Well, to Steam's credit they gave me a refund after I replied a bit more forcefully.
I thanked them and told them I may keep buying from Steam, but never again a preorder, that's for sure.
Of course, now I don't have access to Risen, which was brilliant, and it is too late to go get a retail copy. Steam strikes me in the end! Hopefully I can grab a copy tomorrow.

I think the issue folks were taking was not that Steam would simply refuse to do business with an individual anymore, but rather that in response to a dispute over one transaction would basically vacate every other transaction with that person in the past, without compensating them for what was taken away. I fully support the right for businesses to refuse to do business with any person, but ceasing to provide what was already paid for without refunding the money paid is a different matter entirely.
EDIT: Good to hear that things ended up working out as they should.

How anticlimatic.
I wonder if they have ways of tracking people who start complaining and once they see it's getting slightly out of hand they start doing reparations???
/ponders

All this armchair lawyering is a bit over the top, IMO.
I'd be pissed off too if I'd bought the game and found out there was that extra payload, but if you really believe this is fraud, speak to a real lawyer and see what he says. Personally, at worst I think it's disingenuous of Steam to not reveal the third-party DRM on the game (and I don't buy for one second that they don't know what, if any, third party DRM is on a game they're selling), but I doubt it's a case of fraud.
I'd take it as a lesson learned and just stop buying from them (and I'd make sure they know why).
*edit* The above was actually posted separately from the below (and slightly earlier). Not sure why it amalgamated, but it's all good. Just keep in mind I was composing the above while you posted the situation was resolved. I'd still be curious as to whether or not an actual lawyer would consider it fraud. *endedit*
Just to clear this up as I see this posted quite often when a DRM discussion crops up: yes, technically copy protection is DRM, but the majority of the time that's NOT what people are referring to when they're talking about DRM. What they're almost always referring to is on-line activations and limited activations.
Awesome! (I see my earlier reply was a tad late. Oh well).

Wow, two Steam-hate threads in one day? They're REALLY trying to curry favor with their users, aren't they?
Seriously.
I may not have been one the receiving end of Steam's wrath (for the most part, anyway), but in my opinion, it's generally a good service, and the most problems I have with it are regional restrictions and high prices for games that are probably a hundred dollars cheaper at retail here.

Well, I think that is more a flaw in the system. It is probably not built into the system to allow someone to keep their games but not buy any more (would require another level of user account), so it is an all or nothing kind of deal. And do you really see any benefit to going out of your way to test and implement a system for users who, by definition, are going to be a constant drain of funds and resources? And who will likely be a disgruntled user who will just cause crap on the forums.
And again, do we actually have any real records of people who got suspended/banned for something other than refusing to pay or acting like arses on the forums?
And it is good to hear that you got what you want. Maybe next time you'll finish going the tech support route before you try to rally an army against them? :p

Read back my posts and you'll realize i never claimed they were commiting fraud. To me they're just going about their business as usuall, treating their customers like shit, no surprise there.
The same way, i never said that there were any grounds to take them to court over this, or any of the shit they pull. Their SSA clearly states that "We, the stEAm/valVEA twats, can pretty much do whatever we want. You, the cashcows, aka customers, are going to get screwed and like it, or else it's bye bye account", so i'm aware of the fact that they excel in covering their legal asses, and that taking them to court would be a waste of time, money and energy.
There's only way to win with these morons, and that's not doing business with them, period.
In any case, the fact that they have their asses covered doens't mean that they have a fair/just business model, or that legitimate complaints should be watered down with childish analogies.
I have problems with DRM and activations in general, true.
But when it comes to stEAm, the 'everything tied in a bunch' subscription that can be taken away if you rock the boat ever so gently makes matters much worst, so yeah, i have a major problem with stEAm aswell.

Their first reply was pretty curt and left little room for reversal, they basically told me they never are obligated to inform me of DRM and it was no grounds for a refund.
Their second reply was much nicer, much more understand... might have been two different people, might have been they looked and saw how many games I bought on there, might have been they looked at the forums and saw how many people were upset. Not sure.
Either way I thanked them and told them this means I will be more likely to buy from Steam in the future, which is true. I will get exclusives on there without question.

Christ now this annoys me even more. No offense StingingVelvet but I haven't even had an "O HAI" yet. You had a problem with purchsing which was sorted out very quickly. I have no Steam access at all and I am left pissing in the wind.

I was quite surprised to get a same day reply and a same day refund, I assure you.

I was very polite, and my title was "Risen Refund Request - DRM". Even when I responded back and got more demanding and assertive, I was still very polite and used mature language.
Not sure why I got a reply and refund before you did, I honestly thought lost accounts got priority.

Actually, if you do that, Support tend to disable your account until you appologise to them.

Quite frankly that's Steam's problem. It's fine for a company to choose to not implement a gradient of account options to deal with every situation that might arise, but it's still their responsibility to deal with customer disputes in a manner that basically doesn't amount to outright theft. If you don't have the system set up for a proportional response then you'll need to come up with one on the fly each time a situation calling for one arises. Crunch the numbers and decide which one is cheaper, but nuking accounts from orbit over any dispute simply is not an acceptable response.

I was being sarcastic. My actual subject line was 'Account Disabled' and the message was just 'Tried logging in to my account and it tells me my account is disabled, can I please have a reason for this?'
Like I said I am I really nice person. I just get annoyed when I get put on the long finger.