What's your experience with CD Keys sites?

[Zekkah]

Especially ♥♥♥. I've read online of people claiming these are scamming sites, but I've personally bought countless games from them and haven't had a single issue. Ever.

My favorites are Eneba and CDKeys.

Share your experiences and opinions.

[m662]

I have been on the other side of the debate as in service of a legitimate online game shop and we had cases where keys were not only been resold from cheaper countries but also actual armed assaults happened on route with consoles alleged automatic weapon threats and one time even a alleged RPG.

https://gamerant.com/french-modern-warfare-3-robbery/

All those keys had to be revoked by order of the publishers.
Now those are the extreme cases most times its cheap buy up, corrupt people on the inside or simply database hacks but that told me enough of how lucrative criminals think these things are and I will not ever feed that business.

Most of these companies are simply criminal fronts and should be treated as such. Not all but they certainly have no audit in place to keep criminals even remotely out. And with most things that share stuff they officially do not condone certain behavior but they certainly will look the other way pretending they did not see anything.

[skOsH♥]

There was that penguin one that is not trustworthy but cnet or Tom's hardware kept promoting them. I can't remember which one it was. I think it was Tom's, because I was very shocked

[m662]

引用自 skOsH：

There was that penguin one that is not trustworthy but cnet or Tom's hardware kept promoting them. I can't remember which one it was. I think it was Tom's, because I was very shocked

Oh don't worry they still do just look under there /coupons/ directory.

[IFIYGD]

I've used Humble Bundle, Green Man Gaming, Fanatical (formerly Bundle Stars) and IndieGala.
The only one I ever had issues with was IndieGala- years and years ago a bunch of really cheap keys from really cheap bundles were revoked and no refunds were given. But, again, that was years and years ago.
I don't touch grey-market "key reseller" sites at all, only Steam authorized vendors. And even with those, I don't link my Steam account to redeem keys, though it is more of a pain now to type them all in by hand. Been a few years since I bought any bundles or CD Keys, though, so things may be very different from the last time I bought any. I still have a huge stash that I am slowly gifting to IRL friends and their kids, and I have too many games in my own backlog as it is (I don't need to add more from cheap bundles).

[Kargor]

引用自 Spawn of Totoro：

These days I just avoid the confusion of key sellers by purchasing on the platform directly.

No confusion for me; I just read what they offer. Also, I generally know that companies like Ubisoft don't sell Steam keys.

In general, it seems I'm an extremely bad customer for Steam:

...
*** [2024-08-04 01:00:25]: account has 2459 licenses (+2459)
*** [2024-08-04 01:00:28]: account owns 1915 games
[***] command> list-games
...
listed 1915 games (221 adult, 58 early access) with a total playtime of 12193 hours
out of the 1990 licenses, 346 have payment-type "Complimentary" and 1566 have "ActivationCode"
out of the 1990 licenses, 214 have billing type "NoCost" and 129 have "FreeOnDemand"

It's missing about 500 licenses, but that's likely because the software doesn't support DLCs yet. Regardless, 346 complimentary and 1566 keys leaves only 78 licenses as Steam store purchases...

So yeah, while I'm generally a bad customer for games, Steam really gets the short straw -- they run the platform, but they don't get a lot of purchases...

[WhitePhantom]

The legit ones are great for when you want to buy a game at launch as you can almost always get a chunk off with a discount.

[corn man]

Honestly you guys can hate me I don’t care but I don’t trust cd keys with my money. Or g2a

[Spawn of Totoro]

引用自 Kargor：

引用自 Spawn of Totoro：

These days I just avoid the confusion of key sellers by purchasing on the platform directly.

No confusion for me; I just read what they offer. Also, I generally know that companies like Ubisoft don't sell Steam keys.

Good for you.

Sometimes people miss the little "For X platform" especially when they get excited about a good deal on something they have been waiting for.

Never said I wasn't at fault, just that I took measure to ensure it didn't happen again and the reason I did so.

引用自 WhitePhantom：

The legit ones are great for when you want to buy a game at launch as you can almost always get a chunk off with a discount.

Yep.

Then there are those of us who wait for all a game's DLC and several patches before considering buying a game. By then, there is usually a better discount.

[Mizu]

引用自 Spawn of Totoro：

引用自 Kargor：

No confusion for me; I just read what they offer. Also, I generally know that companies like Ubisoft don't sell Steam keys.

Good for you.

Sometimes people miss the little "For X platform" especially when they get excited about a good deal on something they have been waiting for.

I feel like this would be the first thing you would check for, though? Most sites like that have stock that is around 95% Steam keys, so you must've been pretty unlucky if you managed to overlook the few [other] keys they sell for some reason.

[Spawn of Totoro]

引用自 Ichigo：

I feel like this would be the first thing you would check for, though? Most sites like that have stock that is around 95% Steam keys, so you must've been pretty unlucky if you managed to overlook the few [other] keys they sell for some reason.

I didn't use the Bethesda Launcher and didn't even know it existed it until latter. Just got excited for the Doom DLC (found through IsThereAnyDeal). Had only ever purchased Steam Keys there before, so didn't even think to check. Seems there were no Steam keys for it and the only way to get the DLC for the game on Steam, was through Steam at the time.

So a combination of being too quick and things I wasn't aware of at the time.

Heck, last time I had used it was before they added console keys to the site.

[SLG]

It depends on the sites you use. I use one that I do not have to add money at all. I earn digital currency then use that currency to purchase the keys. So far the keys have worked. There was one issue with a Steam gift card, but that was I mistake I made.

[Mythical]

I've used the censored site you mention several times for a few obscure titles, thus far without any issue. You can never go wrong with being very careful when using that site. I always use a preloaded debit card with sites like that, and just pay attention to who the seller is. Read reviews, do some research, look around and accept that no matter how confident you are there's always the possibility that you're throwing money in the toilet. If possible, I'd recommend just buying directly through Steam.

[꧁♔༺KevSanz༻ᴳᵒᵈ♔]

todo me parece una mierda ggwp

[T9]

no problems

[Zekkah]

引用自 BJWyler：

引用自 jose_silveira20：

Is this fact or speculation?

Facts.

At the end of the day, many sites take advantage of people who are desperate to get games for super cheap.

They steal Steam accounts to sell. They buy keys with stolen payment information. They use deception to get keys through other means. And yes, when developers find out about it, they Revoke those keys, regardless of if some sap bought and used the key.

If you want to be 100% completely and totally assured of having absolutely no problems with buying a game, you get it from Steam or the Developer directly.

If you want to get a key from a third party reseller, you need to research and ensure that you only get them from the well known resellers with impeccable track records, Humble Bundle being one of them.

IsThereAnyDeal dot com, is the best way thus far to vette these resellers. Any other reseller is to be treated as suspect and avoided, no matter how many random YouTubers or shills tell you otherwise. Simple as.

These sites are basically marketplaces like eBay and AliExpress, and with the same risks. You also can't be sure you're not buying stolen goods from eBay.