Square Enix screws Deus Ex: Human Revolution customers

[Melan]

Read all about it on Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

 

Oh dear, someone isn't supporting our No Oceans campaign. Square-Enix have sadly region locked the boxed retail versions of the PC release of Deus Ex: Human Revolution across Europe. Retail copies sold in the UK will only activate on UK Steam accounts. It's a similar story for copies sold in Russia/Poland, and the rest of the EU makes up the third European region.

 

What possible motivation could Square-Enix have for restricting the range of choice that their European customers have when it comes to deciding where to buy their game from? Well I had a poke around, and for gamers in France, for example, the cheapest price I've been able to find for Human Revolution is €35.99 (or £31.51), whereas they would be able to import a UK copy for £23.49 + £4 shipping, a total of £27.49 (or €31.40). Looking at the pricing of buying Human Revolution direct from Steam, the UK price is £29.99 (or €34.25) and the Euro price is €44.99 (or £39.38). This region locking protects Square-Enix's policy of international pricing, and prevents customers who are in the EU from being able to avoid the price hike of ~30% Square Enix may or may not have decided to bestow upon their region.

 

First, I pre-ordered the Augmented Edition of DX:HR on Amazon.co.uk because the price was Ł25, the equivalent of €29. In Hungary, the same product costs €54 when ordered from Steam. That's almost twice as much. So, in other news, non-UK customers are fucked.

 

Second, as it has been raised by a lot of posters already, this is 100% to be illegal. No, it goes against one of the fundamental principles the EU is built on. Wow.

 

Third, mods on the DX: HR forums are spreading blatant lies about the situation.

 

I don't know if this is a new low for the computer game industry or not, because I haven't been buying new games lately (DX3 has been the first since Bioshock), but I must tell you, it doesn't feel like a welcome. And God bless piracy, I guess, for letting me enjoy games I bought legally with my fucking money.

 

[edit]To add (some guy on the Eidos forums):

"Bravo, Square-Enix! You successfully managed to get DX:HR off the top spot of the Amazon.co.uk bestseller list for 'Hot New Releases' in 'PC & Video Games'. Let's see how hard you can make it drop til Friday next week."

Bwahahahaha!

Edited August 17, 2011 by Melan

[demagogue]

It would be against EU rules if the governments were restricting the trade, but in this case it's a private company doing the restricting. Nothing is *legally* stopping a person from buying a game abroad they can't play. As to whether the law can allow companies to do it, I mean practically every company breaks its market into regions & treats them differently and takes steps to restrict cross-region trade all the time, like punishing distributors that sell outside their region. I think it's legal.

 

The only difference is most companies only restrict distributors because they're not worried about pissing them off; but when you restrict consumers and piss them off, you're playing with fire. You can do it but you deserve the shitstorm you get. It's definitely against the spirit of having a single market that people take as an entitlement (they don't see the restrictions distributors are already under). No way they could pull that shit in California vs. New York; people would take to the streets, which is what people should do here and shame SqEnix into better behavior.

[rebb]

If i am forced to play a localized version of this, it's a definite no-buy for me.

[Ladro]

I totally agree: it's incredible. Always the same stupid politcs!

 

This selling politic it's the best way to have the game on torrent spots the *same* day it will be on markets or even before (look at Crysis2, ie). My compliments to Square-Enix selling and marketing department to have this incredible talent on losing money and loyal consumers. Clap clap clap!

 

I'm very happy that cool ideas like Humble Bundle are raising always and always better.

 

Of course I will no buy DE with this tricky disgusting remote activation. Why I (and we as consumers) have to trust these company when these company are NOT trusting me ??!?

 

Remember always this cool video:

 

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=UnXU7z2_6Jg

Edited August 18, 2011 by Ladro

[jdude]

First, I pre-ordered the Augmented Edition of DX:HR on Amazon.co.uk because the price was Ł25, the equivalent of €29. In Hungary, the same product costs €54 when ordered from Steam. That's almost twice as much. So, in other news, non-UK customers are fucked.

