Representative Ritchie Torres of New York has unveiled the Power To The Players Act a legislative effort aimed at redefining how video games are sold in the United States. Under the draft, the purchase of a game would grant the buyer actual ownership rather than a revocable digital license. The bill also obliges publishers to provide an offline mode for any title that relies on online servers before those servers are decommissioned.
The initiative arrives amid growing frustration from consumers who feel that modern distribution models let companies pull the rug out from under them. Players who have paid full price for a title often watch its online components disappear, rendering the game unplayable despite the original purchase. Torres argues that such practices amount to “rentals disguised as sales.”
Key provisions of the Power To The Players Act
At its core, the legislation would task the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) with drafting rules that ensure three rights for gamers: the right to own the product, the right to play it whenever they wish, and the right to transfer it to another party. For titles that depend on cloud-based services, developers must ship a version that can operate without an internet connection before the official shutdown of any server infrastructure.
Critically, the bill does not demand that publishers keep servers running indefinitely—a point of contention in earlier proposals that ignored the financial burden of perpetual hosting. Instead, it focuses on a “grace period” where an offline alternative must be made available, pushing studios to design more flexible architectures from the outset.
Industry response and technical hurdles
Major console manufacturers have already signaled resistance. In a recent class-action defense, Sony’s legal team argued that the act of clicking “purchase” does not create a durable right of use, describing the transaction as a “one-time rent fee” that can be rescinded at the publisher’s discretion. This stance reflects a broader industry view that the current EULA framework protects intellectual property while granting limited consumer rights.
From a technical standpoint, retrofitting existing online-only games with offline capabilities can be challenging. Some titles are built around persistent server-side logic, matchmaking, or live-event economies that cannot simply be switched to a local mode. Critics warn that mandating offline functionality could force developers to overhaul network architecture, potentially increasing development costs or delaying releases.
Parallel legislative efforts and activist pressure
Torres’ proposal joins a growing chorus of consumer-focused initiatives. Pennsylvania state senator John Kane recently introduced the Protect Our Games Act which similarly demands offline options, community-run servers, or a minimum 25% refund when support ends. Both bills draw inspiration from the Stop Killing Games campaign, a grassroots movement that has highlighted cases such as Ubisoft’s The Crew which became unplayable after its servers were shut down in 2024.
Advocates also point to DRM-free platforms like GOG, where ownership is effectively granted once the game files are downloaded. While the new legislation is unlikely to outlaw copy protection altogether, it could push the FTC toward a softer, more consumer-friendly definition of ownership that coexists with existing anti-piracy measures.
