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Forums - Gaming - What does it even mean to “own” a video game?

Chrkeller said:
BraLoD said:

I'm not, you are. I'm making actual statements.

Sony could only brick my PS5 if I allowed that update to go through. And if they even released an update like that, they would be commiting a crime.

The thing is, no company like Sony, Nintendo, Microsoft, Sega, Ubisoft, Konami, etc could ever take the vast majority of my games away from me.

Valve could take your from you. Within their rights.

The likelyhood of it happening is meaningless, the fact you are under that possibility, even hypothetical, and I'm not, is what defines onwership to me, like any other product, someone would need to commit a crime against me for it to happen, or a natural disaster, or Godzilla not liking my house as you said.

Valve is literally selling you licenses within their entire right to revoke when needed, you are complying to exactly that when you are renting games in their service.

It would be silly if I said I expect it to happen, it's not silly to state it could in fact happen, meanwhile Godzilla not liking my house would be silly, it looks so good, we could even play my games together there instead.

hard, hard, hard disagree.  I don't worry about things that are extremely unlikely to happen.  I just don't.  I could slip down the stairs and crack my skull, but I ain't wearing a helmet when I walk steps.  

And Valve can't just remove games, there has to be legally justifiable reasons, not that it matters.  Your argument is basically "Valve could wreck their entire business for no reason" which is just, IMHO, silly.  

Have you ever read the terms of the license of games you are purchasing in Steam? BTW you are a subscriber of Steam, it is a service.

The Steam Subscriber Agreement says:

"This Steam Subscriber Agreement ("Agreement") is a legal document that explains your rights and obligations as a subscriber of Steam from Valve Corporation"

"Steam and your Subscription(s) require the download and installation of Content and Services onto your computer. Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a non-exclusive license and right, to use the Content and Services for your personal, non-commercial use (except where commercial use is expressly allowed herein or in the applicable Subscription Terms). This license ends upon termination of (a) this Agreement or (b) a Subscription that includes the license. The Content and Services are licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Content and Services. To make use of the Content and Services, you must have a Steam Account and you may be required to be running the Steam client and maintaining a connection to the Internet."

"Valve may restrict or cancel your Account or any particular Subscription(s) at any time in the event that (a) Valve ceases providing such Subscriptions to similarly situated Subscribers generally".

"You are entitled to use the Content and Services for your own personal use, but you are not entitled to: (i) sell, grant a security interest in or transfer reproductions of the Content and Services to other parties in any way, nor to rent, lease or license the Content and Services to others without the prior written consent of Valve, except to the extent expressly permitted elsewhere in this Agreement (including any Subscription Terms or Rules of Use)"

And much, much more. Go give it a read. You own nothing and you agree with it.

It's funny that you are arguing against a fact, and usually you are the one being argued against by stating facts where others respond to your posts.

Again, the likelyhood of it is meaningless, what is important is that is it a fact, not a supposition. Silly is to try to argue against it.



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BraLoD said:
Chrkeller said:

hard, hard, hard disagree.  I don't worry about things that are extremely unlikely to happen.  I just don't.  I could slip down the stairs and crack my skull, but I ain't wearing a helmet when I walk steps.  

And Valve can't just remove games, there has to be legally justifiable reasons, not that it matters.  Your argument is basically "Valve could wreck their entire business for no reason" which is just, IMHO, silly.  

Have you ever read the terms of the license of games you are purchasing in Steam? BTW you are a subscriber of Steam, it is a service.

The Steam Subscriber Agreement says:

"This Steam Subscriber Agreement ("Agreement") is a legal document that explains your rights and obligations as a subscriber of Steam from Valve Corporation"

"Steam and your Subscription(s) require the download and installation of Content and Services onto your computer. Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a non-exclusive license and right, to use the Content and Services for your personal, non-commercial use (except where commercial use is expressly allowed herein or in the applicable Subscription Terms). This license ends upon termination of (a) this Agreement or (b) a Subscription that includes the license. The Content and Services are licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Content and Services. To make use of the Content and Services, you must have a Steam Account and you may be required to be running the Steam client and maintaining a connection to the Internet."

"Valve may restrict or cancel your Account or any particular Subscription(s) at any time in the event that (a) Valve ceases providing such Subscriptions to similarly situated Subscribers generally".

"You are entitled to use the Content and Services for your own personal use, but you are not entitled to: (i) sell, grant a security interest in or transfer reproductions of the Content and Services to other parties in any way, nor to rent, lease or license the Content and Services to others without the prior written consent of Valve, except to the extent expressly permitted elsewhere in this Agreement (including any Subscription Terms or Rules of Use)"

And much, much more. Go give it a read. You own nothing and you agree with it.

