Ubisoft deactivating keys it says were "fraudulently" obtained and resold

Defiant306 · 27 Jan 2015 at 01:30

Sorry to hear all folks problems with these games and Ubisoft, thank god I never went for them in the end.

Mart2912 · 27 Jan 2015 at 02:06

Also had Far Cry 4 removed from my list. A little communication goes a long away.
There is a thread on the Ubisoft forum (http://forums.ubi.com/showthread.php/1001533-Concerning-Far-Cry-4-removal-from-our-libraries-Open-letter/page34 34 pages and counting) with the majority saying their keys had been banned.

JoeFX said:
G2A have said I can have a refund but only when I send them proof of why Ubisoft banned my key... so I'm waiting for a reply to my support ticket from Ubi (probably along with several thousand others).

Yeah same boat I'm in. Just need to wait for a reply from Ubisoft. Who knows how long that will take with all this going on...

Boycey0211 · 27 Jan 2015 at 02:42

so the jist of it is if you didn't give Ubi £50 but instead paid say £30 for a legit key you don't deserve to play in Ubi's eyes????

I hope you all get your money back, and the key sellers find a way to prosecute Ubi for this if they were all legitimate.

Also hope this brings and end to pc games being sold for £35+, especially for buggy turds of games like theyve been banging out one after another recently

dbmzk1 · 27 Jan 2015 at 06:31

These websites do not have fraudulently obtained or stolen keys though, they get them through legitimate channels and sell them at whatever price they want. Some sites like G2A are more like eBay/Amazon/etc. How retarded of Ubisoft to stop people playing their games. Hope they go bust.

Sean_UK · 27 Jan 2015 at 07:25

Found this interesting:

Ubisoft have also repeatedly engaged with everyone’s favourite screeching youtube personality, PewDiePie. Ubisoft community manager sharing a video of his in order to help promote their game. Ubisoft twitter account telling pewdiepie that he is awesome. Ubisoft congratulating him and sending him some swag for having reached 30 million youtube subscribers.

PewDiePie is also the face of G2A.com, one of the bigger unauthorised retailers, and indeed one of the retailers that people experiencing games being revoked are stating they bought their key from. He is front and centre in their lineup advertising their affiliate scheme.

What’s it to be Ubisoft? Are we expected to trust PewDiePie when he is showing off your games, but not to trust him when he tells us where to buy them? If these retailers are conducting fraudulent activity, why on earth are you engaging with someone who promotes them to a massive audience? Why are you granting him monetization permission? It’s entirely feasible that someone could discover PewDiePie via official Ubisoft marketing channels, and then discover G2A.com via PewDiePie. It seems to me that there is an element of hypocrisy in Ubisoft’s actions. They want coverage from PewDiePie and other youtubers and streamers, but aren’t bothering to check whether they are directing customers to unauthorised retailers, nor to deny monetization permission if they are.

Ubisoft do seem to enjoy self harming publicity.

StriderX · 27 Jan 2015 at 07:29

Lol, thank god i've stopped purchasing their ****.

MikeTheNative · 27 Jan 2015 at 07:48

I got mine from simply cd keys and it's still there.

Teaf · 27 Jan 2015 at 07:52

After looking at my list I think all my games are still there, but I've not used Ubisoft's own program for ages so without an e-mail to say whether I did / didn't get anything removed from them I'd have no idea.

Xordium · 27 Jan 2015 at 07:56

If games companies didn't try and rip off people in the West by making them pay so much more than the developing world for something that costs the same amount to make all over then there wouldn't be this problem in the first place.

I don't like their games and I don't buy the ones I do like anyway as a matter of principle. Plenty of other games from publishers that do care about their customers and give them a fair deal. People will just pirate their stuff now and to be honest I really don't care - you reap what you sow.

WiZZyWiGG · 27 Jan 2015 at 08:16

randal said:
So they're not region locking then?

Also, isn't this part channel problem on their side?

The only real way to block this kind of thing is to region lock keys, even then people will just use a VPN, and still moan they are region locking as they like getting cheap games.

kedge · 27 Jan 2015 at 08:57

dbmzk1 said:
These websites do not have fraudulently obtained or stolen keys though, they get them through legitimate channels.

If this is what you claim is true then all Ubisoft need to do is ask the key sellers for the information to the 'legitimate channels', also why are key sellers refunding the customer?.

WiZZyWiGG · 27 Jan 2015 at 09:40

If a site hasn't got the keys direct from Ubisoft then it isn't a 'legitimate channel'.

Buying up cheap stock in countries where its cheaper and selling on the keys isn't legitimate no matter how much people want it to be.
Also people buying codes on stolen credit cards and selling them is a big thing for digital stores, so these keys should be deactivated.

Yes games are expensive, yes certain publishers have stupid digital pricing at times, yes we all like cheap games but there is a big grey area in selling keys and if a price looks to good to be true... it probably is.

