German Store Restrictions - We Need a Better Solution

[flyomotive]

I'm writing as a dedicated Steam user of over 10 years, with more than 1000 games and several thousands of Euros spent on the platform.

Steam has always been my go-to platform for gaming - it's user-friendly, innovative, and has consistently put users first. However, this month an incredibly frustrating situation has come about in regards to German regulations and Steam's missing age verification system:

Recently, a significant number of games have become completely inaccessible in the German Steam store due to missing age ratings. This affects both upcoming releases many have been excited about, like Subnautica 2 to name only one example, as well as recently released titles like Flight of Nova, an impressive space flight sim that I can no longer even view in the store. Even beloved older titles like Animal Super Squad and The Banner Saga have disappeared. Given that their developers already had months to fill out the Age Rating survey, it's unlikely that it will happen at all for lots of such games.

What's particularly concerning is that smaller and older games are disproportionately affected - and these are often the titles where Steam is the only platform to play them! The inability to even discover which games are affected, as they're completely removed from view, makes this situation even more frustrating.

While I understand that Valve is forced to comply with the short-sighted German regulations, the current implementation feels overly restrictive, especially given the robust age verification infrastructure already available in Germany and the EU (digital ID, passport, Postident, etc.).

It's worth noting that Steam has previously faced fines for breaching EU geo-blocking regulations (Regulation 2018/302), though I understand this is a complex situation.

Many of us would gladly verify our age through any of these established methods to regain access to the full Steam store.

Questions for Valve:

- Are there plans to implement an age verification solution?
- Could you share any timeline for addressing these issues?
- Is there any way for users to help expedite this process or verify their age on an individual basis?

Right now, many of us are forced to use other platforms just to stay informed about games, browse an uncensored storefront, track wishlisted games, and buy and play older games - something that is impossible for Steam-exclusive titles. There has got to be a better solution.

Thanks for your concern.

[AROCK!!!]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Sazzouu:

Been on a trip until now. Can someone give me a quick headsup:

Ursprungligen skrivet av Ben Lubar:

Even if Valve set up one of the expensive systems people have suggested for age verification, that only proves that there is an adult in the room. It doesn't prove that there are no minors. And the law only cares whether there are minors, not how many adults there are.

What „expensive systems“ are we talking about? Because last time I‘ve checked (and as many users including me already pointed out) the systems are already there. They only need to be used.

Plus what „constant costs“ do we have here? Because once setup (no matter if custom build or using the existing solutions) there are no other costs

There is a group of users here that constantly and without fail object to pretty much every suggestion made, and always exaggerate on costs, resource usage, etc.

These individuals also use alt accounts to "up" there numbers in a sad attempt to make it seem like many are against this, when in fact it is only a very small minority.

The fact that numerous, much smaller companies do this, and that it would have no effect on them whatsoever is irrelevant.

They are here for no other reason than to troll and disrupt the conversation.

[Crazy Tiger]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Ben Lubar:

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/4183351393029705363

It wasn't Valve's decision. If it were Valve's decision, why would they have made the decision differently for your country than for every other country in existence?

Valve could have decided to utilise one of the already existing age verification systems. They didn't.

While the German government made their laws, it's ultimately still Valve who makes active choices in how to deal with all that. Their "hand-off" approach, cause that's what they essentially do currently, is their choice. So yes, it is partly Valves decision to have such games blocked for people.

And no, it doesn't matter that it doesn't take long for developers to fill in the required documents for rating via the Steam system. Cause ultimately, while it would be nice if developers do that, other choices could have been made by Valve.

[Ben Lubar]

Ursprungligen skrivet av AROCK!!!:

Ursprungligen skrivet av Sazzouu:

Been on a trip until now. Can someone give me a quick headsup:



What „expensive systems“ are we talking about? Because last time I‘ve checked (and as many users including me already pointed out) the systems are already there. They only need to be used.

Plus what „constant costs“ do we have here? Because once setup (no matter if custom build or using the existing solutions) there are no other costs

There is a group of users here that constantly and without fail object to pretty much every suggestion made, and always exaggerate on costs, resource usage, etc.

These individuals also use alt accounts to "up" there numbers in a sad attempt to make it seem like many are against this, when in fact it is only a very small minority.

The fact that numerous, much smaller companies do this, and that it would have no effect on them whatsoever is irrelevant.

They are here for no other reason than to troll and disrupt the conversation.

The only information I have about the age verification systems is what people have told me in this thread and others like it.

And "a few bucks" per potential customer is not an amount of money that Valve can sustainably spend just to let someone browse the store. A customer simply browsing the store does not make Valve "a few bucks" in profit.

[Doctor Zalgo]

I do agree that Germany is just taking the lead here and while it would be very funny to just go 'haha Germany sucks' the fact is that if Steam doesn't get ahead of this by implementing their own technical standard they'll have 20 different standards inflicted on them by 20 different countries.

