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Foxhack: You want to risk your account? Go right ahead. But don't pretend nothing will happen, because one day they might begin to enforce this. And then it's bye bye games.
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Export: They could ban you for getting a slightly different version of a patch, or they could not ban you and continue to get money from you. I've spent over $2500 on Steam, and will surely spend many thousands more in years to come. They're not going to throw away money because someone in Germany downloads a US patch for a game they legally bought, or someone in England downloads their legally purchased copy of Skyrim 12 hours early. You really have to learn the difference between reality, and reams and reams of legalese; you're coming across kind of like a Vulcan.

There's also a program you can use to give yourself achievements you haven't actually earned - there's of course the potential to be banned, but what do Valve care about more, tens of thousands of dollars, or the morality of pretending to have smashed 1000 barrels when you've only smashed 678? If you want to see that as a risk, go ahead, but I assume you'll also never get into a car because of the comparatively much higher risk of being killed in a road accident?
watch whats going to happen to this thread
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3002043
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langurmonkey: WOW, they really are assholes for banning people for using VPN services.
No, they're not. This prevents people from abusing regional pricing, like buying games from russian Steam, for example, since the games there are much cheaper.
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Foxhack: Using a VPN for any sort of activity is forbidden by the Steam EULA.
FYI, unless you use a VPN to purchase something, Valve apparently can't even tell. I've been using VPNs for years to unlock my legally purchased games (something that a Valve employee even suggested I do). My account is still in good standing. Conversely, a friend of mine accidentally made a purchase while using a VPN and their account was banned soon after. They did however, get their account back a few months later.

Of course, if you want to be on the safe side, don't use a common free VPN. And when you do use a VPN to unlock a game early, either then switch Steam into offline mode or look up the text file trick (which doesn't always work) and set the game to not update. That way you can limit VPN access to a few minutes.
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langurmonkey: WOW, they really are assholes for banning people for using VPN services.
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Neobr10: No, they're not. This prevents people from abusing regional pricing, like buying games from russian Steam, for example, since the games there are much cheaper.
Solution - get rid of regional pricing.

:)
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Neobr10: No, they're not. This prevents people from abusing regional pricing, like buying games from russian Steam, for example, since the games there are much cheaper.
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mondo84: Solution - get rid of regional pricing.

:)
Ask publishers, they are the ones who set the prices, not Steam. And sometimes regional pricing is actually a good thing when it's used to make games cheaper on regions with lower average income. In Russia prices are lower to try to prevent the huge piracy there, and so far, it's working, Steam is doing really well in Russia.

Now we got regional prices here in Brazil too, along with new forms of payment. Now we get slightly lower prices than we had with the US store, which is great, since the average income here is MUCH lower than EU/US and piracy is rampant. The only publisher that didn't lower the prices here in Brazil was Bethesda.

The Tomb Raider pre-order, for example, is available in Steam for R$76,49 here in Brazil, which would be something like U$ 37.
there you go , see what i meant ? thread locked and valve dev replied saying its not ok
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3002043

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showpost.php?p=33348783&postcount=8

you cant be warned more than this not risk using vpn
Post edited November 12, 2012 by liquidsnakehpks
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Foxhack: Using a VPN for any sort of activity is forbidden by the Steam EULA.

http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/

"You agree that you will not use IP proxying or other methods to disguise the place of your residence, whether to circumvent geographical restrictions on game content, to purchase at pricing not applicable to your geography, or for any other purpose. If you do this, we may terminate your access to your Account."

This isn't about it being right or wrong, this is about Steam potentially banning you from accessing your account because they're jerks.

You want to risk your account? Go right ahead. But don't pretend nothing will happen, because one day they might begin to enforce this. And then it's bye bye games.
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langurmonkey: WOW, they really are assholes for banning people for using VPN services.
AFAIK they only care about that if you're buying games. And the service won't even start if you're using Astrill. But, if you're using games that were gifted or that you've previously bought, Steam doesn't seem to care about that at all.

I've been out of the US for nearly a year now and Valve hasn't sent me any messages telling me to knock it off or banned my account.

I also haven't bought anything through the store since I left the US.
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liquidsnakehpks: there you go , see what i meant ? thread locked and valve dev replied saying its not ok
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3002043

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showpost.php?p=33348783&postcount=8

you cant be warned more than this not risk using vpn
Yea it's not worth the risk.
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Luisfius: I'd say that forcing consistency in multiplayer focused titles is not wrong, but actually the right way to do it, to ensure compatibility between the players. It can be done from within game launchers, but it is honestly much more convenient to have it been done automatically. Single player though, that is more problematic, and ends up fucking over things (and in the case of things like Skyrim, breaking down mod compatibilty since the mods were made for previous versions).
And I don't play multiplayer, sooooo....
Well if it makes you feel better, I have decided to live a Steam free life for now on. I play the games I rent from them already, but I no longer purchase anything that is Steam related. Sadly I have had to pass up on some great indie bundles because of the Steam only game codes.But I still have a great Game collection,purchased from GOG.com, GamersGate, and I use Desura. If I want an indie title I try and buy direct from the developers now.!
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mondo84: Solution - get rid of regional pricing.

:)
Yes, because everybody in the world has the same income.
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StingingVelvet: And I don't play multiplayer, sooooo....
I wonder how many support tickets you can curb by people who didn't bother patching their game "because they don't need to".
Post edited November 13, 2012 by SimonG
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SimonG: I wonder how many support tickets you can curb by people who didn't bother patching their game "because they don't need to".
Not sure what you mean.
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SimonG: I wonder how many support tickets you can curb by people who didn't bother patching their game "because they don't need to".
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StingingVelvet: Not sure what you mean.
Patches fix problems. If people don't apply patches, they have problems that were already solved. They create forum posts/support tickets/angry rants about those issues. With universal patching, everybody has the newest version, which makes bug-fixing and support much easier.
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SimonG: Patches fix problems. If people don't apply patches, they have problems that were already solved. They create forum posts/support tickets/angry rants about those issues. With universal patching, everybody has the newest version, which makes bug-fixing and support much easier.
Patches also create problems, taking Skyrim breaking resistances as a clear and recent example.

Besides, no one is saying go back to hunting for patches on the internet. Simply have a "version chooser" in the properties menu on Steam for those with the intelligence and desire to use it.
Post edited November 13, 2012 by StingingVelvet
Solution - get rid of patches!