EU Rules You Can Resell D/L Games

[Pvt.pile]

Interesting read.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012...s/#more-114473

[Pagan]

Well theres a bunch of lawyers set for the rest of their lives then.

[Shadrach]

Well, most of the games I've bought lately have been DRM-free anyway, GOG, Indiebundles, Gamersgate. This would have some pretty interesting implications for Steam I'd reckon.

Well anyway, not until we can get our fingers out of our arses up here and actually join the EU that is

[Grobut]

There's one huge problem with this, and it's this line:

The specific rule seems to be that if a license is sold indefinitely – i.e. not a license for a year, or similar – that the rightholder “exhausts his exclusive distribution right”.

“Such a transaction involves a transfer of the right of ownership of the copy.”

This implies that if our ownership of the game is further restricted, IE it expires and we are infact only renting the games for a year or so, then publishers can continue with their consumer hostile tactics.

Yeah that means games may be rentals from now on, that we cannot buy them and must continue to pay every year or so if we wish to keep them.
It would be the easiest workaround for publishers to do, and hey, which one of them woulden't love to either make more money every year on us rebuying our rentals, or kicking us out of the game so that we'll be looking for a new one to buy.


I can very easilly see that happening..

[Reise]

Yeah but how do you think they could get away with selling people games for a limited time?

Nobody's going to shell full price for a rental.

And I really doubt they could make as much money doing that as before. People would buy a discounted rental, get bored with it, then never play it again.


I hope this leads to an end to distributor exclusivity.

[Crusher]

Originally Posted by Reise

Yeah but how do you think they could get away with selling people games for a limited time?

Nobody's going to shell full price for a rental.

And I really doubt they could make as much money doing that as before. People would buy a discounted rental, get bored with it, then never play it again.


I hope this leads to an end to distributor exclusivity.

I think people are stupid enough to buy games for a limited amount of time, most people buy the same game with minor updates every year (COD). But besides that, who plays a game longer than a year? The only game I ever played longer than a year was ROOST but I have played a game and reinstalled it years later. Games these days aren't build to last, they exploit the current popular theme and after a year an updated version is released which is packaged as a new game. Games focused on Singleplayer aren't longer than 50 hours anymore with some exeptions.
I bought bulletstorm a few weeks ago, fun game but it took me 10 hours to complete the singleplayer and try out the multiplayer which sucked. I doubt I will play it again any time soon.

I don't support making games rental but it fits with the attitude of the game industry but I don't see indie devs doing it any time soon.

[Moyako]

I wish I could resell a couple of crappy steam games I regret buying (Yeah, Just Cause 2, I'm looking at you)

[Crusher]

The problem is back in the days you bought games in shops and you wanted to resell it you had to sell it at a lower price because it was mostly visibly used, the CD had scratches, the box a bit damaged but when you buy a game online there's nothing that would drop the price so you can resell it at full price. There's no decision to be made wether you'll buy the clean untouched version in the shop or a used possibly damaged but still working version from some guy. Online you can choose between buying it from an online shop from steam or from some guy at the same price, the only difference being if you buy it from the shop the devs get their part and if you buy it from a guy they don't. Unless when you sell it from a guy secondhand online the devs get a part either way.

[Grobut]

Originally Posted by Reise

Yeah but how do you think they could get away with selling people games for a limited time?

How did they get away with changing the standard price on PC games from 50 bux to 60 bux?

How do they get away with using things like SecuRom, GFWL and limited activations?

How do they get away with on-disc day-0 DLC?

How did Microsoft get away with making Xbox users pay them monthly for the priviledge of using their own damned internet connection?

How do they get away with 4 houer long SP games for full price or removing Dedi-server support?


If there's one thing that should be obvious to gamers by now, it's that the industry has us by the balls, because let's be honest here, the vast, vast majority of the games people want to play come from the same 4 or 5 gigantic publishing houses who own most of the prominent developing studios, and handle the publishing for many other studios they don't own aswell, so when they decide to do something that we hate, we're left with the choice of boycotting a significant portion of the games that will be released, or hanging our head in shame and forking over the dosh anyway (or the 3'rd option i guess, yo ho fiddledi, do what you want cus a pirate is free... but that's not actually a solution now is it).

It's not like there's a lot of choice for us, outside of cheapo indie titles (which are fine for what they are, i'm not knocking them, but if you want a good FPS game or a spectacle fighter, then "Cthulhu saves the world" or "Braid" won't scratch that itch), basically all that gets released in the full price or near full price range is made by a big publisher owned studio, or gets published by them (same difference, either way they are the publisher and decide the rules for how it's made avalible to us).

