Do You Hate Steam Sales To?
Like this?
http://imgur.com/7E5DRGC
I'm just testing my Photoshop skills...
Comment has been collapsed.
= .= YES, Especially when they choose the Best time for every big event -------------Exam week
Comment has been collapsed.
Hate when that happens especially for Fall Semester during college exams and plus work is super busy and has mandatory overtime which means no game time even if huge sale on steam site.
Comment has been collapsed.
Yes this exactly. Godammit steam. I was so confused, didn't know whether to game my time away or revise!
Comment has been collapsed.
$80? Perhaps you aren't taking the right opportunities to get the greatest value out of your money. ;)
Comment has been collapsed.
Steam sales around 4-5 years ago were among, if not the absolute best ways to get games for the cheapest. Then they started to focus on adding streaming, market, workshop, and pretty much anything but store and support improvement. This is why even Origin can be considered a superior service now… except that it is a whole lot more expensive still.
Comment has been collapsed.
We got alternatives to Steam now, but the Steam sales haven't actually gotten worse...
And what kind of improvements would you suggest for the store? Especially if the workshop and the market don't count... Those are two features that have a large effect on what it means to buy and sell through the Steam store.
Comment has been collapsed.
Quality service. This whole two week/two hour refund is just a small damage control against the sheer mountain of crap that has flooded Steam, especially through Greenlight. When Bad Rats somehow got on Steam, before Greenlight was even an idea, it was sort of a spectacle, because the quality of games on Steam up until that point was generally quite high.
Now, they just let anything there, especially if the creator makes trading cards, because it gives them money, and damn the rest. Essentially, Valve's policy seems quantity and income instead of even the smallest shred of quality.
And with the increasing of frequency of site outages, the legendary dreadful and unresponsive, plus quite incompetent support, Steam seems like nothing but an anarchic flea market where the best video game companies try to keep up with the pace of cheap, broken stuff the greedy scammers flood the market with. And even worse, now even the large companies started to release half-finished garbage since they learnt that people buy anything as long as you put free trading cards on it, and they can forge any statistics for the investors.
Comment has been collapsed.
The refund thing is actually unrelated to the quality of the games that are being sold, they had to choose between allowing refunds or stopping service to Europe and Australia.
Valves policy is based on supply and demand. The demand is measured using the Greenlight system, this then shows that people have enough of an interest in the lower quality stuff to make it viable. Also, there were only a few site outages that weren't caused by routine maintenance or DDOS, at least outside of the major sales (things get a bit overwhelmed during the sales when suddenly millions of people go to the store at once). People actually WANT the games for some reason...
For that, you need to blame the people who vote on the low quality stuff (often for the promise of getting the game cheaply through a bundle when it passes through Greenlight, thus breaking the system with bribes), and not Valve that tries to be more open towards smaller developers that may actually have good products they could never sell otherwise. You can't possibly expect any store to check every game thats offered and play it through to see if there are issues, not without taking a much larger portion of the money at least... Most of the alternatives that accept games from indie developers and small companies (and not just big companies) either have their doors open to all submissions (like itch.io) or only let well known titles in their system.
The policy from the big companies isn't related to the quality of things on Steam either. That is an issue thats been around since the introduction of easy patching systems, as they can just release a broken game on the scheduled and patch it later... And even before then, some companies had that same kind of policy, relying largely on mods to remove bugs (Bethesda, I'm looking at you!).
Comment has been collapsed.
I have every intention to play all of the games on my backlog eventually. that could mean i'll have to retire early (say 40yo) and start playing 24hour a day. :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Steam sales have been BS this summer. First Devil May Cry Franchise on sale but the bundles were more expensive then buying games seperatly then ARK the new dino game was on sale before Summer sale for 17percent off then suddenly it was on Daily Deal a day ago was still on 17percent off o.o.
Comment has been collapsed.
God I hate Crapcom now. I use to love them for great their great games but they screw over their fans. They even stated if DMC4 Remake doesn't sell well even though its the exact same game but with new characters. And they even killed Megaman X series off despite huge fanbase so now all the people who know and love Megaman series went to buy Mighty No 9 just to spite Capcom(Buying it on PC, and Xbox One).
Comment has been collapsed.
