But still someone might want that game. Why let it go to waste and remain unused?
That happened with me. PID was on my wishlist until someone gave it to me. And I didn't even know it had been given away for free.
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You know this is actually a double-edged sword really. Sometimes even really good triple A games are simply given away for free. Does it mean that they should disappear from giveaway list on SteamGifts? I mean if they start removing every single game that was given away for free at some point somewhere, they might as well get to removing the whole list at some point and nobody will be able to give away anything.
Sure you can say this is absurd and such thing would never happen, but the truth is that the list is already missing some very good titles for this very same reason and it's not like those games would turn into free to play, no they are still sold on Steam and not exactly cheap. Good games don't grow on trees and the quality of this website still highly relies on the quality of the games that are still available in the list and offered by giveaway creators, so when good titles get removed, also quality and variety of the giveaways will be affected negatively.
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It's still possible to give away free stuff in the forum, via a puzzle or whatever. :) You just can't get more precious CV for free with them. :)
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There are maybe 100-150 games/DLC removed from the list.
Out of, what, 4000+ on Steam now? Just base games?
Probably an average of 1-2 a week since free keys became commonplace. There are definitely more than 1-2 games added to Steam each week. The idea that every game would be free, or even bundled, just isn't right.
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While it is true that there are many games added now and then to Steam, quantity does not always mean quality and if we remove a few games of high quality from giveaway list on SteamGifts and replace them with higher amount of new games but those new games would be of lower quality, in the result it will not be the same and it will inevitably reflect on the quality of giveaways in the long run too.
For some reason we all somehow assume that everyone here is aware of that there are games given away for free for a limited time and we all manage to grab them, but it's not always true and the only way to get them for most of us will be to purchase them on Steam, again it's not like they would really become free just because they were given away at one point for a limited amount of time, so I think that they should return to giveaway list after some fair "timeout" time after which even the price on Steam may be lower than before so that the points that count towards user's level will not get as high as they would if the giveaway was made at the time when the game is given away for free and also this time would minimize abusing the free keys.
As far as I know, there are still fake giveaways - one game given away disguised as a different game to avoid this rule and also there are still users who manage to create giveaways for the games before they are removed from the list, in other words, there will always be people who go under radar so to speak so removing the games from list isn't exactly your bulletproof solution in the first place, so making them unavailable for a limited time only would make more sense in my opinion and it would also make it more fair towards the others who don't want to abuse the system and want to enjoy the good giveaways including the games that would be unavailable otherwise due to this rule.
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I'm sorry, but I'm having a hard time figuring out the point(s) you are trying to make, here. Perhaps I should come back and try again when I'm more awake?
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I apologize for a long post, but it's a long text for a reason. I was trying to explain in-depth why I believe that the current system of removing games that were once given away for free (temporarily) is lacking, as it's more than clear that it's not really serving its purpose since it still doesn't prevent those who want to abuse free codes to boost their level here and in the same time it just takes away the chance for regular users to get these games here once these games are removed from the list.
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If a free game gets 0P you will not see many giveaways for it. That kind of user who tries to trick the system is the same who wants to get free CV. No free CV=no massive free game giveaways.
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I believe Gameminer uses this 0 point method or something similar for mass free GA items.
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This is by far the best solution. Free game=0 points, you don't get CV but the winner can enjoy a game.
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I don't get it.
Edit: I think I get it but my answer is no. Not so great activity because most users should already get that particular game for free.
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This is correct. The servers wouldn't be overloaded. And if Hyoshi thinks they would be, why/who says that this is the case?
Think of all the GAs we already have... how can some 0P ones overload the system.
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I'd actually suggest regular Points (according to Steam price - if you can't get the game for free anymore, your only other option is to buy it, why should it be completely free here?), no CV (should be possible like with bundle games, but lowering those 15% to 0%)*. This way it wouldn't get thousands of entries from everyone who sees the GA, but just people who might have an interest in it and want to spend some points on it (mostly, there's always people who'll enter anything)
*I'm not a programmer, I don't actually know if this is possible, but from the way bundle games are handled, I think it is
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Good idea, and possible to do. In fact, max points for giveaways over 100$ are 100P for the entrants but the creator gets full CV (if the game/pack is not bundled).
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Another wayto deal with it is removing these games temporarily (let's say for a month). This should helps to avoid overloading servers and eveeyone will be happy. Of course 0p still should be applied for free games.
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Yes, I don't see why it shouldn't work. Showing grayed-out options is better for letting people explicitly know that they are not available.
Great idea.
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I think no one ever put it that way, great idea!
I and many more people suggested to make them 0p no-CV undetectable and blahblahblah, but why not?
The idea to just grey them out and show a message is actually great! I'm sure it won't stop people from doing free-games GAs, but at least it would limit the problem!
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I don't think extra information would hurt, and for the sort of people who use the forums to ask questions it would probably help... :) But as for the rest of the people... :)
There's a link to the FAQ on every page, and they haven't clicked it once. Why would they read one more useless thing on their screens? :) Guess we can dream... :)
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I asked for this when this version of the site was still in development. Unfortunately never came to be.
