The case The Crew and the rights of players and companies

With games increasingly limited to the digital medium, new situations and dilemmas constantly arise, often dividing opinions of consumers and desires of companies and developers. Recently, Ubisoft shut down all active servers of The Crew, an online arcade racing game, and prevented all players who had purchased the game from accessing the product. The controversy sparked debates about the rights of players and companies regarding games.

As justification for the "death" of The Crew, Ubisoft cites problems with the "server infrastructure" and "licensing restrictions." Fans of the game hoped that the game could continue to live with private servers, but completely lost access, even to single-player modes, 10 years after its release.

The rights of players and developers

The attitude of Ubisoft and other companies that have not given much attention to game preservation raises new debates, especially in the legal field. Can a developer completely remove a player's right to play a game they have already purchased? Lawyer Mariana Rezende believes that the company may not have legal support in this situation.

“I don't see, at first, any legal support for this conduct. First, because, specifically in Ubisoft's case, the company sold the game as a perpetual product, without imposing a time limitation on its use, as it happens, for example, in a service or subscription system. Second, consumers complained that they were caught off guard by the loss of access to the game, which violates a well-known principle of Brazilian Civil Law called prior notice of a sanction, in which all people have the right to be informed in advance of the imposition of something harmful to them, whether to question the sanction, defend themselves, or even avoid it. In the official statement from Ubisoft about the deactivation of The Crew, the developer only mentions generic reasons for taking this decision, which does not contribute to the consumer's basic right to information,” Mariana explains.

Facing this situation, several players have already expressed their intention to seek legal recourse in order to receive a refund for the deactivated game. There have been reports shared by consumers who requested a refund for the game on the digital platform used for the purchase, and the request was granted.

Regarding this, Mariana explains that the case opens the door for players to request a refund for the game, even 10 years after its release, and even seek judicial recourse if the request is not met.

“The first measure to be sought by the consumer would be to request a refund for the game through the means made available by the company. Generally, refund requests are limited to a few hours of gameplay or a few days after the purchase. However, in this case where the game was deactivated years after its release, it would be pertinent for Ubisoft to create a specific refund policy for this case, returning the money paid by consumers in the purchase of the game they can no longer play. If it is not possible to solve the problem through this avenue, the affected player can always seek their rights through a legal action,” she said.

Class actions?

Although the individual act of requesting a refund and legal actions by players who purchased The Crew may be effective for each individual, Mariana believes that class actions may be the best way to pursue consumer rights, not only for practical changes, but also to stimulate debate and regulation on new dilemmas that arise in the digital realm.

“Many people will seek individual reimbursements in scattered legal actions, but I believe that the best solution to the problem is through class actions, which are already widely used in conflicts involving consumer rights. We know that the individual losses of consumers are relatively low, so many will not even take this issue to court. For this reason, a class action, filed by the Public Prosecutor's Office, for example, would be the best way, as it could, in addition to repairing consumer damages, bring a broad debate about the issue of game preservation and, who knows, condemn the developer to reverse server and game deactivation policies, generating important precedents, and even motivating the creation of laws on the subject,” she ponders.

Finally, with the digital realm becoming increasingly the exclusive space where players acquire their games, Mariana believes that the debate on game preservation is of great importance, so that the legal agenda can also advance.

“I think that the game preservation agenda will gain a lot of prominence in the coming years, which is very positive for us consumer players. There are increasingly digital and online-exclusive games, and players gradually build their game libraries only on virtual platforms like Steam. We need to urgently think about how to keep alive games that depend on servers or are sold only in digital stores,” she concluded.

Faced with so many new legal and juridical issues that constantly arise in the digital and video game realm, lawyers and professionals in the field have increasingly specialized in the subject, and positions specifically designed in this field have been emerging every day, as you can check on Mundo Gamer Jobs.