It's funny that you are arguing against a fact, and usually you are the one being argued against by stating facts where others respond to your posts.

Again, the likelyhood of it is meaningless, what is important is that is it a fact, not a supposition. Silly is to try to argue against it.

We will have to agree to disagree.  I don't refute that the ownership is different, given it is a fact.  I just ask myself, is it a problem?  Will it be a problem?  The answer to both of those questions is "no."  I simply have better things to worry about than a 0.019% chance Steam takes my access away.  A quick google search says this has happened a couple dozen times over 125,000 games, which is 0.019%.



rtx 4090, 32 gb ram, i7-13700k

Switch 2

Chrkeller said:
BraLoD said:

Have you ever read the terms of the license of games you are purchasing in Steam? BTW you are a subscriber of Steam, it is a service.

The Steam Subscriber Agreement says:

"This Steam Subscriber Agreement ("Agreement") is a legal document that explains your rights and obligations as a subscriber of Steam from Valve Corporation"

"Steam and your Subscription(s) require the download and installation of Content and Services onto your computer. Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a non-exclusive license and right, to use the Content and Services for your personal, non-commercial use (except where commercial use is expressly allowed herein or in the applicable Subscription Terms). This license ends upon termination of (a) this Agreement or (b) a Subscription that includes the license. The Content and Services are licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Content and Services. To make use of the Content and Services, you must have a Steam Account and you may be required to be running the Steam client and maintaining a connection to the Internet."

"Valve may restrict or cancel your Account or any particular Subscription(s) at any time in the event that (a) Valve ceases providing such Subscriptions to similarly situated Subscribers generally".

"You are entitled to use the Content and Services for your own personal use, but you are not entitled to: (i) sell, grant a security interest in or transfer reproductions of the Content and Services to other parties in any way, nor to rent, lease or license the Content and Services to others without the prior written consent of Valve, except to the extent expressly permitted elsewhere in this Agreement (including any Subscription Terms or Rules of Use)"

And much, much more. Go give it a read. You own nothing and you agree with it.

It's funny that you are arguing against a fact, and usually you are the one being argued against by stating facts where others respond to your posts.

Again, the likelyhood of it is meaningless, what is important is that is it a fact, not a supposition. Silly is to try to argue against it.

We will have to agree to disagree.  I don't refute that the ownership is different, given it is a fact.  I just ask myself, is it a problem?  Will it be a problem?  The answer to both of those questions is "no."  I simply have better things to worry about than a 0.019% chance Steam takes my access away.  A quick google search says this has happened a couple dozen times over 125,000 games, which is 0.019%.

Sure, there is no need to worry about it right now. Valve is doing great and its in their best interest to keep doing exactly that.

Actually, even in the event it somehow goes under they could actually just allow anyone to run the games locally without the need of their client to work, it doesn't necessarily mean games would always just become unplayable, though we should really expect the worse outcome from money driven companies rather than the good one.

Valve is a privately owned company tho, it's as easy as someone willing to change it completely when Gabe is not there anymore for it to go terribly wrong, tho. We are seeing Epic right now letting go of 1000 people even when they have some of the most successful games ever. Despite all this success they started wasting a lot of money and losing players, and bad things are already happening. That's also a giant privately owned company, and literally anything could happen.



BraLoD said:
Chrkeller said:

We will have to agree to disagree.  I don't refute that the ownership is different, given it is a fact.  I just ask myself, is it a problem?  Will it be a problem?  The answer to both of those questions is "no."  I simply have better things to worry about than a 0.019% chance Steam takes my access away.  A quick google search says this has happened a couple dozen times over 125,000 games, which is 0.019%.

Sure, there is no need to worry about it right now. Valve is doing great and its in their best interest to keep doing exactly that.

Actually, even in the event is somehow goes under they could actually just allow anyone to run the games locally without the need of their client to work, it doesn't necessarily mean games would always just become unplayable, though we should really expect the worse outcome from money driven companies rather than the good one.

Valve is a privately owned company tho, it's an easy as someone willing to change it completely when Gabe is not there anymore for it to go terribly wrong, tho. We are seeing Epic right now letting go of 1000 people even when they have some of the most successful games ever. Despite all this success they started wasting a lot of money and losing players, and bad things are already happening. That's also a giant privately owned company, and literally anything could happen.

My theory, if Valve did go under or whatever, the PC community would hack/mod/reverse engineer the client service in a month, and we would carry on.  



rtx 4090, 32 gb ram, i7-13700k

Switch 2

Chrkeller said:
BraLoD said:

Sure, there is no need to worry about it right now. Valve is doing great and its in their best interest to keep doing exactly that.

