By Lewie Procter on September 14th, 2011 at 2:42 pm.
Methinks the extended stress and strain of game development has made the good folks of Tripware interactive get just a little bit crazy. But in a nice way. After finally being able to buy and install Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad, some fans over at Reddit noticed that there was a few humorous additions to the electronic user license agreement – traditionally the most vast and boring of all the documents in gamingland, but not in this case. It’s all quite sweet, and clearly in good fun: It’s nice to have a story about EULAs that isn’t about publishers trying to further restrict your rights for once. The whole thing has been snapped and had the appropriate bits highlighted here.
If you prefer your words from developers to be more heartfelt than silly, Tripwire founder & president John “RammJaeger” Gibson took to their forums to pass on his thanks to their supporters. Let’s hope they never lose that enthusiasm.
14/09/2011 at 14:46 Eclipse says:
so tempted to get this game…
14/09/2011 at 18:53 Shadrach says:
Do it, you have my word you will not regret it!
14/09/2011 at 14:46 Crimsoneer says:
Tripwire are a stunning, stunning company.
14/09/2011 at 14:48 Unaco says:
Shame the game is in quite the poor state on release.
14/09/2011 at 14:50 Arkaniani says:
I’ve played the game and it’s actually fine. Still needs a few patches here and there, but it’s no worse than a Battlefield release.
14/09/2011 at 15:00 Arca says:
The game is fine and expect them to have most of the main errors, especially the graphical and fps killing ones fixed within a few days. They did an outstanding job of this in beta.
14/09/2011 at 15:59 EOT says:
What beta did you play?
14/09/2011 at 16:46 Nevard says:
I know a couple of people who had to cancel their pre-order because the game didn’t work at all in beta, continued not to work after multiple patches and didn’t work at release.
14/09/2011 at 20:05 jay35 says:
The game is playable but there are many frustrations, bugs, and generally poor UI/ergonomics to contend with. Surely some will be fixed in patches and in the meantime it’s still a reasonably fun shooter when everything aligns just right.
14/09/2011 at 14:47 scorcher24 says:
LOL hilarious.
I like.
14/09/2011 at 14:48 drowsy says:
The game is all kinds of busted up, but you know what? I don’t really care. These guys come from a modding background, and have shown the willingness to work on their games until they are as good as they should be. If this was from an EA or Ubisoft studio, I’d be punching walls out of sheer rage, but I’m very content to just give the game a couple of months to mature. Or at least until I’m sick of BF3.
14/09/2011 at 15:50 PoulWrist says:
So I’m curious, do you differentiate between products by an EA studio or one by a studio like DICE, where you’re bound to see loads of problems upon the release of BF3, which will definitely require lots of patches to get to where the game can be, balance wise and so on.
Hell, BC2 was and is an excellent game, required a bunch of patches, and still you see people hating on how it was never good. BF3 will likely not be different.
14/09/2011 at 18:17 steviesteveo says:
“These guys come from a modding background, and have shown the willingness to work on their games until they are as good as they should be”
Coincidentally, this is also the same point as when they should release to the general public.
14/09/2011 at 14:51 Swainy says:
They already did this ages ago on Killing Floor’s EULA.
Welcome to the party. There’s still some salted peanuts left for you.
14/09/2011 at 21:14 HeavyHarris says:
Be nice.
14/09/2011 at 14:56 thepaleking says:
The X-Com games, on steam, received a new EULA pop-up. It is cold and humorless.
14/09/2011 at 14:57 Dana says:
I told my mom that bad people sold me a beta version of the game.
14/09/2011 at 18:31 Cinek says:
And mom says: I told you not to play these sex games!
…
14/09/2011 at 14:58 Out Reach says:
Only problem is I’d rather not get my steam profile banned too.
14/09/2011 at 14:58 asshibbitty says:
It’s me I’m the electronic user.
14/09/2011 at 14:59 Kelron says:
Does an amusing EULA make it ok to ban cheaters from playing single player?
14/09/2011 at 15:02 Chris D says:
Seems a bit harsh but I’m finding it hard to work up much sympathy.
14/09/2011 at 15:23 Batolemaeus says:
Sympathy? Not for actual cheaters.
But what about false positives?
