Ubisoft Revokes Digital Keys For Games Purchased Via Unauthorised Retailers

RogueyWon writes: For the last several days, some users of Ubisoft's uPlay system have been complaining that copies of games they purchased have been removed from their libraries. According to a statement issued to a number of gaming websites, Ubisoft believes that the digital keys revoked have been "fraudulently obtained." What this means in practice is unclear; while some of the keys may have been obtained using stolen credit card details, others appear to have been purchased from unofficial third-party resellers, who often undercut official stores by purchasing cheaper boxed retail copies of games and selling their key-codes online, or by exploiting regional price differences, buying codes in regions where games are cheaper to sell them elsewhere in the world. The latest round of revocations appears to have triggered an overdue debate into the fragility of customer rights in respect of digital games stores.

Comments

grandmother reference

[turkeydance]

“You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.” ok, i don't understand this.

Re:grandmother reference

[AK Marc]

ok, i don't understand this.

Ubisoft sold keys ad different prices. Some of the "cheap" keys were activated in "expensive" areas. Rather than identifying the resellers and shutting them down (though they may have done nothing wrong), Ubisoft identified the keys, and revoked them.

Note, Ubisoft made a profit selling these keys to authorized distributors, and the users paid for a (at the time) valid key. But Ubisoft thinks they could have extracted greater profit with a different sales plan, so they revoked them all to try again. Too many "save, restart" games played by Ubisoft.

Re:grandmother reference

[pla]

Simple, really:

Ubisoft just taught another generation of paying customers that piracy provides a superior product, regardless of price.

Congrats, Ubi! We haven't had a good DRM fuckup like this in a while - Without all your hard work, people might eventually forget how much it (and you) sucks. Keep up the good work!

Re:grandmother reference

[Pinhedd]

It's a marketing tactic called price discrimination.

The same product (usually a product with a very low marginal cost) is offered at different prices in different markets with the price tuned appropriately for each market.

A product may be offered at $60 in the North American market because that's what the market accepts as a fair value. On the other hand, $60 may be too high for a market such as eastern Europe, China, or South Asia where the per-capita income is much lower. Since the marginal cost of the product is very low, the product is sold at a lower price in regions with lower income. However, this opens up opportunities for grey-market activities where third parties purchase the product in the lower priced markets and resell them in the higher priced markets at a price below that of the original manufacturer. The third party then pockets the difference.

Grey market activities ultimately harm lower-income markets because these markets contribute substantially less to the manufacturer's bottom line. If revenue from the manufacturer's primary markets is threatened, they'll simply end price discrimination or cut off the weaker markets all together.

Re:grandmother reference

[kuzb]

Except in this era of increasing server-side reliance, game piracy is becoming less of an issue. It will eventually get to the point where you're not actually buying the game, you're buying an account with which you can then play the game. Since the majority of people don't think twice about needing to be always connected this trend will only continue.

Re:grandmother reference

[Sir_Substance]

I've been on an anti-account binge for a while. If your game requires me to make a new account, I'll never play it.

It hasn't really affected the quality of my gaming experience. Turns out companies that spend heaps of time making elaborate anti-piracy mechanisms make shit games, who knew?

As a side note, I haven't bought a Ubisoft game for about 4 years, ever since this incident:

Speaking to IncGamers, creative director Stanislas Mettra stated that there are currently no plans to bring the game to PC because of fears that only Pirates will steal the game, and the last thing he wants to hear is any of your incessant ‘bitching’ over the issue.

Again, it hasn't really affected the quality of my gaming experience. Occasionally, I wonder if I'm missing out on assassins creed, but then I go try to play Dishonored, and remember I hate the whole genre.

Re:grandmother reference

[Hamsterdan]

And that is why It's a bad idea to use software that relies on server side authentication. Case in point, I just reinstalled my security cam software, but it won't accept my *paid-for* license because it doesn't exist anymore. So my legally bought software is now useless.

Re:grandmother reference

[sjames]

Or to put it another way, they take advantage of unhealthy markets in North America that fail to push prices down to the marginal cost of production and do their best to defeat any natural market force that might bypass that market.

Re:grandmother reference

[sjames]

It's actually more analogous to living near the border and driving to the other country to buy your TV for less. Then when you get home, the manufacturer breaks in to your home and steals it.

Re:grandmother reference

[sg_oneill]

Ubisoft sold keys ad different prices. Some of the "cheap" keys were activated in "expensive" areas. Rather than identifying the resellers and shutting them down (though they may have done nothing wrong), Ubisoft identified the keys, and revoked them.

Note, Ubisoft made a profit selling these keys to authorized distributors, and the users paid for a (at the time) valid key. But Ubisoft thinks they could have extracted greater profit with a different sales plan, so they revoked them all to try again. Too many "save, restart" games played by Ubisoft.

