E

epmode

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #1

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...game-key-reselling-exposed-by-indie-developer

This is pretty interesting.

One indie developer claims a popular PC key-reselling website sold nearly half a million dollars' worth of its games - and didn't receive a penny in return.

In an email sent to Eurogamer Alex Nichiporchik, boss of Punch Club and SpeedRunners publisher tinyBuild, accused G2A of selling $450,000 worth of its games.

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Nichiporchik, however, described G2A's business model as "fundamentally flawed" and said it "facilitates a black market economy". He accused G2A users of using a database of stolen credit cards to buy game keys in bulk from a bundle or third-party key reseller, then putting them up on G2A to sell them at half the retail price.

In tinyBuild's case, it attempted to sell its games from its own online shop, but it was crippled by chargebacks associated with fraudulent credit card purchases.

"I'd start seeing thousands of transactions, and our payment provider would shut us down within days," Nichiporchik said. "Moments later you'd see G2A being populated by cheap keys of games we had just sold on our shop."

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Nichiporchik asked G2A for compensation and was told, flatly, no.

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G2A's response to tinyBuild is printed in Eurogamer's article along with a few more details.

The comments thread also pointed me to a similar article from the co-founder of Mode 7 Games (Frozen Synapse).

 

L

L~A

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #2

Looks scummy as hell.

 

V

Venom Fox

Banned

• Jun 21, 2016

• #3

Glad the thread last night garnered some attention! Hopefully this gets sorted.

 

M

mnz

Unconfirmed Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #4

The part that I don't understand: why doesn't tinybuild just block/ban/invalidate those keys? They know who bought which key and who scammed them.

 

L

LiK

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #5

Never bought from them. Never will now. Gross.

 

L

lucebuce12

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #6

mnz said:

The part that I don't understand: why doesn't tinybuild just block/ban/invalidate those keys? They know who bought which key and who scammed them.

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Even if they did that, it's not gonna get them their money back which is arguably the shittiest part about all this.

 

K

Kyry

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #7

Does G2A sell the keys themselves or do they just match a buyer with a seller?

 

D

Draft

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #8

Being an American means I'm a privileged consumer of digital gaming, so I'm sympathetic to my brethren in other countries that get gouged by exchange rates. That being said, key reselling is morally dubious at best and I'm not interested in saving a few bucks if it means the developer gets ripped off.

 

M

mnz

Unconfirmed Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #9

lucebuce12 said:

Even if they did that, it's not gonna get them their money back.

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Well no, but they are running an online store for keys, this is their job.

edit:
And they actually might make it back if there are fewer cheap keys for their games on the market.

 

H

Hasney

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #10

Same thread I believe since Eurogamer is just pulling the news from their site:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1236957

 

M

mabec

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #11

G2A is just a market, much like Amazon or eBay, with sellers from all over the world.

Iam sure they deal in the grey area but they are not alone when it comes to purchasing game keys online

 

T

toilet

Banned

• Jun 21, 2016

• #12

Ugh now I feel bad. I use g2a all the time.

 

Hari Seldon

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #13

Yeah this shit just seemed shady, never bothered with it.

 

A

Atomski

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #14

Never used G2A but just recently started noticing ads for them. How exactly are they getting keys and not paying?

 

E

epmode

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #15

Hasney said:

Same thread I believe since Eurogamer is just pulling the news from their site:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1236957

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Ah, I searched for the tinyBuild guy's name, didn't see anything.

 

Freeman76

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #16

Such a huge % of people are totally unaware of this too. If you search any number of PC game keys on google, G2A, G2PLAY etc are often in the top returns. A huge number of people just see a cheap product on offer for less than they would pay anywhere else, and click that buy button. The practices those 'GREY' sellers partake in need to be exposed. I for one am always lookong to save money, but not as tge result of stolen card info.

 

H

Hasney

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #17

Atomski said:

Never used G2A but just recently started noticing ads for them. How exactly are they getting keys and not paying?

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They allow users to sell with no checks, so it's mostly average people buying keys, doing chargebacks and then selling on the keys for profit.

 

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Omnii-chan

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #18

Shit I had no idea the key websites screwed developers. I have no idea how they work honestly.

I thought the keys were from retail boxed copies, just from other countries, so they were cheaper due to exchanges?

Hasney said:

They allow users to sell with no checks, so it's mostly average people buying keys, doing chargebacks and then selling on the keys for profit.

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That's so scummy, fuck that.

 

S

SoundLad

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #19

These news always seem to forcus around G2A. Do other key sellers such as cdkeys behave in the same way also?
From my understanding, cdkeys purchases the keys from lower income countries and then sells those on for a small profit and I don't exactly see the problem with that.

 

Dr. Buni

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #20

I have told people numerous times to not buy from G2A, kinguin and similar sites, yet they chose to buy from there because the products are cheaper.

They can't complain if somehow they lose the licenses purchases from shady sites.

 

A

Atomski

Member

• Jun 21, 2016

• #21

SoundLad said:

These news always seem to forcus around G2A. Do other key sellers such as cdkeys behave in the same way also?
From my understanding, cdkeys purchases the keys from lower income countries and then sells those on for a small profit and I don't exactly see the problem with that.

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Yeah kinda curious about this as well. Ive used Green Man Gaming quiet a bit.