The thing with FF14 is that the client is already available as a free download. It's really only the server authenticating you that prevents people from "stealing" the game.

Yeah that's the biggest issue I think most companies would have.

EULAs could be written by J.R.R. Tolkien, I'll still treat them like Tom Bombadil.

To come back to the game that got this party started.

And just in case somebody forgot, it is The Crew, a MMO racing game with original vehicles.

How do you wrap your head around the IP stuff in the game that does interfere with the car manufactures, when that IP
is most likely only rented for a limited time frame.
The reason racing games are taken off even from GoG and why we will never see many of the good old racing games back again ever.
Not to speak about the track list the game most likely got.

Here we are not only talking about one layer of IP stuff, we are talking about several layers.

To everybodies surprise and something the starters of the "rescue my most liked game" campaign seem to have ignored, the game is getting 10 years old this year and depending on when contracts for music and cars have been closed and assuming rights have been bought for 10 years - yeah, here we are.
I mean, the devs were clearly stating in their message, that it is about licences. And you can write so much additional stuff, licencing is the breaking point.

I am absolutely sure, that 3rd partie companies will sell rights for the same amount of money they take now for 10 years, when there is some "law" saying that the game must be there forever and ever.
And for sure they won't call for more money, when you give away the stuff for free after 10 years, after the rented rights endet. Just to close the next time limited deal with a big smile on the face.

I love how this point is nowhere adressed in this "uprise".

So? It's not like you have any power to make servers come online.

If they licensed music or rights to use vehicles based on time it would make sense that they would have to shut it down eventually.

I don't even really know what the licensing was for Larian to get Baldur's Gate. I assume it was not based on time but a dollar amount but don't really know.

Well

https://www.ubisoft.com/en-gb/game/the-crew/the-crew/news-updates/mOR3tviszkxfeQCUKxhOV/an-update-on-the-crew
"We understand this may be disappointing for players still enjoying the game, but it has become a necessity due to upcoming server infrastructure and licensing constraints."

For some reason nowhere mentioned by whoever started and promoted this campaign

It's because they don't care about IP, licensing, agreements made, or being profitable. They just want they want.

Of the possible reasons to kill the game, an expired DRM technology license would be the most entertaining. Does Ubisoft truly own its own DRM, or is a 3rd party sending a proverbial tow truck to collect its leased car from Ubisoft's driveway. Whatever else comes of Ubisoft's practices perturbing a Youtuber to seek such extensive legal action, I hope things like this will be stated publicly (and ideally in French).

An online-only game would not require a 3rd party to implement DRM because the game was already built to require a connection to the company's servers.

A primarily offline game that wanted to implement DRM might use a 3rd party server (ex: Persona using Denuvo). But for an MMO or other type of online-only game it would not make sense.

God forbid people wanting to access what they bought. It's understandable to close MMO's and stuff like that, when the costs of operation go too high, but a game with singleplayer shouldn't be closed like that, regardless of any licensing stuff.

Earlier in the thread, multiple levels of DRM were discussed:

If a layer or library of the DRM were used by them but not developed by them, Ubisoft may have had licensing terms with a 3rd party for parts of the DRM system(s) for this game.

It's more likely some licensing terms with a car company, musician, or some other artiste, but the potential for the DRM system itself to not be in Ubisoft's control would be peak absurdity. "The company's servers" or are they... :-)

A MMO that is sending you into instances where you and only you do stuff is more Single Player as The Crew has ever been.
Yes, you had a single player campaign and stuff, but in the end it was a persistent online world for several players doing their thing.
With several instances of that world, yes, but in the end a MMO style game.
It was never solo, it was never offline.

Rebuilding that for pure SP might be costly.
Giving away the ability to create own servers, which would include very likely several players MP would most likely break licencing agreements to 3rd parties.

Letting the game run, but not selling new copies, would most likely break licencing contracts and it would be burning money.

While I don't know how much ingame sales the game had. There are only 2 reasons for shutting down MMO like games.
1. No profit anymore.
2. Licences end.

If Lord of the Rings Online or Star Trek Online will die some day, it most likely won't because of not making money anymore. It will be because of licence contracts end. Because those games rely on 3rd party licences.

As any racing game out there that is using real world cars.

End of story.


Denuvo got time limited licences, that is known.
That is why it is removed after some time very often.
But in terms of money, licencing a DRM software isn't much money compared to 3rd party assets.
Means, DRM licences run out too most likely, but just because they end the same time the big ones end.

I love this shit, of excusing big corporations fucking over paying customers. We've been throught this over and over again, like with Darkspore and other titles, yet people still defend the corpos. Amazing.

Maybe the game should never have been built like that, it's one thing. Second is that it would absolutely be possible to make it singleplayer only, it was just an arbitrary thing to need online connection to access the campaign,

But whatever, let's just let corporations do whatever the fuck they want, it can't end badly, right?

For The Crew, this is tragically relevant; which is why I avenge that game by partaking in DRM-free versions of games that are "officially" no such thing. I'm even generous enough to encourage big publishers to take my money; all they need to do is remove the DRM, sell it here maybe.
That's the spirit, death to the MMO! Making LotR Online into LotR Offline would be the best thing to happen to the Tolkien Fandom.

I can't blame a company for doing exactly what the agreement says. If you don't like the license agreement you don't have to buy the license. It's an online car game not water. It's hardly a must have purchase.

I can understand someone not liking the license agreement and not buying the license. What I do not understand is someone agreeing to it and then complaining like 10 years later.

It doesn't even seem like the developer wanted to shutdown but that their own license purchases have expired and it's not profitable enough to renew them. If they are bound by their license agreements why would their customers not be?

In those 10 years, it had been changed and it was impossible to disagree with that, because you lost what you paid for.
I understand if company went bankrupt. I could understand if they closed MP cause of costs. BUT I don't understand when a company with millions of dollars in revenue shuts down an auth server with cost counting in bytes. Because it's only SOFTWARE change. They still pay for auth servers. It's just anticustomer politics.
They still sell games with sentence "buy our game", not "Temporary access to content".
Temporary? - How long? If you buy anything else you have warranty. But games - you bought it yesterday, today they announce that after 2 months they will block you playing what you paid for and you can't do anything. (In my experience, it happened even 2 weeks).
Let's come back to warranty. In most countries it's one year. In mine country and few others it's 2 years - simplifying. BUT not with games. All this destroys the basic principle in the civilized world - equality the law.

ps
One more thing.
Most of you don't remember that but people thought that if they bought a game, music, they owned it. They can copy it and do whatever they want with those copies. That's why copyrights and licenses were created, to prevent injustice, but this has long since been perverted by corporations.

pps
It's sad that some people are defending corporations against their own rights.