Steam Region-Locks All Games From Russia, Asia, South America

[Steven Bogos]

Steam Region-Locks All Games From Russia, Asia, South America

Users from these regions will no longer be able to send or receive gifted games from any other region.

One of the greatest things about Steam is how consumer friendly and non-invasive it is to its massive user-base all over the world. However, a move made by the company earlier in the week has taken away a huge chunk of freedom from users in some regions. Fans have discovered that Valve "flipped the switch" on every game sold in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Russia, Southeast Asia, South America, and Turkey regions, disallowing users in these places from sending or receiving gifted games with other users.

For a bit of insight on why and how this happened, we need to look back to December of last year, when Valve introduced a can be considerably cheaper [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/130718-Report-Steam-Allows-Publishers-To-Crack-Down-On-Cross-Region-Gifting] than games in the USA. There's also the matter of censored or banned games, which players in unaffected regions can trade in.

Anyway, according to some reddit sleuths [http://www.reddit.com/r/SteamGameSwap/comments/2pj8zj/psa_all_gifts_are_now_regionlocked_if_bought_in/], Valve went ahead and took that AllowCrossRegionTradingAndGifting and turned it on for every game in the affected regions. While it won't affect games already in players' inventory, any new game purchased by these users will be greeted with some variation of the following message:

Gift purchases for Crusader Kings II can only be added to the gift recipient's library if they are in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Republic of Moldova, Russian Federation, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan

PC gamers are understandably upset at this change, as the ability to "grey import" a title from a cheaper region is something we have been able to do ever since importing existed. Region-locking has always been a "console problem," but now it looks like its seeping its way onto the PC too.

Source: reddit [http://www.engadget.com/2014/12/17/steam-region-locking/]

Permalink

 

[shintakie10]

Its cool guys. Valve totally is your benevolent dictators and would never ever do something solely to dick over customers in the name of profit margins!

Now that that is out of my system, that is pretty jacked. It'd be one thing if they never allowed it in the first place, but its been allowed for so long that at this point most people assumed that's what you were supposed to do in the first place. Its totally within Valves right to do so, but its never not goin to be a dick move.

 

[Eric the Orange]

while on the surface this appears to be another case of "old corporations being unwilling to move with the times". I'm not so sure it is. Valve isn't one of the old guard who is afraid of change. If this was say, Nintendo, then that would make a lot more sense. But as it stands I'll give Valve the benefit of the doubt until more information comes out.

 

[Sanunes]

I am wondering if this has to do with certain countries currencies dropping very low because of the lower cost of crude oil and that led them to just localize the games, but I do wonder how much further Valve might take this.

 

[Covarr]

Eh, as long as they're not breaking games that were already purchased, I don't see a problem. I suspect they're doing this out of necessity, to prevent people from buying in regions where the games are already sold at a ridiculously low price to curb piracy, and then reselling them and undercutting the Steam store. I mean, sometimes these games can get really cheap (think $5 USD for new games) just because otherwise they'd be pirated; I'd be willing to bet some online store has been snatching games up at those prices and selling them at almost what Valve is charging in the US (which is still less than most of Europe, Australia).

P.S Thanks

 

[War_Dyn27]

I am perfectly fine with this. Those regions prices are low to help combat piracy and to balance against lower wages, not so other countries can exploit it to get discounts.
Its the same reason countries like Australia frequently pay more for stuff, because the minimum wage is higher. When people exploit the regional pricing, they are ripping off the developers more than Valve, costing smaller indie companies a lot of money, so I see this as a positive.

 

[Imre Csete]

Yeah, games are practically measured by TF2 crate keys on some boards, it's kinda funny. Oh hey, cool new game you got, how much was it? 5 TF2 keys! Meanwhile EUR to USD is still 1:1, so the world hasn't gone completely mad.

