Steam is now Regionally restricted

[Prince of Ales]

Ah yeah, if there's people reselling from different regions then it makes perfect sense. It's a consequence of the EU VAT rules change that came into effect at the start of the year.

If I took my account to another country I'm betting it will still work.

 

[AT God]

STEAM IS NOT REGIONALLY RESTRICTED, YOUR THREAD TITLE IS INCORRECT.

The article you linked clearly says this applies to gifts, if it applied to games purchased through steam (NOT GIFTED THROUGH STEAM), it would mean that steam is region locked.

There is a major issue with steam's trading system and according to that PC gamer thing, that is what this applies to. Games cost different dollar values depending on where you are located in the world and some people abuse that fact by paying people in areas with lower prices to buy and gift games to people in areas with higher prices. Russia has lower game prices (or it did at one point) and I had a friend on Steam offer me a bunch of games at discount prices because he was in Russia and he wanted to make money, like if a game was the equivalent of 40 US dollars in Russia, but 60 US dollars in the US, he would sell games gift a game to someone for 50 US Dollars, that way both ends benefit.

I understand the automatic anger over any region locking but the alternative would be to charge uniform prices for all games across the globe, or jack up the prices so that games were scaled to make a 60 dollar game in the US equal 60 dollars in a place where games are usually cheaper.

Thats why I just don't do the whole gifting/trading thing, I occasionally buy a friend a game on their wishlist but if worst case scenario happens and they move and lose access to it, they aren't technically out any money. Now if Steam region locks games that are bought directly off the store and for the purchasers Steam account, then I would be mad.

I get that its a bummer but thats no reason to mislead people over the truth, especially when your own post shows that you are wrong.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Well at the very least, I can say that I am still able to purchase games on my US account and play them in Japan. Just tested by buying Child of Light. Previously purchased games work as well.

 

[josemlopes]

So the article is about the gifts restrictions something that happened about a month ago I think and are a thing because of people buying russian or brazilian keys that are dirt cheap. Still a loss for the consumer but nowhere near what the title implied

 

[Flames66]

My question is what if you take your laptop (or even big boy PC) on a big trip to a another region and the trip last longer than the two week time limit for Go Offline Mode? (Is GOM still a thing?) Or, you want to buy a game with on vacation/business in another region?

Steam should just look at the person's address on file and compare to where they are. If the regions match, let the stuff work. If the regions don't match, but the computer was registered in the address's region, let them at least play their games, if not also buy new games. (Safety measures would have to be in place so no one can cheat the system by purchasing games for cheaper than what they would normally play.) Finally, there should be a way to keep (most of) your games but change your region because you moved. That one should have severe limitations but at least allow you to do it at least every so often, even if it was a hidden option and you had to contact Steam Support to do so. (Think about business people, military personnel and families, diplomats and their families.)

I think I see where you are coming from here, but I disagree. The system should be completely unrestricted by region and every game should have a universal global price. Locking things by region is severely outdated and needs to be forgotten more thoroughly than using mercury to treat headaches.

 

[Erttheking]

I never got the point of region locking. I mean how does ANYONE benefit? It feels like being a dick for the sake of being a dick.

 

[Albino Boo]

In shock news company restricts gift from countries whose currencies are tanking. What a game priced in roubles is worth 50% less in dollars than it was this time last year. So to stop people buying in countries with falling currencies and then "gifting" to them the rest of world and profit to themselves regional restrictions where introduced.

 

[Denamic]

What people were doing was essentially tax evasion, so I understand why valve would do this. It's easy to get upset at them because you lose a way to pay less for games, but I see it as an unfortunate but necessary action.

 

[Noblemartel]

Ah as I expected the thread is full of hyperbole and clearly people haven't actually read the post.

This is to do with gifted games rather than just games in general, such as moving your PC to another country your games will still work fine.

The reasoning behind this is simple, companies were mass buying keys at cheap rates in 3rd world locations and then selling the keys for a profit to people overseas.

Now this restriction isn't actually new, Valve spoke of this ages ago, but this is the first time they have decided to implement a block on the gifting across greatly differing price brackets.

Wrong. all of the games that I purchase here in singapore have a warning saying that they are only accessible in Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia... it's really annoying and has been in place for a while so I'm unsure why you guys are bringing it up now.

Edit: This isn't a response to just you it's to everyone.