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Also please don't call them free games. Man I wish I would have a chance at Lucius from days ago when it was actually given away for free, but I missed that one and "FREE" tag went away with it so yeah.. Lucius costs 27.99 EUR (currently discounted for 9.51 EUR) on Steam.. Why Steam can't give it to us for free if it was given away for free? Well it's for the same reason why I think that removing these temporarily free games is a bad idea in its current shape and form.
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they will probably select another game with a similar name, as they do now.
this is what will happen when someone would want to give away a free game, for example, Anomaly: Warzone Earth
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This was exactly what I was about to post.
Just look at what happened when Stealth Inc 2 was given away on HB. A boatload of Stealth Bastard Deluxe GAs showed up. Then you tell the creator it's a misleading GA, and they just don't care. The worst is their altruistic claim of "I just wanted to give a game to someone!: ... but when you suggest giving it away to a friend or on the forums, they just ignore you. It's all about the CV for them.
Dishonest people are going to be dishonest regardless.
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you're assuming everyone is just dishonest about it, but what about people who are still relatively new here and got a previously free game in a bundle, only they weren't around when it was free and don't even know about that. Maybe they even bought a copy on Steam to give it away. Now they want to make a giveaway and can't, for a game they purchased like any other. It's obviously confusing in those cases.
Dishonest people are still going to try to circumvent the rules, but this might lower the number of those kinds of posts asking why game xy isn't on the list.
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I was disagreeing with the OP - I voted YES. It's a good idea -- but it's only going to be helpful for those honest people who actually follow the rules.
Unfortunately, I've seen a lot more of the dishonest variety - you warn them politely that a game can't be given away because it's free, give them the link to the FAQ, and they reply that they don't care or they ignore you -- and the OP's addition will do nothing for that situation. So far I've only come across one or two people who have deleted a misleading GA because they didn't know they were breaking the rules, and I've come across (literally) dozens of the other variety that just don't care.
Perhaps I'm just a pessimist, but I see a lot more dishonest people creating misleading GAs than honest people. :/
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hmm maybe. it's obviously better than the current system.
anyway, i changed my vote to yes since it would help new people who don't know how free games work in GAs.
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Yes, I've had that problem before ... I had to ask in discussions, why I can't create a giveaway for a paticular game, I got my answer, but I really
like your idea, because it's always better if you don't even have to ask in the first place.
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Server load is a joke excuse. Just look at every other game giveaway site that includes them. You could even include a separate index that includes only 0P games so they never get re-checked (i.e. never causes actual server load other than standard giveaway creation/entry).
If even bobafatt asked for this to be implemented, and no one ever did it, I doubt it'll be added even though the entire community supports it. Sadly, SG is not a democracy.
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I've made the suggestion that instead of removing them from the list, just make them all 1p to enter and its worth 0cv.
This way the proper ones can be used for giveaways, and no matter how many are actually used, they get 0cv for it. And leave a little message about them say "This game will provide no CV, it was given out free in massive amounts, don't bother asking why you CV did not go up" Actually make this the button to submit the giveaway that way they can't say they didn't read it.
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I noticed a "FREE" game I gave away on another site since I had bought it and had a receipt had my greatest number of entries of all games I ever gave away.(almost 13,000 entries. Yes thousands). So much for everyone having the free games. I know I miss most of them and would enter.
I would agree with the 1 pt and 0 CV. (Though since more people are missing these games than other it may be a cause of great server stress.)
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Maybe we could do some "polls" with a "free" games and choose one a week to unban a single/few freebies so the servers won't be so loaded and when the week is over,we can choose a new one and close the previous...
The chosen games will become "bundled" one so people won't get really much CV but still can give it away and get some value added...
Yes, crazy idea, which won't take place anywhere in the universe.
BTW: Left4Dead and Borderlands were actually given away for free by Steam ages ago but are they unavailable to give away?
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Left4Dead 2 was given away by Valve/Steam for a very short time, but you had to add it to your library to actually get it. You could not put it into your inventory so you could not actually give it away to anyone else. And if you already owned it you could not get it again.
I don't remember Borderlands being given out like that, but if it was given out by Steam like L4D2 was, again that means it had to be added to your library.
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thanks!
Actually thought I can't give it away at all =\
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The free Borderlands 1 thing requires using the "Borderlands Granting Tool" in the "Tools" section of your library with a physical Borderlands 1 disc - it checks you are using the correct disc, and if so adds the game to your Steam library.
So, naturally, pirates tried with a disc image, instead of the real thing... If you ever see a brand new Steam account with all the free games, plus Borderlands 1, that's what is happening... I assume eventually Valve will close the free Borderlands spigot, like they did with NBA 2K9. Thanks, pirates. :(
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Borderlands is "free" if you install pirated version and use granter tool on steam. 'legit' deal.
Jokes on you tho, you won't get dlc and it costs more than goty edition.
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