Ubisoft delays server shutdowns, prevents purchased DLC from going away | Hacker News Reader

Ubisoft delays server shutdowns, prevents purchased DLC from going away

arstechnica.com

36 pointsisaacfrond19 comments

I wonder if the updated Anno 2070 will remove their silly online restriction. I am still waiting that to play that game.

For those that don't know, in Anno 2070 there are some single-player features that can't be used unless you are online, for example newgame-plus style item transfer. This "feature" is obviously some hamfisted DRM on top of the realm DRM the game already has (in fact some versions has two different DRM on top of each other, and some players can't play because they deadlock).

If Ubisoft removes DRM from Anno 2070, I will then buy and play it. I refuse to touch it until then, even borrowed from a friend, I just refuse to play a game that does this (another one is Diablo III, never played it, and I won't play until it becomes accessible 100% offline when in single-player).

But I won't hold my breath waiting, currently it feels that waiting Ubisoft to ditch DRM is like waiting gravity to fall upwards, considering instead that they add DRM to games that had none before (Anno 1404 for example)

I can't remember what exactly the problem was, but Anno 2070 was the very last Ubisoft game I ever bought, because I bought it through Steam and then there was 'Some Stupid Problem' relating to either DRM or their trying to force the use of their own Steam-a-like too, and I never actually got to play the game.

I don't buy that many games any more, but I certainly haven't bought a single thing from Ubisoft in over a decade now, because of that.

And to think how much I loved them back in the 16-bit days for the stuff they put out on Amiga... . EA were beloved too, strangely.

Yeah, Ubisoft Game Launcher (as it was then, later uplay and now ubisoft connect) barely worked in those days and I remember my disc based copy of Anno 2070 and my steam copy of AC2: Revelations installed conflicting versions which could only launch one or the other so I had to keep swapping the folder in AppData

This issue still exists, on the comments section of Anno 2070 official site post announcing the update for the servers, people are complaining of this issue still.

>Anno 1404

I'm sure the parent knows this, but for any that don't, it's available on GOG [0] (and thus forever beyond the reach of DRM [1]) and is an excellent game.

[0] https://www.gog.com/en/game/anno_1404_gold_edition

[1] Oh, sure, Ubi could pull it for whatever reason, but it's already Out There in the wilds of the internet, a bit-perfect copy of the currently-legit version you can get from GOG. So, uh, functionally forever. Archivist, pirate, and hoarder are, IME, just different hats on the same guy

Products which rely on external services should be required to carry a expiration date, aka a guaranteed services date.

I would like one additional option. When a game's servers are deprecated, the source code to host the server should be released in advance using a license that permits hosting the server for public or private use.

That seems like a requirement that would favor the companies. I think the UniSofts out there would gladly normalize expiration dates if they could.

I would prefer a requirement that, if the external services are taken offline, either the services must be made available to users to run themselves, or a patch must be released which makes the game no longer dependent on external services.

I think it would make it clearer to just ban calling it "buying" and force marketplaces to call it rent/license for x years.

I could see that. I would also HOPE that it might make people realize what they're buying. Then again, plenty(most?) people already happily defend publishers with the "I got x hours per $ from this game; I will gladly pay $y per year to keep playing it" meme, so it would probably be unremarkable to them.

It would create competition. Are you going to buy the smart thermostat with a five year expiration or a ten year?

You would have to make it very clear that there is a possibility for liability or for the customer to sue if that expiration date is decreased.

I wonder if there is a business opportunity here: operating licence servers for legacy games. It would obviously require the approval of the game publisher, and some kind of subscription-based business model. I have no idea if that would work, but I suspect that there is a fair-sized subset of the gamer community that would be prepared to pay a small recurring fee to keep a much loved game alive. Thoughts?

Nope. Game companies want to end those games so they can sell the same engine or mechanics but repackaged by an army of asset artists.

I'm sure you're right - its hard to see any significant upside for the original publisher. I'm not a gamer myself and it was just an idle thought.

And sell an eventual remaster.

Heard from inside source through a friend, take with a grain of salt, but that particular server was running ancient software (think very obsolete windows server version) and would have a peak of less than 10 concurrent users, worldwide. I don't think there is a business case to make here.

It's a maintenance nightmare. Poor, rushed together server components. Noone still around the company that still knows how it was built. No automated tests whatsoever, so any code changes or recompile with newer libs would require important QA efforts..

I'm not saying this justify anything. It's still very bad business practice and consumers are right to be mad. Kinda was predictable though, and game publishers should have a clear EOL policy when selling a game.

Doubt it. Steam offers this service to game developers for free[1], and some older games have switched over to them successfully after their old servers shut down (Company of Heroes is one example I can think of off the top of my head).

[1]- (paid for probably by the usual cut they take from selling games through their service)

GOG's original business model was basically selling legacy games with copy protection patched out and added patches for compatibility and localization. In the beginning CD Project/GOG did that through reverse engineering, so for publishers it was free revenue for old projects.

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