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French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

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Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#51

Post by ElonMuskrat »

magashna wrote: post #5

I can't imagine Valve won't find some loophole or way around this. Being able to resell digital games would destroy that economy. A possible outcome would be games in France are never on sale and they can only be traded within the French Steam economy. Can Valve still take a cut of all sales on their platform or add fees? Very curious how this turns out, but I feel like it's 50/50 whether this makes things better or…

Destroy the economy is a gross exaggeration.

Game sales over time generally resemble a power distribution. Most sales happen within the first week or so, then sales follow a steep drop-off. There are of course exceptions in the indie game community, but AAA publishes build up to a tidal wave of marketing for release day, then things kind of simmer down.

So a second hand market would cut into the tail-profits. Certainly not desirable for studios, still but quite a few jaunts away destroying the economy.

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#53

Post by ElonMuskrat »

_edo wrote: post #48

With laws like this you generally have to ask what's best for the consumer. I'm not sure reselling is. The current setup gives game developers a somewhat predictable revenue model and on the strength of that model they can encourage investors to put up money to make the games. Changing the revenue model may change how investors look at the market. Maybe for better maybe for worse. Who knows, but it would be a disrupt…

> The thing that I don't like is if you allow reselling then developers get less long-term revenue but (hopefully) more short-term revenue. This will cause them to focus more on getting a big opening weekend than making a solid game that might have years of appeal.

But this exactly what happens now anyways.

Not a cynical view point just a statement of what I believe to be facts. I had some interest in making indie games myself, so I looked at the market.

Almost all games sales follow a power curve with most sales falling in the first week. The publishers build a tidal wave of marketing hype months before the game is released. AAAs spend tons of money to build-up to a critical mass of media influencers [e.g. YouTubers, entertainment conventions, TV ad spots, etc...].

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#54

Post by archi42 »

umvi wrote: post #39

Sweet, time to create a bunch of steam accounts, stock up on cheap games during steam sales, and then resell after the steam sale, undercutting the the "new" version (it's not like a digital resale is any lower quality than the "brand new" one). Rinse and repeat. Profit.

You know you probably have to pay taxes on that?

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#55

Post by ajnin »

criddell wrote: post #2

Could this extend to ebooks as well? Valve's argument that what they sold was a license and not the game feels like a distinction without a difference to me. Say I accept that. Then why can't I sell that license?

I think this should. Using the same logic, this should apply to in-game items and other "dematerialized" goods.

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#56

Post by shadowgovt »

If this ruling is accepted, it's going to go a bit further than "can't ban," right?

AFAIK right now, there's no infrastructure for transferring one's games on Steam from one user to another (apart from, say, selling the password to one's Steam account). So would compliance of the ruling imply Steam has to build some kind of digital marketplace infrastructure to allow for licenses to be resold?

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#57

Post by simion314 »

Causality1 wrote: post #24
archi42 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some titles there is no option to get a "resale allowed version". E.g. I bought a retail version of Borderlands 2 several years ago on DVD (long time post release, was like 20 Euro in a local games store). Well, turned out that DVD basically was a Steam Installer plus key (of course, that's a decision made by the publisher). Also, "so I can get the game cheaper" - do you? When I buy a newly released game on Steam…

On the upside, having resale value is a direct attack on loot boxes, micro transactions, and other forms of in-game financial exploitation. You might be less likely to sink a thousand dollars into loot boxes if you're thinking about selling the game.

Also it can encourage making more expansions or DLC, a good example is Witcher3 , if you deliver a quality expansion each year for a few years then people would not sell the game. I am so disappointed on games that the writers wrote a cool story but you need to wait years between releases(Dragon Age) or forever(Half Life) because the management and developers keep rebuilding the engine or try to modernize a good enough game with a big fan base.

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#58

Post by roblabla »

criddell wrote: post #2

Could this extend to ebooks as well? Valve's argument that what they sold was a license and not the game feels like a distinction without a difference to me. Say I accept that. Then why can't I sell that license?

A license is a contract between you and valve. You can't transfer that license because the contract says you can't. The court says that the digital game is a good (just like a DVD is), and not a license, so you must be allowed to resell it to somebody else.

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#59

Post by shadowgovt »

_edo wrote: post #48

With laws like this you generally have to ask what's best for the consumer. I'm not sure reselling is. The current setup gives game developers a somewhat predictable revenue model and on the strength of that model they can encourage investors to put up money to make the games. Changing the revenue model may change how investors look at the market. Maybe for better maybe for worse. Who knows, but it would be a disrupt…

It probably bites one-and-done adventure-style games more than games with the replay value of, say, a multiplayer competitive system or a Roguelike randomizer. That's a category already bit by the people who just watch the game played on YouTube instead of buying and playing their own copy; decreasing their opportunity for first-sale revenue increases the opportunity cost of making such a game.

There will always be developers who will make a game as a passion project, but I'd predict that this ruling'd make the market for the potential next Sierra or Telltale even deader than it already is.

Re: French high court rules that Steam can’t ban users from reselling digital games

#60

Post by roblabla »

throwaway66920 wrote: post #45

I think this is a bad idea which will encourage more in game transactions to be profitable. Margins aren’t good enough for the majority of games. I hope this doesn’t expand out of France.

This will likely expand to at least the whole European Union since european texts were used to arrive to this ruling.
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