Full title: Ubisoft says you “cannot complain” it shut down The Crew because you never actually owned it, and you weren’t “deceived” by the lack of an offline version “to access a decade-old, discontinued video game”
Ubisoft’s lawyers have responded to a class action lawsuit over the shutdown of The Crew, arguing that it was always clear that you didn’t own the game and calling for a dismissal of the case outright.
The class action was filed in November 2024, and Ubisoft’s response came in February 2025, though it’s only come to the public’s attention now courtesy of Polygon. The full response from Ubisoft attorney Steven A. Marenberg picks apart the claims of plaintiffs Matthew Cassell and Alan Liu piece by piece, but the most common refrain is that The Crew’s box made clear both that the game required an internet connection and that Ubisoft retained the right to revoke access “to one or more specific online features” with a 30-day notice at its own discretion.
If buying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing.
The problem is it’s getting harder and harder to pirate games, especially games that are entirely online.
I like the cut of your jib.
When you “buy” software, you’re buying a license that grants you permission to use it subject to the terms & conditions. The stealing as the law would see it is from using software without purchasing a license or using it in violation of the license.
It even extends to digital content people “buy” on Steam, or Google Play, or Amazon including books, music, and videos. You didn’t buy that content, even if you think you did. You bought a license to it which is why occasionally Amazon or whoever will just scrub the content from your account without your consent. That’s also why in some countries you pay VAT on e-books even though you don’t pay VAT on real books - because you actually bought a software license which is liable to VAT.
So the best advice is don’t buy digital media from online services. For games and software it is unavoidable but recognize you don’t legally own squat although most console games on disc or cartridge can still be sold second hand. But even that is being eroded. Nintendo apparently are planning to sell “physical” games in stores but you open it up and there is a redemption code inside. Sony and Microsoft have both tried to get away from physical media too.
If you have to buy it, you own it. Make it free to play but have in game purchases. Everyone knows free games can shut down any time. I play lot of mobile apps until I get tired of playing it, then delete.
I avoid buying games that requires online connection. It means the game is unplayable without it.
It’s sickening what companies can get away with just because it’s legal. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.
Get balatro you’ll never get bored :)
I’ve beaten most of the Gold Stakes and all of the challenges, its not a forever game. But it is fun.
I’m tired of all the pixel art indie card games.
There are better games to play if gambling is your thing.
I’ve enjoyed the hell out of Buckshot Roulette. It’s about playing Russian Roulette. With a pump action shotgun. There’s power-ups!
….what? If gambling was my thing I’d be gambling.
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And lying isn’t the answer either.
Seem a few comments recently that seem to think cards = gambling. Balatro doesn’t even use a vaguely standard deck of cards though.
Not that it would matter if it did. But would freecell be considered gambling?
Balatro isn’t gambling so win:win
Technically they’re right, which is why pirating Ubisoft games is ethical.
Edit: Pirating Nintendo games is ethical too, of course.
There you go, offline mode ftw
If they don’t sell the game but a long term rental license, then they should not say “we’ve sold 1234557890 copies of <game>”.
The thing is with MMOs or online only games do you have a valid expectation of the game surviving forever?
It was deliberate choice by them to make even the single player campaign online homie. It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
Don’t even play like that wasnt fucked up, ok? If your actual argument is “i think companies should get to do what they want” them say that, with your whole chest, not this Weak socratic-method-bootlick-bull…
Take that stand and defend it. Or you could also stfu
It was deliberate choice by them to make even the single player campaign online homie.
As one would expect from an online racing game. Anyone buying it would know in advance that single player offline modes do not exist when they bought the game.
It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
It kind of was and it was intended to work as it did by the company that made it.
If your actual argument is “i think companies should get to do what they want”
My argument us that this is a game designed to be played online only. When you bought the game the packaging/materials do not talk about offline play so you shouldn’t expect it to work in a way it expressly isn’t designed to do. Adults should be aware of what things do when they buy them.
It ain’t an mmo, and it never should have been built like this.
It kind of was and it was intended to work as it did by the company that made it.
Adults don’t dance around semantics in debate when they’re called out. I told you to stand up and this is your response? Mebbe you’re not even hidin! Maybe it’s the only way you can talk?
I guess you disagree, but I find your speech pattern embarrassing and tiring.
Be better eh? For me
Your perspective seems to be you should get whatever you want regardless of the actual product you were sold and the terms of that sale. That’s not rational. You bought an online only game. If you wanted a single player offline mode to exist then you should have bought a game that had one.
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Pretending authority is your only tactic. As the likely old-head here I deny you my permission to “be the adult in the room”
Call out use of argument from authority fallacy, call to his own authority instead… Quite ironic.
Well you know what, I call upon the deep magic of rule 2 to remove your message (for the part I didn’t quote, for those who wonder).
roll dice, get a critical failure “well fu…”
Anyway, please stay civil, no matter how heated a debate can become.
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I think there is an implication that if you buy a game which is online by nature (e.g. an MMO) that the servers can and will shut down eventually. My cupboard is filled with defunct MMOs. And people do not “own” any commercial software per se, they run it under licence.
So I don’t see that Ubisoft has any legal obligation here. But as a good will gesture they really should put the server code in escrow, or open source chunks of it so that games can continue to enjoy life after the company itself has no economic incentive to continue running it.
This is why I will always have some nostalgia for physical media. I still got CDs I bought in the 90s (which I’ve copied onto my hard drives a long, long time ago) and while they need a like coaxing to work at times, they are forever mine and no one can take them from me.
I was very hesitant to go on steam specifically for their ‘you don’t own shit even if you paid and followed the rules’ garbage.
