So ... we should buy the games on our own store now? ... that means i will be broke very fast then due the unfair currency :(.
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I also remember Valve saying that the publishers are enforcing their prices and that they can't do nothing about it, but now they seem pretty happy that publishers are enforcing such crappy prices (60€ for a game, really ? And I'm not even talking about Australia ...). Wish I'd be back when steam's prices were in dollars in Europe.
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I agree with you, steam should get back the dollars in europe.
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If steam starts to suck, GOG will rise!
But still.. I love steam, hope this isn´t true.. they make a lot of bonus money with the trading system.. for example Games I would plainly NOT BUY because they are censored in Germany and every game someone trades for ingame-items like TF2 or DOTA2.. thats earnings that otherwise just would not exist.
Oh, and not to forget the gazillions of dollars the makers of Railworks earned thanks to gifting ;D
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this is just wrong, each game has to be checked individually and a reason has to be given - games never get indexed because the previous title was.
also racism isn't really an indexing factor. the main points for games being indexed is using symbols of unconstitutional organizations (wolfenstein 3d, kz manager, uncut sniper elite series, ...) or glorification of violence against humanoid beings (quake series, unreal-tournament series, dead island, darkness 2, alien vs. predator, uncut left 4 dead, postal², ...)
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Mike was already in previous troubles for large transactions and cross border gifting and trading.
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Well, with that, piracy is likely to increase, and thus show them that they'd better make a smaller fortune than no fortune at all.
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I would like you to take a look alteriwnet and tunngle
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I've pirated really old games I can't find for sale anywhere (and I believe are classified as abandonware anyway), and the general rule of thumb is that if it has a LAN mode, you can play it over the internet using things like Tunngle or Hamachi.
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Oh my, but you must know exactly who you're talking to, don't you?
Being a sailor of the internet and all.
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Any idea if this is universal? As in, gifting games to say, my Euro friend, or my American buddy?
If so, they might as well do away with the gifting system entirely.
Steam Trades will also probably hurt from this if its also the case.
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So basically- if we trade across borders/nations, Valve's saying we can be banned from buying anything else on Steam?
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Not buyers, "gifters", or in this case, sellers. If I got it correctly.
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+1
Unless Steam updates their terms and conditions with the new rule, PPG is right. There's no way to differentiate between a gifter and a seller, so the most they would be able to do is temporarily remove gifting (or purchasing) privileges until they are able to "build a case" against them. Granted, they'd have to use things that they have control over (or that are public knowledge) to build the case (being any information exchanged via their client or on a forum/board). I don't really see any other legal way for them to verify whether someone is a gifter or a seller.
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No, not what I was trying to say, I was trying to say that if you bought the game from a seller, you won't get banned, but the seller will. If I understood it right.
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Its just unfair. The German Store has not all games (no Dead Island, Dead Space2 etc), alot of Cut Games (Fallout3/New Vegas/Borderlands) and the prices are at least 25% highter than US.
I try to get every game gifted from RU-Store, bceause I hate to get fucked with.
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Valve doesn't want to have to work out how to verify your drivers license against your nation's (or state/province/prefecture's) national database and go through all the legal hassle of obtaining access to those databases. For every country that has age verification.
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I think this is actually good. I dont want Valve sharing my info with governments or other parties.
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Didn't knew, you are German, too. However, I don't think that we will have a age verification soon. No way before 2013 and even after this there is only a small chance, that I see in the Piraten. Bot they won't be in the government of course. So import from other countrys will be the only option. for UNCUT tries to encourage VAlve to implement a system for years. Valve just don't reply. Such a system costs money & could give a negative reputation like: "Steam now sells killer games legally!" or something like that. Too sad. And now they don't want people to save money. What will happen, if they ban such traders? More abuse, I guess.
Btw: Isn't there a free trading zone in the EU? And Romania is in the EU, isn't it?
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LOL, no offense against you, but that's just not reallly true
Origin has NO valid age verification! They have this:
want: last line of this
user has this ID card
Btw: hard to get ha valid number for the old ID card, cough
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This is pure bullshit, and what's even worse, is that we complain but we're still buying (stupid summer and holiday sales). What we should do is an international boycott to stop buying games from every seller that does this crap of changing currencies instead of putting one fucking price to every country like it should be in the first place.
As long as we keep buying and accepting their terms and conditions the situation won't change at all.
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Yeah its not like its uber hard to make same price everywhere (look at gog and they have hames from publishers like Activision, EA or Ubisoft), they just want to milk us for all we got and thats why I only buy on sale or budget games. And seriously, the whole point of digital download is to make selling of games cheaper and they sell them for more than retail, thats just lame. I can get retail 1/3 cheaper than on steam and I have nice box and some bonuses like map, etc. In some cases even T-Shirt, I really dont understand people that pay for game more just so they can show off and say hehe I have XXX games on steam (and I dont play 90% of them :D ) I played almost all my games (some before I got them on steam in sale) and I never bought game for full price there and if they continue to treat us like this I never will.
They are even breaking EU law by preventing the rest of EU to purchase games on GB steam.
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This post is full of lies and illiteracy.
Also, people need to learn that Steam doesn't control the pricing, the publisher does.
