So you accept that they sell keys that are not officially sourced, yet are OK with them claiming to do so on their site?
http://www.greenmangaming.com/about/
GreenManGaming selling unauthorized Ubi/Acti/WB keys
- Thread starter nynt9
- Start date
So you accept that they sell keys that are not officially sourced, yet are OK with them claiming to do so on their site?
http://www.greenmangaming.com/about/
Banjo-Kazooie
Member
I don't think the problem is that they are doing it. The problem is that they are doing it, and lying/falsely advertising how they get some of their keys.
If you don't see how this is wrong then I'm not sure what else to say lol
exmachina64
Banned
I haven't been able to for at least several months. Did a Google search and a lot of people are having similar problems.
Right, they need to alter their tos and become a known gray market seller, or stop selling any games they don't have a direct relationship with the publisher for. If they go for the second route though it's going to be hard to trust anything they say anyway, so they might as well just become a gray market site like Cdkeys.
YianGaruga
Banned
So you accept that they sell keys that are not officially sourced, yet are OK with them claiming to do so on their site?
http://www.greenmangaming.com/about/
This is something they need to clarify, but it's a much much smaller issue than people are making it out to be. If you only want official keys you now know to avoid them. For anyone else the situation didn't really change did it?
Personally, it doesn't really matter to me where their keys are coming from.
Let's say that they are selling shady keys because publishers won't provide them legit keys. Is it ok than that publisher favors one digital seller over the other if GMG offers them normal and legit contract? Is it ok then that GMG who tries to make deals with publishers gets closed but tons of other gray market sellers are getting rich more and more every day and nobody gives a sh*t about that just because publisher doesn't want to work with GMG suddenly (like CDPR did)?
GMG is trying to do good things but real gray market sellers are ruining them and other legit digital distributors and as i said nobody gives a sh*t about that. What did Ubisoft do when G2A and Kinguin sold keys purchased with stolen cards? They actually let people keep games if they stared them just because people complained to Ubisoft instead of G2A and Kinguin. People defended them and blamed Ubisoft. That is really sad and that puts even more pressure to legit digital distributors.
I don't think it's a small issue. There's a reason I bought from gmg and not cdkeys.
Activision could also sue them into the ground for false advertising, and for lost sales. You can't just go around saying you have contracts with people for the sale of their goods when you don't. It's a legal problem.
YianGaruga
Banned
As I said, if you care where the keys are coming from and if they're "authorized", then it's an issue for you. For everyone else it isn't.
And I seriously doubt any publisher will seek legal action here.
The problem is that they are a "real gray market seller for selling cdpr and Activision games without being authorized to do so, while saying every game you sell on your site you have a direct relationship with the publisher. Doing this actually makes them worse than a gray market site who isn't making any claims about being an official retailer.
I guess if you're fine with being lied to as a consumer, good for you?
Is your response going to be that companies lie to consumers all the time? Sure, but that doesn't justify anything. People who just ignore the bullshit enable companies to continue lying.
I think I'm in the "everyone else" group here, and that you're more of an outlier. They absolutely need to be more upfront that not every game they sell is authorized by the publisher.
Yah they really f-ed up with Witcher 3 release but i blame both them and CDPR. For Activision we don't know yet. But it is just sad tat there is so much pressure on GMG or any other legit retailer to constantly prove themselves while G2A and other real gray market sellers are under 0 pressure from publishers and buyers/customers/gamers. Why there is not pressure on publishers from gamers to shut down G2A for example?
YianGaruga
Banned
No. There's tons of information on their site I don't care about. I don't care if it's true or not that they won awards or any of that stuff either. Just as much as I don't care where they get their keys.
They offer good prices, keys that work and decent customer support.
If their keys are authorized or not and if what they're saying about them on their site is true is something the publishers can deal with, not me.
I'm pretty sure that the majority of the people (maybe not on GAF, but in general) would agree with me.
My guess would be that G2A is a much smaller operation than GMG. And that's part of the problem here. Gmg has been the second option outside of steam for most because they put themselves out there as an official channel.
G2A and Kinguin are huge operations. They are promoted buy popular Twitch streamers and Riot had to forbid LoL players to advertise them. i think that GMG is way smaller than G2A and Kinguin.
EatinOlives
Member
I'm really not sure what you're trying to argue here. That the vast majority of people don't care where their keys come from? Evidently they do given how loudly GMG shouts from the rooftops how they're legit. If you want to argue the people who care about this are in the minority I hope you have numbers to back that up. Otherwise you're just dismissing the argument simply because it's not a convenient one to acknowledge for you.
