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Another forgotten MMO was revived recently!
(lemmy.ml)
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this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2024
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How about release server side source code so people can self host it, or better yet, make lan patch when game is "dead"
Lan patches cost money to make, big money if the game was originally massive multiplayer. Since the game is at EOL it cannot generate any profits, meaning any money spent on development of such lan patches is going to just burn a hole in the company's budget.
Releasing server side source code opens up a route for abusing the game studio making the game. Since if some 3rd part wants to profit off of running private servers of that game, all they have to do is make a flood of bots in-game and on the game's communication platforms (eg discord servers, communities on Reddit or even Lemmy), which is not that hard to do nowadays, especially if you're a corporation. This coupled with finding as many in-game exploits as possible can drive up costs enough to bankrupt the studio, forcing them to release server side source code, which the corpos can then grab and monetize the crap out of. Since the bot flood can be made nigh untraceable by having them operate out of an unfriendly state (say, Russia or China), and there's no studio acquisition necessary to get server side code, this would be a perfect extortion method that'd fly under the radar of antitrust legislation
If, as you said, as the game is EOL it doesn't make profits, then it can't cause losses either. Otherwise it'd have to be kept alive.
Uh... If they're 3rd-party servers then hosting isn't paid for by the publisher. Additionally, game publishers don't pay for hosting of Discord/Reddit/Lemmy communities. And even if they did if the game is EOL they'd axe that too if it induces any cost.
It absolutely can't. The game is DEAD. It causes no profits or losses. Nothing aboit the game matters to the publisher anymore except for brand/reputation for a possible sequel.
Nothing explicitly forces release of source code, any reasonable server application wpuld suffice, open-source or otherwise.
The "corpos" usually make the games. The monetization concern is minimal since a server for a game isn't anything a corporation couldn't make on its own if it wanted, nor is it something groundbreaking.
The bots would attack servers nit owned or operated by/for the publisher.
What does any of this have to do with antitrust legislation? If anything, this would curb the publisher's monopoly over the game servers although that in and of itself isn't even an illegal monopoly.
I mixed up words, what I meant was that the company could be harassed before it'd go bankrupt and EOL the game
Now you misunderstood the statement. When the game is still hosted by the original devs/publishers, in-game bots would 1) tank the user experience (imagine tf2 but like half a year after launch) 2) put strain on the servers, the ones that still belong to the devs/publisher While that is going on, bots spamming media related to the game would tank engagement (who would want to play a game filled with bots that also has like no public community around it that isn't ruined by other bots). All that would make the revenue crash, and turn the game into a huge financial burden, causing the eventual drop of support/bankruptcy
I won't pick the rest of the comment apart, since you didn't quite get how this extortion scheme works (partly due to my poor explanation, but still)
Is such a strategy really feasible? Adding legislation that a game has to be made operable in a reasonable manner after the publisher discontinues support for it in no way influences this strategy.
If someone wanted to do such elaborate botnet defamation attacks in hopes of getting the game playable on 3rd party servers they could've done that already without legislation.
Bots making the game unplayable is a problem, but opening the servers in general would help the problem as private servers can implement harsher requirements for players than official ones usually do, opting to rather make a huge bot-filled cesspool as you've already said.
However, this proposal isn't a general "all games must have FOSS self-hostable servers" proposal. It's just a "if you kill a game it still has to be alive afterwards" proposal. Whether publishers open servers or not before they shut theirs down is their decision without the proposal as much as it is with it.