The Inconvenient Truths of 'Stop Killing Games' - Paul Kilduff-Taylor | grokludo 17

Gaming has an end-of-life problem.

While we've made some progress in preserving games as cultural artifacts, new questions have arisen about when - and how - publishers should end support for their games. At what point can access to a game you've "bought" be revoked?

The Stop Killing Games movement aims to answer this by imposing legal liability on publishers, and though the details are vague, it's starting to be taken seriously by the UK and the EU.

Much like the loot box issue, the engagement from publishers and industry bodies has been minimal – barely acknowledging it exists, and characterising any sort of action as too expensive, too impractical, and altogether too hard.

Also much like the loot box issue, these failures could likely result in a cross-nation patchwork of sledgehammer regulatory schemes, devoid of technical nuance. A far worse outcome than if they had lifted their heads from the sand to consult with consumers, indie devs, and policymakers.

This week's guest, Paul Kilduff-Taylor, is concerned that this process will hit indie devs the hardest. He's written about the complex middleware and third-party services in many modern games, each one a barrier to end-of-life solutions, and contends it's impossible to cover the myriad technical architectures of modern gaming in any one piece of legislation.

Would any legal code that tries to encompass all of modern gaming be necessarily too vague to have teeth? Could such a thing be enforced? Would it hit small businesses hardest, and/or result in studios eschewing regions simply because of the increased admin?

Paul believes so, and I find his arguments compelling. I consider myself supportive of Stop Killing Games, but I think Paul has coaxed me towards his position somewhat, even if I have much less faith in industry self-regulation.

There's a special bit towards the end this week, where I get Paul to read out some of his absurd press releases from 2011 onward. I hope you enjoy!