Well, the problem would be the part where they’re charging me money.

I mean... yeah.

Why do you all keep arguing like I’m defending rentals?

No, I have explained how they are different many times. It’s just that you seem to think that explaining how they’re different means disproving how they’re similar, but that’s not how those words mean.

Hah. Thanks.

That’s... not even a little bit how capitalism works out, friend. There are tons of bad deals out there people have to take all the time.

My concern isn’t necessarily for games to not be available for purchase, although that is certainly a thing we’ll see at some point. Other subscription services in other media have eroded media ownership in general without removing the option of media purchases.

Nah, my argument is that a shift to subscription-first in gaming is a bad thing for the industry, in general terms.

Well, I don’t know if in general the GoldenEye thing is ironic appreciation, but that sure would explain a lot.

I don’t see the need to justify MS’s crappy decisions here. Yes, most people don’t want or need to edit anyting in their files. The answer to that is not to take the files away, the answer is doing nothing, because most people also don’t *try* to mess with their files at all in the first place.

I mean, I’m being mildly facetious, like I said up top if you have nostalgia for it, that’s fine by me.

Yeah, I agree that all those things are both possible and they suck. And yeah, I’d like to see legislation catch up with things in terms of both copyright and an equivalent of right to repair.

You haven’t read my comments, then, because my point was that while I did have a PC good enough to play those games they were generally being experienced in LAN cafes and similar places for arcade-like prices, so owning the hardware was less of a factor.

If you’re ok for Xbox to be a Netflix thing where you don’t own the content and it goes away the moment you cancel your sub or MS phases them out then... yeah, I suppose.

I mean, no, it’s Game Pass’s fault for delisting stuff when I want to play it.

Humble isn’t even that bad at this point. Definitely still better than the DRM alternatives on this front. They just get a lot of crap for any attempt to make money or roll back their limitations because they’re backing away from their positioning as a charity. Think of them as the left wing politician of the gaming…

No, screw that. It doesn’t make any sense. It was an attempt to effectively lock down the entire PC ecosystem into an Apple-like garbage walled garden and I’m glad it, like every other attempt MS has made, blew up in their faces. And I don’t even care that they’ve rolled back enough of it that it’s *technically* not…

Well, no, Humble doesn’t just give you games to keep while your subscription is up, they give you games to keep, period. You just get Steam keys. It’s more of a buyer’s club.

Well, it “matured a lot” in the sense that it is mildly less like active malware now.

So don’t buy those. Those are also bad. Doesn’t make subscription services good.