Thank you based Ross.
I really don’t see why an indie dev would oppose this. If you were an artist, you wouldn’t want to watch your creation completely disappear from existence because you couldn’t keep working on it, would you?
I remember Thor saying that not tying a single player campaign to a server would be bad for developers and Louis barely covered that statement here. How? How would keeping single player and any server-based systems separate hurt the dev? Just plan for this from the beginning. 🤦♂️
It hurts the developer by impairing the control over the deployed software. This can mean monetization (like microtransactions or some stuff), this can mean “drop-in multiplayer” or whatever it’s called, this can mean a simple friendlist or statistics page, or something along those lines.
It is seldom something different from monetization. Especially in the AAA compartment.
Yep. And wtf happened with LAN multiplayer? Even the Beta from Diablo II Ressurected had it, but they REMOVED IT from the release version. I call BS on what this Thor guy is saying.
Blizzard swore off local multiplayer after what happened with StarCraft esports. The Korean leagues ran huge tournaments and made a ton of money off Blizzard’s IP and essentially told them to pound sand. Now everything has to go through their servers so they control the ecosystem.
Same with how Blizzard now owns every custom game you make. They learned their lesson with DOTA/LOL and feel like all that money should be theirs.
All of which seems to indicate that this is a real problem. People can play Brood War forever, but what happens when the SC2 servers go down?
I’m a little surprised either of them have such a strong opinion about something EU related anyway, given it doesn’t affect them directly. Well I guess Louis is just really passionate about that stuff so it’s not all that surprising. As for Thor, maybe he’s using his online presence to kickstart a live service game himself? Obviously regulations are scary in that case. It’s a wild guess from my side but I think that would be on brand for him.
It would affect video game developers that want to publish in the EU.
It likely won’t affect Thor directly unless he makes a live-service game in the future. He just thinks it’s harmful to the industry and tends to speak out about stuff like that.
Damn, imagine if it passes and devs just don’t release in the eu anymore. I mean the best scenario we are all hoping for is it passes and is obliged by everywhere due to the Brussels effect. Doesnt mean it will though.
In the end, it may pass but publishers stop selling in the EU in an official capacity but europeans still digitally buy the games anyway…
The potential legislation would be specific to the EU, but that doesn’t really matter; this market is large enough that it would directly affect other markets. Either the games are patched for all territories or others will make the EU-specific build available. One option generates positive press, the other negative, and any difference in cost would be negligible.
There’s also the argument of preserving art.
I am out of the loop but it seems like a topic to once again promote my age old belief that:
The moment purchased or licensed software is no longer serviced or supported it must become open-source.
No exception. I am still waiting on the firmware to reprogram my smartish oven.
I’d go even further: developers ought to be required to submit reproducible builds to the Library of Congress in order to be eligible for copyright in the first place.
(And copyright ought to be shortened back to its original term length, by the way.)
Sadly, even if I’m moralistically in favor, there is so much insane computer science logic (and proprietary mechanisms) behind the process of compilation, especially on certain embedded systems where this issue comes up, that I doubt that could ever be pushed into law.
This doesn’t make sense as the compilers would also be included in this new copyright scheme and would become public property after so much time.
There are open source compilers for all major CPU architectures. In fact the open source compilers regularly outperform the closed source ones. It’s also not exactly that difficult to add on more architectures to an existing compiler these days thanks to the modular way modern compilers are built. Once you build a backend for LLVM you unlock not just one language but about a dozen.
You would maybe not be surprised to know that there is way waaaaay more in common from one software project to another. Especially games which essentially all use one of a handful of game engines and asset sources.
I think proper codifying engineering standards for software would also help… maybe even should happen first.
I understand it’s easy for a layperson to have that opinion, but I don’t think it can be hand-waved away as too difficult when people are actually doing it.
Boy, it was frustrating to see Thor completely misrepresent the position of the campaign. It wasn’t “vague enough to also include live service games”; it purposely includes them.
I’ve been a big fan of Thor since his first shorts boom, but this take is a massive fucking L from him that I’m very sad to see.
Honestly him calling Ross a “greasy used car salesman” really hurt to see. I didn’t take Thor as the type to insult someone like that simply for disagreeing with him.
Kind of makes me wonder if his whole nice guy thing is an act. Either way it calls into question the person I assumed he was.
I’ve heard reference to that and Thor backpedaling calling it ‘car salesman logic’ or something. Do you know where the clip is?
He’s showing his true colors here. either doubling down so his initial reaction doesn’t make him seem foolish, or he really has a soft spot for mega corporations due to his ties with Blizzard.
Ross wrote a response to Thor’s in the comments of this video, but it’s a bit buried. I’ll include Thor’s for context as well:
Thor:
I’m aware of the process for an initiative to be turned into legislature much farther down the road after many edits. If people want me to back it then the technical and monetary hurdles of applying the request need to be included in the conversation. As written this initiative would put a massive undue burden on developers both in AAA and Indie to the extent of killing off Live Service games. It’s entirely too vague on what the problem is and currently opens a conversation that causes more problems instead of fixing the one it wants to.
