This isn’t a new thing, nor is it unique to Steam. Most major platforms price their services differently between markets- it’s in any business’s interest to bring in as much revenue as possible from a market without pricing everyone out.
"Valve must stop making excuses": Steam under fire for "significant price disparity for PC games," causing regional pricing that's "often 20% to 30% higher than the dollar equivalent"
Submitted 3 weeks ago by themachinestops@lemmy.dbzer0.com to technology@beehaw.org
Comments
echo@lemmy.tf 3 weeks ago
BurgerBaron@piefed.social 3 weeks ago
I’ve been buying keys from the legit shops like Instant Gaming, Fanatical, and Green Man Gaming for years now because the prices on Steam itself are usually higher more often than not for Canada anyways.
psx_crab@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Holy shit, it’s really is. I wonder what factor they used to adjust the pricing, it isn’t like this before.
Ludrol@szmer.info 3 weeks ago
Steam reccomends exchange rate, but it was last updated when złoty was very weak. Now people are demanding steam to update exchange rates to the current ones.
More info at: polishourprices.pl
Mubelotix@jlai.lu 3 weeks ago
Poland needs to switch to Euros. Dura lex sed lex
thisisbutaname@discuss.tchncs.de 3 weeks ago
I remember someone saying that it makes sense to price games less in lower income areas of the world, otherwise most people wouldn’t be able to afford them
psx_crab@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
As someone from lower income country, it definitely help a lot, but lately the regional pricing isn’t as enticing as before. What i’m not aware is that some other country could have price jacked up as high as 45% and in this case 60%(!), so in combination of my own experience they must’ve change something.
dis_honestfamiliar@lemmy.sdf.org 3 weeks ago
Fuck Sweden I guess
ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one 3 weeks ago
Remember when people said that since Steam is privately held and the largest distribution platform.
thingsiplay@beehaw.org 3 weeks ago
But Steam is not making the prices, its the decision of the publisher. And we should be thankful that Steam does not have the power to say how publisher price their game all over the world. You don’t want Steam to have this much power. It’s just a platform where publishers are allowed to publish their games, at the price they wish. That’s called free market.
Yes, it comes with some downsides, but you can’t fault Steam for it.
Ludrol@szmer.info 3 weeks ago
The article is doing a bad job at explaining what’s going on. The backlash is specifically about Polish prices set by Valve recommendations for publishers. They weren’t updated in 3 years and the exchange rates diverged making games more expensive on steam. Better explanation is at: polishourprices.pl
thingsiplay@beehaw.org 3 weeks ago
I personally understood that point as well. But the point I am making is, the developer or publisher is responsible, not Valve. The price recommendation tool by Valve is just a help, not an enforcement. Before this tool, publishers did the pricing themselves and the prices “were wrong” too.
What I mean is, as an analogy, if programmers use Ai tools like ChatGPT and produce bad code, then the company behind ChatGPT gets attacked instead the programmer who is responsible. Yes, to a degree both are at fault, but its the publishers / programmers fault of trusting it blindly.