Don't buy games through steam aussies

Recommended Videos

Pegghead

New member
Aug 4, 2009
4,017
0
0
Still cheaper than buying them from the stores over here, especially considering when Steam puts on one of their many sales.
 

zombieeater6000

New member
Oct 1, 2010
156
0
0
Archangel768 said:
On top of not buying from steam. Don't buy from retail stores in Australia either. Double the price of what USA pays for their games. Just stick to importing from the US unless it's on a REALLY good special on steam or in stores.
ntsc format won't play on pal format machines at least for the 360 as far as i know
i think they the ps3 will play ntsc but im not to sure
not a pc gamer so no clue with importing pc games
 

Zhukov

The Laughing Arsehole
Dec 29, 2009
13,769
5
43
Still cheaper then buying in retail.

Also, you don't have to pay for postage or wait ages for it to arrive like you do when importing.

Plus sales.

I like Steam.
 

PlowmanMk

New member
Oct 7, 2010
76
0
0
Ive seen that site. Us Australians just have to pay more. At least those prices are better than in-store. I remember MGS4 on the PS3 was $120-140 :/

Its pretty ridiculous actually.
 

Aedrial

New member
Jun 24, 2009
450
0
0
General_Potatoes said:
It's still cheaper than buying from a game shop (EB games, if you live in Australia).
Damn straight. Paying $50 still beats $120.
 

captaincabbage

New member
Apr 8, 2010
3,149
0
0
Red Charlie said:
Two words:

Import Tax
One word. Bullshit. This is Steam guys! there's nothing to import on Steam.

Alas this is how it's always been for us Aussies, getting the short end of the stick. When a game's shipped over here there's a whole bunch of extra people who want a slice of the pie, which is even more fucked considering the AUD exchange rate atm.
 

Aurgelmir

WAAAAGH!
Nov 11, 2009
1,566
0
0
DalekJaas said:
Discovered this website today, 'Top Rip-Offs' that compares steam prices by region, you are better off buying games online off of different websites than steam.

Link here: http://www.steamprices.com/au/topripoffs

EDIT: website also shows best bargains on steam, but the price gap between the bargains and rip-offs is massive
You only just now noticed? Europe was raging over this some years ago when they just swapped the $ for a ? on the prices... which made everything twice as expensive more or less.
 

Archangel768

New member
Nov 9, 2010
567
0
0
zombieeater6000 said:
Archangel768 said:
On top of not buying from steam. Don't buy from retail stores in Australia either. Double the price of what USA pays for their games. Just stick to importing from the US unless it's on a REALLY good special on steam or in stores.
ntsc format won't play on pal format machines at least for the 360 as far as i know
i think they the ps3 will play ntsc but im not to sure
not a pc gamer so no clue with importing pc games
Knew that. You don't have to read all of this but, I thought I may as well tell you. It's not all about NTSC and PAL. They're just different signals. What makes something like an NTSC game not work in a PAL Xbox 360 is the fact that it's region locked. However, whether or not the game is region locked is left up to the publisher. So when it comes to the Xbox 360, the games are sometimes region locked but some publishers don't region lock their games. This is what I've read however, I have no first hand experience with it.

With the PS3, Sony made it so all games released on it are region free so that means that you can play any PS3 game on any PS3 console. However, if you have a PS2 backwards compatible PS3 console then the PS2 games are still region locked because PS2 games have region locking. PS1 games are also region locked. The only region free part of the PS3 console is the PS3 games specifically. I have bought PS3 games from Europe and USA and they have worked on my Australian PS3 console.

PSP games are also region free which is nice.

The PS2 games are region locked however, the UK uses the same region code as Australia so games from there can work (I have bought games from the UK and they work on normal Australian PS2s). I'm lucky enough to have made my PS2 region free so I can buy games from anywhere in the world.

With PC I believe there is no region locking, however I'm not entirely sure.

The problem with PAL and NTSC signals is that some TVs won't play both. I heard a lot of US TVs only support NTSC. However, supposedly most new TVs sold is PAL regions also support NTSC. Luckily my TV supports both.
 

Autofaux

New member
Aug 31, 2009
484
0
0
I'm using GOG to buy the uncensored Witcher 2 version. At the very least its a relief that Australia doesn't block imports of RC games.
 

Merkavar

New member
Aug 21, 2010
2,429
0
0
well steam to me is a trusted source of game. they have a large range. i like the whole steam game libary thing. plus the games are cheaper than store bought games buy a fair bit.

also i have looked at importing games from the us a little and with postage it seems to not really be worth waiting a week to save the 10$

can someone come up with some examples for me. like a US based company that will export games to australia and after postage are still cheaper than steam games?
 

