Stop Killing Games - 2

Alright I'm done Narrator: He was in fact not done

I feel like its a hard topic to discuss, because of all the different types of games we have. Games where you need x amount of people to play a match etc is very different from for example The Crew. I really liked The Crew, but barely used the online functions at all, so i was very confused at first, because i actually thought it was playable offline

I wonder how the consumer base will respond to the first game that plainly states "You don't own this game you that just spent $100 for. We do. We are granting you a temporary license to play it until we say otherwise". Have that message popup on startup. Right before the company logo and safety advisory. I mean... that's how (live service) games operate right now, but I'm talking about witnessing the shock of waking up a sleeping public to the reality of it. I don't think they'd respond well to it and it would create a public backlash for the publisher/developer which they would rather not deal with, which is why they hide it in an EULA no one ever reads to begin with.

I think the preservation point was glossed over, it's the main and really only point that I feel makes sense to me, sure "why would I play a dead game with 5 people", but also it'd be beneficial to those 5 people and what about all the other people who eventually come back to revisit the game after it's gone? Hell, you yourself revisited Global Agenda a few weeks ago which wouldn't have been possible had the official servers gone down.

MS Paint on top

The ONLY reason TF2 survived the bot crisis is because Valve allowed its player base to run private servers. If it weren't for Uncle Dane, LazyPurple, and other popular server hosts, TF2 would've been completely unplayable for years, and likely dead by now.

Edit : I've seen some comments implying that the TF2 bot attack was done by community server owners, we know this isn't the case due to the new ban wave by Valve and the fact that most of the bots are ran by a small group of people doing it for attention. I feel like people are coming to this conclusion due to flawed argument presented in the video. The point he makes about non existent private server trolls somehow destroying the game to generate profit from private servers is very unrealistic and only really applies to MMOs, most games make profit from the game, not the server it connects to. The microtransactions, DLC, and the game are on a storefront usually not owned by the game developer(Steam Epic PSN Xbox Store ETC). If the company were to stop running the servers for the game, the game dev would still have the profits from the game's sales and DLC. So unless every store host shuts down all at the same time, the main source of income wouldn't be affected. OG COMMENT : tf2 has community servers already, in fact ALL of valves older multiplayer games are only alive due to community servers. The bots were only a issue on valves OFFICAL SERVERS. For most players, the only real way to play the game without bots was community servers which have actual moderation by real humans. If this were any other modern game you would be out of luck.

I think people are just tired of "You'll own nothing and you'll be happy" and they are using whatever they can to fight back. It might backfire but at this point they feel so powerless that in their mind any change is a good change.

Bots in TF2 are not something new. Bots were there for last... six(?) years. And TF2 allows to run communuty servers since beginning.

On the point of "dead" live service games, I know a lot of underground places that quite enjoy exploring old games like that!! And archiving is not necessarily about fun either, it's about preserving the ability to play and even research/do digital archeology in the future.

The second argument for whatever reason just assumed that every game is a battle royal or MMO, there are a ton of games with smaller server sizes where the intended experience could happen with 4-20ish people. A ton of games need smaller playercounts and can be pretty perfectly preserved with a smaller audience with dedicated servers, this happens for games like Tribes 2 or niche HL2 mods. Even with that though, the idea of "the game isn't perfectly preserved because uhhh less people are playing" is fine? If people don't want to play they don't have too? It feels as if it completely mis-understand why anybody would value preservation. Even for incredibly niche games you will have groups host "let's play every saturday at this specific time" just to get the game playable in any way, for an MMO even if it wouldn't completely capture the experience, and there are only about 30 people interested, that is enough to do a significant amount of content within the game. That can enable a lot of the PVP, Raids, ect. I personally like hypersacpe, a battle royal with 100 player per match, but being able to play with 35 players instead of 100 is better than the game literally just being impossible to play. If that would only be achievable on a very specific time weekly, that's genuinly just better than it not. I can understand the first argument, but I believe you are completely unable to understand why anybody would want a game preserved to genuinly make the argument "ermm it's not perfectly preserved because it doesn't have 12 million players" Ratz Instagib has an average of 8 players and I will literally just play it with my friends sometimes because it is good. The third point is just true, but no really contradictory to anything. Honestly shrink wrap licensing agreements are so fucking stupid they're not really worth talking about. The first situation would be ridiculously niche honestly. The company would have to die to stop them from sending cease and desists on top of the game being shut down in order for any of that to happen. Even in examples where people have launched deliberate attacks to kill the game (like either TF2) it didn't really work. Titanfall 2 was an incredibly niche game with a low playercount and despite the servers nearly being unplayable, the community largely still held on to the game and tried to play in the few times when it was possible, until the problem kinda just went away. I can't think of an example where a deliberate attack killed a game. Even with the attack on Team fortress 2, the entire botting thing was built off the back of leaked source code. Even assuming it died, typically another company will just sweep in like a vulture and get IPs for cheap. In that case, they would be the ones able to send ceases and desists to whoever is unlawfully monetizing their IP. If this doesn't happen, the tools to host a server would just be public, so the party trying to monetize this would have to compete with other people, some of whom would just host it for free. If the company and game were in such a vulnerable position that all of this was feasible, would this even be profitable? I feel this could only really work with a very small player base. This entire situation feels incredibly fringe. Genuinly the possibility of somebody attacking a decaying game because they want the ability to host modded servers , or literally just a TF2(either one) situation where it's done out of maliciousness and nothing else seems more likely than this.

