You Don’t Own Your Digital Games — Licenses, Shutdowns & Consumer Rights | GZ Chop Shop

Gregory (00:01.41)
You know that feeling when you boot up a game you bought years ago, one you pay full price for and suddenly you get a screen that says the servers are shut down? Or you try to access your digital library and something's just gone? That's not a glitch. That's a business decision. And today on the GZ Chop Shop, we're going to get into it. We're talking about digital game rights. The quiet, slow erosion of the idea that when you pay for something, you own it. We've got three segments packed with the receipts.

From server shutdowns, that white paid libraries, to terms of service updates that rewrote the rules mid game, to the one question the industry does not want you to ask, do you actually own anything in your digital library? Stick around, hit subscribe wherever you're listening, and subscribe to our Press Play gaming newsletter for the written companion pieces of each episode and sometimes game reviews, link in the show notes. So let's get to it. Okay, this is a topic we have

partially covered throughout the entire show's life, but we've never really dived into it.

Uly (01:05.599)
We talk about it. Well, we talk about it a lot where we mentioned it's like we're gonna go to another country in specific country To buy the games that we want because they're no longer on sale here. They're no longer available online It's like hey, you Lee. Yeah, guess what? I just picked up this game. I'm like a great is what I picked up these games

Gregory (01:26.69)
Yeah. So as we've gotten into what is pretty much the better part of the gaming era, it's also the worst. One of the reasons is when you buy a digital game, you're not buying the game. You're buying a revocable license to access the game, which has been a huge point of contention in recent years. And one of the big developers that made gamers aware of it is

Ubisoft and that's because

Uly (01:57.627)
Although we gotta add the other thing that's like you can buy physical games now that are just keys to the G's. So even if we buy physical, we're not getting physical.

Gregory (02:03.085)
that are just keys.

Gregory (02:08.365)
Yep. And it's been a really big issue in recent years. And actually, this kind of ties into the episode we did a few weeks ago with Sony's DRM scanning for licenses and people seeing deadlines on their digital game. And people were even saying that they forgot to log in and they watched their digital library just dwindle because they didn't check in.

Uly (02:31.625)
That's a weird thing because they they shadow released it and then there was the timer and then like after two weeks they didn't do it and like wait what happened to this game didn't I own it and it's very few let's be honest it was maybe out of the hundreds of millions a couple hundred that it happened to very short number still a very concerning thing

Gregory (02:43.157)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Gregory (02:57.581)
Yeah, very concerning. And the reason I bring up Ubisoft is because there was a huge thing because not only did two players actually open up a lawsuit against Ubisoft, Ubisoft pretty much tried to push back against it. And for anyone who doesn't know or pretty much forgot, the crew came out in about 2014 and after. And I'll pull it up on the screen because we have keyboard warriors out there that are like, are you sure you guys are reading the right information? No, no, we just.

Uly (03:24.401)
No, we're not reading the right information. Yeah, I will be honest. I'm not reading the right information.

Gregory (03:28.333)
We just we just talk out of our ass when we do this podcast. No, we do not have the information. But yeah, one of the articles, it says after a decade of support, we will be decommissioning the crew one March 31st, 2024. It said at the time, we understand this may be disappointing for players still enjoying the game, but is necessary due to upcoming server infrastructure and licensing constraints. I want to focus on that part in particular, because a lot of developers

Uly (03:31.539)
Half the time I do.

Gregory (03:58.174)
Major developers. I want to be clear on this a lot of major developers and publishers are using that as the main excuse to shut down Online games and shut them down quickly a lot of games aren't even making it past seniors I will say at least the crew made it nine into ten But then you've got Yeah, they shut it down for the sequel game and

Uly (04:19.155)
Well, they shut it down for the sequel game.

Gregory (04:27.501)
I feel like that's a bunch of bull. I get it. know, servers take time, effort and money. But if you know you're not going to be willing to support a game after a certain amount of years. And just to clarify, Ubisoft had an expiration. People found in the digital files that they had an expiration for stuff up to 2099 and games that are live service. When you buy currency, that's the equivalent of a gift card.

which technically in certain states is not allowed to expire, California being one. So that was a breach of their agreement to the consumers because you took away the product and that currency is non-transferable. That's one thing that's included in every TOS, EULA of these games that comes out that says, hey, you buy any of our currency, it's non-transferable, you gotta spend it in our game.

But if you take away the product in which these players can spend their gain, you know, spend that currency that they cannot transfer, they've also breached their agreement with us on like two fronts at that point.

Uly (05:36.755)
I think there's also some some guidelines of like look you can use this currency as long as we have the game active once the game is no longer active currency can't be used anymore so it becomes voided like there's there's there's those little subtle violent guidelines of like the currencies this this this it only works with this this this this active they have technically some right to remove the currency but that

It's like the biggest one that's going to happen soon is when GTA 6 comes out. We know for a fact they might shut down the servers for GTA 5 online. It may not be, you know, in the next five, maybe 10 years, but after that people still spend hundreds, like billions of dollars in them shark cards. What happens after they shut down? there's the, yeah, what was that movement called? Stop killing games movement.

Gregory (06:07.683)
yeah.

Gregory (06:12.461)
Mm-hmm.

Gregory (06:28.779)
Yeah, stop killing games.

Uly (06:29.735)
stop killing games, doing the Lord's work and making sure we can have access to those games to the point where California, the state I live in, God help me with this state too, but they're doing something good. The bill that we were just talking about, we had it up here, the Protect Our Games Act Assembly Bill 1921 is for video game preservation and the consumer rights in the United States.