On the plus side, once boxed PC finally dies this kind of issue will decline.

scritchyrat · 27 Jan 2015 at 10:29

I've had my Far Cry 4 deleted. Bought from cdkeys.com whom I've always thought were very legitimate due to some of the goods they carry (iTunes codes, PSN codes and Live codes and we all know how accommodating Apple are of unauthorised sellers).

Ubisoft haven't responded to my ticket, cdkeys gave me a full refund two minutes after I contacted them at 9PM on Sunday night.

Ubisoft needs to die as a company.

hyperseven · 27 Jan 2015 at 10:41

WiZZyWiGG said:
If a site hasn't got the keys direct from Ubisoft then it isn't a 'legitimate channel'.

Buying up cheap stock in countries where its cheaper and selling on the keys isn't legitimate no matter how much people want it to be.
Also people buying codes on stolen credit cards and selling them is a big thing for digital stores, so these keys should be deactivated.

Yes games are expensive, yes certain publishers have stupid digital pricing at times, yes we all like cheap games but there is a big grey area in selling keys and if a price looks to good to be true... it probably is.

On the plus side, once boxed PC finally dies this kind of issue will decline.

It not the point Ubi have offered no proof or explanation as in their own EULA.

Since when have Ubisoft become a police force?

zola25 · 27 Jan 2015 at 10:50

I think it would help immensely if Ubi - and for that matter other game producers - clearly state which channels are considered official to purchase from. They must have known for a long time that key resellers are selling their games, why not publish a warning that this is not a practice they support, and there is a risk of losing your games?

WiZZyWiGG · 27 Jan 2015 at 10:52

hyperseven said:
It not the point Ubi have offered no proof or explanation as in their own EULA.

Since when have Ubisoft become a police force?

What would you like them to say? I can't think of anything they could say that would turn all the 'die Ubisoft' comments into 'oh thats ok then' ones.

They should be more open about why, agreed. Doesn't change the fact that this kind of thing is an issue in games and people need to be careful where they buy.

zola25 said:
I think it would help immensely if Ubi - and for that matter other game producers - clearly state which channels are considered official to purchase from. They must have known for a long time that key resellers are selling their games, why not publish a warning that this is not a practice they support, and there is a risk of losing your games?

Yep, this kind of thing would help.

w00dy85 · 27 Jan 2015 at 10:56

I got my Gold edition off a well known auction website about 3 weeks ago and that got banned by uplay, sometime last week. I think it's bad they revoke the game with out saying anything to the account holder.

I was lucky, the seller gave me a full refund straight away when I told them what happened.

Wej · 27 Jan 2015 at 11:02

WiZZyWiGG said:
If a site hasn't got the keys direct from Ubisoft then it isn't a 'legitimate channel'.

Buying up cheap stock in countries where its cheaper and selling on the keys isn't legitimate no matter how much people want it to be.

Interested how you come to this conclusion.....?

If I buy something from Amazon that can also be bought directly from the original manufacturer more expensively (as is true of thousands of products) am I buying something illegitimately?

If the original keys come from Ubisoft, then Ubisoft either need to a) region lock all their keys or b) accept that people will try and get valid keys from the cheapest possible place. These aren't fraudulent keys, these come from Ubisoft. It's just they've come from other, cheaper countries. If Ubisoft want to stop this, make country specific keys....

Bloomfield · 27 Jan 2015 at 11:05

kedge said:
If this is what you claim is true then all Ubisoft need to do is ask the key sellers for the information to the 'legitimate channels', also why are key sellers refunding the customer?.

They're refunding customers because Ubi are removing the games :confused:

.

WiZZyWiGG said:
If a site hasn't got the keys direct from Ubisoft then it isn't a 'legitimate channel'.

Buying up cheap stock in countries where its cheaper and selling on the keys isn't legitimate no matter how much people want it to be.
Also people buying codes on stolen credit cards and selling them is a big thing for digital stores, so these keys should be deactivated.

Yes games are expensive, yes certain publishers have stupid digital pricing at times, yes we all like cheap games but there is a big grey area in selling keys and if a price looks to good to be true... it probably is.

On the plus side, once boxed PC finally dies this kind of issue will decline.

I'd be very surprised if the law agrees with you and Ubi.

spoffle · 27 Jan 2015 at 11:06

WiZZyWiGG said:
If a site hasn't got the keys direct from Ubisoft then it isn't a 'legitimate channel'.

Buying up cheap stock in countries where its cheaper and selling on the keys isn't legitimate no matter how much people want it to be.
Also people buying codes on stolen credit cards and selling them is a big thing for digital stores, so these keys should be deactivated.

Yes games are expensive, yes certain publishers have stupid digital pricing at times, yes we all like cheap games but there is a big grey area in selling keys and if a price looks to good to be true... it probably is.

On the plus side, once boxed PC finally dies this kind of issue will decline.

You seem to be suggesting that illegitimate is a synonym for wrong or bad.