Ideas around digital game ownership are certainly about to change, as Steam is making it clear the games you pay for are actually just licences to play them.
Last month, California governor Gavin Newsom signed a new law which means that digital storefronts have to make it clear that when you purchase something digitally, whether it be a movie, game, album, ebook, or the like, you only just own a licence to it (assuming you aren’t purchasing a DRM-free digital item). The reason behind this law being put into place is to ensure that “the false and deceptive advertising from sellers of digital media incorrectly telling consumers they own their purchases becomes a thing of the past.”
For all you gamers out there, that means that PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo will have to have a little warning note that when you purchase a game on their storefronts, you’re just buying a licence to play it. And now, Steam has already put that into practice ahead of the legislation going into effect next year. If you head onto Steam and add a game into your shopping cart, you’ll be met with a message that reads “A purchase of a digital product grants a licence for the product on Steam.” I doubt it’ll stop all that many people from using Steam, sunk cost fallacy and all that, but it might get more users to think more about digital ownership more broadly at least.
Fellow PC games storefront GOG had a bit of a cheeky response to the Steam change, writing on Twitter, “Since checkout banners are trending, we’re thinking of putting one up ourselves. Thoughts on this one?” with a screenshot of the website’s shopping cart with a message that reads “A purchase of a digital product on GOG grants you its Offline Installers, which cannot be taken away from you.” For some context, all games on GOG are DRM-free, meaning it doesn’t have any checks to make sure you have the licence to play it – it’s just installed on your computer, for as long as you want it there, with no way for it to be taken away from you.
Apart from sites like GOG which offer DRM-free games, you’ll be seeing a lot more messages like the one on Steam over the next year. Maybe it would be nice if some legislation could be put in place to make more storefronts release things DRM-free, but baby steps, I guess.
