I’ve been wodnering how regulations about not killing games deals with compaines running multi-player servers?

For single player games or games with single player modes it seems easier to implement.

  • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    3 days ago

    From the initiative:

    This initiative calls to require publishers that sell or license videogames to consumers in the European Union (or related features and assets sold for videogames they operate) to leave said videogames in a functional (playable) state.

    Specifically, the initiative seeks to prevent the remote disabling of videogames by the publishers, before providing reasonable means to continue functioning of said videogames without the involvement from the side of the publisher.

    The initiative does not seek to acquire ownership of said videogames, associated intellectual rights or monetization rights, neither does it expect the publisher to provide resources for the said videogame once they discontinue it while leaving it in a reasonably functional (playable) state.

    This is all that the initiative states on the matter. How it would actually work in practice is anyone’s guess because the wording is so vague. Supporters seem to be under the impression that companies have a “sever.exe” file they purposefully don’t provide players because they’re evil and hate you. They could also be contracting out matchmaking services to a third party and don’t actually do it in-house. Software development is complex and building something that will be used by 100,000 people simultaneously isn’t easy.

    There’s a reason comedic videos like Microservices, where an engineer explains why it’s impossible to show the user it is their birthday based on an overly complex network of microservices, and Fireship’s overengineering a website exist. Big software is known to be difficult to maintain and update. Huge multiplayer games aren’t any different. It’s likely there isn’t actually a “reasonable” way for them to continue to work. Supporters are hopeful this initiative would cause the industry to change how game software is developed, but that hope gets real close to outright naivety.

    • UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      3 days ago

      Games and multiplayer have existed before any of this mess, so it is evidently not necessary. If a publisher thinks otherwise, they can’t continue to make multiplayer games. Sucks to be them I guess, I’m sure others will pick up the ball

    • WolfLink@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      3 days ago

      Supporters seem to be under the impression that companies have a “sever.exe” file they purposefully don’t provide players because they’re evil and hate you.

      There is some truth to this

      They could also be contracting out matchmaking services to a third party and don’t actually do it in-house. Software development is complex and building something that will be used by 100,000 people simultaneously isn’t easy.

      There is some truth to this too.

      Making an MMO maintainable by the userbase might be complicated. But way more common are games that could easily have LAN based multiplayer but the company decides not to add it, or even singleplayer games that require an internet connection, just so the company can put limits on how and when the game is played.