The Soulless Social Payne of Rockstar Games

It has been a long time since Tony “Two Toes” has written to Tap-Repeatedly, one of the few sites on the net that cares desperately about its readers, a site with a conscience.  Of all the sites I visit, the words of its writers are most carefully measured to ensure the best products for it readers, those that have a guttural love of games.  I come from a family of gamers, people who respect games – good ones at least – as art.

That said, games are more than art, they are products, and products have to be marketed by companies that hope to make a profit, and that is as it should be.  As game lovers, we flock to games that inspire imagination, force us to think, require a nimble mind.  And, as a rule, we do not mind paying a price for games that do that.  We are prepared to defend gaming to whatever extent necessary to ensure their fun, viability, and honesty.  Most game developers and publishers understand this and do their utmost to ensure the customer’s satisfaction, often going to extreme get input, always striving to make their buyers happy.  These companies care that their games are honest, that they work effectively.  And to the increasingly few who make no attempt to control their customers, I salute you.

Unequivocally, I say Rockstar is not one of these companies.  They are greedy, selfish and without remorse. They make it difficult, even impossible for a customer to receive satisfaction when there is a problem. The truly ironic thing is, they pretend they are trying really hard.  One gets the impression, early on, that he/she is being helped.  But, before long, you realize that your emails don’t seem to have been read, by real eyes in any case.  I have suspected they turn on the Chatterbot to return polite, meaningless phrases that create the illusion of helping.  I suspect the customer is seen as a money pit from whom they are free to take much, but give back little, while giving the impression of assistance.  I cannot help but believe there are thousands of others who feel as I do.

Whew, now that I have that out of my system, I should explain my reasoning. Who knows, maybe someone out there can help.

Let me start at the beginning.  On July 15, 2013, I purchased Max Payne 3. Steam sale, you know how they are. It was $9.99. But that’s not the point.

No, I’ll start at the beginning beginning: I love Max Payne. There’s no other title I return to so consistently. No other franchise that comes close to its place in my heart. The writing works (if you appreciate the noir satire they’re going for). The shooting works. Everything works. I won’t say why, I won’t analyze it, I don’t know why. Don’t try and sell me on another franchise I might like better or wonder how it could be that I love it so much, it’s just the way it is. And before you ask, the reason such a great Max Payne lover didn’t trot right out and buy the third when it first came along is based in my love of Max Payne. I’m not up on new releases, I increasingly prefer the standbys I know and trust. I didn’t buy Max Payne 3 when it first arrived because I had the first two and I knew my way around them. They made me comfortable and for all I knew this third one wouldn’t stand up to them. Plus I had serious doubts about my PC’s ability to run the game, and honestly? $60 for something new, even something I love like I love Max Payne – and I love Max Payne – it just didn’t seem… right. It didn’t seem right to me.

Still, Steam sale. Nine dollars. Why not? A nice little summer treat to myself.

Back in the present, Steam did its job, downloading the game, providing the CD key (when do you think we’ll stop calling them CD keys? I’m guessing a long time. After all, we still call records “records.” Funny, language) on general principles. Normally Steam just sits quietly in my system tray and we ignore each other. Today I needed it, and I’ll admit that at first I was directing my anger toward Steam and not Rockstar – Steam being the most immediately visible in a line of providers that failed to provide. You see, I quickly realized I could not open the game I had paid for.

Max Payne 3, like all recent Rockstar games, requires that you join the Rockstar Social Club to play. Not to play online, mind you; not to play with others. To play the game. That’s pretty draconian in my book, and they can suck on their statistics about piracy.

The R* Social Club isn’t the worst out there, but it’s got to be the clumsiest. In fact, so ineptly constructed is this overlay that in Max Payne 3 you can’t even reach a game menu without first logging into their damnable club. You have to three-finger to the Task Manager and kill the app if – heaven forbid – you can’t log in. This was about to become a rather relevant piece of trivia.