G2A is banned here and also on that subreddit.
Visualante2
Member
Could I get a better citation on Kinguin and G2A being huge other than they run an affiliate scheme with some low rent internet personalities. Lets not try to conflate Riot's involvement as anything other than doing the right thing either. Though it probably is reducing their customer service overhead.
LOL.
Yeah and? They can be banned from every forum/deal web page but they are still an issue. Big issue. Hell IGN is promoting them in their newsletter and nobody gives a sh*t. That's the issue. There is 0 pressure on publishers/developers to take legal actions against them.
We can see that when keys are get deactivated like few months ago with AC Unity and Far Cry 4. And with Sniper Elite 3 we had exact numbers over 7000 keys. http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-06-30-steam-revokes-7050-stolen-sniper-elite-3-codes
Sure, but how is that relevant to the conversation here?
YianGaruga
Banned
What kind of legal action do you have in mind? What part of their business is illegal?
I don't think that people really take issue with gray market sites that are clearly gray market. Gray literally means it's not black or white from a legal perspective, and thus difficult to sue over. And again, I don't think cdkeys, g2a, etc. are nearly as big as GMG. You know what you're getting into with a gray market site.
GMG is clearly engaged in false advertising, operating as a white market site but selling gray market goods, and that's what myself and many others are taking issue with. You don't really know if the code is authorized by the publisher or not, and that's a problem when gmg is telling you prominently all over their site that it is. It basically means that they are now a gray market site, and that sucks for those of us that don't want to buy gray market keys.
Barack Lesnar
Banned
I've been buying from GMG for years. In the back of my mind i knew it was too good to be true but i just blocked it out and kept on truckin. By far the best deals on PC games are from GMG. I haven't decided yet if I'll keep buying or not....most likely not since I have a job and can afford to pay 15 to 20 bux more.
what happend with Fallout 4 and Funstock? Just curious.
While it is not illegal most of the time they are threat to legit sellers. Unfortunately only thing publishers/developers can do is region locking and/or only one language per region.
As i said it is just sad to see GMG (rightfully in this situation) under big pressure when they are too under big pressure from those grey market sellers.
.
I bought Black Ops 3 under the impression that GMG was an authorized reseller of Activision Games. Getting a ROW key is fine with me, but now I have no idea where it came from. I'm worried about my key either being revoked or something happening to my Steam account (I acknowledge that both are unlikely).
If GMG doesn't accept my refund request I'll be contacting my CC company.
I should have trusted my gut and gone with a $38 boxed copy from Best Buy with GCU+$10 pre-order promotional cert.
This is my issue.
For now Witcher 3 is only time we know 100% that this is case. And we had huge thread about that issue here. We still don't have 100% legit proof that this is case with Ubisoft/Activision.
It's pretty much 99% the case when they say in their about us section that every game they sell is backed directly by the publisher, and yet they don't have Activision on their publisher list and they are still selling bopsiii. Add to that that people were getting invalid bopsiii codes and/or did not get nuke town when they pre-ordered.
Yeah, that's enough to at least raise questions and GMG should make a statement.
That's on the mods, I can't do that.
Why is that.
GatticusFinch
Member
Seeing people not defend this after they lost their fucking minds when Xbox One was going to disallow "grey market" used games make my head hurt.
Suddenly reselling a CD key is taboo, but reselling a physical game is not. Suddenly having the publisher's permission to sell a CD Key is mandatory, but reselling a physical game does not.
Which part? The lying or the general fact that key reselling exists?
In general, I cant defend the lying, but without actually seeing the contracts its hard to determine how big of a lie they are telling (or if they are telling one at all).
'Authorized' reseller is such a vague term it could mean literally anything. They could be buying keys directly from the publisher or one of their brokers with some sort of clause that prohibits them in some way from disclosing the source, but at the same time is buying direct from the pub or buying direct from someone directly authorized by the pub to sell keys for resale. There's simply no way to know for certain.
In general though, I think key reselling is a good thing. I think publishers agree, otherwise they would have shut the practice down.
RealityCheque
Banned
How does this actually work? Where and how do they get masses of keys for AAA games for prices cheap enough for them to make a profit on?
Genuine question as I'd like to know more.
Genuine question as I'd like to know more.
Only big corps are allowed to benefit from a global marketplace #hailcorporate
They buy from publishers is placed like the UAE, the keys are legit ROW keys.
Apples and oranges. Also best buy doesn't lie to you and sell you new game that's actually used. Gamestop will sell you the last "new display" copy that's been opened at new price though
But yeah, the problem isn't key reselling, the problem is lying about how you obtained the key.