 

[Lilani]

I have to go with the "misleading thread" camp--it has only to do with gifted games, and for a pretty legit reason of preventing people from taking advantage of local pricing quirks.

Though I will say it was skeezy of them to do it quietly and not offer support or clarification to legitimate customers facing issues. You know better than to do this to your customers, Valve.

 

[lacktheknack]

I tried to buy Puzzle Quest 2 a month ago and it wouldn't let me. Now I know why.

This is ridiculous. I'm going to be moving back and forth between North America and East Europe a lot in the future if I have my way, how much of my library is going to stop functioning each time? Terrible, terrible move, Valve. If you and gog.com have the same title, gog.com is going to get my money every time now, regardless of which is cheaper.

 

[lacktheknack]

I have to go with the "misleading thread" camp--it has only to do with gifted games, and for a pretty legit reason of preventing people from taking advantage of local pricing quirks.

STEAM IS NOT REGIONALLY RESTRICTED, YOUR THREAD TITLE IS INCORRECT.

The article you linked clearly says this applies to gifts, if it applied to games purchased through steam (NOT GIFTED THROUGH STEAM), it would mean that steam is region locked.

Ah as I expected the thread is full of hyperbole and clearly people haven't actually read the post.

This is to do with gifted games rather than just games in general, such as moving your PC to another country your games will still work fine.

I DID read it, and saw this:

The restrictions may also apply to more than just gifts: A user who purchased Skyrim while he was living in Ukraine found that it wouldn't run when he moved back to the US; ironically, he couldn't re-buy it until he contacted Steam support and had the original key deleted from his account.

Also, Valve straight up won't let me buy Puzzle Quest 2, and a quick Google search shows that other Canadians are having the same "problem".

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Thanks for regressing Valve and pulling a Nintendo move of all things :/

 

[Lilani]

I have to go with the "misleading thread" camp--it has only to do with gifted games, and for a pretty legit reason of preventing people from taking advantage of local pricing quirks.

STEAM IS NOT REGIONALLY RESTRICTED, YOUR THREAD TITLE IS INCORRECT.

The article you linked clearly says this applies to gifts, if it applied to games purchased through steam (NOT GIFTED THROUGH STEAM), it would mean that steam is region locked.

Ah as I expected the thread is full of hyperbole and clearly people haven't actually read the post.

This is to do with gifted games rather than just games in general, such as moving your PC to another country your games will still work fine.

I DID read it, and saw this:

The restrictions may also apply to more than just gifts: A user who purchased Skyrim while he was living in Ukraine found that it wouldn't run when he moved back to the US; ironically, he couldn't re-buy it until he contacted Steam support and had the original key deleted from his account.

Also, Valve straight up won't let me buy Puzzle Quest 2, and a quick Google search shows that other Canadians are having the same "problem".

Sorry for not trimming the quotes, I'm on my phone.

Is that truly something on Valve's end, or is it that the dev hasn't released the game in Canada? Steam is only the platform, it can't sell a game in a place the dev hasn't released it to be sold. If you bought the game in Canada but can't play it anywhere else, or bought it somewhere else and can't play in Canada then that's region locking. But if you can't buy the game in your country at all that sounds like a restriction the dev made, not Steam. Steam being just the store I can't imagine they could straight up prevent people from buying and playing things in countries the devs have cleared them to be sold in, at least without working it out with the dev in advance.

 

[lacktheknack]

Sorry for not trimming the quotes, I'm on my phone.

Is that truly something on Valve's end, or is it that the dev hasn't released the game in Canada? Steam is only the platform, it can't sell a game in a place the dev hasn't released it to be sold. If you bought the game in Canada but can't play it anywhere else, or bought it somewhere else and can't play in Canada then that's region locking. But if you can't buy the game in your country at all that sounds like a restriction the dev made, not Steam. Steam being just the store I can't imagine they could straight up prevent people from buying and playing things in countries the devs have cleared them to be sold in, at least without working it out with the dev in advance.

You USED to be able to buy it, and you can still buy the mobile and box editions here via not-Steam. The least malicious explanation is that it's a glitch that they haven't fixed in half a year. The more reasonable explanation is that Valve or the devs decided to stop selling it here via Steam for whatever reason.

 

[Lilani]

Sorry for not trimming the quotes, I'm on my phone.

