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NarrativeBear , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

When something gets removed from steam and it’s in your steam library but not installed, is it gone forever?

yamanii ,
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

No, people just can’t buy it anymore.

Stern ,
@Stern@lemmy.world avatar

You can still install and play it. If it has cards you can earn them and get account xp from making sets of them, same with emotes and wallpapers. You can’t sell (or buy, obviously) any of that on the Steam marketplace though, but can still trade them. Achievements get a little wonky.

Source: I own Transformers: Devastation, which was delisted.

dzervas ,

I’m so happy about steam’s monopoly. I almost feel like they’re there for us, they broke capitalism

nutsack , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

it makes sense that failing business would want to remove digital assets hosted somewhere else that can’t possibly lose them money

wolfpack86 ,

Revenue must be less than the benefit of the losses they’ll get a tax break on.

The system is broken.

Snapz , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

If you’re buying games these days, STOP buying non physical media

GerPrimus ,

I bought GTA 5 as a disc back then. You can’t even install it without the Rockstar Game Launcher. What do the discs do for me?

miss_brainfarts ,

I was going to say that the discs at least have a full game on them already, but can you even play that retail version without being forced through all the updates?

blind3rdeye ,

Better still, stick with DRM free games.

cyberpunk007 ,

While I kinda agree, you can still kill switch consoles and physical games with software easily. This is why I prefer buying off gog

AlexWIWA , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

… why? They’re complete products that just sit there and make money for almost no effort

ReallyActuallyFrankenstein ,

From what we have seen from Zaslav, I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re going to claim another creative tax write-off for the non-depreciated value of the assets.

CitizenKong ,

WarnerBrosDiscovery is in massive debt (40 billion) to AT&T, which is itself in even more debt (138 billion). They are trying to make as much money liquid as quickly as they can to pay off the debt, long term profitability be damned. I wouldn’t be surprised if WBD is bought by an ever bigger player in a few years (Apple, Sony, Disney or Microsoft).

Adalast ,

Does my nose deceive me, or am I catching a whiff of yet another monopoly?

AngryCommieKender ,

Quintopoly right now, Quadopoly if WBD gets acquired. Probably a Triopoly or Duopoly fairly soon after that.

Theharpyeagle ,

But we have antitrust laws and everything!

rottingleaf ,

Normies at this point are trained like Pavlov’s dogs to ignore the very possibility to treat these big companies as they should be treated by law.

They are irrationally afraid that Earth will split in half and become infested by goblins if there’s no Apple, just separate Apple Computer, Apple Mobile, Apple Music, Apple TV, Applesoft - I want to see this - and so on, no Google, just separate Google Search, Google Mobile, Googlesoft - ok, not as funny, - etc, Microsoft is a small company and there are also Microhard and Microcloud …

Apocalypse didn’t happen when AT&T was broken up. Nokia wasn’t broken up by regulators, but that didn’t lead to an apocalypse too, while still was a bad thing. DEC or Sun going down didn’t cause apocalypse.

Guntrigger ,

Making money by destroying/burying digital media. What a backwards world we live in…

CitizenKong ,

Even worse, only to appease shareholders that are only after short term gains and might even bet on the company failing.

mods_are_assholes ,

I think we’re in a slow burning culture war that is trying to erase everything but one single mindset of thought.

Discovery channel felt it early, and now that same sentiment is spreading everywhere. Cut away the vibrant ecosystem for a single channel, controllable narrative.

And it’s across every fuckdamn media.

sizzler ,

You speak one of the scariest truths there is.

rottingleaf ,

Sometimes I feel I’m fortunate to have ADHD. Until I think about my life not on the Web.

mods_are_assholes ,

As an aside: I’ve begun to think that ADHD and some other neurodivergences are actually evolutionary responses to the exponentially increasing amount of data processing that modern humanity does on a daily basis, just not having long enough time for natural selection to smooth out the rough edges yet. Give it a few hundred thousand years or so.

Like we are those prehistoric transition mudskipper-like fish things that traded part of their swim control for the ability to absorb oxygen through their swim bladders, they couldn’t swim as well as swimmy things, couldn’t walk as well as walky things today, but at that moment it was the only chordate to be able to hunt the shore.

We’re species transition in action maybe.

rottingleaf ,

As an aside: I’ve begun to think that ADHD and some other neurodivergences are actually evolutionary responses to the exponentially increasing amount of data processing that modern humanity does on a daily basis, just not having long enough time for natural selection to smooth out the rough edges yet. Give it a few hundred thousand years or so.

