There’s actually nothing wrong with no longer supporting a game you developed. The problem is these scummy bastards make sure no one can support the game or run it privately after they abandon it.
maniel@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
well, while i understand sunsetting old online multiplayer games because hosting game servers is a non zero cost, i can’t understand the need for singleplayer games to be always connected and rendering them unplayable
JokeDeity@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Mango@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I can’t understand the “need” for the server to be hosted by the company. Our computers are just as good.
VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
Well look at gta online, moders and hackers have so much more power when the session isn’t run by the company. it alao allows them to find exploits much easier if the server tools are available to run locally. Also If you don’t want people being able to give themselves all the weapons and money and mess up your game that means game states can’t transfer between servers which means you could invest weeks in a campaign only to have the server close.
I prefer locally hosted stuff but there are obvious benefits which draw game companies to choosing to control the hosting process
Mango@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Terrible example. Why should the company decide how anyone plays? Just join a server that’s decent if that’s what you want. You shouldn’t decide for others if they can spawn in tanks.
2pt_perversion@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Looking at you hitman…
BrikoX@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
The company wouldn’t be required to keep their servers online, just to allow other people to host their own. So it has 0 ongoing cost and maybe few hours of coding during game development.
FPSkra@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Unless you are a game developer I would hold off on assuming how much work would be required to do what this proposal asks.
calamitycastle@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Used to be the norm back in the day though. I’m saying 15 years or so before the old internet disappeared with AWS etc.
Self hosted should be an option and I think this is a reasonable requirement tbqh. Yeah it’s not 0 work but it’s not a hardship either, really, given the many hours that are going to be needed on netcode anyway. Especially if you know this going in to development.
FPSkra@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That isn’t an unreasonable take. But the language this proposal uses is far too vague and leaves too much in the hands of the government, and could be used by the EU, and organization not really known for their tech savvy, to place some burdensome requirements on developers…especially indie developers who do not have the resources that big studios have.
umbrella@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
if they can code their own server software already, it wouldnt be a problem to release it.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Wat
Building a whole cloud backend is not a few hours work.
Plus I bet most of these companies share cloud tooling so they’ll need to make distinct standalone self host code
BrikoX@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
Most of what they use built-in in game engines, not their standalone code. It’s a matter of switching the servers used with some minor tweaks.
scaramobo@lemmynsfw.com 1 month ago
Ask any professional senior software developer if they ever maintained an existing or new codebase and made the mistake of thinking "oh easy! it’s just a matter of doing this or that and changing a couple of small things. Won’t take longer than <small amount of time>. " Then ask them how long it really took.
Post results here for our amusement :)
MotoAsh@lemmy.world 1 month ago
While simply allowing the game to use a variable for the server URL is easy, the VAST majority of gamers would assume it’d come with a clean server installer and the ability to set the URL in some kind of UI.
Both of those details are very much NOT simple in many cases. Sure, quite a few well written games, it could be done quickly, but as someone who’s worked on software for decades … it’s NEVER well written. Especially when video game studio style crunch is involved.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 month ago
Hah.