„Stop Killing Games” initiative faced second rejection. UK government sees no reason to change the law, but is to „monitor the issue”
The UK government has once again rejected a petition to prevent game developers and publishers from „killing” games once support ends.
Disappointing news has reached us from the United Kingdom. As reported by PCGamer, the local government has rejected for the second time this year a petition prepared as part of the citizen initiative "Stop Killing Games." A document that has already been signed by over 13,000 people at the time of creating this news advocates for "prohibiting publishers from irreversibly disabling video games they have already sold."
The authors of the petition argue that "most video games can run indefinitely, but some have elements that will cause them to stop working when the publisher decides, without providing a shutdown date at the time of sale."
Further in the document, there is a mention: "we consider this a type of planned obsolescence, as customers may lose the option to buy and won't be able to maintain or repair a specific game."
The authors argue that this practice is hostile to consumers, but it can be prevented by changing the existing laws.
Even though government representatives "recognize the concerns raised by players regarding the functionality of purchased products," they don't plan to make changes to British consumer law.
According to the UK government, current regulations don't require "software-producing companies to support older versions of their products." Consequently, "there may be situations where decisions are made based on the high ongoing costs of maintaining servers for older games, and a decreasing user base."
Later in the response, the government acknowledges that there could be instances where a particular game should stay accessible, such as when "consumers believe the game will still be somewhat playable, even after physical support ends." The regulations "may require that the title remains technically efficient (for instance, available offline) and playable in that form." This kind of situation will soon occur with MultiVersus, which will remain playable without requiring an internet connection.
The authorities of Great Britain emphasize that they will "monitor this issue and take it into account in the work of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the field of consumer rights and damages."
- Arkane founder appeals to people concerned about game industry crash: „The market is correcting, we need to adapt”
- It hasn't released any games yet, and it's already laying off. New studio of Just Cause series creator suffered „unfortunate failure”
- Baldur's Gate 3 publisher says there's a simple way to get big studios to stop breaking their game's launches
- „Value slaughter.” Baldur's Gate 3 publisher has no illusions: the engagement economy is big threat to game developers
- BioWare veteran believes that sometimes it's worth „throwing the thing in reverse and finding another way forward”