Recently, there has been an increase in interest in games as a service and other titles that require an Internet connection to play and in cases where the servers are down, they become paperweights that the user can collect. In response to this trend, Stop killing games (Stop Killing Games in English), a website “dedicated to real actions to end the practice of publishers destroying the video games they have sold to customers”.

Although this is a problem that the video game industry has had for a long time, there are many people who feel that the situation has worsened in recent years. There is the case of Babylon’s Fall, a game-as-a-service developed by Platinum Games and published by Square Enix, which launched on March 3, 2022, and whose servers were shut down on November 29 of that year, marking the end of the title and becoming a paperweight for those who they bought it, either literally or figuratively. Poor reviews and poor public reception contributed to this, effectively dooming Babylon’s Fall from day one.

We are more focused on the present and as a Stop Killing Games launcher we have a case Crewa Ubisoft racing game that was released in December 2014 and will be discontinued on March 31, 2024. On December 14, 2024, the French company explained that “The Crew 1, including all its editions and virtual currency game packs, will be removed from all online stores.” The game will be playable until March 31, 2024 for all owners of The Crew 1. After this date, the servers will be shut down, meaning the game will no longer be available on any platform, including PC, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation. 4, Amazon Luna and Ubisoft+“.



Ubisoft, a company whose track record of good work has not been outstanding for a long time, tried to apologize in the following way: “We understand that this may be disappointing for players who still enjoy the game, but it has become necessary. due to upcoming server and licensing infrastructure limitations. Dissecting a game, and especially the first one, is not something we take lightly. “Our goal remains to provide players with the best action-packed gaming experience, and to achieve that, we continue to provide new content and support for The Crew 2 and the recently released The Crew Motorfest.”

It is understandable that there are games that lose their abilities onlinebut not so much that they are completely unplayable when their servers are down, especially if mods are likely to be introduced offline and multiplayer in a local network. Because, youtuber Ross Scott, who is behind the Accursed Farms channel, launched the Stop Killing Games campaign to get the authorities to monitor the practice and consider putting an end to it through legal reforms. The intention is to improve the protection of video games. Dejen de Matar Juegos, which takes advantage of pro-consumer legislation in France, sees The Crew’s case as an opportunity to set a precedent.

Users have already given way too much to services like Steam, which eliminate the advantages of the physical format in favor of greater convenience. Unfortunately, the fact that most games come out unpolished has ultimately made the physical format not worthwhile, as the contents of the disc in question are probably so broken that it’s probably not worth keeping unless the patches are stored on another medium. , and to make matters worse, the patches have not been bright lately.

Cover image created by artificial intelligence.