Item — HN Reader

Getting into even MORE nuance.

Having worked on federated login with Sony, I suspect this "account taint" behavior is because Epic is using Sony's payment platform for loot crates. It's against Sony's policy to be able to pay for things to be used outside their ecosystem...mostly because that opens up a whole can of legal worms. It's for the same reason Spotify subscriptions use in-app purchase but you put your credit card into Uber and Lyft. Allowing cross-play means the in-game items you paid for with loot crates should transfer.

Aha, HN devs say, why don't you just carry a bit with those items that were paid for and hide them on other platforms? This is, more or less, how Blizzard deals with this. However, if that's not how you set it up out of the gate, that can be a painful thing to do retroactively. That's why I feel it's a bit disingenuous to heap ALL the hate on Sony. Epic could possibly work around this.

That said, everything about the account is cosmetic-related. You'll have to start all over getting your John Wick skin...but how big of a deal is that really? It doesn't affect gameplay. That's probably what Epic is thinking.

5 comments

I think its insane how many comments are trying to deflect from the issue. Sony can and should allow users to bring their accounts and purchases with them to and from their platform.

> It's against Sony's policy to be able to pay for things to be used outside their ecosystem...mostly because that opens up a whole can of legal worms. I can purchase skins on PC and use them on PS4. So that blows up the legal argument.

This feels like a weird distortion because its gaming related. For example Apple allows their users to bring kindle books purchased outside their platform even though they didn't get a 30% cut of sales. We would be roasting Apple right now if they were locking it down like Sony is.

Apple did want to block books purchased outside their platform. Kindle for iOS still doesn't support purchasing because of this.

https://www.computerworld.com/article/2509396/mobile-apps/am...

https://www.theverge.com/2013/7/30/4572170/amazon-finds-clev...

http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/24/technology/gadgets/kindle-ap...

This isn’t the same thing exactly.

You can buy items in the game on the PC play it on multiple platforms but as soon as you log into the game on a PS4 the account will be locked to that system as far as consoles go.

There is no warnning, there is no way to reverse this and they essentially lock you out out of your own account.

Apple wanted a cut that Amazon didn’t want to give but they didn’t not block you from using the Kindle app on an iPhone nor did they locked out the books from being accessible on other platforms once you’ve opened them on your phone.

Not even Apple is that stupid.

Also even if Apple did block books purchased outside of their platform that would still would not be comparable as they did not forcibly locked you out of content you’ve already owned on all other platforms.

I would be Ok if Sony and Epic made a deal that items purchased from the PSN store would be unavailable else where but locking your account because you logged in even once and didn’t play the game or even bought an item is just bullshit.

I should add to this that this isn’t even only Fortnite as this is on the Epic account level so if you played previous Epic games on your PS4 your account is locked out by default.

A friend of mine had his Fortnite account locked out because they played the Paragon beta on their PS4 like 2 years ago. They don’t even own a PS4 anymore and never played Fortnite on it.

> For example Apple allows their users to bring kindle books purchased outside their platform even though they didn't get a 30% cut of sales

They also don't allow you to purchase books within their ecosystem. On PC, you're using Epic's payment platform. Same way you can pay for your kindle books on the web in Amazon's ecosystem and then read them on an iPad.

My point is that weird technical and legal hurdles, when followed lazily, can lead to anti-consumer practices. I don't think it's deflecting from the issue to discuss the underlying technical and legal constraints. It's Hacker News. If you want to rage against Sony for not allowing cross-play go to Polygon.

> On PC, you're using Epic's payment platform.

I don't see how this is different from Xbox/iOS/PC/Switch all sharing digital purchases. Sony is the only platform that has "legal hurdles" preventing this?

> My point is that weird technical and legal hurdles

I don't think their are any technical challenges unless you insist digital licenses must be sandboxed. Epic has accidentally removed the technical blocks previously.

> It's Hacker News. If you want to rage against Sony for not allowing cross-play go to Polygon.

I'm sorry if it feels like I'm raging but I strongly believe users need to fight for fair digital licensing. Sandboxing purchases feels like a fine technical workaround but I'd prefer platform owners change policy to match users expectations.

> Sony is the only platform that has "legal hurdles" preventing this?

Not all companies "move fast and break things" in legal matters. We don't know the full circumstances, but Sony may have evaluated the landscape and decided the liabilities weren't worth the potential profits, while Nintendo and Microsoft looked at the landscape and decided that the profits exceeded the liabilities in this case.

It's for the same reason that you find Wells Fargo or Facebook committing transgressions that other banks or social media sites may avoid.

> If you want to rage against Sony for not allowing cross-play go to Polygon.

While you might not agree with the other poster, this REALLY isn't the way civil people debate. Don't do this.

> > For example Apple allows their users to bring kindle books purchased outside their platform even though they didn't get a 30% cut of sales > They also don't allow you to purchase books within their ecosystem.

Apple will absolutely let you purchase ebooks within their ecosystem. But if you are selling other people's books, that 30% is likely your entire margin.

Ironically, you can buy real books too, without giving apple a cut (except their portion for the CC tx fees from the bank for Apple Pay)

>You'll have to start all over getting your John Wick skin...

But you can't. It would not only cost money to, but it is also time gated, and once that gate closes you can't open it back up. No new account can have a John Wick skin because it requires buying something no longer for sale and then completing challenges that are no longer part of the game.

>I suspect this "account taint" behavior is because Epic is using Sony's payment platform for loot crates.

But Sony's response says "We also offer Fortnite cross-play support with PC, Mac, iOS, and Android devices". It seems like consoles in their target market are specifically excluded for portability here.

Interesting, I didn't see that. In that case, it makes the account lockout case even weaker. There really is no technical reason for it. However, that makes it Epic's issue, since they clearly have means of handling it.

> You'll have to start all over getting your John Wick skin...

My understanding, having not played Fortnite:

* Some skins (like John Wick) are time-limited and purchase-limited and achievement-limited. In other words you have to purchase the Battle Pass for a given season and complete all the challenges before the time runs out. John Wick skins are past that window, nothing can be done about them now.

* Other skins are just time and money limited. I'm told that you can log in and there will be only a single skin for sale.

But really, discussing whether it's a big deal[0] is missing what's important here. Neither Sony nor Epic adequately warned players that this would happen. That's the meat of the issue right there.

Again, I've not played Fortnite, only seen it in the Epic launcher when I dust off Unreal Engine 4.

[0]: Do I really need to say it is a big deal that players who poured money into their account are now being told to start from scratch?

It's weirder than that, you aren't really paying for the items directly from Sony's platform when you play on the PS4, you're buying V-bucks, Fortnite's currency, and that's what you use to buy your items.

For one, the solution should be keeping two different V-Buck wallets: one for Sony, and another for everyone else, legal issue solved, moving on. So, because it's not happening, there must be something we're missing here...