Greeeed. :D And idk why they killed off the franchise, but I never played the games, so I can't judge that. Also, the Re5-DLC tha finally came to PC costs like... A lot of money for a little ported and drm-removed stuff. And the sale-price is just ridiculous. Meh!
Comment has been collapsed.
Same, had $110 in Steam wallet, spent $15. Nothing really caught my eye except a few little games. Too many games on weak-ass 50% or less discount haha!
Comment has been collapsed.
I want that game so much! But I set myself a rule that I won't buy anything in the steam sale unless it's at least 50% off.
Comment has been collapsed.
Lets be honest with yourself - do you hate steam sales? Or your own lack or selfcontrol?
Valve didn't make you buy anything. ;)
People wonder why Valve does the things it does - then blame Valve for bad games on its platform.
Meanwhile they just keep buying the bad games and promoting the behaviour.
Valve is a business, they're here to make money. As long as people keep buying they'll keep delivering.
Now if you think buying games you won't play is a problem. Its time to be more discerning when it comes to purchasing decisions.
As tempting as the sales are, don't buy games off-hand. Make a list for yourself, or better yet a few lists...
Split it up in games you REALLY want to play (and you know you will play).
Games you would like to play or are interested in, but would not be your first pick if you had something better available.
Then get a final lineup of titles that you'd purely consider if they were cheap.
Compare that lineup to both your demands for quality and your time available.
If you think a game does not meet your standards - consider whether its worth the money and whether you'd get around to playing it.
If you don't have the time because you have other games you're playing remember that in a few months another sale is gonna hit and even if Steam doesn't have a sale there are half a dozen other platforms that do.
Comment has been collapsed.
Eh, I can see where the struggle with getting a good deal comes from.
But at the same time the math is pretty obvious.
"The next Bastion" is gonna be a rare thing. Any discount you'd get on it would not outweigh the number of bundles you'd get if you would not play or enjoy them.
More importantly, bundles do inherently devalue content.
Again, weigh the chance of getting 10 mediocre games against the chance of getting 1 or a few better ones.
At the end of the day you get what you pay for and the industry will respond to our spending habits.
With a large share of the audience buying more and more from bundles. They will start making games to match.
Which is why we've seen such an increase in mediocre and shitty games. (Bundles make it easier to offset the investment and turn a profit through sheer volume and low cost involved.)
Its a double-edged sword that can and will cut both ways.
Comment has been collapsed.
I agree with the general gist, but I think that most devs don't make games based on what sells. The reason we see more mediocre and shitty games is simply that we see more games. Creating a game and putting it on sale is easier than in the past, that's why we have these games.
Comment has been collapsed.
Its basic economics. While it is true that some people create something because they REALLY want to.
These passion projects tend to carry a certain quality to them.
The large amount of bad games do not exist because there is a sudden influx of passionate (but inexperienced) developers.
It is because of demand. People want more games but more importantly people want cheaper games.
And in this day and age the "Well its only $x..." barrier has gotten very low.
This is why the mobile platform is thriving and why sales, discounts and shovelware are aswell.
If making a game costs you $10k, then you only have to get that number of sales at $1 a piece.
The risk of that backfiring would lose you at most $10k - but given the number of people active on bundle sites, Steam and other distribution platforms (same holds true for iOS and android) the chance that that won't hit is negligable.
And that is ignoring advertising revenue through views and clicks.
Yes, making a game and distributing it is easier than ever. But if everyone were to refuse to spend any money on these bad titles.
Then they would pop up a lot less frequently. Risk vs Reward and Supply vs Demand are the names of the game.
This same theory plays into why we see bigger budget titles decrease in quality.
It simply isn't as profitable to make a really GOOD game than it is to nickel and dime.
If it were easy to make and distribute GOOD games, we'd be seeing a lot more of them than their shovelware counterparts.
Relatively few people in the industry are exclusively motivated by passion. And the ones that are generally are dependant on people that aren't to get funding. This in turn is what enabled crowdfunding (as both the developer and the consumer want better games).
But then still you have the greedy and inexperienced developers mucking things up.
The majority of developers are ultimately if not outright motivated by, atleast heavily reliant on financial viability. (And this isn't a bad thing per se...)
If they don't make enough money they can't keep making games so keeping costs low and reaching as high amount of sales is essential.
And many people aren't bothered by the morality. (Hence abusive monetization models exist that play on "addiction" tendencies we long ago banned in other fields such as gambling.)
