A California bill aimed at preserving old video games for consumers is currently making its way through the state legislature and has caused quite an uproar inside the American gaming industry, pitting the makers and consumers of video games against one another. AB1921 was created by the same organizers behind a European citizens’ initiative – dubbed plainly “Stop Destroying Videogames” – which aims to “stop developers from ending support for their favourite video games once a company decides it’s no longer profitable to maintain the software, rendering games unplayable.”
The initiative collected over 1.3 million signatures across the EU, which requires the European Parliament to respond. A response is expected June 16. With that in mind, let’s talk about the video game industry, some of its business models, and how it reflects a broader consumer rights movement.
“Game death”
It used to be that when new video games were released, you would go out and pick up a physical copy of the game. But like most entertainment in our increasingly digital world, all you have to do today is hit the download button. While that may be easier – and not having physical copies certainly frees up space in your home – gamers are learning that there is a huge downside to digital-only games.
For starters, many popular video games need to communicate with the publisher’s servers over the internet. Therefore, if the publisher disconnects its servers, the game is no longer playable. This is becoming an increasingly common scenario. The EU initiative was started when one of the largest video game publishers in the world, Ubisoft, turned off its servers for its popular game The Crew in 2024. That infuriated many dedicated players. Not only was their favorite game no longer playable, but many argued that they weren’t sufficiently warned about the possibility of discontinuation when they purchased the game and that an offline version should be available for single-player gaming.
The goal of the initiative isn’t to force companies to perpetually maintain games, but rather to provide “reasonable means for these video games to continue without the involvement of the publisher.” Essentially, an end-of-life plan should be in place. As a U.K. parliamentary group member told The Independent, “A publisher should not be able to deliberately disable every copy of a game that consumers have already purchased, leaving them with nothing.”
Microtransactions
Another aspect of the gaming industry that has turned some gamers off of online games are microtransactions. While gaming platforms used to rely on outright purchases of new games to generate profits, many publishers now rely on free-to-play downloadable games that encourage the continuous purchase of virtual items or tokens inside the game. This strategy has been very lucrative for games. Researchers estimate that microtransactions make up around 60% of the $196 billion spent on the gaming industry, and that share will continue to rise.
While game publishers are certainly not unique in turning to a recurring transaction style business model, they often package microtransactions as a benefit to the consumer experience. Ubisoft wrote in its 2025 annual report that its monetization strategy “makes the player experience more fun by allowing them to personalize their avatars or progress more quickly.” While many of the purchase options are available with extended gameplay, the games often encourage users to purchase them to get a head start on other players. As one gamer wrote for Mother Jones, “A pastime that used to offer rewards for hard work, grit, and perseverance has turned into a matter of who is willing to whip out a credit card and spend their way to success.”
Consumer rights in a digital world
Video game makers aren’t the only ones with digital content that can suddenly disappear after purchase. A class action lawsuit was filed against Amazon Prime last August for “bait and switch” tactics that allege the company “misleads consumers into believing they’ve purchased content when they’re only getting a license to watch, which can be revoked at any time.” Similarly, Amazon also received backlash last year for removing the ability to download Kindle ebooks to your computer.
Another downside to digital materials is that unlike the physical CD of an artist’s album, the digital counterpart cannot be resold, raising the question of what value this content truly holds and who is really benefiting from an increasingly digital world. As a copyright attorney put it, “Anything that you’re doing digitally has somebody on the other end who’s giving you that access. And that power shift is just tremendous.”