 

I don't think they will need you to buy it again, you will probably get it on CD from where-ever you got it from and it will install steam from the CD like HL2 did.

 

My view is I was going to get it off steam when they had a sale anyway, so doesn't really matter to me, but I can see how it would make someone mad. For example I'm not buying Battlefield 3 because it needs Origin.

[Serpentine]

And this sirs, is why preordering kills good developers, because it rewards stupid moves... or at least it does to bean counters who matter at the end of the day.

 

You might want to check SE's stellar history of not understanding the western market and their recent track record of destroying western IP that they've bought into.

[stumpy]

this is old news, its been known for over a year that the game would unlock over steam and that america and canada get the game 2 days before the rest of the world, its because the steam servers cant handle the load of it being unlocked all at once. look what happened to crysis 2 when crytek tried to unlock it via their own servers. steam has servers scattered all over the world to allow for the load on day 1. as for the price difference its likely to be the fact that america has lost its tripple 'AAA' credit rating due to the tea party and the euro isn't worth the paper its printed on. Banks in the uk wont exchange euro's for pound sterling.

[ungoliant]

this whole thing has reeking undertones of the pro-digital-copies-of-PC-games faction of douchebaggerers. Note: digital copies will not be region locked. i've read different accounts of what physical copies will/wont be locked. but it seems clear that if you purchase it on steam: no problem!!! I'm reminded of PC vs Console gaming. Half the concept that is supposed to appeal to consumers is: if you buy it on a console, it just works. period. Soooooo, now, if I buy my copy of DE:HR on Steam, "it just works", hmmmmm? I don't know if I buy my copy in the U.K. if it will work or not, based on what package I order, but as long as I get it on Steam instead, its all coolies.

 

edit: also, i officially rename this game Deus Ex: European Union Revolution

Edited August 18, 2011 by ungoliant

[New Horizon]

They're saying that the game is region locked on DVD because they couldn't fit all the different languages onto DVD...which makes sense I suppose, but rather than region lock it and treat consumers like idiots, they could have just let them buy the DVD they wanted...and then well, you know...download the language pack from steam.

[Melan]

That's a blatant lie, since it wouldn't need region-locking to work. People would just buy the version they needed.

[New Horizon]

From my understanding of the situation, they're only selling the 'physical' DVD in certain languages within their specified regions. I agree that people should be able to buy whatever version they want, it doesn't need to be region locked but I don't think it's a blatant lie so much as it is a bone headed decision.

 

If I were to buy the game from a german site, supposedly I would get the german only version since they couldn't fit all the languages on there. I'm guessing there is a ton of dialog. Since the game activates with Steam anyway, it would make more sense to me to let the 'user' decide where to buy it for the best price, and then download the language pack update of their choice from steam.

[fllood]

Since the game activates with Steam anyway, it would make more sense to me to let the 'user' decide where to buy it for the best price, and then download the language pack update of their choice from steam.

Exacly! ... like Bioware/EA did that exemplary with Dragon Age.

 

Fact is many European gamers prefer to play the english version over the translated one. And the localized versions are even cut sometimes as well. Needelss to say why pay a domestic price if most often European mainland people get it for half the price from UK??

 

To lock the UK version is very much dissatisfing indeed!

[lost_soul]

I am a hardcore DX1 fanatic. I've played it countless times and all of the mods like TNM and Redson and that other one that escapes me right now. I have the soundtrack on my MP3 player. That said, this doesn't surprise me one bit. I too fail to understand why the game industry goes out of its way to screw the honest person. They lost me at "activation required" because I bet they won't be allowing people to activate it in a decade for one reason or another.

 

If you've had enough of this crap, do what I did. Buy a console and start buying all of their games used. That way, you get a product that will still work in a decade and they don't get squat. It really has gotten so bad these days that I actively try to avoid supporting game developers. I've paid more for a used copy than a new one would have cost just to show them how I feel.

 

Besides, I'm really not expecting much from this game or T4. I followed the development of DXIW and T3 like a fanatic but was let down by the maps hardly being bigger than the apartment in which I live. I rushed out and bought both those games immediately upon release, but I'll be watching to see how these games turn out before I even consider buying them.

