Stop Destroying Videogames – the European campaign inspired by the Stop Killing Games movement – says it’s “confident” its petition will progress to the legislative phase now that 15 EU countries have successfully verified almost half of its 1.4m signatures between them.
Stop Destroying Videogames is looking to convince the EU to pass regulations preventing “the remote disabling of video games by the publishers, before providing reasonable means to continue functioning of said video games without the involvement from the side of the publisher.” Its European Citizens’ Initiative – an official EU mechanism designed to provide a way for citizens to propose a legal act to the European Commission – surpassed the required 1m signatures before the petition closed in July, meaning it can be presented to the EU for either a public hearing or full debate session at the European Parliament provided those signatures can be successfully verified.
Writing in September, Stop Destroying Videogames said it expected the verification process to take around three months, and it’s now shared a progress report in a new post to the Stop Killing Games campaign’s subreddit. “Out of 1,448,270 signatures, 689,035 are already verified, and 15 countries have met their thresholds,” petition organisers explained. “We are still missing the two largest countries – Germany and France – but based on our current progress, we are confident we have surpassed the required thresholds.” They added only about 3 percent of signatures have failed verification so far.
According to the update, Stop Destroying Videogames organisers have been engaged in “intense discussions” with Members of the European Parliament, national governments, political parties, and the European Commission throughout the verification process, ready for the legislative phase. It’s also been working to secure expert backing from academics, explaining, “Having politicians, lobbyists, and developers in our ranks is invaluable, but we must credibly address the tough questions.” Organisers previously said they were taking steps to counter “misinformation and industry lobbying”.
“Our fight is not against a united CEO front,” the update continues. “It’s against a handful of companies holding our favourite games hostage… Let’s not just talk about developers but with them, big and small, who are already resisting these awful practices. We can’t undo past damage, but we can stop what’s coming. If we allow these few bad actors to dictate the future, we will continue to lose ground on issues that should never have arisen.”
Stop Destroying Videogames’ update concludes with a call for EU citizens to reach out to their governments, local consumer protection groups, and favourite studios in order to spread the word. It also encourages developers to make their voices heard. “We are already in talks with many in the industry,” it explains. “If we’ve missed you… please reach out to us… We are planning public events and want to bring some of you in front of parliament to demonstrate how things could be.”
In July, EU industry body Video Games Europe – whose members include Ubisoft, Take-Two, Warner Bros., Riot Games, Activision Blizzard, Microsoft, and Nintendo – insisted the initiative’s proposals would make games “prohibitively expensive to create”.
