OH no they don’t want my money? Now’s not the time, I won’t bother then
If they don’t want me to buy them then why should I buy them now instead of borrowing them for free for unspecified amount of time from the Internet?
I bought them ages ago and let me tell you, crazy taxi without the offspring is just not the same. Borrowing the original versions for free from the internet is the only way to go.
they are probably cooking something, maybe their own platform? who knows
Probably remasters or remakes. They don’t want to compete with themselves.
Exactly, they announced earlier this year that they were working on reviving a bunch of licences, including Crazy Taxi, Jet Set Radio, Shinobi, Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, and hinting at a longer list. We don’t know yet eactly how many titles that includes, and which of them will get remakes, remasters, or brand new games, but it was hinting brand new. Early dev footage was leaked at some point for Crazy Taxi and Shinobi.
They already did this with the classic Sonic games (Sonic Origins) and removed them from any new Steam copies of the Genesis/Mega Drive Classics collection. I doubt they’re working on all the games in their library, but it may be enough of them that they just decided to pull the whole collection rather than leave it so gutted out. Sucks, but yeah, that’s the way it goes. That said, Shining Force remaster please? That would be awesome.
No ‘probably’ about it. Can’t speak to all of the titles being removed, but they dropped this trailer almost a year ago.
I wonder if it’s a licensing thing. I know a few of these games had heavy use of licensed music, like Jet Set Radio and Crazy Taxy. At least, the original versions did, I’m not sure if that’s the case for the Steam ports.
If by “grab”, you mean “pirate”. Don’t reward them for taking games away.
They mean grab by now buying it and you will keep it on Steam. But it will be unavailable for users after late December to buy it.
That’s just a longer way of saying “reward them for taking games away while you can”…
I think I have a single Steam game from within which I can then run those games. How would I backup the delisted games?
No, you need to install them as well. It’ll work as long as it’s installed, but after they’re delisted, I don’t think steam can even distribute them.
I know I have at least one game “grid: race driver” that was delisted from steam, at some point I must have uninstalled it, and now I can’t download it, it doesn’t even show up in my library. I’ve been trying like hell to find a way to play it, but even pirated versions are being difficult.
Edit: judging from comments and downvotes, apparently this is rare? But it does definitely happen, I’m not making this example up. And I don’t know how you could predict whether a game will just be unavailable for purchase or totally disappear…
It’s extremely rare for a delisted game to be removed from your library, and they only do it in cases where, for instance, the game would literally be unplayable because the server isn’t there anymore. Often times they won’t remove the game from your library in that situation either. Having the game in your library is, in fact, enough.
This is not the case with the sega games we’re talking about. The announcement specifically mentions the games will still be available to download if you bought them before the delisting.
Removing games from player inventory is very rare; I’ve only seen it happen when malware is uploaded to Steam as a game.
I have a few games that can’t be played anymore, like Super Bomberman R Online and The Crew. I still can download their files from Steam; but I can’t play them.
But now I’m curious too, what could’ve happened that got that game removed from the people who bought the game
That’s the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive Classics collection. I have it myself (bought several years ago). It’s just an official emulator/GUI wrapper (styled like a bedroom with a CRT) that comes with the games. If you have the collection you can find all the ROMs in the collection’s folder and play them with whatever emulator you want. If Steam ever threatens to take them away I strongly recommend backing that folder up somewhere.