B-B-B-But Reddit's Holy Crusade against GMG. Some of the keys they sell are probably from the so called grey market when they can't have a good price (20%) to offer to their customers on some titles. Seeing on how the COD games rarely have deep discounts on them and how GOG tried to price control the Witcher 3 I guess these two are example of means they took to get cheap keys to their customers when publishers don't want to sell them keys at a discount. The emergency panic signal seems to have been lit way to early once again.
EDIT : I agree with the others saying you shouldn't disclose your business contracts (even redacted) to some nobodies on the internet.
YianGaruga
Banned
Buy cheap retail copies and rip out the keys
Buy from regional distibutors that have to hit sales targets and will offer a good deal for keys in bulk
VibratingDonkey
Member
Aw come on... GMG is the only seller I knew to have good prices and officially sourced keys. But apparently the only difference between GMG and any other unauthorized reseller is that GMG misleads their customers into believing the keys are legit. Which would be a shitty thing to do. I'll wait a bit for this to get sorted out though before I start getting legitimately disappointed.
A reseller doesn't have to be entirely condemned for trading in the grey market, all I'm asking for is they confirm and detail the origin of keys (and don't lie about it), allowing me to purchase games that are guaranteed to not be any degree of shady.
Publishers are also bad about informing customers, how many have even gone to the minimal effort of putting up a list of authorized resellers? Ubisoft and Devolver Digital are the only ones I can recall.
Amazon, GOG, Gamersgate, Humble Bundle, Nuuvem (Nexway), Steam and Uplay are the ones approved by both of those two at least. Steam is a no go for any recently released AAA games as they're basically all €60, which is a ridiculous price that I'll forever refuse to pay.
A reseller doesn't have to be entirely condemned for trading in the grey market, all I'm asking for is they confirm and detail the origin of keys (and don't lie about it), allowing me to purchase games that are guaranteed to not be any degree of shady.
Publishers are also bad about informing customers, how many have even gone to the minimal effort of putting up a list of authorized resellers? Ubisoft and Devolver Digital are the only ones I can recall.
Amazon, GOG, Gamersgate, Humble Bundle, Nuuvem (Nexway), Steam and Uplay are the ones approved by both of those two at least. Steam is a no go for any recently released AAA games as they're basically all €60, which is a ridiculous price that I'll forever refuse to pay.
You're ignoring literally everything going on here though. We can demonstrably show through multiple examples that GMG are being dishonest to consumers about the nature of some of their keys, and contradicting their site's core values.
Also, the reddit mods aren't asking for entire contracts, they said that you can redact like 80% of the document removing all information but the fact that a deal exists and that would be fine. The bar for verification is set really low. And GMG reps have been contacted over and over regarding this issue, yet they've refused to respond, despite commenting passive aggressively on the status saying they'll keep advertising to the sub through reddit's advertising system. They're not answering the questions directed towards them.
The simplest solution would be to add a note to the page of certain items they sell saying "this key has not been directly obtained from the publisher" or change their "about" page and this would all be over.
My thoughts exacly.
Activison is not listed in GMG's own partners list, and there were issues with BLOPS3 keys that made people doubt their source, in fact that was what lead to the questioning of GMG's process.
That, and the Witcher 3 debacle.
What a private individual should be allowed to sell and what a company operating under the promise of being an authorized seller should be allowed to sell are separate things.
GatticusFinch
Member
So your answer is no, then? There's no official confirmation. WB already said the information they gave was false and GetGames said they also are not on the Ubi list, so it stands to reason that GMG not being on it has no bearing on this.
The Witcher 3 "debacle" was just as much on CDPR's greed than it was on GMG.
what about that one guy who sells steam keys for cheap on the marketplace here? Are his keys 100% legit?
There have been no additional statements from GMG confirming or denying this, and publishers haven't made another statement either. I've contacted jschreier with a request for him to cover this issue, but that could take time, if he deems it worth his time to begin with - you can contact him and the publishers yourself to make a clarification, that's the best way to get a development on this issue right now since GMG is stubbornly refusing to say anything else.
A private individual selling keys is not the same thing as a company claiming to be an authorized vendor selling keys.
All of these emails are from CSRs, including the reversal from WB. So basically they are worthless. The one from acti is from their privacy team so you can maybe give that a bit more weight, and GMG also removed acti from their publisher list and official logo page at some point before September.
Need official word from publishers via a press release to be 100% sure, but it seems most likely that GMG is not an authorized Activision retailer, and are selling Activision games, and claim that they have direct support from the publisher/dev for every code they sell.