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General discussion (archive)Steam, Impulse, whatever else your heart desire bashing(894 posts)(894 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted April 22, 2010
Yep, it isn't just Steam that can run sales of their choosing.
A little while ago, a friend and I were able to interview the CEO of Gamersgate for our new site. We asked him about sales.
Who decides when sales come about? Is it a deal you make with publishers before hand or how does that work?
- Sales are generated on an ad-hoc basis, typically. We’re happy to work with publishers when they want to have a sale to promote a certain game or games. We can also offer discounts at our discretion if we want to, for example, drive interest in a certain genre to build visibility for a specific upcoming title.
Posted April 23, 2010
About prices:
Impulse just released SpellForce Platinum for $14.99 . It's $9.99 on GOG. So who decide the price ? The publisher or the seller ?
Posted April 23, 2010
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Crassmaster: A little while ago, a friend and I were able to interview the CEO of Gamersgate for our new site. We asked him about sales.

Nice interview. I can't say I buy all my stuff from GG but I do like them a lot, more so than Steam and unlike Steam they are always trying to improve the service.
As for Stardock yes Bansama is correct. It's a broken record now. If you are not doing well in business you don't go and blame the competition for having a better service. The fact they actually send their people onto services like Facebook and Twitter searching for 'dissent' speaks volumes of where there priorities are.
@Chautemoc I highly doubt Steam can go ahead and make sales without at least informing the publisher especially if what Wardell says is correct that Steam take 30%. That could mean in the case of COD4 Activision are making less on each sale.
Post edited April 23, 2010 by Delixe
Posted April 23, 2010
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lackoo1111: About prices:
Impulse just released SpellForce Platinum for $14.99 . It's $9.99 on GOG. So who decide the price ? The publisher or the seller ?

I imagine that both parties will negotiate until they agree on a certain price point. Which is why I think that Stardock has the worst business negotiator in this industry.
Posted April 23, 2010
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Delixe: Nice interview. I can't say I buy all my stuff from GG but I do like them a lot, more so than Steam and unlike Steam they are always trying to improve the service.

Just as another sign of this, I've been trying to buy from GamersGate for a few days, but ever since they removed their PayNova payment option for credit card payments and replaced it with Moneybookers, all my cards are being declined (or at least, the card companies are refusing to allow transactions with Moneybookers).
Pretty annoying considering the mark up that PayPal add when I purchase through them with a credit card -- for one thing they use a substantially higher exchange rate these days and I wouldn't be surprised if they're still sneaking a percentage based transaction fee on top too*). So not wanting to be ripped off, I mentioned this plight to GamersGate.
Not sure when they'll be able to solve it, or if they can bring back the PayNova payment option for those of us who want to use it, but they did add one of the games I was trying to purchase to my account. Which was a pleasant surprise -- which once again goes to show that they place their priorities on their customers unlike other services.
* At least here in Japan where PayPal have already gimped our service to the point that the only way to add money to the account is to transfer it from a credit card (at their exchange rate) or to have someone outside of Japan send you money.
Posted April 23, 2010
Really nice to know Gamersgate cares. Yeah, laugh about their weird German heavy machinery simulators all you want, but they genuinely do care. The cost of giving a game to someone for free because of a trouble they have is much lower than knowing they're a repeat customer for life. Sadly Stardock, Steam and that other place don't seem to understand that. I'm not asking for free games, but I'm asking for smoe transparency and decent support. Is that too much to ask these days?
Also, they are charging for $15 ($14 if you buy it now!) for the MW2 DLC on Steam. I can see why it costs money on the consoles but on a platform where Valve and other people give content away for no cost (see L4D2) you really do NOT have a unique selling point here. For the same price you can get COD 4 for $15 right now, at this exact moment I am typing right now.
Post edited April 23, 2010 by michaelleung
Posted April 24, 2010
Delixe : Thanks. That one sort of sprung up on us without warning, and we ended up rushing more than we wanted to. I think we could do a much better job now. :)
GG certainly aren't perfect, but they definitely do seem to actually make an attempt to make a customer or potential customer happy.
Posted April 24, 2010
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Crassmaster: they definitely do seem to actually make an attempt to make a customer or potential customer happy.

Can you send that to Mr Wardell. He doesn't get it.
Posted April 24, 2010
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Delixe: As for Stardock yes Bansama is correct. It's a broken record now. If you are not doing well in business you don't go and blame the competition for having a better service. The fact they actually send their people onto services like Facebook and Twitter searching for 'dissent' speaks volumes of where there priorities are.

