1. Guy buys The Orange Box from India while home for winter
2. Guy tries to install game in the US
3. Guy finds out game is region locked
4. ???
5. Profit!! (Valve, not guy)
Sorry about that. I read too many comments on Digg. But the above is exactly what happened. The copy of The Orange Box I bought while in India will not work here because Steam checks my IP and refuses to let me play the game. I’ve tried everything but it won’t work. So just because I happened to buy the game (a legit copy) while at home, Steam hates me. Good going guys. Of course, I can still play the game when I go home next but what if someone was on vacation and will not be going back again? Valve just frakked them out of their hard-earned cash.
Steam was annoying enough 3 years ago when I first played Half-Life 2 with the painfully slow decrypting/updating process. But this is far more irritating. Valve is punishing legitimate customers just because some unscrupulous retailer in Thailand was selling CD Keys to US customers.
There is a reason why more and more people like console games over PC games. In addition to hardware upgrade costs, publishers are making gamers jump through more and more hoops just to be able to play a game they purchased (legitimately). Stop treating your customers like criminals. It’s what the RIAA and MPAA have been doing and see where it’s gotten them. It’s great that you want to make games more affordable in poorer areas of the world, but don’t put bullshit restrictions on them.
I’ve always maintained that Steam is a bad idea. All it does is make life more difficult for us PC gamers. Why should it matter where I am located when I install the game? I paid for it, it’s my computer, then why am I not able to use the product the way I want to? Any type of DRM sucks. And they wonder why piracy is so rampant. People get frustrated when companies resort to tactics like region-locking. DVDs anyone? They enforced region-locking but has it affected piracy one bit? Nope.
I can put up with CD Keys. They are a one-time thing and after entering the string of alphanumeric characters, your game will install and you can play it all you want. Activation via Steam just blows.
I own a Nintendo DS and love being able to just get a game, pop it in, and play. I don’t have a TV here or I would probably own an Xbox 360 too. I always buy retail copies of games – no downloading or buying illegal copies. Yet, issues like region-locking really make me think twice.
#1 by Rohit on January 27th, 2008
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lol…talk about being honest. You buy original game, and look what you get. They still expect one to be honest…excuse me? I’d rather say f*%k off.
#2 by Atul Varaskar on January 27th, 2008
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I dumped my orange box somehwhere behind my closet so I dont see it again …
Got a damaged CD … too lazy to go back to the store .. rather have no time … tried Dloading the game via Steam …. I had to be kidding ,with our broadband I did only 16% in 2 days … gave up the idea 999rs down the drain.
#3 by ray on April 14th, 2009
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this might be too old a blog post, but i’d just like to point out that consoles are heavily region locked too.. the DS is an exception, but that’s a bit of a fluke.
#4 by Ninjakamster on September 21st, 2009
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I live in the U.S and bought GTA4 for the PC while vacationing in India last year, it was only $10 there! Upon buying it, I read the back of the box which stated it could not be activated on computers outside India. So I was disappointed as I wanted to buy other games there like Left For Dead for $20.
But when I came back, it activated and works just fine in the U.S. But I have had another person tell me that Steam games wouldn’t work the same. Thanks for the warning.
But I may still buy some games there, including Steam games and just crack them when coming back to the U.S. I bought a legit copy, it is my game, and I will play it damn it! Stupid DRM!!! > : (
#5 by KVJ on December 16th, 2009
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Do you have any idea if a copy activated in India will continue to work in the US. I’m visiting India for a couple of weeks, and might pick up (and activate and play) L4D2 while I’m there
#6 by ToFu on February 9th, 2010
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No it won’t work. I bought a game in Singapore, activated it in Singapore, moved to Australia and tried to install it on my new computer and it doesn’t work.