If we want to hit the niche and terrible business practice of incorrectly advertising live service games or always online single player only games then call that out directly. Not just “videogames” as stated in the initiative. Specifically call out the practice we want to shut down. It’s a much more correct conversation to have, defeats the actual issue, and stops all this splash damage that I can’t agree with.
Ross’s response:
@PirateSoftware I actually wasn’t planning to write to you further since you said you didn’t want to talk about it with me and I’ll still respect that if you’d like. But since you brought up what I said again I’ll at least give my side of that then leave you alone:
I’m 100% cynical, I can’t turn it off. I wasn’t trying to appeal to legislators when I said that, I doubt they’ll even watch my videos. I was trying to appeal to people who are are kind of doomer and think this is hopeless from the get-go. I wanted to lay out the landscape as I view it that this could actually work where many initiatives have failed. Did it backfire more than it inspired people? I have no idea. I’ve said before I don’t think I’m the ideal person to lead this, stuff like this is part of why I say that; I can’t just go Polyanna on people and pretend like there aren’t huge obstacles and these are normally rough odds, so that was meant as inspirational. You clearly weren’t the target audience, but you’re in complete opposition to the movement also.
I’m literally not a part of the initiative in any official capacity. I won’t be the one talking to officials in Brussels if this passes. The ECI could completely distance itself from me if that was necessary.
In my eyes, what I was doing there was the equivalent of forecasting the weather. You think it’s manipulation, but I don’t control the weather. I can choose when I fly a kite based on my forecast however.
It was also kind of half-joke on the absurdity of the system we’re in that I consider these critical factors that determine our success or not. So yes, I meant what I said, but I also acknowledge it’s kind of ludicrous that these are perhaps highly relevant factors towards getting anything done in a democracy.
Anyway, I got the impression this whole issue was kind of thrust upon you by your fans, you clearly hate the initiative, so as far as I’m concerned people should stop bothering you about it since you don’t like it.
… to the extent of killing off live service games.
I mean… Nothing of value was lost? In my opinion, so far, the only decent live service game to have ever come out is still Warframe. Everything else that cane after is either a pale imitation or straight up cow milking garbage.
We could certainly do with a lot less “live service”.
If we want to hit the niche and terrible business practice of incorrectly advertising live service games or always online single player only games then call that out directly. Not just “videogames” as stated in the initiative.
Spoken like an idealist. Video games is probably the biggest thing that will gain traction. Sure, it would be great to tackle the entire issue, but the people making this initiative aren’t using other software that does that shit. Saying “care about all the people” dilutes the issue.
Hard disagree with Thor on this one.
He’s showing his true colors here. either doubling down so his initial reaction doesn’t make him seem foolish, or he really has a soft spot for mega corporations due to his ties with Blizzard.
I don’t think he have any soft spot for mega corp, is just online figures/influencers can’t never be wrong type of thing.
It’s entirely too vague on what the problem is
How is it vague? If I buy a game, it should be playable for all eternity. Just like how I can pop in Super Mario on NES and play it just like how it was in the 80s.
Or how I can still play Half Life deathmatch more than 25 years after its release.
How is it vague?
It’s vague in all the legal ways:
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First of all which kinds of games it applies to. It obviously can’t work for games that have a technical server requirement, … world of warcraft, but actually EVE online. The guys who run that game, get experimental hardware that’s usually military only (or at least they did in the past). The server is not something, you could run even if you wanted to. Drawing the legal boundary between what “could be” single player offline (e.g. the crew, far cry, hitman), wasn’t done.
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It’s not clear how it should apply to in terms of company scale. The new messenger legislation that was passed, made space for the EU parliament / system to declare and name, individually, who counts as a company that is is big enough, so that they have to open their messenger system to others for interoperability. It’s not clear if the law has to apply to everyone, and every game, or just e.g. companies above 20 million revenue or something.
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It’s not clear what happens if a company goes bankrupt, and the system isn’t immediately ready to keep working.
And a few more.
That being said, I think Thor’s stance on this is silly. All of that is part of the discussion that is now starting. He could raise good points and get them included, but I guess that’s not happening.
I agree. Louis brought a good point when he talked about Gran Turismo licensed content (like Ferrari cars and etc), that some companies have licenses that will expire for content in the game. But you know what? THAT’S NOT MY FUCKING PROBLEM. You buy a game, you should be able to run it until the end of time.
Yeah, that’s why he says it’s stupid. It seems like he’s fine with the idea of removing DRM that makes single player games unplayable but forcing devs to make online multiplayer games playable forever is ridiculous.
Only if you think the campaign means that companies must pay for the multiplayer servers forever which Ross has said on MULTIPLE occasions is not reasonable and not what he wants.
Giving players the tools to host their own servers or adding LAN functionality, though? That’s entirely reasonable seeing as that’s how multiplayer always used to work. I mean, there are still plenty of Unreal Tournament servers active today without any involvement from the developer in decades.
Especially since, if this initiative works, developers will make games with that functionality in mind.
To clarify, your position is it’s ridiculous, or you’re stating that his position is that it’s ridiculous?
My position is it’s ridiculous. I agree with Thor. Saying all games must exist forever is too vague because I don’t think all games should be forced to exist forever.
