Is it fair to stop buying games on steam after the dark sector experience?

[tommo123]

i mean, they sell a clearly defective product - and yes it is their fault. any decent company would have recalled it, apologised, issues refunds for inflicting this carpy game on people and told the publishers not to scam people by selling faulty goods via steam.

but, they aren't a decent company. they refuse to stand by the consumer. why would i possibly buy another game through steam again? i couldn't trust them to vet the game and make sure it at least works before selling it. they also refuse refunds.

i've decided not to buy via steam anymore - no matter what kind of deals they have

[arizonachris]

How is Steam responsible for a game the sell? Is any retailer responsible? Do they have to test every game? No, it's very unfair to blame Steam if this game doesn't run for you. If you bought the retail box version, do you tink the store you got it from would refund your money? Game runs just fine for me.

I have over 70 games I have purchased thru Steam and I have no intention to stop buying from them. So it's your loss.

[tommo123]

my loss? what do i lose? the ability to buy games without any quality assurance? if i bought this in store I could take it back as it is faulty. failing that, i could get my card provider to do a chargeback. you can't do that with steam since they hold other games you have hostage.

unless of course you do what a lot of people do - create a new account per game - then sell the account once you're done with it. i understand now why people do that. to prevent being ripped off.

[tommo123]

btw, they ARE responsible since they know the game is faulty. this forum is full of complaints about it, and people have also mailed steam support. they still choose to sell a defective product - that is valves choice

[arizonachris]

Originally Posted by tommo123

btw, they ARE responsible since they know the game is faulty. this forum is full of complaints about it, and people have also mailed steam support. they still choose to sell a defective product - that is valves choice

Ummm, sorry, wrong again. If I take a game back to Game Stop, or Best Buy, or Frys Electronics, if I have opened the package I am out of luck. Sure, I can try to get a refund to my credit card, but it will not work. These stores (Steam is a store, NOT a game producer) all have their policies.

And, if you mean to tell me, that a retail store does not continue to sell a game that has problems, even if someone from the store knows the game has problems, you are dreaming. They will sell it until they run out of stock. Get real.

You know, if you had come in here asking for advice about how to get this game to run (which has run fine for me on Win XP, Vista and now Win 7) you might get some help. But you just want to bash Steam. So, have a great day!

[Farlong]

Is it fair to stop buying games on steam after the dark sector experience?

No

10negatives

[tommo123]

Originally Posted by arizonachris

Ummm, sorry, wrong again. If I take a game back to Game Stop, or Best Buy, or Frys Electronics, if I have opened the package I am out of luck. Sure, I can try to get a refund to my credit card, but it will not work. These stores (Steam is a store, NOT a game producer) all have their policies.

And, if you mean to tell me, that a retail store does not continue to sell a game that has problems, even if someone from the store knows the game has problems, you are dreaming. They will sell it until they run out of stock. Get real.

You know, if you had come in here asking for advice about how to get this game to run (which has run fine for me on Win XP, Vista and now Win 7) you might get some help. But you just want to bash Steam. So, have a great day!

see, this is the problem. why the holy h3ll should you need help to get a game to run? it should just work. every other game i've played on a PC works. are you playing it stretched out and think it's fine? are you one of those people with a widescreen tv, and play 4:3 content on it stretched across the whole display like a r3tard?

oh, and btw, i don't care about those stores you mention. i live in the UK and there's a thing called consumer protection laws here. This game is simply 'not fit for purpose' and the credit card company would have to refund the charges if amazon or whatever refused a refund. they are jointly liable with the store i purchased from.

anyway, as i said, i've decided not to buy from steam anymore. i was going to buy their crysis pack but after this, i'm not going to anymore.

there are other options. buying a game on physical media that has nothing to do with steam. then of course, you can sell it - unlike steam. and before you say 'activation', you don't have to do that.

one thing is for sure, i will not buy any more steam games.

and yes, i will have a great day thanks enjoying the thought till i go on my next holiday

[arizonachris]

You call me a r3tard? How nice. This is an end user Forum. The game designers/ publishers do not read any of this, so you are just bashing others trying to help.

