🚀 go-pugleaf

On Tue, 24 Nov 2015 14:56:39 +0300, "Andrew Rybenkov"
<aryb...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Tue, 24 Nov 2015 00:18:12 +0300, Zaghadka <zagh...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 23 Nov 2015 19:19:20 +0300, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg, Andrew
>> Rybenkov wrote:

>>> http://www.pcgamer.com/steams-autumn-and-winter-sales-will-ditch-daily-deals-and-flash-sales/
>>> It seems Gabe have earned all money he wanted.

>> Meh. Games will still be on sale, just not on "obsessively click the
>> refresh button" sale. I'll wait to see what the longer term sales look
>> like. I'm guessing, pretty good.

>Flash sales were a major device to lure people (me, for example)
>to buy games they did not plan to buy.
>Obviously there will not be crazy "80-90% off" anymore.
>Steam/Valve/Gabe became rich and boring.

Gotta agree; this pretty much kills my interest in the seasonal sales
now. I almost never bought a game at the "duration sale" price; if I
didn't see it at the "flash-sale" super-low price, it just wasn't a
consideration. I bought a lot of games at flash-sale prices though...

Of course, there have been a number of articles that show that these
flash-sales really aren't that beneficial to the developers /
publishers. Yes, they get a lot of sales but the lower price means
they didn't make as much money as they would have had they kept it at
the "duration sale" price. 

The flash-sale prices are mainly to draw attention to either the
retailer (e.g., Steam) or the product. But seeing as Steam is already
huge and every PC gamer worth his salt goes there already, there's
little advantage to Valve to maintain the sales. Big-name games don't
really need a sales-frenzy to draw in customers; they'll buy the
latest Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed regardless. Meanwhile,  the
ones who would benefit most from the "advertising" that is Flash Sales
- small Indie developers - are the ones who really can't afford it in
the first place, since it cannibalizes the full-price sales that would
keep their business afloat. 

The only ones for whom these sales are advantageous are the customers,
so it is no surprise that Steam is killing them.

Having said all that, these days I buy most of my games from GOG
anyway. Their "modern games" selection - while still significantly
behind Steam's - is becoming ever more competitive and their old-games
selection is unsurpassed. Plus, not being the "big dog" in the digital
retail space, it is still to their advantage to offer flash sales in
order to siphon customers away from Steam... like me. 


So I guess this is a plus for me: Steam and developers make more
money, and I won't have to bother visiting Steam every day during the
seasonal sales anymore because I'm not going to buy any of their games
anyway ;-)