Ubisoft: Accepting A Free Game Forfeits Your Right To Sue

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You know that free game Ubisoft is handing out to people that bought Assassin's Creed: Unity? You have to forfeit your right to sue the company in order to get your free game.

You hereby irrevocably and unconditionally RELEASE, WAIVE, AND FOREVER DISCHARGE AND COVENANT NOT TO SUE Ubisoft Entertainment S.A., and each of its past, present and future divisions, parent companies, subsidiaries, affiliates, predecessors, successors and assigns, together with all of their respective past, present and future employees, officers, shareholders, directors and agents, and those who give recommendations, directions, or instructions or engage in risk evaluation or loss control activities regarding the Campaign....
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if they refunded your game, thats fine to me. however if its "if we refunded your game, and now you cant sue if we kill your parents, destroy your car etc" then obviously its not going to fly.
 
reminds me of sony making a manditoring ps3/psp update in 2011 with a binding individual arbitration clause. couldn't access the store or any online functionality of games until you installed it.
 
also if they cause wrongdoing like arras an underage kid that would be a crime. whats the point in these clauses lol
 
That's an unenforcable legal contract that won't hold water in court. Historically, courts have thrown those kinda things out. Then again, Ubisoft has been extremely considerate to PC gamers over them trying to run a next generation game on their underpowered computer hardware at settings that no existing PC GPUs can really handle. That's really not Ubisoft's fault. They made it for new consoles and computers will just need a little longer to catch up.
 
i feel like it's done as an intimidation tactic. a signed waiver doesn't mean someone now has to right to throw all legal liability to the wind.
 
I'm still trying to get over being forced to relinquish the constitutional right to a jury trial, just to get health or auto insurance. We've taken corporate prostitution to levels never seen or imagined before in U.S. history, that would have made our country's founding fathers sick if not angry.
 
jroe52 said:
if they refunded your game, thats fine to me. however if its "if we refunded your game, and now you cant sue if we kill your parents, destroy your car etc" then obviously its not going to fly.
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It's specifically only referring the the situation surrounding AC: Unity -

ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO THE PURCHASE, ACQUISITION, RENTAL, POSSESSION AND/OR USAGE, AND/OR THE INTENT TO PURCHASE, ACQUIRE, RENT, POSSESS AND/OR USE, THE ASSASSIN’S CREED UNITY VIDEO GAME AND/OR THE ASSASSIN’S CREED UNITY SEASON PASS ON ANY AND ALL PLATFORMS, AND/OR RELATED TO THE CAMPAIGN, WHETHER CAUSED BY THE NEGLIGENCE OF THE RELEASED PARTIES OR OTHERWISE.
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Steve said:
You know that free game Ubisoft is handing out to people that bought Assassin's Creed: Unity? You have to forfeit your right to sue the company in order to get your free game.
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Another good example of this:

http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1041306889&postcount=103

Here's how I see it: The "free game" giveaway is nothing but a wolf in sheeps clothing. They word their announcement like it's them making up for a bad release, when really it's just about limiting liabilities. The cost of a free game that you didn't buy (and therefore are unlikely to buy at this point) is essentially zero, yet they reap the bounty of limited legal liability.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
That's an unenforcable legal contract that won't hold water in court. Historically, courts have thrown those kinda things out. Then again, Ubisoft has been extremely considerate to PC gamers over them trying to run a next generation game on their underpowered computer hardware at settings that no existing PC GPUs can really handle. That's really not Ubisoft's fault. They made it for new consoles and computers will just need a little longer to catch up.
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wat?
 
SunnyD said:
wat?
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http://anandtech.com/show/8738/benchmarked-assassins-creed-unity

Single GTX 980 is not fast enough to handle maximum settings past 1080. Computers need more time or there's SLI, but the majority of performance complaints appear to be caused by unrealistic expectations of PC owners getting caught off guard by next generation console ports being too much for their existing hardware. It's gonna be a little while until PCs can handle stuff like this in the way that some people are expecting.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
http://anandtech.com/show/8738/benchmarked-assassins-creed-unity

Single GTX 980 is not fast enough to handle maximum settings past 1080. Computers need more time or there's SLI, but the majority of performance complaints appear to be caused by unrealistic expectations of PC owners getting caught off guard by next generation console ports being too much for their existing hardware. It's gonna be a little while until PCs can handle stuff like this in the way that some people are expecting.
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AC:U actually had performance issues on the consoles at launch as well.

The actual performance on the PC version is not exactly out of line if you consider that the PS4 (roughly r7 265 GPU with more memory) is not able to run it at 30fps (with frequent dips) at 1600x900 on settings that are likely roughly between medium/high (high on the PC as 2xMSAA, PS4 version is FXAA only) in terms of performance demand on the PC version. A r9 280x would be needed just to accommodate the resolution increase to 1920x1080 (1.44 more pixels than 1600x900).

The problem is a lot of people seem to assume that console games are aiming at the same "max settings" with AA at 1080p@60fps as people are using to gauge performance on the PC. There is a lot of misunderstanding that console games get "performance" gains by optimizing purely via code while the most actually comes from "optimizing" via adjusting the actual visual quality to gain more performance.

So look at Anandtech's benchmark numbers for medium and high at 1080p. Take a number between that for the r9 280x, that's fairly comparable to the PS4 performance once you factor in the differences.
 
limitedaccess said:
AC:U actually had performance issues on the consoles at launch as well.

The actual performance on the PC version is not exactly out of line if you consider that the PS4 (roughly r7 265 GPU with more memory) is not able to run it at 30fps (with frequent dips) at 1600x900 on settings that are likely roughly between medium/high (high on the PC as 2xMSAA, PS4 version is FXAA only) in terms of performance demand on the PC version. A r9 280x would be needed just to accommodate the resolution increase to 1920x1080 (1.44 more pixels than 1600x900).

