Ubisoft says you "cannot complain" it shut down The Crew because you never actually owned it, and you weren't "deceived" by the lack of an offline version "to access a decade-old, discontinued video game"
www.gamesradar.com
The Crew players "received the benefit of their bargain and cannot complain now that they were deceived," Ubisoft argues

Full title: Ubisoft says you “cannot complain” it shut down The Crew because you never actually owned it, and you weren’t “deceived” by the lack of an offline version “to access a decade-old, discontinued video game”

Ubisoft’s lawyers have responded to a class action lawsuit over the shutdown of The Crew, arguing that it was always clear that you didn’t own the game and calling for a dismissal of the case outright.

The class action was filed in November 2024, and Ubisoft’s response came in February 2025, though it’s only come to the public’s attention now courtesy of Polygon. The full response from Ubisoft attorney Steven A. Marenberg picks apart the claims of plaintiffs Matthew Cassell and Alan Liu piece by piece, but the most common refrain is that The Crew’s box made clear both that the game required an internet connection and that Ubisoft retained the right to revoke access “to one or more specific online features” with a 30-day notice at its own discretion.

  • Lord Wiggle@lemmy.worldEnglish
    30·
    6 days ago

    Although ubisoft is a shit company, don’t think it’s the only one. Every game you bought on Steam, Origin and Epic aren’t your property either. You just bought the right to play their game for as long as they allow you to.

    If you truly want to own your products, buy on GoG (you will get the offline installer as a download) or pirate. Because when you pirate, you have more rights and benifits than a paying customer.

    Companies don’t even care anymore, it’s just a money grab with the newest bug simulator. As soon as the first purchase bubble ended, the project is abandoned and people are stuck with a piece of junk they do not even own.

    In the exceptional case a dev truly delivers, like indie studios or Larian studio, the game dev world goes mental as it shows how corrupt and fucked up they are.

    Support the few proper devs, pirate the rest. I pirate everything these days and when the game is good I’ll buy it.

      • Lord Wiggle@lemmy.worldEnglish
        8·
        6 days ago

        I have over 500 games on steam. If the platform dies, that would be a major loss for me.

        Honestly, platforms like steam and Netflix made me stop pirating. But with the increasing amount of streaming services, with increasing prices and more and more limitations and loss of rights, loads money grab junk content, I dusted off me old pirate hat. I am a paying usenet user, I automated all my movie and TV show downloads, I pirate games first and only buy them when they are worth it. I use Grayjay to view YouTube, because it has more freedom than a premium user.

        I’m happy to pay for stuff which is good, I refuse to pay for junk, limitations and loss of my rights.

      • Lord Wiggle@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        5 days ago

        Which is like a physical copy of the game. But if the game is only online and the servers go down, you own an installer of a non-functioning game.