pippin
Guest
They could always say it's the fault of the people selling and buying illicit keys. They apparently do sell legit keys and they offer additional safety measures but those only really work with their own keys.
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G2A Steam Key Reseller Drama Thread
- Thread starter Infinitron
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http://www.pcgamesn.com/scott-hartsman-g2a-fraud
Trion Worlds CEO speaks out on G2A controversy: “Someone's getting hurt; it's just a question of whom”
Update June 22, 2016: G2A have responded to the recent controversy sparked by TinyBuild's accusations of the company allowing fraudulent keys to be sold on their platform.
In a statement released today, G2A claim TinyBuild did not cooperate with their request to get a list of the questionable keys, which they needed to check against their own database.
G2A also call into question TinyBuild's estimated value of $450,000, citing frequent sales of up to 85% off as proof that the estimate is just too high. You can read our full story, along with G2A's statement at that link.
We've also reached out to G2A for comment on the story below.
Original Story June 22, 2016: As we reported yesterday, G2A have recently been under fire for their practice of allowing anyone to sell keys on their service. Indie publishers TinyBuild said that a significant number of keys they believe were purchased with stolen credit cards were sold on the service. Now Trion Worlds CEO Scott Hartsman, someone who has “spent more time combating fraud in the last couple years than making games,” has issued a long statement regarding G2A and their practices to PCGN.
Hartsman first explains how this actually happens.
“In our ideal world, none of this would matter - let people buy and sell keys as they like. That worked for a long time. Unfortunately, we live in a world with millions of stolen credit cards available for practically nothing, and a world of hundreds ofmillions of hacked account credentials floating around.
“People frequently reuse those across multiple sites. Sometimes their banks, their Paypals, their Amazon accounts, and so on. Exchangeable keys now come with massive fraud risk. Bad actors [a cyber security term for people who access databases with malicious intent] get stolen credentials/CCs, buy keys from legitimate sources, then list them on grey market sites. Then only later does the owner of the stolen CC notice, call their bank, and a chargeback gets issued.”
It’s at that point where places like TinyBuild are in trouble, as they’re out of money. So, why don’t the banks fix this?
“What most people don't know is that there's no incentive for the banks to take a stand here. Their customers are the credit card holders. If a CC holder with a stolen card says ‘cancel all the transactions,’ the bank's response in taking care of their customer is, ‘You got it, we'll reverse it all,’ as they should.
“Farther up the chain, isolated from both the developer and the CC holder, are the CC companies themselves. To them, for better or worse, it's a numbers game. Small number of chargebacks? Here are some punitive fines you need to pay us. Too many chargebacks for too long? Poof. You can no longer accept credit cards. And the innocent customers who just thought they were getting legitimately cheap keys lose access to games. It's a crap deal for everyone involved.”
‘Poof’ is exactly what happened to TinyBuild’s store, as they explained yesterday. But what about G2A specifically saying that they say legitimate resellers are using their store because of its reach?
“In our experience, the number of times that 'other partners' have bought keys and resold them on grey market sites, as G2A uses in their reasoning to TinyBuild, is exactly zero,” says Hartsman.
In response to this level of fraud, Trion have invested heavily in fraud protection. “We’ve built up what's likely the industry's best fraud protection for online games sales and microtransactions. It's not a problem that can be solved in software alone - it's a combination of data, software, and human effort, with multiple checkpoints along the way for every single transaction. We even pass partners' wallet transactions through our system when we can. It's surprising how many bad actors we catch that they don't. It's not ideal when we have to invest huge amounts of developer and service staff time into efforts other than ‘create and run good games,’ but it's a part of the reality of running a publisher today.”
A sad reality, really. While the guy who designs a prevention system for credit card fraud isn’t necessarily working on the same projects as the woman with a game design degree, it’s still money and resources that could have been spent on something other than preventing crimes. Here’s how Hartsman says potential buyers can help:
“As you're looking to buy a game, if a price looks too good to be true, it probably is. Someone's getting hurt; it's just a question of whom. Game creators of all sizes survive on your support. If you want to make sure they're getting their share and are able to use it to pay their own teams and bills and continue creating great things in the future, support them and buy directly from them or from their primary-source partners like Steam, Amazon, GOG, and others.”
Generally, a developer’s website is your best bet to either buy the game directly or be linked to an approved partner. Buying directly from Steam is also the only way to be able to secure a refund when a game proves not to your liking. Hartsman has also been posting further thoughts on Twitter, if you'd like to read more.
