Stop Killing Games, a movement to keep online games playable beyond their official lifecycle, has received public support from Romanian politician and European Parliament vice president Nicolae Ștefănuță.

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Founded last year by YouTuber Ross Scott, also known as Accused Farms, Stop Killing Games is an initiative that aims to force publishers and developers to keep their games in some form of playable state after official support has ended. The effort focuses on games that use the increasingly popular live service structure, which forces titles to require online connections that, once the servers are shut down, are completely inaccessible, despite being a paid product.
While its popularity began to dwindle, Stop Killing Games has seen a significant increase in support in the last month, allowing its petitions to exceed the required number of signatures for both the UK and European Parliaments to discuss potential legislation.
The EU petition has received 1.3 million signatures so far, which includes Ștefănuță, a member of the European Parliament since 2019. Over the weekend, the Romanian politician publicly supported the movement on Instagram. "I stand with the people who started this citizen initiative," Ștefănuță wrote. "I signed and will continue to help them. A game, once sold, belongs to the customer, not the company.'”
Despite Ștefănuță's support, the initiative has received criticism from notable companies and figures in the industry, including Twitch streamer and indie developer PirateSoftware and EU lobbying group Video Games Europe, which consists of several major publishers such as EA, Warner Bros., and Ubisoft. Many of the criticisms focus on the potential resources needed to make a game playable without an official online structure, as well as legal and safety concerns regarding private servers.

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Game preservation movement Stop Killing Games receives support from European Parliament vice president