European court: You are allowed to resell your steam games

edscdk said:
how come this can be done to steam but microsoft get away with stopping you reselling / or even re-using oem windows???!!!
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Read the rulings. This isn't applying specifically to a single company it's applying to all. The company in court was Oracle we are now speculating on the effect on digital game distribution.

I can't believe people are actually opposed to this, judging by the huge DRM hate threads. It's a huge victory for our consumer rights and will mean we actually own the games that we pay for.

People seem to think that this will kill PC gaming, how exactly? There is still huge money in it. Just look at consoles games, there is a huge 2nd hand market there and yet console games are still being made. PC game publishers will now have to adapt to the new conditions and stop gouging us at every new release. Maybe it will encourage them to actually release good, finished games in order to get people to buy them.
 
Interesting. The EU are usually pretty heavy-handed when it comes to selling goods which break the rules, as can be seen in the current Google/Apple/Microsoft/Samsung patent war. The worst case senario is that Steam/EA/Microsoft all oppose the sale of each others games in the EU and we are unable to use any of these services.

However, Steam can easily alter their client to obey this ruling. All they have to do is allow people to gift any game - even if it's previously been played.

GreenManGaming currently have a resale system. You can sell your digital games back to them when you are finished for credit to put towards new purchases. It works quite well and hasn't damaged sales there.
 
I don't like the idea personally.

I'm all for the removal of DRM and limited activations, along with the selling of physical copies of games, but I don't like the idea of selling digital copies, as this will damage the PC side of things. Digital copies are purchased for the convenience, and I think balancing that convenience with the removal of reselling is fair enough. Want to be able to resell? Buy physical copy. Want the convenience of digital? Forgo reselling.
 
Clav said:
People seem to think that this will kill PC gaming, how exactly? There is still huge money in it. Just look at consoles games, there is a huge 2nd hand market there and yet console games are still being made. PC game publishers will now have to adapt to the new conditions and stop gouging us at every new release. Maybe it will encourage them to actually release good, finished games in order to get people to buy them.
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Isn't the second hand market one of the reasons why console versions of multi-platform games are more expensive than their PC counterparts?
 
I can't believe how many people think this is a bad thing. For years license agreements have been getting sillier and sillier, publishers greedier and greedier. This is a slap in the face for the corporate view that you don't own something you've bought, that it's just a license to use software.

It's been happening with digital books and music for years too, about time a bit of common sense was injected into the whole mess.
 
Paid MMO's sell a subscription to a service rather than an actual product so I don't think it will be covered. However I haven't read the whole ruling so I could be totally wrong.
 
I suppose again that depends on whether what's in the EULA for the subscription contravenes what's laid down in the law. You could end up being able to legally sell your account, toons and all.
 
I dont see why you shouldnt be allowed. Essentially your paying to sell the time you have invested. Its like paying for the services. Its not unfair really
 
krooton said:
Isn't the second hand market one of the reasons why console versions of multi-platform games are more expensive than their PC counterparts?
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No. Console games cost more than PC games because there is the extra cost that the game publishers have to pay to sony, micorosft or nintendo for each copy sold.

The second hand market is a major factor in the success of console games. If the second hand market didn't exist, many people wouldn't buy as many games on release, because they wouldn't then be able to sell the game on. The second hand market reduces the real cost of NEW games allowing people to buy more of them, which means the publishers get MORE money than they would if the second hand market didn't exist.

Also, selling games cheap helps any franchise. Many people have bought, say, the first game in a series when it was a bargain biy or cheap second hand copy. They then enjoy that game so much, that when it's sequel is released, they want it so much, they buy it new.

So the second hand market can help GOOD games do very well, when the sequels in that franchise come out. bad games of course sink without trace, as they should.
 
Second hand sales don't go to the publisher/developer, it doesn't help the game do very well at all in their point of view.
Every second hand sale is a lost sale.
I'd rather see the second hand market eradicated for PC and Console, it's unfair for stores to profit on second hand sales while nothing goes to the developer/publisher due to the frequency in the which the gaming industry works.
 
