• SavvyWolf@pawb.social
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    1 year ago

    If you’re not intending to sell them for profit any more, then just let us download and emulate them.

    It’s not a hard problem.

    • dfyx@lemmy.helios42.de
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      1 year ago

      Well, it is a bit harder than that. Most of the games are not mate by Microsoft but by other companies so they can’t just decide to give them away for free. And even if they could get everybody to agree to that, they would still need to provide the infrastructure to download them which would be just as much work as keeping the old store running.

      • SavvyWolf@pawb.social
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        1 year ago

        Yeah, fair. But they can do it for first party games and maybe try to convince other publishers to do the same.

        With the infrastructure cost, I don’t think a simple site that allows downloads yet doesn’t need logins or payment info would break the bank, especially for Microsoft. But if it is an issue, they could probably only run it for a few months and let fans set up their own mirrors.

        Or Microsoft could even do what GoG does. Charge a token ($5-10) fee to purchase a ROM to download to cover costs. Also might make it more appealing to other publishers since some money is better than no money.

        There a lot of consumer friendly solutions to this issue, but I bet the outcome will end up being $70 compilations or remakes…

      • Wage_Slave@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        It’s not even their company and just the suggestion here has their legal teams on high alert and ready.

          • TehPers@beehaw.org
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            1 year ago

            You really thing not referencing them or making any content related to any of their IPs will prevent them from sending a C&D? They’d probably send one out to everyone if it didn’t cost them any money to do so. God forbid you hire some plumbers, wear a red shirt, or draw something in the shape of a star.

    • all-knight-party@kbin.cafe
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      1 year ago

      Isn’t some of the issue there that just because they don’t have plans now doesn’t preclude them from deciding down the line to do something? If they release that all for free then later ports or things of that nature directly lose value.

      • lolcatnip@reddthat.com
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        1 year ago

        Companies that don’t actively market/license their IP should lose it fairly quickly and be required to release it to the public domain.