Simple solution for Age Verification in countries like Germany!

[Stoned Rhyno]

A few years ago, many games labeled Adult Only became inaccessible in the German Steam store, since then no measures were taken to introduce proper age verification that is in line with German standards.

Now many older games that have no age verification are at risk to be locked away in Germany.
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/4183351393029705363

Selling Adult Only games is not illegal in Germany, but restricting them from being bought in Germany as a whole in frankly discriminatory towards mature German gamers.
Even games that are on the German index can legally be sold to adult gamers in Germany, they can just not be openly advertised, because of the risk to appeal to minors.

The issue in Germany is, our bureaucracy is too far back from the digital age, which means in order to verify you age, you need a physical person as a witness.

This witness can be any legally adult person, even a postman or a retail cashier.
All Valve needs to do is to sell a physically printed age-verification code, just like a Steam gift card, either in German retail stores or via mail like when ordering Steam hardware, while adding a proper notation that this code can not be sold to minors.
Whenever I would buy this code card, the person handing it to me only requires my signature and a look at my ID card (if my age was not visually obvious).

Entering this code into steam could then permanently unlock the Adult Only category and otherwise age-restricted games for the account.

Honestly i am not a fan of "steamy" (it's a pun, lol) Visual Novels or games that purely celebrate bloody rage or gruesome violence, but there are still games that have these attributes while offering much more.
I just don't want my rightful choice as an adult gamer be withheld, just because it is easier than offering a proper solution.

[Mad Scientist]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Stoned Rhyno:

Selling Adult Only games is not illegal in Germany, but restricting them from being bought in Germany as a whole in frankly discriminatory towards mature German gamers.

It's not discriminatory, it's compliance by means of choosing the simplest option.
If you have an issue with this, take it up with the german politicians that keep making silly laws & trying to dictate all other countries do as they want.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Stoned Rhyno:

The issue in Germany is, our bureaucracy is too far back from the digital age, which means in order to verify you age, you need a physical person as a witness.

If bureaucracy is the cause, your solution is to contact said bureaucracy to stop interfering with international trade.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Stoned Rhyno:

Entering this code into steam could then permanently unlock the Adult Only category and otherwise age-restricted games for the account.

The legal issue is that someone could merely be buying it for a minor even though they're not supposed to, the eu finds out, and tries fining valve billions of dollars like they tend to try with companies because someone did that which can also result in the vendor getting into trouble, because in many cases by-default the eu presumes guilt because fining companies is profitable.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Stoned Rhyno:

I just don't want my rightful choice as an adult gamer be withheld, just because it is easier than offering a proper solution.

Rights end where laws or interference with others begin. I would also presume it's more of a privilege, not a right, when you're on another countries store or property as to what they decide to do in response to a country that makes absurd laws for trade constantly.

[HikariLight]

The personal info needed to prove a person's age is something Valve/Steam will not hold onto due to privacy laws.
If you don't like your government, then as a citizen you need to contact your representatives and ask them to do something about it.

[Brujeira]

Right........ yeah, just a brief Google suggests that the scheme you described doesn't actually fit the requirements of the legislation. The word "permanently" shouldn't be in your post for a start.

[Start_Running]

And who's to say the person enterying the code is not a minor?

[cinedine]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Stoned Rhyno:

This witness can be any legally adult person, even a postman or a retail cashier.
All Valve needs to do is to sell a physically printed age-verification code, [...]

This is completely outdated. There are multiple digital only solutions available. From using the eID features of your ID card from using online banking to verify you are 18+.

Początkowo opublikowane przez HikariLight:

The personal info needed to prove a person's age is something Valve/Steam will not hold onto due to privacy laws.
If you don't like your government, then as a citizen you need to contact your representatives and ask them to do something about it.

(A) The only thing they need to hold on to is "This person is 18+ years old". And they don't even need to store it per account and can just require a new verification per order.
(B) Because this has been proven to work, right? Also where does it say they don't like the government/legislation. Most Germans are perfectly fine with our youth protections laws because they get barely get in the way of adults. The problem they have is Steam not implementing an age verification.

[Freqsync]

Huh?

Germany is to far back ...

Just because you human don't mean can have air on moon. Germany said no. As some say yes to pork and liquor some areas say no to both. That is a good thing to not be burnt to crisp by sun that never sets. Can either not be there or wait to the night, If make it everywhere ...that term will not be spoken on steam because me be able to say "no" too.


me neanderthal me to far back for you to be a neanderthal you jealous of me be neanderthal. Vicious circle.



And second. this is in English why are you not stating this in Deutsch. Gosh this tree is in my way I think gonna cut it down.. now a mudslide happened think gonna sludge through an maybe find some gold except find mounds and mounds of dirt closed the road since all there is no dirt no one could grow a tree neat and clean without some adult interruption. We all live as slugs in the mud drowning and clawed at to be flown about and fed to baby birds in a nest and as the parasite say it was our doing all along.


Choice as a gamer? Go back to checkers. name thyself King me. see how it goes. when someone finally slingshots one of those caps across your knows.



If could find a place where steam was 5 games only is where it is at. tried my hat at making a library house a steam machine yet the cost would be riots and acid rain for lemonade if that act were to be followed. Takes a village idiot to believe that their what raises children.

[TGC> The Games Collector]

In the Netherlands we had age verification on our bank passes for a while.
For instance for getting cigarettes out of vending machines and stuff.

And I mean, it's not like it had my birth certificate or anything, just a 1 or 0 if I'm old enough.

I never really got why they didn't do more with this. I mean, making a system like that digital would make age verification real easy.
Just buy something and your age can be verified through the bank.