Now, I’m not a fool. I may not watch the industry consistently but I can feel the wind and the direction it blows. Rockstar is not alone in data mining under the guise of “social enhancement.”  And I suppose they promised certain benefits that would make it worthwhile… to some members.  Trouble is, at my level of skill, I had no interest in playing online, which is really the only reason these services exist. I didn’t want to join the club, I wanted to play the game. In fact I really wanted to play the game. Because I forgot a little how much I love Max Payne, and this whole experience of the Steam sale had re-ignited some powerful excitement. I went from zero to zowie in the space of an Add to Cart button.

Little did I know I was entering the world of doublespeak; seeing I had no choice in the matter, I had to join the club if I wanted to play the game.

I’m a stubborn man, and there was a part of me that – for nine dollars – almost gave up there. I didn’t want to register, I shouldn’t have to register. I’ll live without Max Payne 3. But then… then, I do love Max Payne. I may have clicked BUY on a whim, but my tummy got more a-flutter as Steam’s download bar trudged along. Because I love Max Payne, and now that his third installment was mine things were going to be great.

So I sighed and registered. I’ve signed up for worse things. The worst they did – which is pretty damned bad now that I think on it – the worst they did was build a system that denies you even access to a main menu and for some reason doesn’t accept email addresses from the third largest provider on the planet. What Yahoo did to piss Rockstar off I’ll never know, but it flatly refused to acknowledge that address. I have an ancient Gmail account too. I never use it, but it forwards and it works, so I just used that. Problem solved!

Click the purple OK button, and I’m ready. Bring on the bullet time! Bring on the sadness! Max, have I ever missed you. Let’s run off to Brazil together and drink ourselves into a self-loathing stupor.

But where was the Max Payne Overture’s dreary viola? That’s a sound I’m not embarrassed to admit I’d suddenly become really eager to hear again. Because I love Max Payne. Instead, I was met with the following:

Um. Okay. “Permanent” seems strangely ominous, but I guess it all makes sense.

Naturally, I approved the request thinking that I would soon be chasing villains and following the hard drinking Max, we pair of brothers, we Boys from Brazil.

Instead, I got the following message, again, and again and again:

“This profile already linked to a different Steam user.”

What now?

I tried and tried again. I restarted my computer. I restarted Steam. I clicked things in a different order. I entered text into the fields in a different order. In spite of it all, Rockstar’s bedamned Social Club returned again and again to that message. This profile already linked to a different Steam user.

Missing Max, and after trying every password I have ever used, and both email accounts, I realized how stupid I was being.  I am the only person who uses this computer. I am the only Steam user in the house. This is the only Rockstar game I have ever bought with Steam. This, whatever this was, this was not on my end.

How do they make us feel like it’s our fault? Like we’re doing something wrong?

Always meeting the same failure, and knowing the definition of insanity, I did the next logical thing.  Steam’s responsibility ended when they provided me the game. But certainly, I thought, Rockstar would help.  They’re hardly a fly by night operation that hung out a shingle. So popped over to their support page and opened a ticket.

I opened a ticket, by the way, under the Knowledge Base Issue #21849421 – “Profile already linked to a different Steam User” in Max Payne 3. I didn’t throw a dart at their support system and I’m not such a fool as to misinterpret the existence of a knowledge base article. It means that plenty of others have had this very issue. A Google reveals the same. In a way that’s good news; the more who suffer from the problem, the faster they’re likely to fix it.

On the left side of your screen is the Rockstar Support Knowledge Base article about my issue. On the right side is the email response I got from Rockstar technical support a few days later.

In all honesty, I probably should have guessed how this was going to go based on their first response. But, interestingly, this would actually be the last time for several weeks that Rockstar Support personnel would give any indication they’d actually read and understood my issue.

Anyway, the response was less than helpful. But I kept my temper. Replying to their reply, I re-explained my dilemma and made this salient point:

…(this) is the ONLY Rockstar game I have ever purchased from Steam, and I have no other accounts tied to my games, however, it claims that “the profile is already linked to a different Steam user” when I try to log into the game.

