Digital Game Resale policies under scrutiny. Valve under litigation.

[Lodakai]

Something to watch for those of us who purchase digital game copies.

 

A lawsuit has opened up in france putting valves Steam user agreement contracts in question.

This will probably have an effect on most of us here in some form or another eventually.  

Good or bad.. who can say.  But here is the source:

 

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3017060/software-games/the-french-are-steamed-about-valves-unfair-game-resale-ban.html

[Legionaire]

Good read, nice find.

 

My 2 cents.

If Valve does not comply with EU laws and they get sued over it, they have done something wrong. Big companies always try to milk every last cent out of their companies.

There is only one thing that makes these big players move - fatass lawsuits. They've grown so big that they otherwise get away with anything less.

 

I hope things change for the better, but I think that, in the end, no matter the outcome, the gamers will pay the price with their wallets less full.

 

At least I got Loverslab.

[Sural Argonus]

You aren't buying a physical item.  How are you able to resell something you don't physically own?  You buy the access to use a piece of software.   Now if you want to resell the license key, I can understand that, but that's as far as I would go.  Allowing the sale/resale of the access keys I can agree with.  But these lawsuits are really a waste of people's time and money and really hurt developers in the long run.  

[Vacaliga]

If this goes all the way I fear that anti-piracy DRM and other funky things are gonna start running wild soon after, and would only give publishers more fuel to push those things even harder since digital copy's now will have resell value, they are already crying enough about physical copies being resold.   

 

Quickly glancing over the article, it looks more like social justice than anything else.  

 

 

[Make-Use-Of-ME]

my 2 cents. we buy a copy of something. that makes its an object. an object should be able to be sold. the other side of this fucked up coin. we buy a license. we can't sell that license. we get bent over and barrel and rogered. the problem at this point is we buy both a license and a copy. USA  has effectively Neutered this argument.  making digital sales of said object not ever able to be transferred/sold what have you.

[Kendo 2]

Can't sell a licence to a 3rd party unless the licencor allows it, BUT the licencor can't amend an existing license once it's agreed to without prior notice, remedy or the licensee's agreement.  Valve violates terms all the time and are never held accountable.  Bethesda does the same thing and so do other game companies.  IMO, the French case has merit since the Valve license is one sided in favor of the licencor and gives no rights or protections to the licensees.  Site 12 clauses to get one or two fixed.

 

Anyway, legaly there is no difference from a digital version of software downloaded from a site or one installed directly from a physical disk.  Same content, different distribution format.  Most software has a perpetual use clause for the end user unless that user violates the license.  Realistically, preventing resale and key code exchanges promotes piracy to some extent, since the corporate stance is 'you really don't own the copy of the game you just bought, on a do-as-we-say license'.

 

All of this is a lose-lose for players and it isn't UFCs fault; blame the game corporations and their dubious licenses and how they handle customers.  I've stated several times on this forum a day of legal reckoning is coming for companies like Valve and Bethesda.  Eventually they would be sued, and now it's happening.

[pinky6225]

You aren't buying a physical item.  How are you able to resell something you don't physically own?  You buy the access to use a piece of software.   Now if you want to resell the license key, I can understand that, but that's as far as I would go.  Allowing the sale/resale of the access keys I can agree with.  But these lawsuits are really a waste of people's time and money and really hurt developers in the long run.  

 

the license key is all your really buying when you buy software since regardless of the medium a lot of stuff now has to be validated and a license key entered so how you get the software onto a pc doesnt matter

 

the main problem with sellings/transferring license keys is how do you determine the price/worth? when i brought space marine for £30 on CD and typed the key into steam to start the download the key was worth £30 but you can buy the game in a sale on steam for about £3 now so is it worth £3? should some of the value be taken away as i've used the key for 1000 hours of game play? if so how much and why as whether i've used it once or a thousand times doesn't affect the key as it isnt a physical thing to have wear and tear but should we apply wear and tear deductions for market/ethical reasons?