Everyone hates Impulse because they don't live in America. Just consider it an America only DL service, stop bashing it for no reason. Impulse is great and is my favorite Digital Distribution service, fastest downloads, tons of sales, lack of DRM and it doesn't need to be running in background to play games after it installs them to a normal directory, not a custom Steam/ directory that pooches mods.
Posted April 24, 2010
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tb87670: Everyone hates Impulse because they don't live in America. Just consider it an America only DL service, stop bashing it for no reason. Impulse is great and is my favorite Digital Distribution service, fastest downloads, tons of sales, lack of DRM and it doesn't need to be running in background to play games after it installs them to a normal directory, not a custom Steam/ directory that pooches mods.

I have never said Stardock don't provide the best service on Earth to people in the US. My issue is with them calling themselves the 2nd biggest Digital Distribution platform in the WORLD.
Posted April 24, 2010
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Delixe: Nice interview. I can't say I buy all my stuff from GG but I do like them a lot, more so than Steam and unlike Steam they are always trying to improve the service.
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bansama: Just as another sign of this, I've been trying to buy from GamersGate for a few days, but ever since they removed their PayNova payment option for credit card payments and replaced it with Moneybookers, all my cards are being declined (or at least, the card companies are refusing to allow transactions with Moneybookers).
Pretty annoying considering the mark up that PayPal add when I purchase through them with a credit card -- for one thing they use a substantially higher exchange rate these days and I wouldn't be surprised if they're still sneaking a percentage based transaction fee on top too*). So not wanting to be ripped off, I mentioned this plight to GamersGate.
Not sure when they'll be able to solve it, or if they can bring back the PayNova payment option for those of us who want to use it, but they did add one of the games I was trying to purchase to my account. Which was a pleasant surprise -- which once again goes to show that they place their priorities on their customers unlike other services.
* At least here in Japan where PayPal have already gimped our service to the point that the only way to add money to the account is to transfer it from a credit card (at their exchange rate) or to have someone outside of Japan send you money.

It's probably because Moneybookers is used for online casinos
Posted April 24, 2010
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tb87670: Just consider it an America only DL service, stop bashing it for no reason.

Wait, because we're not in the US and are complaining about poor service from a distributor that claims to be a worldwide one, is bashing it for no reason? Wow. Just wow.
Sorry, but if you're going to pretend to sell (some of) your products worldwide, then expect to be called out on your false claims and bad treatment of international customers (double charging full price for products not yet released, for example) from a worldwide perspective.
Just because you consider them to be the best, and have probably so far had only positive experiences from them, does not discount that a large number of customers have had nothing but grief from them. It's the same with any service be it Steam (and their shitty support), GamersGate (and their DRM problems, one of which is currently affecting The Whispered World) or Impulse (and their oh so stupid claims of being the second "best" in the world).
That is not bashing them for no reason. It's bashing them based on their very own actions.
Posted April 24, 2010
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bansama: (double charging full price for products not yet released, for example)

I was going to make a T-Shirt. Then it happened to me twice and I decided to just tell people not to buy from Impulse. Stardock don't like me doing that.
Posted April 24, 2010
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tb87670: Everyone hates Impulse because they don't live in America. Just consider it an America only DL service, stop bashing it for no reason. Impulse is great and is my favorite Digital Distribution service, fastest downloads, tons of sales, lack of DRM and it doesn't need to be running in background to play games after it installs them to a normal directory, not a custom Steam/ directory that pooches mods.

Just consider Steam as an 'indefinite videogame rental service' (especially with their awesome midweek/weekend deal price!), stop bashing it for no reason. ;)
Posted April 24, 2010
Problems arose with my bank as well after purchasing from GamersGate on April 4th, for the reason mrt1212 stated. I sent a message to them and they replied with this:

Oh, this is good information that can tell us why some banks refuse payments to it. Actually, you have several options up now, and i guess some may be added as well in the future - usually paynova or click and buy also may accept cards, but see if you have those options as well.
I will pass the info you gave me and i can say that you may use also blue coins to get games (i see that you cannot buy anything using moneybookers, but maybe you can get a certain amount of blue coins for now and use them later), or gifting (if you can ask anyone else to gift the game to you). Please excuse us for the inconvenience this has brought you.

I appreciate them replying to me, but PayNova is apparently not an option for me. I wish that it was, because there have been several deals that I've wanted to take advantage of. I also love Paradox games and I will probably buy more in the future, but it seems like I'll have to buy from Direct2Drive instead.
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General discussion (archive)Steam, Impulse, whatever else your heart desire bashing(894 posts)(894 posts)
(894 posts)