this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2023
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I wonder where sites like GreenManGaming, Fanatical, Humble and IndieGala fit into the mix as I understand it are legit keysellers?
the listed ones have contracts with publisher to get legit keys where the developer gets it share too
At a legitimate website, the developer(s) and publisher(s) make money for each key purchased and every key is legal to own, so there is little chance of a key being revoked and your account banned on your chosen storefront. At a grey market seller like G2A, they can sometimes get their keys illegally (credit card theft, stolen accounts, etc.). So because GMG, Fanatical, Humble, IndiaGala, etc. are all legitimate resellers, they buy their keys directly from the source (usually the publisher or storefront where they are redeemed, but that's just my guess). Apologies if that's not what you were asking.
I wonder if Humble Bundle has any stance on the giveaways people do with their unused Humble Choice keys
It's against the TOS unless you are actually giving it away as a gift with no promotional value. https://support.humblebundle.com/hc/en-us/articles/202712380-Can-I-sell-trade-or-use-my-keys-for-promotional-purposes-i-e-Stream-Social-Media-giveaways-
So perfectly fine in the common case where people give keys away for free.
Like this one.
Pee See Pee Aych En - Nine Why Ay Eee Double You - Vee Eight Pee Em Vee
Please don't take it unless you actually want to play it.
Yeah exactly like that. Damn that's a good one.
Here's another: Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy
Ex Seven Pee Ex Jay - Four Gee Bee Gee Bee - Too In Eye Eee Tee
At first I thought I was having a stroke, then I realized it was a key. If I may ask, why spell everything out instead of just posting a copy and paste able code? Only thing I could come up with was to prevent bots from scraping codes out of comments, but I think it would still be pretty easy to parse it into a regular game code.
It's probably not as bad here; But if you posted a game code on reddit without some kind of obfuscation, a bot would grab it in seconds. I was mostly just copying the person I was replying to.
Yeah, it's really just an old habit from Reddit. No idea if it's necessary here, but really, if someone wants a free game and can't be fussed to decode that, they probably don't want that free game too badly anyway.
Great game. Spent over 50 hours not even playing the campaign just exploring with a majority of the hazards turned off.
It sounds like the typical Reddit giveaways would be fine under their TOS but they would understandably not provide support for them.
They'd fall under Steam.
G2A would technically fall under Steam too, except they have a history of buying stolen keys and reselling them (over and over again).
Those are all official seller stores.
They buy keys from the devs/publishers directly or legit wholesalers who are known to get the keys from the devs/publishers. Wholesalers themselves don't popup on consumers' radar since they only buy and sell in bulk.
Who do the wholesalers buy FROM, then? It seems clear that the dev, in this case, wants no part of this. Is the publisher enabling this crap?
Yes, only the publisher/developer can generate keys. That's where all key sites get their keys from. You cannot obtain them through the Steam store. And that's also why games that simply do not sell keys to wholesalers don't have this issue. Just look at Factorio. They don't do sales, they don't do bundles, and they don't sell keys. You can get it on key sites but only as a gift and for the same price it's being listed on for on Steam.
Wholesalers get them from the devs and publishers, like I said. But they're not the key sites.
Key Resell Sites, like G2A, don't often get them from wholesalers. They operate like eBay. The sellers buy them from whatever legitimate source they can use their stolen credit card info at, and then they slap their essentially free key on the Resell Site for pure profit. Some sellers on sites like G2A might be legitimate, buying keys from wholesalers, but too often they aren't. With a site system like that it's near impossible to police for stolen goods, as there is no way to verify a key's origin. Sites like Swappa, which facilitate selling mobile devices, can use things like a phone's IMEI to check if it's marked stolen or not. But Valve, for example, provides no way to check a key without redeeming it, and hence there's also no mechanism for anybody to report a stolen key short of telling the dev/publisher and having them revoke the key which has likely already been used by some unwitting consumer.
That's also where most other key sites get their keys from (mostly from bundles). It has been shown time and time again that keys being purchased with stolen credit cards is mostly a myth. Just look at the fact that Factorio, which never had a sale and never sold a single key in a bundle, is just as expensive on key sites as on Steam (Source. That wouldn't be the case if criminals where purchasing licenses with stolen credit cards and then selling them for cheap as a form of money laundering.
Where are criminals even supposed to purchase those keys? Only the developer (and publisher) themselves can generate keys. You can't obtain them through Steam.