 

[Kendo 2]

the main problem with sellings/transferring license keys is how do you determine the price/worth? when i brought space marine for £30 on CD and typed the key into steam to start the download the key was worth £30 but you can buy the game in a sale on steam for about £3 now so is it worth £3? should some of the value be taken away as i've used the key for 1000 hours of game play? if so how much and why as whether i've used it once or a thousand times doesn't affect the key as it isnt a physical thing to have wear and tear but should we apply wear and tear deductions for market/ethical reasons?

You bring up a good point.  What is the value of a key?  It is obviously set by demand (the game is new) and the corporation (we charge this much because we can).  A $60 key 6 years ago is now worth $5.  Same game, same material, nothing removed; yet the price is cut,  I don't know the reasoning but if I were a French lawyer I'd be asking that question to Valve in open court and make them explain it all in detail.

 

If game corporations set the price of a key then it has no material worth; the market price is a 'thing' and not of real hard value.

[windpl]

I'm not bothered by reselling stuff, I'm more pissed about region locks, that is bullshit that I will never swallow. And just for that valve (or distributors) should be roasted for.

[Chaos63]

Meh. One more reason to keep pirating.

[afa]

The games as service/licence vs product is imo enough of a muddy area that is worth going after, but it seems like as a whole we are willing to accept the service/licence argument.

Steam trading already exist I believe, I have never used it myself, but I think it sort of allow you to trade your games for something else with another user. Rather if that could be translate to real money is probably something the two parties have to work out.

Citing people can't turn their steam credit back to real money is...well an interesting case. I can't say for sure, but essentially if you are providing a service where people can store money and then cash out as currency, you are essentially running a bank, and base on their public image, the goods and services that they seem to provide and I would say Valve isn't really a bank.

 

...although there are also these Russian drug trade/black market rumors, but that's story for another time.

[Vacaliga]

The steam wallet is indeed a bit iffy, however, I suspect that should it be ruled by the court that users should be able to take money out again Valve would/could simply make up some new digital currency like 'SteamPoints' and handle it very much in the same way in-game currency work, hell they could even take it a step further do something similar to what Riot Games are doing with league of legends, and make it so you can't buy just only the points you need to buy the item but always leave you a few points below or above.

 

Too an optimistic person a reason they have not already done something like that could be that it would annoy the customers as some if not most would quickly start to lose track on how much money they have spent. Who knows maybe there is a little tiny warm feeling heart beating somewhere in the big scary evil entity called Valve.

 

On a side note, it's pretty common for many stores only to give store credit when returning an item, an at least around here and that only really come up in as slight inconvenience doing casual small talk, to about that same level as complaining it raining that day.

 

Annnd I forgot where I was going with this so sleepy time. 

[vipermagi]

I jumped on board steam shortly after they started (digital download of the orange box while in an area where U.S. stores were rare), and through convenience that library just kinda grew, though even now it isn't large. Through this time, I have watched Valve's policies with Steam slide farther and farther down a slippery slope. I already buy as many games off GoG as I can. I have no doubt that given enough time, Valve will chase EA's skirts.

 

I would love for big companies to learn to treat their customers like people rather than cows to be milked, but I suspect, as previously stated, however this lawsuit turns out, you can be damn sure we the customers will pay for it.

[LordNecris]

The game industry is also afraid of having to provide digital resale of owned licenses due to their tendency to ship games with shitty 2 hour 'campaigns' these days. That way, someone buys the game, plays the shitty 2 hour campaign, tries multiplayer, sees that he can only play 2 maps (unless he buys the Season Pass for another 40 <currency unit>), and decides to resell.

 

While someone owning the game with no way to resell means higher pressure for getting any amount of value out of the game, by getting nickled and dimed for Season Passes and DLCs.

[Rokabur]

Only reason I even have Steam on my PC is because a pirated copy of Skyrim won't use mods with .esm/.esp (and yes I do own a physical copy of Skyrim.) I don't like having to use anything like Steam cause if you don't agree with anything in the EULA, you can't play any of your games that require the service.

