The big three gaming titans, Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo, are currently under scrutiny of the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) branch, with an investigation having been opened in regards to the policies of their online services. According to the official press release, the CMA believes that the three aforementioned companies must be investigated to ensure that UK consumers are protected, and that the subscription services are legal within the country. Though there is no proof at this time that any laws have been broken, Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft are required to respond to the UK government with information on their respective contracts, so that the CMA can research that the terms are fair. What they appear to be looking for are incidents where customers have had trouble cancelling the services, dealt with numerous price hikes, or were forced into having to turn on auto-renew. Once the investigation concludes, a decision will be made, and either nothing will occur, or the offending party will have action taken against them.

The CMA has written to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation and Xbox requesting information about their online gaming contracts to help better understand their practices. It is also calling on customers who use these services to get in touch with the CMA and share their experiences in order to assist the investigation, which will examine several issues, including:

• are the contract terms unfair? - do the companies’ terms give them wide discretion to change the quality of the deal, for example, by reducing the number of games included or increasing the price?
  
  
• how easy it is to cancel or obtain a refund? - are there any factors that make it difficult for people to cancel their contract or get their money back?
  
  
• how fair is the auto-renewal process? - are customers clearly told that their membership will be rolled over, are they regularly reminded that they are on a roll-over contract before further payments are taken, and is auto-renewal set as the default option?
  

Source

 

[BvanBart]

Hope we get some money/ games out of this. Paying for online backups and multiplay is so 2010

 

[DANTENDO]

Gaming is a hobby let's look at other hobbies has anyone gone to football match has anyone pld a round of golf does anyone paint re the cost of materials I think youl find video gaming when compare is great value

 

[Technicmaster0]

• The cost is little everyone talks like it's 50 quid a month mayb people should stop buying expensive fizzy unhealthy drinks and drink free water thts good for you - not saying you drink fizzy drinks

50 quid a month is at least one game more per month.

 

[DANTENDO]

50 quid a month is at least one game more per month.

Dont get what Yr saying I'm saying online doesn't cost 50 quid a month

 

[mattytrog]

"Under investigation by the UK government"

The "Strong and Stable" one hahaha...

 

[|<roni&g]

lol
Have you heard of server costs?
The amount is debatable though.

Don’t defend paid online, sony had free online for PS3, Nintendo had free online up until the switch. These are billion dollar companies, they don’t need us to foot the bill for the servers, the servers are paid for. Online should be free on all consoles and we don’t need customers arguing in the favour of big companies.

 

[Bladexdsl]

it should be illegal to offer just 3 games a month on your shitty online service

 

[HarveyHouston]

i don't care about the perverted things in games it's just removing features from a game that is promised to be in there... also nintendo not get any thing censored is also a jerk move see now you guys are going get me bitching about this censorship bull shit...

also i bet some of your are suck ups to making people pay money for better features...

i could compare some censor ship stuff on here but i'm not going till unless someone makes PISSES me off and does.

forget one thing about nintendo they are censored things in the past but now there getting away with it...

Does anybody listen to this guy?!? I'm not sure if it's a rant or what...

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

I own both. And I also own a PS3 which also had free online. Yeah, things were nice when they were free, but I've accepted they wont stay free forever. I'm just glad Switch Online only costs half as much as PSN and XBL.

Hmm, I see your point. And with Kimishima screwing everything up and Furukawa being a wuss, I've pretty much abandoned Nintendo as long as they keep screwing their customers. I put that much nicer than the way I actually think; I'm not really the posting-cuss-words-on-forums-for-everyone-to-see type.

 

[osaka35]

I mean, shouldn't this sort of thing happen as a matter of fact? consumer protection and all that? but either way, I know sony has gotten super squiffy on their refund policy so it'll be interesting to see how this shakes out.

and some games use their own company's servers, but you still have to pay the toll to access them. is that still the case? I'd imagine that might be a problem for the EU.

