We've had colourful discussions about G2A in our Telegram group, IRC, reddit and other places. Some people don't care and just want cheap games, but for those of you who want to support not only Linux, but gaming in general—read on.
I've written before about how IndieGameStand has to deal with fraud, and it's not pretty.
The developer tinyBuild originally had their own shop on their website, which they had to shut down due to chargebacks. They noticed that later G2A would suddenly get a bunch of keys to their games.
Here's the developer tinyBuild on how G2A has sold approximately $450,000 worth of their games without them being compensated.
Note: Seems their website is now suffering problems, here's a screen-grab of the article.
The developer emailed the store, and got a reply along the lines of "you won't get a penny from us, start selling your games on our store or we won't do anything about it".
Stores like G2A make me very angry, ripping off developers and gamers and by the looks of it they don't give a hoot, disgusting.
If you didn't know about this, fair enough, but I urge you to stop now. If you buy from G2A and you understand this, you're not helping developers at all. I implore you: if you use G2A just stop.
I should note, that I don't personally see anything wrong in selling on keys you legally own and haven't used to someone else. The problem is that stores like G2A built a business around it, which has obviously attracted the attention of a fair amount of scammers using stolen credit cards to buy keys and sell on. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
I've written before about how IndieGameStand has to deal with fraud, and it's not pretty.
The developer tinyBuild originally had their own shop on their website, which they had to shut down due to chargebacks. They noticed that later G2A would suddenly get a bunch of keys to their games.
Here's the developer tinyBuild on how G2A has sold approximately $450,000 worth of their games without them being compensated.
Note: Seems their website is now suffering problems, here's a screen-grab of the article.
The developer emailed the store, and got a reply along the lines of "you won't get a penny from us, start selling your games on our store or we won't do anything about it".
tinybuildIn short, G2A claims that our distribution partners are scamming us and simply selling keys on G2A. They won’t help us unless we are willing to work with them. We are not going to get compensated, and they expect us to undercut our own retail partners (and Steam!) to compete with the unauthorized resellers.
Stores like G2A make me very angry, ripping off developers and gamers and by the looks of it they don't give a hoot, disgusting.
If you didn't know about this, fair enough, but I urge you to stop now. If you buy from G2A and you understand this, you're not helping developers at all. I implore you: if you use G2A just stop.
I should note, that I don't personally see anything wrong in selling on keys you legally own and haven't used to someone else. The problem is that stores like G2A built a business around it, which has obviously attracted the attention of a fair amount of scammers using stolen credit cards to buy keys and sell on. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Mountain Man Jun 21, 2016
What kind of Store is instantgaming?Basically, if a deal seems too good to be true then you need to be suspicious. Out of the ones you listed, I'm pretty sure that only Steam and Humble Bundle are legit. I'd be wary of the others.
I bought a couple of games on it two months ago with a increíble price.
Normally I buy games on Steam, humble Store and Bundlestars
Look, I'm all for saving a buck, but not when it screws the developer.
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Mountain Man Jun 21, 2016
Um, get the FBI involved maybe?Pretty sure they're outside of the US. Companies like this tend to take advantage of the lax laws in their own countries.
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natewardawg Jun 21, 2016
Then you have to region lock it so people can't trade it or use it if they travel/move. If not then don't complain when people are buying it for export. Economics 101 is also about scarcity which hardly describes modern computing.
I don't need to region lock it. I wouldn't punish honest people because of a few fraudsters. This is just where you need to be careful who you sell keys to and in some cases how many you give out (IE some unknown Youtuber will get 1 key and that's it). Only give them to places that actually have a good reputation to lose, like Humble Bundle. If a Russian decides to buy 100 copies of my game on Steam at $3 and resell it to people (IE Americans) for $5 when it retails at $10, that's fine with me, and everyone like this still won't make up majority of my sales.
The world is full of dishonest people and they will find some way of ripping you off one way or another if they have their heart set to it. Might as well not make people who want to be honest suffer because of them.