[RitualClarity]

If that happens they will likely just add some "thrift store" element to the Steam Shop where you can buy games from other members. They will make sure the older games that are most likely to be sold will be on sale as much as possible lowering the resale process and money obtained. Offer "Steam bucks" which can be used to buy other games (at full retail for most of the year) and services.

 

Why on Steam.. well most game companies use Steam for distribution and sales. They use Steam to verify that the ownership is true and accurate for proper non pirated software. Steam has to be part of the equation and not doing it in steam workshop (for example sales papers or outside sales etc) would mean a very difficult matter of securing what is what and who owns what. etc. (their argument) If this happens Origin and other companies might just start this to avoid the legal troubles as well.

 

Don't want Steam bucks .. well there would be a processing fee of x % for payment to Paypal or some other registered payment option you have on your Steam account. You would loose money from your sales that way as well.

 

This brings up other issues. What happens if a relative passes away? If it is valued products like car and home it can be part of an estate. Which means legal issues will arise to determine those without wills who will get what. Then they can sell it on the established markets for credits, cash or use it.

 

I am sure Apple is really watching this as well as it would likely expand on to digital music collections. When you consider how much many people have in digital products it is a very big issue

[RapidWaterOver]

I jumped on board steam shortly after they started (digital download of the orange box while in an area where U.S. stores were rare), and through convenience that library just kinda grew, though even now it isn't large. Through this time, I have watched Valve's policies with Steam slide farther and farther down a slippery slope. I already buy as many games off GoG as I can. I have no doubt that given enough time, Valve will chase EA's skirts.

 

I would love for big companies to learn to treat their customers like people rather than cows to be milked, but I suspect, as previously stated, however this lawsuit turns out, you can be damn sure we the customers will pay for it.

It doesn't help that the large majority of gamers today are just like that when it comes to video games, brainless cows chewing up anything shat out by AAA companies and shoved into their mouths without any hesitation.

[Darth_Falcon]

Speaking in a general sense, I don't think reselling digital games should be allowed. The only resell of games that should be allowed is physical copies of console games, because otherwise there is absolutely nothing stopping you from keeping the game files, downloading a crack, and continuing to play the game. If we do ever get the right to resell our digital games on PC, you can forget about ever having anything close the the level of sales we currently have, because that is one of the main reasons they exist: they know we can't resell the keys ever, and that they will get the money for their product, so they let us have it much cheaper than a console gamer who could trade their copy in to gamestop or something, where the dev doesn't even get a penny out of the resell transaction.

[windpl]

Speaking in a general sense, I don't think reselling digital games should be allowed. The only resell of games that should be allowed is physical copies of console games, because otherwise there is absolutely nothing stopping you from keeping the game files, downloading a crack, and continuing to play the game. If we do ever get the right to resell our digital games on PC, you can forget about ever having anything close the the level of sales we currently have, because that is one of the main reasons they exist: they know we can't resell the keys ever, and that they will get the money for their product, so they let us have it much cheaper than a console gamer who could trade their copy in to gamestop or something, where the dev doesn't even get a penny out of the resell transaction.

 

That's ill logic, It would be accurate if digital copies were cheaper by right than physical one. But they aren't.

[Darth_Falcon]

 

Speaking in a general sense, I don't think reselling digital games should be allowed. The only resell of games that should be allowed is physical copies of console games, because otherwise there is absolutely nothing stopping you from keeping the game files, downloading a crack, and continuing to play the game. If we do ever get the right to resell our digital games on PC, you can forget about ever having anything close the the level of sales we currently have, because that is one of the main reasons they exist: they know we can't resell the keys ever, and that they will get the money for their product, so they let us have it much cheaper than a console gamer who could trade their copy in to gamestop or something, where the dev doesn't even get a penny out of the resell transaction.