The problem is a lot of people seem to assume that console games are aiming at the same "max settings" with AA at 1080p@60fps as people are using to gauge performance on the PC. There is a lot of misunderstanding that console games get "performance" gains by optimizing purely via code while the most actually comes from "optimizing" via adjusting the actual visual quality to gain more performance.

So look at Anandtech's benchmark numbers for medium and high at 1080p. Take a number between that for the r9 280x, that's fairly comparable to the PS4 performance once you factor in the differences.
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Not at all disagreeing with you. I think the problem on the PC side is more about the differences in conditioned expectations for how a console port will run from the last generation and what happens in the current generation. It'll start to like normalize as PC gamers figure out what kinds of hardware and display settings they can handle and as computers get faster so that ported games move down the stack toward progressively lower end graphics processors until IGPUs can handle ported current generation games gracefully. That kinda stuff just takes time and there are lots of amazed and upset people who are confused about things.

I also don't disagree that the game has performance issues in general and needs help. Even Ubisoft is admitting that and trying to do their best to fix the problem, but there's more to the story that just the publisher/developer "churning out an awful, poorly optimized, broken game to cash-grab."
 
elian440 said:
reminds me of sony making a manditoring ps3/psp update in 2011 with a binding individual arbitration clause. couldn't access the store or any online functionality of games until you installed it.
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Don't forget you couldn't play any new games either because they "required" the update. That's how I eventually updated...got to point you couldn't do anything.
 
I'm fairly certain that it's not legal regardless of anything. I don't think waiving the right to sue is actually legally binding.
 
Quix said:
I'm fairly certain that it's not legal regardless of anything. I don't think waiving the right to sue is actually legally binding.
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Why not? No different then getting into a car accident and insurance company cutting you a check providing you sign an agreement saying you accept this as settlement for damages and injuries. if you take their compensation I see no reason why they can't revoke your right to sue for further compensation.
 
People, people, people.

Don't you understand? "Vote with your wallets" (that includes free games bro)

The only way to resolve this problems is simply not support the company by not downloading or purchasing any of their products.

Preaching to empty air though. This will never happen. Bread and circus. You guys are in for cheap entertainment, pfft. :D
 
Quix said:
I'm fairly certain that it's not legal regardless of anything. I don't think waiving the right to sue is actually legally binding.
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In most states, it's not. In fact, you'd be surprised how many legal contracts just plain aren't legally binding at all. Most are just taken at their word because the injured party is either too good of a person to go back on a deal, or too ignorant to do anything about it.
 
You can always release and waive your right to sue for past claims, which is what this agreement is saying. It is basically a settlement agreement where you are getting the "free" game in return for settling your claims against Ubisoft.

More interesting to me is if they are claiming these games are actually "free," that is false, since a release of claims has real value and thus this is not a free gift. And this waiver does not release them for that.
 
Quix said:
I'm fairly certain that it's not legal regardless of anything. I don't think waiving the right to sue is actually legally binding.
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Exactly, they can put whatever terms they want in a TOS or EULA but that doesn't mean they'll stand up in a court of law.

On the other hand, if someone was to class action over Unity the lawyers would take the lion's share of the money and the people who bought the game would end up with a $20 voucher or some crap like that, so a free game is pretty good.
 
I signed this waiver in DURESS because I was fearful for...Oh a contract signed under duress is null and void? Cool! Que up the lawsuit amirite?!?!?
 
Dwango said:
On the other hand, if someone was to class action over Unity the lawyers would take the lion's share of the money and the people who bought the game would end up with a $20 voucher or some crap like that, so a free game is pretty good.
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Exactly. Why would anyone be upset with this? Like anyone is gonna sue Ubi and get anything out of it. Unless the installer formats your hard drive or sends intimate pix to your email contacts you are gonna be severely limited to what you can claim. Why not take a free game and enjoy it?
 
Maybe somebody should explain to Ubisoft that a signed waiver/contract is not legally binding if its, you know, ILLEGAL!
 
Cerulean said:
People, people, people.

Don't you understand? "Vote with your wallets" (that includes free games bro)

The only way to resolve this problems is simply not support the company by not downloading or purchasing any of their products.

Preaching to empty air though. This will never happen. Bread and circus. You guys are in for cheap entertainment, pfft. :D
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I have been preaching this for years, if people stop buying the crap, the crap sellers will slip under the waves..

Wait for the game to ship and wait for the honest reviews.

Another few weeks will make no difference.
 
I think the number of individual gamers who are actually suing Ubisoft without the pernicious activities of lawyers in and around the situation is practically 0. But let's examine:

1) If I deny that I ever took possession of a copy of this game then it will be up to Ubisoft to prove that I did and that, therefore, the terms of this silly Eula can actually be applied to me in the first place.

2) You can legally "bury the hatchet" in legal settlements over *past, ongoing* lawsuits; it is not possible to do so for future events. Of course--because they have not yet occurred. So it's very much like taking a post-dated check: if you took the check and you knew on the day that you took it that the check was no good then the loss becomes yours whether or not the was an agreement otherwise between you and the defendant. If the defendant simply couldn't obtain the funds or else simply decides that dishonesty is the best policy, you will have to eat the check yourself. You cannot indemnify yourself in this manner against any action you may commit in the future.

3) As someone else mentioned, if a contract between two people violates existing state law when it is written, it automatically becomes null & void and unenforceable. Further, if a contract adheres to state law but violates Federal law then the contract is there again also null & void automatically, since Federal law always supersedes contradictory state law.

4) Proof is inexorably mounting that Ubisoft is being run by Pure-Tee idiots & morons...:D
 
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