How do 3rd party sites operate?

[Mush Mush]

Maybe someone can explain to me how all these 3rd party sites can sell the same Steam keys for games way cheaper than Steam does? Even the games that are not released yet can be as much as 25dollars cheaper on a 3rd party site.
How do they make it happen?

[76561198218426745]

Depends on the site. The keys could be stolen, fake, or collected from promotions/giveaways. It could also be that the developer has worked out a deal with the web site, particularly if the site is known for pushing a lot of sales.

[gwait]

Usually if you buy in a bulk it would be cheaper.

[Spawn of Totoro]

Originally posted by GreedyIV:

Maybe someone can explain to me how all these 3rd party sites can sell the same Steam keys for games way cheaper than Steam does? Even the games that are not released yet can be as much as 25dollars cheaper on a 3rd party site.
How do they make it happen?

Diffrent buisness models.

Steam - The developer sets the prices. They don't get any money untill the game sells (-30% for Valve).

3rd party - Buy the key from the developer directly at a fixed price (typicaly 40-50% of the MSRP), sell for what makes you a profit.

Some unofficial resellers buy boxes copies (clearance) and sell those, some buy from Humble Bundles and sell those (against the TOS), some buy keys from people (often stolen) and sell those. In most these cases, the developer sees little to no money from the sale.

[Mush Mush]

Originally posted by Spawn of Totoro:

Diffrent buisness models.

Steam - The developer sets the prices. They don't get any money untill the game sells (-30% for Valve).

3rd party - Buy the key from the developer directly at a fixed price (typicaly 40-50% of the MSRP), sell for what makes you a profit.

Some unofficial resellers buy boxes copies (clearance) and sell those, some buy from Humble Bundles and sell those (against the TOS), some buy keys from people (often stolen) and sell those. In most these cases, the developer sees little to no money from the sale.

Thanks a lot for the reply, others as well! My main concern was about if I am hurting somebody somewhere, because as far I have had no problems and I generally buy only from one other site rather than Steam if the price is lower.
Thanks again :)

[Spanky]

@SpawnOfTotoro[http//-http]
Do you mean digital copies from third parties such as the ones found on Group are not legit?

[Diablo]

Originally posted by Spawn of Totoro:

Diffrent buisness models.

Steam - The developer sets the prices. They don't get any money untill the game sells (-30% for Valve).

3rd party - Buy the key from the developer directly at a fixed price (typicaly 40-50% of the MSRP), sell for what makes you a profit.

Some unofficial resellers buy boxes copies (clearance) and sell those, some buy from Humble Bundles and sell those (against the TOS), some buy keys from people (often stolen) and sell those. In most these cases, the developer sees little to no money from the sale.

I'm some 2 years late for the party, but can you please explain to me how is it profitable for Valve to generate keys for developers to sell to 3rd party distributors if they don't take 30% cut on those? It seems like a system that could be exploited to circumvent paying Valve their 30% share.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Originally posted by Diablo:

I'm some 2 years late for the party, but can you please explain to me how is it profitable for Valve to generate keys for developers to sell to 3rd party distributors if they don't take 30% cut on those? It seems like a system that could be exploited to circumvent paying Valve their 30% share.

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys

It does get abused by shady devs but they get removed from Steam quickly.

[Spawn of Totoro]

Originally posted by Diablo:

I'm some 2 years late for the party, but can you please explain to me how is it profitable for Valve to generate keys for developers to sell to 3rd party distributors if they don't take 30% cut on those? It seems like a system that could be exploited to circumvent paying Valve their 30% share.

Those people still have to use Steam to get the game and play. If they use a Steam key, then come to Steam to play, they are likely to buy more games on Steam.

There are also restrictions in place to prevent abuse.

[Γαῖα]

All that glitters is not gold OP.

Steam in my understanding conducts business at the point of sale however another site selling keys may be in a deal where they have said they will take a 100'000 keys say at x amount rate per key. Now this part i cannot say is a fact, im dropping it in but steam end of year could say all these keys amounts to a loss of revenue so could act as a deductable in terms of cost to provide security,promotion,purchasing, you get the picture.
You would have to really take business studies to get this but chances are this benefits steam equally or more than the developer/publisher, it really depends on the amount of revenue overall steam is generating. The game in business is to spend the tax (make deductable) rather than pay it.

There is a way lot more to this but i dont have the time so seriously consider studying business.

[Mush Mush]

@Γαῖα love the dedication to respond to such an old topic. Yet it is still not 100% clear to me at this point.

I don't think that business studies are necessary to understand this. It could just be some shady/unspoken game industry trickeries that are not so easy to understand until the right person speaks up about it ;)

[V1ndy]

My question about this is how does these site work? Like after I enter my debit card info and buy something, how does the item get onto my account?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Originally posted by V1ndy:

My question about this is how does these site work? Like after I enter my debit card info and buy something, how does the item get onto my account?

If you trust them enough to give away your payment information and not get scammed, they give you a key that may or may not work or be for what you purchased.

[Dom]

At best: Buying them in bulks, taking advantage of regional deals etc.

At worst: Credit card theft and money laundering.

If you buy a key from third-party source and it turns out to be fraudulent, your game will be revoked once found out. But you may not get your money back.

[V1ndy]

i was looking at sites like d-market and CSmoney since I play counter strike

[Steven]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.