Purchasing Games for Friends in Different Regions

[Mad Hadderz]

I know that this sometimes works, but I'm sick of not being able to buy games for friends because I'm in New Zealand and they are in Australia. I get that steam doesn't want to lose money by people buying it where it is cheap for people where it is not as cheap. I totally understand, what I don't understand is why I can't pay the higher of the two prices and still get the game.
I would rather pay more to gift it to a friend then not have that option at all.
Also, steam, please tell me that I can't buy the game for that friend before I type out my gift card to them, like... Jesus that is so annoying.
I come from a programming background and this is not something I would consider difficult to implement. I can't be the first person to complain about this, so what is the issue?
By having the system as it is I have not been able to buy at least three games for a mate, I don't know what percentage of these purchases steam gets but you are losing money buy being lazy about this problem.
I know this is a huge platform and you want to avoid tinkering with things and risk stuff breaking, come on, at least tell me I can't buy the game for the friend straight up, before writing my gift card to them. But I'm telling you, you are missing out by not having a system like the one I have described.

[Start_Running]

YOu come from a programming, but nota business background, Might I suggest you try looking at it from that side.

[999999999]

The price difference must be less than 10% after currency conversion.

Gift one of these https://store.steampowered.com/digitalgiftcards/selectgiftcard

[Mad Hadderz]

@Start_Running
Want to explain what you mean by that or just throw some baseless statements out there?
I thought I was pretty clear about how I expected this kind of change to effect things.
How about you think about this: Steam takes a bit of money from every steam purchase, what is going to make them more money: People buying games, people not buying games. They wouldn't be losing money because people are buying the more expensive copy. How does that not make sense?

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

Don't bother arguing with Start_Running; he pretty much always argues to preserve the status quo anyway.

Also, you can't gift across regions EVEN IF THE PRICES ARE THE SAME, as long as the two copies have different region designations.

Seriously, wtf.

[999999999]

Factor in taxes for the prices in certain regions. They are added to the price itself.

Originally posted by Quint the Pirate Shark:

Also, you can't gift across regions EVEN IF THE PRICES ARE THE SAME, as long as the two copies have different region designations.

AUS and NZ are in the same region. Region restriction =/= Region play lock

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

There might be reasons why the games are region lock.

A. Might be due to legal issues, which why it might not be available in certain country.

Or

That they get a different version of the game, and you're trying to gift them a version that wasn't acceptable in that country which why it was restricted.

B. Might be price difference, which people in the past went out of their way to abuse the price difference, and try to resell them, to make a quick buck on the 3rd party gray market.

C. Might be the Publisher / Developer doing, as they do get the option to set this BTW if no one was aware of this.

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

If it's a price difference, it really ought to be possible for people to gift to more expensive regions by paying the difference.

If it's not a price difference, and not a content difference at all, then cross-region gifting should simply be enabled.

[999999999]

I'm not paying VAT when I don't live in a country where VAT is added to the price.

[tommy]

so nice

[Mad Hadderz]

@999....
I'm just looking for the option to be there, that's all.
Naturally you should be warned when extra taxes and higher prices are involved with a gift, but you should still be able to do it.
I'm sick of being generous and looking to buy a game for someone only for good intent to be blocked by this b.s.

[Mad Hadderz]

Also I know about gift cards, I didn't for a long time but it's still not really good enough, lot's of games sit between the values that are offered by a large margin, I found that I often need to buy 2 of them to make it work. It's a senseless complication that, in my eyes, is pretty simple to solve.

[Snapjak]

Originally posted by MachineGeek:

Also I know about gift cards, I didn't for a long time but it's still not really good enough, lot's of games sit between the values that are offered by a large margin, I found that I often need to buy 2 of them to make it work. It's a senseless complication that, in my eyes, is pretty simple to solve.

Use this guide, it works for the digital gift cards.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=328859255

Or use Enhanced Steam with Chrome/FireFox.

[Mad Hadderz]

Thank you for that Snapjak, I looked at the comments for this guide and it's more of the same "Why do we have to go through this" It's a simple thing that should be fixed, I want Valve / Steam on this, not workarounds.

[999999999]

Valve may do that in the future but as of now, it is easier to have set amounts.

[Calculated Luck]

The solution to the entire gift thing is to buy the keys outside steam, then you can also postpone giving games and you can give them by simple email as you used to do in the past.

You can then either buy the key for the region your friend is in or you can buy a global key, and even buy the game outside of steam entirely if you wish.