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Ubisoft is stripping people's licences for The Crew weeks after its shutdown, nearly squandering hopes of fan servers and acting as a stark reminder of how volatile digital ownership is

https://www.pcgamer.com/games/racing/ubisoft-is-stripping-peoples-licences-for-the-crew-weeks-after-its-shutdown-nearly-squandering-hopes-of-private-servers-and-acting-as-a-stark-reminder-of-how-volatile-digital-ownership-is/

Ubisoft has gone one step further to try and stop people getting into The Crew.

Ubisoft is stripping people's licences for The Crew weeks after its shutdown, nearly squandering hopes of fan servers and acting as a stark reminder of how volatile digital ownership is

52 comments

CannonGoBoom

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PSA: if you own the crew, consider taking action.

https://www.stopkillinggames.com

ranoss

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Especially if you live outside of the US!

Buddahriffic

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Maybe raise a stink with your attorney general and/or representative, too. The whole idea that a company can sell licenses for something and then arbitrarily decide they don't want to do it anymore and revoke all the licenses doesn't sound legal. And if it is, it doesn't sound like it should be.

ampersandrew

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Is their removal of these licenses a measure to somehow prevent people from taking action?

whereBeWaldo

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Kinda wish I had the crew so that I could clown on these Mfers

Mango

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I own the crew, but honestly think it's a shit game that's not worth my attention.

original_reader

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It's not about this particular game.

It's about setting a precedent for games you do care about.

Mango

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The games I care about will be preserved no matter how the publishers of them flail about

original_reader

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Not in this case, seeing that progress is stored online.

Who says that the game you care about tomorrow won't do this next? Why be against an action/not care about something that can only benefit players now and in the long term?

Mango

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The games I care about all already have backup options. They're all the kinds of games that attract people like me who will just fix them right away.

Zoot

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I mean, God forbid Ubisoft gets its way and all games go this direction! Step up before you don't get the choice to backup your games.

psud

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The idea is that since the company is French and France has excellent consumer protection, The Crew is the best example of this practice to fight

It's not about whether the game is good, it's about Ubisoft being French

Mango

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Didn't know that. Thanks!

Also every time I hear about France, I like them more.

Gunrigger

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The Crew was great in its time. It was basically the bridge between Test Drive Unlimited (superior open world gameplay) and early Forza Horizon (superior driving physics). Later Forza Horizon games simply took all the good gameplay features from both TLU and The Crew and is unmatched in quality now.

The Crew 2 was worse than both its predecessor and the competing Forza Horizon at that time, so if you were talking about that I'd half agree. But it's still a problematic industry trend worth stopping.

original_reader

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Digital "ownership".

"Ubisoft is determined to take things one step further to stamp out any attempts to continue playing it past its expiry date."

_sideffect

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Lmao, fuck licenses; pirate it, and we'll make our own servers.

They can't do shit then

wreckedcarzz

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Afaik nobody has cracked it as it's always-online, though I'd be happily incorrect about this if one can slide me some sauce. I'm one of the affected players in the shutdown (still play occasionally) so the ability to continue playing this game would be very nice.

redcalcium

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Afaik there is no crack for The Crew because it stored your progress on ubisoft's server and has no local save data.

seliaste

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There are cracks that managed this tho Nfs:World and wangan midnight comes to mind

DestroyMegacorps

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So if we need to somehow pirate it we need to break ubisoft drm and rediect the calls for savedata that are supposed to be sent to the servers to a local storage

redcalcium

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There is a possibility that the game actually has a hidden "production mode" where it allows offline play. Make sense though because the game developers must be able to run the game during production where the server hasn't been up yet. ~~Research into the possibility of reenabling this mode in retail build seems to be losing steam though.~~ Looks like it picked up some steam again: https://steamcommunity.com/app/241560/discussions/0/4306075118785997064/

rollerbang

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It can't not have local save data. It can delete it at exit, sure, but it needs it to load the game properly. Save game extraction might be more complex, but it is still sent to the local machine.

Unless it's a streamed game of course.

redcalcium

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Seems like it.