So meaning like, you know, we get these are the key notes that this bill will bring to us if it's, you know, finalized provide 60 day notice before terminating the game that required, you know, online services, keep the game playable or refund us. So if you're going to shut down a game, Hey, release an update where we can play it offline. Fun. Cool. And then, then there's this part right here. The exclusions does not apply to free to play titles or games. That's the tricky part.

Gregory (07:03.553)
Mm.

Uly (07:25.427)
Technically Fortnite is a free to play game. So they decide to you're screwed on that part.

Gregory (07:27.917)
Mm.

Gregory (07:32.418)
Yeah. And you know, that's why I think a lot of these companies are making such a huge push for live service free to play games, because then they can circumvent the legalities that make them account that hold them accountable to the consumer, because in the end they can go, well, you didn't pay for the game. You paid for the things we created to utilize in our game that we provided to you free of charge. At that point, it is on you as the consumer.

You made a conscious choice to take part in a free to play. It's it's it's I don't want to say it's like gambling, but it is kind of like gambling because you're gambling with your money.

Uly (08:09.607)
No, you're gambling. Any, no, and look, let's be honest. Any physical or digital item we buy, is a gamble that we might hold it. You never know. Something can happen in your house that, look, the, you know, your pride, your stuff is destroyed. It happens. Same thing with digital market. Anything can happen. You don't technically own everything forever, but you would like at least to own it for as long as you live.

Gregory (08:31.403)
Right, you at least want to be able to hold on to it. And that was one of the things that they were talking about, you know, with the Ubisoft case at the time, the plaintiffs claimed that Ubisoft misled players by telling them they were buying a game when in fact, all they were renting was a limited license to access a game that defendants choose to maintain at their own, you know, leisure or however you want to word it.

The plaintiffs also claimed that the product's packaging falsely represented that the crew itself was encoded onto physical disks consumers could buy or the digital files consumers could pay to download when in fact the physical disks and downloaded files consumers paid for were more akin to a key they could use to open the gates of this remote server which defendants could one day decide to fail to main.

which comes back to what you were saying earlier. It's like they started getting slick with the collector community and saying, okay, we'll give you the piece of plastic because we want your money, but you're still going to do it our way because you're going to have to download the game because all this is, is a glorified key.

Uly (09:41.733)
I hate that it's like I bought what game was it EA Star Wars second one Jedi Survivor Yeah, see this is what I when I was when I loaded in I buy it on discs or PS5 Loaded in I'm like, right, cool. I can't wait to play because I bought it when it was on sale So it was already out

Gregory (09:50.753)
the phone. Which way? Battlefront? Genesis. Okay. Yeah.

Gregory (10:07.021)
you

Uly (10:08.063)
Loaded in the disk and I'm like a hundred gig download. When am I downloading? We have to game. I can't just, you know, what if I don't at a point I don't have internet. It's like, I want to play the game. Well, you couldn't download this patch. You can't play the game. So the game was incomplete. So you're telling me in this physical disc, I bought, paid 70 to $80 for a complete game only to have part of it. And I need the internet to finish the rest of the game.

Why can't I just have the whole game on there? Is the Blu-ray disc that bad that it can't have 150 gigs of data? I thought they were the pinnacle of discs.

Gregory (10:45.741)
Yeah. Right. And it sucks because just to show and I will never understand a lot of people will go to bat for, you know, these major corporations. These companies are not your friend. People, you know, need to understand that even if you've got the money to throw at them and you don't see the issue because you happen to have the money to throw them, they're still not your friend. Ubisoft's response to all of this was frustrated with Ubisoft's recent decision to retire the game following a notice period.

diverted on the products packaging, plaintiffs apply a kitchen sink approach on behalf of a punitive class of nationwide customers alleging eight causes of action, including violations of California's false advertising law. That's not a political false advertising law.

Uly (11:33.811)
Dude, this is... I understand lawsuits you have to make it sound professional and all that. You could have just said, they fucking lie to you.

Gregory (11:40.3)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. And then basically it comes down to Ubisoft claims that players should have had no expectation that they were purchasing unfettered ownership rights in the game. And that makes up another argument, which is what got Sony in hot water before and still gets them in hot water. When you go to the PlayStation store, when you go to the Steam store, when you go to the Xbox marketplace, when you go to the Nintendo shop, that button that lures you in says purchase

or by. The meaning behind that is very clear.

Uly (12:20.509)
No, no, no, no, no, no, it's not because you're purchasing buying the game or the license for the game. They don't say you're buying the actual game. No, you're buying the license for the game or you're buying the rental agreement for this game. It's never you're buying the game that. You know, I get it. We it's it's. Now I can't think right now I'm drawing a blank. I don't know how to put this.

Gregory (12:27.595)
And that's the thing.

Gregory (12:48.32)
Because it's so messy.

Uly (12:49.527)
Is it's a messy situation like how do you how do you put this in a situation where? I'm trying to think like like Pokemon like let's say I buy a pack of Pokemon cards and the seller has the right to like Revoke them if I open it up and I pull out a god card. It's like well I'm taking your license away from that card and it's mine now No, just so I can I the seller can have it and sell it again myself

Gregory (13:07.361)
Yeah, just so you can have like the collector value and make millions.

Uly (13:16.285)
Because you were just buying the rental agreement for that. Let me take that away from you. Yeah, that's my car. I'm to sell it for someone else. It's one of those things.

Gregory (13:25.899)
And I just, you know, I'm pretty sure people are thinking like, well, there's not that many games that do that. Well, there was Battleborn, which was 2K Gearbox January twenty twenty one entire live service title wiped out purchase content gone. Knockout City, EA, June twenty twenty three. The developers released a free to play private server option before shutdown, which is a precedent that no other company has followed, which proves

Uly (13:43.506)
evolve.