Edited August 18, 2011 by lost_soul

[rebb]

It would be nice if more developers would support something like language packs, true. That might also do wonders for those games that ship with all languages, bloating up the download-size needlessly ( in case of digital distribution ).

[Melan]

Well well well, this is a concrete example of why the EU can be a good thing:

Originally Posted by Eidos Boards Region-locking plan UPDATE

We're aware of some discussion regarding the planned region-locking of boxed PC versions of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, and after careful review we have decided not to implement this in the UK/Europe. Please note, this plan only related to PC boxed games, and not digital or console editions.

God bless the four basic freedoms and all that. Although the people who cancelled their preorders will still be mighty pissed. Lucky Ducky that I am, I didn't (okay, I also speculated something like this may happen).

Edited August 18, 2011 by Melan

[Ladro]

IMHO the problem is Steam and any kind of remote activation and/or DRM, not the language pack, or updates for this specific game.

 

Protections and DRM costs *a lot* of money to companies. Rather then use this money to make a lower price (that helps also to sell better), they use it to *control* users decisions. It's insane, it's stupid.

 

Anyway:

 

after careful review we have decided

 

Sounds really really good to me

 

("after careful review..." ROTFL!)

Edited August 18, 2011 by Ladro

[Melan]

As someone on RPS posted,

"After careful review” – we asked our lawyers.

“We have decided not to implement this” – they said it was illegal

[Bikerdude]

And God bless piracy, I guess, for letting me enjoy games I bought legally with my fucking money.

Recently games I have had to do that with were Metro2033 & Chronicles of Riddick:ADA. I point blank refuse to buy any games on steam, and will only consider purchasing games that require online activation when a crack has been released to bypass that crap.

[lost_soul]

IMHO the problem is Steam and any kind of remote activation and/or DRM, not the language pack, or updates for this specific game.

 

 

Bingo! Game developers can't even bother to patch CD-checking malware out of their old games now that CDs are obsolete, and yet we're supposed to believe they'll still be allowing us to activate our old games in 2020?

Edited August 18, 2011 by lost_soul

[Serpentine]

Bingo! Game developers can't even bother to patch CD-checking malware out of their old games now that CDs are obsolete, and yet we're supposed to believe they'll still be allowing us to activate our old games in 2020?

You mean besides Ubisoft releasing scene cracks as their own patches? That still amuses me

[lost_soul]

Did that really happen? You would think a company could never do that because it is almost impossible to guarantee that an exe will not do anything malicious... Or am I wrong? How could they sanction something like that which could conceivably have a hidden payload or something unless they went through every byte of the file and determined what it does?

[Bikerdude]

Ubisoft releasing scene cracks as their own patches

Another very compelling reason to never buy a ubisoft game, ever.

[Melan]

You mean besides Ubisoft releasing scene cracks as their own patches? That still amuses me

This really happened? Wow!

[Baddcog]

Well, on a side note

 

If anyone pre-orders on Steam and DOESN'T have a premium TF2 account wants to work a deal...

 

You get Dues X items for TF2 with pre order. I would be willing to make the premium upgrade purchase for you if you'll trade me the items. I may even be willing to buy you a $10 game or something. Steam now has gifted game trades available through Steam chat so you can trade games for in game items, etc..

 

I don't want the items but they are valuable towards trades for something I'm trying to obtain... Yeah, full geekdom.

 

Anyway, let me know if anyone wants to get rid of them and get a little something out of it. (They would be useable, but not tradeable until DuesX is released.

[jdude]

I just read a review of the game in a PC Gamer magazine I bought on a whim. Apparently it's really good (94/100. The only downfalls according to the review is that there's a lack of feeling in maps that you are in a big world due to a lack of mission including the ability to walk around outside the areas before you decide to enter as well as a lack of emphasis on using clever tactics to overcome obstacles.

 

The editor said it was the best game he'd played in 4 years, then later said it was the game of the decade.