cool web head

Graviteam Tactics is probably my second favorite war game ever (after "Fire in the Lake" and other games in the COIN series). Its a really beautiful game with an unparalleled sense of continuity and interconnectedness between its mechanics, and the decisions you make as a player. The game has been unlike any other tactical level war game I have ever played ever since the introduced of the communications mechanics in a free update. It completely changed the game and put it over the top in terms of it being a model for combat. It really endeared me to the developers too that they introduced such a complex and game changing mechanic as a free update, they really are dedicated to making an amazing game. I found it very hard to get into, especially trying to understand how the game mechanics at the operational level connected to what would happen in the tactical battles. Its also not clear at first exactly the meanings of the orders you are giving to your soldiers, because GT has an interesting way of combining different 'attributes' into the order you submit to a unit, such as formation, speed, ROE, etc. And the way your soldiers behave in response to these orders kind of obfuscates whats happening until you are more experienced with the game. This is all made worse by the fact that the developers are not english speaking and the translation isnt as good as it could be. Despite this I can't recommend this game enough. No other war game delivers an experience like this one (to my knowledge). For example there is a particular type of moment you experience commonly in this game, that no other game provides (to my knowledge). When you are attacking an enemy position, and the enemy will not relent or break, and you begin to suffer losses as your soldiers approach the enemy position. Your formation breaks down, morale is beginning to fail, and the caucophony of battle has defeaned your soldiers so that your orders can't reach them. All you can do is watch the violence unfold after orderly battle plans descend into chaos. It reminds me of the march at the beginning of Shostakovich's 7th symphony, or the descriptions of combat you read about in books like Forgotten Soldier or Chickenhawk. So I advise everyone to get this game and to keep it at in the face of initial frustration and confusion. I remember in Graviteam Tactics Operation Star, in the campaign the player is likely to start with (where you play as some germans trying to resist a soviet attack until some panzers arrive and help you break out of a pocket), one of the first tactical battles you are likely to fight is a practically hopeless battle where you play as a german infantry platoon with almost no anti tank equipment facing a soviet tank assault in this village at night. So you can spend up to an hour waiting for the soviet tanks to arrive, never seeing them until the last moment, and then they whipe the floor with you easily (especially as a new player). Reading online, I got the impression that this was almost everyone's first experience with the game. I can definitely see why it would turn people away, and I have no idea why Graviteam would make this be the first experience players have with their game, but if you can make it past stuff like that you will find a war game like no other.

No I wasn't, it only took me like 5 seconds to think of all those companies. And I know there is more.

If I have the right to play the game having paid the purchase price, then I need to have access to the installer and thus the rest of the game content, otherwise I can't play. Therefore barring the user access to the installer and any other game content is violating the user's right to play the game.

Not true, because a link expiring doesn't mean there is no possibility of accessing the resource that the link lead to. You may be able to get a new link (as many other distribution services), or there may be multiple links. There is no reason to conclude that the resource will be permanently inaccessible (barring the fee, which is never indicated).

Ok fine, you can still direct your attention to that list you quoted.

So you want me to list digital distributors who dont charge additional fees, but I can't list any digital distributors? Uh, whatever. Here's a list of a bunch of small companies who distribute their games digitally, and who let you download for free, forever just off the top of my head: Indie Royale GreenHouse (lets you download executables without even buying the game) Cryptic Comet Bay12Games (operated solely through donations, still provides unlimited free downloads) Spiderweb software Enormous Elk I remember when taleworlds was still tiny and making mount and blade, that had unliimted free downloads. You guys will probably say their too big to be comparable now, but back then they werent. Runic Games Fractal Softworks Goldhawk Interactive

No it hasn't, people just keep stating and restating they think they should have to pay full price again, and not explaining how they deduce that conclusion given the text during the payment process.

C. It's not as unreasonable as you're trying to make it seem, considering that much smaller developers do exactly that.

For like the tenth time, the opposite of this is true. This policy is unprecedented. No other digital distributor charges a fee to access the game after a certain period has passed.

I have already explained why it is unreasonable to conclude that you would have to repurchase the game, but reasonable to conclude that there would be no additional charge to get a new link. There is no need for everyone to keep restating that they think they should have to buy the game again if they happen to lose their backup. Check again, I posted a thread and made a couple posts several months ago.

I agree, which is why I find the decision to alienate customers with this policy in an effort to make 5 bucks pretty confusing. Personally I have dissuaded 6 people from ever buying any battlefront products again, and apologized for recommending this game to them in the first place. That is probably 100s of dollars lost in exchange for a chance to make a quick 5 bucks.

I can see trying to use analogues to this situation was a mistake, since everyone is unable to reason about them properly and is in fact ignoring my own points to make up whatever scenario will support their position. I realize you're probably thinking the same thing about me, so let's just move on from using analogues. No it doesn't, and I've explained why that is an irrational conclusion to jump to based on the "how it works" steps already. It's plainly obvious that a "backup" on the same media is not a backup, and that a backup that is untested is a little naive. No one has suggested otherwise, and OP never indicated thats what he did. Unless you're suggesting that you test your back ups daily or hourly, there is still a non-negligible chance that the backup media will fail in the interim between tests. I would also like to re-state here, that no other digital distribution service (even companies smaller than battlefront) asks its customers to test and re-test their back up drives to avoid additional charges. You making a different assumption would not set a different precendent for digital distribution services. I don't even know what you could possibly mean here. I've explained multiple times why its misleading. It's exploitive because customers are never told they will have to purchase an additional link, and then later they are forced to purchase an additional link to access the game they were already told they bought. This is totally ridiculous. I have no interest in what you think about Tom Morello or OWS. If you are going to post again, please read my other posts first. Much of what you said here are points I already addressed earlier in the thread.

Saying "the download link expires" does not imply that "you will no longer be allowed to download the installer without paying an additional fee". They are very different things first of all, as I have illustrated many times in this thread. Second of all, there is no reason you would jump to that conclusion since that type of policy is unprecedented amongst digital distribution services.

Unless you've ever used a digital distribution service from any other company before. Plenty of services have the link expire after awhile. Only with this system does that mean you no longer can access the files without paying an additional fee. Why do you think that little bit of information (that you need to pay to get another link) is conspicuously absent from the "how it works" bit during the buying process? Why wouldn't they include that? Can battlefront not afford to transfer a few extra bytes of bandwidth for that sentence?

I already went through the payment process though and they never mention (unless I missed it) an additional 5 dollar charge to get a link to the game. The only other thing in your screenshot is the "how it works" steps which have already been pasted in this thread, and which I have already criticized.