Gregory (13:55.646)
It can be done. They just do not want to. For whatever reason, probably because they feel it would dilute their ability to sell their live service products. It won't be able to get the FOMO crowd involved because people, you know, they probably think, well, if people know we're going to make it available offline after a while, they'll wait until.

super sale or until we stop supporting it and then they'll get it for dirt cheap, which yes, there's a lot of people that have that patience and would do that. But however, that does not give you the right to pretty much abuse your customer base just to appease your shareholders with their greedy little grubby hands.

Uly (14:41.971)
Well, that's why we say, were your wallet? Don't, if you suspect that a game might be pulled out because it is a live service or that the company you're buying it from will just pull the rug from under you. Why would we put ourselves in that risk unless the game is really worth it?

Gregory (14:59.277)
Yeah. Basically, almost any EA sports game at some point, which let's just be honest, they created that formula decades ago. They knew.

Uly (15:07.455)
All right. You know what? I'm that EA sports games. I can't like every year. Look, me and my boys, we, sometimes we'll fall into that trap. Well, yeah, sometimes. And every year it's like we gained 26, we gained 27. And for like the last five years, I'm like, no dog. It's just an update. Like it's just in roster update. It's nothing has changed for the last five years when it comes to Madden. This is a game we play. I'm like,

Gregory (15:35.437)
Mm.

Uly (15:36.999)
It's a roster of days. I know they're adding these new small mechanics. I'm like, it's a roster update. Not even that, not even the crowds have gotten better. It's like, can you at least fix the crowds? Like hell yeah. No, it's my, my pain. maddening.

Gregory (15:41.261)
The blades of grass are reflective.

Gregory (15:49.911)
Yeah, the paper crowds.

Gregory (15:57.57)
Yeah. Another one that's actually, I know this hurt me. It probably hurt you too. When PT got pulled, we didn't even get to keep the demo.

Uly (16:06.847)
do remember when playstations with PT in it were selling like hotcakes?

Gregory (16:11.309)
Dude, I was so upset because I had beaten the demo and I was like, they were like so certain that the game was gonna come out. So I deleted the demo, cause I was like, all right, I finished the demo. I can't wait for the game. And then I think that was the next day they said, we're canceling it. I ran home so fast to try to redownload it and Konami was like, nope, we were on it. They killed it, couldn't redownload it. Cause I was like, I would have sold my PS4 because I had PT on there from the day the demo dropped to the last minute.

Uly (16:31.231)
Hold.

Uly (16:38.973)
All up. think about this. Now, I think about this. You can still play PT if you still had it downloaded. They, they removed it from the store. They couldn't remove it from your system. I don't know. Now they can remove from your system. They can remove it from your library. It is the scary times to live.

Gregory (16:41.579)
I still kick myself about it.

Gregory (16:47.053)
If I side-dailed, yeah, I could have still played it.

Gregory (17:00.139)
And then this one was more of like Google just killing their entire console and people have like forgotten about it was cyberpunk 2077 stadia versions became unplayable. Google killed Stadia in 2023. Users were refunded, but it exposed just how volatile cloud gaming is and.

Uly (17:10.802)
No.

Uly (17:14.205)
Listen.

Uly (17:20.295)
I gonna say if you invested in stadia, you should have expected that to go kabosh. There is no way that was gonna last.

Gregory (17:25.42)
Hmm.

Gregory (17:31.542)
and of course mobile games like mobile games are pretty huge example of this.

Uly (17:36.977)
Hey, hey, I fall for mobile games too. Don't worry, dog. I look, we've all, we've all gotten into that angry birds vibe where it's like, all right, you know what? I'll pay a dollar here, a dollar there. Cause we were bored on the sun. I was bored on the part when that game was popping. So I was just playing that and then, no, after they removed, like they, they updated and removed it. I don't know what happened to angry birds. Cause I stopped playing and they updated it. And I'm like, this isn't angry birds. I remember. I don't know what this is as like, do I keep anything I bought? Nope. I'm like, well.

Gregory (17:39.789)
You

Gregory (17:50.444)
you

Gregory (18:03.778)
Yeah.

Uly (18:07.389)
I expected that from mobile games though.

Gregory (18:10.189)
And then, you know, the other thing that, you know, Daniel and I, were huge Dusty fans and I'm an on, on, off again, Dusty 2 fan.

Uly (18:20.605)
Destiny is still my second longest played game.

Gregory (18:24.095)
Yeah, I still haven't beat the time on on Destiny even close. Like there's no game that's even come close second to beating that. And that's been my number one. The thing, though, that killed Destiny for me is one of these practices. They did. They came out with the content vault, which was a softer version of the content you play for, through, pay for and earned became voltage or guns became outdated. They became inaccessible.

And we're talking exotics. We're talking things that people spent. I never understood that. And it was like they were like, well, because we want people to try the new guns when they came out, we didn't want everyone just Gala Horn. And I'm like, I get it. But if the person earned that Gala Horn, let them fucking use the Gala Horn.

Uly (18:55.005)
I never understood that.

Uly (19:08.701)
Let them use the Gjallarhorn. Especially when you have a six-man raid squad with the Gjallarhorn. You'll be... You'll be rocking it.

