When you tried again, you copied the key directly from Steamgifts, correct? My guess is that the giveaway creator noticed their mistake and replaced the key for a ROW one.
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I think it's still a Russian key since it said (RU) next to it when it was activated. Also, the key is... pretty weird and certainly not like any other keys I've seen before. I guess Russia has their own special key system? Am I allowed to put it here since I already used it or is that frowned upon? Also, I believe I copied it directly most of the other times (perhaps I didn't though), so not quite sure why it went differently this time around.
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There are various formats of steam keys, this one may have been from a retail version or something.
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It should be fine. I won the same key from discord 2 months ago and asked about it on here. I still have the game on my account.
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Considering that the key does consists of 15 letters and numbers combined, then it's still a Steam key regardless of whether it looks weird or not.
On another note, seeing as you activated a RU key without further issues, you only may need to make amendments to its language settings by right-clicking on the game in your library then check Properties.
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It's actually 26 characters for whatever reason.. eh, whatever, I already redeemed it, so I'll just post it here. 46-PNCL4T-SYHVDP-JGZ7TN-BTXGMV.
Thanks for the tip about the language settings thing. I'll do that right now... though, about further issues, will there be any further issues? Will Steam ban my account or something? Apparently, you can redeem a Russian key if you use a Russian VPN which is against the rules, but... I didn't, so I still have no clue what happened.
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I don't know how it works for The Witcher 2, but I have a similar same case for Max Payne, where I bought a Russian key on purpose and was able to activate it and use it normally. So it's possible that it does work all fine. I'd say just make sure that the appID of the Witcher game you now own is the same as the appID of the GA, as in Max Päyne's case they were different
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You should censor atleast some characters since bots or stupid users will try to redeem it and you'll get spam email from steam when they do so.
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As long as you don't use a VPN and break the Steam TOS, you're fine. I also have activated a couple of Russian keys myself, they play just fine and there never has been a problem, so you're all good.
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The only problem you might run into, though not in this case, is when you want to purchase dlcs.
Happened to me with Fallout NW. Base game purchased in the UK, but for some reason steam was selling me the RU dlcs and they would not activate because the base game was not compatible.
Had a chat with support and they removed my UK game and replaced it with the RU version. This fixed the problem, but also removed all my progress and achievements.
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That's because New Vegas has two completely separate games and you can own both the Russian and the ROW version. Whereas for most games all keys will activate the same package but just default to downloading a different depot dependent on your region/language settings.
Even when a game is removed fro your account your achievements aren't lost they just may not be visible. You didn't need to lose any progress either as saves are compatible with both versions. I know this for certain as I used my own saves with both versions so that I wouldn't need to repeat certain achievements.
If you ever do rebuy the ROW version then Steam will still track any achievements you already owned. As a bonus you'd only need to buy the base game and not the DLC as you can simply copy over the DLC files you already have. Again, this is exactly what I did. I bought the Ultimate Edition (ROW) but just the base game for the Russian version.
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- RU - Borderlands 2, Darksiders, Dishonored, Duke Nukem Forever, Fallout: New Vegas, Football Manager 2012/13/14
- JP - Dead Island Riptide, Homefront, Mafia 2, Metro: Last Light, Resident Evil 7, Risen 2 - Dark Waters
- US - Mensa Academy, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
- DE - Wolfenstein (all 3 of the newer games), Sniper Elite: Zombie Army 1/2
There are also
- Korean/Asian versions of some of the Football Manager games
- Games that have different names/versions in the US (Battle vs Chess/Check vs Mate)
- Games that have separate Mac releases (Arma: Cold War Assaault, Black Ops 1)
- Remasters etc. - This is the category most people will be familiar with.
Not even close to a complete list but it'll give you an idea of what there is.
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So, I won a giveaway for The Witcher 2 around a week ago, but the key wasn't working... I decided to submit a support ticket today. Before I did, I tried it once more just to make sure and it suddenly worked for no reason. I don't know if I copied it incorrectly (like 20 times...) or what, but, yeah, that happened. Well, I'm happy that I have the game now and all, but, uh... will this cause any problems with Steam or anything like that?
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