Please see the attached files – they show my CD key, requested transaction information, and the specific error messages I’m getting when I try to launch the game. I’d be grateful if you could reset the (broken) system claiming that the game is already linked to another Steam profile, since I have no other Steam profiles and have never created a Rockstar Social Club account until now.”

Yeah, the last few lines had a little bit of a tone to them. But you can understand. I love Max Payne, and now the fact that he was so tantalizingly within my grasp made his absence all the harder. For not having given a damn about its release for a year, suddenly I was really excited. And why shouldn’t I be? I love Max Payne. I really do!

In my innocence, I expected a simple response, perhaps providing me a process to simply open the game.  Unfortunately, days later, I received the following:

Thank you for contacting R* Games Support.

We’re sorry that you’re experiencing this issue and would be more than happy to assist. Before we can begin the troubleshooting process we will need some more information about your computer.

For this information we will need to see your DXDiag and MSinfo files.

To get these files:

1) Press the Windows key +’R’ on your keyboard > Type dxdiag > Click OK > Click Save all information

2) Press the Windows key +’R’ on your keyboard > Type msinfo32 > Click OK > Select File and then EXPORT and save the file as a text file(*.txt)

3) A screenshot/video of any error messages that you might be getting.

Log in to your support ticket and then select the “attach file” option under the comments box to attach the files to your case. Alternatively respond to this email with the files attached.

Once we receive this information we will research your issue and respond back.

Their request seemed a bit strange, in light of the fact I had already forwarded the error messages I was getting, and the fact that DirectX and MSInfo diagnostic information wouldn’t be of any use for this issue.

And the fact that their knowledge base makes it quite clear – really quite crystal clear – that no diagnostic effort is needed since they know the exact cause of the issue and exactly how to fix it.

It was, pretty obviously, a boilerplate copy/paste… as the first response had been. But at this point I was still hopeful, so I followed their instructions and provided the information wanted (again).

The next response pushed me closer to the edge. This time they included an insult:

We’re sorry that you’re experiencing this issue and would be more than happy to assist. Before we can begin the troubleshooting process we will need some more information about your computer.

1. Copy of the Steam invoice

2. The Social Club nickname that originally activated the game

3. Any other Social Club nicknames that may have logged in on your computer

4. The activation code used to activate typed out

5. Screenshot of the activate code as seen when you go to Steam Library, right-click MP3, and choose “View CD Key.” Steam ID must be visible in the upper right of this screenshot

6. Your Steam nickname

7. Your Steam ID. You can use a tool such as the following to find this:

http://steamidfinder.com/
http://steamidconverter.com/

8. Confirmation that you have turned Auto-Login OFF in Max Payne 3. If you have Auto-Login on and we unlink your account manually, the same problem will happen again the next time you sign in.

Did you catch it? No? That’s not because you didn’t read it. It’s because software companies like Rockstar have trained us to accept subtle epistolary digs like “the Social Club nickname that originally activated the game,” and “Any other Social Club nicknames that may have logged into your computer.”  They have us thinking it’s the language of tech support.

Any consumer service group worth a damn would – first and foremost – be trained to never even imply, however obliquely, that the customer with whom they’re working could be responsible for wrongdoing. Hell, even if the customer is clearly responsible for wrongdoing you don’t accuse. It’s not tech support’s place to do that.

So I didn’t appreciate the response, especially since I’d shown them a receipt and clearly stated that I owned no other Rockstar games on Steam and that no one but me ever used this computer. “Chris T,” my tech support rockstar, was going out of his way to read off a script.

I’d pretty much given up by this point. It had been about two weeks, and Chris T’s responses were clockwork copy and paste. Again and again he asked for information I had repeatedly provided: a shot of the error. A shot of the receipt. A copy of the CD key. Again and again I provided it.

Sixteen days after I posted to their support site asking for help, he broke the camel’s back. His latest response to my – again – explaining the issue and uploading the required files? He suggested that I join the Rockstar Social Club:

 i suggest creating a social club to help resolve this issue.

is a free Rockstar community service which offers access to special in-game bonuses and exclusive website features. If you do not already have a Social Club account, you will need to create an account after clicking the ticket link to access your ticket

Typos and all. And I guess something in my kind of broke that morning.