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Oh wait, THAT TinyBuild? The ones who made a game that sucked so badly due to poor optimization that they needed to re-release an updated version YEARS later for free, just so that people would pay them any heed?
Pope Amole II
Nerd Commando Game Studios
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Eh, you're forgetting that this comes from the indie dev who sells their games mostly on attention whoring (like it was with the punch club - gimmicks and stuff). So it's rather obvious that he's interested in creating as much scandal around his studio as possible - even if he's not getting a penny from the G2A (if it was that easy, someone would've already done that), he's getting media coverage for free and that's the only thing he wants.
gaussgunner
Arcane
Any decent amount of traffic looks like a DDoS when you're running Wordpress.
EDIT: they're also running Woocommerce, the piece of shit shopping cart of choice for all WP noobs. No wonder they can't tell who bought which key.
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gaussgunner
Arcane
Specifically VISA and MC, but the whole banking system is vulnerable. Merchants are wary of Paypal too. Bitcoin might be better but you won't sell many games if that's all you accept.
It sounds like G2A are also guilty here, for enabling the fraudsters to sell stolen keys in bulk. If they were legit they'd implement strict enough limits to make bulk selling unprofitable. Or they will now that it has come to light.
*looks around* I'm surrounded by spergs!!
As a developer, I would rather have players pirating my games outright than buying keys from fraudulent resellers. The latter is a criminal business stealing from me. When it's just players who can't afford games, there's no lost sales, nobody profiting from my loss, so it's fine.
I haven't released a game commercially yet but that time is fast approaching. Given all the bullshit, I might try the honor system. Pay what you want, or skip the payment, and here's a download link. No keys to sell on G2A, and no fucking app stores taking 30% in exchange for the privilege of getting jerked around.
LESS T_T
Arcane
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Mustawd
Guest
I like Craig Stern and his games, but I don't get the reaction here.
How is providing a reselling platform any different than what ebay or craigslist does?
It's a secondary market. Period. I honestly thought G2A's gesture was pretty good. How many other markets provide venue to receive revenue after the initial sale?
And if they resell for pennies on the dollar? It's probably worth that much to the larger secondary market. Which is probably why a lot of these games got bundled and bought for cheap in the first place.
How is providing a reselling platform any different than what ebay or craigslist does?
It's a secondary market. Period. I honestly thought G2A's gesture was pretty good. How many other markets provide venue to receive revenue after the initial sale?
And if they resell for pennies on the dollar? It's probably worth that much to the larger secondary market. Which is probably why a lot of these games got bundled and bought for cheap in the first place.
Lyric Suite
Converting to Islam
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Hipster indie trash developer causing drama and bitching their shitty products aren't making any profits. Is that what is happening here?
pippin
Guest
IIRC sites like Bundlestars get keys directly from developers. The others like Gamersgate et al get them from Steam. And that's not counting bundles... I mean, if you don't really respect your own product, why are you complaining now?
If anything, Steam itself grew on the basis of shitting on consumers' rights.
If anything, Steam itself grew on the basis of shitting on consumers' rights.
Zdzisiu
Arcane
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If anyone wants to learn more about the whole G2A debacle, here is a reasonably competent video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBakPg6x63Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBakPg6x63Q
Dexter
Arcane
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It's really not. It's retarded propaganda. G2A giving in in a sign of good faith will undoubtedly be seen as an admission of guilt by the same people, so that's also a pretty stupid thing to do from their part.
LESS T_T
Arcane
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Defender's Quest developer weighs in: http://www.fortressofdoors.com/g2a-piracy-and-the-four-currencies/
G2A, Piracy, and the Four Currencies
I never thought the day would come where I would passionately argue that fans should pirate my game rather than pay for it, but here we are.
That's conditional, of course. If you're going to be buying Defender's Quest from us then knock yourself out! But if you're going to buy it from a grey-market key reselling site like G2A, then, please, please, just pirate the game instead.
To be clear, I don't agree with or condone piracy. But I'm a realist, and piracy is so much less worse than buying from seedy online pawn shops like G2A. If you're not going to make the best choice, please don't dive straight into the worst choice.
Do Yourself a Favor
But it's not just the worst deal for me, it's literally the worst deal for you the consumer, even if you don't give a fig about developers and publishers and just want to save a few bucks (I won't judge, I swear!).
