The internet became locked in a somewhat morbid but perhaps practical conversation around death recently after Steam said players couldn’t transfer their games or accounts via a last will and testament. Those who prefer GOG to Valve’s platform are in luck, however, as it will do its best to honor your final digital wishes.
“Unfortunately, Steam accounts and games are non-transferable,” said Steam customer support in response to a user who broached the question (but doesn’t plan on “dying anytime soon”).
“Steam Support can’t provide someone else with access to the account or merge its contents with another account. I regret to inform you that your Steam account cannot be transferred via a will.”
This once again raised questions over the fickleness of the digital era of video game ownership, as no quibbling would surround, for example, leaving behind a stack of physical PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo games.
In response to the hubbub, and after being asked by some users if it would allow posthumous transferring, CD Projekt-owned GOG said it would “do its best” to make its users’ wishes happen.
“As this is a particularly delicate matter with little to no existing legal guidance on the issue of video games preservation, we’d like to address it properly, so that you, and every other GOG community member, can be sure what can happen to your games in case of unexpected events, such as death,” GOG customer support told its curious and concerned users.
“In general, your GOG account and GOG content is not transferable. However, if you can obtain a copy of a court order that specifically entitles someone to your GOG personal account, the digital content attached to it taking into account the EULAs of specific games within it, and that specifically refers to your GOG username or at least email address used to create such an account, we’d do our best to make it happen.
“We’re willing to handle such a situation and preserve your GOG library, but currently we can only do it with the help of the justice system.”
GOG told IGN it’s not aware of such a situation ever happening before, but also noted that, as the platform provides offline installers with every purchase and each game is digital rights management free, users can also download their entire library onto a hard-drive and preserve their collection that way.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.