• missingno
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    1171 month ago

    They’re patching it to be playable offline, but only if you’ve previously downloaded the game.

    Why not just leave that version up instead of delisting it? They could even sell it. Would be seen as a success story for preservation instead of another loss, and it’s especially baffling because it’s a fully avoidable loss.

    • @[email protected]
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      101 month ago

      Yeah, they’ve just ensured the only way a person can play it is through piracy. Very smart move, WB, very smart…

      • @[email protected]
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        81 month ago

        Pretty sure hosting costa arent it, the only thing possible woyld be licensing issues for the IP’s otherwsie they could leave it on steam forever and STILL make money off of sales. There are games that do this by making the players host their own servers each match.

      • @[email protected]
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        251 month ago

        Do you even have to pay hosting costs, if you put a game on steam or does valve not distribute your game for free?

        If I’d have to guess the bigger issues with a game like this would be licensing or that delisting allows some form of tax advantageous asset depreciation.

        • @[email protected]
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          91 month ago

          Valve hosts it for “free” (30 to 15% of every sale), yes.

          I’m guessing this game has some phone-home DRM or something, and maybe it’s only required the first time it’s executed after installation ? They could of course just give the game a patch that removes it but I guess they don’t want to anger the line investors and make it go down by working even a second on a “discontinued” game.

        • @[email protected]
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          141 month ago

          You don’t pay anything to steam other than the initial 100 bucks or so, and the cut they take

    • @[email protected]
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      61 month ago

      I would venture to guess it’s to avoid potential licensing issues that could arise down the road that they don’t want to deal with.

      • snooggums
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        11 month ago

        Were any characters in the game not owned by Warner Bros?

        • @[email protected]
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          41 month ago

          Potentially, I don’t exactly know all the rights owners.

          But just looking at the roster, I’d assume Arya Stark might be the most complicated. While HBO falls under WB, unsure if ol’ George signed away all rights to the character. And there’s always future deals too, since rights holders can change hands.