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Sega is delisting 60 classic games from Steam
- jm4 2y agoMaybe a controversial opinion, but screw them for delisting games. Why would I buy these games when they obviously have no interest in selling them? To me, this is a license to go download the ROMs.
- tertle950 2y agoPiracy is the one true frontier for games preservation. If it's not on Steam or GOG, it may be the only feasible way to experience a game. I believe "abandonware" is the correct term
- sqeaky 2y agoAnd because Valve made it clear that purchasing doesn't provide ownership then piracy can't be theft.
- snoman 2y agoI’m sure a judge will agree with you.
- ffsm8 2y agoI'm sure pretty much every judge would? It's copyright infringement, not theft. The media industries just want to guilt trip consumers into thinking it's theft, but it's not. Neither legally nor actually.
- bravetraveler 2y agoI'm sure someone pirating for personal use will ever encounter a judge. Pounds of sarcasm, in case this wasn't clear.
- sqeaky 2y agoI don't think it matters if the judge agrees with me. Cases will be brought before judges based on money. Big pirates that are somehow making money doing it will be brought in front of a judge and some love will impact them. Anybody hypothetically pirating one steam game to play for themselves because they felt alienated by Steam isn't going to be dragged in a judge.
- goosedragons 2y agoGetting most of those games on Steam literally gives you the ROMs. DRM free and usable in any emulator. It's likely that at least for the Sega Genesis games Sega will throw out a new collection. The current one is pretty old and has issues, especially with latency.
- echelon_musk 2y agoWhile this comment is well intentioned, you do not own the ROMs. Using the example of the SEGA Mega Drive and Genesis Classics [0] Steam listing the EULA states: > THIS SOFTWARE IS LICENSED, NOT SOLD. > 3. NO RIGHT TO OWNERSHIP YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT YOU SHALL HAVE NO OWNERSHIP If you look at the Steam store page there are numerous reviews from people who bought the collection only to have Sega remove some of the ROMs from the collection making it impossible to play these games that you paid for. [0] https://store.steampowered.com/app/34270/SEGA_Mega_Drive_and_Genesis_Classics/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/34270/SEGA_Mega_Drive_and...
- goosedragons 2y agoYes, technically they are licensed. But what software is owned and not licensed? This is not new. Unlike most collections the ROMs here are out in open and easy to access. The reviews here are complaining about Sega delisting the collection. People that already have it will still be able to play them and redownload them off Steam. They have already delisted some of them (e.g., Sonic 3) and they're still available to those that got them before they were removed.
- lmm 2y ago> While this comment is well intentioned, you do not own the ROMs. Well, maybe. Sega might claim that they have only licensed them and you don't own them; a court might disagree, given the big "buy" button and the consideration paid for them.
- citruspi 2y ago> Sega might claim that they have only licensed them and you don't own them; a court might disagree, given the big "buy" button and the consideration paid for them. I'd really like to believe that is the case, but I think we've already seen that is generally not true based on other digital marketplaces (e.g. Kindle books, iTunes media, etc.) But specifically regarding Steam... this was just last month[0][1] > Valve is now explicitly disclosing that you don’t own the games you buy from its Steam online store. The company has added a note on the payment checkout screen stating that “a purchase of a digital product grants a license for the product on Steam,” as reported earlier by Engadget. > > ... > > Why? Probably, a new law. California has a law going into effect next year that’ll require digital storefronts like Valve’s Steam platform to clearly say that you’re only purchasing a license for your digital media because some companies like Ubisoft and PlayStation were removing digital purchases from users’ libraries, keeping them from playing games like The Crew or watching their old Discovery shows. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/11/24267864/steam-buy-purchase-license-digital-storefront https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/11/24267864/steam-buy-purch... [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41809193 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41809193
- downrightmike 2y agoSteam only gives you a license, you don't own anything
- stateoff 2y agoMaybe, but SEGA seems to muddy their own case as their official support FAQ section [1] states: "Will I still be able to play the SEGA Classics games? Absolutely! All SEGA Classics games and bundles you own will remain in your library, ready to be downloaded and played at any time." Note the "you own" here that is in dispute with the Steam user agreement. [1] https://support.sega.com/hc/en-gb/articles/29776767664145-SEGA-Classics-FAQ#h_01JBWBC4E7NJ9WH4TKAZXJK27N https://support.sega.com/hc/en-gb/articles/29776767664145-SE...
- keyle 2y agoBut after that, for reasons that Sega does not make explicit, they will be "delisted and unavailable." I really don't understand this move. The hard work is putting the games on Steam and making sure they work. Assets, testing, integration. Why take them away? Anyway I'll never use Steam to buy a game anymore anyway, because you're only really buying a license to rent a game.
- chupchap 2y ago> Anyway I'll never use Steam to buy a game anymore anyway, because you're only really buying a license to rent a game. Hasn't that always been the case for all games purchase for a while now?
- lxgr 2y agoI believe GOG still sells a lot of things DRM free.
- jakebasile 2y agoThey are DRM free, but you are still only buying a license to the game which can likely be revoked under the terms of that agreement.
- favorited 2y agoBut GOG offers offline executable installers, so from a practical perspective even if your license was revoked, they'd have no way of preventing you from playing the game (assuming that you had downloaded the installer, of course). The even joked about it after Steam added the checkout banner: https://x.com/GOGcom/status/1844752098145038435 https://x.com/GOGcom/status/1844752098145038435
- alpaca128 2y agoThe license doesn't matter if you can have the DRM-free installer on your harddrive forever. They sold it to me (and called it a "purchase"), I downloaded it, who cares about the license, it's mine now.