Let me try to explain my position using the "Four Currencies," model, perhaps my most popular article of all time.
A summary of the "four currencies" theory is quoted here, feel free to skip if you're familiar:
I propose that music, moves, and games (like most goods and services) don't have just one price, but four1:
Through this lens, piracy is a competing "service" that costs zero $M, but has some non-zero $T and $P cost, not to mention the $I (integrity) cost associated with doing something that incurs legal risk and/or violates a person's moral code. Obviously the weight of the latter is subjective and varies from person to person, but it is a real cost that weighs just as greatly as the others.
- $M Money-dollars
- $T Time-dollars
- $P Pain-in-the-butt-dollars
- $I Integrity-dollars
1There's more than just four of these "psychological currencies", probably an infinite amount. These are simply the most salient for my purposes.
The bottom line:
People favor the product that charges the lowest total four-currency cost.
I'm not arguing that this is good, or right, or how-I-think-it-should-be. I'm simply arguing that this is how it is, and like it or not, we have to respond to these forces if we want to succeed in business.
The True Cost of G2A
If you need some background on this, this excellent rant by TotalBiscuitis a great place to start. This video, "Den of Thieves", is great too. And of course the spark that started this recent controversy was this eye-opening post from TinyBuild.
Back already? Let's continue.
In short, G2A is an "ebay for Steam Keys" where people can sell & trade their unused digital game store keys on the secondary market, which means you can get games for cheaper than normal price. Let's compare the total 4-currency costs of buying legitimately, buying from G2A, and "buying" from pirate sites (with one's non-money-dollars).
Buying a game legitimately looks like this to a typical consumer (Four-currency costs are always subjective and depend on the individual, so your weights may vary):
Digital storefronts have gotten pretty good at reducing purchasing friction, to the point where the main obstacle is just having money, not the time & hassle of signing up for accounts and downloading & installing stuff. The traditional edge that the legitimate store has is its low $I (integrity) cost -- there's no legal risk of getting in trouble by buying the real thing, and there's no associated moral guilt of doing something bad, though this guilt is only felt by those who care about such things.
Here's the Four-currency price that Piracy is "selling" the game for:
It's free, but if I'm being honest I find it faster & easier to buy a game on Steam or GOG these days than to try to find a good torrent and navigate the shady world of malware-infested sites to bother with piracy. And often pirated games are outdated or lack a convenient update mechanism. (Of course, veteran pirates can probably smooth the $T and $P costs down through practice). The biggest $P cost of piracy these days is you don't get a real steam key! What's funny about this is that a lot of modern players don't just want to play the game, they want it officially in their Steam account (or GOG, etc), with achievements and everything. Depending on the game you might also be forgoing multiplayer and other features. And of course, Piracy is "wrong." It's also technically illegal. Some people don't care about this, but as I argued in the original article,enough people care about $T, $P, and $I, that lowering those costs is enough to tip them over the edge and give you their $M for a legit copy.
And this is precisely what makes G2A so insidious. The (relatively) high friction of piracy, and decades of demonizing industry propaganda against it, have given G2A a golden opportunity to masquerade as a store that outcompetes the legitimate service on all four currency costs:
G2A offers the game for a lower price, it's just as fast and convenient as Steam (complete with a slick, safe-looking website), and you get a real, honest-to-Gabe steam key! G2A presents themselves as an innocent second-hand store, akin to eBay or Craigslist. You buy stuff on eBay and Craigslist, right? Right of first sale and all that. Furthermore, G2A goes way, way, out of their way to build legitimacy, too, which is what keeps their $I cost down in the eyes of their customers. Not only do they sponsor esports teams and major Youtubers (PewDiePie's sponsor can't be bad!), they also run Charity drives and other events:
Save the Children -- with stolen goods and laundered money!
...
Here's what's really going on:
When you buy a key on G2A, a lot of the time you're buying a Steam Key somebody bought with a stolen credit card. When the cardholder inevitably finds out, they issue a chargeback and the credit card company refunds them, taking the money from the store (plus a fee), and giving it to the fraud victim. This means the store (or developer if they're selling direct) made negative money on the sale of that key, as TinyBuildand IndieGameStand have detailed. However, the thief still got paid. And so did G2A. So they do it again. And Again.
When you buy stolen G2A keys, forget "lost future sales" -- money is being taken out of developers' and publishers' pockets and given to literal thieves.
