What's the difference between buying on this sale or tomorrow's sale?

[its_rich1]

A lot of games have their sale clock end time for the winter sale. What's up with that? Titles that are practically always on sale have it too but I assume they will be on sale again tomorrow. I highly doubt they would miss out on winter sale. EA games for example

[Tito Shivan]

No one knows if a particular game will be on sale during the winter sale of for how much. Chances are good they will. But there's always surprises.

[D. Flame]

Buy a game you want now, play it less than 2 hours, and refund it if tomorrows is a better deal

[jerk store]

Publicado originalmente por D. Flame:

Buy a game you want now, play it less than 2 hours, and refund it if tomorrows is a better deal

Be careful with that if you care about trading cards dropping fast, I refunded and now all my games take 3 hours each to drop cards, they punish you for refunding with no warning of course. Every one of these shadow changes they make like the pending market change or refunding should have disclaimer before you do it that says they are punishing you. Seems shady

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Publicado originalmente por its_rich1:

What's the difference between buying on this sale or tomorrow's sale?

I think you're mistaken. There is no current sale. The Winter Sale (which is usually a big event every year) is an actual sale. And going to start today/tomorrow.

The reduction you see on those other games are off-sale reductions. The kind you can see and find year long, and done by the devs/publishers of those game. In fact it is a totally common marketing practice to up the price of any kind of product some time/months before a huge yearly sale (like Christmas) and offer up a small reduction right before the actual sale. Most people who get "had" this way don't even realise it and thus they make more money with the same sale.

Now, how to know if the dev/publisher you're looking at is going to do this? You don't, really. You could check for yourself tho. But I assure you that the very, very top majority of users don't go ogle the store page of a game they're just bought just to check the price again. That's clearly counter intuitive for most people to begin with. Anybody doing it could be justified to contact Steam support to get that reduction if the time frame is short enough... But again, most people don't bother/don't care enough.

[Tito Shivan]

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

I think you're mistaken. There is no current sale. The Winter Sale (which is usually a big event every year) is an actual sale. And going to start today/tomorrow.

The reduction you see on those other games are off-sale reductions. The kind you can see and find year long, and done by the devs/publishers of those game.

Back when big sale dates weren't public (Or started to be periodically leaked to the public) Seeing all the 'weeklong deals' expire at the middle of the week was the warning sign of the big sale coming.

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

In fact it is a totally common marketing practice to up the price of any kind of product some time/months before a huge yearly sale (like Christmas) and offer up a small reduction right before the actual sale. Most people who get "had" this way don't even realise it and thus they make more money with the same sale.

On Steam devs can't rise the price of a game less than a month before a sale they're participating, to avoid this kind of bad behavior.

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Please understand that I wasn't really targeting Steam specifically.

But I'm doing my own little experiment right now. There is a specific game I had in my wishlist for a while but I'm not really interested in it. It was at 75% off this week and right now I've just looked and it's not on sale anymore. I'm going to make sure to check what happen when the sale hit.

This kind of behaviour happen all the time everywhere. And is nothing new.

[Tito Shivan]

If you're interested in tracking game prices You can take a look at SteamDB. You can find a neat price history graph for any Steam game there.
https://steamdb.info/

[Mad Scientist]

Publicado originalmente por its_rich1:

A lot of games have their sale clock end time for the winter sale. What's up with that? Titles that are practically always on sale have it too but I assume they will be on sale again tomorrow. I highly doubt they would miss out on winter sale. EA games for example

If you want Battlefield 2042 you should do it before the deal expires; the beginning of the Steam Winter Sale. Sometimes Developers/Publishers want a chance at income before a sale, so they may offer high discounts to essentially beat others to the potential income.

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

Publicado originalmente por its_rich1:

What's the difference between buying on this sale or tomorrow's sale?

I think you're mistaken. There is no current sale. The Winter Sale (which is usually a big event every year) is an actual sale. And going to start today/tomorrow.

There is literally right now, ending today, the EA "Early Holiday Sale"
Developers/Publishers often do their own sales, there's also 3rd party sales; it's not restricted to the primary steam sales. For example EAs has been going a while right now and it ends when the Winter Sale begins, and 92% off of Battlefield 2042 is just too good not to get if people like FPS games.

Other stores are already doing Winter Sales as well, including Ubi.

[Tito Shivan]

Publicado originalmente por Mad Scientist:

and 92% off of Battlefield 2042 is just too good not to get if people like FPS games.

I bought it for twice that much a year ago, just because EA added bot matches back into the game (I'm not that fond of playing MP) and have had a blast with it for the last year.

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Publicado originalmente por Mad Scientist:

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

I think you're mistaken. There is no current sale. The Winter Sale (which is usually a big event every year) is an actual sale. And going to start today/tomorrow.

There is literally right now, ending today, the EA "Early Holiday Sale"
Developers/Publishers often do their own sales, there's also 3rd party sales; it's not restricted to the primary steam sales.

A given publisher deciding to give a rebate on their game(s) is not a "sale". They might try to make you believe that because marketing is a thing but the only actual sales on Steam, by definition, come from Steam events.

[nullable]

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

Publicado originalmente por Mad Scientist:

There is literally right now, ending today, the EA "Early Holiday Sale"
Developers/Publishers often do their own sales, there's also 3rd party sales; it's not restricted to the primary steam sales.

A given publisher deciding to give a rebate on their game(s) is not a "sale". They might try to make you believe that because marketing is a thing but the only actual sales on Steam, by definition, come from Steam events.

Why are you being pedantic about sales? What are you gaining trying to redefine sales as only Steam events?

You're free to abide by arbitrary/strict definitions yourself, try not to be surprised if no one else plays that game with you though.

[Mad Scientist]

Publicado originalmente por Eagle_of_Fire:

Publicado originalmente por Mad Scientist:

There is literally right now, ending today, the EA "Early Holiday Sale"
Developers/Publishers often do their own sales, there's also 3rd party sales; it's not restricted to the primary steam sales.

A given publisher deciding to give a rebate on their game(s) is not a "sale". They might try to make you believe that because marketing is a thing but the only actual sales on Steam, by definition, come from Steam events.

1. It's a literal sale "Electronic Arts Early Holiday Sale"
2. It's 92% off for BF2042, that is a literal sale.

Are you under the impression Steam makes sale prices for the Summer & Winter Sales? Those are Developer/Publisher chosen, they're just given dates in advance for what major sales/themed sales are when and for how long.

[Kaed✩Wolf]

Sometimes publishers gives a better discount before the winter sale. So keep an eye on games that you are interested.

[Kargor]

Publicado originalmente por Tito Shivan:

If you're interested in tracking game prices You can take a look at SteamDB. You can find a neat price history graph for any Steam game there.
https://steamdb.info/

isthereanydeal[isthereanydeal.com] is even better -- they track other stores too.

[Komarimaru]

Keep in mind, didn't the sale rules change a while back? Could have sworn developers couldn't put a game on sale until 4 weeks have passed. So if it's on sale now, it wouldn't be discounted in next sale.