I hope they didn't try this stunt on Australian customers. We have "parallel importation" legislation forbidding retailers from trying to prevent people monopolizing sales channels againt people who import cheaper from overseas. Back in the day, the ACCC actually forced retailers to stop supplying DVD players that where not multiregion, although the bloody conservatives put a stop to THOSE shenanigans. Hell back then the ACCC even sued Sony for going after mod-chippers.

Re:grandmother reference

[robosmurf]

That's not really true of Steam. The reason I (like many people) have huge Steam collections, is that they frequently DO offer games (including recent AAA ones) at a significant discount.

Re:grandmother reference

[TheRaven64]

It's really the only viable answer to piracy that's left and publishers are embracing it wholeheartedly.

I used to pirate games and I used to buy games. I eventually couldn't be bothered with pirating and worrying about malware or with trying to jump through the hoops that the publishers wanted, so I stopped playing games altogether. Then gog.com launched and sold me games that I was nostalgic about, cheaply. Then they started selling newer games. I spent more with them last six months than I did on total on games in the five years since Steam was launched and the industry wend DRM-happy. I can download DRM-free installers for all of the games, often in OS X, Windows, and Linux versions.

It turns out that there's another answer to piracy that works: sell your product in a way that's easy to use at a reasonable price. Stop worrying about pirates and start worrying about customers. Someone who wouldn't buy your game anyway who pirates it is not a lost sale, but someone who can't be bothered to put up with your treating them like a criminal and so doesn't buy from you is. Buying a game from gog.com is easier than pirating and, if you factor in the cost of your time, probably cheaper as well.

Give me a product I want for a reasonable price and I will happily hand over my money, because I feel that I'm getting something valuable in return. Don't, and... well, computer games are not the only form of entertainment available.

Re:grandmother reference

[Pinhedd]

Wrong.

The marginal cost of production is not the same as the total cost of production. The marginal cost of production is the cost to produce one more unit of a product. In the case of easily replicable digital products the marginal cost is negligible, especially when distributed digitally. The total cost of production includes other factors such as the massive amount of capital sunk into developing and marketing the product. Fixed costs need to be recouped for a project to break even and eventually turn a profit. If the price were depressed to the marginal cost of production the company would never recoup any of the fixed cost and hence never break even much less turn a profit.

Re:grandmother reference

[Cenan]

Except a pirated item does not equate to a lost sale. Further, those hypothetical people who would then download the pirated game have already paid, again not hurting sales. You'd be surprised how quickly people turn back to the monkey that kicked their teeth in for another treatment.

Event Y is going to hurt the profits of X - bullshit. Time and time again we're shown that prior reputation has absolutely nothing to do with future profits, contrary to common belief. My personal hypothesis is that marketing machines are just too good at hyping whatever game the company is putting out, making gamers want to fork over money to a disreputable company rather than wait for the pirated version to become available.

First Sale

[AK Marc]

Well, it's final. The Right of First Sale has been revoked. Soap, Ballot, and Jury boxes haven't worked. What's next?

Re:First Sale

[Gr8Apes]

People are still buying Ubisoft? Why? That's a serious question actually, why would you pay money for some DRM infested crap that corrupts your system? There's no game so important I'll corrupt my system to play it. Any Ubisoft game can wait until it goes on sale on GOG, or be avoided forever. No loss here.

Why you shouldnt buy anything with revocable DRM

[Crashmarik]

It's not about piracy it's about control, and what you "BOUGHT" isn't really yours.

In this case UBISOFT has a dispute with gray marketeers and decides to take it out on the customers instead of taking it to the courts with the people they have a problem with they lash out at the customers, taking advantage of the fact the customers will likely have to suck it up.

Smart move, Ubisoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you want piracy? Because this is how you get piracy.

I have an idea..

[grasshoppa]

STOP FUCKING GIVING UBISOFT MONEY.

By this point, anyone who gets bitten by this or any future shady behavior from a software house with such a sterling DRM reputation deserves whatever they get.

What they don't deserve is our pity. Ridicule maybe. I could even be convinced that "Mocking them" is the appropriate response.

Re:I have an idea..

[Fwipp]

It's like the old Texan saying: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, can't get fooled again."

This is like

[future assassin]

me in BC buying a car from a guy who bought/brought it in from Alberta and sold it through his car dealership in BC. Then Ford comes in and repossesses my car because I didn't get it through a dealer in BC and because the prices are lower in Alberta so it was unfair to the dealer in BC since it wasn't sold through an authorized dealer.

Re:Vote against Ubisoft with your dollars

[JMJimmy]

You still have the ballot box. Vote against Ubisoft with your euros, dollars, or whatever: stop buying Ubisoft games. Buy games in the same genre from their competitors and email your purchases (and reasoning) to Ubisoft support.

Yes, buy them from the likes of Microsoft who, after 9 years, changed their Xbox policy so that once you delete local content of a delisted game, you lose that content. They made no announcement, gave no notice of games being delisted, just changed their polices and screwed over their customers.

