Marlowe45 on 15/10/2024 at 22:42
I have hard copies of the entire Thief series (except NuThief) but I also have steam copies as well. Today when I went into Thief Gold on Steam I had to accept a new EULA agreement before I could play the game.
Wonder if this portends anything in the future for new games...for better of for worse.
When it popped up I heard Garret's voice in my head go "ahhh interesting."
voodoo47 on 15/10/2024 at 22:51
yeah, it's that you actually don't own the games you buy thing. now where did my eyepatch and parrot go?
Tomi on 15/10/2024 at 23:52
That's why you should buy your digital games on GOG.com. You actually own the games that you buy. The Thief series is often for sale over there, even right now actually. Thief Gold for example costs just €0.99!
voodoo47 on 16/10/2024 at 09:20
GOG just makes your life easier by making offline installers available (for most of their games), but apart from that, it actually doesn't matter, EULA is irrelevant if you live outside US, you paid for it you are entitled to use it. that means in most countries, you are legally permitted to remedy a situation where you would lose access to the installation files or the game itself by any means necessary - download an iso file, no-cd/3rdparty patch, keygen, edit the game files, activate using a dummy server, anything goes, EULA can scream bloody murder all day and then some.
so as long as you have the receipt, you can legally play the game forever, unless the publisher has some technical means to prevent you from doing that (multiplayer for example, if the publisher is the only one running the MP servers). so, if steam locks me out of my account (a grand loss of about 30 dollars), then I can simply get the installers from wherever, use that to install the games, and everything is just fine, if valve calls the local law enforcement and informs them about an EULA breach, they are going to laugh so hard they'll choke on their doughnuts. and if they send you some angry letters, just let them know you are making them public so everyone can laugh, and ask for more - free entertainment.
iirc EU is actually preparing a legislation that would unify this (basically making it very official that publishers are not permitted to pull this garbage, or rather, that EULA cannot be enforced in any shape or form), but don't quote me on that.
demagogue on 17/10/2024 at 22:33
I've just copied over my original installs since 1998 or whenever it was all this time.
voodoo47 on 18/10/2024 at 08:41
another thing I was doing happily before GOG were a thing was purchasing a physical copy of a game, keeping it shrink wrapped for potential future sale (and not burning through online activations if the game had them), and then just played a downloaded copy. again, legal over here, you paid for it, you get to play it, how you do it is completely up to you. ah, almost forgot to mention - not all is fine and dandy, the counterweight to this is that if you buy a multiplayer game and it doesn't work for whatever reason (serial number invalid, no more servers active etc), then you aren't getting your money back, if you try to call the authorities they will again just laugh very hard and that's going to be it.
Cigam on 10/11/2024 at 19:43
Quote Posted by voodoo47
another thing I was doing happily before GOG were a thing was purchasing a physical copy of a game, keeping it shrink wrapped for potential future sale (and not burning through online activations if the game had them), and then just played a downloaded copy. again, legal over here, you paid for it, you get to play it, how you do it is completely up to you.
Does that still apply when talking about obtaining a cracked version of a game, as opposed to a straight-copied version?
I seem to remember there being some European law that forbade the circumventing or breaking of digital copy protection mechanisms.
And this leading to suggestions of there being a conflict between this law and another law that gave the consumer the right to create a backup copy of any purchased game.
After all, how could a consumer exercise their right to create a backup copy of a CD / DVD-only game if they do not have the right to circumvent it's copy protection?
But then this was many years ago so perhaps this question has been resolved by now.
voodoo47 on 11/11/2024 at 00:26
would actually have to ask a local lawyer to give you a proper answer, but when you cut it all the way down, it's still "if you paid for it (one copy) and are using it (on one computer), no way anyone is going to cause you trouble just because you tweaked the software in some way (that the publisher doesn't like)".
SaferShadows on 2/12/2024 at 18:52
Imagine the terms of the company change now and then, but it does inspire curiosity in a new thief title