Martini1991 said:
Second hand sales don't go to the publisher/developer, it doesn't help the game do very well at all in their point of view.
Every second hand sale is a lost sale.
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This. Even if the person that bought second hand might have waited until the game was dirt cheap in a sale, they'll have still paid something to the developer rather than nothing.

Devs and publishes have been trying to curb second hand sales on consoles with day 1 DLC and cutting huge chunks of a game out unless you buy first hand. Don't expect them to not gimp PC games in the same way.
 
Totality said:
I dont get the arguments saying that selling second hand games will kill off the PC market! NOT being able to sell the games if they are **** is what put me off buying full price games years ago!

The console market is booming and they have a second hand market and can sell/buy used copies. Explain that one in your logic about why it wont work with PC gaming? A game is a game. How come the developers don't moan about it happening on consoles?

Despite the large second hand market for consoles, look at the sales of Call of Duty each time they release a new version. The second hand market doesnt stop it from being a top selling product when brand new. If people want it they buy it.
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With second hand sales you may as well just pirate the game, devs ain't getting anything out of it.

If devs ain't getting the money expect plenty of more shabby ports.
 
Totality said:
I dont get the arguments saying that selling second hand games will kill off the PC market! NOT being able to sell the games if they are **** is what put me off buying full price games years ago!

The console market is booming and they have a second hand market and can sell/buy used copies. Explain that one in your logic about why it wont work with PC gaming? A game is a game. How come the developers don't moan about it happening on consoles?

Despite the large second hand market for consoles, look at the sales of Call of Duty each time they release a new version. The second hand market doesnt stop it from being a top selling product when brand new. If people want it they buy it.
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Next gen consoles are being restricted so you can't play any second hand games whatsoever. Consoles only owners will finally know what its like for us PC users and we could see the exact mentality for console players about not buying full priced games which will result in less money being made by these Console lord developers who just throw any carbage onto the PC and call it a successful port then maybe we the PC gamers will get treated a bit better. Heres hoping anyway.
 
again this makes interesting reading (Source PCG)
Green Man Gaming CEO speaks out on EU digital sales ruling

Yesterday the European Court of Justice ruled that consumers had the right to sell digital their digital games. This is something that could potentially change digital distribution forever, but how exactly? Eurogamer have been speaking to Paul Sulyok, CEO of Green Man Gaming, about what all this could mean. The ruling states that you can sell your digital games onward, but that you must disable your own copy to do so.

Currently most digital retailers have no way to do this beyond selling your entire account. Sulyok believes that companies will be forced to provide this, but only after a test case has gone to court. “There will be a first case against one of the platform holders.” He says. “The result of that is a foregone conclusion. So they will have to facilitate that.” There’s a few potential impacts this could have on the market. With Sulyok pointing out that the current trend for short term, high discount sales is vulnerable to the emergence of a used market. A third party could buy keys in bulk during a sale, and then sell them on at a mark up once the sale has ended, undercutting the original distributor. “The classic technique of deep discount, short time limited discounts, all of that will be slightly skewed now.” he says “Because you don’t want to have a deep discounted game that can then be sold on elsewhere.” Green Man Gaming currently allows gamers to trade in their downloaded games to get discounts on future purposes. But Sulyok points out that if Steam or Origin were to enact the same practice it would have a serious impact on his business. Again this allows third parties to game the system by taking advantage of a short term sales, then trading them in.

Gamers have grown accustomed to big Steam sales and Humble Bundles giving them cheap games in a short term window, but this ruling could threaten that practice. If putting your game in the Humble Bundle just once will grant third party distributors an infinite number of one penny copies, people might not be willing to take the risk.
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A third party could buy keys in bulk during a sale, and then sell them on at a mark up once the sale has ended, undercutting the original distributor. “The classic technique of deep discount, short time limited discounts, all of that will be slightly skewed now.” he says “Because you don’t want to have a deep discounted game that can then be sold on elsewhere.
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I need to go away and digest that, hadn't looked at it from that point of view.
 
At the end of the day for a game to be sold second hand it has to have been sold already therefore developers have had the sale already, developers seem to think that if people buy their game second hand its a lost sale but its simply not the case, When I have bought a second hand game in the past it is generally a game I would not have bought at retail price anyway. I welcome this whole heartedly its about time customers rights were put first.
 
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