Xbox One - Does it breach EU consumer rights?

CubeNX01

The EU seems to be clamping down on companies who want to stop you reselling their products. The Xbox One has some serious restrictions in place.

I can understand restrictions for games purchased digitally, but these restrictions apply to physical discs purchased in physical shops.

You can read the official statements on the Xbox website (news dot xbox dot com).

Essentially:

- If your console can't connect to the internet for 24 hours (your internet goes down, you move house and don't have internet straight away, your college/university blocks consoles, you take it on holiday, Microsoft's servers go down or plenty of other reasons) you can't play any of your games. Not even ones which don't have any online features.

- Trading in games will be extremely restricted. Private selling, such as on eBay, will not be possible at all. Microsoft have to approve retailers before they can accept the trade in of games. I think this is a big thing which should breach EU law.

- On top of this, Microsoft allow publishers to block trading in games completely. So you won't be able to trade in your games at "participating retailers".

- You can "gift" a game to a friend who had been on your "friends list" for over 30 days. However, they receive a reduced license and are unable to give the game back to you or gift it to anyone else. Again, this can be blocked by publishers.

- There is no guarantee at all that, when the console reaches the end of it's life (could be between 5 and 10 years), we will be able to keep playing our games. According to the information they have posted so far, they could potentially turn off the entire system and every single Xbox One game and console will be disabled 24 hour later.

I'm just curious if any of these actually breach the EU consumer rights, as I'd be surprised if something doesn't make the EU think that "something is wrong". Especially as the EU has had trouble with Microsoft in the past for unfair practices.

bris

When you buy a game you buy a personal licence for you and you only, just like MS office and tens of thousands of other software packages.

All MS are doing is making it so you cant share you game, nothing illegal, although because of the way games were played on discs before they haven't been able to do it in the past.

If the EU was to make it illegal they would have to make all software the same, thats never going to happen.

frugal_mike

bris wrote: »

When you buy a game you buy a personal licence for you and you only, just like MS office and tens of thousands of other software packages.

All MS are doing is making it so you cant share you game, nothing illegal, although because of the way games were played on discs before they haven't been able to do it in the past.

If the EU was to make it illegal they would have to make all software the same, thats never going to happen.

Well they could do it before, they just didn't. Some publishers did it themselves though, such as EA restricting multiplayer by making you pay for a code to access it. I think they are shooting themselves in the foot by trying to limit second hand sales though. A game may be worth £40 new to someone if they know they can sell it for £25-30 a month later, but by making it difficult to sell the game it may not be worth £40 to that person anymore. The publishers aren't going to want to lower their prices, so we'll end up with a market where only brilliant must-have games will get bought because people don't want to risk full price on a game that might not be worth it. That won't be good for innovation, its already difficult for games companies

From a consumer rights point of view I don't like the thought of Microsoft being able to pull the plug on my ability to play games I have paid for, even in offline mode. It may not be illegal, but it does seem to give them way too much power for my liking.

The only option will be to spend my money elsewhere I guess, assuming there are other consoles that aren't so restrictive.

deanos

Think people will vote with there feet on this one, i certainly wont be buying one with those restrictions

ValHaller

CubeNX01 wrote: »

- If your console can't connect to the internet for 24 hours (your internet goes down, you move house and don't have internet straight away, your college/university blocks consoles, you take it on holiday, Microsoft's servers go down or plenty of other reasons) you can't play any of your games. Not even ones which don't have any online features.

Never mind the EU, that one is a show stopper for any sane buyer

deanos wrote: »

Think people will vote with there feet on this one, i certainly wont be buying one with those restrictions

Let us hope so.

And I would hope that the EU will deal with this. If nothing else, they do seem prepared to take on US IT and software companies.

ILW

Most commercial software is sold on a license. Cannot see why games should be any different.

frugal_mike

ValHaller wrote: »

Never mind the EU, that one is a show stopper for any sane buyer


Let us hope so.

And I would hope that the EU will deal with this. If nothing else, they do seem prepared to take on US IT and software companies.

Absolutely. With restrictions like that the games would have to be very cheap for me to take the risk, but they're not going to suddenly drop the price.

ineed

I'm not buying an Xbox one with those restrictions, it's ridiculous. The not connecting to the Internet thing?! Seriously :eek:. I also like to trade in games from time to time when I feel my collection gets a bit overcrowded and I haven't played a particular game for a while. I also like the option of being able to buy and play rare older second hand games I find on eBay.

frugal_mike

ineed wrote: »

I also like to trade in games from time to time...

You'll still be able to do that at participating retailers and if the publisher agrees. Not sure what a retailer has to do to be participating, but I wouldn't be surprised if it costs money. Pay Microsoft a percentage of every sale perhaps? Not exactly great for competition.

ineed wrote: »

I also like the option of being able to buy and play rare older second hand games I find on eBay.

Technically you can still do this as long as your buyer is willing to wait for 30 days until you can send them the game! Stupid....

ineed

frugal_mike wrote: »

You'll still be able to do that at participating retailers and if the publisher agrees. Not sure what a retailer has to do to be participating, but I wouldn't be surprised if it costs money. Pay Microsoft a percentage of every sale perhaps? Not exactly great for competition.



Technically you can still do this as long as your buyer is willing to wait for 30 days until you can send them the game! Stupid....

It is, it's far to restricting. I'd imagine the restrictions would be opt in, like they have to opt in and agree that their games can be traded in, probably paying Microsoft as well as you say. I think I'll just stick with this gens consoles and then get a PS4.

unholyangel

All of my friends who were die hard xbox fans have all said the same.....if thats how the new xbox is going to be, they'll just get a ps4.

They've also removed the family gold subscription. Used save over £100 a year.

Their logic is probably that it will lead to more money for them. How sad, instead of getting £70 from my family this year, they got £0. And due to not having any gold subscription.....we wont be buying any more games either.

Way to shoot yourself in the foot MS.