And what happens when you buy stolen goods? Sometimes the stores are able to track which keys have been fraudulently obtained, and they cancel them. So you just saved $10 by buying a game from G2A, but now your key's been revoked and you have nothing. Now G2A has defrauded you too! And no, they won't refund your money.
...Unless you pay for G2A shield!
G2A knows that some portion of their keys are stolen and that customers will get scared. So, they offer a guarantee -- tack on a little extra, and if your key gets revoked, we'll replace it with a legitimate one. And hey, it's still cheaper than buying from the official store, so it's still a good deal!
But when you look at the whole picture, it's clear that something's rotten.
G2A wants you to make this comparison:
When you should be making this comparison:
And if I'm being totally honest, if you don't want to give me any money, I'd rather you do yourself a favor and just make this comparison:
A lot of people like to say "Piracy is theft." It's not. It's an infringement of my legal monopoly right to control the distribution of my work for a limited period of time (aka "Copyright.")
Piracy is not theft.
G2A is theft.
If you have to choose between them:
Or just, you know, buy our game. It's really good, I promise you'll get your four currencies' worth:
[
Mustawd
Guest
What a dumb blog post. Why should there be moral guilt? I'm selling something I bought with my own money. Man, indiedevs don't know crap about business or anything for that matter.
Freakin' bunch of drama queens.
Freakin' bunch of drama queens.
Excidium II
Self-Ejected
Fuck indies crying about their shitware, almost nobody's buying it to begin with. If it really hurt sales AAA companies would just send hitmen.
Mustawd
Guest
Don't read it. It'll literally give you brain cancer.
Neanderthal
Arcane
Besides indie devs don't need much dosh, hair dyes as cheap as shit.
Zdzisiu
Arcane
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2009
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- 3,499
Damn, some people here are either too edgy or too dumb to see that the whole debacle is about keys bought with stolen cards and keys acquired through other illegal means.
No one is arguing here that people shouldn't be allowed to sell their legally bought game key. The problem with G2A is that it turns a blind eye to every scam going on because it turns a profit on it. Sure, there is a load of legit deals going on on G2A and they are well in their right to make profit on those. But as it was demontrated a few times there are also instances of hundreds, and sometimes thousands of game keys being sold on their site that were bought with stolen credit card info and exactly zero dollars went to the creator of the game and 70% of the money went to the thief, 30% to G2A. Why? Because sooner rather than later, the bank that the stolen credit card belonged too is hit with charge backs, and the bank demands the money from the creator of the game, which he is legally obliged to give back. So now the creator is left without both the money and the keys. And in many instances, the creators do not have the ability to revoke the keys bought with the stolen card (Some creators can do it, and did it in the past).
So, you are saying that you are ok with a situation in which a creator of a game is scammed out of thousands of dollars simply because he is a dude you dont like, or he makes games you think are shit? I mean, come on, there is being edgy and cool and then there is being a retard.
No one is arguing here that people shouldn't be allowed to sell their legally bought game key. The problem with G2A is that it turns a blind eye to every scam going on because it turns a profit on it. Sure, there is a load of legit deals going on on G2A and they are well in their right to make profit on those. But as it was demontrated a few times there are also instances of hundreds, and sometimes thousands of game keys being sold on their site that were bought with stolen credit card info and exactly zero dollars went to the creator of the game and 70% of the money went to the thief, 30% to G2A. Why? Because sooner rather than later, the bank that the stolen credit card belonged too is hit with charge backs, and the bank demands the money from the creator of the game, which he is legally obliged to give back. So now the creator is left without both the money and the keys. And in many instances, the creators do not have the ability to revoke the keys bought with the stolen card (Some creators can do it, and did it in the past).
So, you are saying that you are ok with a situation in which a creator of a game is scammed out of thousands of dollars simply because he is a dude you dont like, or he makes games you think are shit? I mean, come on, there is being edgy and cool and then there is being a retard.
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2012
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- 5,114
Nah, proper companies actually have systems in place for this. How do I know this? Because Civilization 5 key I acquired through G2A ages ago got recalled by 2K at one point. Of course, I was fully refunded after showing evidence to G2A support, evidence Steam support provided. So no, it's not "too hard" to keep track of your keys and counter this if you really want. This was before G2A Shield or at least before it was mandatory for refunds, mind you.
Excidium II
Self-Ejected
Found the indie dev.
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