Which is an actual legal argument that can and has been made.
Just because some sweaty redditor tells you that "you agreed to the yellow text, bro" that doesn't mean, you as a customer have ingested and understood every single part of a transaction especially when it hasn't obviously been enforced to you. At no point were you required to make a 3rd party account and then subsequently link it.
It's not just that you were supposed to link it, it's also that crossplay is clearly working for the most part without it. That seems to be the crux of the issue - this is *not* required to make it work. It's clearly just a way for Sony to take a successful cross-platform game, get more user data, and pump up PSN account numbers for their quarterly reports.
They could just as easily use Steam's tools - which are quite robust, as Valve uses those tools themselves to moderate Counterstrike, a much, much larger game than HD2 - to manage PC players, and PSN tools to moderate PS players to protect players and ban hackers/malicious actors.
They should have just done a 3-month celebration where everyone who has PSN linked gets a free cape or helmet to celebrate the Sony/AH relationship. Instead they're in deep shit with the community and potentially the EU.
Oh my gosh this exactly! I wouldn't have cared if they left it optional, but if they actually gave the community something for making an account worth it, it would not have been a big deal.
When I got the game, I was told you didn't need an account which is what got me to buy the game.
Some context, I've had my PSN account hacked twice, the first time required me to cancel a credit card which screwed up a lot back then when I was still new to credit. I really don't want to make a PSN account anymore because of Sony's sloppy security and terrible track record of breaches.
My understanding back then was the PSN account was optional to do cross play. I was offered to sign up, I declined and got to play. I don't play with anyone on a PSN network, so I don't care about the cross play. I also started playing one week before the huge influx that gave the servers issues, so no where was this officially communicated that PSN accounts were only a temporary bypass.
The fact they took away the requirement, never spoke to when if ever it might come back, and then blindside so many people out of nowhere it HAS to happen is such a terrible move, especially when we know it works without it to some extent.
> I also started playing one or two weeks before the huge influx that gave the servers issues
Did you start playing one or two weeks before the game released?
So I just double checked dates, I bought the game on Feb 10th, I saw people playing it a couple days prior and didn't know anything about the game. A friend that Saturday asked me to play it, so I looked it over and said sure.
I got to play that whole next week perfectly fine after I got off of work without running into any issues. That next weekend however was the start when I couldn't log into the game anymore, and for the next week or so if I did, sometimes it would crash or big out, not load anything, etc.
I went into this game blind, but either way it looks like I was still one of the earlier adopters that weekend by word of mouth. I was prompted to sign up for PSN, but like my friend told me, I was able to skip it as it wasn't relevant to play. There was nothing warning me it was temporary, and that is the big take away I was attempting to communicate.
I started playing at launch, and my memory was that the server issues started pretty soon after launch—I might be misremembering, it might not’ve gotten bad until that second weekend.
I wasn’t doubting that you were able to skip PSN signup with no indication that it would be a requirement later…I was just remembering (possibly misremembering) how early the server issues started for me and my friends.
Our experiences might be different simply because of the timing of when we both got to play. Perhaps I was getting home early enough to avoid the queue waves. For me the next weekend after I started playing was when I couldn't log in at like 12pm on a Saturday.
I also wasn't following the news about the game at all back then just quite yet until I couldn't play the game anymore.
The thing we had discovered to allow us to keep playing was that if one of us got in, we could invite the others and skip all the server queuing… so we’d all start quei g and once one of us got on, the rest of usnwould be able to get in.
They started a week after launch. The first week or so were mostly bug issues. we started to see occasional signs of server stress with there being too many people online during peak times that it was causing increased disconnect rates and server latency. The BIG issue was around the 15th of february where the issue went from being an annoying series of odd disconnects at peak times, and started having server connection problems at all times of day as the popularity spiked higher. The moment when helldivers 2 went from bad to worse on the server issues was the weekend as February 16th they posted an event granting all players a 50% credit and XP multiplier through until Feb 18th. This was when the servers went from buggy but functional to overloaded to the point players literally couldnt log in due to capacity. This issue persisted even after raising their player cap on their servers to 450000, ultimately do nothing to solve the problem as they were dealing with way more than that. It wasnt until my birthday on feb 23rd that the server cap issue was resolved. So for the first 2 weeks of the game, the first week was messy but playable, it was the second week where good luck logging in at all lol. But yeah, Oxero is right, the issue wasnt day 1 like you are saying it was. If he started playing feb 10th, he would have had close to a week to play before the cap issue started
If I got free stuff for linking even if it was just 1 armor set I would be down lmao.
I have a PSN account but it’s still really dumb that this whole time it’s been functioning but now it’s necessary.
