Unfair default Steam regional pricing for Ukraine

[Player]

Countries like Russia, Turkey, Argentina have their default regional prices that Steam recommends to developers set at 40-60% lower than Ukraine. All of the above countries have average salaries higher than Ukraine [www.numbeo.com].

This disparity can be seen on games published by Valve (for example HL:Alyx[steamdb.info]). Many developers and publishers also choose to not bother setting their own prices and use the default ones provided by Steam so the pricing ends up reflecting just what you see with Valve games.

Please consider adjusting the pricing so that it fairly reflects the purchasing power of users from poorer countries.

[Satoru]

Repeat after me

Publishers, set, pricing

Feel free to scream at the publishers for that

[Player]

Originally posted by Satoru:

Repeat after me

Publishers, set, pricing

Feel free to scream at the publishers for that

Publishers. Set. Pricing. Based on recommendations provided by steam. What I am asking is to make adjustment to their default recommendations. As I already said in my post.

[kitt]

Originally posted by odddo:

Originally posted by Satoru:

Repeat after me

Publishers, set, pricing

Feel free to scream at the publishers for that

Publishers. Set. Pricing. Based on recommendations provided by steam. What I am asking is to make adjustment to their default recommendations. As I already said in my post.

doesnt mean Publishers/Dev would change the Price..

[Player]

Originally posted by kitt:

Originally posted by odddo:

Publishers. Set. Pricing. Based on recommendations provided by steam. What I am asking is to make adjustment to their default recommendations. As I already said in my post.

doesnt mean Publishers/Dev would change the Price..

That's true but at least the future releases would have the new price.

[Start_Running]

Originally posted by odddo:

Originally posted by kitt:

doesnt mean Publishers/Dev would change the Price..

That's true but at least the future releases would have the new price.

You're making a heck of an assumption there.
Look as said. Publishers set pricing. That many of them go with STeam's recommendation is becauyse whatt steam recommends is what suits their needs. If STeam's recommendations stop being useful...they will siimply not use the recommendation.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by odddo:

Originally posted by Satoru:

Repeat after me

Publishers, set, pricing

Feel free to scream at the publishers for that

Publishers. Set. Pricing. Based on recommendations provided by steam. What I am asking is to make adjustment to their default recommendations. As I already said in my post.

You're still looking at the wrong place.

Valve do INDEED recommedn pricing, but that's a SERVICE and in no way an obligation. It's more for people new to the market who don't know such things.

I suspect you're more talking about triple A games, which does not apply to that - that's just an excuse.

Publisher in those games set the prices and Valve have BUGGER ALL to do with it. You want to protest it? Talk to them directly.

[Start_Running]

Worth noting that the recommendation is based around markett data as to what sells at what price and how well it sells at sthat price.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by Start_Running:

Worth noting that the recommendation is based around markett data as to what sells at what price and how well it sells at sthat price.

Fair point. I should have mentioned that.

It is effectively no different to offering a table of data, whereas some cklaim this as if it's a dictatorial "you WILL charge this".

[Player]

Originally posted by Start_Running:

Worth noting that the recommendation is based around markett data as to what sells at what price and how well it sells at sthat price.

I would imagine Ukrainian purchasing patterns closely reflect Russian ones so the price difference of 40-50% makes no sense.

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Originally posted by odddo:

Publishers. Set. Pricing. Based on recommendations provided by steam. What I am asking is to make adjustment to their default recommendations. As I already said in my post.

I suspect you're more talking about triple A games, which does not apply to that - that's just an excuse.

Publisher in those games set the prices and Valve have BUGGER ALL to do with it. You want to protest it? Talk to them directly.

Unfortunately many indie developers use default Valve pricing. For example Stardew Valley, Rimworld, Cuphead, Spelunky, Hollow Knight, Undertale, Factorio. As far as bigger publishers go - Paradox Interactive, Devolver Digital, Deep Silver. I did write to bunch of developers and few of them replied telling me to take it up with Steam directly.

[Brian9824]

A lot of flawed assumptions. Salaries by itself isn't a good factor, there are other costs such as regulatory costs of doing business, cost of goods, cost of living, etc that all play into purchasing power.

For instance take a job that pays $100,000 in the middle of nowhere where you can rent a house for $1000 a month and spend $200 on groceries versus the same job in another place where rent is 5x that and groceries cost 3x as much.

[Player]

Originally posted by brian9824:

A lot of flawed assumptions. Salaries by itself isn't a good factor, there are other costs such as regulatory costs of doing business, cost of goods, cost of living, etc that all play into purchasing power.

For instance take a job that pays $100,000 in the middle of nowhere where you can rent a house for $1000 a month and spend $200 on groceries versus the same job in another place where rent is 5x that and groceries cost 3x as much.

Living costs in Russia outside of Moscow are pretty much the same as in Ukraine.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by odddo:

Originally posted by brian9824:

A lot of flawed assumptions. Salaries by itself isn't a good factor, there are other costs such as regulatory costs of doing business, cost of goods, cost of living, etc that all play into purchasing power.

For instance take a job that pays $100,000 in the middle of nowhere where you can rent a house for $1000 a month and spend $200 on groceries versus the same job in another place where rent is 5x that and groceries cost 3x as much.

Living costs in Russia outside of Moscow are pretty much the same as in Ukraine.

Yeah but you are aware that there is more to Russia then just the area outside of Moscow right?

Like in the US the cost of living is quite different between Alamaba and Sacramento yet there is 1 suggested price for all of the US.

A suggested price will never be perfect, its just a rough idea based on an average and it will be too low in some areas and too high in others just like in any country. Hence why its just an example and the dev's can adjust it. If they see sales aren't occurring enough to be happy in a region they can easily lower the price if they want.

[Player]

Originally posted by brian9824:

Originally posted by odddo:

Living costs in Russia outside of Moscow are pretty much the same as in Ukraine.

A suggested price will never be perfect, its just a rough idea based on an average and it will be too low in some areas and too high in others just like in any country. Hence why its just an example and the dev's can adjust it. If they see sales aren't occurring enough to be happy in a region they can easily lower the price if they want.

While this is true, most publishers and devs simply consider most small countries as irrelevant and do not bother with adjustment hence their usage of default pricing.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by odddo:

Originally posted by brian9824:

A suggested price will never be perfect, its just a rough idea based on an average and it will be too low in some areas and too high in others just like in any country. Hence why its just an example and the dev's can adjust it. If they see sales aren't occurring enough to be happy in a region they can easily lower the price if they want.

While this is true, most publishers and devs simply consider most small countries as irrelevant and do not bother with adjustment hence their usage of default pricing.

Then talk to the publishers, if they consider your country irrelevant then there will be bigger issues, worse case the game price drops in a few months, so its not like the prices stay that way forever.

[Kate Hanami]

haahaa.. once again, regional prices suck
a weekly salary in USA is around 760$ and a PS4 costs is about 399$
while here in Brazil the MONTHLY salary is 1050$ and a PS4 is 3999.99$