The Stop Killing Games initiative, created by angry gamers after the scandalous shutdown of The Crew racing action game servers, has once again made headlines in gaming media. In Brussels, representatives of the European Commission held a closed meeting with the top management of major gaming companies, including Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot. Adding to the piquancy of the situation is the fact that no one invited the organizers of Stop Killing Games to the negotiating table. This caused a powerful resonance in the community.
European officials have listened to only one side of the conflict just two weeks before the European Commission is due to deliver an official verdict on the petition of the Stop Killing Games civil initiative. The organizer of this closed invitation—only event was Video Games Europe (VGE), the main lobbying force for the gaming industry in Europe. Defenders of the rights of players naturally considered such a coincidence a planned blow to their campaign.
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Why are Video Games Europe lobbyists defending Ubisoft?
The activists did not remain silent and immediately issued an open letter to the public with an appeal to spread the information as much as possible. The situation really looks as cynical as possible: Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot is discussing the future of market regulation with EU officials, although it was his publishing house that destroyed The Crew in 2024, taking away a product bought for real money from thousands of gamers. Actually, this precedent triggered a wave of popular anger.
The authors of Stop Killing Games emphasize their goals separately to avoid speculation.:
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No eternal support. Nobody forces publishers to keep empty servers for decades. This is not economically feasible.
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Give players autonomy. Developers are required to leave working tools after the project is closed. We are talking about offline modes or patches for launching user servers by the community itself.
How will the European Commission’s decision change the rules of the gaming industry?
When one side of the dispute whispers with regulators behind closed doors, and the authors of the petition are left to freeze on the threshold, it looks at least questionable. The coming weeks will be crucial for the entire gaming industry, as the legal status of digital purchases is at stake.
If the European Commission accepts the terms of Stop Killing Games, the rules of the game will change forever. Major publishers like Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, or Sony will have to completely overhaul their approach to closing their online titles. It seems that the industry has reached the point of no return. After all, it all started with one disabled race that people just wanted to run on their PCs and consoles.
