Give Games to Friends

[blitz]

Why can't we gift a game in our library to a friend? I have so many games that I don't play that some of my friends have on their wishlist. I think it would be a cool feature for us to be able to gift it to them.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Originally posted by flee:

Give Games to Friends

Why can't we gift a game in our library to a friend? I have so many games that I don't play that some of my friends have on their wishlist. I think it would be a cool feature for us to be able to gift it to them.

You own a non-transferable license to play the game.

[blitz]

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Originally posted by flee:

Give Games to Friends

Why can't we gift a game in our library to a friend? I have so many games that I don't play that some of my friends have on their wishlist. I think it would be a cool feature for us to be able to gift it to them.

You own a non-transferable license to play the game.

:winterbunny2023:

Ah damn, that makes sense then.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by flee:

Why can't we gift a game in our library to a friend? I have so many games that I don't play that some of my friends have on their wishlist. I think it would be a cool feature for us to be able to gift it to them.

Developers like to sell more then a handful of licenses and get paid. If you could gift games in your library one purchase could be gifted to tens of thousands of people....

[blitz]

Well I mean if the game was bad then it wouldn't matter, but if the game was good it would matter because you'd have to buy it to play with your friends wouldn't you? But yes it wouldn't work for single player games, they would lose money big time.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by flee:

Well I mean if the game was bad then it wouldn't matter, but if the game was good it would matter because you'd have to buy it to play with your friends wouldn't you?

If the game was multiplayer then by your logic you wouldn't be gifting it if you wanted to play it with your friends as you wouldn't have it to play once gifted.

Many games are not multiplayer, and instead of people buying 10 copies of a game they would buy 1 copy and then just share it or sell it to someone once they beat it reducing sales to the developers.

[Yujah]

A sort of cute tweak could be to allow gifting as a refund alternative (so as to avoid it becoming a thing by itself, only once per product, or if you'd want to get fancier only until the refund possibility has expired combined over original purchaser and subsequent recipients),

Not refunding would be good for Steam, and perhaps it's something users would enjoy. I can see that being coolish.

[Shinoskay]

Originally posted by flee:

Why can't we gift a game in our library to a friend? I have so many games that I don't play that some of my friends have on their wishlist. I think it would be a cool feature for us to be able to gift it to them.

honestly, this would be awesome. I'd love to hand off a few of my games to some people.

Would love to see this feature.

[GGcake]

Money! Money! Money! - Gabe Newell

[Ogami]

Originally posted by GGcake:

Money! Money! Money! - The entire gaming industry

Fixed that for you.

[GGcake]

Originally posted by Ogami:

Originally posted by GGcake:

Money! Money! Money! - The entire gaming industry

Fixed that for you.

thanks

[Start_Running]

Originally posted by Yujah:

A sort of cute tweak could be to allow gifting as a refund alternative (so as to avoid it becoming a thing by itself, only once per product, or if you'd want to get fancier only until the refund possibility has expired combined over original purchaser and subsequent recipients),

Not refunding would be good for Steam, and perhaps it's something users would enjoy. I can see that being coolish.

Exceot it can add complications to the refund process.

Originally posted by GGcake:

Money! Money! Money! - Gabe Newell

Welcome to the world of capitalism comrade.

[Shinoskay]

Originally posted by Start_Running:

Originally posted by Yujah:

A sort of cute tweak could be to allow gifting as a refund alternative (so as to avoid it becoming a thing by itself, only once per product, or if you'd want to get fancier only until the refund possibility has expired combined over original purchaser and subsequent recipients),

Not refunding would be good for Steam, and perhaps it's something users would enjoy. I can see that being coolish.

Exceot it can add complications to the refund process.

Originally posted by GGcake:

Money! Money! Money! - Gabe Newell

Welcome to the world of capitalism comrade.

if I give my game to someone else, it is very likely ive checked if they want it.

I think it would be safe to not allow refunds for games gifted from a library

[Yujah]

I still like my above tweak suggestion. Trying to think of potential issues f.e. in the context of international consumer law but it would seem Steam will already need to have solved that in the context of "normal" gifts anyway -- and that would then also be the "customer experience" at least; if a direct turning of a "for-myself" purchase into a "as a gift" one is not possible implementation-sides, a regular refund minus the actual monetary refund, plus unlocking the game on recipient's account, minus for them the possibility to "refund" (or maybe not even that if it's just added as $0 purchase).

Anyways. Seems nice. Not sure how much actual demand there would be.

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by Yujah:

I still like my above tweak suggestion. Trying to think of potential issues f.e. in the context of international consumer law but it would seem Steam will already need to have solved that in the context of "normal" gifts anyway -- and that would then also be the "customer experience" at least; if a direct turning of a "for-myself" purchase into a "as a gift" one is not possible implementation-sides, a regular refund minus the actual monetary refund, plus unlocking the game on recipient's account, minus for them the possibility to "refund" (or maybe not even that if it's just added as $0 purchase).

Anyways. Seems nice. Not sure how much actual demand there would be.

Ton of potential issues such as tax issues, the cost of the game, region restrictions, cheating, offline time tracking,etc.

[Yujah]

All of which go away in the sense that they already exist if it's only possible to "refund-gift" to a recipient to whom you could also normally gift.