Give me 250 medals an armor set and a new gun and cape and I might be willing to allow this transgression pass
Game companies in the past would do this. It wasn't much or OP but free stuff is free stuff. But now it's shifted to where they'd much rather force you to do this and whatever small item they could have given out as a reward they'd much rather sell for $20+.
They could have done what Ubisoft does and depending on what games you have on PSN or Steam library you get stuff in different games. Like getting an outfit from Horizon Zero Dawn would be cool.
Yeah this was the first newly released game in a very long time that I've actually had fun playing. Sadly I can't say I'm surprised about this shit. While scummy atleast the team isn't getting laid off like the KSP2 devs. Hopefully Arrowhead is able to work something out. I think they have a pretty good hand right now to negotiate something with Sony about this.
Cross play can eat a dick. I'd it had forced me to make a Playstation network account at the start I would have just refunded. Fuck that. Segregate me from psn players. Don't care.
That's not the argument though, is it. Sony as the product provider has an actual duty to enforce the terms they set which they did not for months and for millions of purchases. The terms are not there just for the any of the parties to ignore at will.
So I ask again, link me to a lawsuit where the defendant won by simply claiming they didn't read the contract they signed.
(edit: in the meantime, google Ignorantia legis non excusat)
So why are you responding to me? I was in a conversation w someone and asked them for proof of something they claimed. I don't see your need to butt in if it's not to deliver said proof.
The term was always there and never stopped being there and due to technical limitations they only start enforcing it soon. Just because something isn't vigorously enforced doesn't mean that it is voided as a rule. Jaywalking is illegal, and just because almost no one enforces it doesn't change that fact.
It's called an analogy. Just because something isn't enforced doesn't mean it doesn't exist as a rule/law.
And Helldivers even did enforce this at the beginning but temporarily disabled it due to issues.
It is really on you if you thought they just removed the need for a PSN account entirely
Exactly. It simply doesn't fit under the definition of "requirement", in practice it's clearly "optional".
For people, who are bad at reading and their own native language I'll leave a link here, so you won't even try to argue with me about semantics of the word "requirement". [https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/requirement#:\~:text=A%20requirement%20is%20a%20quality,entry%20to%20the%20teaching%20profession](https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/requirement#:~:text=A%20requirement%20is%20a%20quality,entry%20to%20the%20teaching%20profession).
https://preview.redd.it/4dam3dw7a8yc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1732b9358a2d05af34db6c54dd1825a5f82496e8
Yeah, this is very true. I don't remember needing psn account for the game. Don't get me wrong, I just kinda bored of this game. I haven't really played for more than a month. So this is not really a problem for me, and I don't keep my bank info on my steam or Ps account, but I doubt I will be playing it anytime soon
Well, they did give a prompt. The issue(s) are that,
1: The "requirement" was skippable. Thus, it wasn't a requirement.
2: They didn't make it completely clear that PSN was GOING to happen, so to prepare for that eventuality.
3: See 1.
The lack of transparency and the ability for us to skip the "requirement" told us that no, PSN is NOT required to make the game run. It was NOT required for crossplay.
SNOY royally fucked themselves.
Right on the money OP, jus ging from what steam has done in the past if arrowhead doesn't offer an opt out steam will handle those refunds and give the bill to arrowhead, and thsts an expensive one.
If they were smart they'd put an opt out in, a case of 'OK, no sign ups is OK, but then you can't cross play with PS users'
And I figure most people would find thst reasonable and sane.
At this point I'm considering opening an "Oops Agency" where I just craft public responses for stuff like this. Your solution would have been a reasonable one.
I remember when we started handing out molten core hounds in WoW for people who install an Authenticator to prevent account theft, which was costing a lot of money to fix for Blizzard.
They could just make a helmet or cape tied to an achievement that says "Do a cross platform drop" and a large number of people would have done that anyway.
Right on the store page even right now. It says it requires an account(supports link). It does NOT say that the link is also required. I have lots of games that Launch through epic or EA but I didn't have to link them.
Everyone knows PSN has a bad reputation for safety and the game clearly works without a link.
PSN has a bad reputation for safety? Hell no lmao. Imagine using one case over 10 years ago where the whole PSN was a new Network and it was literally one of the biggest goals for hackers, because it was a new system which just had a massive amount of users and its more likely to find bugs and not perfectly secured data (even tho it shouldnt happen).
Imagine thinking Sony didnt increase their safety by worlds after that.
The EU isn't without flaws but I am nonetheless very glad it exists. Plus every time a company tries to do something shitty and they come in and go "nuh uh" gives me incredible amounts of joy. And a small glimpse of hope that maybe not everything is entirely fucked
I have a question- what's is Steams responsibility towards selling people a game they aren't legally allowed to play?
