End User Agreement - Say What??

I went to add a pre-order key to my account, then scanned the End-User Agreement when it popped up.

Imagine my surprise to see the following clauses:

"4. ACCOUNT
(a) Eligibility. Accounts are available only to adult individuals 18 years of age or older. If you are less than 18 years of age and wish to use the Service, your parent(s) or guardian(s) must complete the registration process, open an Account in their name(s) and accept full responsibility for all obligations under this Agreement. Those who have completed these steps and who maintain their Account in good standing are sometimes referred to in this Agreement as ?Members.?
By accepting the terms of use in the Agreement, Members represent that you are an adult 18 years of age or older. Only one person may use an Account. The registered user of an Account may use the Account or may choose instead to permit a minor child of the registered user to use the Account. You are liable for all activities conducted through your Account, and parents or guardians are liable for all activities of their minor child conducted through the Account.
(b) Master Accounts and Game Accounts. To use the Service, you must first create a Guild Wars account either by creating a master account on the PlayNC service (?Master Account?) or a game specific sub-account for Guild Wars or using the registration system provided when launching the game (?Game Account?). Master Accounts on the PlayNC service are free and can be created at www.plaync.com <http://www.plaync.com/>. A Game Account is subject to specific fees as per section 5 (see Chapter Purchases).

<more deleted>

5. CHAPTER PURCHASE
Our fees and billing procedures are published in the registration section of the Web Site, which are incorporated herein by this reference. All fees are stated in U.S. Dollars. YOUR CHAPTER PURCHASE IS PAYABLE IN ADVANCE AND IS NOT REFUNDABLE IN WHOLE OR IN PART FOR ANY REASON WHATSOEVER, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, INTERRUPTION OR UNAVAILABILITY OF SERVICE (SEE ALSO SECTION 10 BELOW). We will automatically charge your credit card for applicable new Chapter purchases, plus any applicable taxes we are required to collect, where you authorize us to do so. All new Chapter purchases are payable in advance. YOU ARE FULLY LIABLE FOR ALL CHARGES TO YOUR ACCOUNT. By paying by credit card, you represent to NC Interactive that you are the authorized user of the credit card used to pay the new Chapter purchase. You agree to promptly notify NC Interactive of any changes to your credit card account number, its expiration date and/or your billing address, and you agree to promptly notify NC Interactive if your credit card expires or is cancelled for any reason.
NC Interactive reserves the right to alter the fees payable for new Chapters or introduce alternative fee structures for the Service. Any alteration to the purchase price will be posted on the Web Site at least 30 days prior to such alteration taking effect. If you do not agree to any such alteration, you should not purchase the new Chapter and/or you should terminate your Account prior to the date on which the alteration takes effect, otherwise the revised amount will automatically be debited to your Account."


Now, PLEASE (please, please, please!!!) correct me if I'm wrong, but my impression is that we are, upon Registration, going to be required to open an account which will require a Credit Card that will be automatically billed for any subsequent 'Chapter' (which seems to mean whatever content the company wishes to define as a chapter), with any frequency deemed fit by the Company, even, dare I say it, monthly. The price of said chapters is not indicated anywhere that I was able to access.

I'm concerned, particularly about the last sentence, which effectively states that, if you don't like the price and don't want to pay it, you should cancel your Account, ie. stop playing the game, period. Uh, I thought we'd be able to play even without buying new chapters? Any new chapters. Right?

I can't think of the number of times I've been bombarded with assurances that there would be no 'monthly fees' for playing this game. The implication seemed to have been that additional Chapters would be optional, available at retailers, and that there would be no need for any sort of automatic billing or further payment.

Right now, I feel like I have perhaps been had, that the letter of what A-Net promised may have been true - not 'monthly', just every 38 or 48 or 15 days? -- the spirit of it may not. I'd really like to know, before I plunk down the rest of the purchase price, BTW, just WTF is going on here.

Administrators?

Alpha testers?

