News Ubisoft deletes 'fraudulent' Far Cry 4 keys

So instead of going after the people that obtained and resold these fraudulent keys they think it's better to go after their customers, sounds like good business sense to me.

 

Buyer beware. When you buy your game key from disreputable websites and shady third parties this can happen. I'm glad Ubisoft is banning these keys. It's a message to the buyers to think twice about where they buy from and it hurts the fraudsters because they'll have less people buying stolen keys from them in the future. They aren't even Ubisoft "customers" really. Plus there's only so much Ubisoft can do to "go after" people who are in countries like Russia using stolen account info to buy their keys to resell. Their efforts would be better spent beefing up their security and require two-step verification on purchases, etc.

 

I get what both of you mean but you would think they would be a bit more proactive in warning people of potential dodgy keys, maybe I'm just unaware of what Ubisoft has done in terms of warnings before swinging the ban hammer.

Like you Neogumbercules i would never buy a game from one of these key-reseller sites as i don't trust them, but a lot of people are probably more trusting than you and I.

Speaking of which anyone want to buy a car, at a hefty discount.

 

Seems legit. How much?

 

@Gareth, with a car there is a possibility to check if it has been stolen (unless of course the theft happened minutes ago and it hasn't been reported stolen yet), but with games there is no such possibility, so it isn't really the same.

 

Do you trust Ubisoft only to cancel keys that are proven to have been purchased using stolen credit cards, or do you think that they would happily cancel keys that have been purchased legally in one region yet sold in another - pocketing the cash from the original purchase?

Ubisoft's track record on consumer friendly practices in not enviable and I am not inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt.

 

Please tell me you're joking?

Ubisoft bought much of this on itself. Far Cry 4 and ACU weren't initially available on Steam in the UK because they wanted to make it Uplay exclusive (read: very expensive). FC4 is now on Steam for £44.99. That is the price of the next gen console disc, which I might add, would work regardless of it's source. So they were trying to strangle the market by asking a high rrp for a PC game as there are no licensing fees for them like console games.

Further, they have not yet proven that these keys were obtained illegitimately and if they have, where is that proof? I thought it was a free market? You shop around for the best price, we're not talking dodgy sites offering it for a couple quid are we? So if I bought Xbox live subscription from an online site like amazon for £10 less than Microsoft sell it, does that mean it's dodgy? Does that mean it's illegitimate? Get real.

Ubisoft are dirty and greedy. What's funny is these people still bought these keys and the PC version of the game is still very buggy. Instead of focusing on fixing it for their customers they're putting effort into taking it away from people who've paid for it - not software pirates who's versions still work for them - and putting out paid DLC, when the game doesn't work properly still. It has known crash bugs, save bugs, game breaking glitches in it. But Ubisoft are out to make a buck and they don't care. So I really hope that if you're still truly on their side of the fence, that your copies of the games spontaneously combust because that would simply be karma.

 

Personally speaking, £45 for a PC game is beyond my comfort threshold. Having said that, I wouldn't resort to buying games anywhere else other than directly through Steam, Humble or well known avenues.

In fact I'm happy to wait for the Summer sale.

(Added)

The keys being debated were stolen. If you buy stolen goods you can't expect to hang on to them. That'll learn ya.

 

While game reseller websites are a grey area as a lot of their trade is a user-based marketplace, they do often have a highly regarded reputation.
One of the major problems is that gaming celebrities (Twitch & YouTube streamers like PewDiePie, Athene and the MLG Ocelote) actively promote places like G2A or Kinguin, people like this can have a lot of sway on how much trust a website gets.


While Ubisoft may be in the right about revoking the games (yet to be properly determined by their investigations), they went about it in the worst possible way by simply removing games without providing any notifications to their unsuspecting customers.
The major uproar about this situation would have been far smaller if they simply sent out a mass email to customers, letting them know that they've detected the games keys that they believe to be fraudulent in their logs and would be conducting account sweeps to remove any games that they deem illegitimate.

Any serious action like that should always begin with communication.

 

Interesting post, whether true or not who knows.
(It's Ubisoft, I don't think there's anything they could do that would surprise me)

 

It might be a crap situation for genuine purchasers, and I would be mega pissed if it involved me. But all Ubisoft need is for the genuine buyers to say where they bought their honestly bought code - Ubisoft will be able to confirm that immediately and clear that player.

Do we know how many genuine buyers have been affected?

 

With Ubisoft not even bothering to communicate with it's customers that there maybe dodgy keys in use or that it was going to perform a sweep, i don't hold out hope of them confirming anything.

