Steam Recap / Year in Review Including December

[rivbert]

I think it would be really great if the Steam Recap included December 15th to January 1st. It could be included in the following year perhaps, so December 15th-31st 2023 would be included in 2024's recap.

I understand why music services don't include it but to me it doesn't make sense that Steam excludes this time period. Around Christmas time, people receive a lot of new games due to gifts/bundles/sales (the Steam Winter Sale doesn't even start until December 21st). So any new games you receive during this time, from my understanding, aren't included. For my recap, my new game count is inaccurate because most of my new games I bought last year during the limbo period. Also plenty of people are receiving new games as gifts on Christmas, which is not included in the period.

Excluding playtime as well doesn't really make sense as during this time period people have more free time. People in school oftentimes have 2+ weeks off and people who work get vacation days during this time. Not to mention, being gifted games or even buying more games because they're on sale, means you're more motivated to play after just receiving them. This time period is also where winter officially starts, which means the shortest day of the year is in this time period, so it's cold, dark, and you have more free time. Perfect time to play more games!

Yes, only two weeks are excluded, but in my opinion, if it can't be included, it would make more sense to exclude the first two weeks of January than the last two of December.

(Edited for grammar and to include: Addressing the idea that yearly recaps are purely a marketing tool and Steam shouldn't have to include the entire year while other companies don't)

I do understand that typically it really is just a promotional thing that was spurned on by Spotify. However, Steam works a little bit differently than other companies that do recaps.

(1) The thing about music streaming recaps (or even Duolingo that rewards streaks) is that people typically listen to music pretty consistently throughout the year. Where when it comes to sinking actual time into video games, as multiple people have commented in this thread, people oftentimes game more in December than in other months due to having more free time.

(2) If they're trying to generate more sales from doing a yearly recap, then they're working on the assumption that on December 18th, people will see their review and it'll motivate them to purchase more games, and they will wait until December 21st when the winter sale starts to purchase or gift games (which probably works really well for Steam). However, if being excited about the year in review is the thing that motivates you to purchase more games, you probably will be very disappointed to find out you have to wait until January 1st to play them for it to count. The timing of it definitely shows that it is clearly a marketing strategy because it doesn't make sense otherwise, partially due to the nature of Steam which goes into point 3.

(3) A lot of players who use Steam are incredibly into stats. Which Steam acknowledges by catering to this. Not only does Steam have achievements, but they have badges, which you can use to level up your profile (which has literally no purpose other than "yay, stats!"), it rewards you with stats by posting in the community, by making things in the workshop, and the list goes on. You can even showcase how many games you've perfected. Steam KNOWS its users LOVE stats. I and many other users choose to buy games on Steam rather than other consoles partly because of this. I can't craft badges to show off on my profile through Nintendo, so what's the point of buying it on Nintendo.

The fact that Steam gave its users a compilation of stats and then made it inaccurate is wild to me, if they know their user base AT ALL.
There really isn't any reason for them not to at least update it in January, all it would do is make their users happier for very minimal effort on their part.

[DarkCrystalMethod]

I'd like to see these regenerate live up to and including the last day of December and after that they can lock it. That then would give a fair view of the entire year without ignoring the last two weeks. Also they can go back and re-run/re-build the report for last year(just once) for a fair comparison. Recapping "a year" but excluding just isn't right, but I doubt they will change it.
If its a technical issue and they simply can't rebuild a year's report after its been shown, then please hold it until Jan 1st and then give us a summary.

[BossKids]

Totally agree.
I know that create this summary cost a lot of computing power.
However, I also appreciate if Steam will update the summary again after new year to include the missing 2 weeks

[haRT3r]

I fully agree. I play the most games/sessions during these last 2 weeks of the year. Valve, please include them

[Icecold]

I strongly agree. I'd rather to have it delayed till the following year, than to exclude that two weeks of time in the review.

Those two weeks are the holiday period, and one of the very few periods in which I spend more time gaming than other months. Excluding that period is like excluding Christmas sales figure in yearly sales figure. It just doesn't make sense.

[Tanoomba]

Aren't those two weeks just going to be included in next year's recap?

[Sleepy Yoshi]

Originally posted by Tanoomba:

Aren't those two weeks just going to be included in next year's recap?

The two weeks of 2022 weren't included in 2023's, so without a change it would not appear so.

[ザ ル]

+1

[term1nu5]

Valve, just fix this to include the whole year please. It's silly to exclude 1/2 a month like it doesn't exist. Not accurate.

[rivbert]

Originally posted by DarkChrystmasMethod:

I'd like to see these regenerate live up to and including the last day of December and after that they can lock it. That then would give a fair view of the entire year without ignoring the last two weeks. Also they can go back and re-run/re-build the report for last year(just once) for a fair comparison. Recapping "a year" but excluding just isn't right, but I doubt they will change it.
If its a technical issue and they simply can't rebuild a year's report after its been shown, then please hold it until Jan 1st and then give us a summary.

Yes, a live update would probably be a lot of work to make happen, and maybe isn't worth the work for a fun end of year recap. But at least updating it on January 1st seems like it would be relatively easy to do. Even if they wanted to release it halfway through December they could include a statement like "check back on January 1st to see the full year", and then update it then.

[♥♥♥♥♥♥]

they could jusy delay the recap up to second january or just include last day of december in the following review.. but i totttaly agree, that most of games are for january december..

[SoundOfDarkness]

Yeah, it really sucks that everything from december 15th to 31st is just ignored. I just bought 4 games and will probably beat all of them in the next 2 weeks.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

All those game gifts being sent during the Winter sale before Jan 1st, the ones you want to send by Christmas, fail to be counted in the Replay.

[Dusty]

Are new games purchased and played Dec15-31 really omitted entirely? It's confirmed that they don't show up as new games you've picked up for the next calendar year?

If so, that is pretty silly. A lot of games are picked up during this time of year.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Originally posted by Dusty:

Are new games purchased and played Dec15-31 really omitted entirely? It's confirmed that they don't show up as new games you've picked up for the next calendar year?

If so, that is pretty silly. A lot of games are picked up during this time of year.

Correct.

I'm not gifting anymore games or even playing any games until at least January 1st.

[rivbert]

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Originally posted by Dusty:

Are new games purchased and played Dec15-31 really omitted entirely? It's confirmed that they don't show up as new games you've picked up for the next calendar year?

If so, that is pretty silly. A lot of games are picked up during this time of year.

Correct.

I'm not gifting anymore games or even playing any games until at least January 1st.

:winterbunny2023:

That's understandable, I'm tempted to do so myself. I started playing a new game for the first time and have sunk 40 hours in it in the past week. I started playing it before I realized it wouldn't be counted towards anything, which sucks because I normally play pretty short games.

Although, one thing I did find out is that the "New Games" count, only counts games that you've played (I assumed it was games added to your library). So I guess technically you can buy games for the holidays and just not play them until January, which is still ridiculous.

Another thing about this time of year too is that a lot more people are physically together, which I'm sure means a lot more couch co-op video games get played. One of the most fun things about any sort of yearly recap is that you sort of get to remember all the things you did that year or even previous years. Like "ah yes, in February 2021 I literally spent all of my time play such-and-such game", so you could also be missing out on memories like "oh this is when all my cousins were over for the winter break and we played this multiplayer game the whole time they were here, that was so fun".