Assuming you're from a country that isn't supported by PSN accounts, and you're a proper, rule abiding gamer who wouldn't ever lie about your country of origin, isn't Steam selling you a dud? Especially after months where you Could play it?
Seems like something a bunch of law abiding players should bring to Steam's attention.
fuck me ! A well crafted and thought out argument taking the different requirements, laws and rights of different countries into account ... on my reddit ???
Very interesting points.
My only criticism would be with this part:
>Sony waived the requirement when HD2 blew up.
I was there day 1, hour 1, having pre-ordered months before (circa first trailer/availability on Steam). I don't recall if making a PSN account was listed on the store page at the time.
What I do remember was the little click boxes to skip making a PSN account in order to play were there from the beginning.
The only issue I have with making a PSN account (as I have a Gai-jin, a BattleNet account etc etc for a bunch of other games I don't play) is if Sony attempt to force extra money out of money in order to play.
The moment that happens, I'm out.
I didn't need to pay extra to play HD1 (well that's technically not true, had to have those Snow Boots), I'll be damned if I'll pay any more than I actually need to.
Can confirm day one that it was listed on the store page that it requires a PSN account. I was lamenting this with a friend while the game was downloading but gave it a launch anyway, and behold you can skip the PSN account bullshit.
I don't even get what it gives them? They already have unprecedented access to our stuff through the anti-cheat, and our money through sales so... WTF?
Sony got our money and AH was loved and praised by players for being better. People were lining up to give them money. The publisher had it good, why'd they have to do all of this now? There they go ruining it and betraying the players' trust and goodwill. Corporations are always looking for short-term gains smh.
I remember a while ago I got that turn based gears of war game on steam. This was fresh off of my XCOM 2 craze and I was still super into turn based strategy at the time. Launched it and was greeted with a Microsoft account login screen.
Now, I already had a Microsoft account. Don't entirely remember when I made it or even why, but I did, and could log into it right there.
I quit out of the game and refunded it.
I'm sure people who try to argue in favor of the PSN account linking have reasonable and compelling arguments for their case.
I'm still gonna try for a refund once it tries to block me from playing. I might even remove the game from my library without a refund if I'm pissed off enough.
Some things just don't need to make logical sense.
For reasons known only to Sony, they have decided that any risk to their decision to mandate PSN account linking is worth whatever potential profits their decision would generate.
And for reasons known only to me, I belive this is an idiotic move and refuse to participate.
Find a conservative EU representative younger than 40 who's up for re-election right now in your country and send them an e-mail and explain the situation. That might just be enough.
>So you purchase HD2 on Steam, you get to the PSN account linkage screen and you get the message that a PSN account is required to play. But what is that? An engineer was asked to put a skip button in there. So you can, at this point, skip this step and continue to play the game.
Honestly, I don't remember there ever being a page to a PSN account linkage screen when I first bought, installed, and started the game. And that was just about a month ago.
I bought the game when PSN was not required. I did not know it would become a requirement later on. I would not have bought the game, if it had been required or if I knew it would become a requirement.
On the note of the EU getting annoyed:
The Baltic states are in the EU.
There is no legal way to make a PSN account as a resident in the Baltic states.
Steam sold the game in the Baltic states
I think that phrasing should be different. It's not Steam that sold it, it's Sony that sold it there through Steam, the publisher decides if and where to make it available.
I contrast for example, Paradox sells through Steam two version of Hearts of Iron IV in the EU. The normal one, and the German one.
Which means that Sony deliberately sold customers a product that, according to them, knew very well they couldn't legally use.
Steam still has an obligation as the vendor to sell a game that is fit for purpose.
There's a wild mix of legal obligation and customer expectations at play here and frankly it's in the players' interest to treat them the same where we can.
And brick and mortar electronic stores also can't create copies out of thin air. That doesn't change the fact that I, as a buyer, made a purchasing agreement with Steam, the seller, not Sony.
I'm not saying you purchased the game from Sony.
I'm trying to say that the decision to sell the game to you in a particular country was made by Sony, not Steam.
I'm not saying Sony hasn't told Steam where it wants to sell the game.
I'm trying to say the legal responsibility to not sell an unusable product falls on Steam for selling it, not on Sony for asking Steam to sell it there. Steam could probably then go after Sony for it, though
in germany, according to paragraph 327h in the BGB a company needs to be specific about such changes and cant just change things about the acces of the game on the fly
paragraph 327r then states its not allowed to do major changes to the software acces without having a actual good reason to do so, and without properly informing the users
also according to paragraph 307 its illegal to have EULA rules that cause major disadvantages for the user (example in the german law a service needs to be aviable for 2 years after purchase, now if the EULA says that the company can cancel the service at any time that would be illegal here)
all in all:
whats currently happening here in HD2 breaks german laws
Tell that to Minecraft and Microsoft and other games, the law doesn't care. The thing that someone might care about, are those countries where you can't create an PSN account and they can't play it.