 

That's ill logic, It would be accurate if digital copies were cheaper by right than physical one. But they aren't.

 

 

Physical copies also don't constantly go on sale, they rarely EVER do beyond the game's sales dropping to the point the game is moved to the bargain bin. Compare that to other recent releases such as MGS V and The Witcher 3, which you could get for a fairly nice discount less than a month after they released on PC. I'm not talking about cut-rate key resellers either, specifically they were both heavily discounted on Greenman Gaming. Heck I got Fallout 4 for half price BEFORE it launched, when have you ever seen that for a console game?

[pinky6225]

 

 

Speaking in a general sense, I don't think reselling digital games should be allowed. The only resell of games that should be allowed is physical copies of console games, because otherwise there is absolutely nothing stopping you from keeping the game files, downloading a crack, and continuing to play the game. If we do ever get the right to resell our digital games on PC, you can forget about ever having anything close the the level of sales we currently have, because that is one of the main reasons they exist: they know we can't resell the keys ever, and that they will get the money for their product, so they let us have it much cheaper than a console gamer who could trade their copy in to gamestop or something, where the dev doesn't even get a penny out of the resell transaction.

 

That's ill logic, It would be accurate if digital copies were cheaper by right than physical one. But they aren't.

 

 

Physical copies also don't constantly go on sale, they rarely EVER do beyond the game's sales dropping to the point the game is moved to the bargain bin. Compare that to other recent releases such as MGS V and The Witcher 3, which you could get for a fairly nice discount less than a month after they released on PC. I'm not talking about cut-rate key resellers either, specifically they were both heavily discounted on Greenman Gaming. Heck I got Fallout 4 for half price BEFORE it launched, when have you ever seen that for a console game?

 

 

When retailers over order a game expecting it to be very popular and it is not as popular as expected also unless things have changed a lot since i worked in retail the mark up on a game isn't very good so the retailer will make very little profit from just selling the game, the game gets you into the store where you will hopefully buy other accessories/stuff the store sells (does depend on whether we are talking about a dedicated retailer or a general retailer) which does have a much better mark up/profittability

 

As your removing a lot of logistic problems by selling something non-physical (i.e. having to many copies in one shop that dont sell and then having no copies in another store and missing out on sales) you would expect there to be a saving

 

[Kaz Aanh]

Re-selling = piracy

[windpl]

 

 

Speaking in a general sense, I don't think reselling digital games should be allowed. The only resell of games that should be allowed is physical copies of console games, because otherwise there is absolutely nothing stopping you from keeping the game files, downloading a crack, and continuing to play the game. If we do ever get the right to resell our digital games on PC, you can forget about ever having anything close the the level of sales we currently have, because that is one of the main reasons they exist: they know we can't resell the keys ever, and that they will get the money for their product, so they let us have it much cheaper than a console gamer who could trade their copy in to gamestop or something, where the dev doesn't even get a penny out of the resell transaction.

 

That's ill logic, It would be accurate if digital copies were cheaper by right than physical one. But they aren't.

 

 

Physical copies also don't constantly go on sale, they rarely EVER do beyond the game's sales dropping to the point the game is moved to the bargain bin. Compare that to other recent releases such as MGS V and The Witcher 3, which you could get for a fairly nice discount less than a month after they released on PC. I'm not talking about cut-rate key resellers either, specifically they were both heavily discounted on Greenman Gaming. Heck I got Fallout 4 for half price BEFORE it launched, when have you ever seen that for a console game?

 

 

Console games are going rary to sell because developers have to pay console owners additional fees, and longer the game life span (it get updated) they pay even more.

 

Re-selling = piracy

 

Watching painting = theft.

[ToJKa]

Re-selling = piracy

 

That's what the publisher would have us believe. Alas, the law disagrees

[Kaz Aanh]

• order a pizza
• buy ketchup dlc
• eat it
• call pizzaguy again and ask for refund
• seems legit?

Games are consumable products too.