YouTuber Ross Scott Leads Fight To Save Video Games From Corporate Destruction Through European Citizens' Initiative

Ross Scott, the creator behind YouTube channel Accursed Farms, has launched a campaign to prevent video game publishers from destroying games they've already sold to customers. His "Stop Killing Games" initiative, now formalized as a European Citizens' Initiative, represents perhaps the most significant legal challenge to the industry's anti-consumer practice of rendering purchased games unplayable through server shutdowns.

"Most video games work indefinitely, and... Yeah, that's pretty much it," Scott explains in his campaign video. "But more and more are being designed to stop working the second support ends from the publisher—a kill switch, essentially. It's a form of planned obsolescence where publishers are destroying games they've already sold to you, but keeping your money."

This predatory practice has become increasingly common as publishers push always-online requirements for even single-player experiences. When servers are inevitably shut down, games that consumers purchased at full price become worthless digital artifacts, unable to function despite being fully paid for.

Scott compares this to "studios from a century ago burning their own films after they were done showing them to recover the silver content. And now most films of that era are gone forever. That's very similar to what's happening to video games today."

The European Citizens' Initiative, which requires one million signatures from EU citizens to advance to legislative consideration, would require publishers to "leave games they have sold to customers in a working state at the time of shutdown, without requiring any further connection to them or affiliated parties for the games to function."

Importantly, this wouldn't require publishers to give up intellectual property rights, release source code, provide endless support, or host servers indefinitely. It would simply require them to patch out online requirements or allow private server hosting when official support ends – ensuring consumers can continue to use products they've purchased.

"Publishers can continue doing whatever they want, as long as you get to keep your game," Scott emphasizes, highlighting the reasonable nature of this consumer protection measure.

he initiative addresses a growing crisis in game preservation. According to research compiled by Scott's volunteers, approximately 75% of online-only games that get shut down are permanently lost, with only about 3% saved by publishers themselves. The remaining 22% are rescued through community efforts like reverse engineering and server emulation – efforts that currently exist in a legal gray area.

For gamers concerned about this issue, Scott offers a clear path to action: EU citizens can sign the initiative at stopkillinggames.com, while those outside the EU can help by spreading awareness to European gaming communities, particularly non-English speaking ones.

"If we can get enough signatures then I think we end this and change gaming history," Scott states. "Or we can't get our act together and the problem gets worse and worse, then in the future we really don't own anything, and we're charged a lot FOR not owning anything."

With the initiative running until July 2025, there's still time to reach the signature threshold, but Scott emphasizes that success depends on reaching beyond his existing audience. "The only way this works is by reaching out to European YouTubers and streamers and so on to get on board, and non-English-speaking ones at that."

For an industry increasingly dominated by digital distribution and games-as-a-service models, this initiative represents perhaps the last chance to establish meaningful consumer ownership rights before the concept of owning games disappears entirely.

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