They is usually what people do when they put a game up for torrents without the renaming of files, those uploaders aren't trying to make money though so this is much worse imo. Some people really scummy.
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Amazon is selling pirated digital copies of games
- Thread starter SteveWinwood
- Start date
Yep. I even get Facebook ads for these. It's brazen and stunning and has gone on far too long.
Sure, but there's tons of old games that can suffer the exact same problem : old keys from Humble Bundles / Free GoG Gifts and stuff.
This is still happening to games, not only reserved to Frost Punk.
The were one of the first places to sell Titanfall 2 for $5.
They did the Uncharted Nathan Drake Collection for $10 when it wasn't that old.
They regularly do Mass Effect Trilogy for $5.
The did The Order: 1886 for $5 when it wasn't that old.
Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition for $5 on Xbox and $4 on PS4 when it wasn't that old.
Dark Souls for $5.
My job is literally to find good prices on games, and it's incorrect to say that Amazon don't do aggressive discounts on digital games.
Tried to get a refund for Battle Chasers that I bought yesterday.
They said they can't give refunds on digital downloads
Then i literally sent them a link to this thread and the guy said he'd issue the refund. Hmmm.
They said they can't give refunds on digital downloads
Then i literally sent them a link to this thread and the guy said he'd issue the refund. Hmmm.
As I understand it, every single Amazon employee is under great pressure to perform and continually increase profitablity. That is their only value to Amazon. So at each level you get folks trying to squeeze every last cent from everything and Amazon has cutting edge algorithms and data to monitor this. This isnt Jeff saying, 'sell this $3 pirated game.' Rather, it is someone in the chain looking to increase margins. The chance of getting fined or sued for small potatoes is very tiny, so employees who make ethical decsions with reguard to these things will not perform as well as the calculatingly unethical, so they will be the ones who rise, the others will be fired. This is a result of the data driven nature of the company and wont stop unless external forces change it.
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It is not the same problem.
Re-selling an issued humble key is still not legal to the purchase agreement, but at the very least you aren't replicating the game, impersonating developers or selling disfunctional goods.
I couldn't help but burst out laughing at work while reading this. Thanks.
They didn't even try to make home made CDs and slap a skin to it? So lazy.
It'll make publishers less likely to put their games on GOG.
Were gog versions unavailable, a cracked version would be functionally identical for the purposes of this scheme.
Same, the deals just seemed to good to be true and there was the issue of "updates", I have no idea how the game would handel updates seeing how it was a direct download and one of the big things that Steam did from when it was created was to auto update games, which I was having doubts that Amazon could take care of. I'm glad I didn't buy either
GOG do updates too. But you get them from your account, which obviously would not work for anyone who did not buy the game.
That's the problem. That's a 3rd party seller faking as Amazon. Amazon sells digital downloads through Amazon Digital Services LLC. Not sure why Amazon even lets people create 3rd party seller accounts with names like that.
If I'm right they are not reselling, they are selling several licenses from one license they own. This is not a steam code.
In your example, they buy the car, replace and sell. Here, they buy a license, copy the game several times and sell each copy they are doing.
They might not own a single license, could have originally pirated it too
I think a big difference is that a car can't be copied. The people who sell these bootlegs are basically reproducing their own copies of the game, and selling them. Digital goods can be reproduced for unlimited profit, while a car can only be sold once.
OP
OP
When I made this thread I was worried people might lose some important context. Or not have seen the Amazon deals. Something like that.
But the one thing I didn't think I'd have to make clear is how this is piracy.
But the one thing I didn't think I'd have to make clear is how this is piracy.
They could use a cracked version from Steam,it would be the same.
I have some games with GOG but have never actually installed them so I have no idea how that works. My biggest concern was how it would work on Amazon and if it would even offer that at all, I have never had experience with a direct download game from Amazon before. There is Twitch but I've never download one of those games and don't know how updates work on them, do those rely on the Twitch client to update? I remember hearing that most of those games are DRM free.
Guess it's no worse than the bootleg fake games, but they are both really really bad and Amazon and eBay both need to clean up their marketplaces. Unfortunately, they have demonstrated no desire to want to clean it up.
I know this is a bit of a different situation but still highlights an issue.
I know this is a bit of a different situation but still highlights an issue.
I own a few (legitimate!) direct-download games from Amazon. The update scheme is: there isn't one. If a game's been patched since the build that was uploaded to Amazon, you either use a patcher built into the game or download a patch from the developer/publisher. Twitch downloads, which are a completely different system, use the Twitch client to update.
They buy it once (1) from GOG.
They sell it multiple times (>1) on Amazon.
They're not selling their personal copy (like with a physical copy, or a unique key), they're just selling the same copy over and over again, while pretending to be the original publisher or official reseller.
Lol if they can hold personals sites personally responsible for sex trafficking, they certainly can hold an online retailer responsible for people selling counterfeit goods and pirated software.
Well shit. I was told I'd get a refund and credit but they never processed it. There's no reflection on my order page
Exposes multiple failure points on amazon's store but I'm pretty confident eventually it'll get fixed up and won't happen again. A third party being able to sell with the word Amazon in their name is nuts. Selling digital downloads as a third party without a lot of prior vetting is nuts. Selling at extreme discounts without any vetting also nuts.
More concerning will be online stores that really do little to no vetting, I'm sure more and more scammers will jump on this bandwagon now and try to resell repackaged GOG and pirated games everywhere.
More concerning will be online stores that really do little to no vetting, I'm sure more and more scammers will jump on this bandwagon now and try to resell repackaged GOG and pirated games everywhere.
I just issued a refund request through chat stating "apparently this software has been repackaged and should be considered a pirated version". He said he was checking, then came back and said no problem and that "a refund would be processed in 3-5 days". We'll see what happens I guess. Certainly don't want to support this kind of bs.
This is one thing I've been wondering about the recent trend of obscure '90s games packed with DOSBox and sold on Steam. If someone decided to take a 20-year-old game from a defunct developer and sell it on Steam, how long would it take for someone to notice? This Amazon scheme only got caught because it's selling current high-profile games for way too cheap.
yup got my refund for both Battlechasers and Frostpunk.
The Amazon rep I spoke with did both for me in one chat. Really quick. Just mentioned "pirated version from seller", "developers did not support the selling", "seller repackaged the software", and linked the original tweet from Surviving Mars just in case. The rep was pretty fast and pleasant to deal with. No questions other than "did you download it" which I said "no didn't want to risk a malware/virus just in case"
The Amazon rep I spoke with did both for me in one chat. Really quick. Just mentioned "pirated version from seller", "developers did not support the selling", "seller repackaged the software", and linked the original tweet from Surviving Mars just in case. The rep was pretty fast and pleasant to deal with. No questions other than "did you download it" which I said "no didn't want to risk a malware/virus just in case"
Intellectual property that can be copied in millions by anyone is not the same as a physical property like a car.
We'll never buying from them again. Is it possible this Frostpunk copy is malicious? I have the installer downloaded but haven't ran it yet. At the very least it might be a good way to test if it can run on my laptop.
Chat or email?
Chat or email?
$3.17 after tax. It wasn't much, but I don't want any part of this. I'm deleting the game when I get home, and I'd like to get a refund for it.
Exactly that? It looks like real codes are sold by "Amazon Digital Services LLC".
So a third party scam with an impersonating name.
Wow people are seriously defending this? This is objectively wrong here. I feel bad for anyone affected by this. This sure is messed up.
This is gross.
Pondering how much money was spent there in the fifteen or so seconds I've spent in this post...
Pondering how much money was spent there in the fifteen or so seconds I've spent in this post...
