This is not what GP asked. AFAIK, it's not legal in the EU as long as the customer has a reasonable expectation that the subscription is not time-limited, i.e., if no time limitation is clearly mentioned when the subscription is purchased. There are often clauses in EULAs stating things like "our company has the right to terminate the subscription at any time for no reason" but these are generally void and can make the whole EULA void. Otherwise, it would be legal to sell software and simply switch it off after 6 months - or, after one month, or even after one day. Clearly, that would be fraud.
The question is rather which of the EU customers will/can afford to sue Steam. My guess is they'll offer a refund for those games before it comes to a law suit.
EA has been routinely shutting down game servers for almost 20 years now. Legal or not, I cannot say.
In any cause, the usual targets seem to be games with annual releases. Apparently, people love buying the same games over and over. While it sucks, this is clearly not on the same level as Blizzard shutting down StarCraft battle-net servers. Lots of people would be rightfully furious.
Your biases may be showing here. I think shutting down servers is just as bad as removing single player games from people's libraries. The end result is quite the same for the customers: they can no longer use the products they paid for.
In my case, the last Ubi game I purches, and played, was released back in 2003. Hopefully that clears my stance on this particular company
As someone who does not enjoy single player games, I don't think this is bias. There is no functional reason for a server for a single player game. There is no reason for Ubisoft to have to make these cost-cutting moves in the first place.
It's bringing an inherent disadvantage of closed multi-player games to single player games.
1. Service level agreement for n years explicitly stated at release?
2. Release a binary containing the bare necessites of the title's backend services (stripped of any analytics or proprietary stuff)?
3. Something else?
Whats frustrating is that studios and publishers (should) have an idea of what the lifetime cost for each player is, so they can price the game appropriately. I wish it were industry best practice for large studios to be transparent at release and state "we can support this game for a minimum of 10 years, if it's a hit, longer".
I would like the answer to be "release the server for free", but I understand the reality is more nuanced.
Server-side code might have proprietary components or code reused for other games, or a whole lot of complications which are difficult to extricate from a "free" release, and the company might just not want the bother. Releasing something always comes with expectations, just look at how much grief authors of free and open source code sometimes get from entitled users!
But yeah, I would love for game companies to release their servers once the commercial shelf life of a game has ended.
I think it's unrealistic to always expect this, though.
1. The single player part of the game should be able to run forever.
2. Service level agreement for n years explicitly stated at release? -> Actually Yes, If we are buying subscriptions I would like to see the terms of that subscription.
I can't speak for them, though I would imagine the reason, not an excuse, is to make more money? Maybe having these games available is costing them some money.
As I said above, I stopped dealing with this company a long, long time ago.
> Maybe having these games available is costing them some money
Do you mean in the sense of "people are still playing this game instead of buying my new game?". Probably. I would guess this is probably false though -- that people keep buying games for companies they perceive as consumer-friendly.
Or do you mean they lose money by providing customer support? They could just add a warning notice the game is no longer supported, and that you buy it (or play it) at your own risk.
It wouldn't be the first time companies make short-sighted decisions, though.
