" so we’re only able to open up this contest to legal residents of the United States who are 18 years or older. " I get that you don't want to deal with tax issues when shipping physical items internationally, but this is a digital download. Why the geographical restriction, my dear Anandtech eds?
The short answer? We don't want warrants out for our arrest in a foreign nation as a result of holding a contest that local laws don't allow. There are about 200 countries in the world, and each have their own laws regarding giveaways.
Which I apologize for, as I know our non-US readers want to be able to enter these contests as well. But it gets impractical very quickly to run a small contest that spans multiple countries.
"We don't want warrants out for our arrest in a foreign nation" Hehehe, you just made me chuckle. :-) I suggest that we approach the International Court of Justice to grant you current and future amnesty.
This is why "US and Canada excluding Quebec" is common on these. The rest of Canada though, a digital competition shouldn't really have any limits for.
"contest to legal residents of the United States who are 18 years or older. "
Considering all the illegals in California, are you allowed to ask for legal proof of residence? I thought that was taboo and there was even some laws against it now? Didn't Gov. Brown enable you to even get a driver's license and vote without being legal, but now I can't enter this contest?!
Better watch your back Tomb Raider, the jungle is no comparison to the shambles of Golden Gate Park, even the 2 escaped murderers couldn't hack it there.
About the geographical restriction, that has been well explained before. It's not just taxes, but some countries have different laws and restrictions, blah blah blah, and it can become a complex nightmare to properly administer an international give-away. Look in older give-aways for a better explanation in AnandTech's own words.
I never got into the Tomb Raider games until the "reboot." Really enjoyed it, though it's console roots showed. I certainly would be up for the sequel!
Windows store is real unintrusive as far as that sort of thing goes, you can just download and then load the app as far as I've ever seen, it's the closest digital platform to not being one I've seen.
Haha, I don't buy this BS about legal wranglings around international competitions. Almost every contest offered by one of your competitors from the UK, who I won't mention by name, are open internationally. Perhaps we should petition them to exclude entrants from outside the UK so we get a fair chance at winning something over here.
"Staff" is not the same as a legal representative. Writers are not lawyers. You're welcome to believe whatever you'd like, but we're more inclined to believe our legal counsel than your anecdotes. Go ahead and do some research as to the actual costs of obtaining legal licenses for running these things in various countries, and the various stipulations that come with it. Did you know that a contest that includes Italy REQUIRES that at least one Italian citizen wins? Probably not, but then that's why we listen to our lawyers about this, because we wouldn't have known either.
Honestly, who wants looks for ways, who doesn't want looks for reasons. There are tons of various lotteries or giveaways both digital and physical and majority of such is able to handle such a giveaway pretty much all over the globe (perhaps except North Korea and Iran).
The folks that go on about wanting international contests are being disingenuous. What they really want is "my country included", which is fair enough, but if they were taken at face value and truly were pushing for international contests open to all we would need to include everyone. Including China and India. Which would mean none of us westerners would win a contest pretty much ever again.
I do wish international contests were easier to run. However even if they were, having region limits would still be a good thing, at least if the goal of a promotion is some form of marketing (whether for the website or the goods provider). Nobody wants all of their marketing to end up in one location simply due to population density.
I was just about to write the same thing. Contrary to you I won't hold back with the name, however.
Hexus has lots of international competitions, quite often won by residents of the US.
I don't buy into this legal stuff keeping Anandtech from allowing non-US residents to enter. It's a question of effort, in my opinion, and apparently Anandtech doesn't want to go the extra mile.
So we aren't explicitly requiring social media here (I specifically wanted to avoid that situation). However it appears that the service we're using has a bot check system that we failed to account for, and that system requires a social media login if it thinks you're a bot.
Unfortunately there's nothing we can do about this before the content closes, but I apologize for the inconvenience. This isn't something we wanted to have to put you guys through.
oh, strange. I would never even think to try it out on such a device. I have the i5/16gb SB 4 and while it is a great device, I would assume that a title like this would crush all configurations.
Word of warning to anyone entering, the Windows Store version has some pointless restrictions applied to it in terms of settings. The game only runs in Windowed Full Screen and Vsync is forced on.
