Ubisoft, the company famous for things like, telling players they need to get used to not owning their games and not putting the game they’re selling to players on the disc those players are buying is being sued – for pretty much exactly these kinds of practices.
That’s not precisely why they’re being sued, but this particular suit against the Assassin’s Creed-maker wouldn’t have been brought forth, if not for Ubisoft thinking and acting like it does.
Specifically two California-based players are suing Ubisoft for making The Crew entirely unplayable. Spotted by Polygon, these two gamers allege that what Ubisoft did by taking down the servers for The Crew is like buying a pinball machine, and then years later the company that made the pinball machine takes everything out of the it that makes it playable in the first place.
“Imagine you buy a pinball machine, and years later, you enter your den to go play it, only to discover that all the paddles are missing, the pinball and bumpers are gone, and the monitor that proudly displayed your unassailable high score is removed,” the suit reads. “Turns out the pinball manufacturer decided to come into your home, gut the insides of the pinball machine, and remove your ability to play the game that you bought and thought you owned.”
There was never an offline mode for The Crew, it’s been an online-only game since it launched in 2014. When Ubisoft de-listed the game from digital storefronts last year, before taking servers offline this past March 2024, the game was effectively removed from players libraries.
The two plaintiffs say that because Ubisoft failed to properly inform them that when they bought The Crew (as physical disks, the suit adds), they did so with the understanding they had purchased a game to own. Not a license that can be revoked whenever the licenser decides to.
That the two plaintiffs also bought the game on disk is also important, because they allege that Ubisoft was misleading with regards to the fact that the disk did not contain the actual game printed on it, and was instead just a DRM-check for when it was connected to online servers.
As Polygon points out, the plaintiffs want the suit to be upgraded to a class action lawsuit, which could potentially bring many more disgruntled The Crew players to the cause. If they’re successful, they’re seeking monetary relief and damages for those the shutdown impacted.
After the backlash Ubisoft faced for its decision to take The Crew’s servers down, it’s committed to making offline modes available for The Crew 2 and The Crew Motorfest, though that does fans of The Crew no good.
Of course it could be the case that this suit gains no traction, and Ubisoft is able to continue along its merry way, changing its wording slightly to ensure it doesn’t get into the issue of players not being aware they’ve purchased a license, instead of something to own.
But it could also go the other way, and potentially be impactful to the whole of the games industry, where every publisher now thinks twice about making games unplayable without an internet connection.
Source – [Polygon]