A French court has ruled in favor of a local consumer group to keep Valve from blocking Steam users who want to resell their games.
The High Court of Paris settled a four-year legal battle between Valve and a French organization known as UFC-Que Choisir. The group had sued the Half-Life maker in 2015 for preventing consumers from reselling their Steam-bought video games.
For its part, Valve said that it does not accept the court's decision and that it will push for an appeal.
"We disagree with the decision of the Paris Court of First Instance and will appeal it," Valve co-founder Doug Lombardi told PC Gamer. "The decision will have no effect on Steam while the case is on appeal."
However, if the company's appeal were to fail, some observers believe the High Court's ruling would have ramifications not only in France but even across the European Union.
In particular, the judicial body did not find any merit in Valve's claim that Steam was a subscription service. This helped convince the court to allow users to resell their games.
French Court's Ruling On Other Counts
Aside from the issue of reselling Steam-bought digital games, the High Court of Paris also sided with UFC-Que Choisir on several other claims. The group had raised concern about Valve's practice of assuming users' leftover currency in their Steam Wallet when they leave the service. The court ordered the company to reimburse any user who would request for their money back.
The game maker must now take responsibility for Steam products that may cause harm to users, even if the said item was still in beta.
The French court's decision also effectively diminishes Valve's rights to mods and community content created by users. The company is required to provide full disclosure to users regarding the conditions under which they could lose their access to Steam.
Valve will have to pay upward of €3,000 ($3,300) per day for up to six months if the company were to fail to change its rules. It also has to post the High Court of Paris' decision to Steam within a month.
Legality Of Reselling Digital Games
When it filed its lawsuit in 2015, UFC-Que Choisir was adamant that Valve customers should have the freedom to resell their legally purchased digital games whenever they want.
The group said that it was aware that many online stores have similar restrictions on the resale of products. However, it argued that the difference between being able to resell a physical video game disc and not being able to do the same for a digital game was "incomprehensible."
UFC-Que Choisir claimed that no court decision prevents the resale of second-hand market games that were bought online. It also cited a statement by the European Court where it allowed the resale of software, which the consumer group stressed is an "integral part of a video game."
The group was referring to a 2012 ruling by the European Court of Justice regarding the resale of downloadable enterprise software that were licensed from Oracle.
In its decision, the court said that it did not make a difference whether the copy of the software was made available via download from the right holder's website or through physical discs such as CD-ROMs or DVDs.
From an economic point of view, the ECJ found that the reselling of a physical software disc and the reselling of software downloaded from the internet are the same.
However, when a similar case was filed by a German consumer group against Valve, the Regional Court of Berlin ruled in favor of the video game company.