With 200 keys it's pretty good odds to win one, but it's just not worth it having to switch to Windows 10 plus how the game's been crippled.
You can buy the Win 10 store version for about $9 if you change your location in the settings. Also, those restrictions are very arbitrary and annoying.
As an older female gamer who appreciates RP games of this caliber, but who can't even win an argument, thanks for the chance. I usually buy games digitally, because honestly I am tired of being asked if I am buying a game for my son...Ugh.
Only open to US Residents, make it abundantly clear at the top, preferably in brackets at the end of the title to avoid a bait & switch which this is. I thought AnandTech would be better than this, guess I should lower my level of trust & respect for AT in future.
Whoops, I went straight from reading the word giveaway to filling in my details. I live in The Netherlands so probably am not eligible, sorry if I caused any inconvenience :P
Was wondering though since you can buy the game on steam here, would steam codes not work? You can gift those :P
Please give it a few hours. I have to send out all the codes manually through email, and it took me long enough just to remove all the non-US entries. I've got a few things going on that take priority over this, but I'll try to have the game codes sent out to everybody by the end of today.
Sick of this USA only contests, at-least specify this in the article title itself, removing the Adblock whitelist for this website, the USA readers are what you care about and i am fine with it but not going to support you with adblock whitelist from now.
It's actually quite a bit more complicated than a simple "we don't care about overseas audience." They actually talk about the legal issues with internation contests in the beginning of this comments section.
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AndrewJacksonZA - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
" so we’re only able to open up this contest to legal residents of the United States who are 18 years or older. "I get that you don't want to deal with tax issues when shipping physical items internationally, but this is a digital download. Why the geographical restriction, my dear Anandtech eds?
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
The short answer? We don't want warrants out for our arrest in a foreign nation as a result of holding a contest that local laws don't allow. There are about 200 countries in the world, and each have their own laws regarding giveaways.Which I apologize for, as I know our non-US readers want to be able to enter these contests as well. But it gets impractical very quickly to run a small contest that spans multiple countries.
AndrewJacksonZA - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
"We don't want warrants out for our arrest in a foreign nation"Hehehe, you just made me chuckle. :-) I suggest that we approach the International Court of Justice to grant you current and future amnesty.
ImSpartacus - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Quebec: scaring the hell out of giveaway administrators since 1663Seriously though, that should be their motto.
tipoo - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
This is why "US and Canada excluding Quebec" is common on these. The rest of Canada though, a digital competition shouldn't really have any limits for.jkhoward - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Don't be sorry, you have no reason to be sorry. Please don't feed into this new generations need to feel loved and special.praktik - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
I think we should create safe space for Ryan Smith to apologize if that's what his inner voice is telling himxthetenth - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Got to love taking shots on another group for no reason other than to feed a smugness you don't have to work to earn.Space Jam - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
This must be Space Jam because you just dunked that fool xthetenth.webdoctors - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
"contest to legal residents of the United States who are 18 years or older. "Considering all the illegals in California, are you allowed to ask for legal proof of residence? I thought that was taboo and there was even some laws against it now? Didn't Gov. Brown enable you to even get a driver's license and vote without being legal, but now I can't enter this contest?!
Better watch your back Tomb Raider, the jungle is no comparison to the shambles of Golden Gate Park, even the 2 escaped murderers couldn't hack it there.
Sttm - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Well to be fair they made the crucial mistake of looking shabby near a Whole Foods, which of course gets you immediately snatched by the cops in SF.Tunrip - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
It's a shame that it started by saying "for everyone to enjoy" and I thought you'd cracked the international egg :( Oh well!doggface - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
US, Canada, Uk, Aus, (?)europe. Surely they have broadly the same rules on this. Especially the English speaking countries.Sttm - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Its not Anandtech's fault you do not live in a free country.doggface - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Says thr country with the Patriot Act. LolSttm - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Which keeps the socialists from taking away my prizes!Stan11003 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Different laws govern each country. It would hard to have a contest span to the globe and still be legal.skifiddle - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
It surely would be sweet. Christmas in February.justaviking - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Looks like a fun game. Sign me up. :)-
About the geographical restriction, that has been well explained before. It's not just taxes, but some countries have different laws and restrictions, blah blah blah, and it can become a complex nightmare to properly administer an international give-away. Look in older give-aways for a better explanation in AnandTech's own words.