Steam is crazy in how it’s still usable and not completely enshittified after existing for so many years. I don’t know how they do it
It’s called staying away from venture capital. It really is as simple as that. Because Valve has a lucrative business model they have no need or desire to raise capital from outside investors, therefore there is nobody to squeeze them for value at the expense of their customers.
If you watch Cory Doctorow’s talk where he coined the word “enshittification” he explains how the process works, and it starts with outside investment. Enshittification is just a catchy term for value extraction, from the perspective of the customer.
Damn, now I understand the hype!
I bought Star Wars squadrons and it worked for a bit. Now it doesn’t even boot and I don’t know why. Initially it was my shitty anti-virus that was causing the problem, but even after disabling it it doesn’t load.
Definitely deceived into thinking you are purchasing a game though.
servers ain’t free. I know ubisofts are a bunch of pricks but if you run servers indefinitely without generating income you’ll eventually run out of money.
Sure, but in that case they need to make the server code open source so game owners can run their own servers.
Or they need to include a lan / offline mode
Not every game is an MMO requiring vast server farms. A game like the crew 1 that is past it’s prime is not expensive to keep a few servers running for. It’s a negligible cost.
They could also put in the time to give players the tools to host their own servers, or simply allow offline play. This used to be standard for all PC games. They chose to do neither of these things in an obvious effort to force players towards the sequel or their other games. They should not be permitted to do anti-consumer things like this.
Even MMOs have been run by amateurs. If you make the servers available, someone will figure out how to run it.
yes scaling past a couple hundred users becomes an engineering nightmare
Depends on the game for what point scaling further gets difficult. I think Factorio can do near infinite with the clusterio mod and from a server host perspective it’s very easy to setup. You just need enough servers, the mod allows cross server interaction.
Uhoh, the widdle baby corporation can’t handle hosting their game!
They should be forced to give people the tools they need to host.
Good point, thats why we should be able to run servers ourselves after the game dies
that’s a good point too. however it’s very possible they’re using proprietary code that’s used in other IP. Especially the core game engine, which you’d have to open source too.
The server code could also be released as a binary blob under a proprietary license. No different from distributing any other piece of software.
It could be but it wouldn’t take long before it’s replicated in a way thats not propriety or just stolen by devs in countries where that means nothing.
They are a giant shitty conglomerate they will find 10,000 reasons
I agree with this, however, I also don’t think they should be allowed to call it purchasing. If you don’t own something, then you didn’t purchase it. The button for games like these should be “long-term rental” or something to that effect.
I’m okay with servers being shut down eventually, my issue is we don’t know when. If they want to call it a license and that it will be revoked later, well fucking plan it out and tell people. Did the game get cheaper as the clock ran down? Did the people buying 10 years of access pay more than people that only got to play it once? I’m pissed for the people like me that sometimes take a few years to get to playing their games only to find the servers are gone and they thought they were buying something (or at least licensing something) they would get to use.
Of course they would probably find that if they told people how long they could use it, a lot of people wouldn’t pay them for it (i.e. their business would fail without intentionally deceiving their customers).
I gotta thank Ubisoft for saving me money by consistently saying dumbass shit so I don’t buy their crappy games. The one Elon tweet was still pretty funny though I won’t lie.
Some call it piracy when you download games, movies, music, software or books. I call it an online public library. In 2003 I used to get video games from the public library, install them on my PC and play them. You had to have the disk in your CD drive to play the game so when the game was due back at the library you could return or renew it. If game makers don’t provide hard copies then downloading is no different than using the library.
Looks like I’ll be pirating Black Flag for my next replay.
And people will still defend this company
Does anyone defend them? I think what happens is that people get mad at them but then still buy the games anyway because they’re absolute fucking idiots. I believe this is what happens.
People are still buying the games. Call it what you want but if you give them money it’s your fault they keep doing this.
Same goes for the people who whine about how broken COD is yet still buy it every single year. People often wonder why the game industry is the way it is, but then you realize the average person has a gold fish brain and will keep wasting their money on crap just to be disappointed over and over. Companies absolutely love that kind of customer and would rather rely on them than actually try.
Yea that’s exactly what I’m saying. I blame the consumers. It’s not like they don’t have options.
Yeah, that’s true
Ubisoft deserves to go bankrupt, get dissolved, and have their IP’s sold to people aren’t malicious.
No, make it a entirely employee-owned company, so they can vote the execs out, sanitize the culture, and keep the thousands of worker out of unemployment
No, let them die. Better to start fresh than start cursed.
The workers, the gamers, and the industry are glad you’re not in charge of anything, punishing them for things they have no control over, and wasting good talents and infrastructure.
The workers and gamers would own the fucking companies if I was ‘in charge’. I have no intention of letting poor management ruin any of the games. I would kill Ubisoft to signal the end of an old rotten era and the beginning of a new, better era. Death is not a thing to be shunned and rejected as much as accepted as a vital step of the natural cycle. Like an over grown predator in the wilds, its death would sustain and entire ecosystem unto itself spurning the creation of newer smaller life.
Why are you defending Ubisoft like they actually give a shit about their workers? They clearly don’t more than any other tech company otherwise they’d be more like Larian less like EA or Activision. There’s more reasons to kill them off and break them up than let them live.
How old are you?
Older than you if you’re asking that question.
You want to use the “throw everybody out and see what happens”, and you claim how much better things would be under your governance.
You’re talking like a Elon Musk wanna-be, even using shitty metaphors that mask all the complexity of the problems, and the cruelty that these kinds of decisions imply.
You want to throw 20k employees out without any consideration for the economic and personal consequences, not to mention all the other companies around who will see their business sometimes heavily impacted.
All this to make a stupid metaphor. You’re 14 at best.
“You will own nothing and like it”
I don’t like it, though.
Tell you what customers absolutely can do: decide to stop doing business with you.