At this point I already suspected “Chris T” wasn’t a person.  It wasn’t just that the process seemed unusual, inconsistent with good business practice; it wasn’t just that his phrasing, grammar, and lack of keyboard faculty made it clear English was a language with which he had only a passing familiarity. It was that by this point I’d received eight separate responses from him, and not one even suggested that he knew what my issue was, let alone was working on a fix. Each message asked for the same information as the last, or recommended I do the precise thing that was the source of my error in the first place.

Frankly, I would be lying if I even pretended that I wasn’t losing patience with this unending series of emails, each requesting pretty much the same information.  I hope my response to Chris’s latest doesn’t offend any virgin ears that may be part of Tap’s readership.

Aug 03 06:15 am (EDT):

Chris,

Your absolute inability to help is fascinating to me. I can only assume that one of three possibilities is true:

(1) To this day you still haven’t looked at my issue;

(2) you’re following a policy by which you endlessly paste useless instructions unrelated to the error I’m receiving;

(3) you are not a person at all, but a poorly coded chatterbot program designed badly with the sole purpose of reducing Rockstar’s human resources costs.

STILL, let’s try this again. For those keeping score at home, this is the FOURTH TIME I have supplied this information to you, and you still haven’t acknowledged that you even comprehend the problem I’m having.

MY ROCKSTAR SOCIAL CLUB ID is __________________
THE EMAIL ACCOUNT is ________________

MY STEAM ID is _________
MY STEAM NICKNAME is ______________

MY MAX PAYNE 3 CD KEY is WG__-___-___-___SZ

THE ERROR I’M RECEIVING is “This profile is already linked to another Steam user.”

I attached a screenshot of my Steam receipt with the very very very first message I sent, back when I thought that Rockstar Support would actually support me. I also provided the CD key and other useful screens of the problem. As you remain evidently unable or unwilling to read the words I type, let alone review the attached documentation, I have some doubt as to whether this latest message will result in any progress.

But you know what? I believe in the inherent goodness of people. In the spirit of that philosophy I’ll provide all the relevant links again:

HERE IS A LINK to my CD Key

HERE IS A LINK to the error message I get when I try to play the game

HERE IS A LINK to the Steam purchase receipt

Now, those code-looking things with the slashes and stuff, those are called HYPERLINKS. They are magic words that create windows into a new world! You can click them, or paste them into your URL bar (pasting copies of things is something I know you do well), and they will display colorful screens full of interesting and handy information that will allow you to DO YOUR GOD DAMNED JOB AND GET THE GAME I PAID FOR WORKING.

I look forward to your next unintelligible response.

I mean hell, nine bucks was nine bucks, right? I’d happily pay another nine bucks just to vent my spleen at them, even if just over email.

Now, you all probably think that was the last of it. Of course, being a non-English robot means that Chris T can’t understand my angry rant. Maybe the all caps would make him understand. Surely they’d cut me off, though, after that. I’d long washed my hands of the whole thing, decided for $9.99, it really wasn’t worth the aggravation, aside from the principle of the thing, when…wait…what ho!  Another email from the R* Chatterbot:

 Chris T, Aug 03 12:55 pm (EDT):

Hello

Your Steam ID is still need. It is not letters but numbers and we will need that for the unlinking process. You can find it using this http://steamidfinder.com/

best Regards

Chris T

Interesting that at no point did they offer ANY substantive help (it would have been useful, for example, to know that a SteamID is not a username, and not a nickname; that it is in fact something users have to go through some contortions to get). Instead, their entire process was directed at (1) ensuring I had not pirated the game, (2) ensuring I indeed had a Steam account; (3) keeping me amused by offering to provide a Social Club; and (4) working hard to drive me nuts by asking for the SteamID which – never having heard about this not letters but numbers thing – I believed had already been supplied, at least three times. After emitting a crazy-person shriek of laughter at Chris T’s latest, I did a little Googling, followed the instructions, and sent him my SteamID.

To silence.