jardows2 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
I never got into the Tomb Raider games until the "reboot." Really enjoyed it, though it's console roots showed. I certainly would be up for the sequel!jardows2 - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
Just got my email notifying me that I won! Thanks AnandTech! Downloading it right now, and am excited to start playing!CJ_Jacobs - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Cool Giveaway. Good Luck To Everyone Entering.Anonymous Blowhard - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
> requires Windows 10Nope, enjoy your botnet
Samunosuke - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Let me guess - Windows 7 user.tipoo - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
The one with an off switch, for its anonymized telemetrics? So malicious.xthetenth - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Five bucks says you use Google's much more intrusive services.SpartanJet - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
^thisEvery single one of these tinfoil hat users seem to be gobbling up that AD companies shilling funds.
Gigaplex - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Windows 7 users on Skylake are more likely to be part of a botnet soon, due to the withholding of security updates.azrael- - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
What's that you're smoking? Seems like some good stuff...MustISO - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Thanks for the giveaway, entered!!pixelstuff - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
It is kind of difficult to read those terms and conditions with them not flowing to fit the narrow column of the entry box.smorebuds - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Def agree. I ended up copy/pasting into notepad. Not ideal!Titillating - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Sorry about that! This is a new contest-hosting service we recently started using, so we didn't realize how off the formatting would be.I went ahead and fixed it up a bit and it should fit the box much better!
Bateluer - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Not keen on adding another digital platform to my list; Steam, Origin, GoG, uPlay, etc. Don't need one for every publisher under the sun.xthetenth - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Windows store is real unintrusive as far as that sort of thing goes, you can just download and then load the app as far as I've ever seen, it's the closest digital platform to not being one I've seen.Azurael - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Haha, I don't buy this BS about legal wranglings around international competitions. Almost every contest offered by one of your competitors from the UK, who I won't mention by name, are open internationally. Perhaps we should petition them to exclude entrants from outside the UK so we get a fair chance at winning something over here.Azurael - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Both for physical good and digital downloads, I should add. I think it's especially poor given that you have staff over here.Titillating - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
"Staff" is not the same as a legal representative. Writers are not lawyers. You're welcome to believe whatever you'd like, but we're more inclined to believe our legal counsel than your anecdotes. Go ahead and do some research as to the actual costs of obtaining legal licenses for running these things in various countries, and the various stipulations that come with it. Did you know that a contest that includes Italy REQUIRES that at least one Italian citizen wins? Probably not, but then that's why we listen to our lawyers about this, because we wouldn't have known either.HollyDOL - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Honestly, who wants looks for ways, who doesn't want looks for reasons. There are tons of various lotteries or giveaways both digital and physical and majority of such is able to handle such a giveaway pretty much all over the globe (perhaps except North Korea and Iran).Kristian Vättö - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
The sites that do international giveaways have simply decided to ignore the local laws in hopes for more entries (and thus page views and revenue).Reflex - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
The folks that go on about wanting international contests are being disingenuous. What they really want is "my country included", which is fair enough, but if they were taken at face value and truly were pushing for international contests open to all we would need to include everyone. Including China and India. Which would mean none of us westerners would win a contest pretty much ever again.I do wish international contests were easier to run. However even if they were, having region limits would still be a good thing, at least if the goal of a promotion is some form of marketing (whether for the website or the goods provider). Nobody wants all of their marketing to end up in one location simply due to population density.
azrael- - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
I was just about to write the same thing. Contrary to you I won't hold back with the name, however.Hexus has lots of international competitions, quite often won by residents of the US.
I don't buy into this legal stuff keeping Anandtech from allowing non-US residents to enter. It's a question of effort, in my opinion, and apparently Anandtech doesn't want to go the extra mile.
gwolfman - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Oh boy, thanks AT & Square for the chance to win!DrakeWing - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Even for games we're not allowed to enter. These competitions are the ultimate feel bads :(r3loaded - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
"Sorry! We need you to verify that you are a real person. Please login with any of these social networks to get started: (Facebook/Twitter/Instagram)"Erm, how about no? I don't even have an account with any of them - why can't you just send a confirmation email to my email address?