Save Game Dumper now available

https://steamcommunity.com/app/241560/discussions/0/4306075118785997064/

redcalcium

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I can't believe they double down on this. It seems ubisoft's management actually thrives on gamers' rage.

rickyrigatoni

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Well they are french.

daniskarma

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If buying is not owning, pirating is not stealing.

ampersandrew

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The problem is this game can't even be pirated due to how it's architected.

YeetPics

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That's true, but still not a good reason to expose yourself to ubisoft's bs.

anonymous111

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For anyone who doesn't think this is a problem, watch this video and join this campaign.

The Crew represent a real chance to change things globally (seriously, watch the video).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w70Xc9CStoE

https://www.stopkillinggames.com/

PeriodicallyPedantic

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you're only allowed to have fun if we control it

kaine

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How the digital ownership normalized the fact that any service, game can disappear easily. The full digital future empowered the corporations, and that issue is here clearly shown by Ubisoft.

umbrella

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release server software and let us self host!!!

they dont even need to foot the cost for anything.

Amir

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That eats into their profits for their other/new games

JoeKrogan

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Boycott this shit company

Veraxus

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Been doing that for years. Will happily continue.

But I’m just one person. Ubisoft won’t feel it unless hundreds of thousands more do the same.

JoeKrogan

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Same

teolan

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If you want to do something about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w70Xc9CStoE

supersquirrel

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If you want to do something about it just go play beam.ng or motor town or another racing game from a smaller dev.

all-knight-party

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Not the same thing at all. When the Crew is lost, a unique game and its world are lost with it. That's like saying if you want to play something like Metal Gear Solid you can go play Hitman. They're broadly the same genre, but a lot of unique art and experience is lost by just giving up and letting it go the easy way.

Son_of_dad

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When Nintendo eshop closed, I lost all my purchases. I tried contacting Nintendo to see if they could transfer my purchases to my switch account, but contacting Nintendo is like trying to contact god, you're gonna get nowhere

undeadfoodsnob

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Thanks UbiSoft for rubbing it in my face with this message, "You no longer have access to this game. Why not check the Store to pursue your adventures?"

the_post_of_tom_joad

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Urhg that makes me mad to read.

You no longer have access to my money. Why not kiss my ass Ubisoft, to pursue your adventure?

xamirozar

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"Your single-payment rental period is suddenly over. Check out our shop where you can single-payment rent another game."

Fixed it for Ubisoft

NoneYa

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Permanently Deleted

Mango

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As if copies of a game on your computer is somehow more digital than the copy being on a disk or a chip that's ROM.

evranch

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Digital ownership, not storage. As in DRM, GaaS licensing and always-online launchers.

A ROM cartridge was physical ownership, if you had the cartridge, you could play.

A CD-key was also a form of physical ownership, install the game and type in the key from the case, you could play.

richmondez

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That should be "ownership" as actual ownership implies having control over a thing and no one who "purchased" this seems to have much control. Breaking the DRM and creating a self hosted sever is taking ownership of it. Don't pretend CD keys were physical ownership either unless the key was entirely validated offline which admittedly older key schemes were.

grue

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volatile

You misspelled "fraudulent."

UndercoverUlrikHD

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It's a shame, but people are asking for it when they buy, and therefore support, these kind of games. If people simply refused to buy always-online games, we wouldn't be in this mess.

chuckleslord

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Literally victim blaming. Classy.

original_reader

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Blaming the player goes a bit far, true.

That said, the sad truth is that companies only react when it affects their bottom line.

all-knight-party

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Well, there's the other route. If they are forced legally to comply, which is what Ross is trying to get done, and is the far better option alongside being more expensive and difficult, because a company's reaction to finances can be reversed as soon as it doesn't matter or the public forgets.

jyoskykid

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It is general knowledge that these companies do this. FSF has campaigned a lot against DRM, under the name Defective by Design.

When someone makes a contract with the devil and complains when it affects them, pointing it out is not victim blaming.

AeroLemming

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Permanently Deleted