 

[bi388]

lol
Have you heard of server costs?
The amount is debatable though.

Why should Sony get laid money for me to play overwatch on blizzards servers? If anyone is charging shouldnt it be blizzard? That argument would work if companies only charged for games that run on their own servers, but they charge for other companies games

 

[coppertj]

So what's the outcome of this "investigation" forcing another company to pay a shit ton of cash to the U.K. government? Like that time with google, and facebook, also EA, oh wait didnt the they kid to pass link taxes too? Hm... trend?

 

[pohaxsf]

no i had factory reset the console, i found out by pure chance, i dont use my credit card alot so usually tends to have max available credit, but i remember seeing a statement that was £50 short(or however much PSN+ costs) and thought i better check something weird wasn't going on. I'm genuinely glad i had stuck it on my credit card originally otherwise i would of lost that money as most UK banks dont tend to charge back online subscriptions without proof it was someone else.

that was the first and last Sony playstation i will ever own, i genuinely dont even remember reading about it being an automatic renewal, and it definitely didn't mention when i set the account up! very Devious!!!!

then how do u know you are banned. your purchaser might be at trouble

 

[AceX]

I think this is a good thing. Three years ago I bought a month of gold for Xbox 360 and didn't even realise that auto-renew got turned on. The next month when I was looking at my bank statement online I noticed that the charge was recurring, so I cancelled the recurring payment through my bank. The next month came and I went to play Saints Row and got a message, I can't remember exactly what it said but to sum up, I wasn't allowed to play any of MY games until I had payed the monthly bill.

In the end, after three rounds with Microsoft customer support, they unlocked my account and told me something to the effect of "if you do it again we won't unlock it until it is payed".
How can they stop me playing games that I own for something (even though I didn't pay) they never gave me in the first place?

 

[Sakitoshi]

and some games use their own company's servers, but you still have to pay the toll to access them. is that still the case? I'd imagine that might be a problem for the EU.

Why should Sony get laid money for me to play overwatch on blizzards servers? If anyone is charging shouldnt it be blizzard? That argument would work if companies only charged for games that run on their own servers, but they charge for other companies games

sony and microsoft perform sanity checks first and then send you to whichever external server the game requires.
this benefit the companies because they don't need to implement a system to prevent cheating and such. so they still are doing something to earn that subscription money.

 

[Subtle Demise]

I think its fair, as long as they're throwing in free games with the service. I think Nintendo has it right with their pricing and the free stuff they give you for it.
I guess Sony and Microsoft charge what they do because people are still willing to pay for it.

They charge what they do because the "free" games are higher value, and not 30 year old NES games being trickled down at 2-3 a month.

 

[Rune]

They charge what they do because the "free" games are higher value, and not 30 year old NES games being trickled down at 2-3 a month.

That's a good point. But as someone who doesn't want those games, I'm having to pay more for just the online anyway. Where as if you ignore the free games with Switch Online, you're still paying half as much for the privilege of online multiplayer.

 

[osaka35]

sony and microsoft perform sanity checks first and then send you to whichever external server the game requires.
this benefit the companies because they don't need to implement a system to prevent cheating and such. so they still are doing something to earn that subscription money.

that's assuming they don't already have one, which is probably only a safe assumption if it's a console only game.

 

[raxadian]

Pay our service or you can't backup your save data legally and if you pay it doesn't even work in all games!

Remember how online play used to be free? Well now is not!

Backup of saves is my main motivation to hack my Switch.

 

[chartube12]

There was a video on YouTube from two lawyer about two weeks ago, discussing the legality of requiring a subscription for games that are p2p. Long story short, some loop holes that allowed this to happened were closed on January 1st 2018. Meaning, at least in the US, Xbox, Sony and Nintendo, have been breaking the law. However no one has the financial power to challenge them.

 

[cdcrossy]

about time these robbin cunts get there collar felt costsme 24£ a month just for xbox live thats not even going into the game pass one of the kids have
the price of games should come right down or the live service should be free