Titillating - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
There are no social requirements to this at all. The only things it asks for are a name and an email address.TrackSmart - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
I have the same issue. This is what it says after clicking the enter button:Verification Needed
Sorry! We need you to verify that you are a real person. Please login with any of these social networks to get started:
That's a bridge to far for me...
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Interesting.So we aren't explicitly requiring social media here (I specifically wanted to avoid that situation). However it appears that the service we're using has a bot check system that we failed to account for, and that system requires a social media login if it thinks you're a bot.
Unfortunately there's nothing we can do about this before the content closes, but I apologize for the inconvenience. This isn't something we wanted to have to put you guys through.
zinfamous - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
LoL @ user comment:Crashes on Surface Book! Can't Play!
What a waste of $50 bucks, it crashes on the Surface Book i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD version. Fix this please!
App stores are such a different corner of the internet that is very unfamiliar to me.
xthetenth - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
That's weird, since Thurott went over how it plays on the SB (pretty decent all told) and SP4 i5 (lol).zinfamous - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
oh, strange. I would never even think to try it out on such a device. I have the i5/16gb SB 4 and while it is a great device, I would assume that a title like this would crush all configurations.abrowne1993 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
PSA: If you don't win you can still get the game from the Windows store for $10 by changing your region.Tifosi248F1 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Word of warning to anyone entering, the Windows Store version has some pointless restrictions applied to it in terms of settings. The game only runs in Windowed Full Screen and Vsync is forced on.With 200 keys it's pretty good odds to win one, but it's just not worth it having to switch to Windows 10 plus how the game's been crippled.
godlyatheist - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
You can buy the Win 10 store version for about $9 if you change your location in the settings. Also, those restrictions are very arbitrary and annoying.Argy - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
If I win I might even reboot to Win 10 for some time :)Inja60 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
As an older female gamer who appreciates RP games of this caliber, but who can't even win an argument, thanks for the chance. I usually buy games digitally, because honestly I am tired of being asked if I am buying a game for my son...Ugh.melted829 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
yes please..sounds like a great gameDeathReborn - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Only open to US Residents, make it abundantly clear at the top, preferably in brackets at the end of the title to avoid a bait & switch which this is. I thought AnandTech would be better than this, guess I should lower my level of trust & respect for AT in future.dungeonimp - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Hope it's more tomby this time.prime2515103 - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
lol No kidding...rickon66 - Wednesday, February 3, 2016 - link
Tomb Raider!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Hxx - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
NiceRyan1981 - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Whoops, I went straight from reading the word giveaway to filling in my details. I live in The Netherlands so probably am not eligible, sorry if I caused any inconvenience :PWas wondering though since you can buy the game on steam here, would steam codes not work? You can gift those :P
epp1983 - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
"Good luck to everyone..." except those in the "Rest of the World".Joe_S - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Does anyone know when you get your code?Titillating - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Please give it a few hours. I have to send out all the codes manually through email, and it took me long enough just to remove all the non-US entries. I've got a few things going on that take priority over this, but I'll try to have the game codes sent out to everybody by the end of today.vanteo - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Got mine! Thanks AnandTechHxx - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Wow i never win these contests. Thank you so much. Awesome gameAreyes12013 - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
Super sad I didn't win. And I'm a US resident... Hope no mistakes were made.BMNify - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Sick of this USA only contests, at-least specify this in the article title itself, removing the Adblock whitelist for this website, the USA readers are what you care about and i am fine with it but not going to support you with adblock whitelist from now.Akrovah - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
It's actually quite a bit more complicated than a simple "we don't care about overseas audience." They actually talk about the legal issues with internation contests in the beginning of this comments section.MTDEW - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Man, I couldn't win a coin toss. :(Congrats to those who won.
Sushisamurai - Thursday, February 4, 2016 - link
Sweet deal. Thanks Kevin Ng & Microsoft. Been a loyal reader for the last 8 years.Orionsangel - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
https://youtu.be/dVwRzphKgPYleopard_jumps - Friday, February 5, 2016 - link
Need for Speed Most Wanted is now free on Origin !azrael- - Tuesday, February 9, 2016 - link
Strangely enough, for non-US residents as well...