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You can't take it with you, but you can't leave it for someone else either: Valve says you aren't allowed to bequeath a Steam account in a will

https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/you-cant-take-it-with-you-but-you-cant-leave-it-behind-either-valve-says-you-arent-allowed-to-bequeath-a-steam-account-in-a-will/

All these unfinished, 75% off, 7/10 RPGs will be lost to time, like tears in rain.

You can't take it with you, but you can't leave it for someone else either: Valve says you aren't allowed to bequeath a Steam account in a will

67 comments

FiremanEdsRevenge

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You can inherit their debt, but you can't inherit their video games. What a time to be alive.

Kata1yst

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Most debt actually can't be inherited, instead debt collectors get first dibs on inheritance assets until they're made whole or the estate runs out of assets, whichever comes first.

That doesn't mean that debt collectors won't try to convince family members to pay. Just tell them where they can shove it.

Xtallll

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At least in America, you can't inherit debt.

erwan

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You don't inherit debt but they're paid on the estate before inheritance.

So you can't get just debt as inheritance, but debt are only lost for the creditor if the person who died had a negative net worth.

teawrecks

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Exactly. You don't inherit debt, because you can't inherit stuff the person was only borrowing.

Evil_incarnate

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There goes my plan of maxing out credit cards on stuff to bequeath.

Ragnarok314159

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My dad did this. Was almost 70k in unsecured debt at the time of his death. I gave most everything away except his fishing stuff. He had so much shit.

Only one credit card company said “it’s good you are taking over the payments”. Told her I never agreed to that, just informing you of his death, and if they contact me again my Saul level lawyer is going to enjoy that lawsuit. Never heard from them.

Don’t ever assume the debt of someone else.

teawrecks

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Aw damn, I'm glad you knew better, that's downright predatory and should be illegal. You know there are people out there now paying their parents' credit card bills, thinking that that's just how things are. I hope that when those people find out, they are entitled to getting every penny back with interest.

Passerby6497

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If you're gonna do that, give the shit away before you die.

disgrunty

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And check your local inheritance laws. Some places will take pre-death gifts into account depending on how long the time between gift and death is. The UK, as an example, looks at gifts made up to 7 years before a person's death. It's messed up.

erwan

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In France there is a limit, about 30k every 15 years. It's not messed up, it's necessary if we want inheritance taxes to have any weight.

Kyrgizion

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Buy physical gold & hide it (and well, not just in the house).

What are they going to do? Sue your descendants for something they can't prove?

AeroLemming

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Permanently Deleted

Mango

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If there's any debt collectors who think my parents owe them more than they owe me, I have news for them.

arxdat

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As of yet.

notgold

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System is broken that's for sure

ColeSloth

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You can't inherit debt in the US.

Sanctus

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Just turn your family sharing on for it

mesamunefire

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Or give them the password. They aren't going to check if your still alive.

Sanctus

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It is bullshit tho. I feel like for how massive these libraries are, I should be able to do that. Even if it requires a death certificate to make the transfer.

Gradually_Adjusting

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This is what steam is: a lesser form of ownership in exchange for the perks of the platform. I've come to prefer physical media first, DRM free second, and steam third. It's just not as good of a value proposition to me compared to outright ownership (of the license to use the software, I know we don't own "the game").

natecox

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Physical media today isn’t really much better though, increasingly frequently all a disk gets you is a license to activate a digital copy anyways, with a “must be online for first play” requirement.

FigMcLargeHuge

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That's exactly how I ended up with a steam account. Bought a Civ V cd and the game isn't on the cd, just an installer for steam and a key.

NoneYa

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Permanently Deleted

Gradually_Adjusting

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It's sadly true. I have been lucky so far, but I know one day I'll accidentally give money to a developer who does this

teawrecks

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I'm curious what recent games you've been able to purchase physical copies of that ran without updating or validating using the internet. I didn't know any publishers still did that, at least not on PC.

Gradually_Adjusting

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I admittedly don't buy many games lately, especially not from the big budget crowd. BG3 seems to run fine without internet, as do Sea of Stars and Noita.

grue

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(of the license to use the software, I know we don’t own “the game”).