If the likes of AcTvi, Ea, UBI and 2K decide to go rental on us, then we're pretty screwed, and i can promis you that, just as it was with that horrid MW2 boycott, the vast majority of gamers won't have the conviction and spine needed to stand up and say "Hell no, my wallet is cloused to you!".
No, they will swallow this bitter pill like all the ones before it rather than pass up the next overhyped sequal to franchise-X or Y, and by doing so in droves they will condemn the rest of us to do the same by proving to the publishers that yes, they can infact rape us and make a fat profit doing so.


I pray to Cthulhu that it won't come to that, but honestly, if this law stands (it WILL be challenged, you'd better belive it), and this loophole remains, then they very well could go this route, and if even one of the fatcats like EA decides to do it, the others are likely to follow.

[dogbadger]

Originally Posted by Grobut

If there's one thing that should be obvious to gamers by now, it's that the industry has us by the balls, because......the vast majority of gamers won't have the conviction and spine needed to stand up and say "Hell no, my wallet is cloused to you!".
No, they will swallow this bitter pill .

in short - PC gamers as a whole get what they deserve

[Grobut]

Originally Posted by dogbadger

in short - PC gamers as a whole get what they deserve

Make that gamers as a whole, Console gamers have been no better when it comes to shelling out for things they should not have accepted, companies like Activision and EA are no less abusive twords their Console customers, and thease companies will gladly tell you that most of their sales are infact on the Consoles. And then you've got the likes of Capcom who are quite legendary for their abusive DLC practices, and they pretty much only do Console games.

And don't think it gets any better on the extreme casual end of Smartphone and iPad games either, because it only gets worse there..

[Crusher]

Better buy as many games as possible now! They can't change the contract of already owned games right? Right?

[Grobut]

Originally Posted by Crusher

Better buy as many games as possible now! They can't change the contract of already owned games right? Right?

No need right now, whatever comes of this it will take time to happen. The next thing that will happen is that one or more of the big publishers (could easilly be Microsoft and or Sony, since their plans for their next Consoles involves doing away with the used market, Valve and Ea might also join in because this would affect Steam and Origin) will challenge this ruling, and that process will take a very long time.
There's also the matter of that 10 dollar content that companies are now using to get money out of second hand sales, the legality of that practice will now be in question and that'll probably need to be dragged through the courts aswell (probably twice due to appeals).

Also, they might not go the rental route, that's just me pointing out the Elephant in the room, the worst case scenario. We could be lucky that the publishers won't want to risk the backlash that would come from doing that.


But the Elephant is there, so that's something to keep in mind for sure.

[aesdana]

lol imagine a pc future with only F2P rental games *pukes*




edit* Ok Since you rent them... They´re not really F2P... Well... Whatever BUT CONSIDER THAT OH MY GOD! F2P rental games the horror! lol

[dogbadger]

I presume that even a payed account would be transferable under law (ie the developers couldnt get away with the software being free but you need an account to play)- in which case the best model is probably a pay to play (wow) with additional dlc

I think F2P is a good buisiness model as it stands now - to hook ppl into buying DLC - but as the market gets saturated surely it will drop off.
The running costs of these type of games must be pretty high.

This ruling makes me wonder where the customer stands regarding withdrawl of support for a title - eg servers shutting down.
I mean, if say gamersfirst decide the uptake of DLC in APB reloaded isn't worth keeping the game open, what happens to all the ppl who have spent 100s on their accounts?
Sure the EULA will guard against this, but if this is also found to be contrary to statatury rights what then?

[Reise]

Originally Posted by Grobut

How did they get away with changing the standard price on PC games from 50 bux to 60 bux?

How do they get away with using things like SecuRom, GFWL and limited activations?

How do they get away with on-disc day-0 DLC?

How did Microsoft get away with making Xbox users pay them monthly for the priviledge of using their own damned internet connection?

How do they get away with 4 houer long SP games for full price or removing Dedi-server support?

I don't think they get away with it at all. Loads of people cite reasons just like that to move on to piracy, wait for sales, or use less restricting distributors. And it's part of the reason people assume the PC game market is dying.

I like to think the PC crowd is a little more resistant to this sort of garbage.

[dogbadger]

OK so you buy a console game nowadays and it also comes with, i presume, a code that includes DLC. I say presume cos on the 2nd hand market many games are listed with 'no DLC included'

So I was wondering will this come under the new regulation or will it be exempt, that is to say will the law allow you to sell on the DLC?

If the answer is no then phaps the developers get could get round this by selling a barebones piece of software, with practically no value to sell on, with your ability to play it enjoyably being the DLC as it were.

I dunno, but i'm sure the legal teams are looking into it.