If you cannot pass on your ownership rights to your purchased games to your children, then you cannot pass on your copyright either, I guess?

  • @[email protected]
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    841 month ago

    I mean… They’re saying they can’t transfer games from one account to another right? But you could just put your account details in your will and anyone could login to your steam account and access your games, right?

    Sure would be nice if they had the feature. But I’m not sure it’s such a big deal.

    • @[email protected]
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      481 month ago

      This is explicitly against their TOS. Whether or not you’ll be found out is a whole other matter

      • warm
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        1 month ago

        I suppose they would only find out when the account is still in use after 130 years.

        Or if they cared to check payment details and such.

        • Footnote2669
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          111 month ago

          What if I’m planning to live for more than 130 years, then what? Fuck big corporations /s

          • Beaver
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            228 days ago

            Start following the blue zone life style friend!

      • @[email protected]
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        71 month ago

        I can’t be arsed to read the ToS again, but is it also forbidden to just share an account between several people?

        My brother and I opened up that account six years ago and except for the times I forgot to turn my internet off to not be kicked out of games while my brother plays one we never had problems. It would be really shitty if we got into trouble for this because the account is valued somewhere between 1.500 and 4.300€ and is the most expensive thing I own except for my PC.

        • Alto
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          101 month ago

          Probably technically, but I can almost guarantee you they quite literally couldn’t care less about two brothers sharing an account. They’re more worried about large groups sharing an account.

          • @[email protected]
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            21 month ago

            Over the years I have heard stories where Valve closes an account after the owners passing. This is usually because the poster said they had trouble with something and explained that the original owner passed. Valve then responds by closing the account and ignoring the issue.

            With that said I don’t think large groups of people can effectively share a library/account because only one person can play at a time. Small groups like spouses, parents, siblings or a small friend group is doable because it is easier to coordinate who is gonna use the account at any given time. This is especially true if they live together.

            With the Deck, I have issues where I boot up a game on my living room PC and my Deck closes it’s game making me lose progress on the Deck. Imagine that multiplied 20x. Getting kicked mid match, losing that boss fight, lose your high score, getting left on cliffhanger mid cutscene. The throw your controller rage stuff.

      • @[email protected]
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        629 days ago

        This is explicitly against their TOS. Whether or not you’ll be found out is a whole other matter

        Also whether or not those TOS are legally enforceable in every single country Valve operates in.

  • @[email protected]
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    561 month ago

    Honestly it’s bullshit, thousands of dollars of games have died with my brother-in-law, and it’s just another reason to pirate everything digital you can.

    Don’t die without a will and don’t die without telling family important details/passwords.

  • Null User Object
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    371 month ago

    IANAL, but I feel like if the heirs to an estate cared enough about the deceased’s Steam account enough to get the court involved, Steam wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. But that’s probably what it would take to get them to do the right thing.

  • @[email protected]
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    331 month ago

    That’s ridiculous. You should be free to give away, sell, or trade digital games just like you can with physical copies.

        • @[email protected]
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          111 month ago

          Not the whole account, only individual games.

          Last I heard, Steam hadn’t actually implemented that functionality yet, though.

          • exu
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            21 month ago

            It would probably take someone to sue them, but they would have to implement it.

    • @[email protected]
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      28 days ago

      Agree, even more so with the private cloud data. If your loved one dies and you want to visit multiplayer you created together in open world builders it would be shitty to take that away from them. Eg: Father and son played Minecraft together on LAN server or whatever (If that even is a thing)

    • @[email protected]
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      381 month ago

      Yes, Gaben personally goes to every funeral and tells your beloved ones “Hello, I’m Gabe Newell and this was one of our best costumers”

        • @[email protected]
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          21 month ago

          No, you can’t transfer your account to someone else. You can give someone else your password, but that doesn’t make them the official owner.

    • @[email protected]
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      01 month ago

      I mean you’d hope people would have kids to play games with them, which means they would probably build their own steam library hopefully before you die and would be willing to hand it off. While you’re alive you can use the family share setting so they can play your games and leave them the credentials to your account in your family’s password manager that they inherit

  • kbal
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    101 month ago

    That’s okay, I plan to be reincarnated.