Gaile?

that might be the option to purchase directly perhaps online instead of a store

Think of it as buying an expansion for any other game.

here is where it comes in everybody

Answer
Guild Wars will be available at your favorite retail location. You will be able to acquire subsequent chapters for Guild Wars via retail stores or direct download.

Nope. In legal language, 'and/or' means BOTH sides of the proposition. I certainly hope that it will end up optional, but the way I read this, both a Credit Card and (for those of you under 18) parental consent are going to be required upon Registration.

We really need an official response to this.

This makes me worried. We need to light up a signal or something to Anet.... I want to hear from Gaile or Alex! rawr!

wow, havent been this scared in a while. as long as i dont have to give them a credit card # im fine, but my parents wont like giving up their credit card number. also, whats up with that parent registration stuff? and why didnt they ever mention this before in like the BWE's??

Because that would put a downer on things.

Did Anybody Read The Above Post At All??

Option To Download It

If You Download It How Else Will You Pay For It??

Choice Of Store Or Download People

Answer

Guild Wars will be available at your favorite retail location. You will be able to acquire subsequent chapters for Guild Wars via retail stores or direct download.

I don't see how that information pertains to the User Agreement part on the first post.

I believe I agree with Loviatar, that this is a description of an option you have. It looks like you can, if you wish, give them your credit card number and simply have them debit your account automatically for each expansion (for example, if I like the game I'll be doing that, because I live in Japan and have a hard time buying the box version). Of course, if you decide you don't want the next expansion, you'll have to tell them to stop automatically billing it.

My impression (my legalese is not good, but...) is that that's entirely voluntary--you will not be required to get the expansions. The whole second section should be read as an "if...then" discussion.

I believe. Of course, some offical translation of the legalese would be nice.

My husband points out in addition that this seems to be NC Soft's general EULA, which must therefore be vague enough to apply to both GW and all of NC Soft's monthly payment games like CoH, Lineage, etc. That might explain some of it as well.

Starflower

I'm assuming you're referring to this:

"If you do not agree to any such alteration, you should not purchase the new Chapter"

If this is the case, and it is optional, no info on registration, I'll be very, very relieved, since I haven't wanted to play anything this much in a lo-o-ong time. I don't find this to be clear, however, and would dearly love confirmation. Did you check this out at the login screen?

Actually, That made a lot of sense... But I'm still not too sure. I'd like an official to clarify things...

EDIT:

Oh, Also.... The game is rated "T" for teen... So why should the user need to be 18? It's sort of odd.

the latest official word

Am I required to buy the expansion packs to continue to play Guild Wars?

No. Every purchase you make in the continuation of the Guild Wars saga will be your choice. If you purchase expansion packs you will gain access to new regions of the world, new skills and abilities, new items, new professions, and much more. If you choose to not purchase a chapter, you will still be able to play the chapters of Guild Wars that you own, and you will have common areas in which you will be able to play with and against your friends who have purchased the other chapter(s).

Again, I hope you're right. But the vagueness of a general EULA should not be applied to a game that seeks to radically alter the method of paying for online games and, I think, should definitely not express a general disclaimer that refers to a possible alteration of the way the "Service" will be paid for. That phrase is the one that seriously bothers me.

If their other games charge a monthly fee, fine, they need a common agreement. If this one does not and will not charge a monthly fee, it needs a separate EULA.

the 18 or parent/guardian permission thing will simply be because it is multiplayer. No matter if they released Teletubbies online, they would have to put the same of disclaimer in, because you'll always get one person coming online and talking about sexual stuff or being threatening.

again the official word

There will not be a subscription fee of any kind, anywhere in the world and there are no hidden fees. You will not have to pay for the streaming updates that will take place on a regular basis, nor for additional content that we will provide between the chapters of Guild Wars.

That can be applied to anything. If it were so, The general fact that it is an online game should make it rated M.

I still think it shouldn't be required to be 18.

18 is for the credit card purchase of optional later chapters not the game you can walk into the store and buy
calm down everybody

Sorry, I think not Loviatar. It clearly says you are required to be 18 to have an account, which is obviously necessary to play the game.