The Stop Killing Games campaign‘s petition to the UK government urging action against publishers rendering online games unplayable when servers are switched off has been debated in parliament.
The petition, which amassed just under 190,000 signatures prior to its closure in July, received a response from the UK government back in February, when it hit 10,000. “There are no plans to amend UK consumer law on disabling video games,” this reply read. “Those selling games must comply with existing requirements in consumer law and we will continue to monitor this issue.” As is the process, once it hit 100,000 signatures, it was eligible to be debated by parliament’s petitions committee.
The debate lasted around an hour, and saw various MPs ask the government – represented by minister for sport, tourism, civil society and youth Stephanie Peacock – to respond to and provide extra clarity as to how its approaching the concerns set forth about game server shutdowns by the petition and some constituents. It also saw about a million game names be added to Hansard, the record of everything said in parliament, including Cities: Skylines and a Super Mario World ROM hack trilogy called Grand Poo World.
In the end, Peacock stuck to the government’s established line of making no amendments to the law, but working to ensure companies are providing consumers with the info they should when selling games. The government see the existing legislation designed to stop sellers misleading those buying goods by not providing accurate or complete info in 2015’s consumer rights act and 2024’s digital markets, competition and consumers act as doing the job they need to, with Peacock saying: “The law works, but companies may need to communicate better”. Meanwhile, in terms of the campaign’s ask that publishers are mandated to provide a means for games to keep going after servers are switched off via a final patch or handing this over the community, Peacock said the following:
The government is sympathetic to the concerns raised, but we do also recognise the challenges in delivering this from the video game industry perspective. First, this would have a negativen technical impact on video game development. It is true that there are some games where it would be relatively simple to patch an offline mode after its initial release, but for games whose systems have been specifically designed for an online experience this wouldn’t be possible without major redevelopment. Requiring an end of life plan for all games would fundamentally change how games are developed and distributed. While that may well be the desired outcome for some campaigners, it isn’t right to say the solutions would either be simple or inexpensive.
In terms of the keys being handed to fan-run custom servers, Peacock pointed to a difficulty in determining who’s then legally responsible for ensuring the game stays secure and complies with the law. Potential mixups which lead to people placing blame with the original developer or other harm to their reputation was another cited sticking point.
The government are considering taking one form of action based on the petition, that being having the Chartered Trading Standards Institute to put together specific guidance aimed at helping businesses ensure they’re providing game buyers with the info the law requires.
The debate wasn’t going to see the government suddenly do a 180 on their already stated response to the issue, but generally speaking I thought the MPs asking for clarification made some good points and had clearly done their homework. One thing in particular that caught my attention was Liberal Democrat MP Tom Gordon bringing up the recent deal for an investment group led by Saudi Arabia to take over EA as the sort of corporate dealing that could see the waters muddied in terms of where the responsibility lies to ensure games do follow the rules in terms of server shutdowns.
Meanwhile, Labour MP Mark Sewards outlined his view that the government’s current relatively laissez faire approach outside of making sure current laws are adhered to might not be ideal in the long run. “If we don’t act now, the use of this model and the erosion of ownership rights may spread to other areas,” he said. “I think that the warning signs are here in this industry and to act now would be far less painful than to wait until this practice has become entrenched.”
This may be the end of the road for Stop Killing Games’ UK petition, at least for now, but the wider campaign is still in the process of preparing and waiting for EU politicians to debate its citizens initiative on the issue.
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