  • @[email protected]
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    1 month ago

    You typically don’t get “ownership rights” when you purchase a game on Steam. You’ll typically be purchasing a licence to play the game, which could be taken away at any point. Some Steam games don’t include DRM after installation, and you’ll truly own those games after downloading them. (you can search for a game here, and find the DRM used) I’d recommend avoiding purchasing games on Steam whenever DRM is included if you want to own the game you’d buy, there are a lot of online stores that sell games without DRM.

    • TFO Winder
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      61 month ago

      Can same game be with DRM on steam and without DRM on other platform.

      • @[email protected]
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        51 month ago

        Yes, happens all the time on gog. They don’t have the same library of games but there is an overlap.

        • @[email protected]
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          230 days ago

          If the game is DRM free on GOG it usually only has the Steamworks DRM on steam. That one is so easy to remove that you might aswell call it DRM free since its only use is to make publishers think their game is protected.

      • Red
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        41 month ago

        Yes. In those cases the steam DRM is usually for achievements, friend joining, and checking that it was run via steam.

        There are plenty of “steam emulators” or even patchers that remove the steam DRM.

        So as long as you have the files applications such as SteamEMU and Steamless are godsends in ensuring that when you “buy” a game you will still be able to play it.

    • @[email protected]
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      229 days ago

      You typically don’t get “ownership rights” when you purchase a game on Steam. You’ll typically be purchasing a licence to play the game, which could be taken away at any point.

      That is certainly what Valve thinks and writes in their TOS but if their store has a big button that says “BUY HALO” then courts may very well decide that you actually bought Halo.
      And many countries have a strict legal definition of what buying means that cannot be overruled by some company’s TOS.

      • @[email protected]
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        117 days ago

        That’s why the button says “purchase” instead of “buy” it’s been a bit since I used Steam, so I had to check to be sure. I think there’s a legal loophole there, but I’m not great with English.

        • @[email protected]
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          117 days ago

          That’s why the button says “purchase” instead of “buy”

          First off, they’re synonyms
          https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/purchase#synonyms

          Now, I’m certainly no expert on the US legal system. It certainly seems silly if you could circumvent entire laws just by using synonyms but what do I know.
          However I have been talking about other countries where that is not the case and where the language is not English.
          So It really doesn’t matter whether it say “buy” or “purchase” in English when it’s “kaufen” in German or “acheter” in French.

  • Beaver
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    828 days ago

    Valve needs to be forced to allow customers to sell and trade their digital games

  • @[email protected]
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    628 days ago

    Fine just create a digital corporation of your identity and assign rights to that instead. I hear they have the same rights as people.

  • @[email protected]
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    530 days ago

    It is worth noting here that Valve recently announced a new feature that allows Steam users to share games with their friends and family. Dubbed “Steam Families,”

    New? That exists for years Oo. Or what am I missing here?

  • @index
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    -11 month ago

    What’s a steam account and why would i want one?

    • @Piemanding
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      41 month ago

      It’s the biggest video game marketplace/launcher/DRM makers for PC. If you play video games on PC most games you buy would probably have to be through steam. Their parent company, Valve, is the only multi-billion dollar company I like because so far they have stayed pro-consumer.

      • @[email protected]
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        31 month ago

        Which explain why game piracy stay pretty low too. Valve with steam provide a great service

      • Night Monkey
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        030 days ago

        😂 this platform continues to make me laugh. Everybody worships steam but somehow all other businesses are bad.

        • @[email protected]
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          329 days ago

          Yeah also billionaires are literally satan but Gabe Newell gets a pass for some reason lol

          • Night Monkey
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            128 days ago

            Lol yep. They used to think the same way about Elon musk until he bought Twitter and started speaking his mind. Same with the orange man. They all loved him and then one day the software update went out and it was instant hate.

        • xerazal
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          328 days ago

          Yes as a long time PC gamer, I don’t understand why people act as if steam and valve are gods. Like ok cool it has the most games and whatever, but they’ve been going downhill. There’s so many random asset flips and porn games now, and their sales have been shit for years now. I remember games going on sale for 90% off during seasonal sales, and all the % off coupons they’d just randomly give out. That never happens now.

          • Night Monkey
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            28 days ago

            Exactly. This is why I buy grey market steam game codes for games now.

        • @[email protected]
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          128 days ago

          Steam has mostly fixed the “service” issue compared to something like streaming services. One place to get almost any and all games. One account to access it all. Very simple for the end user. And does a load for the community as well. Take a look at proton for a example.