My bottom line is that if you play it smart you will at the very worst get some money from almost every sale while also not punishing your customer and ruining your reputation. Good customer service goes a very long way, especially in a world where it is becoming very scarce. Good customer service also doesn't mean shooting yourself in the foot.
edit: Separated the "dishonest people" statement from the previous paragraph so as not to call the people from the previous sentence dishonest or fraudsters.
Last edited by natewardawg on 21 June 2016 at 2:22 am UTC
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Well if your position is you should be able to sell outside the US for cheaper and those sales should be allowed to be transferred to those in the US, then we have nothing further to discuss because I completely agree. Well, except I would disagree that it's "fraud" or dishonest.
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Mountain Man Jun 21, 2016
This seems like more of a technical problem than anything. Why wouldn't tinyBuild revoke specific keys for which the payment was charged back? Just do it, let the blame fall on g2a where it belongs. The fact of the matter is as much as I love the devs of these games, they are trying to operate without a secondary market. It sounds like the same complaints big media and gaming industry has against the rental and used gaming market, that somehow transferring ownership of something because you don't want it anymore is stealing billions each year. Sorry I don't buy it.Is it even possible to keep track of keys in this fashion? You're assuming that it is, but I'm not so sure.
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As a developer the technical aspect of linking a key to a sale then revoking it is fairly simple to solve. It'a so simple it's pretty much unfair to the consumer.
Edit: what I mean is from a consumer standpoint buying a 'License Key' you are already pretty much boned because it can be revoked at any time for any reason. You don't actually own anything. /Tangent
Last edited by Gempalm on 21 June 2016 at 2:01 am UTC
Edit: what I mean is from a consumer standpoint buying a 'License Key' you are already pretty much boned because it can be revoked at any time for any reason. You don't actually own anything. /Tangent
Last edited by Gempalm on 21 June 2016 at 2:01 am UTC
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ElectricPrism Jun 21, 2016
I feel like this hasn't been said yet.
As a consumer/gamer I don't buy from G2A because I consider it unethical, I don't buy from them because I'm not even sure if I'll get what I pay for delivered, so I could loose my cash.
If a developer revokes keys that it notices were not from a authorized channel and they revoke them I suspect most of the whiplash will fall not on the developer but on G2A as it should, thus discouraging their business.
In this case the developer should fight fire with fire and write back threatening to revoke all keys from their store thereby harming their credibility and future business. This is the only way to apply pressure to correct the problem.
I buy from Steam primarily for the convenience factor, it remembers my payment information, is simple, I can gift games to friends, they have sales that make piracy take too much effort in comparison to buying a 70% off version of the game, they keep it up to date and patched for you, you have a friends list, its on linux, etc.. etc... etc...
As a consumer I'm not gonna change my buying habits to by from Bozo X Store to save a buck or two when they're shady as fsck.
As a consumer/gamer I don't buy from G2A because I consider it unethical, I don't buy from them because I'm not even sure if I'll get what I pay for delivered, so I could loose my cash.
If a developer revokes keys that it notices were not from a authorized channel and they revoke them I suspect most of the whiplash will fall not on the developer but on G2A as it should, thus discouraging their business.
In this case the developer should fight fire with fire and write back threatening to revoke all keys from their store thereby harming their credibility and future business. This is the only way to apply pressure to correct the problem.
I buy from Steam primarily for the convenience factor, it remembers my payment information, is simple, I can gift games to friends, they have sales that make piracy take too much effort in comparison to buying a 70% off version of the game, they keep it up to date and patched for you, you have a friends list, its on linux, etc.. etc... etc...
As a consumer I'm not gonna change my buying habits to by from Bozo X Store to save a buck or two when they're shady as fsck.
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natewardawg Jun 21, 2016
Well if your position is you should be able to sell outside the US for cheaper and those sales should be allowed to be transferred to those in the US, then we have nothing further to discuss because I completely agree. Well, except I would disagree that it's "fraud" or dishonest.
