Home The Steam Sale is changing how it handles discounts

The Steam Sale is changing how it handles discounts

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There’s three things that you can count on in life: Death, taxes, Steam sales and the Spanish Inquisition gate-crashing my words. Four! Four things! Steam Sales are usually fantastic reasons to buy games that you’ll never play, creating a massive back-log of freshly purchased titles that can be seen from space.

There’s also a trick to them, usually. One that involves playing a waiting game to get games. Sure, you can grab a game the minute it’s on Steam for a big discount. Or, maybe, just maybe said  game will be discounted even further and save you tens of cents. It’s a signature part of the Steam Sale experience, one that has both pros and cons. And now, Steam is ditching that side of their semi-regular sales.

That’s according to a notification on the Steamwork Developers Group (via Reddit), which revealed a more universal pricing structure:

In past sale events, we’ve asked for two discounts—a duration discount that runs for the length of the sale, and a feature discount that runs in the event that a game is featured on the front page. This year, to optimize the sale for customers and to allow us to feature and recommend your products in more ways to more customers, we’re asking for just one discount, to run the length of the sale.

We’ll still be highlighting top games on the front page for 24-48 hour spans, but those products will stay at their most competitive discount, before and after being featured. It’s not a major change, but it does make the sale a lot more valuable for customers, and it allows us to build sale tools that highlight and recommend products all sale long, instead of just during front page features.

So no more Flash or Daily sales then. There’s most likely a number of other reasons why Steam is going this route, although I’d bet easy money that one of those reasons is too prepare for the inevitable rush of folks who’ll abuse the hell out of the refund system in place. You’ll probably see the first of those cha-cha-changes soon, as its rumoured that the Autumn sale will kick off on November 25.

Last Updated: November 19, 2015

38 Comments

  1. Meh. So they’re making the already boring sales even more boring. Flash sales & daily deals during the big sales were the only thing that kept me looking at the site regularly. The big titles always come back on the last day at the same prices anyway.

    Reply

    • Hammersteyn

      November 19, 2015 at 13:19

      Maybe their site took a bigger beating than the Toys R Us website a few weeks ago.

      Reply

      • Corrie

        November 19, 2015 at 13:20

        That I still cannot understand that, whomever was browsing that site needs serious help

        Reply

    • Corrie

      November 19, 2015 at 13:22

      True I enjoyed those quick sales, and I’ve read a few theories on neogaf around it regarding that quite a few people miss those sales and generally site traffic is quiet until the last days of sale.

      Valve should’ve capabilities and made deals only available on their mobile app since apart from gmail, the steam mobile app should always be installed on every device.

      Reply

      • EmmyG

        November 19, 2015 at 13:57

        My guess is that it’s the refund system forcing this change. If every single title going on sale means suddenly having to deal with hundreds or thousands of refund requests from someone who says “It’s cheaper now!”… there’s got to be a lot of overhead cost there.

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          November 19, 2015 at 14:16

          Good point, never thought of that.

          Reply

        • Corrie

          November 19, 2015 at 14:46

          I did read something similar but that seems to probably be the main cause for the sudden change of sale tactic

          Steam could atleast have some form of system in place to keep those who love the old system and those whom cannot wait both happy

          Reply

        • Blogvader

          November 19, 2015 at 18:05

          Agreed, and honestly, I’m fine with paying slightly more if it means I’m not stuck with a dud.

          Reply

    • Captain JJ the Goo

      November 19, 2015 at 14:06

      Yea. Now you’ll take an hour or two, run through the sales and that’s it. No reason to go back to it.
      No reason for the sale to span four days.
      I think this isn’t a good move. Now the sales are going to seem so boring.

      Reply

      • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

        November 19, 2015 at 14:08

        I dunno man, the sales lost the appeal for me lately. Minigames and fluff and cards and whatnot, really stresses me out with the fomo

        Reply

        • Captain JJ the Goo

          November 19, 2015 at 14:09

          The flash sales and rewards are what kept the sales interesting to me. Now it’ll be a moment of excitement and then that’s it. It was one of the few things that made me feel like a kid again.

          Reply

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 14:10

            I thought it was secretly applying eye-liner that made you feel like a kid?

          • Captain JJ the Goo

            November 19, 2015 at 14:13

            Make-up as a kid? Oh hell no.

  2. Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

    November 19, 2015 at 13:23

    Yusssssss I’m being paid on the 25th of Nov!

    Reply

    • Hammersteyn

      November 19, 2015 at 13:25

      • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

        November 19, 2015 at 13:27

        Lolwut he says not to a chick with no pants on

        Reply

        • Hammersteyn

          November 19, 2015 at 13:34

          They’re ducks, their pants will get wet when they swim?

          Reply

          • HvR

            November 19, 2015 at 13:37

          • Hammersteyn

            November 19, 2015 at 13:40

            I don’t want to play anymore

          • Greylingad[CNFRMD]

            November 19, 2015 at 14:02

            Oh man…

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 13:42

            Nee sies dude, this is a family site, pls remove that image ASAP

          • Hammersteyn

            November 19, 2015 at 13:43

            I’ll never use curly straws again XD

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 13:45

            Tried to edit it out, did not work, deleted that.

            Where did I put the brain bleach again…

          • Gavin Mannion

            November 19, 2015 at 13:46

            weird I tried to edit it as well now and can’t for some reason… weird Disqus bug

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 13:47

            Weird indeed, almost as weird as the damn image

          • Hammersteyn

            November 19, 2015 at 14:02

            Next to the duck feed?
            *Runs

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 14:05

            I’d rather gaze at your SilverButt before I see that image again

          • HvR

            November 19, 2015 at 13:52

          • Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

            November 19, 2015 at 14:29

            Great, now I need to delete that article

          • Captain JJ the Goo

            November 19, 2015 at 14:38

            I remember that one.

  3. Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja

    November 19, 2015 at 13:28

    They should have a hat-sale, they’ll make millions

    Reply

  4. HvR

    November 19, 2015 at 13:34

    It is because they do not want to double discount HL3
    https://media.giphy.com/media/RL0xU1daTlMoE/giphy.gif

    Reply

  5. Captain JJ the Goo

    November 19, 2015 at 14:04

    This takes some of the excitement out of a sale. Then the sale only needs to be two days also.

    Reply

    • Pariah

      November 19, 2015 at 15:02

      Yeah. Pretty much can check all the games you’re interested in on day 1, and buy if you want. Then just leave Steam store closed and play the games. The sale isn’t exciting any more, but at least you know the day 1 sales are going to be the sales throughout. I’ve often bought a game on day 2, only for a flash sale to half the price on day 4. Still a good pickup, but it burns a bit. Now, that won’t happen at least.

      Reply

  6. Enigma

    November 19, 2015 at 14:19

    I used to love waiting for 8 ‘o clock every evening to check what was on the daily flash sales. I guess they’re making it a little less exciting by doing this, at least it’ll benefit those who happened to have previously missed the daily/flash sales.
    Only 6 days left to go, then it’s Lord Gaben time.

    Reply

  7. Captain JJ the Goo

    November 19, 2015 at 14:25

    Proof that the few who abuse the system of refunds are screwing over the rest of the community by making the sales boring.
    This is the DRM/piracy-effect in a different disguise.

    Reply

  8. Jaime J. Denizard

    November 19, 2015 at 16:54

    to*

    Reply

  9. ALBKenshiro

    November 20, 2015 at 17:47

    Pirate > Wait For Sale > Buy!

    Reply

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