- fourfour3 2y agoDo not buy Crazy Taxi from Steam. It has broken input (analogue controls are really digital without fan patches), and does not play the original audio.
- MegaDeKay 2y agoNot playing the original audio is a crime. First thing I think about when someone names that game is The Offspring. "Ya ya ya ya ya"
- saturn8601 2y agoI wonder if that is why Governor Tim Walz was playing the game so weird. At certain points you could tell that he was struggling with the XBOX controller [1]:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGZa1Mgb-GE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGZa1Mgb-GE
- garaetjjte 2y agoI thought he would play with the mod... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0SIIjnNe_I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0SIIjnNe_I
- AdmiralAsshat 2y agoThere are unofficial patches to restore the original music.
- simonlc 2y agoMy guess is licensing, they probably sold exclusive licenses, and part of that is delisting on other platforms.
- AcerbicZero 2y agoProbably this; I wonder if they're all going to Epic for a few years before coming back.
- nitwit005 2y agoOr they think they can make more selling some sort of bundle.
- aquova 2y agoI dont think so, they own a lot of these games and IP's outright, and most don't have licensed content. I think they're doing the same thing they did when they removed the Sonic titles from the collection a few years ago -- they're preparing some new title for those IPs, and some of these games will come with, so people will double dip under the guise of cleaning up their offerings
- SllX 2y agoNot sure about other platforms but at least on the Switch this doesn’t affect the Sega Ages line of games. As far as I can tell, this is specially the line of releases they titled Sega Classics, but the Sega Ages line are typically the best in class individual titles put together by M2.
- ahofmann 2y agoAll four posts in this thread have obviously not read the article in full. Sega does this allegedly because they want to sell some kind of classics in stores. So while they have this sale, they delist the steam games.
- crtasm 2y agoThe article's author doesn't know the reason. They repeat speculation that the same games will be re-released in new bundles.
- AcerbicZero 2y agoI mean, bold of you to assume that delisting a game from steam would stop me from acquiring it, if I wanted to, but ok.
- Rapzid 2y agoI don't think this is about you.
- GauntletWizard 2y agoAll of the games on this list comprise the "Buy SEGA Mega Drive and Genesis Classics" and "Dreamcast Collection" bundles. My guess is that part of it is the emulation layer - They use a shared backend and launcher for the Genesis games. Maybe they couldn't come to a license agreement with the emulation developer? The standouts for me are Jet Set Radio and NiGHTS into Dreams. The former is well known for it's soundtrack; Ain't nothing but a funky beat. The latter is unique and doesn't quite work, but there's something compelling anyway about the dreamlike visuals and weird floaty gameplay. Crazy Taxi is one I loved as a kid, but it's a bad port - an "Enhanced Remake" that ruined the game by leaving out it's killer soundtrack and breaking the controls. https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/10143/SEGA_Mega_Drive_and_Genesis_Classics/ https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/10143/SEGA_Mega_Drive_... https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/14082/Dreamcast_Collection/ https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/14082/Dreamcast_Collec...
- rosmax_1337 2y agoIf you don't remove old good content nobody will buy the new bad content. Sounds cynical and it's certainly a practice which isn't exactly widespread, yet.
- hedora 2y agoIt's certainly widespread for movie remakes. Old classics usually cost money, or a specialty streaming service. New remakes of the same classics are usually on prime or netflix.
- lawlessone 2y agoRemakes are often bad because they're phoned in too ,to capitalize on the success of the orginal. I'm sure if as much effort was put into a remake as an original then the remake would be great.
- shiroiushi 2y agoThere are some examples of remakes that are great. Frequently, these become the "classics" and people forget about the original. A canonical example is John Carpenter's "The Thing" in 1982, which was a remake of a somewhat crappy 50s movie and is now a sci-fi horror classic. Another good example is "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" from 1978, starring Donald Sutherland. It was a remake of a 1950s movie too, though in that case the 50s movie was actually pretty good, but the 1978 one was scarier. I can't think of any good remakes from after the year 2000.
- jhbadger 2y agoDoes the Coen Brothers 2010 version of True Grit count? I think it was better than the 1969 John Wayne version, but maybe it doesn't count as a "remake" because both were based on Charles Portis' novel.
- shiroiushi 2y ago
- mikepavone 2y agoFor what it's worth, the existing Genesis/Mega Drive titles here generally contain the actual ROM. It's generally the cheapest way to get a legitimate copy of these games for use in an emulator. I realize a lot of folks probably don't care about that, but it's a good option for those that do.
- AlienRobot 2y agoI already own the bundle on Steam, but I wish they would just sell the ROM files instead and tell you "just use it in any emulator."
- hinkley 2y agoI don't recognize most of these but I do recognize Golden Axe.
- ofrzeta 2y agoDid they actually port the games to PC? Or did they link them with some kind of emulator layer?
- goosedragons 2y agoThe genesis games are emulated. Stuff like Crazy Taxi are ported.
- NikkiA 2y ago(from the xbox version, which was essentially a PC using DirectX anyway, so fairly minimal work)
- mindcrash 2y agoI looked into it a bit and if you want to be ready get this bundle: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/10143/SEGA_Mega_Drive_and_Genesis_Classics/ https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/10143/SEGA_Mega_Drive_... And this one: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/14082/Dreamcast_Collection/ https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/14082/Dreamcast_Collec... These contain every game about to be delisted. Each available for around 35 USD/EUR RRP The Steam Autumn Sale might be the last opportunity to get these on discount.