14/09/2011 at 15:27 ASBO says:
Exactly this. If people want to cheat, sure ban them from the server. If someone is suspected of cheating, does that make it OK to remove their license completely?
Obligatory analogy: if I see someone speeding down the road, does that make it ok for their car to be permanently impounded?
14/09/2011 at 15:41 Chris D says:
@Batolemaeus
I guess in the case of false positives a multiplayer ban isn’t fair either. The thing would be to try to ensure the minimum number of false positives and have an effective appeals process in place. But given that no system is likely to be perfect then a multiplayer only ban would protect the game from abuse and mitigate the effect on anyone falsely accused so it’s a fair point.
14/09/2011 at 15:42 Anthile says:
“Obligatory analogy: if I see someone speeding down the road, does that make it ok for their car to be permanently impounded?”
I don’t think that’s a very good analogy. You never own software, you only purchase the right to use it. That’d be if your driving license was inherently bound to a single car and you could buy a different one at any time.
14/09/2011 at 16:33 mlstrum says:
@Anthile You might not “own” it, but you still lost 39$ because of the misdemeanor which is incredibly harsh. And what if you cheat in singleplayer, does that qualify you as a cheater?
The definition in the EULA is painstakingly black and white and is bound to affect innocent players as false positives. I’d be for banning them from the servers or might even consider multiplayer altogether, but let them keep the singleplayer at the very least.
edit: Their cheater’s definition is quite exhaustive and seems to dismiss my “singleplayer cheater” argument. I withdraw it.
14/09/2011 at 18:19 steviesteveo says:
@ mlstrum:
Just to split some semantic hairs, I’m pretty sure that cheating in single player totally makes you a cheater.
14/09/2011 at 18:28 Medo says:
IANAL, but I don’t think they can revoke your license once they have sold the game to you, at least in some countries, due to the exhaustion doctrine. They’d be within their rights to block you from accessing their online services though.
14/09/2011 at 14:59 MDevonB says:
It’s kind of ruined for me with the other words there… I’m guessing it has VAC? I’ll save the tirade for another time and thank you for posting this and saving me some money.
14/09/2011 at 15:26 mickygor says:
It’s a PB game actually :P
14/09/2011 at 15:31 Barman1942 says:
It’s both.
14/09/2011 at 15:04 Dreamhacker says:
But will it
blendhold up in court?14/09/2011 at 15:07 HeadlessDevil says:
A friend and I actually made a game that was completely contained in an installer. The plot is laid out (hidden) in the EULA.
Here is a link if you want to check it out.
14/09/2011 at 15:38 Pod42 says:
Didn’t work for me.
14/09/2011 at 16:27 HeadlessDevil says:
It was a while ago, but I tried running it (Win7) and it did work. Did you extract both the .exe and .cab file?
14/09/2011 at 15:09 Unaco says:
What counts as a “Cheater”? Is that defined anywhere? Would it have to be a ‘hack’ or similar, or would exploiting a bug or quirk be enough? What about generally ungentlemanly conduct or similar?
Also, does it have to be cheating in RO2? What if they found out about that 1 time I pushed a unit of Orcs forward 1/2 an inch in a WH:Fantasy game when my opponent wasn’t looking so they’d be in range for a charge? If I told them about that (which I would do, as I’m an honest and open individual) would they then ban me for life from the game?
14/09/2011 at 15:12 Wilson says:
And immediately inform your mother. It’s only what you deserve.
Good point though.
14/09/2011 at 15:24 amishmonster says:
“Cheater” is capitalized, so I’d imagine it’s defined in proper boilerplate in the preceding paragraph.
Your mother would be ashamed of your Orc fudging, though.
14/09/2011 at 15:40 ASBO says:
So I presume that means IDDQD is ok then.
14/09/2011 at 15:11 Berzee says:
I do so wish there was a demo of this. =)
14/09/2011 at 15:34 pakoito says:
Red Orchestra 1′s demo? GOG UT2k4 and mod it? it’s the same but better.
14/09/2011 at 15:14 MiniMatt says:
Whilst there’s undoubtedly a clause in there somewhere to counter, I wonder what effect this sort of joke would have should they at some point need to take legal action over any other part of the agreement. Surely a defendant would merely point to this wording and argue that it’s reasonable to assume the whole agreement is a joke or at the least impossible to discern the serious from the frivolous.
