As is stated in the article, but is not clear just from the headline, this was not an unexpected outcome from the initiative. The Commission did not seek discussions with SKG, and spent virtually all of their time with the gaming industry lobby groups.

SKG was prepared for this, and their intention has been to join up with the group putting together the new Digital Fairness Act, since the objective there is very similar, but much broader in scope, and most of the groundwork is already there. Much of the earlier recorded Q&A sessions in Parliament had representatives commenting on this already, so it's the natural approach. This way, legislation will almost certainly be put forward and voted on, and the lobby groups will likely have a harder time trying to wrestle with a larger movement and a parliament that seems sympathetic to the cause.

Basically, this is a battle lost that never really mattered. The climax of this war is yet to come.

The ECI process forces the Commission to respond formally, not to legislate. The Commission said no, which SKG anticipated. They had already secured a legislative call signed by 45 MEPs and are pushing to amend the Digital Fairness Act through Parliament. The headline frames this as a defeat. Finishing the ECI process shifted the venue to Parliament, where SKG says they have majority support.

Well, it's a million signatures for something to be brought up, not for something to definitely become law.

A decade or so ago I (among millions) signed to abolish daylight saving time. Still waiting for that heh.

As written, wouldn’t this result in fewer online games? Maybe dramatically fewer?

I would say lobbyist are continuing their take over of the EU. Copyright law is the excuse but 90's games proves this to be invalidated.

None of the games from the 90s and early 2000's required authenticating with a launder. They just worked and this is why those games are still playable to date.

Those same games that had multi-player allowed for downloading a self-hosted server.

Enemy Territory is a prime example. The game would still be playable even with out ID Software releasing the source code.

GOG is built upon legacy games that don't require a launcher. Politicians in the EU have been bought and paid for. President exists and is not being applied.

makes me envy of Switzerland's "enough signatures causes referendum which actually does create a new law" system

If only those 1.3 million signatories pledged to never buy from a company that Kills Games again...

> In its official response on June 16, the Commission said it “cannot propose a legal obligation” requiring publishers to keep games playable after they stop being sold commercially.

Control behavior by regulating the intermediary. Figure out what the intermediary publishers rely on is, and regulate the intermediary or transactions to that intermediary

This works within any legal system anywhere and just requires a little inspiration

at least, I can do it anywhere, so just reach out

They are too busy passing freedom-stifling laws.

I'm curious to see if this will embolden game corps to continue mistreating consumers or if they will acknowledge consumers are aware of that ethereal state of their "ownership" of games and start selling more complete products instead of "clients" to servers that can be rug-pulled at any time. I think we all can guess the answer as consumers continue to buy, unfortunately, but this movement is at least a step in the right direction.