N-no, it’s happening too fast to be explained by recent evolution. It’s been there, just psychiatry has only recently become interested in people without hallucinations, inability to speak and murderous impulses.

I’d rather imagine that a population needs a certain proportion of explorers or people behaving more chaotically.

Socsa ,

This is honestly the only reasonable explanation. Adult Swim was millennial counterculture, and now there is an effort to undo it and erase it from mainstream history.

mods_are_assholes ,

That seals it, digital piracy is the freedom to shape our culture in the face of greedy corporations. A moral good.

WIIHAPPYFEW ,
@WIIHAPPYFEW@hexbear.net avatar

Tax fraud, baby agony-deep

altima_neo ,
@altima_neo@lemmy.zip avatar

I think they’re trying to close adult swim games. If that happens, the money from sales go nowhere, so they’re delisting the games too.

The whole Warner Bros thing is such garbage.

SomeGuy69 , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

As if I’d need any additional reason to not buy Warner Bros games. So stupid of them.

curiousaur , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

They already have. Can you install Super Monsters Ate My Condo? Released 10 years ago, great android game, gone now.

TrudeauCastroson ,

Android games are different because old ones use currently unsupported libraries, and you’re not supposed to run old versions of android. That’s more a problem with how Google thinks android has to work.

PC games and PlayStation store games don’t really make sense to de-list like this because win10 is very backwards-compatible with software, and PS4/PS5 games that are released and work don’t need any upkeep.

cyberpunk007 ,

Never heard of it, is it zombies ate my friends?

duckduckgo.com/?q=zombies+ate+my+condo+apk&t=fpas…

pirat ,

From wikipedia:

Monsters Ate My Condo was an iOS tile-matching video game developed by PikPok and released on September 15, 2011 by Adult Swim Games for $0.99. A sequel, Super Monsters Ate My Condo, was released in 2012.

Note: I did not test/check/scan any of the files I’m pointing to!

Found these APKs for SMAMC to sideload on Android: apkcombo / apkmonk

And this modded SMAMC APK (unlimited money): happymod

Also this IPA for (older?) iPhones: archive.org


Bonus: MAMC APK: apkcombo

Bonus: MAMC modded APK: happymod

machiabelly , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@machiabelly@hexbear.net avatar

Why do they do this? It doesn’t make sense. They don’t have to pay to keep it listed.

Thordros ,
@Thordros@hexbear.net avatar

If it’s “failed” they can write off the investment as a loss. They get a tax break as a result. Capitalism rewards innovation (in tax avoidance) and after all.

prole ,

I don’t know if I want to upvote or downvote this comment lol

Vendetta9076 ,
@Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works avatar

Youre might be right right thats what theyre trying to doz but thats not how that works with complete games that have been released for ages. They’re just being retarded.

More than likely they just want to shut down the entire publishing arm and going full scorched earth is the only way they seem to do things

Zedstrian ,

If that were the case there would at least be some value in selling the division to another company. Perhaps by not selling it they can claim the division lost money, artificially reducing the tax burden on profits from divisions corporate management is more interested in.

Vendetta9076 ,
@Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works avatar

Thats not really how tax breaks work though. Especially not corporate ones.

machiabelly ,
@machiabelly@hexbear.net avatar

WHAT? THE FREE MARKET GIVES TAX BREAKS TO CORPOS WHEN THEY LOSE MONEY??? I DON’T KNOW WHAT I EXPECTED BUT I’M MAD

Blackmist ,

I read it was so they can fire the people whose job it was to pay the creators of the games.

Rights should go back to the devs from the publisher at that point, or full public domain if they don’t want to distribute it either.

GalaxyBrain , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@GalaxyBrain@hexbear.net avatar
Blackmist , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

Products no longer available to buy should fall into public domain.

WB are an absolute cancer. Suicide Squad fails spectacularly due to being a multiplayer live service game that nobody asked for, and their immediate response is to go all in on multiplayer live service games.

Because heaven forbid the executives could be fucking wrong.

lepinkainen ,

If I can’t buy it, I will pirate it with zero moral issues.

I own over 1000 DVDs and a couple hundred BluRays, but will pirate anything that gets removed from streaming or isn’t available in my region for some shitty licensing reasons.