Sorry to be the boring legal guy (and I’m not even a lawyer, I can be quite boring however) but wouldn’t this make the whole EULA unenforcable?
14/09/2011 at 15:17 johnpeat says:
What if they have no Mom (only Americans have those) or their ‘Mom’ is dead or insane or a man or an alien or a dog???
Think of THAT!
14/09/2011 at 15:30 mickygor says:
I was under the impression that EULAs are actually bullshit anyway
14/09/2011 at 16:26 Graves says:
In short, no, its quite enforceable. For one thing, one joke or two jokes in the agreement that in general is obviously a legal document does not make the whole thing unenforceable. Further, there is a boilerplate, as you expected, that states that if one clause is found unenforceable the rest of the agreement is valid. It’s just harmless fun.
14/09/2011 at 17:25 rayne117 says:
Not in Germany, it isn’t.
“Even if the license terms were agreed on the purchase (for example, when buying online ads through appropriate high visibility before the purchase or sale in a shop by clearly recognizable imprints the full terms on the packaging), its effectiveness can be severely limited. They then Terms and Conditions constitute the contents of the control by the Terms and regulations of the BGB subject. In practice, for example, many provisions of those agreements, at least for residential customers is not binding, because the end user and unusually unilaterally restrict ( § 307 BGB) or against specific provisions in § 308 and § 309 notices (eg, limitations of liability).” Translated with Google Chrome.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endbenutzer-Lizenzvertrag
14/09/2011 at 18:27 steviesteveo says:
To be fair, these are clearly not the German terms and conditions — they’re in English. The German localisation (is there one) should have involved a translator running their translation of the EULA by a local lawyer.
I would say that, at worst, they’d actually have to tell your mum you were cheating as well as ban you, because they did say they would do both things. People get to choose not to do stuff they’ re allowed to in reaction to contract breaches all the time though.
14/09/2011 at 15:18 Joe Duck says:
That is awesome.
Also, just thinking of the face my mom would put if a games company contacted her to tell her that her 38 year old son had cheated in a game would be priceless.
I am actually tempted to cheat now…
14/09/2011 at 15:19 markcocjin says:
That’s nothing.
EA made this funny joke about going into my hard drive and accessing my other files and activities and then giving my information away for their partners to use.
It’s amazing nobody’s brought attention to that easter egg. I bet I’m the only one who got the humour. I guess that’s the point right? Us elite EULA hackers extraordinaires get to find it. Gosh I feel like I’m part of Anonymous or something. :D
14/09/2011 at 16:16 Ergates_Antius says:
“It’s amazing nobody’s brought attention to that easter egg”
You mean apart from: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/08/24/eas-origin-eula-proves-even-more-sinister/#more-70939
Though that post did only get 354 comments, which is more or less nobody.
14/09/2011 at 17:59 Felixader says:
Just that it was all over the gaming news?
You overslep one week or something? :-P
14/09/2011 at 15:37 nootron says:
Haha. That’s amazing.
I played last night for a few hours and in one match, some guy had 100 kills. When we first started, about 5 seconds in, about half the starting group fell over and died to rifle fire from a direction that no enemies could possibly have gotten to in that short amount of time.
But that was the only weirdness I encountered. I finished the night with a stellar 1.19 kill/death ratio. Im gunna be an hero!
14/09/2011 at 16:48 Jesse L says:
Welcome to the wild west, varmints!
Tell ol’ Scratch that Wild Bill Hickock says hello.
14/09/2011 at 15:38 nootron says:
WAIT, i just thought of something. Is that legally tenable? I mean, do Tripwire have a legal obligation to tell our moms now or risk nulling the EULA?
So, if they are unable to tell my mom, does that mean we can get our accounts reinstated?
14/09/2011 at 15:42 Calneon says:
If you read the Reddit thread it turns out that the general consensus is that the EULA for most Steam game are not legally enforceable at all because you have to accept them AFTER you buy the item, and Steam doesn’t allow refunds on bought games. So I would guess not.
14/09/2011 at 15:46 LionsPhil says:
Near the bottom you will very likely find the usual clause that should any part of the the agreement be found unenforcable, the rest will remain in effect. That much is stock EULA boilerplate.
