5 ms·

I do get your point but I wonder if it's really that hard to argue? I don't think Blizzard will have a hard time defending the stance of "we haven't abandoned

I do get your point but I wonder if it's really that hard to argue? I don't think Blizzard will have a hard time defending the stance of "we haven't abandoned WOW". and if you enter the world where we consider WOW legally abandoned, publishers will start re-evaluating their expansion models, possibly for worse?

Forge36 8y ago
Maybe, however I see a court stuffing siding with consumers as the game as released is no longer playable. Compare with StarCraft Brood War. The ability to play on a lan connection means the game remains playable (It's also still sold). To look back further I'd point to games from Lucas Art. SCUMMVM allows to games to continue being played, while not sold.
- plopz 8y ago
  I don't think WoW is a good example, its still being sold and maintained. I don't think you can claim something is abandoned just because it was patched or updated. A much better example would be Star Wars Galaxies which was actually abandoned and the servers turned off in 2011.
  - vbezhenar 8y ago
    Technically WoW 1 and WoW 8 (current version) have very little in common. But they are remaking it under WoW classic brand, so definitely not abandoned in this case.
  - derefr 8y ago
    Different software companies have vastly different criteria for differentiating between "a patch update to the same product", "a new major version of the product requiring you to buy it again", and "an entirely new product." For example: assume that at some point, Super Mario Maker (which is effectively solely an online service) is going to get a release for the Nintendo Switch. Like with the 3DS version, a hypothetical Switch version would probably get its own global level-uploads database, partitioned off from that of the Wii U version. Let's say Nintendo then, eventually, shut down the servers for the Wii U version of the game, while keeping the servers for the Switch version online. Under the "separate games" interpretation, the backend for the Wii U version of Mario Maker would probably become abandonware as soon as it was shut down. People could set up their own compatible backend to put their level data back up and keep playing SMM on their Wii U's, and it'd be entirely legal. But under the other two interpretations, it wouldn't be legal. And keep in mind that, even if the client was a complete re-write, the servers would likely consist of 99% the same code between the two "generations" of the game. You could say that the Wii U version's servers "became" the Switch version's servers. One "evolved into" the other, without the Wii U version's ever actually "shutting down." They just, at some point, dropped compatibility for speaking to the old Wii U client software. Given that what you bought in this case is the client software... would the previous paragraph matter? It's entirely an implementation detail hidden to you.
esotericn 8y ago
The original game is radically different in major ways to the current version. Maps are different, class mechanics are different, races are different, models are different, enemies and bosses are different, classes are different, etc. It's a completely different game now under the same banner. Theseus' Ship comes to mind; yes, there's been a continuous migration process in place, but you cannot play World of Warcraft v1 any more. A more reasonable comparison would be Windows 95 vs Windows XP or something. Yes, XP is backwards compatible, but it's obviously a completely different OS in most ways aside from the name.
- scrollaway 8y ago
  WoW seems like a terrible example for this, in light of their announcement of WoW Classic remastered. A remaster is a pretty solid way of saying "we haven't abandoned the game". There's thousands of abandoned MMORPGs and you pick the one that's getting remastered? :)
  - esotericn 8y ago
    The first expansion came out in 2007. It's coming up on eleven years. We're talking about a decade. So even if you take the announcement as an implication they're actually going to do it (I personally don't think it's going to happen, we will not see a 1.x.x release go live again without dramatic changes), six years ago it would still be illegal under this framework to fix a game you bought because at some indeterminate point in the future the manufacturer could appear again. Hell, even the _announcement_ was a year ago.
    - scrollaway 8y ago
      > So even if you take the announcement as an implication they're actually going to do it I have the files on my computer as I write this, they're downloadable unencrypted off their CDN (use this tool I wrote if you want them, with the remote `ribbit://us.version.battle.net/wow_classic`: https://github.com/HearthSim/keg https://github.com/HearthSim/keg). The demo will be playable at BlizzCon, if you're going there (come say hi if you are!).

Forge36 8y ago

Maybe, however I see a court stuffing siding with consumers as the game as released is no longer playable. Compare with StarCraft Brood War. The ability to play on a lan connection means the game remains playable (It's also still sold). To look back further I'd point to games from Lucas Art. SCUMMVM allows to games to continue being played, while not sold.

plopz 8y ago
I don't think WoW is a good example, its still being sold and maintained. I don't think you can claim something is abandoned just because it was patched or updated. A much better example would be Star Wars Galaxies which was actually abandoned and the servers turned off in 2011.
- vbezhenar 8y ago
  Technically WoW 1 and WoW 8 (current version) have very little in common. But they are remaking it under WoW classic brand, so definitely not abandoned in this case.
- derefr 8y ago
  Different software companies have vastly different criteria for differentiating between "a patch update to the same product", "a new major version of the product requiring you to buy it again", and "an entirely new product." For example: assume that at some point, Super Mario Maker (which is effectively solely an online service) is going to get a release for the Nintendo Switch. Like with the 3DS version, a hypothetical Switch version would probably get its own global level-uploads database, partitioned off from that of the Wii U version. Let's say Nintendo then, eventually, shut down the servers for the Wii U version of the game, while keeping the servers for the Switch version online. Under the "separate games" interpretation, the backend for the Wii U version of Mario Maker would probably become abandonware as soon as it was shut down. People could set up their own compatible backend to put their level data back up and keep playing SMM on their Wii U's, and it'd be entirely legal. But under the other two interpretations, it wouldn't be legal. And keep in mind that, even if the client was a complete re-write, the servers would likely consist of 99% the same code between the two "generations" of the game. You could say that the Wii U version's servers "became" the Switch version's servers. One "evolved into" the other, without the Wii U version's ever actually "shutting down." They just, at some point, dropped compatibility for speaking to the old Wii U client software. Given that what you bought in this case is the client software... would the previous paragraph matter? It's entirely an implementation detail hidden to you.

esotericn 8y ago

The original game is radically different in major ways to the current version. Maps are different, class mechanics are different, races are different, models are different, enemies and bosses are different, classes are different, etc. It's a completely different game now under the same banner. Theseus' Ship comes to mind; yes, there's been a continuous migration process in place, but you cannot play World of Warcraft v1 any more. A more reasonable comparison would be Windows 95 vs Windows XP or something. Yes, XP is backwards compatible, but it's obviously a completely different OS in most ways aside from the name.

scrollaway 8y ago
WoW seems like a terrible example for this, in light of their announcement of WoW Classic remastered. A remaster is a pretty solid way of saying "we haven't abandoned the game". There's thousands of abandoned MMORPGs and you pick the one that's getting remastered? :)
- esotericn 8y ago
  The first expansion came out in 2007. It's coming up on eleven years. We're talking about a decade. So even if you take the announcement as an implication they're actually going to do it (I personally don't think it's going to happen, we will not see a 1.x.x release go live again without dramatic changes), six years ago it would still be illegal under this framework to fix a game you bought because at some indeterminate point in the future the manufacturer could appear again. Hell, even the _announcement_ was a year ago.
  - scrollaway 8y ago
    > So even if you take the announcement as an implication they're actually going to do it I have the files on my computer as I write this, they're downloadable unencrypted off their CDN (use this tool I wrote if you want them, with the remote `ribbit://us.version.battle.net/wow_classic`: https://github.com/HearthSim/keg https://github.com/HearthSim/keg). The demo will be playable at BlizzCon, if you're going there (come say hi if you are!).