Thanks for pointing that last part out. I did try and separate that statement into it's own paragraph for that very reason, but I can definitely see it mixing with the previous. I don't think that buying at $3 and selling at $5 is fraud or dishonest either. I'm going to add an "edit" note for that.
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metro2033fanboy Jun 21, 2016
ops...just got Pillar of Eternity on G2a ...my bad!
goVEGAN
goVEGAN
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Kuduzkehpan Jun 21, 2016
never bought games out of Steam only 1 time from GOG and that was not compatible with my ubuntu. (very very old game tho.)
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mulletdeath Jun 21, 2016
I have nothing to add that hasn't been said in one way or another, really. With GOG, Humble, Steam, itch.io and occasionally directly from a particular developer (among other legitimate ways to buy Linux games), I have absolutely no reason to engage with shady key reselling nonsense. Phooey on G2A in general.
Last edited by mulletdeath on 21 June 2016 at 4:53 am UTC
Last edited by mulletdeath on 21 June 2016 at 4:53 am UTC
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Wait a sec... imho it's okay to point this issue out, but putting customers on the same level as scammers goes to far.
What's the problem of blacklisting those illegally bought keys? If they show up in a keystore, they won't work and the keystore has to deal with it. Immediately their reputation goes down and automatically no one buys anything there anymore.
Of course it would be nice of G2A if they would help tinyBuild in this issue, but it's up to them. If they don't check those keys, and they are working... why should they bother? For them it seems to be a correct key. If the key doesn't work, they have to deal with it and refund the customer.
Is it a problem to blacklist those keys? I have no idea, so I'm asking.
As far as I am concerned, I've never heard before, that G2A is selling illegal keys intentionally. And I know this store for a while now. There was a similar issue with Ubisoft's Far Cry 3, but this didn't affect only G2A as keystore. So the article should be rewritten, with a warning that this issue exists with this particular game/developer/publisher, but not accusing customers of G2A being no better than scammers in general! Let the readers judge for themselves, just from the facts.
edit: after having read tinyBuilds article, they do the same: "Make your own conclusions"
Last edited by Corben on 21 June 2016 at 6:02 am UTC
What's the problem of blacklisting those illegally bought keys? If they show up in a keystore, they won't work and the keystore has to deal with it. Immediately their reputation goes down and automatically no one buys anything there anymore.
Of course it would be nice of G2A if they would help tinyBuild in this issue, but it's up to them. If they don't check those keys, and they are working... why should they bother? For them it seems to be a correct key. If the key doesn't work, they have to deal with it and refund the customer.
Is it a problem to blacklist those keys? I have no idea, so I'm asking.
As far as I am concerned, I've never heard before, that G2A is selling illegal keys intentionally. And I know this store for a while now. There was a similar issue with Ubisoft's Far Cry 3, but this didn't affect only G2A as keystore. So the article should be rewritten, with a warning that this issue exists with this particular game/developer/publisher, but not accusing customers of G2A being no better than scammers in general! Let the readers judge for themselves, just from the facts.
edit: after having read tinyBuilds article, they do the same: "Make your own conclusions"
Last edited by Corben on 21 June 2016 at 6:02 am UTC
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What I don't get is why they don't limit the cheap versions of the games sold in other countries. For instance, let the cheap Russian version only have the Russian language. Then they'd be instantly useless for the rest of the world.
More market fragmentation, geoblocking and price fixing on questionable border assignments, that's just what we need. And then it turns out you can't play your games in English, because you happen to be on vacation in Russia. Or you can't play or buy them in English at all because you're living in Italy.
Insanely stupid idea.
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Wait a sec... imho it's okay to point this issue out, but putting customers on the same level as scammers goes to far.I've adjusted that one bit, the rest of the editorial stands. G2A built a business around key reselling, they know fully well this is a big repeating issue.
What's the problem of blacklisting those illegally bought keys? If they show up in a keystore, they won't work and the keystore has to deal with it. Immediately their reputation goes down and automatically no one buys anything there anymore.
