Ubisoft were probably all within their legal rights to deactivate keys that were stolen. However, the damage has been done and has generated such a negative gesture that it will hurt them for a long time to come. Coupled with the fiasco of AC Unity and average reviews of THe Crew, ubi really needed to eat some humble pie.

Kinda the last thing ubisoft need right now is for gamers to think.. oh.. that's a ubisoft game.. no thanks..

Waiting patiently for some sort of sale... $75 AUD is just too much..

F$*k yeah... Our govt is really completely clueless when it comes to the borderless internet..

onya, Fictional Devolver for not giving a f$(k and rather than modifying a game for our nanny country, those small amounts of lost sales can be used as a promotion to motivate other people to buy it..

Well done!

The pieces are all there for an enjoyable game but this is not the game that I remember. The dogfighting is just.. well.. silly.. You ALWAYS face the enemy and they only take 1-2 hits.. so each encounter is like 20 secs of dogfighting.. I really wanted to like it, but can't..

One thing that everyone seems to have missed is that there's no way that Valve could ever pull out of the Australian market.

What about all those games sold through JB/EA games that require you to have a Steam account to play? Just imagine all those local distributors getting their panties in a twist about how they now can't sell games for $90 because the game relies on Steam..

The side benefit to all of this is that hopefully, it might actually force publishers to release quality games, rather than having a bug filled mess on day 1 release. As it stands steam & all the publishers have all the power, if you buy something you can't return it.. Thats a $90 AUD lesson and whilst you're initially upset, you just wear it.. The addition of a possible refund is comforting knowing that you're going to get a playable game that actually works as intended.. Not a constant game of russian roulette..

Steam should offer refunds to games which are inaccurately/falsely advertised (ie, colin mcrae rally), games which are broken (ie, ashes cricket, x rebirth) or games that are now completely useless (no active servers for MP games, ie starbound).. Even valve has removed wording on those early access games stating that some projects may never finish.. Yes it's all caveat emptor but steam knowingly sells broken games which, if they were a physical good, would be deemed as not fit for purpose. The ideal situation would be you buy a game/app and within say 30 mins of play time, if it's unsuitable ask for a refund. That said, google play doesn't have a problem and works quite well

Oh god.. not this again.. No doubt at some point they'll have a steam version which you'll have to rebuy because they can't 'migrate databases' over to steam.. As much as I'd love to buy this, i'll wait this one out until it's 75% off on steam..

Anyone who pays retail aus prices is contributing to the problem. An item is only worth as much as people are prepared to pay for it. EB Games will only sell a game for RRP, yet, they offer a price matching guarantee. Even tho, they know that you can buy it cheaper elsewhere, you have to prove that it is cheaper elsewhere to get it at a competitive price. Whilst I can also appreciate that distributors are hedging their bets as our dollar fluctuates so much, they should be more on the money in their pricing as a lot of people are now more internet savvy and can buy games cheaper either online or from overseas.

Obviously local distributors want to protect their regional pricing models, hence why steam prices are that much more. You can go and blame it costs a bazzallion dollars to get things shipped here, yet, why is it that hardware is much closely priced to the US, even when taking into consideration our 10% GST, customs/import taxes and shipping.

That said, whilst I do try to do the right thing and any game that I play, I purchase, I refuse to pay a cent more than I should have to. THis is accomplished by steam sales (I login into a US IP VPN and pay US prices), cd key sites or buy from the UK all at considerably less prices. Sometimes I'll play the latest games, but not purchase them, and then at a later date buy them at a price I consider to be acceptable. I do think that distributors have it all wrong, we are consumers wanting to purchase a product at a competitive price. Give me a reason to buy the product rather than gouge every last cent and then add the DRM insult. A number of high profile B&M stores have gone under recently, with the number one whinger, Gerry Harvey, making a point that he cannot compete with online sales.

One can only hope that local distributors are also hurting badly, as it would actually be better if local distributors went under so we could import games, and hopefully make steam prices more inline with global pricing.

Seriously, who in the US would pay $80 USD for Mafia 2, $90 COD: MW2, $90 USD Fallout New Vegas, $90 Shogun 2, $70 USD Dragon Age Origins, $90 USD Football Manager 2011...