Its finding that thin line and balance on it that is so hard. For both consumer AND creator.
We try to get as much bang for our buck. They do the same. Our motivations are in opposite directions though.
Comment has been collapsed.
You're wrong on several counts, or at least you put too much weight on the less important factors. Let me explain one idea by an analogy to another field: writing. People have always written crap. They sent it to publishers, and the publishers rejected it and that was the end of it. Then publishing came. Suddenly, anyone who wrote a book can publish it on Amazon for free. So all the crappy books people write can go directly to being published without going through an editor. The result: a glut of mediocre and bad books. It's not because people suddenly demand crappy books more than good ones, it's just because there's no filter.
It's the same with games. It's easy to sell games now. You create one, you can find a place to sell it. Even Steam is pretty easy to get on these days. Add to that the ease of creating games, which is also quite new. You can get Unity for free, get some free resources (or buy them for cheap) and create a game. Or use RPG Maker, or whatever. So suddenly all the people who wanted to create games can create games and can publish them. Nothing to do with demand for crappy games.
"Relatively few people in the industry are exclusively motivated by passion."
I'd say that nearly 100% of them are motivated by passion. "Exclusively" is just your way to justify your cynicism. But really, how many people go to any particular creative field if they're not interested in it? No, people who create games are people who want to create games. Sure, they would rather make money off it, because it allows them to create more games, but they are creating games because they're interested in that first and money second. If that wasn't the case, they'd go to another field.
Comment has been collapsed.
There is a marginal difference between people who create what amounts to "fanfiction" and people that try to make a living off of something.
Yea sure, the low entry threshold will enable a lot of "fanfiction" to reach platforms such as Steam.
Which enables people who have made something in their free time to kick it on their because their "investment" isn't valued in money. They didn't do it from a professional perspective so they don't need that return of investment either.
Meanwhile we have a large number of developers who are motivated by money.
There are countless companies that churn out one mobile app after another in the hopes that they hit the next "Clash of Clans" or "Flappy Bird".
They aren't motivated by passion. They don't care about the quality or content of their game. They just care about one thing and that is revenue.
While fanfiction will occur regardless of demand. This latter group only exists because there are people that will buy or download games regardless of quality of content.
So you get some guy with more money than sense and he sees the success garnered by titles such as Clash of Clans and they want a piece of that pie. Suddenly we see a hundred clones with similar traits, the one worse than the other.
Are these games made because people had a great idea they thought they could make? Or are these games made because someone figured that dropping $10k on a rookie developer to make a Clash of Clans knockoff would probably return that investment easily when that title is subsequently dropped on the iOS appstore?
So we get countless programmers who have a passion for programming but who either do not have a creative bone in their body or they don't have the capital to pursue their own dreams.
They end up being hired by a company that has the money and business sense but has zero interest in making a good game.
If they could afford it they'd make a passion project - but they need to pay the rent so rather than risking going independant they become a cog in the machine. So that they can use their free time to work on their own project or so that perhaps one day they can take a year off to work on their own thing.
And yes... I am a cynic. I'm also a realist.
Just because someone would want to make a good game. Does not mean they get the chance to.
And people don't make "clones" because they are driven by passion for what they're doing.
They do so because that is what is 'popular' right now. Because they know people are hungry for more after playing popular game here.
Comment has been collapsed.
You're discussing mobile space now. I assume you were thinking of it before too. But it's irrelevant to your original point, which was PC based, and I don't see these things happening on PC as much.
So while you think of yourself as realist, the fact that you need to move to another space to back your claims shows that it's your cynicism speaking, not realism. (But then, most cynics think they're realists.)
By the way, the mobile example also goes against your claim that consumer habits in buying bad games is what affects which games are created. The example you give for opportunistic developers are of clones of simple but successful games. Clearly they're not thinking: "crappy games make small sums of money, let's try that". They're thinking: "some simple games make tons of money, we want that."
Comment has been collapsed.
The market is inherently intertwined.
Practices that thrive in the mobile market are creeping into the PC market slowly but steadily.
You only have to look at the average releases list over the course of the year on Steam to realize how many titles fall under those very same business practices.
Infact, there are publishers that do exclusively that.
The PC market isn't the pristine environment of AAA-titles and high quality content that it used to be.