Of course it would be nice of G2A if they would help tinyBuild in this issue, but it's up to them. If they don't check those keys, and they are working... why should they bother? For them it seems to be a correct key. If the key doesn't work, they have to deal with it and refund the customer.
Is it a problem to blacklist those keys? I have no idea, so I'm asking.
As far as I am concerned, I've never heard before, that G2A is selling illegal keys intentionally. And I know this store for a while now. There was a similar issue with Ubisoft's Far Cry 3, but this didn't affect only G2A as keystore. So the article should be rewritten, with a warning that this issue exists with this particular game/developer/publisher, but not accusing customers of G2A being no better than scammers in general! Let the readers judge for themselves, just from the facts.
edit: after having read tinyBuilds article, they do the same: "Make your own conclusions"
Key reselling would not be a big earner if it was just legit sales. I will never buy from G2A and I stand by my thoughts on them.
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I'm sure Russian translations are very often very very bad.The worst. For movies, they often voice-over (one speaker, all the roles) instead of just using subtitles. As if Russians couldn't be expected to read.
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jasondaigo Jun 21, 2016
i buy almost everything on g2a. rarely indie though.
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Key reselling would not be a big earner if it was just legit sales. I will never buy from G2A and I stand by my thoughts on them.
How do you know that most of their profits come from illegal sales? G2A definitely seems shady if they're not willing to cooperate with others when there's a problem but it seems too much to condemn every single one of these businesses and claim that they wouldn't be successful as legitimate businesses. One would think this kind of behavior would actually get them into big trouble if they've allegedly ripped off half a million dollars from just a single small developer. I guess I'd be willing to believe this if there's absolutely not a single key reselling site that tries to do something about this.
It's also not clear to me that their business model is the thing that is flawed here. Unfortunately this kind of thing is a reason to consider stronger DRM measures and doing away with selling keys entirely. Interestingly this kind of a situation is where Bitcoin's lack of any kind of chargeback would actually prevent fraud while for buyers it typically can be a problematic feature.
Last edited by badber on 21 June 2016 at 8:04 am UTC
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People can repeatedly stick up for G2A all they like, their entire business model is based on crap like this happening so they can turn a big profit. I will never, ever endorse G2A or buy from them.
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Something I don't get is why it is impossible to match a credit card transaction to a steam key. I mean: why is it impossible when receiving the chargeback for the editor to say "OK, for this transaction I sold this key. Invalid transaction => invalid key". I understand this is impossible, not to invalidate a key but to know which key to invalidate and I don't understand why. This would be the solution : if someone buy a key from G2A that suddenly becomes invalid, they would at least ask for a refund to G2A who would lose money or attack the frauders.
Does someone know and could explain, please ?
Does someone know and could explain, please ?
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Something I don't get is why it is impossible to match a credit card transaction to a steam key. I mean: why is it impossible when receiving the chargeback for the editor to say "OK, for this transaction I sold this key. Invalid transaction => invalid key". I understand this is impossible, not to invalidate a key but to know which key to invalidate and I don't understand why. This would be the solution : if someone buy a key from G2A that suddenly becomes invalid, they would at least ask for a refund to G2A who would lose money or attack the frauders.
Does someone know and could explain, please ?
just a quick example:
Indiegamestand has the stolen/fraud cards associate with the steam keys that have been purchased.
The problem is that Steam doesnt have an API that will revoke the stolen keys from the users immediately.
It doesnt give that feature on third party vendors. I dont know how long it will take to contact steam and force steam to revoke codes from a third party vendor. I guess is pretty much impossible, maybe is easier for the game developer to revoke steam keys. I dont know that for sure.
Have in mind that G2A is selling also "legitimate" steam keys from Humble,Bundlestars or any other bundle side etc. so is impossible to revoke these codes.Actually every user can sell anything on G2A and steam or GOG codes make it much easier for transactions.
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