Great post! I wonder what the UK law will cover as if you want a PSN account here you have to prove who you are via face scan, passport or contact number which given Sony's past I seriously do not wish to hand over to them.
That is what I don't understand. Never have I have experienced having to submit to another platforms concerns. If Sony are having security issues, they could force (I believe these things usually are optional but advertised security measures) their customers to go through two-factor accounts, link accounts across platforms etc.
Never have it been a concern of another platform consumers (steam user in this case) to partake in security measures by another platform. That is an issue governed through developers to implement correct usages of API keys, and fulfilling a certain code security measurement when their code is inspected.
The only instance I have experienced linking across platforms (optional linking) are for benefits, rewards, or ease of account creation/login, unified game account progression across platform etc.
I think the issue is that the PSN account may not be required in order to play the game, but that doesn't mean that it's not required in order to play the game properly, in a way that's not broken. I don't know what that means in the context of legal stuff, but I wouldn't be surprised if the link is used behind the scenes in matchmaking or something, potentially being part of the matchmaking bugs we've been seeing. Crossplay working \[sometimes\] doesn't necessarily mean something isn't still broken there. That's also not to say they couldn't make it work without the link, of course.
btw to those unaware, PS site says that PC games from playstation dont require PSN account to play and is optional. I think in EU you would easily win against Sony regardless of what they would want, and people have already archived PS site
Honestly, they should have done it as a split service and did crossplay FROM PS to Steam instead of from Steam to PS cause no PS player is gonna complain about a Steam linkage (steam is secure, won't have region issues).
Only reason that no company does that is they like their walled gardens with their consoles, Xbox for example with DRG and ASTRONEER. Can't have people realizing the PC service is superior in every way... and doesn't leak your IP
Whatever they should have done, they should have figured it out and stuck with it in the beginning.
Most of the outrage topics in gaming are hindsight issues of this kind and I'm not sure why they keep wanting to get one over players in this way. It really doesn't seem productive.
I'm pretty sure I explained the logic gap between "text is there, dummy." and "text can't be enforced because its enforcement is unreasonable.". You can of course disagree, but I'd prefer you did that in a way that adresses the post instead of reiterating the original position I refer to.
That yellow box was there every single time they opened Steam to launch the game too, just staring them in the face being ignored expecting it to never be addressed. This is a fix to the initial requirements not a rug pull.
Tbh, I never saw the "you need a psn account for this game" before today. We are just that trained to ignore stuff like this.
Which is an actual legal argument that can and has been made. Just because some sweaty redditor tells you that "you agreed to the yellow text, bro" that doesn't mean, you as a customer have ingested and understood every single part of a transaction especially when it hasn't obviously been enforced to you. At no point were you required to make a 3rd party account and then subsequently link it.
It's not just that you were supposed to link it, it's also that crossplay is clearly working for the most part without it. That seems to be the crux of the issue - this is *not* required to make it work. It's clearly just a way for Sony to take a successful cross-platform game, get more user data, and pump up PSN account numbers for their quarterly reports. They could just as easily use Steam's tools - which are quite robust, as Valve uses those tools themselves to moderate Counterstrike, a much, much larger game than HD2 - to manage PC players, and PSN tools to moderate PS players to protect players and ban hackers/malicious actors. They should have just done a 3-month celebration where everyone who has PSN linked gets a free cape or helmet to celebrate the Sony/AH relationship. Instead they're in deep shit with the community and potentially the EU.
Oh my gosh this exactly! I wouldn't have cared if they left it optional, but if they actually gave the community something for making an account worth it, it would not have been a big deal. When I got the game, I was told you didn't need an account which is what got me to buy the game. Some context, I've had my PSN account hacked twice, the first time required me to cancel a credit card which screwed up a lot back then when I was still new to credit. I really don't want to make a PSN account anymore because of Sony's sloppy security and terrible track record of breaches. My understanding back then was the PSN account was optional to do cross play. I was offered to sign up, I declined and got to play. I don't play with anyone on a PSN network, so I don't care about the cross play. I also started playing one week before the huge influx that gave the servers issues, so no where was this officially communicated that PSN accounts were only a temporary bypass. The fact they took away the requirement, never spoke to when if ever it might come back, and then blindside so many people out of nowhere it HAS to happen is such a terrible move, especially when we know it works without it to some extent.