Its riddled with gunk and shovelware. And we as consumers play an active part in supporting that by buying whatever hits our front page.
Denying that reality does not change it nor does it make it go away.
Holding on to a few "good titles" as proof that this is false is denying reality and hiding from your part of the problem.
Even the big publishers are resorting more and more to releasing incomplete titles and resorting to bad micro-transactions that do not represent any value.
Comment has been collapsed.
You're still trying to argue your assumption of causation as reality. Of course there is more "lower quality" stuff, which is explained by the increased ease of getting published. You haven't shown that there's a need for anything additional to explain it. That's a simple explanation, and in fact it's also an underlying requirement for your own reasoning, so I feel that Occam's razor applies here.
Also, although your stated hypothesis is that developers create crappy games on purpose in order to capitalise on (supposed) small but existing demand for them, the "proof" you've shown is that developers are trying to copy successful games, which as I said before doesn't support that hypothesis one bit.
So clearly your perception of reality hinges on some dubious assumptions.
Comment has been collapsed.
If everyone had the time and budget to release GTA V they would - they don't however.
So they settle for the next best thing.
They try to copy the elements of a popular big title and cut out as much of the BS to save on costs.
They then rush development and push out a crappy clone.
Similarly because of the inherent risks involved plenty of developers will push a dozen $10k title rather than a single $100k title - as the odds of getting a $10k revenue is more probable than a single $100k.
Its splitting the risks across a lot of small investments rather than a single large one.
Sure if the large one pays out then you're solid - but the odds of the large one backfiring is significant when you're not willing (or able) to go the whole way.
Moreover, to make such a large investment you need to have a large bankroll to begin with and the willingness to risk all that money on a potential payout. So again, we look at risk versus reward.
You can either make a really great game. Or you can make a mediocre game betting that enough people will buy it on the basis that "Its only $x".
You can earn a profit through quality, but you can also earn a profit through quantity.
Hence flooding the market.
If your assumption were to be true. Wouldn't we be seeing a lot more games with good content rather than the shovelware we're looking at today? Moreover, if all these folks were motivated primarily by passion - then please do explain the prominence of abusive free-to-play models and so on.
For a bunch of amateur creators, they seem to be oddly well aware of how economics work and how they can make their shitty title financially viable.
Much unlike the passion projects that are currently burning in early access because the creator wanted to make a good game but lacked the business sense to pull it off.
Comment has been collapsed.
It's actually something interested that could be checked, although there will be need for someone with web programming skills for this. It's possible to take the list of games on Steam and check their statistics.
For example: take all games with bad scores, find the devs for them, check how many games each of them has, and whether there's improvement in quality over time.
As for your questions, first of all, free to play is hardly a force in PC games. In particular going back to your original point about bundles, the F2P offerings there are rare (and are mostly, or only, MMO and mobile).
I don't know how familiar you are with a creative scene, but I've been on writing forums and critique groups in the past and I read enough comments from game devs. Sure, everyone wants to make money off their passion, and the more astute devs/writers can learn how to do that effectively, but they predominantly create because that's what they want to do, not because of some misguided notion that it's easy money.
The majority of games don't make back the money invested in them. I include time in that. Someone could use the time it took to create a game and work at McDonald's, and get more money. That's true for most creative endeavours. If you persist and create more and more works, and build a fan base, then you will likely end up somewhat successful. If you happen to create something good from the get go, you might be successful from the get go. But that's the exception rather than the rule.
For every successful creator there are a hundred wannabes. Read the stories in a critique group (where people already have a notion that they need to improve), listen to wannabes on X-Factor, there are tons of people who think they can do stuff but don't have the skill. How many do you think go: "if I go on X-Factor and sing badly it will give me enough exposure to make some money off singing badly" compared to those who think: "I sing well, so if I go to X-Factor I could get to the top, and even if not, it's exposure?"
Comment has been collapsed.
I wish more people would, and not just during sales.
But I suspect that the day a video game (or anything else for that matter) will be judged for its actual qualities rather than promotional nonsense is still far off...
Comment has been collapsed.
If you don't have time to make a list then you don't have time to play any games either.
So you don't buy anything.
Seriously, it shouldn't take you long to come up with a basic set of standards of what you expect or demand from a video game.