Is that truly something on Valve's end, or is it that the dev hasn't released the game in Canada? Steam is only the platform, it can't sell a game in a place the dev hasn't released it to be sold. If you bought the game in Canada but can't play it anywhere else, or bought it somewhere else and can't play in Canada then that's region locking. But if you can't buy the game in your country at all that sounds like a restriction the dev made, not Steam. Steam being just the store I can't imagine they could straight up prevent people from buying and playing things in countries the devs have cleared them to be sold in, at least without working it out with the dev in advance.

You USED to be able to buy it, and you can still buy the mobile and box editions here via not-Steam. The least malicious explanation is that it's a glitch that they haven't fixed in half a year. The more reasonable explanation is that Valve or the devs decided to stop selling it here via Steam for whatever reason.

That definitely sounds like a dev decision. Unless it's a bad game which is earning them bad press Valve has no reason to just suddenly pull the plug on games, I imagine they're getting a lean cut from every unit sold. Again, Steam is just the store. Excepting extreme cases they can't just pull the rug out from under a dev like that, and nor do they have much of a reason to.

 

[Noblemartel]

This is actually quite odd. I went to buy something so I could grab a screenshot of the message I was talking about and it wasn't there anymore... I'm almost positive I saw it last time I bought something and many times before. Ah well guess I can't show you guys.

Edit: found something similar only the message I had said it applied to purchases in general not gifts.http://i.imgur.com/RCDQtSS.png

 

[Albino Boo]

I think I see where you are coming from here, but I disagree. The system should be completely unrestricted by region and every game should have a universal global price. Locking things by region is severely outdated and needs to be forgotten more thoroughly than using mercury to treat headaches.

I strongly suggest that you understand that currencies do not stay static in relation to each other. The Rouble is worth 50% less Dollars than a year ago. So a game priced in Roubles would be half the dollar price. To stop people buying games in Roubles and then selling it as a gift at profit to themselves regions are locked.

 

[AT God]

snip

I DID read it, and saw this:

The restrictions may also apply to more than just gifts: A user who purchased Skyrim while he was living in Ukraine found that it wouldn't run when he moved back to the US; ironically, he couldn't re-buy it until he contacted Steam support and had the original key deleted from his account.

Also, Valve straight up won't let me buy Puzzle Quest 2, and a quick Google search shows that other Canadians are having the same "problem".

One man's mention of having an issue with Skyrim doesn't mean Steam has region locking. There are millions of concurrent steam users, if region locking were added there would be hundreds of these reports. Games within Steam can be region locked, it appears Skyrim might be one of them. If Steam, as a whole, were region locked, every single game that the guy purchased (not received thru gifts) while in the Ukraine would have had the same issue he reports with Skyrim.

Also, not having a game available in your area is not at all Steam's fault, that is something the publisher/developer/whoever does. Hotline Miami 2 isn't sold in Australia, that doesn't mean Steam region locked it there, its something else. Same goes for hundreds of World War 2 games in Germany, they aren't region locked by Steam but by the German government.

PC Gamer really went crazy with that insinuation that one reported incident with a single title means region locking.

Personally, I don't understand why Puzzle Quest wouldn't be allowed in Canada but it could be a programming error or maybe the developer hates Canada for some reason, regardless a game not being available in one area isn't the sort of region locking being discussed by the article or the OP's post.

You can actually test this region locking thingy at home (although I wouldn't recommend it due to possible security issues) by using a proxy server in another country to log in to your steam account and run games. I have done it before when I wanted to set up a virtual LAN and my usual program for doing so wasn't working, one Steam account connected through a server in the Netherlands played games bought in the US. (Note: this was months ago so it doesn't apply to this discussion and I do not recommend doing this, just saying that it can be done if you are that curious about Steam being evil or whatever the intention of this thread is)

 

[lacktheknack]

I think I see where you are coming from here, but I disagree. The system should be completely unrestricted by region and every game should have a universal global price. Locking things by region is severely outdated and needs to be forgotten more thoroughly than using mercury to treat headaches.

I strongly suggest that you understand that currencies do not stay static in relation to each other. The Rouble is worth 50% less Dollars than a year ago. So a game priced in Roubles would be half the dollar price. To stop people buying games in Roubles and then selling it as a gift at profit to themselves regions are locked.

I... didn't... say... that...