I installed Alien Isolation on my laptop to test something. Anyway, I read through the EULA and found this gem of a clause.

Sega does not recognize the transfer of the Game Software

Absolutely amazing piece of Smoke and Mirrors.

I'm sure if I looked under a microscope I would not regonise the Ebola virus. In fact there are a number of fundamental ideas or objects in our world that I wouldn't recognise.

I wonder if I can choose not to recognise parts of copyright law.

I'm going to bet 80% of gamers simply do not care.

This is not the transfer you're looking for...

Your Jedi mind tricks won't work on me, old man Sega!

To give my opinion about that, I should first understand what the heck that is even supposed to mean. It doesn't help that apparently it is written in Engrish.

Transferring your game (software) from drive C: to D:? Nah ah, you first installed it on C:, so that's the only drive you'll ever be able to play the game! Yeah, that totally sucks if that is the case.

Transferring the game from your laptop to your desktop PC (as in, uninstalling it from the old PC, and reinstalling it on the new one)? Ok then, Sega has an issue with that and prevents you from re-installing the game on the new PC?

Transferring the game LICENSE (=right to use) to a new owner? Oh ok, but if this is what you meant, THEN SAY SO. Write "license" (or "licence"?), not "game software". Not sure if all local laws agree with that though, but Sega might still be able to refuse to offer the on-top services for the new owner (updates, multiplayer services etc.), so the new owner would be on his own with the game.

We're of course talking about transferring from the Steam servers to your computer. By downloading and especially installing the game you're in breach of the EULA :-p

That's brilliant. They must employ some former Konami executives.

How about you post what the hell that is supposed to refer to?

Here is the full clause


4. NO SALE OR ASSIGNMENT

SEGA does not recognize the transfer of the Game Software. Therefore, you may not give, purchase, sell, bargain, barter, market, trade, offer for sale, sell, license, assign or otherwise divest your rights, responsibilities or obligations under the Agreement, either in whole or in part, without the prior written consent of SEGA. Any attempt to do so shall be void and of no effect.


The first line, in all its glorious vagueness and legally dubious grounding, is the clause.


Now I'd not seen this type of clause in any EULA before (and I'm sad enough to read them). But a google search shows its now rather popular in EULA's.

I'm guessing its a reaction to the oracle/usedsoft case and changes in the law. Given about an 80th of a percent actually READ the EULA, i'm guessing its higher.

We gamers don't recognise your EULA,.

I mean, we can't. Haven't got a clue what it looks like.

Did it have big letters at the top?

80% of gamers of todays world can barely read, why would they read a EULA! :P

I'm confused, which EULA has ever allowed licence transfer of digital games? It has never been an option on Steam, Gog or any other store (except maybe GMG?).

The wording is what the OP is pointing out as illogical. What SEGA presumably means is "we do not recognize {your right to} transfer {ownership} of the Game Software". The words in brackets are important additions to make the sentence have the correct meaning.

The phrasing they used is akin to "My cousin went and got a professional makeover, and she looks so different, I didn't even recognize her at the family reunion!" It sounds as if even if you did transfer the Game Software, they could not see that you had done so.

Maybe they should make it like a kids story.

Once upon a time there was a poor publishing house. They sold their books and their heartless readers, who once parted with money had all these silly rights and laws that let them sell or give away the books with out giving the poor pennyless publisher anything. The poor publisher had to eat leftover binding paste from the money grabbing book binders.

The magic came to the kingdom and the publisher found their stories had magically escaped the books that once bound them.

The same magic that freed the stories from the paper prisons also let the publishers copy the stories over and over again.

No longer needing placate those money grabbing book binders, the poor publisher felt happy.

But then he found his heartless readers could use the same magic and copy the stories too.

So he consulted the second most powerful wizard in the land, who infused these copies with the soul of a Dragon (Really Mean). The dragon stopped readers from copying their magic books, and stopped them from giving them on.

Uncouth Sailors found the dragon lazy and easily dealt with, while the heartless readers just had to put up with the smell of sulphur and occasional aetherial dragon poop.

While readers where annoyed with the Really Mean Dragon and said it wasn't stopping Uncouth Sailors, the Publisher's friend "The scantily clad Emperor" said its a good idea to keep the Dragon.

And so the time past, the publisher (still poor in spite removing a third of their overheads and having more readers than ever before) found the heartless reader wanting to pass on these magic stories once they'ed finished reading them. They pointed to the old laws of the land.

So he went to the most powerful wizard in the land, a lawyer, and he wrote magic words at the start of the story.

With these words in place the Publisher could finally afford to eat something more than Binding paste, (which was in surplus since the book binders no longer had jobs and starved to death 3 years earlier)

I got a good laugh out of that, well done. :P

Actually a number do.

The EULA for TombRaider explicitly allows it. Not that either VALVe or Square-ENIX will actually uphold this clause.

Most didn't explicitly allow it because it was a possible right granted by copyright law. You don't tend to write things the law allows you to do.

Its only recently companies have tried to explicitly excluded the right .
Now I though that, but by including the phrase "right" or "ownership" they are acknowledging that it is a right they're are denying.

Not so, actually. You're looking at only one of the defnitions of 'recognize' (the one most of us think of when hearing or reading the word):

identify (someone or something) from having encountered them before; know again.

They're using it in a different context (note the bolded part):

acknowledge the existence, validity, or legality of.

The sentence is perfectly fine as written, and just clarifies the heading under which it falls (No sale or assignment). So, in essence, they're saying they do not acknowledge the transfer of the software (either through sale or giveaway) as valid or legal.