Or from Steam, who forces patches on you that can completely change the product you purchased. Bought a GFWL game? It's now a Steam Edition game.

Or Origins... *giggles*

They're all just as bad as the other because no one is willing to put up the money to fight them.

Everyone back up a step...

[Notabadguy]

FTFA -

Ubisoft claims (for what it's worth) that the only digital keys that they revoked were those purchased fraudulently with stolen credit cards.

No one has a right to keep stolen property. If you buy a watch in a pawn shop, and the police come for it because it's stolen, you forfeit the watch. Don't get me wrong - I absolutely detest Ubisoft, ever since XIII, and will never buy another product of theirs...I hope their corporate building burns down, they lose their IP to someone, and the name Ubisoft becomes a curseword...

But at the same time, clamoring that the stolen goods you purchased on the black market were taken away from you doesn't garner sympathy.

Re:Everyone back up a step...

[Anonymous Coward]

You should have read the first link:

1. a Belgian expat living in Poland buys his game from another country because all the ones sold in Poland are only in Polish language. He wanted the game in French or English language.
2. Ubisoft says "Fuck him, he's a dodgy motherfucker buying games from where we're making less profit. Off with his key!"

Re:Everyone back up a step...

[IamTheRealMike]

That's not what the second link says is happening though.

My reading of the second article is that there is the following problem. Website G2A.com allows private re-sale of game keys, whether that's to undercut the retail prices or avoid region locking or whatever is irrelevant. Carders are constantly on the lookout for ways to cash out stolen credit card numbers. Because fraudulent card purchases can be rolled back and because you have to go through ID verification to accept cards, spending them at their own shops doesn't work - craftier schemes are needed.

So what they do is go online and buy game activation keys in bulk with stolen cards. They know it will take time for the legit owners of the cards to notice and charge back the purchase. Then they go to G2A.com and sell the keys at cut-down prices to people who know they are obtaining keys from a dodgy backstreet source, either they sell for hard-to-reverse payment methods like Western Union or they just bet that nobody wants to file a complaint with PayPal saying they got ripped off trying to buy a $60 game for $5 on a forum known for piracy and unauthorised distribution.

Then what happens? Well, the game reseller gets delivered a list of card chargebacks by their banks and are told they have a limited amount of time to get the chargeback problem under control. Otherwise they will get cut off and not be able to accept credit card payments any more. The only available route to Ubisoft or whoever at this point is to revoke the stolen keys to try and kill the demand for the carded keys.

If that reading is correct then Ubisoft aren't to blame here. They can't just let this trade continue or it threatens their ability to accept legitimate card payments.

Re:Vote against Ubisoft with your dollars

[JMJimmy]

So you're saying Microsoft went and remotely erased your games or did you? If it was the former, then you may have an argument. If it was the latter, then the blame is solely yours.

Actually, in my case I didn't even get a chance to download it. I purchased a game December 3rd, sometime between now and then it was delisted, when I went to download it less than 60 days after purchase it was no longer possible.

Ubisoft has done this sort of stuff before

[Orion Blastar]

I bought some Ubisoft games at Big Lots on clearance for $5 in CD/DVD form.

One of the games had a discount code for half off the Ubisoft web store. I bought a few titles and applied the discount code to get half off my order. I entered my debit card and paid and waited for the software to ship. Two weeks later my order was canceled, out of stock on every item I ordered. My money was refunded. I tried the discount code again but now it doesn't work.

The games I bought for $5 at Big Lots, the keys were no longer valid.

Re:Vote against Ubisoft with your dollars

[JMJimmy]

You can quite easily disable updates in Steam per game. Are you saying they push updates even after you've disabled them?

Steam's current setup is that you can disable automatic updates on a per-game basis, however, only until you try to play it next at which time it forces the update on you. You can run in offline mode for up to 6 months, losing a huge chunk of Steam/some games in the process, but after 6 months you have to go online to re-validate your DRM and bam - updates.

Re:Why you shouldnt buy anything with revocable DR

[pla]

Or maybe it would be an idea to not buy from the cheapest seller

What a great moral to the story! "Quit price-shopping, assholes - Pay full retail, or we... will... fuck you!"

Glad to see people feel just peach about that.

Authorized resellers

[Xian97]

One problem is that how does the consumer know who are authorized resellers? Ubisoft doesn't have a list that I can find, so how do you know if a site is legitimate or not? It's hard to go by the old adage "if it looks too good to be true, it probably is" anymore, with so many sites having sales at cut rate prices on digital goods. I picked up a few "too good to be true" bargains last month during the Steam sales.

Congrats!

[duke_cheetah2003]

Dear UbiSoft,

You've just entered the same realm as Sony as a completely assbackwards company with no respect for your customers whom I will never do business with again, no matter what.

(not that I had a very high opinion of UbiSoft as it was, but this kind of shenanigan just brought it to the bottom.)