No, you don't own the copyright, but you do own your individual copy. Don't fall for the "licensed, not sold" self-serving propaganda.

Gradually_Adjusting

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I added the caveat simply because I didn't want to get into it

firecat

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Ubisoft “No you don’t”

mnemonicmonkeys

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And Ubisoft can go fuck themselves with a cactus

FiniteBanjo

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I like that motto but for me it's Physical media, Supporting Developers directly, and then Steam third.

If a publisher has DRM on their steam version then I'm sure af not going to buy directly from that publisher's store for a less DRM version, that just feels like coercion.

teawrecks

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Add it to the list of ethical circumstances for piracy.

In fact, for the titles I cared about, I would contact the studio/publisher themselves, explain the situation, send a death cert and a steam account, and see if they would allow a transfer or grant a new key. If not...they're part of the problem.

mnemonicmonkeys

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I guarantee that you'll get crickets for 99% of those emails

teawrecks

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Yeah, but I would say trying to contact is the right thing to do here before pirating.

DudeDudenson

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At the end of the day steam is also selling licenses not games. They might be the least diabolical shop around but copyright laws still apply.

FiniteBanjo

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Imagine getting a community badge for being a user for 147 years.

Gigasser

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How the hell can they know though?????

jol

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They can't, but if you don't give you password and safety codes away before you die they can't legally let you transfer ownership of the games. Just don't tell them and arrange for all your emails, security keys, and 2FA keys to be safely transfered to your children.

TheBat

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Check account age? Gotta be effective method after like 50 years or so

LordOfLocksley

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That's discrimination against the immortal

DebatableRaccoon

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And the grandpappy gamers. I'ma have joysticks rigged into my zimmer frame when the time comes. Til death do we game.

TinklesMcPoo

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Highlander rules state there can only be one though.

SupraMario

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Highly doubt this would hold up in court, but then again no one has challenged these digital market places. If you buy the game on their platform it should be legally yours and you can do what you want with it.

z3rOR0ne

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Damn...makes me want to take the time to pirate games I already bought and own...

And then write it in my will that those who inherit my few earthly possessions have to play through each of my games at least once in front of a lawyer in order to receive their inheritance. Lol, I kid, 😂...or am I 😈?

Dasnap

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This is why I buy GOG first where possible. You can block my account, but ya can't take my hard drive.

SidewaysHighways

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Meh I haven't even played each of my games, or probably even half

z3rOR0ne

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Honestly, me neither. Lol.

Zerush

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How will they control if someone other continue with your account when you die?

Moghul

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Same as any other illegality. It's legal until you get caught. The account will work fine until for one reason or another it becomes obvious you're not the original owner of the account, and then it's banned. Billing changes, location changes, ip changes, confession, etc.

Zerush

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Maybe some generations later in the future it becomes suspicious. Valve want gain money and there is no reason that it will deep investigate if the downloads are still paid from the same account and paid with the same banc account, irrelevant if it's from a different IP or ISP, that are things that can change even with the same user (transladet to other city, changing provider or PC, etc).

Moghul

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But imagine if the original owner bought Skyrim, and then you have to buy it again if you want to play it. Two Skyrim moneys!

Zerush

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Anyway, if I'm dead I'll give a fuck if Valve want to claim something

dependencyinjection

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When it appears the OG user is 150 years old.

grahamja

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I can't be the only one that puts their age as 1st Jan any random year in the 1920s instead of taking the time to put my real age in to view new games coming out. Steam already thinks I am near death.

vulgarcynic

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There was a great response to this from Gabe several years ago (looks like 13 years ago, fuck, I'm old)...

https://www.totalgaming.co.uk/93-of-steam-users-born-on-january-1st/

dependencyinjection

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Nope. I too don’t use my own DOB but I’ll tend to keep the range correct. Maybe I should start going older.

bitfucker

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Shame. It would be a good way to know if you are their favorite child lol. All joking aside, I think this is a compromise as others have alluded deep in comments. Valve likely doesn't care or enforce it, but they don't want to be responsible for account transfer due to games licensing and other legal shenanigans.

