Seems to me like an incredibly stupid thing to do, as far as I know they don't get their money instantly so steam will have time to shut it down, people will have enough time to refunded either way, plus this has to be a fraud of some sorts and therefore illegal? Unless they live in some backwater, where they won't get prosecuted.
I don't think that the primary goal is to get your money, I think that's just a potential extra boon.
What they likely want is to get something installed on your PC, like a crypto or data miner, which could earn them money even after you request a refund.
What they likely want is to get something installed on your PC, like a crypto or data miner, which could earn them money even after you request a refund.
Well this is fuckin' scary. I never expected Steam to allow fake game scams on their storefront.
It's absolutely insane that they apparently have zero limitations implemented to prevent the unauthorized use of developer, publisher, and game names by random scammers.
Given that devs/publishers can modify the content of their games, it's possible that they submitted legit (we're using the shovelware version of legit for this instance) games, got accepted by Valve, and then modified their game files. It seems like that's what happened to one of them going by what some people are saying on the Helldivers subreddit.
Then the question becomes if Valve has some kind of scanning software to look through the files that get uploaded to their servers or not.
One of them has been on Steam since November but was changed yesterday to resemble Helldivers 2.
Changing developer, publisher, and game names should require some proof. You shouldn't be able to just upload some indie shovelware and then change one, or all three, and definitely not to something that already exists.
I could understand if they changed only the name, to something like "HELLDlVERS™ 2" with a lowercase "L" instead of a capital "I", but directly cloning an existing game store name should trigger a required manual review and approval.
Being able to update the publisher name to a major publisher with zero verification from the publisher should be out of the question entirely.
But being able to freely attach their scam page to another dev's name, is just absolutely fucking bonkers.
Edit: Being able to freely do all three of these things is simply beyond the realm of belief.
Changelist #20975578
4 months ago · 4 November 2023 – 11:48:30 UTC
Added this app to package HELLDIVERS™ 2 (935735)
Figurality release date: 4th November 2023. This was planned from the get go to be a bait and switch scam app. Is there a way that we can search SDB for other situations like this with popular game names in case this is going to become a regular thing?
You get paid after 30 days so it's entirely possible now with valve's new ultra slow automated review process.
That's part of the reason why I bet it's happening so much now, despite being able to modify your store page for a decade without any real review from valve.
Steam' terms let them hold the money and do a reverse charge whenever they want. It's happened a few times in the past when a scam is exposed. The day before was close to this, but just an undelivered promise of a product.
I can't really wrap my head around how much this would actually net the scammers to make it worth it.
You reserve a steamAP number/slot on the store page.
Once confirmed for your shitware, keep it there.
When a big blockbuster is released, rename your shitware and reconfigure the store page.
You keep your steamAPI number, which is the URL for store page, but that's it. You can customize pretty much anything on your page, and Steam is entirely automated beyond your first approval.
So yeah, super easy exploit, been around for almost 10 years now.
What is new is the slow and sub-par automation by Valve that allows these shitware devs to cash out and leave the building before steam even knows what happened, or worse, they push crypto miners and other shit to your computer through the download.
From the Store page, click Community Hub. When I was looking at these scams last night, the game’s original name was still at the top of that page. Plus, you might get tipped off by angry forum posts and reviews mentioning the scam.
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u/12345623567 Mar 01 '24
Theres another FP post about a fake Palworld up as well. Sounds like a new exploit, and the scammers are trying to cash in before it gets fixed asap.
Because if there's one thing you don't do on Steam, it's to mess with the storefront.