This is potentially a big problem for anyone who plays PC games, because virtually every game you buy on Steam or elsewhere is technically sold as a license rather than a product you own. Plus, we’re no strangers to seeing our favorite games disappear when servers shut down: games like Hymn, Concord and dark spore (Remember that one?) became basically unplayable for that very reason. And the only reason I know that is because I was watching the latest episode of The Full Nerd on YouTube.
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Of course, the bill was just announced and still has a long way to go before it comes to a vote, much less becomes law. And since the full text of the bill has not yet been published, we don’t even know how effective it could be or what ramifications it may have for the business of buying and selling PC games.
But even if Representative Torres’ proposal never becomes law, I think it’s interesting that we now see members of Congress who seem pretty smart when it comes to gaming. Torres himself appears to have been born in the Bronx in the late ’80s, so it’s very easy to imagine that he spent quite a bit of time playing and talking about games with his friends growing up. As someone who was also born in the ’80s and still has vivid memories of people like Jack Thompson and Leland Yee running ridiculous campaigns to blame youth violence on the influence of violent games and movies, it’s encouraging to see some people in the US government taking a stronger, more empathetic attitude about PC gaming.
“When you pay for a game, you should own it,” Rep. Torres says, according to his announcement of the bill. “Consumers should have the right to own, play and transfer the games they purchase. A game that can be taken away the moment a company goes offline is not a purchase. It is a rental disguised as a sale.”
Looks pretty good to me!
On this week’s episode of The Full Nerd
This week, PCWorld’s Michael Crider joined his regular co-hosts Adam Patrick Murray and Alaina Yee to discuss the “Gamer Power Act” and what it could mean for PC gaming players, as well as discuss his impressions of the first wave of RTX Spark laptops now that Crider has had the chance to review one himself.
