5 ms·

As a consumer, I can confirm this phenomenon. I just don't pay more than 5 bucks on steam for anything anymore. I wait until the game I want is on sales for 2 o

As a consumer, I can confirm this phenomenon. I just don't pay more than 5 bucks on steam for anything anymore. I wait until the game I want is on sales for 2 or 3 bucks.

matwood 15y ago
Well I guess the question is if there were not any sales would you buy the game at all? I find myself buying many titles because of a good sale that I otherwise would have skipped.
- masklinn 15y ago
  Much likewise, I have two categories on steam: * Stuff I buy on sale because it looks ok and at that price it's nice. That makes up 90% of my library * Stuff I buy right at release because I want it now because it looks/feels/seems that awesome. Recent examples in that category are Binding of Isaac and Bastion, which I bought at release.
  - teamonkey 15y ago
    Binding of Isaac and Bastion had a fair bit of hype surrounding them at launch; is it fair to say that this is the case for all indie games you bought at launch?
    - masklinn 15y ago
      Yes and no, I obviously have to know about the game to buy it at launch. And I have to be confident it's not a halfway chance of shooting myself in the foot. This has improved since I started regularly reading RPS, but before that Steam Sales were actually a great way to discover small Indie games: they're often featured pretty prominently, and /r/gaming and neogaf tend to have massive reco threads around sales, that's how I discovered gems like Atom Zombie Smasher. But I tend to buy indie games at launch more often than "big name" $60 stuff.
- yoshamano 15y ago
  Steam sales are what convinced me to stop pirating games. I'm perfectly happy picking up 1+ year old games on sale for under $15 (and usually much less). Doing this I usually buy about 6 - 10 games a year, and that's about all I have time to play. Heck, I've actually gone overboard the last couple of sales and I currently have 9 games waiting to be played (4 of which are indie titles). I see where you're coming from though. It sucks when you put your heart and soul into something, and then you gently release it out into the world like a smiling parent only to then watch it be mauled by a cruel and unforgiving world. The fact of the matter is there are so many great indie games out there, and only so many gaming hours in a day and so little money in my wallet.
Tichy 15y ago
I've toyed with the idea of creating a service that aggregates the game reviews of several years ago. Then I would only read those and get the "brand new" games for five bucks.
- matwood 15y ago
  Interesting. Make the site where you only review games once they get below a certain price threshold. Pull prices from amazon and reviews from the normal places. Let the user use slider(s) and order highest rated in a price range.
  - kstenerud 15y ago
    Review the game right away, THEN put in the threshold control. Let the user decide with the price threshold what reviews to see. Once the price/quality falls within his criteria, he'll see the review.
- icebraining 15y ago
  You can do that by going into e.g. Metacritic's advanced search [1] and setting the date range. [1]: http://www.metacritic.com/advanced-search http://www.metacritic.com/advanced-search
  - Tichy 15y ago
    Good idea, thanks!

As a consumer, I can confirm this phenomenon. I just don't pay more than 5 bucks on steam for anything anymore. I wait until the game I want is on sales for 2 or 3 bucks.

matwood 15y ago

Well I guess the question is if there were not any sales would you buy the game at all? I find myself buying many titles because of a good sale that I otherwise would have skipped.

masklinn 15y ago
Much likewise, I have two categories on steam: * Stuff I buy on sale because it looks ok and at that price it's nice. That makes up 90% of my library * Stuff I buy right at release because I want it now because it looks/feels/seems that awesome. Recent examples in that category are Binding of Isaac and Bastion, which I bought at release.
- teamonkey 15y ago
  Binding of Isaac and Bastion had a fair bit of hype surrounding them at launch; is it fair to say that this is the case for all indie games you bought at launch?
  - masklinn 15y ago
    Yes and no, I obviously have to know about the game to buy it at launch. And I have to be confident it's not a halfway chance of shooting myself in the foot. This has improved since I started regularly reading RPS, but before that Steam Sales were actually a great way to discover small Indie games: they're often featured pretty prominently, and /r/gaming and neogaf tend to have massive reco threads around sales, that's how I discovered gems like Atom Zombie Smasher. But I tend to buy indie games at launch more often than "big name" $60 stuff.
yoshamano 15y ago
Steam sales are what convinced me to stop pirating games. I'm perfectly happy picking up 1+ year old games on sale for under $15 (and usually much less). Doing this I usually buy about 6 - 10 games a year, and that's about all I have time to play. Heck, I've actually gone overboard the last couple of sales and I currently have 9 games waiting to be played (4 of which are indie titles). I see where you're coming from though. It sucks when you put your heart and soul into something, and then you gently release it out into the world like a smiling parent only to then watch it be mauled by a cruel and unforgiving world. The fact of the matter is there are so many great indie games out there, and only so many gaming hours in a day and so little money in my wallet.

Tichy 15y ago

I've toyed with the idea of creating a service that aggregates the game reviews of several years ago. Then I would only read those and get the "brand new" games for five bucks.

matwood 15y ago
Interesting. Make the site where you only review games once they get below a certain price threshold. Pull prices from amazon and reviews from the normal places. Let the user use slider(s) and order highest rated in a price range.
- kstenerud 15y ago
  Review the game right away, THEN put in the threshold control. Let the user decide with the price threshold what reviews to see. Once the price/quality falls within his criteria, he'll see the review.
icebraining 15y ago
You can do that by going into e.g. Metacritic's advanced search [1] and setting the date range. [1]: http://www.metacritic.com/advanced-search http://www.metacritic.com/advanced-search
- Tichy 15y ago
  Good idea, thanks!