When faced with the choice between burning money in games you either won't like or won't get to play anyway or only spending money on games you know you'll like and you'll play. The choice should be quite simple.
Not having time to make a list? There is no reason why you should not have time to do some basic budgetting but do have time to play multiple video games.
I can see why you would RATHER play video games than manage your finances (especially if you're younger and don't have anything else to spend your money on).
But lets get reasonable here - if you are unwilling to do some research and make sure you only buy games you know will be worth it.
Then you're also not in a position to complain afterwards. You're responsible for your own acquisitions.
Comment has been collapsed.
Then you have no right to complain about failed purchases. simple as that.
In all seriousness though. Getting a baseline of standards and putting them against a new release takes less than 15~30 minutes.
And it can save you from spending $60 on a bad game you'll never play.
Comment has been collapsed.
Here is a plan for you:
Want 10 games>>>Bought 2>>>Heavy playing>>>Whoops it's winter, another big sale, fast all games are cheaper again>>>Buy 2>>>Playing>>>Wow it's summer again. Between in these points, there is a chance to get another 2-3 games in a bundle for one dollar, and you can win a giveaway too.
This sale wasn't your last opportunity, to get your stuff cheaper.
Comment has been collapsed.
I'm amused at how people seem to act like it is.
OH NO, its on a big sale. Better buy it quick incase I want to play it later.
six months down the line - I hate sales, I have so much stuff I don't play...
Yea... You hate sales... Way to be honest with yourself. XD
Comment has been collapsed.
I love them but that's what makes me hate them! So much money that I needed to save gone now!
Comment has been collapsed.
I'm just sad that Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag wasn't cheaper =/
I mean, even about six months or so ago it was cheaper than in this sale (Back then it costed 30€ and was 75% off, now it costs 20€ but only get's 60% off =/) I had really hoped for it to go for 4,99€ =/
Comment has been collapsed.
"i just spent 80 dollars on games I'll only play for a couple of hours" sry mate but this is stupidest thing i read all daydid anyone force you to buy them? if not its your own problem . or you just want to brag on the internet how much did u spend money for no reason then just spending it.....
Comment has been collapsed.
of you are ashamed of something you are not going to anounsid with a megaphone in public and even now u have steam refunds so his "problem" is not even a problem now
Comment has been collapsed.
I have no idea who the guy is or how his mind works. So I will not presume to guess his intentions.
However I can certainly say that posting stuff online is normal even if you not want to "brag". Seen plenty of people post stuff they are having trouble with. Hell, I post it quite often the number of hours I have on certain games, even though its nothing to brag about. Its more like a mark of shame that I have spent this many hours in certain games and completely neglected the others. Of course that was before. Now I don't really care about my hours, but there was a point when I did. Seeing comments can lead to an alternative point of view, which is why people talk about stuff that might be troubling them.
On the other hand I still have no idea how it can be a brag. The only way it qualifies as a brag is if you believe its something that is worth bragging about.
Comment has been collapsed.
I only bought the games I wanted for a very long time. The only thing that sucks is that this next month is the final month of my semester, which usually means not sleeping all that much to finish all the work.
Now I have 7 games I've been really looking forward to, and I must not play them for the next 30 days, when I'd crave some relax time the most.
Comment has been collapsed.
It'll make the month after your finals all the better.
Comment has been collapsed.
What I hate I when you buy something and the sales for that game are increased the next day.
Comment has been collapsed.
736 Comments - Last post 1 minute ago by eeev
19 Comments - Last post 2 minutes ago by vlbastos
9 Comments - Last post 14 minutes ago by nonegiven
464 Comments - Last post 15 minutes ago by duville
4 Comments - Last post 17 minutes ago by katukinabarra
6 Comments - Last post 17 minutes ago by FateOfOne
7 Comments - Last post 33 minutes ago by Bigshrimp
2,115 Comments - Last post 16 seconds ago by Eudoxia
26 Comments - Last post 3 minutes ago by nonegiven
443 Comments - Last post 3 minutes ago by Corbian
91 Comments - Last post 9 minutes ago by eeev
25 Comments - Last post 13 minutes ago by herbesdeprovence
3,427 Comments - Last post 20 minutes ago by pizurk
129 Comments - Last post 26 minutes ago by Momo1991
Seriously though, i just spent 80 dollars on games I'll only play for a couple of hours. :(
Comment has been collapsed.