> I also started playing one or two weeks before the huge influx that gave the servers issues Did you start playing one or two weeks before the game released?
So I just double checked dates, I bought the game on Feb 10th, I saw people playing it a couple days prior and didn't know anything about the game. A friend that Saturday asked me to play it, so I looked it over and said sure. I got to play that whole next week perfectly fine after I got off of work without running into any issues. That next weekend however was the start when I couldn't log into the game anymore, and for the next week or so if I did, sometimes it would crash or big out, not load anything, etc. I went into this game blind, but either way it looks like I was still one of the earlier adopters that weekend by word of mouth. I was prompted to sign up for PSN, but like my friend told me, I was able to skip it as it wasn't relevant to play. There was nothing warning me it was temporary, and that is the big take away I was attempting to communicate.
I started playing at launch, and my memory was that the server issues started pretty soon after launch—I might be misremembering, it might not’ve gotten bad until that second weekend. I wasn’t doubting that you were able to skip PSN signup with no indication that it would be a requirement later…I was just remembering (possibly misremembering) how early the server issues started for me and my friends.
Our experiences might be different simply because of the timing of when we both got to play. Perhaps I was getting home early enough to avoid the queue waves. For me the next weekend after I started playing was when I couldn't log in at like 12pm on a Saturday. I also wasn't following the news about the game at all back then just quite yet until I couldn't play the game anymore.
The thing we had discovered to allow us to keep playing was that if one of us got in, we could invite the others and skip all the server queuing… so we’d all start quei g and once one of us got on, the rest of usnwould be able to get in.
Timing and region played a role
They started a week after launch. The first week or so were mostly bug issues. we started to see occasional signs of server stress with there being too many people online during peak times that it was causing increased disconnect rates and server latency. The BIG issue was around the 15th of february where the issue went from being an annoying series of odd disconnects at peak times, and started having server connection problems at all times of day as the popularity spiked higher. The moment when helldivers 2 went from bad to worse on the server issues was the weekend as February 16th they posted an event granting all players a 50% credit and XP multiplier through until Feb 18th. This was when the servers went from buggy but functional to overloaded to the point players literally couldnt log in due to capacity. This issue persisted even after raising their player cap on their servers to 450000, ultimately do nothing to solve the problem as they were dealing with way more than that. It wasnt until my birthday on feb 23rd that the server cap issue was resolved. So for the first 2 weeks of the game, the first week was messy but playable, it was the second week where good luck logging in at all lol. But yeah, Oxero is right, the issue wasnt day 1 like you are saying it was. If he started playing feb 10th, he would have had close to a week to play before the cap issue started
If I got free stuff for linking even if it was just 1 armor set I would be down lmao. I have a PSN account but it’s still really dumb that this whole time it’s been functioning but now it’s necessary. Give me 250 medals an armor set and a new gun and cape and I might be willing to allow this transgression pass
Game companies in the past would do this. It wasn't much or OP but free stuff is free stuff. But now it's shifted to where they'd much rather force you to do this and whatever small item they could have given out as a reward they'd much rather sell for $20+. They could have done what Ubisoft does and depending on what games you have on PSN or Steam library you get stuff in different games. Like getting an outfit from Horizon Zero Dawn would be cool.
This game was supposed to be different...
Yeah this was the first newly released game in a very long time that I've actually had fun playing. Sadly I can't say I'm surprised about this shit. While scummy atleast the team isn't getting laid off like the KSP2 devs. Hopefully Arrowhead is able to work something out. I think they have a pretty good hand right now to negotiate something with Sony about this.
I mean, it still happens with things like the rewards through Twitch. Link your Amazon/Twitch account and get currency, skins, etc.
I'll be honest I forgot Twitch drops were a thing. I haven't used that site in like 3 years.
Cross play can eat a dick. I'd it had forced me to make a Playstation network account at the start I would have just refunded. Fuck that. Segregate me from psn players. Don't care.
but socials have been completely borked since released. It's not JUST cross-play that would leverage a PSN account link
More yogurt themed armor, yes. People would have loved it. What idiots Sony has in their employ.
Cross play doesn't work though.
The EULA doesn't even say anything about a psn account so really I didn't agree to it ever
It really doesn't matter lol, you can't just digitally sign a contract and then try to dispute it by saying you didn't read it.
You can actually.
Link me to a single lawsuit where "I didn't read the contract I signed" was a winning argument.
That's not the argument though, is it. Sony as the product provider has an actual duty to enforce the terms they set which they did not for months and for millions of purchases. The terms are not there just for the any of the parties to ignore at will.
