I'm a new user and very impressed with VO, but it seems odd that I have to accept or decline the VO License Agreement everytime I launch the game. Is this normal or am I missing an obvious setting?

I am running on Mac OS X and have tried VO on both 10.3.6 and 10.4.

Thanks.

I believe its supposed to show everytime. there must be some sort of legal obligation for them to show it everytime you connect or something.

-Kestrel

EvE does it too. The only difference was with EvE the font was generally really small so you couldn't read what it said, and you eventually just clicked through it without thinking.

I can see where this may be needed for trial users, but once you are a paid member, this seems rather unnecessary, especially since it appears after you have logged in, and as I recall, the license agreement was part of the membership process.

Just my 2 cents.

its a legal neccesity i think. If its not something that people have to view time the log on, someone would sue for something stupid and say "well i didnt know because my *son/mom/father/brother/cousin ed* is the one who installed the game, not me."

Since English is not my native language, I can allways claim I did not fully understand the text. The whole Licence Agreement is useless in any non-english speaking country.

I would suggest perhaps making it so that the EULA only appears when it has been altered and/or at the beginning of every pay session (month), and an additional button be added to the initial menu, "Review Current EULA".

ahh, however noid the EULA provisions for use in other countries, besides the button at the bottom says "i agree", meaning wether you understood it or not, you agreed to it.

The point isnt that you understand it or not, its that you cant say you didn't SEE and ACCEPT it.

Same way you can sign a legal contract and are subject to every clause and sub-paragraph in it even if you dont understand it.

Well, IANAL, so I have no idea in how far this agreement is legal, but it seems every judge in every country has his own idea about the internationality of the internet.

Back to the subject:
Clause 1 states that you may not transfer the account to anyone. So after agreeing with this once, only changes need to be shown to this person. If this person lets someone else play the game, the person that is paying is violating the eula. So I don't see a reason why showing it every time is neccecery.

I do, because where vendetta is made they either a) have to, or b) want to c) all the above...

It is what it is, if you dont understand it and want to play, great, it says that much.

<- would be moved to suggestions, but im not fm, alas...

[OFF TOPIC WARNING] Don't you just want to make a video game, put some clause in the EULA that's really stupid (example: you must run around your house 6 times to show your support for the game) and see how many people actually read it? I have always wondered how long it's going to take someone to do that. I personally have never read a full EULA. I just agree to them and never do anything stupid like redistributing it or being a jackarse. [OFF TOPICNESS OVERS]

Relevant thread:
http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/6947#85146

Relevant Dev answer:
Wed, Nov 03, 2004 incarnate
"Every other MMO of note, that I'm aware of, displays their EULA every time. And since people like Sony (and even people like CCP) have more money to spend on attourneys than we do, I assume it's probably a good thing.

It also makes sure that people agreed to it at the time when they played. Something loggable timewise. I dunno, I don't think it's all that terribly annoying."

Phantasy Star Online does *not* require you to agree to the EULA every time you play. Only when you start a new file on a memory card. But then that's SonicTeam.

that's probably because they dont' change there agreement like SOE and some of the others do.

Sorry, but I don't find the argument "because everyone else does it, it must be a good thing." to be valid. Actually only a few game manufacturers do it, the rest of the software world doesn't feel a need for it.

Once I have agreed to it and given you my money, that should be the end of the matter unless the EULA is changed. Ask an attorney -- don't just follow the the crowd. Isn't that one of the best aspects of VO -- they have found out how to do things BETTER?

I'm sorry for the rant, but I really do find it annoying and the answers provided in this thread, and others, just don't hold water.

Counterexample: World of Warcraft only displays the EULA when it's changed. 'tis quite nice. ;-)

The majority of online game makers do this, WoW is the exception. "asking an attourney" is nice, but it costs us like $300 to ask our attourney what the weather is like outside his window. And, chances are, an attourney would say it was legally superior to ask on every login. We do try to do things Better whenever possible, but when it involves areas that are outside our areas of expertise (legalities) and is expensive for us to find out for certain, we tend to err on the side of "inexpensive and safe". This lets us spend more time working on the game and less worrying about.. stupid.. legal.. crap.

I think there is some legal merit to having the user agree to it every time, as it strengthens the arguement that they're aware of it. Personally, I don't find it terribly annoying.

That said, we could perhaps look at doing something like having a "I have read and agreed to this, I only wanted to see updates" checkbox appear after the first five logins or some such. Something to speed up the login process. I dunno, I'll think about this. I know it bothers some people, but honestly I'd rather spend time working on the game itself right now. But, if we can throw something together quickly, we'll do so.

Dont fret over it too much Incarnate. I for one prefer game updates to contain game content and balance. Making an extra click to log in doesnt bother me at all. Then again, I am a somewhat patient individual.

THANK YOU!

I appreciate your candor and your willingness to look into it. I too hope it can be done without taking away from the more important issues, but in the long run, it may make (some) happier customers.

I might also add that I think VO is primed to attract a whole new group of non-gamers. I've been using computer for 20 years but never played games before finding VO -- now I am hooked. Those of us who are not used to some of the arcane customs of the gaming world, may be a little more critical of such apparent idiosyncrasies.

Thanks again for having an open mind on the subject -- VO really is better!