Needless to say, I have not included even a small percentage of all those emails back and forth. You readers really don’t want anything but the highlights, and after all, this is not a novel. I can say this…none of them helped with my problem, all of them requested information which had been previously supplied.  After playing all their games, following all their links, and still unable to open ol Max, I decided I was done.  Last evening I enjoyed a small bonfire in my backyard with all those emails.

What I enjoyed most was putting the four R* game discs I had on a skewer and melting them down.

With the victory came another flavor, though. I haven’t mentioned this yet but I love Max Payne. And I killed him. I melted him in my back yard. Max Payne 3 is still safely encrypted in my Steam folder, but with no way to reach him (and not knowing if he’d recognize me after all these years) he might as well be in Brazil as here with me. It wasn’t Max’s fault my game didn’t work. All Max has ever done is be my guy. I’ve played his games so many times I’m surprised the discs didn’t wear out before I melted them. And no matter how many times I made Max suffer, no matter how many times he had to go into that room and find the broken corpses of his wife Michelle and baby girl, no matter how many times I made him cradle Mona Sax in his arms as she died, he never took it out on me.

Rockstar did this, and it didn’t have to be this way. The terrible, clumsy, intrusive Social Club is an annoyance. But I could have learned to live with it. Even the tech support wouldn’t have been the end of the world if they’d made any effort in nearly four weeks to fix the problem. Instead they won again, because they drove another one off. Maybe I should have stayed on them, refused to leave, attached like a barnacle and badgered Chris T relentlessly, never giving up, not even caring about playing my game any more but wanting desperately to prove that at least one customer wouldn’t go away if ignored, to teach them some kind of lesson.

But I don’t have the energy. And I don’t really like Max Payne that much, to be honest. I used to. I used to love Max Payne, big sloppy-kiss love.

But they ruined him. I’ll tell you… even if the game started working today I’m not sure I’d play it. Not to prove a point or anything, but just because…

…

No matter what happens now, I’ll get a bad feeling every time I encounter Max Payne. Over time perhaps I’ll forget exactly why I get that feeling, but it’s so kneejerk now, so ingrained. They tainted it forever. With their stupid systems and their horrid support and their constant refusal to even give a little shit, not a big one, just a tiny infinitesimal shit, and help a legitimate consumer.

Was it worth it, Rockstar? You’re fooling nobody. The Social Club is DRM, not multiplayer matchmaking. So I want to know. Was it worth it? You drove away a legitimate customer to maybe stop a pirate. And you didn’t just drive him away, you turned him on his favorite franchise. You ruined everything about something he had loved. So even if you stop a thousand pirates, was it worth it? To so completely lose one loyal fan, one person who didn’t like but loved Max Payne? And for what? To deny people who never would have bought the game anyway?

As much as I enjoy reading the wonderful work on Tap-Repeatedly (and I do, I read every word of it), I prefer the words to the thought of the games you talk about. Me, I liked my things the way I had them. I know it’s probably odd-sounding, but that’s a right I’ve earned after all these years. I will go on reading Tap’s words about new games with great fascination. But I don’t really feel like getting in to them. I had Max Payne and I loved him but honestly these days I feel a little sick when I hear his name.

No Tap regular would, but in case a passerby for some reason read this and is even now preparing to post in the comments that the game’s already been pirated and that a crack is readily available at some of the internet’s seedier rest stops, don’t. Just don’t. I know about it. I’ve known about it for three and a half weeks. Of course I looked into cracking the game, I bought it legitimately didn’t I? If they can force me to join their Social Club I can retaliate by breaking into a game that should be unlocked. But I haven’t bothered, and I won’t bother. Yeah, there’s a crack. But it’s a pain in the ass to use and it ain’t worth it because, frankly, I don’t like Max Payne that much.

If any of you readers are able to make sense out of their business process, consider yourself in exclusive company because I cannot…goes to show the value of advanced degrees.  These are bad business practices, and R* should know better, have more respect for their customer base.  That they have, I guess, the right to demand membership in a Social Club to allow one to play a game already purchased, they ought not have the privilege.