Can you still play your Steam games if you move to another country?

[Rodrigo]

I have read that some games I have a license to a specific region in the world.

Will I be able to play most of the games in my library if I permanently move to another country? (Assuming the country has Internet) If yes, then can I move to (almost any) country in the world and still play my games?
Or will I have to buy those games again?

[Brujeira]

Even though you won’t find this anywhere in the FAQs, games become region free 90 days after you buy them.

If you move to a region where particular games aren’t available and they’re within that period then they’ll presumably be unavailable to you until the 90 days are up.

[Satoru]

The only ones like that are the German censored games

Otherwise once you buy a game it’s playable globally

Steam also has the “home country” concept so that if you travel you maintain your original country store pricing so you can use your original payment methods even when abroad

[Muppet among Puppets]

Originally posted by Satoru:

The only ones like that are the German censored games

The ones that misunderstand the concept

[Satoru]

Originally posted by Muppet among Puppets:

Originally posted by Satoru:

The only ones like that are the German censored games

The ones that misunderstand the concept

You’re free to petition your government so that publishers don’t have to hedge their bets that the next chancellor suddenly decides video games cause nazism

The laws make publishers risk adverse and thus censor games so there is a 0% chance it will be subject to government intervention. If said laws didn’t exist, then publishers would have no need to do so

[Muppet among Puppets]

They make censored versions to advertise and openly sell.

If you own any version, nothing tells to prevent that.
Thats why only games that dont understand the concept might not work.

[Satoru]

Originally posted by Muppet among Puppets:

They make censored versions to advertise and openly sell.

If you own any version, nothing tells to prevent that.
Thats why only games that dont understand the concept might not work.

There is a functional difference between

1) individual persons are allowed to own specific version

Vs

2) how does a store sell 2 versions and not fall afoul of German censorship laws

Note that steam has a literal army of lawyers so it’s somewhat delusional to think they somehow don’t have a very firm grasp of the relevant law and it’s potential impact on their business.

Again you’re free to petition your government so that such measures no longer become necessary. Until then steam and publishers will go with the path of least likely to get them into trouble with various government bodies. The measures are necessary due to the laws. Change the law so the measures no longer are relevant

[Muppet among Puppets]

Region locks are not required.

[Satoru]

Originally posted by Muppet among Puppets:

Region locks are not required.

Again yes 'legally there is no law that says so'

But again, the whole 'wow i wonder if we're gonna get our game removed by the government because they think that buying off of external sites and activating on steam counts as bypassing said bans and gets not only the game banned but our entire stoer from gemrany"

the fact that the 'law doesnt require it' isnt relevant. The uncertainty due to the law means its better to be safe than banned from the EU's largest market

If you want to remove said uncertainty, feel free to petition your government to remove said laws. But until they do, companies are going to act in their self interests and hedge their bets against government action. Unless you wanna foot the bill for when the next chancellor decides steam should be banned from germany because they sold an uncensored version of wolfenstien via a VPN.

[Muppet among Puppets]

There were free weekends of games, for example where the developers thought they had to censor a beard and the name eva, and add region locks.

The free weekend was uncensored.
And nothing happened. The game was not that good as well.


Region locks is the cheapest way to put all paranoid worries away. Its not the master class of lawyering that needs a literal army of lawyers to come up with.