Are you one of the 12,000 gamers who accidentally got banned from playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 on Steam due to a technical error? Well after doing some research into the situation, Valve has remedied it and thrown in a bonus for those effected parties: 2 copies of Left 4 Dead 2. Gabe Newall addressed the situation by sending out messages to all the effected accounts:
“This was our mistake, and I apologize for any frustration or angst it may have caused you.”
“The problem was that Steam would fail a signature check between the disk version of a DLL and a latent memory version. This was caused by a combination of conditions occurring while Steam was updating the disk image of a game.
“This wasn’t a game-specific mistake. Steam allows us to manage and reverse these erroneous bans (about 12,000 erroneous bans over two weeks).
“We have reversed the ban, restoring your access to the game. In addition, we have given you a free copy of Left 4 Dead 2 to give as a gift on Steam, plus a free copy for yourself if you didn’t already own the game.”
As any company will tell you, mistakes can and will happen. It’s how you deal with them that determines how your customers respond to you. it’s no wonder that Valve is such a generally beloved company in the gaming industry.
