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> If the game was built around the assumption that it will always have an internet connection, there may also need to be a lot of changes to the game itself to

> If the game was built around the assumption that it will always have an internet connection, there may also need to be a lot of changes to the game itself to operate that way. Then such games shouldn't be sold as goods like the the petition mentioned. They should be sold as services like WoW, so their customers know what to expect at the end of the service. Selling them as goods is worse than selling "lifetime" membership for an SaaS, then closing the SaaS after 3 years, because the customers may not know that the game would become unplayable in a few years when they purchased it.

nerdjon 3y ago
That is a strange distinction that would allow the company to just get out of supporting whatever law they may try to get with just a wording change on the box? WoW you have to buy. Yes there is a subscription but you also have to buy the game and each expansion. Destiny 2 you have to buy each expansion. They are not selling a SaaS as a lifetime one time buy, I checked all of my xbox games and every single one makes it clear that they can change it at any point. So it sounds like your argument is they just change the wording of something, charge the same amount, and then this proposal does nothing? I don't really buy the argument that consumers don't understand that servers eventually shut down.
- neurostimulant 3y ago
  That distinction is actually very important to set the customers expectation. You don't "buy" WoW, their website explicitly ask you to subscribe (monthly or yearly) [1]. Yes, you can buy the expansion, but those wouldn't work without subscription. Customers wouldn't be duped into buying the game and expecting it to still working later when all the servers are shut down, so the petition problably wouldn't apply to WoW, though the petition mentioned about getting this kind of game to support some form of self hosted server support for at least a fraction of its features at the end of its lifetime. You also don't "buy" Destiny 2, it's a free-to-play game. You can buy items and expansions like WoW. It's not as clear cut as WoW, but it's also should be clear enough that Destiny 2 is not sold as traditional goods, and the petition probably doesn't apply to this game as well. The game mentioned in the petition, The Crew, was sold for $50 with single player campaign and online components just like other games usually do. Then the publisher made the game unplayable later, even though it has some single player campaign contents. What's their excuse for doing this? Is this game actually a service where it can be made unusable at any point? If so, it should be clear from the get go and the game shouldn't be sold as goods, so customers who want the game they bought to be playable indefinitely (minus the online components) can spent their money on other games instead. [1] https://us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/world-of-warcraft-subscription https://us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/world-of-warcraft-s...
  - nerdjon 3y ago
    > That distinction is actually very important to set the customers expectation. At one point you did buy destiny 2 just like you did the first one. While they changed their business model for the base game at one point the example is still a valid one. You could argue that their "free to play" part is largely a demo to get you to buy the expansion. FFXIV does the same thing. Same with WoW. You buy those expansions for both games and in both situations when the servers shut down you loose access to something that you spent money on. Regarding The Crew. Part of the problem here, and one of my biggest issues with this particular campaign, is it seems like we are arguing about 2 very different things and the main page paints one picture of what they want and the FAQ is something else. To be clear, I have not played this game so I am trying to get information about what the actual reality of this game is and is not and that makes this a very hard conversation. We have online DRM for single player games. Which I 100% agree with shouldn't ever be a thing. It makes no sense. But then we have online games. Where being online is a fundamental part of the game and the server side component is required. This petition seems to want to treat both of these equally where they are fundamentally different problems and the second one is far more complex. I cannot find a concrete information on where The Crew actually falls for this. It has a single player component but is this actually all local content or was it engineered in a way to rely on something server side. I honestly don't know and we can speculate on whether it should have been or is and is not, but that is an important part of this conversation. I don't think this distinction about traditional goods is as important as you think it is. As far as a consumer goes, when more games were physical. I could go and buy WoW, FF11, Destiny, whatever the same as I would any single player game. And I did, I used to physically buy all of the Wow expansions and it was up to the consumer to understand that it is an online game that may shut down one day. That isn't a hard thing to know.
    - neurostimulant 3y ago
      The Crew is an open-world racing game, similar with need for speed most wanted. Exactly the kind of games where the online components can be replaced with offline bots because it already has bots playing opponent cars in the campaign. You can check the campaign gameplay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdRtfqwj2cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdRtfqwj2cg

