4 ms·

Seriously, what happens if the games I bought on Steam are no longer valid due to some potential disagreement between the game publisher and Valve?

danpalmer 4y ago
I suspect this won't happen, and that Valve have contingencies in contracts to ensure this never happens. You might no longer get updates to a game, but that would likely be it. Why? How is this different to films? Games are what Steam does. Films are not really what the Playstation Store does. Sure you can buy them, but who does? Not enough to cause irreparable reputational damage would be my guess. Also, the Playstation Store has far less negotiating power with film distributors than Valve/Steam does with game publishers, so the contract terms aren't likely to include contingencies for this sort of situation.
- Mindwipe 4y ago
  > I suspect this won't happen, and that Valve have contingencies in contracts to ensure this never happens. They don't, and they literally can't.
  - danpalmer 4y ago
    Is there something in contract law that prevents this?
    - Mindwipe 4y ago
      It's more that no supplier can credibly claim that they can deliver it. If there's a rights dispute about a piece of underlying code for example, the terms can say what they like but they can't override it not being that entity's code to licence. Valve certainly try and insert a presumption they can leave the title up, but it's not a given, and there's also not much to stop a developer from "updating" the title to a barely working basic binary.
      - tzs 4y ago
        That's also a risk with most other purchases, including purchases of physical goods. If the seller got the goods from an entity that did not have the right to transfer ownership or possession of that good, then the seller is not going to be able to transfer legal ownership or possession to you. That's not what is going on in most of these cases though. In most of these cases the entity that provided the digital goods to the seller did have the rights to do so, but those rights weren't perpetual, so the seller could not sell the consumer perpetual rights. Valve could protect against that by dealing only with developers who do have the ability to transfer perpetual licenses and requiring them to do so in their contracts. That wouldn't completely eliminate the risk because the developer might be mistaken or even lying but it could greatly reduce it if they are careful about choosing developers.
kevingadd 4y ago
Valve rarely has to pull games in this case, the agreements they have with developers seem to protect them. I can't remember the last time a game was removed from people's Steam libraries. However, developers do have the ability to replace games in your library, so often an original game will be replaced with a low-quality remaster.
daveoc64 4y ago
Steam has been around for almost 19 years, and with a vast catalogue of games nothing like this has happened to content on Steam.
worble 4y ago
This has happened a few times (e.g Deadpool), in those cases the game has still remained available for users who had already purchased it, just unavailable for new purchases.
- anonymousab 4y ago
  There have been a couple cases of a game being removed from both the store and users' libraries, such as Order of war: challenge.
- anshumankmr 4y ago
  Let's hope it stays that way. Lots of people have sunk quite a bit of cash into buying games. I personally have a collection worth 10K
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

danpalmer 4y ago

I suspect this won't happen, and that Valve have contingencies in contracts to ensure this never happens. You might no longer get updates to a game, but that would likely be it. Why? How is this different to films? Games are what Steam does. Films are not really what the Playstation Store does. Sure you can buy them, but who does? Not enough to cause irreparable reputational damage would be my guess. Also, the Playstation Store has far less negotiating power with film distributors than Valve/Steam does with game publishers, so the contract terms aren't likely to include contingencies for this sort of situation.

Mindwipe 4y ago
> I suspect this won't happen, and that Valve have contingencies in contracts to ensure this never happens. They don't, and they literally can't.
- danpalmer 4y ago
  Is there something in contract law that prevents this?
  - Mindwipe 4y ago
    It's more that no supplier can credibly claim that they can deliver it. If there's a rights dispute about a piece of underlying code for example, the terms can say what they like but they can't override it not being that entity's code to licence. Valve certainly try and insert a presumption they can leave the title up, but it's not a given, and there's also not much to stop a developer from "updating" the title to a barely working basic binary.
    - tzs 4y ago
      That's also a risk with most other purchases, including purchases of physical goods. If the seller got the goods from an entity that did not have the right to transfer ownership or possession of that good, then the seller is not going to be able to transfer legal ownership or possession to you. That's not what is going on in most of these cases though. In most of these cases the entity that provided the digital goods to the seller did have the rights to do so, but those rights weren't perpetual, so the seller could not sell the consumer perpetual rights. Valve could protect against that by dealing only with developers who do have the ability to transfer perpetual licenses and requiring them to do so in their contracts. That wouldn't completely eliminate the risk because the developer might be mistaken or even lying but it could greatly reduce it if they are careful about choosing developers.

kevingadd 4y ago

Valve rarely has to pull games in this case, the agreements they have with developers seem to protect them. I can't remember the last time a game was removed from people's Steam libraries. However, developers do have the ability to replace games in your library, so often an original game will be replaced with a low-quality remaster.

daveoc64 4y ago

Steam has been around for almost 19 years, and with a vast catalogue of games nothing like this has happened to content on Steam.

worble 4y ago

This has happened a few times (e.g Deadpool), in those cases the game has still remained available for users who had already purchased it, just unavailable for new purchases.

anonymousab 4y ago
There have been a couple cases of a game being removed from both the store and users' libraries, such as Order of war: challenge.
anshumankmr 4y ago
Let's hope it stays that way. Lots of people have sunk quite a bit of cash into buying games. I personally have a collection worth 10K

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]