Let us choose what currency we want our Steam to be displayed in regardless of region

[❄ Frosty Vampire ❄]

Title.
Steam wants to change my currency from USD to my local currency but I don't want it to happen and using VPN to change my region is too risky.

I really see no reason to not be able to just change the currency displayed in your Steam client. When adding funds to Steam it already converts it from your local currency to dollars so why not keep it like that?
Steam is based around USD so I don't need to worry about items/games going up/down in price because the dollar value changed, a csgo key costs 2.49$, and it will always be 2.49$. But I can't say the same about any other currency.

[999999999]

Game prices don't change when the currency fluctuates. It only changes when the developers/publishers change the price.

[Satoru]

Steam is based around USD so I don't need to worry about items/games going up/down in price because the dollar value changed

This is nonsensical unless your currency is pegged to the USD. Given that none of the currencies going live are pegged to the USD, then fundamentally what you pay is always fluctuating depending on the strenght/weakeness of your currency vs the USD. Thus to claim that games will 'always be 9.99 USD' is meaningless when today it costs 15 pesos but tomorrow it 30 because of a bank collapse in your country causing your currency to drop like a rock.

The new system will ensure the price you pay, in your native currency,, is always the same regardless of what the USD does globally.

A game could be 8 Euros today and 8.50 Euros tomorrow

This does not happen. Ever.

[❄ Frosty Vampire ❄]

Originally posted by Satoru:

Steam is based around USD so I don't need to worry about items/games going up/down in price because the dollar value changed

This is nonsensical unless your currency is pegged to the USD.

A game could be 8 Euros today and 8.50 Euros tomorrow

This does not happen. Ever.

It happened with csgo keys already so I assumed it could happen with games too.
But I don't want my Steam to not be dollars. It's going to be aids and I will be forced to use Chrome extensions and never be able to use the Steam client

[Seretti]

Originally posted by ❄ Frosty Vampire ❄:

But I can't say the same about any other currency. A game could be 8 Euros today and 8.50 Euros tomorrow

This is complete nonsense, like stated above. Whatever made you think that this happens?

[999999999]

CS:GO keys are products of the Steam Market and not the Steam Store.

[Satoru]

Originally posted by ❄ Frosty Vampire ❄:

It happened with csgo keys already so I assumed it could happen with games too.
But I don't want my Steam to not be dollars. It's going to be aids and I will be forced to use Chrome extensions and never be able to use the Steam client

CSGO keys are different because they are a FIXED CURRENCY ITEM. The cost of CSGO keys have to be harmoinzed across all regions because of how they work. They are always harmonized to the USD price

Note that Steam only rarely does this because currencies by and large don't fluctuate that much to warrant constant changing of them.

Also note that your example explicitly says "a game"

This has NEVER happened. Ever. A game you pay X when the currency conersion happens will aways be X in your native currency. You will always know, in your native currency how much that item is.

[cinedine]

It happens when the currencies differ too much and is a one time change. If you would use USD, your bank changes the rate based on the daily exchange rate, which means your price will fluctuate constantly. Plus exchange fees.

[wuddih]

every game with microtransactions ramps up their prices for consumables over time.

[42]

That would not be a good idea because that way Steam could lose money since the same game can have different price in different countries. So if we all start paying 30$ instead of 60$ for a game Steam would lose quite a lot.


Example https://steamdb.info/app/582160/

See how the price is not the same in every country.

I believe that that was also one of the reason for the now not so new Steam gift policy.

[❄ Frosty Vampire ❄]

Originally posted by 42:

That would not be a good idea because that way Steam could lose money since the same game can have different price in different countries. So if we all start paying 30$ instead of 60$ for a game Steam would lose quite a lot.


Example https://steamdb.info/app/582160/

See how the price is not the same in every country.

I believe that that was also one of the reason for the now not so new Steam gift policy.

This is another reason why I'm worried. I don't want everything to become more expensive.
I don't understand why it's like that though, it should be the same price everywhere. Same item so same price no?

[cinedine]

Originally posted by ❄ Frosty Vampire ❄:

This is another reason why I'm worried. I don't want everything to become more expensive.
I don't understand why it's like that though, it should be the same price everywhere. Same item so same price no?

That's not how economics work. If someone lives in a country where the average monthly income is USD 500 you cannot afford to pay the same as someone who earns USD 2000.

Checkout BigMac Index for more information.

[42]

❄ Frosty Vampire ❄

In a perfect world that would be great but every country has it's own economy, and you don't need to worry about prices going up dramatically unless the economy in your country crashes.


cinedine

You made a good point unfortunately price on Steam has nothing to do with the current economy of the country. For example I live in a country where the average wage is around 300$ and I pay the same for games as most of the world, 59.99€ for the new AC Origins for example, well that's not actually the same since euro is worth more than the dollar so I actually pay more than the person who pays with USD.

And the price is not determined by countries economy since Chinas GDP is ranked third by the IMF (China is right after USA and EU) and China still pays 30% less for games then USA.


Example:

AC Origins

Country ---- Price ---- GDP

USA -------- 59.99 ---- 1st
EU ---------- 69.98$ --- 2nd
China ------ 37.34$ --- 3rd
Japan ------ 71.35$ --- 4th


So to sum up i don't know what Steam uses to determine the prices on Steam store but I'm sure it's not the current economy status.

[999999999]

Publishers set the prices.

[cinedine]

Originally posted by 42:

You made a good point unfortunately price on Steam has nothing to do with the current economy of the country.

Wasn't talking abbout game prices.

Pricing on Steam depends on several factors, not limited to:
- Is you country in its own region or assigned to some major region like "Euro Tier 1" (speak: you'd pay the same in lets say Ukraine as they do in Germany.). This also depends highly on:
- Does the publisher actually know your country exists? Let's face it, global business don'T exactly care about something called Lithuania, which could also be the name of a fantasy land behind a closet
- How much competition is there from other "companies". Russia for example has had a blooming piracy industry where you could buy bootlegs in game shops. China has a thriving F2P industry with Tencent pretty much controlling the market.

[42]

Originally posted by cinedine:

Originally posted by 42:

You made a good point unfortunately price on Steam has nothing to do with the current economy of the country.

Wasn't talking abbout game prices.

Pricing on Steam depends on several factors, not limited to:
- Is you country in its own region or assigned to some major region like "Euro Tier 1" (speak: you'd pay the same in lets say Ukraine as they do in Germany.). This also depends highly on:
- Does the publisher actually know your country exists? Let's face it, global business don'T exactly care about something called Lithuania, which could also be the name of a fantasy land behind a closet
- How much competition is there from other "companies". Russia for example has had a blooming piracy industry where you could buy bootlegs in game shops. China has a thriving F2P industry with Tencent pretty much controlling the market.

Actually I looked it up and in most cases ether the game developer/studio or the game publisher determines the price in a region-by-region basis.

Satoru described it pretty well here https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/7/224446432324091426/ and I see you were a part of that discussion as well.