Steam removing buying gifts, fewer sales?

[Bonk Donkulous]

It didn't really hit me as hard when i saw the news, but serious sam's bogus detour came out today, and i wanted to buy 4 copies, 3 for friends who i know would want the game. When I went to buy my extra copies, I could not, and had to, instead, one at a time, send the gifts.

Instead of buying a 4 pack of this game, i only wound up buying two, because i can't store items in my inventory for later use.
Do you think that this decision will result in fewer games sold for steam?

When I found a game that I really liked, I would buy a 4-pack at full price to show my support for the developers, regardless of who i might or might not give it to. (Yes this resulted in me holding onto extra copies for years in some cases.) Could we re-enable steam gifting if the item is full-price when purchased? Do you think this would prevent the illegal resale of steam items?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

no one really knows but valve. the sales numbers arent published. there are sites that guess the amount of sales by what the publishers say they sold.

eveything else in your post has been covered and discussed to death in the many threads about the change.

[Pheace]

The biggest initial drop will come from all the resellers that used to stock up hard during sales, first the group that resold on the infamous third party sites, and then the ones that focused on trading for keys or other games.

Then you probably get the group of people who want to gift but can't due to regional blocking (which I'm assuming will get some sort of solution at some point).

Then there's probably a smaller group of people who liked doing random giveaways or something or perhaps for contests on Twitch and the like.

Then there's probably people who like to gift to friends whom I honestly think, if they really want to give to friends, they'll mostly end up doing so anyway because well, that didn't change did it? 4 packs were getting pretty rare as it was already anyway.

Anyway. I don't doubt this will have some impact at least.

[HEART]

Actually, 4-packs are still available for some games and the extra 3 copies STILL go into the inventory.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Originally posted by MiSOKΛ:

Actually, 4-packs are still available for some games and the extra 3 copies STILL go into the inventory.

there is no 4 pack of the game.

i have been talking with the devs on twitch about adding one. they said it "may happen" but not going to confirm that yet.

[HEART]

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Originally posted by MiSOKΛ:

Actually, 4-packs are still available for some games and the extra 3 copies STILL go into the inventory.

there is no 4 pack of the game.

i have been talking with the devs on twitch about adding one. they said it "may happen" but not going to confirm that yet.

:qr:

Right but the OP post made it sound like 4-packs were removed altogether, which is incorrect.

[Tito Shivan]

Originally posted by Bonk Donkulous:

Do you think that this decision will result in fewer games sold for steam?

Undoubtedly.
But it will also cut on fraudulent purchases in order to sell those gifts on grey market resellers; which not only doesn't give Steam money but costs them in chargeback fees.

Which probably means the amount of lost sales would still result in a net gain over the expenses of gift purchase fraud that happened.

TL:DR money from lost sales < money from fraud expenses

[happy]

Definetly.

[Radene]

We'll see, I guess. Or rather, we likely won't, Valve will. All we'll have to go on is what actions Valve takes after the sale, if any.

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

This will be the first big semi-annual sales event with this new policy in place, so Valve will find out very soon how well their new policy is doing.

[BossGalaga]

Originally posted by Tito Shivan:

Originally posted by Bonk Donkulous:

Do you think that this decision will result in fewer games sold for steam?

Undoubtedly.
But it will also cut on fraudulent purchases in order to sell those gifts on grey market resellers; which not only doesn't give Steam money but costs them in chargeback fees.

Which probably means the amount of lost sales would still result in a net gain over the expenses of gift purchase fraud that happened.

TL:DR money from lost sales < money from fraud expenses

Yes, there will be lost sales but this will also put a huge dent in both resellers and fraud. I like to trade games and do group giveaways too so it's inconvenient for me but it's nice to see that Valve values principles over enabling the reseller market, even the "legit" resellers.

[wuddih]

some people actually thought refunds will drop sales. the opposite. people tend now to buy more games because of it. throwing money is easier when there is a defined possiblity that you can get it back easier.

i have no insights of how much stuff was actually bought as a gift, i only have unit sale numbers. so i can only barelyimagine the overall impact.
Valve will know the numbers. if a change is too negative, they will adept again in a few months.

[Wolfpig]

Originally posted by Quint the Glowing Bitter Oyster:

This will be the first big semi-annual sales event with this new policy in place, so Valve will find out very soon how well their new policy is doing.

They probably dont even need the upcoming sale to now that, as they can see on the numbers of past sales how many gift purchases where made in them.
And i doubt that they would have reworked the gifting that way as it is now when that number would be the majority of sales...

[happy]

I know someone who buys about 200€ of games as gifts every sale. She buys them to gift them to friends on birthdays/holidays/whenever she feels like it. So thats gone for sure.

[Spawn of Totoro]

Originally posted by Totesfleisch8:

I know someone who buys about 200€ of games as gifts every sale. She buys them to gift them to friends on birthdays/holidays/whenever she feels like it. So thats gone for sure.

If she is planning it out, then she can have the gifts delivered at a specific date during the sale.

I would think the restriction on gifting with a given prices diffrence would have more of an impact then how they are sent/stored.

[Deathbit]

I litteraly can't buy serious sam 3 which is 4.39 canadian .. and gift it to my friend to play with me .. and his is 3.99 USD.. the heck is wrong with this system.. i understand scalpers .. and sites like - are a problem ... but really? .. ugh...