 

[lancar]

Considering that steam prices are already extremely low during the many, many sales the service has, I don't mind this change that much. Sure, it might mean I can't buy games as cheap from key vendors anymore, but eh... just gotta wait for the normal sales instead.

 

[Steven Bogos]

Except that reasoning makes absolutely no sense considering A Most developers are based in America and B We're talking about digital products.

There is no reason a game SHOULD be more expensive in Australia. Technically, it COULD be more expensive considering the higher average wage, but its not "ripping the developer off" by offering it at the same price. Example:

Developer A sells game X for Y dollars in the US. It decides to localize the game for the Australian Steam store. As it's a digital product, the only thing it really needs to do is get approval to sell in the region from the various channels, which means it essentially costs the developer absolutely nothing to sell the game in Australia.

Of course, the AUD is weaker than the USD, so taking into account the exchange rate... the game's price rises to Z. This is were it should stop. The developer is still getting the exact same amount of money on every copy of the game sold, at no detriment to itself. It has allowed people in another region to purchase the game.

Rising the price of game X to Z+$20 because "Australians can afford it" is actually exploiting Australians. Yes, our minimum wage is higher, but why should middle-class earners, who are earning the same as middle-class earners in the US, suffer because of it?

Hope that clears things up.

 

[hentropy]

Does this apply to Japan? I'm asking because I know people there and this would be unfortunate news if they were included in the region lock. Especially since games aren't that much cheaper there. Is there a list of countries this affects? The title says "Asia" but only southeast Asia is mentioned in the article.

 

[SadisticFire]

snip

Everything you said is true, but I don't think it applies in this situation. I'd imagine (I'm only speculating) that it was done to combat people buying games for a under cut in places where it's economy isn't viable. People would spoof their IP's and buy games for pennies, then sell them for a profit, and undercutting VALVe. I'm curious if australlia is actually impacted by this cause sometimes it's grouped up with Asia as a region.

It would be nice if they allowed you to gift/send games from the place with a higher value.

E.G) if it costs 50USD for COD in the US, and it's 10USD in Egypt you would be able to gift it to Egypt but not the other way around. And maybe add a US region tag on the item so you can ship it around if need be.

I'm no economist though so I dunno how bad of an idea that would be.

 

[Living Contradiction]

Except that reasoning makes absolutely no sense considering A Most developers are based in America and B We're talking about digital products.

There is no reason a game SHOULD be more expensive in Australia. Technically, it COULD be more expensive considering the higher average wage, but its not "ripping the developer off" by offering it at the same price. Example:

Developer A sells game X for Y dollars in the US. It decides to localize the game for the Australian Steam store. As it's a digital product, the only thing it really needs to do is get approval to sell in the region from the various channels, which means it essentially costs the developer absolutely nothing to sell the game in Australia.

Of course, the AUD is weaker than the USD, so taking into account the exchange rate... the game's price rises to Z. This is were it should stop. The developer is still getting the exact same amount of money on every copy of the game sold, at no detriment to itself. It has allowed people in another region to purchase the game.

Rising the price of game X to Z+$20 because "Australians can afford it" is actually exploiting Australians. Yes, our minimum wage is higher, but why should middle-class earners, who are earning the same as middle-class earners in the US, suffer because of it?

Hope that clears things up.

Because the EU is updating its taxation laws on digital purchases, Steven. As of January 1, purchases are taxed based on the location of the purchaser, not the seller. That means that if someone buys from a seller not in their own country, it's not just a currency exchange that has to take place; that seller must pay tax to the country the buyer is located in.

That may not sound like much of a pain in the butt, but when you are talking about 75 separate tax codes that have to be filed quarterly, it becomes pretty attractive to a marketplace to say, "You buy from developers in your country and nowhere else."

I can understand why Valve wants to guard against other regions doing the same thing and threw the switch for everybody instead of just Europe.