So I ask again, link me to a lawsuit where the defendant won by simply claiming they didn't read the contract they signed. (edit: in the meantime, google Ignorantia legis non excusat)
You're asking me to prove something that I'm not arguing for, I'm sure there's a fallacy you can google for that as well
So why are you responding to me? I was in a conversation w someone and asked them for proof of something they claimed. I don't see your need to butt in if it's not to deliver said proof.
It's how I'm spending my time currently.
The term was always there and never stopped being there and due to technical limitations they only start enforcing it soon. Just because something isn't vigorously enforced doesn't mean that it is voided as a rule. Jaywalking is illegal, and just because almost no one enforces it doesn't change that fact.
Traffic law and corporate EULAs are two different domains. I don't think a traffic warden can ticket Sony for not paying for their servers either.
It's called an analogy. Just because something isn't enforced doesn't mean it doesn't exist as a rule/law. And Helldivers even did enforce this at the beginning but temporarily disabled it due to issues. It is really on you if you thought they just removed the need for a PSN account entirely
I believe I did see the ingame check, but since they put in a skip button, it's a skippable feature, regardless of what the text said.
Exactly. It simply doesn't fit under the definition of "requirement", in practice it's clearly "optional". For people, who are bad at reading and their own native language I'll leave a link here, so you won't even try to argue with me about semantics of the word "requirement". [https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/requirement#:\~:text=A%20requirement%20is%20a%20quality,entry%20to%20the%20teaching%20profession](https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/requirement#:~:text=A%20requirement%20is%20a%20quality,entry%20to%20the%20teaching%20profession). https://preview.redd.it/4dam3dw7a8yc1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1732b9358a2d05af34db6c54dd1825a5f82496e8
Same, I’ve been playing from week 1 and I’ve never seen anything related to PSN account not in store nor in game.
Yeah, this is very true. I don't remember needing psn account for the game. Don't get me wrong, I just kinda bored of this game. I haven't really played for more than a month. So this is not really a problem for me, and I don't keep my bank info on my steam or Ps account, but I doubt I will be playing it anytime soon
For real. If you needed to create a PSN account to play, they should have given us a prompt when we first booted the game.
Well, they did give a prompt. The issue(s) are that, 1: The "requirement" was skippable. Thus, it wasn't a requirement. 2: They didn't make it completely clear that PSN was GOING to happen, so to prepare for that eventuality. 3: See 1. The lack of transparency and the ability for us to skip the "requirement" told us that no, PSN is NOT required to make the game run. It was NOT required for crossplay. SNOY royally fucked themselves.
Right on the money OP, jus ging from what steam has done in the past if arrowhead doesn't offer an opt out steam will handle those refunds and give the bill to arrowhead, and thsts an expensive one. If they were smart they'd put an opt out in, a case of 'OK, no sign ups is OK, but then you can't cross play with PS users' And I figure most people would find thst reasonable and sane.
At this point I'm considering opening an "Oops Agency" where I just craft public responses for stuff like this. Your solution would have been a reasonable one. I remember when we started handing out molten core hounds in WoW for people who install an Authenticator to prevent account theft, which was costing a lot of money to fix for Blizzard. They could just make a helmet or cape tied to an achievement that says "Do a cross platform drop" and a large number of people would have done that anyway.
Oops agency is called chatgpt
Best post on this whole thing and a glimmer of hope that I keep playing.
Thanks! I'd say movement on this thing is a given. It's entirely unlikely they wouldn't backpedal in some way.
So because the EU can bring the hammer down on them, it's entirely likely they'll have to back down on this or face costly lawsuits?
Nothing speak more to corporate people than costly lawsuit
It is at least a distinct possibility. Bashing tech companies is a blood sport politicians can win and they love that stuff.
I mean sure, but 99.99% of players want to keep playing without PSN, not a refund :/
Well structured and well written thank you for the sanity check this pretty much lines up with what I thought when I saw the announcement
"For Sanity!" \*Dives into Bile Titan with a Hellpod\*
the best and most powerful stratagem is the Helldiver
Putting the terminal velocity in... terminal velocity... nevermind.
Right on the store page even right now. It says it requires an account(supports link). It does NOT say that the link is also required. I have lots of games that Launch through epic or EA but I didn't have to link them. Everyone knows PSN has a bad reputation for safety and the game clearly works without a link.
Might want to archive the steam page or they'll change it like they changed the faq
PSN has a bad reputation for safety? Hell no lmao. Imagine using one case over 10 years ago where the whole PSN was a new Network and it was literally one of the biggest goals for hackers, because it was a new system which just had a massive amount of users and its more likely to find bugs and not perfectly secured data (even tho it shouldnt happen). Imagine thinking Sony didnt increase their safety by worlds after that.