Gregory (19:17.485)
And they were like, we wanted people to try the new mechanics of raise me. I'm like, okay, then you can do that without nerfing the Gjallarhorn into oblivion. You could literally set into place Gjallarhorn restricted or the Gjallarhorn not as effective based off the Ray boss mechanics. Players are not stupid. They would figure it out. They would say, okay, maybe we have to use a new weapon, a new mechanic. You could have done that without taking all their hard earned work and saying,

Well, we thank you for the years you invested. We thank you for the money. And now you get to do it all over again from scratch. You're totally nerfed. Yeah, that power level back down into the oblivion start over.

Uly (20:00.475)
I still don't understand how we love that game. I more I think about it, the more I'm like, why do we spend like so many hours just playing this game when they do that all the time? It's like, I found my meta. I found it with this exotic. sunset the exotic. Well.

Gregory (20:14.507)
Yep. They said it's it's the it's the it's a syndrome. I forget what the official this is where Daniel Adobe, there's a term for it. And it's like. Yeah, there's there's a term for it and we all suffer from it. We all have that developer that when it is blatant that they're abusing us, we're still like, but they love us. They're doing it for our own good. It'll come through.

Uly (20:23.552)
I can't say the word on YouTube.

Gregory (20:42.669)
and the rest of everyone else on the outside is like, yeah, no.

Uly (20:47.593)
you know what game I see that with, Bungie? Is it Bungie that made it? Marathon.

Gregory (20:53.185)
Yeah, bungee.

Uly (20:54.053)
I damn yeah, look I've seen people play that game. My boy loves that game. The more I look at it the more my That one's gonna go away and it's not gonna be pretty They're gonna concord a boat It's not gonna because people actually like that one You actually like marathon so it's gonna I can't I can't I can't we can't go through that again

Gregory (21:03.681)
Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Gregory (21:20.161)
And it's not even just with like games, like this is another different topic, but you know, you got to be careful too with the state that consoles come out in, that they're making them harder and harder to repair, which basically is forcing you to send it to back to them to repair for a crazy fee when.

Uly (21:40.447)
Not even online games. Holy fuck. I just remembered 86.

Gregory (21:47.063)
Yeah, just the idea. Yeah, okay. It's all digital media.

Uly (21:47.485)
Pulled I just remember like I bought I look as soon as they as soon as they as soon as they removed I'm like, I'm buying the blu-ray. I found it. I bought it the next day. I look at the prices for them again doubled I'm like, I'm so glad I bought it right when they announced they were gonna pull it because don't

Gregory (22:04.139)
Yeah, you got in there at a good time.

Uly (22:05.939)
Dude, it is insane how many times I've all, especially when the Funimation Crunchyroll merger happened, how many Funimation animes never made it to Crunchyroll until like years later. It's like, and then there's so many other animes not out on digital, even though technically these few digital stream sites should have it.

Gregory (22:18.263)
Yeah.

Gregory (22:28.907)
Yeah, it's basically all digital media. all and it stems from it stems from gaming. It's it's estimated to be a three hundred sixty three point seven billion dollar industry by next year. So when you look at it, all medias are watching gaming and they see how we react to it. And then they're like, OK, well, if they can do that in gaming, we can do this everywhere.

Uly (22:43.251)
Billions, people.

Uly (22:52.799)
No, no, you know, so not to cut to is a good example of that. People read their e e their agreements, right? Their agreement makes sense because it's still an early access game. So not to cut to his early access. I don't expect to keep an early access game because that's what it is. I'm not you. That is one where it's like you shouldn't know.

Gregory (22:56.961)
So yeah.

Gregory (23:12.896)
Exactly.

Uly (23:17.043)
you're technically paying for a rental license with the potential of them releasing the full game to you. But because you own the rental for this, it'll convert into a fully owned game. So when people are saying like they can remove the game is like, yeah, they can because technically it's not a finished game. It's not a released game.

Gregory (23:40.206)
And I don't want, I like the concept of early access because you can get a game before it's fully finished at below premium price, which is alluring if you can deal with constant changes and updates and the game potentially taking years, not star citizen level of years. Yeah. But, and if you can handle the chance of it never releasing in the dev saying, Hey, that was it. Can't finish the game.

Uly (23:59.175)
and the gamble of never getting it.

Gregory (24:09.601)
then early access might be for you. But I have a strong feeling that if we're going into the era of not owning games, and this takes us into our second segment, the history of deleted games, where Ubisoft, I don't know if anyone remembers when one of the Ubisoft execs was quoted saying users should get comfortable with not owning games and moving toward access models.

The backlash was immense. Yeah. And then they were telling people, this was the kicker. They were telling people who still had copies of the crew, one, that they had to throw away their physical copy. Well, I'm here to say, I did not. So fuck off Ubisoft. But I'm like, no, because I pay for this. I pay premium.

Uly (24:39.069)
to Netflix model, the Netflix model of gaming.

Uly (24:53.011)
Nope, fuck you, I'm keeping it.

Uly (25:00.819)
By the way, guys, I printed that for him earlier today. It took me a while.

Gregory (25:08.941)
price for this game. And you're going to tell me that I have to throw this in the trash and be okay with that. You're literally telling me to throw my money in the trash and be okay with that. No, not happening. Never happening.

Uly (25:24.967)
It's a hoarder syndrome. We like collecting our stuff, but like, no, I'm not throwing it away. There's sentimental value in this game. In, this piece of plastic, in this piece of whatever media that you're holding onto, sentimental value of any sort is worth, like it will be worth keeping for your memory sake. Like, you you never know when you're going to be 80 and you're old, you're having old timers and you look at the crew and you're like, flashback, just all the memories coming back.

Gregory (25:31.531)
Right.

Gregory (25:51.116)
Yeah, this is a reminder of to never trust Ubisoft with online only games ever again. That's literally what it is. It is my reminder of better days and when the turning point began.

