[jammygit]

The Starcraft community requested subscription content for years during the hots years. The popular reasoning was that the game needed refreshing and updating but that a company can’t afford to do it without incentives - and the ongoing revenue would incentivize them to keep the game in great shape.

Then again, you can’t use subscription software at all after the company completely moves on either - no windows 95 compatibility mode to keep using your expensive desktop applications. So you still end up with unusable software eventually - longer peak but a shorter life for more cost

The fundamental problem is how difficult and expensive it is to make software and maintain it year after year

[jedberg]

It doesn’t have to be that way though. The company can open source the server.

They could also release a final patch that unlocks all content and removes the license check.