Ubisoft shut down the servers for its open-world MMO racing game, The Crew, on March 31, 2024. It was unfortunate news, but not particularly surprising in today's modern age of online games having an expiration date of 'whenever the developer decides it can't/won't pay for the servers anymore.' But while the occurrence of online games being shuttered is now commonplace, The Crew's shutdown sparked something more.
It not only sparked a lawsuit that made players more aware than ever that they've always been buying a license to play a game, instead of a copy of a game. It sparked enough backlash that Ubisoft committed to adding offline modes for The Crew 2 and The Crew Motorfest. It caused enough uproar that Valve added a warning to Steam purchases, making it clear to players they're buying a license to play a game, instead of a copy of the game. And, perhaps most significantly, it was the match that lit the flame under the Stop Killing Games Initiative.
While the Stop Killing Games and the Stop Destroying Videogames initiatives and petitions continue, and the lawsuit two Californian The Crew fans began is still underway, a group called The Crew Unlimited (TCU) has been working hard to bring The Crew back the old-fashioned way, by creating an emulator to run the servers on.
Today, TCU realized its goal, and players with a copy of the game can jump back into The Crew thanks to their hard work.
If you own a copy of The Crew on PC, then you should be able to set TCU up for yourself to continue playing a game that's shutdown seems to have had more of an impact on the videogame industry than it did when it was still being distributed by Ubisoft.
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