Uly (26:02.547)
And then we're still all dumb enough to buy a satsuki for re-sync. I know who you are. I'm one of them too. I'm one of them too. All right. I will fall for that. I am that dumb. I love it.

Gregory (26:15.947)
I'm not even gonna pretend that I'm not that dumb. I'm not even going to.

Uly (26:18.439)
No, we're also I don't know. This is like a good segment, but I just read something. I haven't confirmed it yet, but apparently Horizon Ford's Ford's Horizon six has one point two million players logged in and is still on their early release, meaning you had to pay one hundred and twenty dollars to play it. I'm one of those one twenty.

Gregory (26:41.355)
Yeah, think they've already hit like over a million in revenue or something. They hit a high number in revenue.

Uly (26:45.663)
They oh they they they like I did the math if it's 120 let's just let's just say 120 1.2 like that's just the people that Logged in and bought the game right not even the people that bought the game to get early, but couldn't couldn't get on the game That's still like 144 million dollars that is Bank and my hair is going crazy right now look at this fucking shit

Gregory (27:10.901)
And yeah, it was looking pretty cool here. I'm gonna lie. But no, like that's a good point. And I'm pretty sure that that's all digital. That's all digital. And that scares me because I'm like, OK, you know, and man, talking about, you know, something that pisses me off. And I want to preface this by saying, however you play your games is totally your choice. This is just my personal gripe. This is not me saying you have to play a game specifically a certain way.

Uly (27:15.677)
Yeah.

Uly (27:18.995)
That's all digital.

Uly (27:39.783)
Unless you're an Elden Ring player, then you have to play like an Elden Lord.

Gregory (27:39.79)
because that's how I played my games. Yeah, no, this was just me personally. remember I told you guys a story, but I was like, I went into this game stop with my girlfriend late last year and this guy came in and he was trading in his disc based PS5 for the discless PS4 Pro. And I was like, okay, no big deal. I'm pretty sure you can get a driver for it and attach it. So I didn't think anything of it, but it's what the guy said that pissed me off.

As he's trading in, even the cashier was like, you want to give up your disk base PS five, like especially in this era. And the guy's like, I don't do this anymore. I'm all digital. And like the store got quiet and I'm like, huh? Wait a minute.

Uly (28:30.803)
No, no, no, no, no. I know people that are all digital too, that they don't like the idea of clutter. It's like, I get it. You just want the console. You just want the console to hold the games. You don't want discs everywhere. You want less clutter. I get it. That's all right. I also want you to understand that when something happens to that console or when the games are removed, you can bitch, but you made that choice.

Gregory (28:56.321)
Yeah. And like there's, there will be no, you know, and I, I'm assuming that most of those people, they're not thinking about when they're gone, which is totally fair. I'm like, if you are that selfish and you don't care or you don't even think about it, that's totally fine.

Uly (29:11.327)
I don't even think it's selfish. think it's, it's just, you know, they understand. I'm not calling it selfish. The only thing selfish. No, I don't think it's so that is not selfish. That's just people not thinking about the future. They're not thinking about the future satisfaction. They're thinking about the momentary satisfaction.

Gregory (29:15.085)
I think it's selfish. I think it's selfish. You can at me, at me all you want.

Gregory (29:27.202)
but.

Yeah, yeah, no. yeah, and I get it. Like they're thinking about it in the moment, you know, and they're not, it's not a concern of, you know, five, 10, 15 years later.

Uly (29:37.779)
Also, I have never traded my PS five pro. I got the spider-man two edition. This is the only like one of the few they made that were like collectible like that.

Gregory (29:46.702)
I'm just I just want to say and shout out to my boy Tyree for putting me on this. If you've never used the Gamer Eye app and you're a gamer, you're a collector, and I'm pretty sure every collector knows about this app, do yourself a favor. Get the Gamer Eye app and trust me. I think a lot of people would change their mind about physical if they saw how much value having physical games is.

Uly (30:15.901)
Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. I don't want scalpers anymore. All right. We've already said scalp your local scalpers. Nope. If I've started seeing scalpers scalp video games, some of them already do that anyway. It's no, I don't want to fight. I don't want to go on eBay and have a bidding war with someone for a $10 game that reached 200 for some reason.

Gregory (30:21.133)
Yes.

Gregory (30:31.286)
I don't think I-

Gregory (30:38.703)
but see, that's the thing. Game Eye, scalpers, they're not, it doesn't work that way. It takes the actual value, like market value. Consider it like the blue book for cars, how blue book is for cars. This is like the blue book for games. So the actual going value, scalpers can't adjust that because it's not a marketplace. It's just basically the entire, if it's existed as a game or console, it's got a record in Game Eye and the value is tracked.

the official value is tracked. So as soon as you barcode scan that game, that peripheral, whatever you own, you're getting the actual value for it. So then you'll know for sure when a scap scalpers are well scalping. Like I saw the value for my collection and I was like, hello. So, you know, if my because I'm never going to sell my stuff, but I'm like, if my if I have kids and they decide gaming is not my thing, I'm like,

Cool, wait till I'm gone. Make sure I'm gone.

Uly (31:41.503)
Do the doors at the the shrewt method, you know open the casket shotgun blast me a few times Make sure make sure it's done

Gregory (31:45.486)
Make sure I'm gone and make sure and I will put in the will to not just give this away but sell it at its full value. I've already done the hard part. You find the true collectors and you do not sell for less than what it's worth because I got a nice little egg going there and I'm like digital gives me nothing gives me nothing.

which is why I can never go fully digital. And there's no guarantee that that library can be passed down or, you can't trade it and everything's a tie to your account. So.

