Pachter: Valve Will Offer Trade-ins on Steam
- Thread starter Greg Tito
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I would love to do it; there's a bunch of crap in my Steam account that I downloaded because it was on sale and looked interesting and later realized was absolute crap (Manhunt and X-Com Enforcer leap to mind). Thing is, I don't see how they're going to make money from it. They can't re-sell the copy of the game, after all.
I know a lot of people are thinking about weekend deals, and how people could make back money by buying sale games. But that isn't an issue. There is information on the servers of how much you paid for a game. You couldn't wait for a used game to appreciate, because it will always be of equal or lesser value. No, there are too many OTHER inescapable reasons why this idea will never work.
Alright, Valve is awesome. They know that excellent customer service gets them business. They know that free content generates good will, and trust in new properties. They want to make gaming better. But however awesome they are, they are also still a business. They will certainly provide you with free content when its feasible, but they arn't going to, essentially, give you free money. Used games are a very different beast: Give a physical copy to someone, and they can do whatever the hell they want with it, which leads to a secondary market. That's just beyond control, and companies are trying to reign the resellers back in as it stands. But if Valve lets you turn in games that you have already played a bunch of...how do you not go bankrupt? The developer who made the game being traded in isn't going to pay Valve anything. They have their money already, and if a developer suddenly started losing money after people stopped being interested in the game, then they could simply not be profitable. At least, not without INSANE price hikes, mitigating the loss in sales by drastically reduced production value. The developers of the new game arn't going to pay anything. They arn't going to accept part ownership of another developers game as payment, and they arn't going to give away there games for free. Which means that Valve is picking up the tab. Meaning that every time they sell a game that is going to be turned in, all they are making for profit is the convenience fee. When you trade in a game, the people you are trading to get something physical to sell, and make more money: What do Valve get? Their data back? No, it pure, unmitigated lost profit. Valves a sweet company, they're not stupid. Barring some crazy business model that allows them to make more money by making a fraction of the profit they once made from selling games, this just can't happen. It doesn't make mathematical sense.
Alright, Valve is awesome. They know that excellent customer service gets them business. They know that free content generates good will, and trust in new properties. They want to make gaming better. But however awesome they are, they are also still a business. They will certainly provide you with free content when its feasible, but they arn't going to, essentially, give you free money. Used games are a very different beast: Give a physical copy to someone, and they can do whatever the hell they want with it, which leads to a secondary market. That's just beyond control, and companies are trying to reign the resellers back in as it stands. But if Valve lets you turn in games that you have already played a bunch of...how do you not go bankrupt? The developer who made the game being traded in isn't going to pay Valve anything. They have their money already, and if a developer suddenly started losing money after people stopped being interested in the game, then they could simply not be profitable. At least, not without INSANE price hikes, mitigating the loss in sales by drastically reduced production value. The developers of the new game arn't going to pay anything. They arn't going to accept part ownership of another developers game as payment, and they arn't going to give away there games for free. Which means that Valve is picking up the tab. Meaning that every time they sell a game that is going to be turned in, all they are making for profit is the convenience fee. When you trade in a game, the people you are trading to get something physical to sell, and make more money: What do Valve get? Their data back? No, it pure, unmitigated lost profit. Valves a sweet company, they're not stupid. Barring some crazy business model that allows them to make more money by making a fraction of the profit they once made from selling games, this just can't happen. It doesn't make mathematical sense.
Sounds like it would never happen, ESPECIALLY when we buy games for a lower price on the insane midweek and weekend deals
But damn that would be fucking cool
But damn that would be fucking cool
I say,do what my community Game Exchange does,Take 75% of the original price off,and give back 25%
Not gamestops 10%
Not gamestops 10%
do developers actually make any money off even 80% of the games on steam? with the often massive amounts of deals it doesn't seem very likely more like valve makes those dividends not the developers.Zer_ said:
This would be a very appealing feature not just for Steam, but the general practice of Downloadable Content. Those of us who prefer physical copies for multiple reasons, would at least know that something could still be gained for "re-selling" the digital content.
There are people asking how this could possibly work: The key is that valve doesn't give you real money for your games. It gives you credit on steam. So suppose you trade in your $60 game for $50. You have to spend the credit at the store, and most likely you will need to make up some price difference or another with real cash. So if you buy a $60 game or two $30 games you still end up giving them $10.
As a side note, you can't purchase "used" copies of the game. Every copy sold is still "new" so this could help gamers save some cash while not cutting developers out of the loop.
As a side note, you can't purchase "used" copies of the game. Every copy sold is still "new" so this could help gamers save some cash while not cutting developers out of the loop.
- Apr 1, 2009
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if I have to pay then I would probably pass but to just trade in for credit... I dont know, I tend to buy most of my stuff on massive sale so Im not sure how much I would willingly part with anyway
but Ill bet this is false so no need to worry about it
but Ill bet this is false so no need to worry about it
Misleading title is misleading.
It's not a bad prediction, considering Steam puts games on sale like they're going out of business. I know that if I could trade in some of the games I've bought on Steam that I would do it.
It's not a bad prediction, considering Steam puts games on sale like they're going out of business. I know that if I could trade in some of the games I've bought on Steam that I would do it.
This doesn't make any sense.
Valve gains absolutely nothing by deactivating your unused games. If the point is to increase the appeal and customer base of Steam, they might as well award you points for buying games. So once you buy say 15 games you have enough points for a free one or something along those lines.
Valve gains absolutely nothing by deactivating your unused games. If the point is to increase the appeal and customer base of Steam, they might as well award you points for buying games. So once you buy say 15 games you have enough points for a free one or something along those lines.
For a small fee you say, oh boy:
Me: "Good sir, I have tired of this product. Might I sell it back to you?"
Steam: "Certainly, my lord, if you will pay a small fee I shall accept your offer."
Me: "A fee for selling!? How scandalous, I bid you good day, sir!"
I sincerely doubt that Valve will institute such a service, it's just not sound business to charge a fee for such a service. Besides, they're already playing to the downmarket with their numerous Steam Sales. If they were to allow people to sell stuff back to them while still keeping their generous 75% off sales, then someone could make a fair profit buying their games cheap and then selling them back.
Me: "Good sir, I have tired of this product. Might I sell it back to you?"
Steam: "Certainly, my lord, if you will pay a small fee I shall accept your offer."
Me: "A fee for selling!? How scandalous, I bid you good day, sir!"
I sincerely doubt that Valve will institute such a service, it's just not sound business to charge a fee for such a service. Besides, they're already playing to the downmarket with their numerous Steam Sales. If they were to allow people to sell stuff back to them while still keeping their generous 75% off sales, then someone could make a fair profit buying their games cheap and then selling them back.
Well that's nothing a good hacker can't fix.Romidude said:
