The EU has fined Valve and five publishers a total of € 7.8 million (USD $ 9.5 million) for their practice of “blocking” PC game sales on Steam, which basically means users in a country (for example Germany) should be forced to pay the German price for a game, instead of having them buy a cheaper version of the same game from another European country.
Geo-blocking violates EU antitrust rules, and the five publishers named – Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax (Bethesda) – have been fined around € 6.2 million. As owners and owners of Steam, Valve – which “chose not to cooperate with the Commission” – was fined € 1.6 million.
“Today’s sanctions against the ‘geo-blocking’ practices of Valve and five computer video game publishers serve as a reminder that EU competition law prohibits cross-border sales contracts,” said Margrethe Vestager, executive vice president. , Competitive Vice President say. “Such practices deprive European consumers of the benefits of the EU’s digital market and the opportunity to seek the most suitable offer in the EU”.
If the thing “Valve prefers not to cooperate” sounds familiar, it’s because the company was similarly helpless when he faced lawsuits in Australia, before the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission forced its hand.