Dave

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Is this any different from selling an account, which I presume you're not allowed to do?

andrew_bidlaw

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It's probably they don't want to dive nose deep into all individual cases and local shenanigans* about that and probable scams that can occur. You can take other person's account if you have both password and email access, they don't oppose that under the table, but they don't want to be a party in account transit because it makes them responsible for that.

* Is it legal what's described in one's last words, can these games be lawfully transfered as they are under both legal code and game licensing agreements? If there's no more living relatives, would Steam transfer your purchases to the government? Or if the inheritance is disputable between two parties, should it decide anything there? They let anything happen as long as they aren't involved.

Dave

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As another poster alluded to, digital goods aren't really considered property in the traditional sense. Digital property is protected under copyright (and other IP laws). The owner could sell the game, but then they wouldn't own it anymore (e.g. when one game studio buys another, they are buying the games as well). Instead, they grant a licence to use the game, which is how Steam works as well.

If Steam let you transfer your account to someone else (e.g. bequeath or sell it), then they would need this in the licence (which they could do in theory). Other than the logistics of that (especially how to handle people selling accounts - and the scammers that inevitably come with that), the AAA publishers are unlikely to agree to those terms. Ultimately the Steam licence is likely a compromise between Steam's vision and all the AAA publishers that wouldn't publish on Steam if they didn't get the licence they wanted. A bit like how Netflix doesn't really care if you use a VPN, they just have to enforce it so studios will let them use their content.

Stovetop

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I would say in one sense yes, because typically property being bequeathed follows different customs than property being sold for profit.

But the point in this case is that your Steam library is not even "property" to begin with, it is a contract that becomes invalid when one of the parties (the customer) dies.

Aurenkin

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Yes in that you have to be dead to do this which is something most people can only do once.

arxdat

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Ahh, let the Ensh*ttification of all these platforms wash over you.

dRLY

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Would be kind of funny to see the different stats that would change if a family was able to pass on the full account. Like maybe one child didn't give a fuck about games (outside of just signing in here and there to keep it alive and update stuff like email and security) and no other activity. But then their kid goes hard into games and see the gaps of time. There would be lots of accounts that may have super awkward stuff like hentai visual novels. lol. But seeing some stupid high amounts of achievements and total hours of play time would be neat.

But not exactly shocking that these digital accounts would not have the ability to go much past your death. Unless we see the very deep change of all companies allowing people to remove a game and basically "gift" it. Which I can't see happening. Even physically having discs/carts hits a limit after so long. Normal wear of use and the material rotting does mean it is likely those would also not survive past a couple of generations. And that ignores the same issues afflicting the consoles needed to play the media.

So basically the real solution to both the digital and physical passing games (or music/movies) is to rip DRM-less copies and keep the needed tools to either use the game without having the disc or needing to register to a server that is likely gone. Might be a good idea to leave ReadMe instructions along with the iso/rom and copies of the official and community patches that help with new OSes. After that it is basically just down to needing virtual machines or some other PC emulators to run old emulators.

CosmicCleric

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Well, this is disappointing.

~~Anti~~ ~~Commercial-AI~~ ~~license~~ ~~(CC~~ ~~BY-NC-SA~~ ~~4.0)~~

Hawke

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Why is the cc-by-nc-sa license disappointing? Is your disappointment exclusive to version 4.0?

CosmicCleric

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Why is the cc-by-nc-sa license disappointing? Is your disappointment exclusive to version 4.0?

My only disappontment is with those humans (and humans who use ""humans"") who side with AI model using corporations that steal other people's content to train said models for profit, over regular everyday people.

~~Anti~~ ~~Commercial-AI~~ ~~license~~ ~~(CC~~ ~~BY-NC-SA~~ ~~4.0)~~

applepie

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blockchain would solve a lot of these issues but IP owners and even steam likely, appear to be allergic to the idea of digital ownership. i wonder why?