I agree, a game should work "out of the box" as long as your system meets the minimum specs to run the game. But, with PC games, since there is an infinate number of different systems the game must run on, there will always be issues.

I fixed the widescreen bug with this game with info from another Topic in this section.

I never insulted you personally. I just stated my thoughts and personal experience with using Steam to purchase my games, versus a retail store.

If you always want a game to run right, buy a console. Even then, you could get a defective one. It's not a perfect world, eh?

[Alienware Gamer]

Steam should have warned players about the broken widescreen aspect ratio's I cannot understand how they get away with selling broken games like this!

[Alienchild]

Originally Posted by arizonachris

Ummm, sorry, wrong again. If I take a game back to Game Stop, or Best Buy, or Frys Electronics, if I have opened the package I am out of luck.

You must live in a country with poor consumer rights then, because where I live that is exactly what they would have to do; accept a full refund if the product they sold was faulty. This puts the necessary stress on both the producer and distributor of said product.

[TimM]

Originally Posted by arizonachris

How is Steam responsible for a game the sell? Is any retailer responsible? Do they have to test every game? No, it's very unfair to blame Steam if this game doesn't run for you. If you bought the retail box version, do you tink the store you got it from would refund your money? Game runs just fine for me.

I have over 70 games I have purchased thru Steam and I have no intention to stop buying from them. So it's your loss.

Ehm, yes... Normally stores do give refunds. I have tried that a lot.

[neuromancer]

Ahhhh the ubiquitous "it's all the stores fault that this game won't run on my ♥♥♥♥ty PC!" thread... so pathetic and yet so entertaining at the same time.

If only contempt were currency... I'd be filthy stinking rich thanks to these forums

[Goof245]

Does it not work on Steam? It's an awesome game

[arizonachris]

Originally Posted by Goof245

Does it not work on Steam? It's an awesome game

Doesn't work right at 1920x1080, but looks fine at 1600x1200.

and, yes, it is an awesome game. Quite the sleeper. I don't usually get into third person games, but this is an exception.

[Sweetz]

I know I'm late to the party here, but I felt like chiming in. I agree that Dark Sector is a piece of junk regading the widescreen problem, but I strongly disagree that Steam should stop selling it or any game.

While you might think you're trying to be pro-consumer, what you're suggesting is actually very anti-consumer and anti-free market. I do not want Steam deciding what games I can and can not buy. Dark Sector does work fine on 4:3 screens, and there are probably a good number of people that played it on 4:3 displays and enjoyed it. So it's certainly not a universally defective product by everyone's definition. The people with 4:3 displays should not have been prevented from buying and enjoying the game just because it's unacceptable to those of us with widescreens.

Unless you were born yesterday or have never played a PC game before, you should know that PC games can be buggy. This means, unless you're comfortable with losing whatever money you'd spend on the game, you should always research the game a little before buying it. It's not unreasonable to expect a consumer to do his own research before buying something, and whining to the contrary is just being a kid and not wanting to take responsibility for your own purchasing decisions.

I'm an adult, I can figure out on my own whether or not a product is worth buying, and I don't want a store deciding for me that I can't buy a game just because it doesn't work for some people. There are quite a few people that have problems with KOTOR for example, and they complain to no end how it's a very buggy game and Steam shouldn't sell it - but I've never had a problem running KOTOR nor have many other people. If I couldn't buy KOTOR because of the whining of other people that can't get it to work, I'd be damn angry.

At most, I agree Steam could have put a disclaimer on the page indicating the game doesn't work correctly on widescreen displays, but that's the extent of what they should be responsible for. Who you should be mad at is the company responsible for distributing and supporting the game (Aspyr), not the store selling it.