What would likely happen if Steam died or screwed over customers.

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test 5 Jul @ 3:14am

So we don't own our games, says some Steam TOS or whatever we have to agree with. But for now in practice we "own" our own copies. But what if Steam suddenly went bankrupt and out of business. Or decided to be terrible and took our games away and say we can only rent access to our games or something.

What our the real theoretical risks of buying from Steam compared to say Gog where we don't need to depend on or worry about DRM or as much?

Let's say Valve did go out of business, is there any assurances they would provide a patch for the Steam client so we could play our games without worry about lack of access to Steam servers? Have the higher ups and Valve ever talked about this?

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Showing 1-11 of 11 comments

T9 5 Jul @ 3:17am

How many of these threads do we need?

test 5 Jul @ 3:19am

Originally posted by T9:
How many of these threads do we need?

Please link me to another one, a good example with answers.

Chika Ogiue 5 Jul @ 3:21am

Originally posted by test:
Let's say Valve did go out of business, is there any assurances they would provide a patch for the Steam client so we could play our games without worry about lack of access to Steam servers?

Read the SSA. The answer is in there.

But let's face the simple facts. If Valve somehow had to shutdown, the would be overwhelmed by potential buyers looking to buy Steam from them. On the flipside, if GOG somehow had to shutdown, they would have far less offers. You have more chance of losing access to your GOG bought games than you do to losing access to those purchased on Steam.

If you need more answers, read one of the other thousand threads on the subject.

Crazy Tiger 5 Jul @ 3:21am

Chances are a different company takes over. But other than that, we lose the games we have.

Anybody who uses Steam, though, knows that. Cause they informed themselves when they made their Steam account, right?

On GOG you have the same worries, though. Unless you backed up the offline installers, cause if not it's the same situation. Though with much less games.

Thiesen 5 Jul @ 3:22am

Do your "own" the car you took a Loan for?

Technically NO!!!

But you are free to do what you wish with that car.

But you still owe the seller money...

veracsthane 5 Jul @ 3:23am

Originally posted by T9:
How many of these threads do we need?

its relevant to anyone who cares abut consumer rights and gaming

the answer is you are screwed you own nothing and they already took your ♥♥♥♥ away. the only thing that hasnt happened yet is them flipping the lights out switch.

Lithurge 5 Jul @ 3:47am

Originally posted by veracsthane:
Originally posted by T9:
How many of these threads do we need?
its relevant to anyone who cares abut consumer rights and gaming

the answer is you are screwed you own nothing and they already took your ♥♥♥♥ away. the only thing that hasnt happened yet is them flipping the lights out switch.

Except your consumer rights aren't breached if this happens. Selling a license is legal and by buying it you agreed to the constraints that come with it, which includes it no longer being valid if the service shuts down.

Caring about it would be campaigning to get legislation changed not posting endless topics on here that attract the same comments from the same people again and again. Of course anybody who wants to do this should take time to think about the practicalities of maintaining access.

Last edited by Lithurge; 5 Jul @ 3:48am

GalerianXD1 5 Jul @ 3:56am

We all need to get used to owning nothing. It can be described as a rental, a subscription or a license and those things can be revoked at anytime. If Valve ceased to trade you'd potentially lose your licenses and access to the games. It would be quite likely that another company would get involved to pick over the mouldy carcass, but the licensing and brand rights would not be something resolved easily.

Kargor 5 Jul @ 3:58am

Originally posted by test:
But what if Steam suddenly went bankrupt and out of business.

Then your games will be gone.

Now, Steam is not a minor company; if they get into trouble, chances are there might be rescue on the way. Also, back in the old days, publishers occasionally moved non-Steam licenses to Steam; it's likely that a few games can be moved to whatever other platform is the new king.

Dura_Ace 5 Jul @ 5:11pm

Originally posted by Lithurge:
Originally posted by veracsthane:
its relevant to anyone who cares abut consumer rights and gaming

the answer is you are screwed you own nothing and they already took your ♥♥♥♥ away. the only thing that hasnt happened yet is them flipping the lights out switch.
Except your consumer rights aren't breached if this happens. Selling a license is legal and by buying it you agreed to the constraints that come with it, which includes it no longer being valid if the service shuts down.

Caring about it would be campaigning to get legislation changed not posting endless topics on here that attract the same comments from the same people again and again. Of course anybody who wants to do this should take time to think about the practicalities of maintaining access.

Nothing lasts forever.

#10

MonkehMaster 5 Jul @ 6:39pm

well honestly, they cant remove the games from your pc and steam would remove their drm, as has been said for a very long time, if they ever shut down.

but we also have a huge list of games that have zero drm and can be played without launching steam.

as for other developers games, that are using 3rd party drm... thats a whole other can o worms and ill leave it at that.

that said, i doubt this will happen, im sure they have someone or a company in mind, to take ownership, or sell to, not including all the other companies rubbing their hands, for the day it might happen.

in any case, its nothing to worry about.

have a nice day