EU fines video game firms for blocking cross-border sales

  European Union has issued fines to a U.S. video game platform and five game makers after y blocked players from buying cheaper copies of games in or countries in bloc.

EU's executive Commission said Wednesday that it fined Valve Corp., which owns Steam online PC game distribution platform, and game makers a total of 7.8 million euros ($9.5 million) because y restricted cross-border sales in violation of bloc's antitrust rules.

companies used so-called geo-blocking practices to prevent players from activating and playing games sold eir on DVD or by download, commission said. Steam activation keys prevented games from working outside Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, it said.

Such practices deprive European consumers of benefits of EU Digital Single Market and of opportunity to shop around for most suitable offer in EU,” Executive Vice-President Margre Vestr, bloc's competition watchdog, said in a statement.

geo-blocking restrictions affected about 100 games and lasted until vember 2018. Valve, which refused to cooperate with EU's investigation, was fined 1.6 million euros. game makers - Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, KochMedia and ZeniMax - cooperated and received discounts on ir penalties, commission said.