I agree with the OP here. Apart from the free Fallout games, which I already have, I don't see anything particularly compelling here. I think today was the first day I got the option of buying a game I didn't already own out of the gift boxes and once again none of the bundles are for things that I'm likely to actually play.

As far as sales go, this ones a bit of a dud IMHO.
I don't know about that. The promos are supposed to draw people in and I'm not feeling any meaningful temptation to buy in on any of these deals.

Yeah but last year they showed all the bundles on the same day a certain other digital store i wont name launched their sale ....

+1

I have a inventory full of 60-90% off coupons from steam. The market is incredible competitive right now. 50% doesn't even cause me to bat an eyelash these days. We live in a much more competitive market than we did 5 years ago. Here's hoping the sale picks up before the steam sale pulls the masses away.

I wish the Daily Surprise algorithm would weed out games you already own. The only thing it's recommended so far that I didn't own already was some RTS game, and I hate RTS games.

I think the one thing that I've noticed in this year's Winter Sale is that there is much less spectacle.

Last year, every single deal received a huge daily posting with a massive description and marketing speak, not to mention hundreds of comments from users in each day's post. This year they only made one posting for the entire winter sale so each day's deal seems to get less love and attention. The banners for each daily deal are smaller as well.

Honestly, I don't think the deals are any less worthwhile or valuable than last year's. The only thing that's different seems to be the presentation.

Steams discounts are allover the place. U wont find anything (much) over 70% unless its on daily or flash ( games which appear look like they come from a limited pool and get repeated at least 3 times) or community (or super indies). Amazon's sale is... allover the place.Lot of it is price matching Steam deals.The odd super deal. But nothing really flashy.

Disagreeing. I like this sales a lot. It combines a lot of different elements without anything too obnoxious.

- Global discount on almost all games.

- Daily bigger discounts on game packs, BOTH indiviual (left column) AND tied (right column).

- Fun little surprise discount lottery (I don't mind having been offerred only games I already have or am not interested in, so far - it is to be expected given how tiny my remaining wishlist is).

The only gripes I have are completely unavoidable :

- the little "what if a better discount arises tomorrow" that prevents jumping right on the 50% discounts.

- the DLC horror (if at least these games were packed with their DLC in a "complete edition").

The sales itself is very well designed, and allows simultaneously for many approaches, avoids the frustration of one system by also offering alternatives, Whatever kind of sales you dislike (you like/dislike surprises ? you like/dislike tied sales?), there is another kind available for you on the same page: i appreciate this effort to please everyone.

And I'm surprose there is so much room for complains. "Waah the global discount isn't at 90%", "Whaah the random gift package isn't tailored on my personal wishlist", yeah, whatever... :-/

For me its more of a "You got plenty of games already and don't have a lot more you wanted." But yeah I can see where it seems more subdued this year.

Also the insomnia sale wasn't long ago which felt more hectic and took out a good number of games I was waiting to get now.

Every sale bows before the Insomnia Sale!

So far it has been pretty good for me. Just bought the DLCs that I am missing for Strike Suit Zero and SOTS, and got Spelunky too. I think the pricing is fine, I don't feel they should be discounted even more (for me).

Steam versions may be cheaper, but then I consider them worth less too. YMMV.

I do usually get games I already own from the gift boxes, could have something to do with that there are relatively few GOG games that I don't have from GOG already. :) Pixeljunk Monsters HD was an exception, that I didn't have yet.

Mainly wishing to see Shadow Warrior getting a bit better deal, but I might buy it with the current price too...

I think the wishes to make 80% bundles with freely choosing what to include are a bit over-optimistic. Like jamyskis said, it could be the publishers are maybe getting fed up with the the deep discounts, they know PC gamers are already being drowned in $1 bundles and such, soon we will be saying that everything over $0.10 is too expensive. :) Maybe they want to slow it down a bit.

You must admit though the whole random gift boxes with games people already own is a bit dumb. It makes that system more than a bit useless, especially for people like myself who own half or more of GOG's catalog.

We're talking about an encore at the end of the sale, not GOG showing all the bundles at once during the middle.

Oh well, good luck getting this kind of huge discount on actual good games. In my experience with Steam, every game with such coupons is complete crap. I'd much rather have 50% off on Planescape: Torment than 90% off on Hamilton's Great Adventure.

And there are good games with 80% discounts on this sale, but they can only be obtained on the Daily Surprise so far. There's a thread going on in which the community is negotiating their offered games, so you might find something good there.

Plus, Steam has a MUCH higher user base, so they can afford bigger discounts a lot easier than their competition. Also, buying a game on Steam generally means there's DRM involved...so yeah, I see your point, but if we keep this conversation we'll eventually start talking about the imminent crash on the game industry because of these huge discounts and all that :P