EA and Origin: or the beginning of the end...

[Vagrant0]

Also, all these go back to 2010... the peak of Steam hate. So there's no way to know how true any of these are... The re-occuring "$500 account" bit is suspicious.

I see. So Steam became the magical good witch sometime .... after 2010? I don't for one second buy that.

No, just that around that time and for a few months prior there was a campaign among some to make up claims and do everything they could to talk about the "Evils" of Steam. And some people were all too willing to accept without thinking about the source, what the source intended, or how valid the claim.

 

And again, this is the sort of risk you take with ANY online transaction.

Nope, because when I buy hardware from an online retailer, they don't have the legal right to demand I return everything I ever bought from them if one transaction happens to bounce.

You're comparing a physical product with a digital one... There is a rather significant difference in both distribution, shipping, sales agreements, and ultimately scarcity. With software transmitted online, the only cost and delay is bandwidth. The data itself takes up relatively fewer resources than any physical product and can conceivably be replicated endlessly. Welcome to the world of tomorrow where there is so much a lack of scarcity that we have to make our own.

 

Also... You're talking about a direct payment for something that has to be physically shipped, rather than a payment which is made through a 3rd party and is instantaneous for download. If you cancel payment on the thing being shipped, they just stop shipping it, send you a bill, or send you bill to collections and screw over your credit. If you cancel payment on something being bought that is instantly available to you, the only way to block it is to stop that thing being available to you. In the case of Steam, where a game can be downloaded quickly over a high-speed connection. The game is connected to the account, and probably isn't something which can be disconnected by means of some arrangement with the programmer or simply how Steam works with that game. I don't know enough about the inner workings of knowing why Steam would do this, but I don't think they would have a system that works this way (given how unnecessary some of it seems and how much time it would take to process and deal with if it were anything close to a common occurrence) unless there were some substantial reason behind it.

 

And again... Steam hate belongs in another thread.

[Halororor]

 

No, just that around that time and for a few months prior there was a campaign among some to make up claims and do everything they could to talk about the "Evils" of Steam. And some people were all too willing to accept without thinking about the source, what the source intended, or how valid the claim.

 

 

Indeed. You always hear these horror stories about experiences with Steam, yet the claimant is the only person to have encountered it. Concerning bugs and technical issues, you'd expect at least a handful of people to have had similar experiences seeing as it's got a user base of several million, but no, only that one person encountered the issues. Makes you wonder.

[Arthmoor]

You're comparing a physical product with a digital one... There is a rather significant difference in both distribution, shipping, sales agreements, and ultimately scarcity.

Not if I bought a physical product. I would NEVER buy something that was only available as a Steam download. No matter who produced it or how good it might be. So no, I'm comparing physical purchase to physical purchase and that COPY is mine. This whole "software is licensed" thing falls apart badly under those conditions.

 

Valve also has the option to simply remove the product with the botched transaction from the user's account. Seriously, how hard could that be for them to do that? If it's just a one-time thing, no problem. The user and the company are still happy campers.

 

If you get someone with a demonstrated pattern of fraudulent activity and repeated abuse of the system, that's another matter entirely. Valve could then turn that person over to collections and screw over their credit in the same way someone pulling refund scams with physical products would be. Or turned over to the proper authorities for investigation of criminal activity.

 

Also, factual information about how Valve operates is not hate.

[Vagrant0]

You're comparing a physical product with a digital one... There is a rather significant difference in both distribution, shipping, sales agreements, and ultimately scarcity.

Not if I bought a physical product. I would NEVER buy something that was only available as a Steam download. No matter who produced it or how good it might be. So no, I'm comparing physical purchase to physical purchase and that COPY is mine. This whole "software is licensed" thing falls apart badly under those conditions.

Sadly, this is not how it works any more between EULAs, Online verifications, DRMS, and the whole slew of other anti-piracy things. Even if you have a physical copy of a game, it does not mean you have unlimited access to it. Blame ALL companies for trying to protect their product.

 

Valve also has the option to simply remove the product with the botched transaction from the user's account. Seriously, how hard could that be for them to do that? If it's just a one-time thing, no problem. The user and the company are still happy campers.

I'm not valve, I don't know how their system is setup... But, in this case any arguments of physical or non are invalid. In the case mentioned, the thing being purchased was a bundled group of games, as a temporarily special product... DOWNLOADED. It's not a case of one game. It's not a case of the person having a physical game that they've bought and are being locked out of (although other games tied to the account may have been physical). It's the case of several games which were not paid for, which were tied to an account as part of a promotion. Due to the nature of this purchase, it was probably more complicated than "unlinking it from their account." since the account may have already downloaded part of the games while the payment was being processed.

 

And again... this is maybe a dozen instances out of a few million users that have had no problems what so ever. Even if the claim is true, it still doesn't speak to a common situation, and probably is no longer subject to whatever restrictions are present in their system... Again, pretty much all those claims mentioned are over a year old. To say that the system hasn't been improved so that things like this aren't even more rare is a bit shortsighted.

 

 

Whereas Origins pretty much screws over EVERY customer purely for the gain of the company.