Steam

PUGB is living a second youth. The game has increased its number of users constantly since August of last year, achieving a total growth of around 72% in the average number of players. The figures are even greater if we focus on the peaks of users. If in July of last year there were 'barely' 356,738 simultaneous players at the best time of the month, the current record has doubled: this March there was a time when 768,362 people played at the same time.

SteamDB numbers.

 
Ubisoft removed The Crew from Steam and you can't play it anymore -always online, hate that-.


It seems that the PC community on Steam is working on adding mods to have offline servers, so that people can play. It's shameful that normal people have to patch up a company's laziness.

This is why I like the PC, the community remains united when it comes to these things and they fix these abuses through mods, patches, etc.

But it is shameful that Ubisoft don't do what some non-profit people do for the fans of the game. It's unfortunate to have to depend on the community and not whoever took your money.
 
Sounds like Ubisoft is well within their rights to flush it.

I don't like the idea of a world where devs are forced to support every game they've ever made forever. Let the community take it from here.
 
Sounds like Ubisoft is well within their rights to flush it.
Really ? If I sell you the rights to park your car in my garage but it's dependant on me unlocking the garage door so you can do so I cant say at some time in the future "sorry i cant be bothered unlocking the garage door for you and I'm not giving you a set of keys either"
they chose to make the game dependant on them running a server, If they weren't prepared to run the server then they shouldn't of made it that way
When they sold me the game they said "buy the game" not "buy the game for X years" and how about people who bought the game 6 months ago like me they never said buy a game for half a year

I don't like the idea of a world where devs are forced to support every game they've ever made forever
but you think people who have nothing to do with the game should support it instead ?
 
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If a game is multiplayer that requires a server then there's no obligation to run those servers forever. Could they have had an offline version that didn't have multiplayer, new events, mtx? In this game, most likely. But it's Ubisoft, they're not going to do that, ever.

Do publishers make single player games with online only requirements to mostly stuff mtx and "live-service" crap down your throat? Yes, Ubisoft want everything to be that way.

Don't buy their games, there's lots of other great stuff to play.
 
Ubisoft are in their right to stop supporting the servers, that I can understand 'cos servers cost money. However, the game has a fun single player campaign and they could just let the game remain in Steam and let the players play the single player story. which is why people are trying to mod it.
 
Ubisoft are in their right to stop supporting the servers
Would you still have that opinion if you bought a game and it became unplayable 6 months later, If ubi weren't prepared to pay for a server they shouldn't have made the game dependant on a server it's their own fault
Servers arn't that expensive and thats when you rent them if you already own the hardware (i'm sure ubi do) it's even cheaper and no doubt on one of their other servers they have some spare capacity so it would practically cost them nothing.
 
Would you still have that opinion if you bought a game and it became unplayable 6 months later, If ubi weren't prepared to pay for a server they shouldn't have made the game dependant on a server it's their own fault
I guess for most, they've owned it for years. If Ubi were still selling it right up until they close it down, that's definitely wrong. Sadly there aren't statutory rights on how long a multiplayer game should be playable for after purchasing. There probably needs to be a legal case or government intervention to establish this and ensure games aren't sol without a minimum several years guaranteed playability.
 
Sounds like Ubisoft is well within their rights to flush it.

I don't like the idea of a world where devs are forced to support every game they've ever made forever. Let the community take it from here.
I think the discussion here has really uncovered the issues. At face value, I agree with you. It's been 10 years. However, Davros points out that people have been buying this game right up until closure. For those who bought the game in 2014, they've got their money's worth. For those who bought it in February, they've had all of a month for their money.

If there was a clear "this game will end in two years" timeline, players could make informed decisions. In the absence of that, or even with it, the ideal solution as floated somewhere else recently is allow players to host their own servers. Sunset official support but let the community carry on supporting their own investments. A lack of willingness to do that smacks more of wanting players to buy something new instead.

What do you propose as a way to ensure everyone buying the game gets a fair amount of return in play hours on their purchase?
 
I think the discussion here has really uncovered the issues. At face value, I agree with you. It's been 10 years. However, Davros points out that people have been buying this game right up until closure. For those who bought the game in 2014, they've got their money's worth. For those who bought it in February, they've had all of a month for their money.

Is that accurate? What I'm reading is that the shutdown was announced on Dec 14th 2023 and the game was delisted for sale (at least in official channels).


Looking at the SteamDB it was for sure delisted off Steam for purchase at that time. Given the 14 day refund policy now common on digital stores it would mean 4 months of availability.

Of course whether 4 months is enough time or not is another debate.
 
Agreed that the time between de-listing and shutdown is very short. Someone buying in December might want to ask for a refund and see what happens. I would think 12 month notification and de-listing would be a minimum.

The only thing that would change these behaviors by large publishers are class action lawsuits. A storm brought up by game journalism and youtubers might achieve the servers being brought back up for maybe the rest of 2024, but that's about it.

Vote with your wallet.
 
I think they at least have an obligation to release a patch which removes the need for online connection to allow continued access to the single player campaign.

I'm not sure how technically feasible it would be to patch end user hosted servers into the game but if relatively straight forward then that also should be done.
 
Yeah, I'm onboard for not holding a company hostage to footing the bills for servers in perpetuity. I mean really, where WOULD the line be drawn? Can I pass down my media to my children? And they to their children?

The real answer IMO should be open-sourcing the server code. Even if not the code, then the compiled binaries which permit someone / anyone to host the services, of their own volition and at their own expense, and after agreeing to waive any liabilities thereafter (eg we can't expect to sue the company for when modern operating systems evolve to a point where the legacy binary can't run any longer.)
 
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