I feel like your preservation argument kinda falls flat, but this may be a result of a differentiating opinions. If I’m understanding your point correctly we should allow dying games to finally meet their ends because there’s no point if there’s no player base. You severely underestimate gamer’s love for their games. There will always be a players base for any game no matter how small. Just look at how often retro games are still played to this day. Also as an artist (architect) myself I want my works to survive the test of time. It’s the same reason why we have museums and history books. I imagine devs want their works to last and not be cucked by a publisher. Games should be allowed to survive the test of time. But I do admit that there needs to be a deeper conversation on how multiplayer online games should be handled at their end. For single player experiences however, those games really don’t need to be online all the time. I’m a huge gacha player (Genshin, Nikke, Zenless Zone Zero, all games whose primary gameplay is single player focused) and I dread the day that those games get shutdown. There’s no reason why games such as those require an online connection. Those games will forever be lost to time and no online videos should not be their substitute. There will be a day when LoL will die, and it is unfair that such a long standing influential game should carry on after death. And on the whole we are buying licenses of the games, not buying the games, part of Ross’s movements is to make developers clearly state that they are licenses and they have the power to shut down the games anytime, instead of obfuscating those details in the TOS. He proposed that games should have a lifespan clearly stated. Even the UK government agreed with this assessment. With this campaign, he made the UK government respond and they sided with the devs in that they’re protected by their TOS/EULA, but they should also clearly state that the game has limited lifespan. I think a better example of this is that the despite shutting down the Kingdom Hearts gacha games, you can still download the app and experience the story. A lot of the actual gameplay elements were axed, but the story, arguably one of the most important aspects for a series like Kingdom Hearts, still remains. It’s compromises such as these that are doable, instead of the alternative of never getting to experience the game never again.

TF2 is not a good example. Those people who cheat or host bots that cheat do that because they love to watch the world burn. They get a kick out of legit players expressing their frustration that they can't play the game properly. Simple as that. Dedicated servers offered by Valve (and which some of them were hosted by respectable YouTubers as their hobby projects) were essentially the only way to play TF2 without running into cheaters.

Pirate Software and Rossman Group having the most polite YouTube drama of all time

this is practically going nowhere at this point and the main issue is just being forgotten... singleplayer games having forced required server connection for no reason and not owning the games, just owning a license to it, which is just simply halfassed and wrong

I honestly think these games should be designed with their online features expected to fail. Make it so they can play against bots as a final recourse or make it so people can set up their own servers. Valve has allowed their playerbase to make their own servers forever and it hasn't diminish Valves profits. It's kept the games alive for over 20 years or so.

Good points, except I think you are underselling the value of preserving a game with 0 players. Even MMO's especially ones like FFXIV would have tremendous value as a single player experience.

This still doesn't address the issue of games having singleplayer modes being unavailable offline. I understood your stance on the server binaries, but I still don't get the argument against making games playable offline when they have singleplayer modes already. Edit: I said singleplayer modes, meaning in games that feature multiplayer too. I should have been more specific, sorry.

Other industries are obligated to have end-of-life plans too. It's not some crazy idea. Game companies have been living on easy street for quite a while now, enjoying the benefits of both goods and services without any of the responsibilities, and customers have been getting none of the required benefits for either of them. Multiple government and consumer protection agencies have already agreed that the games industry is violating constitutional, fundamental property laws of EU citizens. Fundamental rights are not negotiable. It doesn't matter how "hard" it is to not scam consumers out of their basic rights, if you can't make an ethical product, then it probably just shouldn't be made. Constitutional rights are more important than any single company.

In a museum, you are not allowed to touch the original displayed objects, they can only be looked at, and sometimes they provide replicas you can touch and interact with. The same goes for a server binary. It's not the same experience because the original is gone, but you can have a simulacrum of what it used to be by joining a community hosted server or port forwarding to your friends.