When you buy a $70 video game, do you own it? According to every major digital storefront’s terms of service, no — you have purchased a revocable license that the publisher can terminate at any time. On October 15, 2026, Representative Ritchie Torres (D-NY) announced the Power To The Players Act, a federal bill that would change that by directing the Federal Trade Commission to treat video game purchases as ownership transfers rather than licenses. The bill would also require publishers to provide offline modes before shutting down game servers, making it the first federal legislative attempt to address what consumer advocates call the deliberate destruction of paid-for games.

In Brief

  • Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) announced the Power To The Players Act on October 15, 2026, though no formal bill text or number has been filed yet
  • The bill would direct the FTC to create regulations ensuring three rights: ownership instead of licensing, offline playability after server shutdowns, and the right to transfer purchased games
  • The announcement was prompted in part by NBA 2K25’s delisting on October 30, 2026, and server shutdown scheduled for January 1, 2027 — rendering a $70 game largely unplayable within two years of launch
  • The bill follows failed state-level efforts in California and Pennsylvania, and a European Citizens’ Initiative that gathered over one million signatures but resulted in only a voluntary industry code of conduct
  • The 2024 Supreme Court overturn of Chevron deference significantly limits the FTC’s regulatory authority, creating a major legal obstacle for enforcement
  • The Entertainment Software Association and major platform holders have not publicly commented on the bill

What the Power To The Players Act Would Require

According to Torres’s office, the bill rests on three pillars. First, buying a video game would legally count as a transfer of ownership rather than the grant of a license — closing the loophole that lets publishers describe a purchase as a revocable permission. Second, any game that depends on online servers would need to ship with, or later receive, an offline mode before the publisher is allowed to shut those servers down. Third, the bill would preserve a buyer’s ability to transfer or resell a game they purchased, a right that digital storefronts have quietly erased over the past fifteen years.

The bill directs the FTC to write the actual regulations rather than spelling out every technical requirement in the statute itself. That structure is common for consumer-protection legislation, but it means critical details remain unknown: how much advance notice a shutdown requires, what counts as an acceptable offline patch, and whether publishers of genuinely multiplayer-dependent games receive exemptions. Torres’s office has not released bill text, a formal bill number, or a list of cosponsors as of October 19, 2026, according to coverage from Engadget and Kotaku.

Torres framed the bill in direct terms. “When you pay for a game, you should own it,” he told Kotaku in a phone interview. In a press release, he said: “Consumers must have the right to own, the right to play, and the right to transfer the games they buy. A game that can be taken away the moment a company pulls the plug is not a purchase. It is a rental disguised as a sale.”

The NBA 2K25 Problem

The immediate catalyst for the bill is NBA 2K25, which was the fifth best-selling game of 2024 in the United States. According to Kotaku, 2K Games confirmed the game will be delisted from digital storefronts on October 30, 2026 — barely two years after its September 2025 launch. Online servers are scheduled to go offline by January 1, 2027, making the most popular game modes unplayable. A game that millions of players paid $70 for will become mostly useless within 16 months of purchase.

This is not an isolated incident. The pattern is well established: Ubisoft shut down The Crew in 2024, cutting off access to single-player content because the game required always-online servers. That decision helped launch the Stop Killing Games movement, a global consumer advocacy coalition that has been pushing for legislative protections across multiple jurisdictions.

The NBA 2K25 case is particularly instructive because it highlights the gap between how games are marketed and how they are legally structured. The game was sold as a product with a “Buy” button, not a “License” button. Players invested hundreds of hours and dollars into it. But the underlying transaction was always a license, and 2K’s terms of service — like those of every major publisher — reserve the right to terminate that license when it makes business sense to do so.

The Stop Killing Games Movement

The Power To The Players Act did not emerge from nowhere. It is the latest development in a consumer rights fight that has been building across two continents.

The Stop Killing Games initiative, organized by content creator Ross Kenney (known online as Accursed Farms), built its biggest show of public support in the European Union. Organizers gathered more than one million signatures on a European Citizens’ Initiative demanding rules against publishers disabling games players had already bought. The European Commission ultimately declined to pursue binding legislation, opting instead for a voluntary industry code of conduct — an outcome that left organizers with a symbolic win but no enforceable change.

In the United States, state-level efforts have also struggled. California tried a state-level version of the same fix, and it failed in the state Senate. California did pass AB 2426 in 2024, which took effect in 2025 and requires digital storefronts to clearly disclose when a “buy” button is granting a license rather than ownership. But that law addressed only labeling, not the underlying right to keep playing after a shutdown. Pennsylvania state senator John Kane introduced similar legislation known as the Protect Our Games Act, which would mandate offline modes or require publishers to provide at least a 25 percent refund if a game is rendered unplayable, according to reporting by The Front Page. That bill also died in committee.

Torres is effectively picking up a fight that consumer advocates started and moving it to a venue — federal regulation enforced by the FTC — that none of the earlier efforts used.

The Chevron Deference Problem

The single biggest obstacle facing the Power To The Players Act is not industry lobbying. It is the Supreme Court.

In 2024, the Supreme Court overturned the Chevron deference doctrine in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo. For four decades, Chevron had directed courts to defer to federal agencies’ interpretation of ambiguous legislation. Without it, the FTC and other agencies have far less power to regulate through rulemaking. The commission’s attempts to regulate the game industry could be challenged in court on the grounds that Congress, not an agency, must spell out specific requirements.