Uly (32:24.765)
I want to know everybody. want to know how much did you spend on steam? I spent a lot. I'm not going to lie. I spent a lot of money and I'm expecting never to own that maybe in the next 20 years because something will happen. Cause game new isn't going to live forever.

Gregory (32:32.461)
That's been a lot of money, I'll see.

Gregory (32:39.285)
And that's a fair, that's a fair thought. I actually had that thought recently. Yeah. I've had that thought recently because Steve is a completely digital marketplace. with the conversation that we're having now, anything can happen with that digital marketplace. It's not guaranteed. And once again, speaking on a digital marketplace, know, PlayStation, what something like we mentioned earlier, again, hot water PlayStation revived their terms of service updates and they expanded them to.

give them more ability to restrict, remove access to content, including content previously purchased with minimal notice requirements. Sound familiar, like their DRM thing? And...

Uly (33:20.239)
yeah. Remember when they tried to remove your favorite PS3, PS Vita games from the market or they're trying to shut down the store completely. Yeah. You don't remember that. Do you? I do. You know why? Because I love my PS Vita. Guess what else? I now own a lot of physical PS Vita games. Cause can you guess what? They're downloaded into the little, little plastic cartridge. I don't need online for some games. Some games require online, but

Gregory (33:24.661)
Yep. That, yeah, that's I was going to say. Yep.

Gregory (33:41.663)
Yup. Yup. For some games. Yeah, and that kind of sucks.

Uly (33:48.723)
But there's a lot of games I don't require online. Are they in Japanese? Most of them are. Yes. Can I read that? 10%. Am I still enjoying the hell out of it? Yes. It's, it's, it's one of those things where it's not really one those things. It's just a fact where digital wool is just, is still like when people would understand we'll still, we're still in the wild west of digital.

Gregory (33:57.549)
you

Gregory (34:01.671)
and

Uly (34:19.811)
This isn't a market that's been developed over the last 30 years. This is 20 years, maybe less, like truly figuring it out still.

Gregory (34:25.228)
Right.

Gregory (34:32.161)
Right. Yeah. And they're trying to, the companies are trying to get a foothold before it's figured out so that they can make what they want be the norm before the consumers are like able to understand what's happening.

Uly (34:45.631)
Awesome.

Uly (34:51.123)
That's why we have people that run like stop killing games that are in the front lines fighting for your right to own the games that you paid for.

Gregory (34:55.437)
Yeah.

Gregory (35:00.801)
And not just stop killing games, you got stop killing games. got California's AB 2426 law. You got good old games. Some publishers are trying to do the right thing by giving players offline capability.

Uly (35:16.593)
Also, I think that's just to like win favor. They don't really want you to own the game.

Gregory (35:22.253)
Hey, look, wins a win. Sometimes you just gotta take what you can get and not be too greedy, because then they'll use that against us like they've done in the past. But another example behind PlayStation, Microsoft, you're not off the hook. You're doing good for now, but Microsoft's Game Pass model reframed ownership entirely. pay a fee to access a rotating library that you do not own.

Uly (35:25.311)
wins win.

Gregory (35:50.894)
you cancel that subscription, it's all gone. So while people are like, oh, Game Pass is the greatest because I can just go in and try all these games before I decide to buy them. True. But at the same time, how many of you are going to be comfortable canceling that subscription for a month? You won't. There'll probably be like a handful that'll be like, oh yeah, I had no problem canceling it. But the majority of people who are on Game Pass have been on Game Pass for years.

without stopping, which was the point. And it sold you the idea of, oh, you don't have to buy the game. You can just forever pay us in rent to all of the games. Isn't that so much better?

Uly (36:33.373)
I'm still waiting. I'm still waiting. Like they, they want to keep milking this for money. They want to keep that trip going. I'm waiting for the day that either call of duty. know that the one, I think it was a, one of the lead creators of the EAS battlefield games said it. It's like, what if we charged a dollar per reload? You have to reload. I'm like, I'm waiting for the moment where it's there's a currency now for actions in the game.

Gregory (36:52.89)
my goodness. Yeah.

Uly (37:02.643)
Like not a stamina bar, real life, USD, whatever money you and you use in your country affecting you, your ability to play the Yo, I can't guys, I can't heal you. don't have any more money in the bank.

Gregory (37:18.893)
I don't have any more. I didn't put my $5 in for this round. I'm sorry guys.

Uly (37:23.773)
I'm sorry guys. You know, they're thinking that the digital market could be an arcade where you can just insert coins and keep playing the game until the night ends. It's this. That's not how it works. That's not it's going to happen. An arcade is an experience in of itself. You don't even have to play the games in the arcade. Go get a drink, go eat a pizza, hang out with your friends. And online market, there's it's not an experience. You're playing the game. That's not, that's not entirely it. You know, the experience is also hanging out with your friends, like going on a discord chat.

I don't, as Skype stole it, they know it's zoom now. No, I don't, I don't know what that is. There's so many out there. You can go on any of these other chat rooms and hang out with your friends and play same game, different game, whatever. It's an experience in of itself. They want to monetize you for that experience.

Gregory (37:56.589)
I don't know, there's like so many out there.

Gregory (38:10.891)
Yeah. So, you know, we put out all the information there. We've put out all of our gripes. So for the third and final segment, where do you where do you think the future is heading? I will say. I mean, if we're are you talking literally or?

Uly (38:19.113)
We have a lot of grapes.

Uly (38:26.654)
Fallout.