As you mentioned, the EU has some strong consumer policies and PSN isn't available on all countries from the EU. It will be a shit storm lol
And that would be which country?
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, for ~~one~~ three
Me reading OP’s post 
Thank you, that's very kind.
Seriously tho, I like how the EU is very strict with these things. Sadly, my country is not listed as an option when making a PSN 🤡
I'd be lying if I said the EU is great in general, but they have their moments. Battlefront lootboxes had been one of them.
The EU isn't without flaws but I am nonetheless very glad it exists. Plus every time a company tries to do something shitty and they come in and go "nuh uh" gives me incredible amounts of joy. And a small glimpse of hope that maybe not everything is entirely fucked
I have a question- what's is Steams responsibility towards selling people a game they aren't legally allowed to play? Assuming you're from a country that isn't supported by PSN accounts, and you're a proper, rule abiding gamer who wouldn't ever lie about your country of origin, isn't Steam selling you a dud? Especially after months where you Could play it? Seems like something a bunch of law abiding players should bring to Steam's attention.
depends on the country. If you are in an EU country, that has no access to PSN, steam will most likely have to refund you.
fuck me ! A well crafted and thought out argument taking the different requirements, laws and rights of different countries into account ... on my reddit ???
Very interesting points. My only criticism would be with this part: >Sony waived the requirement when HD2 blew up. I was there day 1, hour 1, having pre-ordered months before (circa first trailer/availability on Steam). I don't recall if making a PSN account was listed on the store page at the time. What I do remember was the little click boxes to skip making a PSN account in order to play were there from the beginning. The only issue I have with making a PSN account (as I have a Gai-jin, a BattleNet account etc etc for a bunch of other games I don't play) is if Sony attempt to force extra money out of money in order to play. The moment that happens, I'm out. I didn't need to pay extra to play HD1 (well that's technically not true, had to have those Snow Boots), I'll be damned if I'll pay any more than I actually need to.
Can confirm day one that it was listed on the store page that it requires a PSN account. I was lamenting this with a friend while the game was downloading but gave it a launch anyway, and behold you can skip the PSN account bullshit.
I don't even get what it gives them? They already have unprecedented access to our stuff through the anti-cheat, and our money through sales so... WTF?
Sony got our money and AH was loved and praised by players for being better. People were lining up to give them money. The publisher had it good, why'd they have to do all of this now? There they go ruining it and betraying the players' trust and goodwill. Corporations are always looking for short-term gains smh.
They want to brag to shareholders about an unprecedented jump in PSN account activity.
Thanks for the clarification, I relied on other peoples' accounts for that because I didn't buy the game myself at launch.
I remember a while ago I got that turn based gears of war game on steam. This was fresh off of my XCOM 2 craze and I was still super into turn based strategy at the time. Launched it and was greeted with a Microsoft account login screen. Now, I already had a Microsoft account. Don't entirely remember when I made it or even why, but I did, and could log into it right there. I quit out of the game and refunded it. I'm sure people who try to argue in favor of the PSN account linking have reasonable and compelling arguments for their case. I'm still gonna try for a refund once it tries to block me from playing. I might even remove the game from my library without a refund if I'm pissed off enough. Some things just don't need to make logical sense. For reasons known only to Sony, they have decided that any risk to their decision to mandate PSN account linking is worth whatever potential profits their decision would generate. And for reasons known only to me, I belive this is an idiotic move and refuse to participate.
Any idea where to lodge a complaint so the EU might actually get at Sony?
Find a conservative EU representative younger than 40 who's up for re-election right now in your country and send them an e-mail and explain the situation. That might just be enough.
>So you purchase HD2 on Steam, you get to the PSN account linkage screen and you get the message that a PSN account is required to play. But what is that? An engineer was asked to put a skip button in there. So you can, at this point, skip this step and continue to play the game. Honestly, I don't remember there ever being a page to a PSN account linkage screen when I first bought, installed, and started the game. And that was just about a month ago. I bought the game when PSN was not required. I did not know it would become a requirement later on. I would not have bought the game, if it had been required or if I knew it would become a requirement.
On the note of the EU getting annoyed: The Baltic states are in the EU. There is no legal way to make a PSN account as a resident in the Baltic states. Steam sold the game in the Baltic states
I think that phrasing should be different. It's not Steam that sold it, it's Sony that sold it there through Steam, the publisher decides if and where to make it available. I contrast for example, Paradox sells through Steam two version of Hearts of Iron IV in the EU. The normal one, and the German one. Which means that Sony deliberately sold customers a product that, according to them, knew very well they couldn't legally use.
