Source about the offline app thing: https://faq.ac-pocketcamp.com/hc/en-us/articles/36353725150489-What-is-the-paid-version-of-the-app#
https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Category:Unplayable_games
And that’s only PC games.
Looks like some of those are games that were cancelled, some were online multiplayer games that had the servers shutdown, some were simply removed from the Microsoft Store and some were single player games with always online DRM for which they shut the servers down. So it’s not all super scummy nonsense
Taking away a game you bought because the game was intentionally made to rely on a server is always scummy behavior. That’s the whole point.
Oh no! Not Microsoft Bingo! That’s a list of D list games nobody has ever heard of that all shutdown years ago. I don’t think the world would be a better place if the devs of Radical Heights, a free to play arena shooter that was launched and shutdown a month later in 2018 were forced to give their game out to everyone for free after.
Hello, sole arbiter of a game’s worth.
Of course not every game is a certified banger, but there’s more than enough notable games on that list that made an impact on the industry and should’ve been preserved for that fact alone.