AngryCommieKender ,

If you have a legitimate copy of Dogma (1999), put it into a fireproof safety box. That is a collectors item already, as they pulled production of the DVD copies after a rather limited run.

dangblingus ,

Nice! I’ve got the 2 Disc collector edition DVD set.

Blue_Morpho ,

Harvey Weinstein is 71. As soon as he’s dead, Kevin Smith will buy the rights and you’ll be able to buy it.

youtu.be/2_DOt1aHjhs?si=bM-2CphP8NDzGeRd

Alexstarfire ,

Akira Toriyama died at 68 and Rupert Mudoch is still alive at 92. Don’t assume Kevin will outlast piece of shit Weinstein.

at_an_angle ,

Look, I’m not outright disagreeing with your first point. I think going that way will be a massive legal headache for just about every business.

Mainly because of patents, copyright, and all the BS, but that’s a whole other thing. I’m mainly thinking about software.

New software v1.0 is released and then updated to v1.1? Is it a new product? If so, does that mean that v1.0 should be free if they only offer the updated version? What constitutes software not being available in a legal sense?

Hootz ,

This is not a matter of versions. If the content is not available for purchase then the only choice is piracy. But at what point does piracy end and it just become public domain (not even legally just them not giving a fuck to go after anyone)

at_an_angle ,

But the version does matter. We all have a game that was updated that either broke it, removed content, or changed it so drastically that it’s like a completely different game. And if the older versions aren’t available, but the game is still being sold… should the older version be public domain whole the current version is being sold?

These are important questions.

Guntrigger , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

This practice feels like something that should be illegal. Effectively it is destroying art that hundreds or thousands of people worked hard to make, for the sake of fiddling the books of the owning company that commissioned it.

If you “write it off” to be worth zero, it should either become freely available abandonware, or can be claimed as the intellectual property of those that worked on it. Otherwise it is evident that there is some value to be had and therefore tax fraud to claim it has none.

Scrollone ,

I agree with you. If a company writes off something in order to make it with zero, then that thing should immediately fall into the public domain.

Corkyskog ,

You would have to have another law that says that anything significantly devalued must be able to be purchased for the stated value. Otherwise they will just say it’s worth $1.

Blue_Morpho ,

It’s crazy that WB is getting away with blatant tax fraud. I can’t claim my house is worth $0 in order to pay no taxes yet WB can say, “This media is worth $0 for tax purposes.”

reksas ,

i wonder if devs would rather have their work eventually erased like it never existed and never pirated or preserved and appreciated by people

Theharpyeagle ,

Back when WB threatened to block the release of a finished series on HBO Max (Summer Camp Island), the creator more or less threatened to leak it herself. I think most devs would feel the same. At least I would. Not like it’s making them any money either way.

Smokeydope , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@Smokeydope@lemmy.world avatar

I loved adult swim flash games in the 2000s would have definitely cared about this a lot more if flash wasn’t already dead and they weren’t preserved on internet archive and flashpoint

Bay_of_Piggies , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@Bay_of_Piggies@hexbear.net avatar

Why??

FlyingSquid , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

FUUUUUUCK DAVID ZASLAV!

He is not only hiding things people enjoy watching and playing, he is hiding history.

Imagine how much less we would know about Elizabethan England if all of Shakespeare’s plays were lost to all time.

Chewy7324 , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles

Luckily Steam will keep Duck Game in my library, but I dread the moment Valve leadership changes. Steam has existed for 20 years, and I naively hope I’ll still be able to play my games in 40 years on my Steck Deck.

SirQuackTheDuck ,

Well, since you retain a license to the content until you or valve closes your account, you should be covered.

According to their own personal Steam Subscriber Agreement, you only forfit licenses when you end your subscription (like EA Play) or when the main service contract ends (close your account).

Although they may try, but then you can still sue for breach of contract.

Jarix ,

That’s as things may be now. What we have consistently seen is that company’s can often change their policy whenever they want. It’s happened too many times already to think the current lunch is future proof

Lojcs ,

Steam can remove games from your account. Their definition of a subscription is different than what you think it is:

the rights to access and/or use any Content and Services accessible through Steam are referred to in this Agreement as “Subscriptions.”

The clause allowing games to be removed from a group of people:

Valve may restrict or cancel your Account or any particular Subscription(s) at any time in the event that (a) Valve ceases providing such Subscriptions to similarly situated Subscribers generally,

Wizard_Pope , to piracy in Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles
@Wizard_Pope@lemmy.world avatar

Yet another reason piracy is right and just

uis ,

I think even Gaben will approve

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