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A comment on California bill would require patches or refunds when online games shut down. Parent comment

Re:California bill would require patches or refunds when onl... by JacobKfromIRC on Friday May 15, 2026 @10:42PM (#48156352)
This would be a way better outcome than the current default. I've even seen this suggested before [1].

If game-specific logic is not public, information needed for reverse engineering could be completely missing, but if game-specific logic is available plus the names of the missing libraries, reconstruction of the game should be possible eventually.

[1] https://drewdevault.com/blog/Open-sourcing-video-games/ (See "What if I don’t completely own my game?")

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:California bill would require patches or refunds when onl... by account42 on Tuesday May 19, 2026 @05:02AM (#48190981)
Yes, partial source is still very useful. I don't think the law should allow for it though as companies could intentionally put as much as possible into "proprietary" libraries that they conveniently only license for binary distribution from a totally unrelated company that for no reason at all is owned by the same stakeholders. Much better to just require everything to be there and then have the industry adapt.
[ Parent | on HN ]