Boy, it was frustrating to see Thor completely misrepresent the position of the campaign.
Louis Rossmann's response to harsh criticism of "Stop Killing Games" from Thor of @PirateSoftware
Submitted 4 months ago by ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net to games@lemmy.world
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TF4zH8bJDI8
Comments
ampersandrew@lemmy.world 4 months ago
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net 4 months ago
He’s showing his true colors here. He’s either doubling down so his initial reaction doesn’t make him seem foolish, or he really has a soft spot for mega corporations due to his ties with Blizzard.
Ross wrote a response to Thor’s in the comments of this video, but it’s a bit buried. I’ll include Thor’s for context as well:
Thor:
I’m aware of the process for an initiative to be turned into legislature much farther down the road after many edits. If people want me to back it then the technical and monetary hurdles of applying the request need to be included in the conversation. As written this initiative would put a massive undue burden on developers both in AAA and Indie to the extent of killing off Live Service games. It’s entirely too vague on what the problem is and currently opens a conversation that causes more problems instead of fixing the one it wants to.
If we want to hit the niche and terrible business practice of incorrectly advertising live service games or always online single player only games then call that out directly. Not just “videogames” as stated in the initiative. Specifically call out the practice we want to shut down. It’s a much more correct conversation to have, defeats the actual issue, and stops all this splash damage that I can’t agree with.
Ross’s response:
@PirateSoftware I actually wasn’t planning to write to you further since you said you didn’t want to talk about it with me and I’ll still respect that if you’d like. But since you brought up what I said again I’ll at least give my side of that then leave you alone:
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I’m 100% cynical, I can’t turn it off. I wasn’t trying to appeal to legislators when I said that, I doubt they’ll even watch my videos. I was trying to appeal to people who are are kind of doomer and think this is hopeless from the get-go. I wanted to lay out the landscape as I view it that this could actually work where many initiatives have failed. Did it backfire more than it inspired people? I have no idea. I’ve said before I don’t think I’m the ideal person to lead this, stuff like this is part of why I say that; I can’t just go Polyanna on people and pretend like there aren’t huge obstacles and these are normally rough odds, so that was meant as inspirational. You clearly weren’t the target audience, but you’re in complete opposition to the movement also.
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I’m literally not a part of the initiative in any official capacity. I won’t be the one talking to officials in Brussels if this passes. The ECI could completely distance itself from me if that was necessary.
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In my eyes, what I was doing there was the equivalent of forecasting the weather. You think it’s manipulation, but I don’t control the weather. I can choose when I fly a kite based on my forecast however.
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It was also kind of half-joke on the absurdity of the system we’re in that I consider these critical factors that determine our success or not. So yes, I meant what I said, but I also acknowledge it’s kind of ludicrous that these are perhaps highly relevant factors towards getting anything done in a democracy.
Anyway, I got the impression this whole issue was kind of thrust upon you by your fans, you clearly hate the initiative, so as far as I’m concerned people should stop bothering you about it since you don’t like it.
ZeroHora@lemmy.ml 4 months ago
He’s showing his true colors here. either doubling down so his initial reaction doesn’t make him seem foolish, or he really has a soft spot for mega corporations due to his ties with Blizzard.
I don’t think he have any soft spot for mega corp, is just online figures/influencers can’t never be wrong type of thing.
atro_city@fedia.io 4 months ago
If we want to hit the niche and terrible business practice of incorrectly advertising live service games or always online single player only games then call that out directly. Not just "videogames" as stated in the initiative.
Spoken like an idealist. Video games is probably the biggest thing that will gain traction. Sure, it would be great to tackle the entire issue, but the people making this initiative aren't using other software that does that shit. Saying "care about all the people" dilutes the issue.
Hard disagree with Thor on this one.
Tattorack@lemmy.world 4 months ago
… to the extent of killing off live service games.
I mean… Nothing of value was lost? In my opinion, so far, the only decent live service game to have ever come out is still Warframe. Everything else that cane after is either a pale imitation or straight up cow milking garbage.
We could certainly do with a lot less “live service”.
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tehmics@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I’ve been a big fan of Thor since his first shorts boom, but this take is a massive fucking L from him that I’m very sad to see.
CaptainEffort@sh.itjust.works 4 months ago
Honestly him calling Ross a “greasy used car salesman” really hurt to see. I didn’t take Thor as the type to insult someone like that simply for disagreeing with him.
Kind of makes me wonder if his whole nice guy thing is an act. Either way it calls into question the person I assumed he was.
ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 4 months ago
Yeah, that’s why he says it’s stupid. It seems like he’s fine with the idea of removing DRM that makes single player games unplayable but forcing devs to make online multiplayer games playable forever is ridiculous.
ampersandrew@lemmy.world 4 months ago
To clarify, your position is it’s ridiculous, or you’re stating that his position is ridiculous?
