4 ms·

Steam used to be a great way to get games at the same time as the USA for the same price. Now it allows access at the same time but with significantly higher p

Steam used to be a great way to get games at the same time as the USA for the same price. Now it allows access at the same time but with significantly higher prices in Australia. In this case it is about price. I don't like being ripped off, even if the amount I'm being ripped off is slightly less than if I went into a physical store to buy the game. So far this behavior is limited to AAA titles from publishers other than Valve, so I'm happy playing indie games and waiting for Half Life 2: Episode 3.

vacri 15y ago
Lifelong game pirater here, back to the Amiga 500 games bought on floppies from a software cracker (yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me! went the into screens) Australia has always been shafted in price - a AAA game for $110-$120? Total nonsense, even when our dollar was very low. Steam is largely what's turned my behaviour around. I've always bought a few, pirated a few, but the convenience of Steam is hard to beat. I mostly wait for specials or bundles, and have a lot of indie games (my catalog is up around 200 games, slightly less than half are unplayed bundle-fodder). Mid-year and new year sales are great times for bargains. But a AAA game at a ridiculous price? Hello pirate bay. Duke Nukem Forever at $80? Good luck with that (not that it's a AAA title... but it theoretically occupies that space). I've found that over the years, with few exceptions, once a game is played, it's done and I don't go back. If I do go back... it's pretty dated and I realise it was better off in the realm of nostalgia. For me the issue of "but what if Steam dies / goes offline - you'll lose all your games!" is a non-issue - I have a couple of racks of dusty game CDs behind me that haven't been opened in years. Long story short: it's mostly about the convenience, but partly about the price.
bluedanieru 15y ago
Do yourself a favor and get a (preferably pro-rated) host based in the US and set up squid on it.
- mambodog 15y ago
  Not much use without a US billing address.
dkersten 15y ago
I bought a physical copy of The Witcher 2 Premium Edition from play.com and paid €35 I think it was. This included shipping, a physical making of dvd, a physical soundtrack cd, a physical map, a brass coin, physical strategy guide book and more. My point is I got a lot of physical stuff for the price where steam users got digital versions which should have been a lot cheaper to produce. Yet steam charged €45 (since been reduced to €39.99) for the digital version of the premium edition.

vacri 15y ago

Lifelong game pirater here, back to the Amiga 500 games bought on floppies from a software cracker (yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me! went the into screens) Australia has always been shafted in price - a AAA game for $110-$120? Total nonsense, even when our dollar was very low. Steam is largely what's turned my behaviour around. I've always bought a few, pirated a few, but the convenience of Steam is hard to beat. I mostly wait for specials or bundles, and have a lot of indie games (my catalog is up around 200 games, slightly less than half are unplayed bundle-fodder). Mid-year and new year sales are great times for bargains. But a AAA game at a ridiculous price? Hello pirate bay. Duke Nukem Forever at $80? Good luck with that (not that it's a AAA title... but it theoretically occupies that space). I've found that over the years, with few exceptions, once a game is played, it's done and I don't go back. If I do go back... it's pretty dated and I realise it was better off in the realm of nostalgia. For me the issue of "but what if Steam dies / goes offline - you'll lose all your games!" is a non-issue - I have a couple of racks of dusty game CDs behind me that haven't been opened in years. Long story short: it's mostly about the convenience, but partly about the price.

bluedanieru 15y ago

Do yourself a favor and get a (preferably pro-rated) host based in the US and set up squid on it.

mambodog 15y ago
Not much use without a US billing address.

dkersten 15y ago

I bought a physical copy of The Witcher 2 Premium Edition from play.com and paid €35 I think it was. This included shipping, a physical making of dvd, a physical soundtrack cd, a physical map, a brass coin, physical strategy guide book and more. My point is I got a lot of physical stuff for the price where steam users got digital versions which should have been a lot cheaper to produce. Yet steam charged €45 (since been reduced to €39.99) for the digital version of the premium edition.