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Lies? Than prove me that I cant buy retail games cheaper here I live (after release for full price off course, I dont mean in big sales - after all thats what I use steam for), if digital download isnt made to make selling of game cheaper than tell me why, prove me that Steam isnt preventing EU customers to buy from GB steam and if gog CAN have world-wide pricing steam CAN too, if they REALLY wanted to, but they rather have more money than care about customers and potentially lose some money.
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I don't think the publishers are the only ones who decide the price, Valve has something to do in the process, after all, Steam is their platform, and therefore, they decide with which companies they want to do business.
I'm really pissed cause I can't get my number 1 wishlist game which is Amalur, cause 38 Studios disappeared and no one knows who decides it's price now. It costs 49.99 €, still at release price on Steam. I can get it way cheaper, but it's on Origin and I refuse to buy anything from there. Are you telling me that now 38 Studios is gone, that the guys at Valve can't change the price of the game?
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He's been dead a long time. In fact, that whole regime has been gone for many, many years. I find it quite ironic that the ills of the modern world are blamed on a political structure that was all but erased over 60 years ago. Something doesn't compute with that. Perhaps, people should stop blaming Hitler for everything and, you know, take a moment to re-evaluate why their countries are completely shit - I guess that would also be Hitler's fault.
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Wait, so... this is only hitting people who are noticibly gifting/trading a lot, I gather? Almost all of my German girlfriend's Steam games have been bought by me (and I'm in the US) because she doesn't have the means to buy online, but that's the only account I send games to, and I make sure none of them are cut/unavailable in Germany. I... kinda can't be too careful with my own account though. lol
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They can fuck customers over with completely stupid and unjustified regional pricing for DIGITAL software. When they do it, it is all just fine but when customers are pissed they ban them :o
Support piracy even more Mr. Newell. Sad it was you saying you have to provide better service/comfort to fight the piracy, way to go.
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MARRY ME ! Youre so logical ! although I doubt youre a girl so the marriage might not be a good Idea however youre fucking Logical!
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Like with Half-Life 3 right? :DDD The are just tolling us.
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They certainly do say Hi.
Amazon upcoming changes: Region Restrictions / Pricing
Digital game downloads are sold to US customers only. However, it seems some users have determined your billing address just needs to be a US address. You can still pay with your overseas credit card. Keep in mind your credit card might require your billing address/mailing address to be the same though so it still may not work for you.
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But all people in the world are equal. Oh, wait...
Ugh, can't they just try fixing regional problems instead of making stuff worse. And, no, I'm not talking about Valve. We all know other companies, organizations and certain people are behind this.
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I can sort of understand where they're coming from, in terms of the more blatant exploitation of regional pricing where you'll see someone advertising that they'll buy games in exchange for PayPal funds. On the other hand, it would be a damn shame if this came back to hurt people who were actually legitimately gifting games (rather than just getting back something that doesn't show up in the trade window).
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Not to mention when they aren't even available for sale.
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and then they complain about pirated versions....
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Not my words, not my opinions. Keep in mind, publishers pressure Valve, so if Valve doesn't comply with their wishes, they can remove all their titles from Steam, so I'm siding with Valve on this.
Via Reddit:
Apparantly some of the big players in the gifting-scene (from russia / the US) have received emails from Valve, urging them to stop gifting to players from Europe. On some accounts, buying games has been completely disabled.
I think this is completely unacceptable. For me, buying games via a US-gifter has never been about getting the game cheaper. It has always been about getting the uncut version of a game.
I see Valves problem from a monetary point-of-view (games are cheaper in Russia / the US than in Europe), but I think it's hypocritical of Valve to use the advantages of globalization, while prohibiting its users from doing the same.
As an adult German I am allowed to buy uncut games. Why won't Valve let me? The German community has been asking for an age verification system for years now and we have gotten basically no answers at all.
Edit: Most reputable gifters never used the system to get rich. All they asked for was a small tip and paypal-fees. Seriously Valve, I am disappoint.
Edit2: There seems to be a lot of misinformation concerning the German system. Therefore I'll add some infos on how it actually works.
Basically you have two big players:
The USK (German self-monitoring of entertainment software) and the BPJM (Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons). If a publisher wants to publish a game in Germany, the game needs to have an age restriction sticker from the USK. Classifications include "no restriction", "6+", "12+", "16+" and "18+". There restrictions are legally binding for the retail sector. If the USK thinks a game is too violent (rascist, etc.) it can refuse classification. In this case the BPJM can index the game which basically means an automatic 18+ rating AND prohibition to advertise the game (which includes displaying the game in retails stores). Buying the game as an adult is still allowed, but getting it can be a problem. Some retailers still have such games below the counter, but if you don't want to buy on the Internet you're probably screwed. Again this is not a situation (directly) forced by law, but a decision made by the retailers due to, probably, low sales.
Important to note is that not the German government censors games. The publishers do, as they want to prevent that their game is being indexed.
Now online it's a really difficult case. Basically Steam already does illegal things by selling USK 16+ rated games to teens. But nobody seems to care. German players just want an age verification system that lets people buy games they could also buy in a German retail / online store.
Edit3: Games actually can get banned in Germany. This is the third, but very rare case. It mostly happens to games like "KZ-Simulator" (Nazi bullshit) or other games depicting swastikas (Wolfenstein), sometimes really violent games like Manhunt. Here selling the game is actually prohibited (afaik not buying, but IANAL). Whatever, this case is not that importat, because it happens very rarely.
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