[HikariLight]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Doctor Zalgo:

I do agree that Germany is just taking the lead here and while it would be very funny to just go 'haha Germany sucks' the fact is that if Steam doesn't get ahead of this by implementing their own technical standard they'll have 20 different standards inflicted on them by 20 different countries.

Steam is already going by as many standards as the number of countries they operate in.
There is no "One Size Fits All" standard when it comes to laws in regards to video games.
Also the same can be said for each countries ID. There is no standard ID layout that every country uses, they all have their own way.
Also, Steam has no reason to know the identity of the person behind the keyboard, they also have shown they have no desire to know.

[STNGTE]

What flyomotive has written here on the subject and in what way, shows in my opinion that no matter what it is about, there are witty gamers who have good ideas and suggestions and are worthy of the attention from Steam/Valve. Why this sometimes results in little to nothing remains a mystery to me, I also really like being on Steam but there are a few things from time to time that don't give me good feelings at all. One of the most important points was and is that it is understandable that Valve has to comply with the regulations and the new laws,
they have no other choice BUT the implementation is very much in need of improvement,
because the way it is right now, it's just not the right way or well thought out.

I have already seen some good suggestions on this topic and have also come up with an idea myself that I think is the best and simplest so far, although I would like to emphasise that it's not about who has the best solution, but just do something!
By the way, I also contacted the Steam support about it but unfortunately it was very disappointing, mostly they give me the feeling that they didn't really read what I wrote.
Even when I very clearly explained that I understood the matter and had informed myself,
but what came back from them was: "...there is this new law in Germany... blah blah..."
Well thank you for telling me what I already know and actually wasting my time.

The Thing is and I would also have no problem having my age verified if there was no other way,
take my ID and let me finally do my things again, but that's not what it's all about.
This new law stipulates that all games must have an age rating, otherwise they may not be offered, or Valve would get in a lot of trouble.
As already mentioned, there is an easy way to do this without the experience of restrictions
and the ugly grayed out images instead of the artwork of a game. And let me make something perfectly clear, I am 43 years old and not just a user but a customer here,
I pay money and want something in return for it.
And that means that in such a case I'm not satisfied with just being allowed to play my pruchased game without access to the store page (reviews, groups...).

A simple and clever way to get the developers and distributors to get a rating, and also
to bother and annoy us as less as possible, would be if Valve deactivated the function of the purchase button as well as the download button for free games, with a note:
(Example) "...without a rating this game cannot be purchased..."
No freaking greyed out images, still access to the store page and everything else what belongs
to a game and still Valve would do what is required of them, namley not to offer games without a rating.
In my opinion this should be the appropriate way to deal with this and with all other similar situations, you can think what you want about the law but I expect Valve to deal with it properly,
which has abbsolutely not been the case so far.

[striker]

in 2013 the largest German anti-censorship group (https://steamcommunity.com/groups/foruncut) held a large survey among its members to assess, how an age verification system (AVS) could be implemented.

When guaging acceptance for this, 76% of users would pay a one-time fee to be age authenticated on the platform (up to 10€). There are online verification services that charge only about 1€ for a verification based on private online-banking logins with SSO-features. There are also very cheap avs based on the ID-Card, which would cost around 0,50€ (est.).

German law provides for a authentication-verification system though. So you would need some kind of token to verify it is the authenticated person using the service (Steam App on Mobile should suffice).

If anyone is interesting in specifics (though the info will be somewhat dated), write on my wall before contacting me, or just join the group for diskussions (there is an EN forum).

[Vilo_le_Loup]

What I also find very unfortunate is the fact that many games in Germany now only displayed in gray and without a cover in the public profile gameslist (where you can also see the hours played, etc.). This has been the case for some time with games that have been removed from the store, and now there are even alot more. It looks really tattered now. There must be also another way.

[flyomotive]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Ben Lubar:

Ursprungligen skrivet av AROCK!!!:

There is a group of users here that constantly and without fail object to pretty much every suggestion made, and always exaggerate on costs, resource usage, etc.

These individuals also use alt accounts to "up" there numbers in a sad attempt to make it seem like many are against this, when in fact it is only a very small minority.

The fact that numerous, much smaller companies do this, and that it would have no effect on them whatsoever is irrelevant.

They are here for no other reason than to troll and disrupt the conversation.

The only information I have about the age verification systems is what people have told me in this thread and others like it.

And "a few bucks" per potential customer is not an amount of money that Valve can sustainably spend just to let someone browse the store. A customer simply browsing the store does not make Valve "a few bucks" in profit.

Why would someone go through all the effort of verifying their age on Steam, just to then browse the storefront and leave? As someone who has done many ID verifications, it's a chore, it takes like 10 minutes. Nothing you do "just cause".