14/09/2011 at 16:12 Graves says:
Calneon, based on my current class in contracts in law school, which I admit may be limited as a lowly 1L, it is enforceable. The ELUA for every steam game is available through the steam store, and RO2′s is on their website, so, essentially, it is your duty as the buyer/licensee to examine the agreement before you purchase the game. Essentially, purchase and installation represents consideration of the contract that you should have read beforehand. In addition, while they could signal that better on Steam to protect them from any accusation that they do not inform you of the ELUA that is necessary when you purchase, both because it is easily available on the site and it is industry standard practice to sell licenses of games which require an ELUA, courts would likely rule the ELUA is enforceable.
14/09/2011 at 16:20 mondomau says:
And in same reddit thread, someone else points out that since you are able to find the EULA online before purchasing the game, that argument wouldn’t necessarily hold any water (legally speaking).
14/09/2011 at 17:27 rayne117 says:
Graves, I’ll follow you around the world and post this.
Not in Germany, it isn’t.
“Even if the license terms were agreed on the purchase (for example, when buying online ads through appropriate high visibility before the purchase or sale in a shop by clearly recognizable imprints the full terms on the packaging), its effectiveness can be severely limited. They then Terms and Conditions constitute the contents of the control by the Terms and regulations of the BGB subject. In practice, for example, many provisions of those agreements, at least for residential customers is not binding, because the end user and unusually unilaterally restrict ( § 307 BGB) or against specific provisions in § 308 and § 309 notices (eg, limitations of liability).” Translated with Google Chrome.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endbenutzer-Lizenzvertrag
14/09/2011 at 18:30 steviesteveo says:
To be fair, I don’t think you do German intellectual property licensing law as a 1L.
14/09/2011 at 16:02 DeCi says:
Awesome! RPS is stealing stories from reddit/gaming/.
14/09/2011 at 16:04 Rii says:
STEALING
14/09/2011 at 16:19 Ergates_Antius says:
It’s especially cunning how they linked to the Reddit story so no one would suspect what they’d done.
14/09/2011 at 16:21 mondomau says:
ha ha. Stealing. From reddit. Think about what you just said.
14/09/2011 at 16:33 Kaira- says:
Stealing from Reddit is like taking a piss into an ocean of piss. Wait, did I get this one wrong?
14/09/2011 at 16:05 Kollega says:
I recall skimming through the Bulletstorm EULA, and the part of it that was written by People Can Fly states that it’s enforced by the clone army, and that even if you disregard that, the people at PCF all want to eat just like you, so please, buy the game legit instead of pirating it. So Tripwire is not the only company that puts those more-humourous details in their EULAs in addition to usual legalese that says they own everything in the universe at all points in time.
14/09/2011 at 16:43 Wooly Wugga Wugga says:
I seem to recall some article somewhere on that site that exposes sexist gamers (Yeah, I know…) some woman threatens to report a random vulgar creep on XBox Live and he freaks and and apologises. He specifically mentioned that his mother would kill him if his account had to get banned for sexist vulgarity.
Who knows, maybe it works.
Seriously.
15/09/2011 at 07:44 elnalter says:
hacking is pretty funny, i wonder why they get so worked up over it. so a guy can noclip around and knife you in the back, big deal
15/09/2011 at 13:37 Shortwave says:
I love the MP of this game. I’ve put 30 hours into it so far and was pulling a 1+ ratio for K/D and wins.
Though the SP has really bothered me. My combat logic and strategies actually seem to break the AI.
I flanked right hardcore and boulder-dashed like a nut bag and all of a sudden I was behind lines watching the enemy and friendly run around in circles doing nothing.. Or enemy just stupidly running by me.. Or hiding on the WRONG SIDE OF COVER.. Like constantly I’m finding issues with the AI which makes the SP currently more or less unplayable to me. This is on regular difficulty setting yes, and I went to options to pump it up to hard though I doubt that will change the brokenness of the AI, BUT it doesn’t let me change difficultly settings after I start.. And at this point, I care not to start over till’ word this AI has been fixed.
Other than that, I wish I could coop with a friend or bunch.
I originally assumed I could but I don’t know why, so I was slightly sad.
Coop campaign might be the only thing that could save that side of the game for me, ha.
Other other than that, I love this game and it runs well performance wise for me at least.
Looks on par with other games and the mechanics are really advanced. Tanks = win.
Opinion, away!