Elite Dangerous Odyssey

[Kherty]

Hi Xenon.

The situation here, is that digital game ownership is no longer treated by publishers in the same way physical ownership is.
When you buy a boxed game, or a DRM-free download, you DO retain access forever, regardless of what the publisher later decides (and even that still depends).
However, more and more games today require constant online verification, a proprietary launcher, or access to servers controlled by the publisher simply to function.

The moment the plug on these servers pulled; the game no longer works, even though you paid the price for it and legally "own" it. Elite Dangerous fits some of these criteria.

This is why there are concerns and campaigns like “Stop Killing Games.” The issue is not about optional cosmetics or micro-transactions. It is the shift from "I own this product, this video game", to "I am only allowed to play it for as long as the publisher permits me", which once again, fits for Elite Dangerous, and plenty of other games (such as gacha games. The only example I have here is Limbus Company).

That conditional access undermines what most players reasonably understand as ownership.

That is the point @Sally has been talking about. The "video games industry", is moving away from true ownership (like I said before, you own the game forever, yeah.), and toward temporary access, which puts every single digital purchase at risk of becoming unusable in the future.

Because you won't be able to say:

[...]
No one can take it away from you. It's your game, and it's the same as if you had the DVD or CD for it, but it's digital through Frontier Lines and Steam.

Because it's digital, as you said, and they have the final say. You won't have said game anymore: when they inevitably pull the plug. Or if the company/companies goes under. Hard to imagine Steam going under, but it still can. Easier to imagine Frontier Games going under.

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