Actually, even in the event is somehow goes under they could actually just allow anyone to run the games locally without the need of their client to work, it doesn't necessarily mean games would always just become unplayable, though we should really expect the worse outcome from money driven companies rather than the good one.

Valve is a privately owned company tho, it's an easy as someone willing to change it completely when Gabe is not there anymore for it to go terribly wrong, tho. We are seeing Epic right now letting go of 1000 people even when they have some of the most successful games ever. Despite all this success they started wasting a lot of money and losing players, and bad things are already happening. That's also a giant privately owned company, and literally anything could happen.

My theory, if Valve did go under or whatever, the PC community would hack/mod/reverse engineer the client service in a month, and we would carry on.  

As long as something illegal is upon the table then there is really nothing to worry about either, only electricity shortage or lack of access could ruin gaming then.



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Chrkeller said:

My theory, if Valve did go under or whatever, the PC community would hack/mod/reverse engineer the client service in a month, and we would carry on.  

Yeah, that's why I don't worry about Steam going under.

Still, I'd say that loosing your account is more likely than loosing your physical games, and why pretty much only GOG bought games are digitally owned.



HoloDust said:
Chrkeller said:

My theory, if Valve did go under or whatever, the PC community would hack/mod/reverse engineer the client service in a month, and we would carry on.  

Yeah, that's why I don't worry about Steam going under.

Still, I'd say that loosing your account is more likely than loosing your physical games, and why pretty much only GOG bought games are digitally owned.

My biggest concern is someone hacking my Steam account and stealing my downloads via email change.  That I think is a legit concern.  It is shocking how easy it is to change email address linked to Steam, then change password.  I changed one of my old accounts to my daughter's email, it wasn't as hard as I think it should have been.



rtx 4090, 32 gb ram, i7-13700k

Switch 2

Chrkeller said:
BraLoD said:

That would require an external factor not related to any of my games, unlike the case of Steam.

So yeah, quite cheeky, it points out the fragility of it quite a lot, as Valve literally could ruin your games meanwhile no game company in the world could ruin mine.

Lol, if you say so.  I mean sure, Steam could, in theory, drop their core business that is generation $17,000,000,000 a year, with 75% market share, in a growing industry.  I guess Apple could just close up shop too?  Hey, what if Jensen decides to shut down Nvidia today?!!?? 

OMG, what if Sony releases an update that bricks all ps5 units and they walk away from gaming????!!!???

come on man, you do realize how silly you are being, yeah?  

Damn i dispise these "pc master race" " digital is king"  people...BUT you are right on this one.



 

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xl-klaudkil said:
Chrkeller said:

Lol, if you say so.  I mean sure, Steam could, in theory, drop their core business that is generation $17,000,000,000 a year, with 75% market share, in a growing industry.  I guess Apple could just close up shop too?  Hey, what if Jensen decides to shut down Nvidia today?!!?? 

OMG, what if Sony releases an update that bricks all ps5 units and they walk away from gaming????!!!???

come on man, you do realize how silly you are being, yeah?  

Damn i dispise these "pc master race" " digital is king"  people...BUT you are right on this one.

I like having fun with the whole PC master race, but for me it is more of a joke.  Mainly because while PC is superior, it gets decimated for bang for buck.  Sure, my rig significantly outperforms a ps5 pro, but it was also 5x more expensive.  Bang for buck, consoles win by a massive margin. 

As for digital, I just don't like dealing with physical, because I am lazy and my wife doesn't like clutter.    



rtx 4090, 32 gb ram, i7-13700k

Switch 2

Chrkeller said:

I like having fun with the whole PC master race, but for me it is more of a joke.  Mainly because while PC is superior, it gets decimated for bang for buck.  Sure, my rig significantly outperforms a ps5 pro, but it was also 5x more expensive.  Bang for buck, consoles win by a massive margin. 

As for digital, I just don't like dealing with physical, because I am lazy and my wife doesn't like clutter.    

IMO PC has far FAR more bang for its buck than something like a PS5. Windows has an Xbox Mode, meaning that right off the bat you’ve already saved $700USD. And then there’s ease of emulation, free online, a massive supply of cloud storage for save data (which isn’t tied to ToS of a games provider… meaning far less liklihood of losing all your save data and/or ROM/ISO files), universal backwards compatibility with QoL enhancements such as 244FPS 1440p, realistic CRT filters (so no need for a CRT), cheap Steam releases, as well as…erm…free access to really any game from any system released prior to 2020, AND it makes life significantly easier. As somebody who frequently uses my PC for studies/work, I cannot even begin to express how convenient it is to not have my PC overheating and crashing with more than two tabs open at a given time lol.