Uly (38:31.359)
We're gonna be fighting super mutants. We're gonna be fighting super mutants in like 20 years That's that we're fighting super mutants in 20 years, and I'm gonna see Daniel get thrown by a deathclaw

Gregory (38:36.584)
Just...

Gregory (38:42.141)
my goodness. I've, you know, dad checks. So did we have a conversation like that? Where he said, damn. That's right. Yes. It's perfect.

Uly (38:45.971)
No, remember when I made that AI video of a deathclaw actually throwing Daniel? Because I was in, I was in such a like, I was in a, I was in a tism AI road where I was just creating random AI things of us. And there's some funny things that we will never show, but I did make one of Daniel running away from a deathclaw and then being chucked by it.

Gregory (39:05.591)
just getting yeeted by the death claw. know, I was like, why does this sound familiar? Yeah, that's what it was. But yeah, you know, I mean, I mean, you're not wrong. Like the video game landscape is very volatile right now. It's great, but it's volatile because every company is trying to push us on subscription based dependency. They are stripping away our ownership of.

the games and they're using a lot of legal jargon to justify it, you know, because they're like, well, you didn't create it. It kind of reminds me of the argument that I had. I won't say argument, but it was a discussion about like artists, their art and the rights to the art where if an artist creates something themselves and then they put it up for sale.

they created it, it's their piece, it's their art, they have forever the rights to it, you buy it to display, but you do not own that art, so you couldn't go around and resell it. But if you commission an artist to create something for you or your business, and this is something I've personally gone through, and I was like, I didn't understand this entire ecosystem until I got involved, and I was like, it kind of changed my opinion on AI a little bit more, because once I got into it, was like, ooh, yeah.

This is why people are leaning on AI art. You commission artists to design something for you that is original, doesn't exist, like your brand logo, your mascot, whatever, because you can't draw it. You create something that does not exist. They draw it for you. You pay them for the work. However, you do not own that art.

And that is something I did not know.

Uly (40:54.656)
I remember this conversation. I remember this.

Gregory (40:56.205)
Yeah, I didn't know that. I was like, okay, well, it's not like you can sell this to anyone else. It's my branded logo for my brand. The only two people in existence that can use this are me and you, but I don't own that unless I buy the rights from you. Like you already gonna have it in your portfolio. I cannot ban you from putting it in your portfolio to use, but I'm restricted.

Uly (41:18.995)
That's how you learn. That's how you learn never to work with that artist ever again. And then you realize like that's the art doing that is an entirely different minefield. You got to go through, you got to like read people. Is this artist worth it? Is this artist good? Is this artist good? And then the good ones are always busy. Their commissions are always closed. So you can't really get them.

Gregory (41:22.701)
Yeah.

Gregory (41:39.947)
Yeah. And and that's kind of like what the developers. Well, I don't want to say the developers. Everyone's usually quickly blazes developers, but it's also the publishers and the shareholders. And it's just easier to vent to blame the developers because they're the first line of defense.

Uly (41:53.939)
No, I'm a blame. I'm a blame the whole team. Cause there's this one thing aspect that's going on right now that I hate. All right. They're trying to make games more expensive, right? Every since the PS3, every game since the generation, PS3, Xbox 360 generation, the games have gone up in price because the publishers, the developers, the whole system is like, these games cost more to make. All right, cool. Well then tell me why people in basements can make extremely fun games and successful games. And

They, you know, work on fucking unity that's free.

Gregory (42:28.119)
Tony Stark built this with a big cave with a box of scrap.

Uly (42:29.995)
Exactly. Look, I'm going tell you this. I'm going tell you this. The day lethal company outsold what was modern warfare two was the day I learned your games ain't Look, I love your games, but you got to understand that there's people with actual passion and actual love for what they make making something and book fucking five nights at Freddy's. The guy made a bunch of games that one stuck out and then it turned into this.

Gregory (42:38.965)
Yeah

Yeah.

Gregory (42:53.313)
Yeah.

Uly (42:59.217)
to say multi-million dollar franchise.

Gregory (43:02.07)
It got so big that he was actually ready to step away from it. It's like I'm tired, man.

Uly (43:07.838)
GTA is gonna scare me cuz they're saying all we spent a billion dollars in this I don't know how you're gonna make that back Yeah, I don't know how you're want to make that like if you're spending so much money to make this game. I Hope you realize you probably might not make that's an that's why there's a lot of people afraid to make new IPs pragmatic brand new IP a risk fucking amazing game 10 out of 10 my game of the year

Gregory (43:12.427)
and they're going to want to make all of that back and then some.

Gregory (43:22.861)
That's a crazy mouth.

Uly (43:34.079)
Just, can't, like, I don't understand if someone says like, it's an UIP, it's untested, it's not Resident Evil, it's not Street Fighter. You know, it's, it's not on brand with us. Like we, don't know if we can do this and someone, someone in there and they are a shareholders meeting or whatever was like, no, do it. I'll, I'll do a fuck. I'll put the bill.

Gregory (43:54.178)
And you know what, that's true. Like there's a possibility that there's always that fifth man that's like, all right, all of you guys are being assholes, but I see the potential. I'll foot the bill. There's always that one person in each field that's probably like, yeah, how about we actually care about the gamers for once?

Uly (44:14.467)
I would only make a game that people don't expect to play but will fall in love with I Didn't expect to play snake while shooting robots like that's what the hacking is it's playing snake and And you're shooting robots at same time. It's somehow they got it right. They got it just right

Gregory (44:19.511)
Yeah, yeah.

Gregory (44:24.877)
Yeah, it is.

Gregory (44:33.217)
They got it right. It hits that little spot in the brain where it feels good.

