Back in 2019 the EU went after Valve and select publishers on Steam for geo-blocking, then in 2021 they were issued fines which naturally was appealed but it has been dismissed so it's likely Valve will now have to pay up.
As per the press release from September 27th it notes Valve and five games publishers including Bandai, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax infringed EU competition law.
The Commission found that Valve and the five publishers had participated in a group of anti-competitive agreements or concerted practices which were intended to restrict cross-border sales of certain PC video games that were compatible with the Steam platform, by putting in place territorial control functionalities during different periods between 2010 and 2015, in particular the Baltic countries and certain countries in central and Eastern Europe.
Valve brought an action before the General Court of the European Union, seeking to have the decision annulled in
so far as it related to it.In its judgment delivered today, the General Court dismisses the action.
To sum up: Valve allowed the use of Steam keys that were locked to specific regions in the EU, preventing other regions from getting them cheaper which is a breach of EU rules. Valve did already stop doing this years ago as this happened between 2010 and 2015, so this is a more of a historical case that Valve tried fighting on copyright grounds that the EU rejected so they will have to pay the full €1.6m fine.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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QuoteTo sum up Valve tried blocking people buying games in different EU regions to get them cheaper, which is a breach of EU rules.
To be clear, it wasn't an action by Valve as such, and it wasn't sales on Steam. The publishers had their region restrictions on sales (which aren't allowed within the EU) and gave out Steam keys (for which Valve didn't get money); the publishers used Steam's region locks to prevent activation of those EU keys elsewhere within the EU, and Valve let them. That's why Valve got fined, but that's also why the fine is quite small. Valve subsequently fixed their tools so that publishers can't prevent activation within the EU of something sold within the EU, so it's just that historical breach.
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Quoting: CatKillerYou are always a veritable mine of relevant information.QuoteTo sum up Valve tried blocking people buying games in different EU regions to get them cheaper, which is a breach of EU rules.
To be clear, it wasn't an action by Valve as such, and it wasn't sales on Steam. The publishers had their region restrictions on sales (which aren't allowed within the EU) and gave out Steam keys (for which Valve didn't get money); the publishers used Steam's region locks to prevent activation of those EU keys elsewhere within the EU, and Valve let them. That's why Valve got fined, but that's also why the fine is quite small. Valve subsequently fixed their tools so that publishers can't prevent activation within the EU of something sold within the EU, so it's just that historical breach.
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Quoting: rustybroomhandleDon't like this. The long term result of this is that they will stop offering regional pricing.Ehhh, probably not. I don't think this slope is very slippery because there are no other confederations like the EU, where a bunch of different countries partly share the same legal system.
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Quoting: CatKillerPoor wording on my part, have clarified.QuoteTo sum up Valve tried blocking people buying games in different EU regions to get them cheaper, which is a breach of EU rules.
To be clear, it wasn't an action by Valve as such, and it wasn't sales on Steam. The publishers had their region restrictions on sales (which aren't allowed within the EU) and gave out Steam keys (for which Valve didn't get money); the publishers used Steam's region locks to prevent activation of those EU keys elsewhere within the EU, and Valve let them. That's why Valve got fined, but that's also why the fine is quite small. Valve subsequently fixed their tools so that publishers can't prevent activation within the EU of something sold within the EU, so it's just that historical breach.
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BlackBloodRum Sep 28, 2023
Quoting: kaimanIndeed, it looks like I misunderstood it. My apologies! I wasn't following the case and skimmed the article.Quoting: BlackBloodRumWith that said, a lot of those limits weren't so much about restricting buyers, but rather restricting scalpers who would buy cheap keys from another region and then sell them on third-party websites.I thought it was more about buying a cheap physical game in EU country A that required activation on Steam, but activation would not work in EU country B.
If the ruling would apply to digital keys, it should be perfectly fine to buy games cheaply by using a VPN service in a low-price EU country. No need for a middle man. But I don't think that's gonna fly ... not that I ever tried.
As for the VPN trick, that actually doesn't work, at least not on Steam. Valve set the region pricing based on the registered address and payment methods location. So, VPN or not, you will get your payment method countries pricing.
That's why a certain store; whose name I will not mention because they don't deserve the free advertisement, sells keys on their market place platform. The keys sold are sometimes stolen, or purchased from cheaper regions, since there is no checking to verify that the third party seller obtained the keys legally.
In any case, it appears that is not what the OP/case was referring to :-)
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Quoting: pleasereadthemanualNow, if only governments would outlaw region locking with DVDs and Blu-Rays.The ruling does not condemn region locks, they must only comply with the law.
Quoting: pleasereadthemanualRegion-locking shows on streaming services is bad enough, but region locking physical media is incredibly greedy.Isn't the same true for any DRM?
Quoting: pleasereadthemanualWas anyone allowed to publish a hardcover book which would combust if a customer attempted to open it in Australia?That analogy doesn't work, you can still use the mediums in the foreign regions. You simply require a device compatible with the region.
Quoting: omer666Good job fining Valve for region-locking, while Germany continues censoring games and Microsoft buying Activision is tolerated.Only one of the three broke the law.
Germany does not censor games. Certain presentations are banned but that rarely happens (only 40 games - if the list is complete - were ever banned, 11 bans rescinded). Many games (but even that now rarely happens) were indexed which imposes major restrictions but technically it was still possible to buy the games. Publishers then censored games to allow a mainstream release. This happens in the US, too: e.g. movies are censored in production for an R rating & avoid NC-17. But unlike German releases this usually affects all releases.
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Quoting: Purple Library GuyYou are always a veritable mine of relevant information.Survivorship bias: the times when I haven't got something useful to say, I try not to say anything.
In this case, it was really from reading Liam's prior coverage.
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Ok. But if it's illegal for Valve why is it legal for Netflix, Disney and all the other national media in Europe?
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Quoting: ShabbyX> pay the full €1.6m fine
Peanuts for Valve I'm sure. I wonder if the cost of lawyers trying to fight it was even worth it, lol
Most likely is that they want to fight this so that they can enable it again, not to avoid the €1.6M fine.
Quoting: MalOk. But if it's illegal for Valve why is it legal for Netflix, Disney and all the other national media in Europe?
Netflix doesn't do what Valve was accused of doing, if you buy Netflix in Croatia you can still logon in Norway with the same account, that is why VPN services works for Netflix to get access to different catalogues of media.
Quoting: pleasereadthemanualNow, if only governments would outlaw region locking with DVDs and Blu-Rays. Region-locking shows on streaming services is bad enough, but region locking physical media is incredibly greedy. Or how about creating firmware for DVD players that will refuse to play discs not authorized to play in this region? How was anti-consumer behavior like this ever allowed? Was anyone allowed to publish a hardcover book which would combust if a customer attempted to open it in Australia?
Fuck region locks. For any reason.
Now you probably talked in more general terms, but just for people who don't know both DVD:s and BR:s are a single region inside the EU so they are both already not region locked as per EU regulation.
Last edited by F.Ultra on 28 September 2023 at 8:14 pm UTC
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Quoting: GuestEveryone here talking about region locks being evil, but no one addressing the elephant in the ROOM of Region locks... in some countries... we cannot buy a Steam deckThat’s an entirely different issue and nothing to do with region locks. Physical distribution comes with a great many hurdles. I do wish Valve would expand it but they will have their reasons why they haven’t.we'd had to pay double or triple price to scalpers.
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