Last night, I was playing Elden Ring, when suddenly the game screen froze, and then went black. The game's music was still playing in the background. I assumed that it was some sort of crash (notably, the first crash I have EVER experienced while playing that game on Steam Deck). After rebooting the Steam Deck, and finishing my play session, I noticed there was some sort of critical notification on my account, which turned out to be the update to the subscriber agreement. I assume that my game 'crash' was actually Steam attempting to show the agreement update over the game. Thanks, guys!
Its one of those weird peculiarities present in US law which apply virtually nowhere else but show up in quite a few agreements across the world.
I wonder how valid the whole agreement is if it contains points which one can not possibly agree to.
It seems that the only way to not accept the new agreement is to close your Steam account. I assume they don't provide any way to use the games you bought if you do this, and don't refund you either. How is that legal?
Of course I've seen this in a ton of subscription-based services, but since Steam lets you "purchase" games, that really seems problematic?
>For example, in the TurboTax case, a judge tallied (PDF) Intuit’s potential costs for the arbitrations to be at least $128 million—$3,200 for each of the 40,000 clients represented by Keller Lenkner, the firm behind the mass arbitration.
https://www.consumerreports.org/money/contracts-arbitration/...
So companies are removing the provision...
>Finally, companies may want to reconsider whether individual mandatory arbitration still represents the best dispute resolution system for their needs. Some companies already have opted to revert to court litigation and class actions, although the majority – even after having to face a mass arbitration – continue to use arbitration, albeit with several of the risk mitigation strategies described above.
https://www.cooley.com/news/insight/2022/2022-06-30-how-comp...