2k Games Suck- Ripped me off - See customer support communication. I lost $20

[nero55555]

My Bioshock CD will not work any longer and I sent all the proof of CD purchase to 2k games and they told me to go to hell. Stay away from this company, they clearly are a greedy unethical company.

MY STORE PURCHASED COPY OF BIOSHOCK WILL NOT INSTALL. PATCH ISSUE CANCELS INSTALL.

Me:
My legitimate Store purchased copy of Bioshock will not install (3MBP-BFSE (may be a 5 instead of letter S)-XK9P-YCP6-NK9Q
When I install the CD on my game desktop it starts installing, gets to the end, the the patch install causes a issue and cancels install and deletes files. I saw this was an issue online so I have attached pics of my box, manual with the product code, and CD. I expect to get access through steam somehow. The label on the box says I paid $19.99 and I expect to be able to play this game. Help getting access to the game is appreciated.
Best,

<pics of CDs, CD box with serial attached, cover box, etc


2k support:
Hi there XXXX!
Thank you for reaching out to us.
I'm sorry to hear that you encountered this issue while installing Bioshock. I'd suggest contacting the retailer because the disk might be damaged.
We understand that you would like to migrate your retail copy of BioShock to Steam. As of April 18th, 2018, 2K no longer offers replacement Steam Keys for Physical retail copies of the game. You can read more about this over at our Knowledge Base.
If ever there is anything else related to our 2K titles, please do not hesitate to contact us again!
Thank you,
XXXXXX.
2K Support

Me:
May I please speak with your manager? I want this case elevated. The disk is not damaged and it is your companies issue, you know that. If 2k does not offer me some sort of credit I will remember this- and will not support your company by ever buying any of your games again. I purchased that game and now you are saying my money was wasted because 2k has a technical issue. Decent companies budget in credit when they screw up so the customer does not eat the cost when they are technically challenged to be able to get installation CDs to work 3 years after purchase. I will remember how your company treats me and will purchase in the future accordingly.

2k Support:
Hello Chris,
I'm going to escalate your request to a supervisor. You'll be contacted soon.
Thank you.
XXXXXX
2K Support

2k Support:
Hello Chris,

My name is Atarratz and I'm a supervisor at 2k support. I understand that you wanted to speak with someone else for an issue with a physical copy of Bioshock.

I understand your concern about not being able to play the game but I'm afraid that we cannot offer any help in this case from customer support. Since the game was purchased from a third party that retailer is responsible for the refund. As my colleague has mentioned the key exchange program has ended and we are not able to offer any.

I hope you can understand the situation and wish you luck with the refund.

Have a good day,

XXXXXXX
2K Support

 

[Zloth]

Exactly what the guy said: take it back to the store where you bought it. That's how this works, same as if you buy a DVD/Bluray movie at a store and it won't play. The store will likely want to see your receipt. Then they will give you a replacement copy or, if there aren't any more, store credit.

 

[nero55555]

A 3 year old game is not going to get reimbursement. You get 30 days usually. And who keeps receipts for 3 years. 2k games could have given me a credit to play it on steam, but they would not even do that.

Exactly what the guy said: take it back to the store where you bought it. That's how this works, same as if you buy a DVD/Bluray movie at a store and it won't play. The store will likely want to see your receipt. Then they will give you a replacement copy or, if there aren't any more, store credit.

 

[Pifanjr]

Is it possible to install the game right up to the point it says the auto update fails, then go to the install location and copy all files there to another folder, then finish the installation and move the copied files back?

 

[Johnway]

I quickly consulted the oracle and it seems like the autopatcher might be a securerom feature just trying to verify that its a legit copy. but since the servers that do it are dead its not possible and thus stays in hell. Some people managed to get it to work intermittently many others have not.

The only one thing you could try is to install it normally and when it reaches that auto patching update you ctrl + alt + del out and kill the the installation process. This will abruptly kill the install/patching process (so it can't do any roll backs) and leave the files on your machine. The next option is to patch the game manually and/or install a cracked version of the .exe to hopefully circumnavigate it all completely.

I can't confirm it works, but its worth a shot.


A prime example why DRM is crap.

 

[nero55555]

Thanks Johnway, I appreciate the effort. Maybe I am just old school, but usually if an audio CD is the same price as a digital copy of the music I get the physical CD. This has not happened with my other games. I do not like that 2k did not try to fix the issue and/or give me a credit for the digital game- and it was money completely lost and there are TONS of bioshock CDs out there. I might try that method, but imagine I would also have to have that game not communicate as well (to update) and put it on that text file list that does not allow communication of certain software. I consider it a complete loss. I cant stomach paying 2k games again. Whereas I would with other developers. Thanks for your information, much appreciated

 

[Johnway]

if i recall back in the day Bioshocks Securerom protection was spotty at best. i bought it when it first came out and yeah, i installed it but couldn't play it because of securerom. I did eventually get into the game but DRM at the time was just vile and generally punishes the consumer more then the pirates. Its why half of the time i just went to a cd crack site to replace the poxy .exe file to remove the disk checks and various layers of BS. But yeah, if you have a server that checks security ffs make sure to keep it alive or just remove it like some games. 2k They should have patched it out.

i'm sure most of us remember the crap that AAA implemented. EA tried to limit the number of times you could install a game on different machines so you couldn't share it. So to free licenses you had to install software to recover activations (if your machine changed too much it counted as a new machineand if you formated your pc before removing keys i believe it counted as a used activation with no way to recover one). Starforce broke peoples PCs (apparently) and in my case i couldn't even play the game because windows thought starforce was bad. Oh and throw in the fight to cripple the preowned market by locking out content from those who bought it preowned.

It still happens now in most cases i guess but its always been there from the start. Like code wheels, cards with codes on them that you couldn't photocopy or you needed the game manual to bypass checks. The code wheels were works of art tbh. I didn't have Monkey island but the pirate wheel was apparently one of the best. Me? I had the Zool one. Although the legacy of sorasil and Disposable hero ones were pretty good. made from high quality plastic and card, with color images to match up.

 

[Zloth]

I'm not about to blame 2K. The DVD worked great when it came out. They offered Steam key replacements for years afterwards, too. But this game is THIRTEEN YEARS OLD! They can't keep supporting the DVDs forever! If you really want to play it, Steam will probably put the remastered version on sale for $5.00 USD in November, if not before. (They even sell the original BioShock.)