Archelon@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Only if you think the campaign means that companies must pay for the multiplayer servers forever which Ross has said on MULTIPLE occasions is not reasonable and not what he wants.
Giving players the tools to host their own servers or adding LAN functionality, though? That’s entirely reasonable seeing as that’s how multiplayer always used to work. I mean, there are still plenty of Unreal Tournament servers active today without any involvement from the developer in decades.
Especially since, if this initiative works, developers will make games with that functionality in mind.
sanosuke001@lemmynsfw.com 4 months ago
I’d even be happy with there being a choice between “either release tools needed to unlock and run services necessary to function OR release all source code to public domain so someone else is able to fix and rebuild the software as necessary”
If I pay for something they shouldn’t be able to disable it
Kolanaki@yiffit.net 4 months ago
I remember Thor saying that not tying a single player campaign to a server would be bad for developers and Louis barely covered that statement here. How? How would keeping single player and any server-based systems separate hurt the dev? Just plan for this from the beginning. 🤦♂️
proton_lynx@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Yep. And wtf happened with LAN multiplayer? Even the Beta from Diablo II Ressurected had it, but they REMOVED IT from the release version. I call BS on what this Thor guy is saying.
BreadstickNinja@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Blizzard swore off local multiplayer after what happened with StarCraft esports. The Korean leagues ran huge tournaments and made a ton of money off Blizzard’s IP and essentially told them to pound sand. Now everything has to go through their servers so they control the ecosystem.
Same with how Blizzard now owns every custom game you make. They learned their lesson with DOTA/LOL and feel like all that money should be theirs.
All of which seems to indicate that this is a real problem. People can play Brood War forever, but what happens when the SC2 servers go down?
KomfortablesKissen@discuss.tchncs.de 4 months ago
It hurts the developer by impairing the control over the deployed software. This can mean monetization (like microtransactions or some stuff), this can mean “drop-in multiplayer” or whatever it’s called, this can mean a simple friendlist or statistics page, or something along those lines.
It is seldom something different from monetization. Especially in the AAA compartment.
the_toast_is_gone@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Thank you based Ross.
I really don’t see why an indie dev would oppose this. If you were an artist, you wouldn’t want to watch your creation completely disappear from existence because you couldn’t keep working on it, would you?
CosmoNova@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I’m a little surprised either of them have such a strong opinion about something EU related anyway, given it doesn’t affect them directly. Well I guess Louis is just really passionate about that stuff so it’s not all that surprising. As for Thor, maybe he’s using is online presence to kickstart a live service game himself and obviously regulations are scary? It might be a wild guess but I think that would be on brand for him.
bread@feddit.nl 4 months ago
The potential legislation would be specific to the EU, but doesn’t really matter; this market is large enough that it would directly affect other markets. Either the games are patched for all territories or others will make the EU-specific build available. One option generates positive press, the other negative, and any difference in cost would be negligible. There’s also the argument of preserving art.
DonZatch@midwest.social 4 months ago
It would affect video game developers that want to publish in the EU.
It likely won’t affect Thor directly unless he makes a live-service game in the future. He just thinks it’s harmful to the industry and tends to speak out about stuff like that.
PieMePlenty@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Damn, imagine if it passes and devs just don’t release in the eu anymore. I mean the best scenario we are all hoping for is it passes and is obliged by everywhere due to the Brussels effect. Doesnt mean it will though.
In the end, it may pass but publishers stop selling in the EU in an official capacity but europeans still digitally buy the games anyway…
webghost0101@sopuli.xyz 4 months ago
I am out of the loop but it seems like a topic to discuss once again promote my age old belief that:
The moment purchased or licensed software is no longer serviced or supported it must become open-source.
No exception. I am still waiting on the firmware to reprogram my smartish oven.
grue@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I’d go even further: Developers ought to be required to submit reproducible builds to the Library of Congress in order to be eligible for copyright in the first place, and once anything stops being sold (software or otherwise) it ought to immediately become Public Domain.
(And copyright ought to be shortened back to its original term length, by the way.)
Katana314@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Sadly, even if I’m moralistically in favor, there is so much insane computer science logic (and proprietary mechanisms) behind the process of compilation, especially on certain embedded systems where this issue comes up, that I doubt that could ever be pushed into law.
melooone@feddit.org 4 months ago
This reminds me of warzone 2100. After its publisher (punpkin) ceased trading, some dedicated ex-employees and community members managed to liberate the source code in 2004.
Now it’s available in some of the major distros and is still updated to this day.
KomfortablesKissen@discuss.tchncs.de 4 months ago
Every line of code needs to be Open Source. The people or businesses responsible can buy a subscription to keep it from the public. No more money => Publicly overseeable sources + FOSS licensing.