I feel like the Steam sales stopped being good a few years ago. I think when they stopped doing flash sales? Now most games are just regular sale price off. No real special deals anymore.
I miss checking daily for new updates on what was for sale and getting a game at a really good price. Now everything is the same price for the entire two weeks so it feels exciting for maybe the first 5 minutes when you check your wishlist and after that it's done.
Don't want to be too negative though. Hope there are some good deals and everyone can grab something at a good price!
They stopped doing flash sales when refunds were a thing. People could buy a game, see it was 90% later, refund and buy it when it was much cheaper. Or if you a week or two before the sale you could do the same thing, but the lightning deals has the biggest impact for refunds. Steam didn't stop them, but the game devs just stopped in light of that.
I know people really like refunds but I miss absolutely ridiculously low priced games. The games used to be so cheap, I couldn't even care if a game was actually trash. Got it for a dollar who cares.
Honestly they should just stop refunds on flash sale items unless in extenuating circumstances like "This game literally doesn't work for anybody" or "The price literally went back up as I was purchasing it so I paid the higher price"
It's not an automobile or a physical item, why can't they just package it differently for each market? Places with ugly capitalism get lightning deals, places with affordable Healthcare don't... lol
That wouldn't solve the problem. The problem is people buying the full priced game, refunding and then getting the lightning deal game. You didn't used to be able to do that.
I didn't encounter that on the site I bought from...I don't think. And it was the only way to get the game by that point, the developer had closed their sales so it was this or piracy. I chose to pay for a key than to pirate.
Technically I'd paid for the game twice. I bought it back in the day for the OUYA and then again for Steam, because I wanted to play the game. I think it's a shame that it wasn't more popular because it was a fun game.
They sell a steam account and some people are mad because they didn't notice, I honestly don't blame them who think they are going to get an account when on a key reseller website. Or family sharing an account?
They dont sell keys, they expect you to link your account to other existing ones through family share
I'm talking about sites like Fanatical and Green Man Gaming. They sell legitimate keys that you can redeem on Steam; they just undercut Steam by a little bit because they can.
I don't understand why you would want your sale to be gimmicky, I hate that. Go shop on Temu, DealDash or something like that if you want lightning sale thrills. I prefer to just have a sale and take some time about what I want to buy.
Edit: because it seemed directed at the person I am commenting to.
While I totally understand where you're coming from and agree, I think the community needs to move on from this complaint. It's been years since we had flash sales and it's not coming back.