[Yujah]

Początkowo opublikowane przez TGC> The Games Collector:

I never really got why they didn't do more with this. I mean, making a system like that digital would make age verification real easy. Just buy something and your age can be verified through the bank.

Something more refined along those line is in the pipeline...

https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age/european-digital-identity_en

[Brian9824]

Don't even need that, they can easily be shown in the store if the developers just get their game rated. Its part of Germany's stupid laws that if they don't have an USK rating steam can't show them

[Pocahawtness]

I suspect that, sooner or late, all governments will insist on age verification. Governments like to know what the masses are up to, and to control them.
I think it's only a matter of time before Valve face legal action and will doubtless at first just stop selling in the odd country, but over time, as those countries grow in number, they will introduce verification.

[Brian9824]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Pocahawtness:

I suspect that, sooner or late, all governments will insist on age verification. Governments like to know what the masses are up to, and to control them.
I think it's only a matter of time before Valve face legal action and will doubtless at first just stop selling in the odd country, but over time, as those countries grow in number, they will introduce verification.

Valve won't face legal action, if laws change to require it then they remove the games like they did with Germany and the games won't be sold. The burden is on the developers right now to get their game rated, not Valve.

In the US steps to force age verification for instance have repeatedly been struck down by the Supreme court as a first ammendment violation. Germany just has a rep for being very overbearing and controlling over what their citizens can do and always has been. Games have to do crazy things like replace enemies with robots, change blood to green, etc to get a release in germany because they are a nanny country.

Anyways as it was already said if the developer gets their game rated this issue goes away. Its not a steam issue, its a developer issue

[Xyales]

Why does the average ameri-tard seem to be unable to understand basic economics?

It seems moronic to constantly proclaim that Steam is going with the simplest solution and then constantly following up with deranged statements such as "Its not financially worth it!" and "Germany is only in the top 5!". Thats quite the high ranking if you consider that they don't have access to some games and or are discouraged from buying it due to games being "cut" versions, hence the current issue. Get of your high horse.

Implementing a solution with eID would be relatively cheap either way, at most 1.000.000$, but more likely in the range of 50.000 - 200.000$. They'd gain way more than they'd lose from implementing it and its not specific to germany but rather to the EU which germany is part of. Its definitively not a monetary issue.

The implementation is purely beneficial as it not only opens up an additional source of sellable products which steam takes a split from (which, even if region-locked currently, can be bypassed via steam-keys which is laughable as there apparenly aren't any restriction to downloading and playing restricted games.). It would also allow developers to completely ignore the prospect of cutting games as they could be made available to germans via proper age-verification instead to cover the market for that. Lastly they wouldn't be re-inventing the wheel as other places have done something like this before, its nothing new.

To begin with, people not affected by the issue don't even have a reason to participate in the whole argument at all, as they wouldn't have to use it even if it was implemented. Similarly how you don't have to use your ID to play chinese/korean games, even though some require chinese/korean citizens to register with ID due to how they're dealing with addiction in those countries.

[76561198407601200]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Xyales:

Why does the average ameri-tard seem to be unable to understand basic economics?

It seems moronic to constantly proclaim that Steam is going with the simplest solution and then constantly following up with deranged statements such as "Its not financially worth it!" and "Germany is only in the top 5!". Thats quite the high ranking if you consider that they don't have access to some games and or are discouraged from buying it due to games being "cut" versions, hence the current issue. Get of your high horse.

Implementing a solution with eID would be relatively cheap either way, at most 1.000.000$, but more likely in the range of 50.000 - 200.000$. They'd gain way more than they'd lose from implementing it and its not specific to germany but rather to the EU which germany is part of. Its definitively not a monetary issue.

The implementation is purely beneficial as it not only opens up an additional source of sellable products which steam takes a split from (which, even if region-locked currently, can be bypassed via steam-keys which is laughable as there apparenly aren't any restriction to downloading and playing restricted games.). It would also allow developers to completely ignore the prospect of cutting games as they could be made available to germans via proper age-verification instead to cover the market for that. Lastly they wouldn't be re-inventing the wheel as other places have done something like this before, its nothing new.

To begin with, people not affected by the issue don't even have a reason to participate in the whole argument at all, as they wouldn't have to use it even if it was implemented. Similarly how you don't have to use your ID to play chinese/korean games, even though some require chinese/korean citizens to register with ID due to how they're dealing with addiction in those countries.

Hasn't posted in years only to post on an almost 5 year old topic, lovely.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Początkowo opublikowane przez The Living Tribunal:

Hasn't posted in years only to post on an almost 5 year old topic, lovely.

Less than a year old topic.

[Start_Running]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Xyales:

Why does the average ameri-tard seem to be unable to understand basic economics?

Oh this should be good.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Xyales:

It seems moronic to constantly proclaim that Steam is going with the simplest solution and then constantly following up with deranged statements such as "Its not financially worth it!" and "Germany is only in the top 5!". Thats quite the high ranking if you consider that they don't have access to some games and or are discouraged from buying it due to games being "cut" versions, hence the current issue. Get of your high horse.

Yeah the thing is Valve knows how much of that was actually being spent on the sort of games being blocked. The reason we can safely assume Valve deems it not worth their time to pursue other solutions is because Valve literally has the numbers.
They know what their revenue from the region was before the blocking, and after the blocking.

And the difference is not enough to make them look any further than the current solution.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Xyales:

Implementing a solution with eID would be relatively cheap either way, at most 1.000.000$, but more likely in the range of 50.000 - 200.000$. They'd gain way more than they'd lose from implementing it and its not specific to germany but rather to the EU which germany is part of. Its definitively not a monetary issue.

And do you know what the current solution costs them... $0.. And the chances are the revenue difference doesn't hit a threshold that'd make that solution worth while.

$0 is a hard number to beat.