HARRISBURG, September 27 — A Pennsylvania state senator wants video game publishers to give customers warning — and a way to keep playing — before they pull the plug on digital titles. The proposal, first reported by PC Gamer on Friday, July 25, 2025, would require companies to notify customers in advance when they shut down servers or remove a game from digital storefronts. It would also require some form of continued access or compensation for games people have already bought.
The senator’s name and the exact text of the bill have not been released, and no vote or committee assignment has been announced.
The technical reality of a delisted game
Under the hood, the problem is licensing, not code. When a publisher delists a title, the storefront stops selling it; when it sunsets online services, the servers that authenticate a purchase or host multiplayer stop answering. For a single-player game with no online check, that can mean little.
For anything with a live-service component, it can mean the disc or download in your library becomes a museum piece. Two recent cases illustrate the range.
In 2024, Ubisoft shut down the racing game The Crew, leaving it unplayable even for owners. In 2023, Blizzard closed Overwatch, the predecessor to Overwatch 2, replacing the original game entirely rather than running both. The Entertainment Software Association, the trade group representing major publishers, has historically opposed measures of this kind, arguing that digital licenses are clearly defined in terms of service.
That position is the industry’s default, and it is the one the Pennsylvania bill would test.
California already moved on disclosure
California went first, in a narrower way. In 2024, the state enacted a law requiring digital storefronts to disclose that customers are buying a license, not ownership, of digital goods. That law governs what you are told at the point of sale.
The Pennsylvania proposal goes further, reaching the moment a publisher decides to switch something off. The proposed law would be the first of its kind in the state and could set a precedent for other states.
The bill’s prospects in the Pennsylvania General Assembly are unknown, and its fate will depend on support from lawmakers and industry lobbying. What to watch next is whether the senator attaches a name and text to the proposal, and whether it picks up a committee assignment. Until then, the detail that matters is the one nobody has published: the actual wording.