And even with a pessimistic calculation the cost incurred by these special cases of users would be offset by the other benefits of the solution.

And one thing that is consistently just glossed over here is that nothing is stopping Valve from making it a paid premium feature. Or give it for free for accounts with at least x purchases. They apply the same logic for account status etc. Just because you envision the worst case implementation does not mean Valve can't be smart about it. They have come up with very smart solutions for other difficult problems in their ecosystem.

[flyomotive]

Ursprungligen skrivet av striker:

in 2013 the largest German anti-censorship group (https://steamcommunity.com/groups/foruncut) held a large survey among its members to assess, how an age verification system (AVS) could be implemented.

When guaging acceptance for this, 76% of users would pay a one-time fee to be age authenticated on the platform (up to 10€). There are online verification services that charge only about 1€ for a verification based on private online-banking logins with SSO-features. There are also very cheap avs based on the ID-Card, which would cost around 0,50€ (est.).

German law provides for a authentication-verification system though. So you would need some kind of token to verify it is the authenticated person using the service (Steam App on Mobile should suffice).

If anyone is interesting in specifics (though the info will be somewhat dated), write on my wall before contacting me, or just join the group for diskussions (there is an EN forum).

Those are the numbers I found as well. I even asked someone working at a company that uses a service provider for user ID verification. They are MUCH smaller than valve in revenue and have fewer employees as well.

Of course there is the administrative and implementation overhead. But as others have said, smaller stores have done it, so arguing that it's unfeasible does not make sense.


It's great to see many sane people here that apply some critical thinking and discuss the topic in good faith. Thanks for your input!

[The nubinator]

Vote for AFD (if youre right wing) or BSW (left wing) in the next election.

[STNGTE]

A few days ago I received the following response from the Federal Center for Child and Youth Media Protection (BzKJ) as a statement, and it is as I had expected:

"Die gesetzliche Regelung fordert die Alterskennzeichnung explizit nur für solche Spielprogramme, die zum individuellen Abruf bereitgehalten werden. Kann ein Spielprogramm nicht abgerufen werden, so ist greift die gesetzliche Pflicht zur Kennzeichnung nicht ein. Demnach könnte ein nichtgekennzeichnetes Spielprogramm (mitsamt Informationen) grundsätzlich angezeigt werden, solange ein Zugriff auf den Inhalt technisch ausgeschlossen ist. In diesem Zusammenhang ist zu betonen, dass die konkrete Ausgestaltung des Angebots allein dem jeweiligen Anbieter obliegt. Nur er kann entscheiden, ob und wie er nichtgekennzeichnete Spielprogramme – im Rahmen der rechtlichen Grenzen – anzeigt. Auf diese Gestaltung des jeweiligen Angebots können und wollen wir keinen Einfluss nehmen."

In English:
"The legal regulation explicitly requires age rating only for game programs that are available for individual download. If a game program cannot be retrieved, the legal obligation to label does not apply. Accordingly, an unmarked game program (including information) could in principle be displayed as long as access to the content is technically impossible. In this context, it should be emphasized that the specific design of the offer is the sole responsibility of the respective provider. Only the provider can decide whether and how to display unmarked game programs - within the legal limits. We cannot and do not wish to exert any influence on the design of the respective offer."

This clarifies who is more to blame for the whole situation and it makes me very sad that in deed it is Steam/Valve.

[Ben Lubar]

Ursprungligen skrivet av STNGTE:

A few days ago I received the following response from the Federal Center for Child and Youth Media Protection (BzKJ) as a statement, and it is as I had expected:

"Die gesetzliche Regelung fordert die Alterskennzeichnung explizit nur für solche Spielprogramme, die zum individuellen Abruf bereitgehalten werden. Kann ein Spielprogramm nicht abgerufen werden, so ist greift die gesetzliche Pflicht zur Kennzeichnung nicht ein. Demnach könnte ein nichtgekennzeichnetes Spielprogramm (mitsamt Informationen) grundsätzlich angezeigt werden, solange ein Zugriff auf den Inhalt technisch ausgeschlossen ist. In diesem Zusammenhang ist zu betonen, dass die konkrete Ausgestaltung des Angebots allein dem jeweiligen Anbieter obliegt. Nur er kann entscheiden, ob und wie er nichtgekennzeichnete Spielprogramme – im Rahmen der rechtlichen Grenzen – anzeigt. Auf diese Gestaltung des jeweiligen Angebots können und wollen wir keinen Einfluss nehmen."

In English:
"The legal regulation explicitly requires age rating only for game programs that are available for individual download. If a game program cannot be retrieved, the legal obligation to label does not apply. Accordingly, an unmarked game program (including information) could in principle be displayed as long as access to the content is technically impossible. In this context, it should be emphasized that the specific design of the offer is the sole responsibility of the respective provider. Only the provider can decide whether and how to display unmarked game programs - within the legal limits. We cannot and do not wish to exert any influence on the design of the respective offer."