Uly (44:37.915)
It's also terrifying when you got a long one and the enemy's right in your face. You're like, ahhhh!

Gregory (44:42.943)
Yep. I know what you mean. I know what you mean.

Uly (44:47.037)
So like and that that took that took innovation that that was a challenge and they're like, all right, let's do it. Not many people are doing that. Everybody is like, everybody. I can't say everybody again. It's just me speaking out of terms. People that I've talked to in general have mostly been, I don't know about this game. The graphics aren't good.

Like is that really all that matters to some yes to others gameplay story anything else matters like I play eight big games I love some of these eight big games that they release $2 game three hours worth it. I had a fun time but the They wanted they think you know, it looks good. It looks like they spent money making it So it's got to be good and we know for a fact. That's not true

Gregory (45:36.674)
Yeah. Yeah, a lot. It's a lot of stuff like this. This is something that we could probably do several episodes on. And if you guys are curious about the gaming law, I did have a guest from Gamma Law, David Hoppe. He was the founder of Gamma Law. And he actually we actually sat down and discussed, you know, gaming law. And we did briefly touch on, you know, terms of service and what's usually included.

Uly (45:38.227)
Make safe. I'm looking at you.

Gregory (46:04.397)
So if you guys are curious about that, I have included a card if you're on YouTube and link will be in the show notes for everyone who's listening. If you want to go check out that. So it's a really good episode. And there's a lot of things that even if you're not a developer and you're just a consumer and you don't read the TOS like 98 % of us don't.

Uly (46:23.615)
98 more like 99.9999 No, no, no, it's to be honest, you know, a lot of us will just click through it Sometimes sometimes I you know, I sometimes I like to just go through 60 pages of legal jargon Just like as much as I like rubbing

Gregory (46:26.701)
I was being generous. I was being generous.

Gregory (46:41.069)
I pretend you know what they're talking about. I do, I do got out of my way now though to read the part about what the purchase entails. And this is my final thought on the episode. Cause like I say, it could go on forever. There are actions in place where they're trying to get the digital store fronts to change the buy and purchase buttons to be more specific on what it is you're buying and purchasing. I think that's a good idea because it should say,

purchase license in the digital store over purchase or buy because the mentality, they understand the mentality that we have. Buy always meant ownership and they know that it's what we're thinking. But while they're changing the rules behind the scene, they're not changing things upfront to reflect that. So they're still circumventing, you know, the rules of the game because they know, well,

We'll just tell them they're buying the game, but they're only buying a license because they know if they start saying buy license, purchase license, those sales are going to tank. They're going to tank. But I'm like, let them tank because they'll recover. Gamers are adaptable. They'll be upset at first and then they'll stop caring. And then eventually the sale numbers will go up. It's better to be honest upfront with it. You're going to do it anyway. Just

Uly (48:04.959)
Cough

Gregory (48:09.441)
change the button and get everyone used to it. And then if you're upfront, there will be no complaints.

Uly (48:15.783)
One thing that gamers hates is being jibbed.

Gregory (48:17.995)
Yeah, like just change the button, purchase license, buy license.

Uly (48:20.189)
Look look at a game that did successful and then they did a little bit of shadiness and

Gregory (48:26.849)
Yep. That's my only thing. I'm like, all of this could be solved if they just change the digital storefront buttons and say purchase license, buy license.

Uly (48:35.133)
All this could also be said if they have rules and regulations for digital anything, like we're still in this digital landmine of with what laws are a breach of our rights and not a breach of our rights, but are actually a protection of our rights.

Gregory (48:51.339)
And also you cannot tell me that this is below like state laws and handlings because they made sure to deal with the taxes. The states made sure to jump in on digital taxing. So obviously it's on their radar. So why can't protecting the consumer be on the radar? They made sure to make like, wait, that's a digital sale. State tax, state tax that. And then they were like, all right, we don't care about the rest.

see it all the way through. See it all the way through.

Uly (49:23.34)
We got, we had a vote with our wallet vote with whoever we put into. Why is this political?

Gregory (49:30.003)
is everything. See when you break it down, everything becomes political. You're welcome.

Uly (49:36.531)
Well, I miss the days when we knew we just talk about the anime that we would love watching or the game that we were playing and not have to focus on. might not own this game tomorrow because they're, they're, said they're going to remove it.

Gregory (49:48.845)
I know simpler times, man. I, you know, I do want to do some more episodes like that where we just like talk about, like, let's let's do an episode in the future where we just talk about the most underrated games that we think people should play. I think that should be one of our future episodes.

Uly (50:01.059)
I don't think we should do that one because me and you play some awfully specific games.

Gregory (50:06.861)
OK, we'll do two different episodes. We'll do the Patreon exclusive and then we'll do the one for you guys. We know who you are. Find us on Patreon. Anyway, that's all the time we have for this week's episode. This episode will fire under you. Share it. This conversation does matter. Cannot stress that enough. Subscribe to the podcast. Yeah, hard, easy press play gaming newsletter.

Uly (50:08.393)
Okay

Uly (50:14.269)
Yeah, we know who you are. You know who we are.

Uly (50:28.905)
but put the fire out first.

Gregory (50:33.655)
for written breakdowns, the links and latest gaming news. And if you had a game pull out from under you, drop it in the comments. We want to hear your story as always.

Uly (50:42.591)
Leave some comments in there. want to hear what games you guys like love that got removed. Because I want to get angry with you too.

Gregory (50:47.787)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we want to be angry. We to be angry with you for sure. But as always, take care of yourself and each other and we will see all of you next week. Later.