 

Looks like while Ubisoft are failing to share much of any real information, EA have stepped in to confirm they've had Ubisoft keys purchased on Origin with stolen/fake credit card details.

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/...y-keys-purchased-with-stolen-credit-card.aspx

 

Personally I haven't had mine revoked, although I bought my CD Key from SimplyCDKeys.com for Far Cry 4 for £26.99. My option at the time was that, or I could buy it on UPlay or Origin for £49.99. Does that make me a mug for buying a CD key that's so much cheaper? Why would I assume it could be illegitimate?

I have never pirated a game in my life and don't intend to and have no sympathy for people who do and end up facing the consequences. But come on. Is caveat emptor really the right attitude to be taking with this? If it looks to good to be true it probably is? When you get scumbag publishers like Ubi trying to jack up the price of their games in market like this which is shear profiteering, people are going to look at better value options.

Why does this not place a lens on Ubisoft's behavior? Where do they get off asking nearly £50 for a base version digital download of a PC game, in a market where the going price for a top-tier release is, at most probably £40 if not £34.99? This price does not reflect their investment costs. It's a good game when it's working okay, but it's a re-hash of the same formula with new paint. Same engine, same ideas, same weapons. Cheap development. So why the price hike on PC? Greed. Pure and simple. That doesn't excuse the use of stolen payment to purchase codes illegitimately, but blimey, it seems to me that Ubisoft isn't the one being disadvantaged by the fraud (which they should be) but rather the little guy.

This is wrong and in this day and age, one of digital media and purchases there needs to be far more robust legal protection for buyers of digital goods. EULAs are draconian, overly complicated drivel and border on being utterly unfair.

 

As an additional pricing point, I have to introduce the concept of inflation.

Yes, a PC game used to cost about £30. But then a pint of milk in 1990 cost 31p and a loaf of bread 46p (average). In 2012, milk cost 50p and the bread £1.20. If we apply equivalent pricing to games, that means a game in 2012 should have cost anywhere between £44 and £78. The truth lies somewhere in the middle, but the simple point is that games are inevitably going to cost more as times pass.

Who are you to say a top tier game should cost £40 at the most? £50 is an increasingly common RRP, and it's only down to savage cuts to drive sales that retailers reduce below this, hurting their profit rather than the publisher. Buying that CD key from SavvyGamer still nets Ubisoft the same amount of money they would have gotten off a retail sale at £50, but it just brings SavvyGamer a very small profit.

I'd love to go back to the days when I could pop down the shops and buy a new release PC game for £30 or less, or a PSone game for £25. But those days are gone.

 

+1 to this.

In 1995 when I my first PC was bought, a decent PC cost £1000+ and a game £50

20 years on a decent [gaming] PC is still ~ £1000 and games are £25-£50


There's also some element of entitlement in the PC gaming crowd, they want more features, better graphics than the console, and run around crying foul when what they get is 'merely' the same game the console players got. but god forbid they have to pay what their console contemporariness do... oh no they want the better version and they want it for less money...

Even as a self-confessed PC gamer the attitude that PC gamers are entitled to better games for less money than console players does my head in...



As for the topic at hand, yes Ubi could've handled it better, they could've handled a *lot* of their recent PR things better. But if Ubi can prove the keys were obtained via iffy means, either buy using stolen cards or by buying the code then getting the card issuer to void the transaction, which based on what EA have said they can and should decativate the codes. Yes it sucks for the poor sod that bought the code, but at the end of the day they bought an iffy code.

 

Don't get me wrong, I do sympathise with those wronged by Ubisoft, and those wronged by scammers.

I'm with those either supporting the £50 fee - time has definitely moved on, budgets used to be thousands, now they're tens, if not, hundreds of millions - and those saying vote with your feet. I wouldn't pay it, but I don't knock a company for risking millions on a game and trying to recoup that. They get my money when my price point is hit by a sale. Do you guys remember buying 8bit Spectrum/Commodore/Amstrad games created by 1 to 5 people and costing between 1.99 and 14.99? Now teams on these stunning games are hundreds of people.

If people want to grab bargains, they should go to common well known retailers. They shouldn't risk their money at the outdoor markets, a pick pocket will get them eventually. 14 years ago I bought a set of Sony headphones from what you would call an aladdins cave of bargains. They were the cheapest sounding broken headphones I have ever bought. A bargain - burnt fingers. (Side note: my iPad corrected 'aladdins cave' to 'a ladies cave'!).

As for the comment about Ubisoft not losing out a sale by allowing stolen keys ... Really?! I probably misread that bit, or confused it, because that would make no sense.