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. For every country with higher pricing than the US, there are at least as many priced below the dollar.
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.
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: https://polishourprices.pl/
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.
Steam specifically designed the system to make it easier for developers to handle pricing for multiple regions, and in their SteamWorks documentation on pricing for developers in the Regional Pricing Recommendations section they say:
"All of these factors have driven us towards the commitment to refresh these price suggestions on a much more regular cadence, so that we're keeping pace with economic changes over time."
yet their suggested pricing has not changed since the program was introduced in 2022. If they don't want to commit to keeping the pricing up to date, as they themselves promise, then retire the program and make publishers set the price themselves on every game.
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.
https://steamdb.info/app/2417610/
Holy shit, it's really is. I wonder what factor they used to adjust the pricing, it isn't like this before.
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: https://polishourprices.pl/
Poland needs to switch to Euros. Dura lex sed lex
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
This is what I’ve heard too. $60-70 sounds steep in America (and fair enough) but it’s prohibitively expensive in poorer countries. Honestly, I’ve always been good with the price disparity if it means more people can afford to enjoy games as long as it’s not used by companies for price gouging in the countries where they can charge more.
As someone from lower income country, it definitely help a lot, but lately the regional pricing isn't as enticing as before(capcom used to sell their game in my region for about 40usd, which is somewhat affordable). 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.
Fuck Sweden I guess
Remember when people said that since Steam is privately held and the largest distribution platform.
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