Valve punking users by region

CoffeeShark · #1 (**permalink**) 10-25-2007, 12:43 PM

Gamers who bought the international edition of Orange Box (for less $$), and are playing it in the US are finding that their Keys are being invalidated by Valve.

Complaints: Valve "Deactivating" Customers Who Bought "Orange Box" Internationally

punked, beetches.

FuzzyLogik · #2 (**permalink**) 10-25-2007, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CoffeeShark

Gamers who bought the international edition of Orange Box (for less $$), and are playing it in the US are finding that their Keys are being invalidated by Valve.

Complaints: Valve "Deactivating" Customers Who Bought "Orange Box" Internationally

punked, beetches.

Rofl...oops.

Why didn't they just pre-order it :P

and lol.... not like it's that expensive anyways.... now if they want to play it they have to buy it again and pay a lot more than everybody else!

DominiKing · #3 (**permalink**) 10-25-2007, 03:59 PM

jajaja goood for them! stupid a-holes. i havent gotten mine yet but will get it on steam in a couple weeeks

Jewtino · #4 (**permalink**) 10-25-2007, 05:15 PM

OWWWWW, cornholed.

Fischig · #5 (**permalink**) 10-25-2007, 07:20 PM

roflpwnt

Bob · #6 (**permalink**) 10-26-2007, 07:47 AM

This is upsetting what the world is coming to. Who cares if they buy the game in another country it doesn't really matter. The fact is that they paid for their game and valve should have no right at all to go and deactivate them. Valve, in my opinion, has lost some of my respect.

Tyrant · #7 (**permalink**) 10-26-2007, 08:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bob

This is upsetting what the world is coming to. Who cares if they buy the game in another country it doesn't really matter. The fact is that they paid for their game and valve should have no right at all to go and deactivate them. Valve, in my opinion, has lost some of my respect.

I actually agree with Bob.

First of all, if it's the same game, why is it cheaper in other countries and why would Valve care if some people bought it at the price THEY set in another part of the world?

Second, I have bought a couple games when I was visiting Spain (although they weren't PC games), and I would be pissed if I found out I couldn't play them back in the U.S. just because I bought it in another country.

Maybe there's something to this we're missing, but if it's just because it was cheaper somewhere else, Valve should be ashamed.

Edit:

Quote:

There is a huge fatwallet.com thread about this, which is I'm sure where the original complainer is coming from. Basically someone on fatwallet discovered you could get this from a Thai company for the equivalent of $20 US. It involved scanning in and sending them copies of your drivers license and credit card (with some stuff blurred out) to 'authenticate' your purchase. The Thai place would then (if you chose) just send you the serial number from the Orange Box.
Don't tell me this sounds like it is on the up-and-up. To the original poster, and his buddies on fatwallet, if it looks too good to be true, then it probably is.

Okay, that does sound pretty shady, in this case maybe Valve did the right thing.

Tyrant · #8 (**permalink**) 10-26-2007, 08:36 AM

And I'm sure it's in their EULA that they have the right to do whatever the f@@k they want to the user who buys their game, so I doubt there's anything any of them can do but complain to the retailer that sold them the game.

SonicSpeed · #9 (**permalink**) 10-26-2007, 11:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tyrant

Second, I have bought a couple games when I was visiting Spain (although they weren't PC games), and I would be pissed if I found out I couldn't play them back in the U.S. just because I bought it in another country.

Actually you'd probably run into a few problems if you bought console games in Spain... first would be region protection (US is a part of Region 1, and Spain is region 2)

Then there's the PAL vs NTSC problem...

But for PC games, I think the biggest reason that they could be deactivating is because the companies in question could be a bit questionable... I remember when my father went to Singapore a year back you still could buy pirated games and OS'es for around $5.

FuzzyLogik · #10 (**permalink**) 10-26-2007, 12:15 PM

It's all about control - I wouldn't doubt that those games are pirated (I've bought a bunch of stuff in Bangkok once... pratically 90% of the stuff is questionable) - but there's specific rules with trading and prices in different countries because of those regulations. They're set that way because they have to be set that way, Valve probably didn't have much choice with the price.

It'd be like buying a car in a different country (for cheaper) bring it back to the US and not paying taxes on it or the cost of importing the car. It's just Illegal.

Those games were designed to be played overseas, not here... which is probably why it was so easy to figure out that people were doing this in the first place. :P