“In a judgement rendered on September 17th by the Paris District Court… The Association for the Defence of Consumer Rights managed to obtain the cancellation of a number of clauses that Valve imposed on Steam,” the website says.
The biggest cancellation is that of Valve’s licensing of Steam games. Although you pay full price for titles on Steam, you do not own games you buy on Steam. This ruling changes that: by allowing you to sell your Steam games that you’ve purchased, gamers now have some form of control over their titles. The ruling doesn’t just apply to games. Games, movies, trading cards and more are all included.
Muscular Beaver wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 20:39:eRe4s3r wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 11:29:There already is a difference. As a German, I cant buy uncensored games there, that have been censored by German officials. I cant buy an indexed game there either. I also have to state truthfully where I live (proxies will get you banned) when I buy a game.
The far more interesting thing about this, which you non Europeans obviously missed. Is that this court can not actually legally decide about consumer rights affecting an EU wide store. Like it literally legally can not. Whatever it decides is irrelevant as Steam can not do what the court asks even if it wanted. There can be NO difference between French and German or Italian customers on Steam. That means the court decision is invalid until a higher EU court decides on it. So I am assuming the translation is wrong and the court did a preliminary decision and uplifted it to an EU court. Anything else would make zero sense, especially as the new copyright law is in normalization phase, meaning a court decision like this could become entirely irrelevant in 2 years.
So yeah.
eRe4s3r wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 11:29:There already is a difference. As a German, I cant buy uncensored games there, that have been censored by German officials. I cant buy an indexed game there either. I also have to state truthfully where I live (proxies will get you banned) when I buy a game.
The far more interesting thing about this, which you non Europeans obviously missed. Is that this court can not actually legally decide about consumer rights affecting an EU wide store. Like it literally legally can not. Whatever it decides is irrelevant as Steam can not do what the court asks even if it wanted. There can be NO difference between French and German or Italian customers on Steam. That means the court decision is invalid until a higher EU court decides on it. So I am assuming the translation is wrong and the court did a preliminary decision and uplifted it to an EU court. Anything else would make zero sense, especially as the new copyright law is in normalization phase, meaning a court decision like this could become entirely irrelevant in 2 years.
So yeah.
Bodolza wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 13:25:
Anyone predicting doom and gloom should remember that this is the way the games industry worked for 20+ years before Steam and the other digital stores started to take over. The music and video industries for much, much longer. The companies hated it then, too, but they still did just fine.
necrosis wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 09:25:HorrorScope wrote on Sep 19, 2019, 21:41:
Be careful what you wish for here, laws like this have a way of turning out bad. For example this could rush in Game Streaming, since the alternative is this law that probably breaks business plans. Laws with good intentions have this happen to them. I don't feel the deal we have currently has been a bad one.
This. It is happening already in a different field.
Fast food register biscuits are demanding $15/hour for pushing buttons. What do the fast food places do? Get rid of their jobs with touch screen boards where the customer can push the buttons. Larger up front cost but long term probably a ton cheaper.
Or like supermarkets and home depos with self checkout. One person 'running' 4-6 lanes.
We already have 'games as services' taking off and its destroying gaming. This will just accelerate it.
BIGtrouble77 wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 09:00:
I wonder how acquiring keys (humble bundle and not so legit g2a) would affect a system like this... I can imagine people will rush to sites like G2A, buy cheap sketchy keys and then try to resell on the used game marketplace. Seems ripe for fraud.
Simon Says wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 04:40:
You buy something, you own it, if you own it, you can resell, nothing controversial here.
Kxmode wrote on Sep 19, 2019, 21:35:
If they go that path, I'll start buying from GOG.
Dontbother wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 09:41:
You people don't deserve to have any rights, couse you will exchange them for convenience, at the first opportunity.
necrosis wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 09:25:HorrorScope wrote on Sep 19, 2019, 21:41:
Be careful what you wish for here, laws like this have a way of turning out bad. For example this could rush in Game Streaming, since the alternative is this law that probably breaks business plans. Laws with good intentions have this happen to them. I don't feel the deal we have currently has been a bad one.
This. It is happening already in a different field.
Fast food register biscuits are demanding $15/hour for pushing buttons. What do the fast food places do? Get rid of their jobs with touch screen boards where the customer can push the buttons. Larger up front cost but long term probably a ton cheaper.
Or like supermarkets and home depos with self checkout. One person 'running' 4-6 lanes.
We already have 'games as services' taking off and its destroying gaming. This will just accelerate it.
HorrorScope wrote on Sep 19, 2019, 21:41:
Be careful what you wish for here, laws like this have a way of turning out bad. For example this could rush in Game Streaming, since the alternative is this law that probably breaks business plans. Laws with good intentions have this happen to them. I don't feel the deal we have currently has been a bad one.
HoSpanky wrote on Sep 20, 2019, 03:10:
The HUGE difference between a digital item and a physical one is that you can resell a physical item without involving the store that sold it to you. You can’t do that with digital. This court is saying companies like Steam have to not only allow people to resell their digital goods, but that they have to assist people in doing so. It’d be like saying a car dealership had to help you resell your car, which magically doesn’t degrade over time, that you bought from them 10 years prior. Not only that, but the dealership has to build a functional marketplace on their own dime to assist people with the sale.
“But DRM could be removed, gog works!”. It works, but not remotely enough to make back development costs and make a worthwhile profit. Games with multiplayer components have servers to maintain. People buying games out of the goodness of their hearts don’t offset the massive number of people who would download a game for free. Back to the car analogy...no DRM means that magical car could be copied infinitely and sold/given away as much as anyone wanted. Oh, and the original manufacturer would have to provide gas (multiplayer servers) for said car, for anyone who got a free one or bought it from the reseller.
It’s gonna kill our ability to run games from our machines. Others on this thread are right; it’s going to mean the end of running games on our own hardware.