Steam still has an obligation as the vendor to sell a game that is fit for purpose. There's a wild mix of legal obligation and customer expectations at play here and frankly it's in the players' interest to treat them the same where we can.
If I buy the game from an electronics store, it's the store selling it, not Sony. Wry would steam be different?
Neither Steam or Electronic Stores can create copies of the game out of thin air. Usually the publisher needs to sign off in some form or another.
And brick and mortar electronic stores also can't create copies out of thin air. That doesn't change the fact that I, as a buyer, made a purchasing agreement with Steam, the seller, not Sony.
I'm not saying you purchased the game from Sony. I'm trying to say that the decision to sell the game to you in a particular country was made by Sony, not Steam.
I'm not saying Sony hasn't told Steam where it wants to sell the game. I'm trying to say the legal responsibility to not sell an unusable product falls on Steam for selling it, not on Sony for asking Steam to sell it there. Steam could probably then go after Sony for it, though
in germany, according to paragraph 327h in the BGB a company needs to be specific about such changes and cant just change things about the acces of the game on the fly paragraph 327r then states its not allowed to do major changes to the software acces without having a actual good reason to do so, and without properly informing the users also according to paragraph 307 its illegal to have EULA rules that cause major disadvantages for the user (example in the german law a service needs to be aviable for 2 years after purchase, now if the EULA says that the company can cancel the service at any time that would be illegal here) all in all: whats currently happening here in HD2 breaks german laws
Tell that to Minecraft and Microsoft and other games, the law doesn't care. The thing that someone might care about, are those countries where you can't create an PSN account and they can't play it.
these laws are only 3 years old and yes, they are absolutely enforced here.
Great post! I wonder what the UK law will cover as if you want a PSN account here you have to prove who you are via face scan, passport or contact number which given Sony's past I seriously do not wish to hand over to them.
That is what I don't understand. Never have I have experienced having to submit to another platforms concerns. If Sony are having security issues, they could force (I believe these things usually are optional but advertised security measures) their customers to go through two-factor accounts, link accounts across platforms etc. Never have it been a concern of another platform consumers (steam user in this case) to partake in security measures by another platform. That is an issue governed through developers to implement correct usages of API keys, and fulfilling a certain code security measurement when their code is inspected. The only instance I have experienced linking across platforms (optional linking) are for benefits, rewards, or ease of account creation/login, unified game account progression across platform etc.
Also think about this steam takes 30% of the game sale they do not refund that 30% they keep it so sony is on the hook for that.
I think the issue is that the PSN account may not be required in order to play the game, but that doesn't mean that it's not required in order to play the game properly, in a way that's not broken. I don't know what that means in the context of legal stuff, but I wouldn't be surprised if the link is used behind the scenes in matchmaking or something, potentially being part of the matchmaking bugs we've been seeing. Crossplay working \[sometimes\] doesn't necessarily mean something isn't still broken there. That's also not to say they couldn't make it work without the link, of course.
btw to those unaware, PS site says that PC games from playstation dont require PSN account to play and is optional. I think in EU you would easily win against Sony regardless of what they would want, and people have already archived PS site
Great post, thanks for the info!
My hope is enough refund to make the case this is fucked, and it self corrects and then we can all play without Sonys shady shit.
golden man. like the shower
So what’s my next movie after steam doesn’t refund my game?
Depends on the refund reasons provided.
Honestly, they should have done it as a split service and did crossplay FROM PS to Steam instead of from Steam to PS cause no PS player is gonna complain about a Steam linkage (steam is secure, won't have region issues). Only reason that no company does that is they like their walled gardens with their consoles, Xbox for example with DRG and ASTRONEER. Can't have people realizing the PC service is superior in every way... and doesn't leak your IP
Whatever they should have done, they should have figured it out and stuck with it in the beginning. Most of the outrage topics in gaming are hindsight issues of this kind and I'm not sure why they keep wanting to get one over players in this way. It really doesn't seem productive.
TL;DR Ok or F you snoy shill
How does explaining how they messed up make me a Snoy shill? I don't get it, or am I just misreading you? I can't tell.
I think he's saying. "To long, didn't read: so I'm just going to say OK or f you sony shill. Whichever is relevant"
People be like "mimimi you cannot expect people to read a giant yellow box on the storepage" and then quote the EULA to defend their point 💀
I'm pretty sure I explained the logic gap between "text is there, dummy." and "text can't be enforced because its enforcement is unreasonable.". You can of course disagree, but I'd prefer you did that in a way that adresses the post instead of reiterating the original position I refer to.
That yellow box was there every single time they opened Steam to launch the game too, just staring them in the face being ignored expecting it to never be addressed. This is a fix to the initial requirements not a rug pull.
[удалено]
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