This clarifies who is more to blame for the whole situation and it makes me very sad that in deed it is Steam/Valve.

There's a lot of stuff on game store pages that isn't just metadata. There's a reason the policy isn't "let children see adult only games but don't let them buy them".

[AROCK!!!]

Ursprungligen skrivet av sharien (he/him):

Ursprungligen skrivet av AROCK!!!:

Valve only cares about money, so until they start losing enough to notice, nothing will happen.
And BTW, if STEAM actually did, as you say, "consistently put users first", this issue would not, not would it ever had existed.

In the meantime, you can get keys from numerous sites, and you can also order games from outside Germany, which is completely legal.
Even if a game is indexed, it is still legal to own and play, it's just not legal to sell it here.

I used to buy from a store in the UK.


The law governing this is not, "short sighted", it's there to protect the youth. Hundreds of other stores manage to implement an age verification, even small businesses, so Valve not doing it is simply because they do not care about us...until as I said, they see they are losing money, then Valve will do something, but it will be because of money, not the customers.

okay just no - indexed does not mean its not legal to sell in germany... i means that its not legal to display and advertise as well as requiring verification of your age to buy it... you could still go into a shop and specifically ask for the game and buy it
THAT is the actual legal situation... but with online stores that essentially means that they cant sell, because there is no one to ask for the game or verify your age to... its not illegal to sell, its impossible with the way they chose to build the store

and on buying keys from numerous sites... oh yeah cool ill go to key resellers where a large chunk of the keys being sold are the result of scammers and credit card theft
good advice

and genuinely im sick of the age old "but wont someone please think of the children" line - no its not... this has absolutely no effect on what children can and will do - teenagers especially are the most likely to just pirate anything interesting they cant otherwise get access to, because the consequences are minimal and they generally dont have much in the way of income anyway - its their parents who are being locked out of buying or even seeing the stuff, especially when they are not immersed in whats going on in the gaming world anyway
that line of "just protecting the children" has been trumpeted over and over from those on the right who just want to censor things they dont want anyone to see

Sorry for late reply...I don't check daily, or often.


Yes, you are correct about indexing...I often get that confused with "banned". In any case, my point is, regardless of the status, indexed or even banned, ownership of the game is not illegal. I myself have several games that are banned.


As to your comment about online key sites. FFS guy, all it takes is a few minutes of checking to find a few reputable ones. I myself have bought at least a dozen keys, without issue.


I get your frustration with the law, but let's be honest, no politician or government official is going to be the one that stands up and suggests getting rid of policies that prevent children from buying violent games and porn games, and to think such a thing would happen is naive to say the least, if not plain out idiotic.


Valve is a multi billion dollar company, and adding age verification for those countries that have laws such as this would probably be such a low expense it would not even be a blip on the balance sheet.
Hell, they could even charge to get your age verified and I bet most "adults" would be more than happy to do it...I would.

FFS, last year alone Valve made almost one billion dollars on loot boxes alone....a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ $1,000,000,000, so the argument that it costs money is moronic, especially when one considers that numerous other companies, much smaller than Valve, have it.

But the simple truth of the matter is that for Valve to change, Valve would have to be losing money, because if Valve actually gave a ♥♥♥♥ about us, the customers, it would already have been implemented.


BTW, I have nothing against the law, in fact, I support it, and I am not as you put it, "on the right". I am a (left leaning) centrist, and a parent.

[AROCK!!!]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Ben Lubar:

Ursprungligen skrivet av AROCK!!!:

There is a group of users here that constantly and without fail object to pretty much every suggestion made, and always exaggerate on costs, resource usage, etc.

These individuals also use alt accounts to "up" there numbers in a sad attempt to make it seem like many are against this, when in fact it is only a very small minority.

The fact that numerous, much smaller companies do this, and that it would have no effect on them whatsoever is irrelevant.

They are here for no other reason than to troll and disrupt the conversation.

The only information I have about the age verification systems is what people have told me in this thread and others like it.

And "a few bucks" per potential customer is not an amount of money that Valve can sustainably spend just to let someone browse the store. A customer simply browsing the store does not make Valve "a few bucks" in profit.

FFS guy, we're not talking about a few customers or a "few bucks", we're talking about an entire country that also happens to be the fifth-largest games market in the world by global sales revenue., not to mention a few other countries that block certain games.

As I pointed out, several times, Valve could charge a fee to get your account age verified, and it only needs to be done, ONCE.


On a more personal note, these forums are not the best place to get accurate info, mainly due to trolls, and the uninformed.

It's always better to go to more official sites if not the companies that actually provide such services to get accurate information.