Finally some good news! I’ve been waiting for quite a while for such a ruling.

Edit: Seems this cites an article from 2012, I didn’t notice that (and it’s still news to me). Though there’s still hope that it’ll happen, EU is slow, but usually eventually gets shit done.

  • krellor
    link
    fedilink
    1107 months ago

    Am I wrong or is this article simply re-reporting a Eurogamer article from 2012? Because the only source this article cited is a 2012 article from Eurogamer.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    337 months ago

    What’s next!? Letting people return a game just because it’s trash?? What is this world coming to?

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    237 months ago

    Am I understanding that correctly? That if I buy a steam game, I can sell that to another person who can then download it from steam? That’s going to be very good for gamers and bad for all those corporations. It would, literally, be a dream come true if this happens.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      87 months ago

      I believe the idea is that you would no longer own the license to play the game yourself.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      27 months ago

      I don’t know how this is good for gamers, it would be the end of perpetual licenses. Every company would move to subscription services immediately.

  • @trackcharlie
    link
    English
    18
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    EU coming in clutch for the consumers again.

    e. I clicked it, I was duped it’s all horseshit >_>

  • Norgur
    link
    fedilink
    167 months ago

    Haven’t we had some ruling of that sort on the past where Valve basically went “fuck it,you may be allowed to sell it, but we ain’t implementing anything you could do that with”?

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      187 months ago

      The article they reference is over a decade old so it may in fact be this you are remembering.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      97 months ago

      Yeah, but if individuals enter into a contract where the license gets sold, Valve would have to abide by it and allow the 2nd party to download the game. If not, they’d probably be sued. At least, that’s how I understand it. Probably easier if they create a used digital game store and just tack on some sort of shitty “processing” fee to make it simple for everyone.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      17 months ago

      /s: By submitting an encoded JSON post request to Steam’s most overloaded server, users may acquire a sale ticket token, which must then be cryptographically delivered to another user, salted with their Steam user ID.

      There are services that will do this for you, but…charge a 50% premium to provide that service, because no technology is free.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    87 months ago

    Didnt read the article. Does this mean steam will have to give the option to sell games or would you have to sell the whole account?

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      20
      edit-2
      7 months ago

      Edit: scratch that, someone paying more attention noticed the article cited is from 2012. There have probably been developments in the interim.

      It’s unclear(PDF)

      Where the copyright holder makes available to his customer a copy - tangible or intangible - and at the same time concludes, in return form payment of a fee, a licence agreement granting the customer the right to use that copy for an unlimited period, that rightholder sells the copy to the customer and thus exhausts his exclusive distribution right. Such a transaction involves a transfer of the right of ownership of the copy. Therefore, even if the licence prohibits a further transfer, the rightholder can no longer oppose the resale of that copy.

  • Justin
    link
    fedilink
    English
    6
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    I wish so badly that this would come to the US… I have so many games I never play that I wish I could sell off

    Edit: nevermind, guess it’s not real… sad

  • sunbunman
    link
    fedilink
    English
    -5
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    I see a massive downside to this ruling as a gamer. This is talking about resale of a digital game. In reality what would happen is someone would download a game, copy the file to a harddrive, sell the “digital license” or whatever it’s called for a lesser amount and still own a copy of the game. It’s basically simplifying piracy.

    This might actually necessitate game companies to have a hardline DRM approach to their games. Ironically the only games that are protected from this kind of resale are the those that heavily dipped in microtransactions since you can’t resell those and would push the market more in that direction.

    IMHO this ruling is shortsighted and pushes for a future with increased monitisation that isn’t in the box value of the game and targets to hurt the Devs that make consumer friendly games while giving games with loot boxes and microtransactions an advantage in the market when talking in terms of overall sales for the devs.

    Edit: My mind has changed from the piracy perspective. Still don’t like how this feels from the overall market perspective.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      167 months ago

      Steam has a sub 2-hour game time no questions asked refund period - what prevents someone from doing exactly what you said using the refund process instead of resale?

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      27 months ago

      As a gamer, that’s some ridiculous whataboutisms. What’s to stop me from buying a physical copy of a game, copying it, and reselling the game? Only time, experience and know how, and yet that isn’t seen as much of an issue. This isn’t any different, it’s just digital.

      • sunbunman
        link
        fedilink
        English
        17 months ago

        Most people aren’t going through the effort of buying a physical game or any media these days, it’s why digital stores are so effective. But the other commenter did say that steam already has a 2hour refund window that basically has the same impact so I might have panicked for no reason.

        Though my other point about micro transactions vs full box value still stands.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      27 months ago

      Any protections to consumers are a win. I think overall this will be a positive for gamers.

      IMHO this ruling is shortsighted and pushes for a future with increased monitisation that isn’t in the box value of the game and targets to hurt the Devs that make consumer friendly games while giving games with loot boxes and microtransactions an advantage in the market when talking in terms of overall sales for the devs.

      Your last paragraph could hold some truth if publishers think this will affect profits. I don’t know if this would significantly impact profits since we’re talking about a new secondary market that did not exist in the digital space before. There’s probably some historical data for how physical used game sales affect new game sales but it might be hard to quantify since that market has existed pretty much from the beginning.

      I would anticipate another across the board price increase for games as a result, but I see this more as an excuse for greed on the publishers’ parts rather than a cost to offset any actual lost revenue.

      • sunbunman
        link
        fedilink
        English
        37 months ago

        My problem is traditional consumer friendly sales model for digital games are already on the back foot. This ruling only works to dissuade any new or existing Devs from persuing that model over one with microtransaction.

        If anything I want this method of purchasing digital content to be pushed further into any game with purchasable in game items to even the playing field.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          27 months ago

          This is an important observation; slowly, it becomes better for EA releasing their next singleplayer adventure to restructure: The base is “free”, and then you can buy passes to access the singleplayer world as microtransactions that are not easily transferred.

          A lot of RMT content is not easy for a court to define resellability of; think things like orbs that increase a weapon’s stats through a one-time forging process. We don’t want to make that a safer vending process for publishers than full games.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          27 months ago

          I agree that microtransactions and loot boxes in gaming need regulation as well. Hopefully this is a step towards that.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      17 months ago

      Maybe this is what those game companies can finally use NFTs for!

      I’m kinda kidding but maybe blockchain can offer a solution.