 

[Rozalia1]

Well what a surprise its all happy and dandy to the majority here and elsewhere from the looks of it. Even top heel "Big Bad" Microsoft have that region lock off (current)... and there was a bit of stink from what I recall when Sony said they were once again going to have the region lock off (which they've had off for ages), but Microsoft wasn't... well I suppose region locking was the least of Microsofts problems at the time... anyway getting sidetracked.

Actually... best I calm myself. I just got done going through threads involving CM Christ you see so my tolerance for this stuff is at all time low at the moment, forgive me.

First thoughts was it was stemming from the money problem they are having over in Russia... but more than Russia is affected. Why isn't good old Britain included? VAT and all that after all.

 

[Kameburger]

That makes sense, they've been doing this for a while, and I'm only surprised they've admitted to it. I had a few long and angry email exchanges with them because I live in asia but I tried to use my US credit card. They asked me for scans of my passport and scans of my drivers license as well as a scan of my credit card including the security code on the back. And this was just to ask a question about whether or not they were region locking content based on my IP or if I had not changed my currency settings correctly. Needless to say I was 100% grandfathered into steam through counter-strike and even though at one point I quite liked steam, I really feel like the industry needs to kill this service. They have so much power and they are so controlling. They are more controlling than apple, and they feel more closed off that consoles do now. No console is region locked at this point except the Wii U and 3DS respectively and the gaming community is much better off for it.

Valve I hope will one day be irrelevant. Personally I think a replacement service could not come soon enough.

 

[small]

I am perfectly fine with this. Those regions prices are low to help combat piracy and to balance against lower wages, not so other countries can exploit it to get discounts.
Its the same reason countries like Australia frequently pay more for stuff, because the minimum wage is higher. When people exploit the regional pricing, they are ripping off the developers more than Valve, costing smaller indie companies a lot of money, so I see this as a positive.

like how dragon age inquisition costs three times the price walking into a store here vs picking it up on amazon ripping off developers you mean?

 

[RealRT]

Well, if to choose between jacking the prices up or getting region locked, I say Valve chose the lesser of two evils.
Then again, the real evil here is international politics.

 

[Ark of the Covetor]

I am perfectly fine with this. Those regions prices are low to help combat piracy and to balance against lower wages, not so other countries can exploit it to get discounts.
Its the same reason countries like Australia frequently pay more for stuff, because the minimum wage is higher. When people exploit the regional pricing, they are ripping off the developers more than Valve, costing smaller indie companies a lot of money, so I see this as a positive.

Bullshit. Corporations shouldn't get to exist in a global marketplace when it suits them(outsourcing service labour and production to cut costs, having a hundred different international entities for the Tax Avoidance Conga etc), then fall back to old-timey Protectionism whenever it disadvantages them. If they can afford to sell the game for $5 in Uzbekistan and make money, they can afford to sell it globally for $5, they just don't want to because it means they can gouge people. "Region locking" is and always has been a crock, and it's annoying to see Valve getting in on the hypocrisy.

 

[Li Mu]

hmmm. I'm a UK expat living in Russia (yeah...great time to be here). I wonder how much this will affect me. I pay using my UK card and my steam account is still listed as being in the UK. I actually pay higher prices when purchasing games at UK rates. Would I be forced to buy games localized to Russia? My Russian isn't good enough to have to play through everything in Russian.

 

[Nikolaz72]

Good to see there is a lack of corporate apologists in here today.

I love steam but, seriously? They should cut that shit out. They are massively profitable as it is, the gifting from russian gamers to european gamers is not serious enough that it needs to be banned.

 

[rofltehcat]

I can understand why they do it. Increasing the cost of games in these countries instead would mean that many gamers in those countries could not afford video games. I have bought a few keys from those countries before and this change means I'll have to wait a lot longer (until a decent sale) before I can buy games. In the end it means I'll miss out on some games (or will have to wait longer).
However, the alternative is them matching prices in which case I'd end up in the same situation and people from other countries would be completely fucked. So this course is the better choice.