers are not always a viable alternative option for players as the protections we put in place to secure players’ data, remove illegal content, and combat unsafe community content would not exist and would leave rights holders liable. No? How would the "rights holders" be in any way liable for someone posting illegal content on a community-hosted server after a game has gone end-of-life? Also, community…

Because parents and the general public won't see that it's Bob's private server for $game. They see $game_name by $developer/publisher. Mojang (creators of Minecraft ) is an unfortunate good case study for this. It's sale to Microsoft is in part down to not being able to balance freedom for server owners and the PR issues caused by people scamming others, in this case children, while obscuring it under the Minecraft…

Imagine if the kids were all hanging out on Bob's Private Club Penguin Server.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#74

Post by Mindwipe »

meheleventyone wrote: post #70
dgfl wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the problem with releasing a server executable? As far as I can tell that would be enough to get around this legislation. And I can’t imagine that to be prohibitively expensive.

What is a server executable? With a lot of modern games it could be a whole stacks worth of systems that neither the game client or server side game runtime will work without.

And which are not owned by the developer or available to be perpetually licensed.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#75

Post by surgical_fire »

meheleventyone wrote: post #62
surgical_fire wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the context of EOL of a game if you have to provide it for free to owners in perpetuity any third party content You start your argument from a presumption that releasing an offline game is almost an impossibility. Are you trying yo argue that offline games have zero things licensed? This sounds like a major argument in favor of offline games. Sounds to me that the simple solution is just stop licensing things wi…

It’s about the distribution of games, doesn’t matter whether it’s online or offline you need a license to distribute IP that you don’t own. Never making a licensed product or using third-party IP is definitely one solution but I don’t think is the intent nor without adverse effects.

> doesn’t matter whether it’s online or offline

Then the solution seems simple. Making the game available offline does not seem to have any impact in terms of licensing.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#76

Post by surgical_fire »

meheleventyone wrote: post #61
charcircuit wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stop killing games is not about forcing developers to perpetually sell games. They can still stop selling games. They just can't leave it in an unplayable state. If developers want to get the rights to distribute a song for 5 years with their game, they can still do that.

No I’m talking about the distribution of games. With physical media that’s all fine because once the license expires they stop making new copies. People that own a copy are fine. With digital distribution once you’ve EOL’d a product you still need to make it available right? Otherwise how do people that have paid for it get it? But that means you can’t distribute elements you no longer have the license to.

With online distribution games can be made unavailable for purchase. You are not distributing it anymore. Only people that previously purchased can still download the game.

There are multiple such cases in stores such as Steam or GoG. I own games that are not available for purchase anymore.

Those games were not killed. I can still download and play them.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#77

Post by surgical_fire »

meheleventyone wrote: post #63
surgical_fire wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’ll make licensing more expensive because the net result is more permissive The current state of affairs is that the net result is such that consumers are stripped of their rights. I find it more unacceptable. If the licensing costs without fucking over consumers is prohibitive, then maybe those games should not exist. If no one is licensing the brands/assets/music/whatever because the licensing costs are too hig…

> If the licensing costs without fucking over consumers is prohibitive, then maybe those games should not exist. Wow, who is killing games now?

Absolutely, games that strip consumers of their rights should not exist.

I am not going to defend predatory practices. You think you threw me a gotcha, but you are actually only exposing yourself.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#78

Post by delfinom »

tehbeard wrote: post #30
hmry wrote: post #4

> Private servers are not always a viable alternative option for players as the protections we put in place to secure players’ data, remove illegal content, and combat unsafe community content would not exist and would leave rights holders liable. No? How would the "rights holders" be in any way liable for someone posting illegal content on a community-hosted server after a game has gone end-of-life? Also, community…

Because parents and the general public won't see that it's Bob's private server for $game. They see $game_name by $developer/publisher. Mojang (creators of Minecraft ) is an unfortunate good case study for this. It's sale to Microsoft is in part down to not being able to balance freedom for server owners and the PR issues caused by people scamming others, in this case children, while obscuring it under the Minecraft…

But the sale to Microsoft resulted in more scamming. In fact, the Xbox version of the game has in game currency added that requires dollars. And Microsoft allows servers free reign to scam children into spending that currency and buying more.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#79

Post by meheleventyone »

surgical_fire wrote: post #75
meheleventyone wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s about the distribution of games, doesn’t matter whether it’s online or offline you need a license to distribute IP that you don’t own. Never making a licensed product or using third-party IP is definitely one solution but I don’t think is the intent nor without adverse effects.

> doesn’t matter whether it’s online or offline Then the solution seems simple. Making the game available offline does not seem to have any impact in terms of licensing.

I don’t think you’ve followed the discussion then.

Re: Game publishers respond to Stop Killing Games claim it curtails developer choice

#80

Post by anton-c »

dmurray wrote: post #60
chithanh wrote: post #52

I don't buy these arguments. If game developers don't want to sell games that way then don't. Sell subscriptions instead. Like instead of $60 for a game, $60 one-time fee for a two-year subscription, which afterwards renews automatically in 3 months intervals at no cost until further notice . Same applies to all paid in-game content. That way the developers can continue offering both games and subscriptions where eac…

I don't think this would have any significant impact on the industry. Publishers would just advertise their games as coming with a 2-year subscription, or whatever. People would have the same expectations as now: the game will be supported for a couple of years, and it will be supported much longer if there's an obvious way that is profitable to the developer. No publisher would unilaterally want to start advertising…

Most games won't need it. When every other offline game says "buy" but the games as a service one has to say "rent" for the same price, consumers will notice I think.
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