SL33TBL1ND

Elite Member
Nov 9, 2008
6,467
0
41
Depends, End of Year Sale is ridiculous no matter what region, and the surcharge is on a publisher by publisher basis. So if something is really expensive, I just go to ozgameshop.
 

Steppin Razor

New member
Dec 15, 2009
6,868
0
0
You can rage all you want, but the simple fact of the matter is that us Aussie gamers allow them to get away with this. If we actually did something like not buy full-priced games for a short while, the publishers would get the message pretty quickly. But we don't. Instead, we opt to ***** and moan on internet forums about how unfair the prices are, followed by a quick trip to the local store/Steam to get shafted through our wallets.
 

Scottieburke

New member
Apr 3, 2010
36
0
0
Aussie here. Last game I bought off steam was Dead Space. It was 3.75 USD. I paid 3.20 AUD.
Steam Buyers = People with disposable income. I have practically no disposable income (exception made for portal 2, of course) I buy games based on price. I have a bigger pre-owned library than new. I'd put money on the fact that a lot of people are opportunity buyers (like myself). I hated Steam for a long, long time. But, It has its benefits.

Poor?

Don't. Use. Steam.
 

Baron_Rouge

New member
Oct 30, 2009
511
0
0
Steam's still relatively cheap though, compared to actual retail prices. iTunes is a much worse offender. The prices are almost double over here for that, and Amazon doesn't even offer mp3 downloads in Australia. Makes downloading music legitimately very costly.
 

Cowabungaa

New member
Feb 10, 2008
10,806
0
0
DalekJaas said:
except they are being downloaded so they aren't being imported anywhere? Also an import tax does not double the price of a game, especially considering Australia has a stronger dollar than the US
It's slightly weaker than the USD, but the difference is small enough to see that the Aussies are still getting shafted big time when it comes to game prices. My guess is that the distributors are the ones that are screwing you over the most.

Anyway, they pull the same kind of joke with the euro, simply copy-pasting the USD price to euro countries. It's why I barely if ever buy new games from Steam, and only buy their insanely cheap deals.
Scottieburke said:
Poor?

Don't. Use. Steam.
Pay attention to deals and Steam is the place to be for poor gamers. My library is worth at least 1.500 euros, but I payed around half for it. I mean, right now Serious Sam HD: The First Encounter is 3,74 instead of 15. Even used I can never find games that cheap. You'll only really get shafted when you buy a new game from Steam.
 

Canned Spam

New member
Feb 28, 2011
52
0
0
Brotherhood was in EB for $200 once, so Steam is definitely the lesser evil. Although that was the retailer being pure evil, not the publishers, since the game was at a somewhat reasonable price at the shop 20 metres away.
 

zombieeater6000

New member
Oct 1, 2010
156
0
0
Archangel768 said:
zombieeater6000 said:
Archangel768 said:
On top of not buying from steam. Don't buy from retail stores in Australia either. Double the price of what USA pays for their games. Just stick to importing from the US unless it's on a REALLY good special on steam or in stores.
ntsc format won't play on pal format machines at least for the 360 as far as i know
i think they the ps3 will play ntsc but im not to sure
not a pc gamer so no clue with importing pc games
Knew that. You don't have to read all of this but, I thought I may as well tell you. It's not all about NTSC and PAL. They're just different signals. What makes something like an NTSC game not work in a PAL Xbox 360 is the fact that it's region locked. However, whether or not the game is region locked is left up to the publisher. So when it comes to the Xbox 360, the games are sometimes region locked but some publishers don't region lock their games. This is what I've read however, I have no first hand experience with it.

With the PS3, Sony made it so all games released on it are region free so that means that you can play any PS3 game on any PS3 console. However, if you have a PS2 backwards compatible PS3 console then the PS2 games are still region locked because PS2 games have region locking. PS1 games are also region locked. The only region free part of the PS3 console is the PS3 games specifically. I have bought PS3 games from Europe and USA and they have worked on my Australian PS3 console.

PSP games are also region free which is nice.

The PS2 games are region locked however, the UK uses the same region code as Australia so games from there can work (I have bought games from the UK and they work on normal Australian PS2s). I'm lucky enough to have made my PS2 region free so I can buy games from anywhere in the world.

With PC I believe there is no region locking, however I'm not entirely sure.

The problem with PAL and NTSC signals is that some TVs won't play both. I heard a lot of US TVs only support NTSC. However, supposedly most new TVs sold is PAL regions also support NTSC. Luckily my TV supports both.

thanks man knowledge is power