Engadget reported that Torres acknowledged this risk but suggested the bill’s enforcement mechanism could be designed to survive legal challenge. The bill’s reliance on the FTC also means that even if it passes, the actual regulations could take years to write, face industry lawsuits, and be struck down by courts that now have far less deference to agency expertise.

This is not hypothetical. The FTC’s ban on noncompete clauses was already blocked by a federal court in 2024, with the judge ruling that the commission lacked the authority to issue such a broad regulation. A game ownership rule could face a similar fate if a publisher or industry group files suit.

What This Means for Game Developers and Platform Holders

The industry’s silence since October 15 is notable. The Entertainment Software Association, which lobbies on behalf of major publishers, has not issued a public statement. Microsoft, Sony, and Valve have not commented. That silence likely reflects standard practice of not responding to a bill before it has formal text, but it also means publishers have not yet had to articulate their opposition publicly.

When they do, expect the argument to focus on the offline-mode requirement rather than the ownership-language change. Reclassifying a purchase as ownership rather than a license is largely a legal and marketing adjustment. Mandating offline functionality is an engineering problem, and its difficulty varies enormously depending on game architecture.

For a single-player game with online leaderboards or cloud saves, patching in offline functionality is a modest technical lift. The core game logic never depended on a remote server to function. For a live-service game built around server-authoritative matchmaking, anti-cheat validation, and persistent world state, stripping out the server dependency can mean rewriting core systems rather than patching a settings menu. Publishers will likely push for exemptions or longer compliance windows for genuinely multiplayer-dependent titles.

The business model implications are significant. Publishers that lean heavily on live-service, always-online titles carry the most structural risk if an offline-mode mandate becomes enforceable law. The industry has spent the past decade moving toward recurring revenue models built on server dependence — season passes, cosmetic shops, and live events that require a persistent connection. A legal requirement to make those games playable offline after support ends could force a rethink of which games get greenlit in the first place.

How Major Storefronts Currently Handle Ownership

Every major digital storefront already tells buyers, somewhere in its terms of service, that a purchase is a license rather than a transfer of ownership. The practical differences show up in refund policy, resale rights, and how each platform handles game shutdowns.

None of the four largest storefronts — Steam, PlayStation Store, Xbox Store, or Nintendo eShop — currently commits to shipping an offline mode before pulling servers. None allows a digital purchase to be resold the way a physical disc can change hands. This uniformity is itself part of Torres’s argument: there is no competitive pressure pushing any single platform to offer better ownership terms, because every major storefront uses roughly the same license-based language.

The shift toward all-digital distribution makes this gap more consequential. Sony reported that digital downloads accounted for 82 percent of full-game sales on PlayStation 4 and 5 in its most recent fiscal year. Sony has also announced plans to end physical game disc production for its next console generation. Nintendo, by contrast, has stated it has no plans to abandon physical media, with an executive noting that the company “knows how much fans enjoy it.”

Why This Matters Beyond Gaming

Torres limited the bill to video games, but the ownership problem extends to all digital media. Earlier in 2026, PlayStation owners discovered that a “purchase” of Discovery channel content was being removed from their libraries due to licensing changes. Similar incidents have affected digital movie and book purchases across platforms.

Torres told Kotaku that he limited the bill to games because of “the unique relationship people have to owning, collecting, and investing their time into gaming,” but suggested it could serve as a model for codifying other digital media rights. “I hope we can set a precedent that will be followed elsewhere in the digital economy,” he said.

For product builders, this is a debate worth watching closely. The legal framework that governs digital ownership affects every software product that depends on server infrastructure — not just games. If Congress establishes that a digital purchase creates ownership rights, that principle could eventually extend to educational software, creative tools, and subscription-based platforms that currently operate under license-based terms.

What to Watch Next

The bill needs to be formally introduced in Congress, where it will enter the committee process. Torres has not confirmed cosponsors or Republican support. An estimated 87 percent of legislation never reaches a full vote, and consumer-protection bills for niche constituencies like gamers often struggle to gain traction without broader political momentum.

Key developments to watch:

  • Bill text filing: When Torres’s office releases formal language, the specifics of FTC authority, enforcement penalties, and exemption criteria will determine whether the bill has real teeth
  • Industry response: The ESA and major publishers will likely mobilize once the text is public, focusing on the technical feasibility of offline-mode mandates
  • FTC rulemaking timeline: Even if the bill passes, the FTC would need to draft and publish regulations, a process that typically takes 12–24 months and invites public comment
  • Judicial review: Given the post-Chevron legal landscape, any FTC rule on game ownership is likely to face immediate legal challenge from industry groups
  • State-level parallel efforts: Pennsylvania’s Protect Our Games Act and California’s AB 2426 show that state legislatures are also engaged, and a federal framework could either complement or preempt state laws

Conclusion

The Power To The Players Act is the first federal legislative attempt to address the gap between how digital games are sold and what consumers actually receive. Whether it passes or not, the bill signals that the game ownership debate has moved from gaming forums to Capitol Hill. For anyone who builds, sells, or buys software that depends on server infrastructure, the regulatory landscape around digital ownership is worth tracking — because the outcome of this fight will shape consumer expectations and legal standards well beyond the video game industry.

The question Torres is asking is simple, even if the answer is not: if you pay for it, should you own it? For now, the answer depends on the fine print. The Power To The Players Act wants to change that. Whether it succeeds may depend less on Congress than on the courts.

Sources

Shamyl Bin Mansoor

Shamyl Bin Mansoor is a technology entrepreneur, product builder and STEAM educator. He is Co-founder and CTO of LearnOBots and works on educational technology, robotics and interactive learning products. Learn more about him.

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