nerdjon 3y ago

That is a strange distinction that would allow the company to just get out of supporting whatever law they may try to get with just a wording change on the box? WoW you have to buy. Yes there is a subscription but you also have to buy the game and each expansion. Destiny 2 you have to buy each expansion. They are not selling a SaaS as a lifetime one time buy, I checked all of my xbox games and every single one makes it clear that they can change it at any point. So it sounds like your argument is they just change the wording of something, charge the same amount, and then this proposal does nothing? I don't really buy the argument that consumers don't understand that servers eventually shut down.

neurostimulant 3y ago
That distinction is actually very important to set the customers expectation. You don't "buy" WoW, their website explicitly ask you to subscribe (monthly or yearly) [1]. Yes, you can buy the expansion, but those wouldn't work without subscription. Customers wouldn't be duped into buying the game and expecting it to still working later when all the servers are shut down, so the petition problably wouldn't apply to WoW, though the petition mentioned about getting this kind of game to support some form of self hosted server support for at least a fraction of its features at the end of its lifetime. You also don't "buy" Destiny 2, it's a free-to-play game. You can buy items and expansions like WoW. It's not as clear cut as WoW, but it's also should be clear enough that Destiny 2 is not sold as traditional goods, and the petition probably doesn't apply to this game as well. The game mentioned in the petition, The Crew, was sold for $50 with single player campaign and online components just like other games usually do. Then the publisher made the game unplayable later, even though it has some single player campaign contents. What's their excuse for doing this? Is this game actually a service where it can be made unusable at any point? If so, it should be clear from the get go and the game shouldn't be sold as goods, so customers who want the game they bought to be playable indefinitely (minus the online components) can spent their money on other games instead. [1] https://us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/world-of-warcraft-subscription https://us.shop.battle.net/en-us/product/world-of-warcraft-s...
- nerdjon 3y ago
  > That distinction is actually very important to set the customers expectation. At one point you did buy destiny 2 just like you did the first one. While they changed their business model for the base game at one point the example is still a valid one. You could argue that their "free to play" part is largely a demo to get you to buy the expansion. FFXIV does the same thing. Same with WoW. You buy those expansions for both games and in both situations when the servers shut down you loose access to something that you spent money on. Regarding The Crew. Part of the problem here, and one of my biggest issues with this particular campaign, is it seems like we are arguing about 2 very different things and the main page paints one picture of what they want and the FAQ is something else. To be clear, I have not played this game so I am trying to get information about what the actual reality of this game is and is not and that makes this a very hard conversation. We have online DRM for single player games. Which I 100% agree with shouldn't ever be a thing. It makes no sense. But then we have online games. Where being online is a fundamental part of the game and the server side component is required. This petition seems to want to treat both of these equally where they are fundamentally different problems and the second one is far more complex. I cannot find a concrete information on where The Crew actually falls for this. It has a single player component but is this actually all local content or was it engineered in a way to rely on something server side. I honestly don't know and we can speculate on whether it should have been or is and is not, but that is an important part of this conversation. I don't think this distinction about traditional goods is as important as you think it is. As far as a consumer goes, when more games were physical. I could go and buy WoW, FF11, Destiny, whatever the same as I would any single player game. And I did, I used to physically buy all of the Wow expansions and it was up to the consumer to understand that it is an online game that may shut down one day. That isn't a hard thing to know.
  - neurostimulant 3y ago
    The Crew is an open-world racing game, similar with need for speed most wanted. Exactly the kind of games where the online components can be replaced with offline bots because it already has bots playing opponent cars in the campaign. You can check the campaign gameplay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdRtfqwj2cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdRtfqwj2cg