Steam increases the recommended price for all currencies. We will clarify here whether this ultimately means more expensive games.
How deep do players have to dig into their pockets to buy a new title? The topic is certainly not new, but it is a constant companion. Just last month, Ubisoft announced that their next-gen games for the consoles will cost 80 dollars in the future.
Steam has now adjusted its price recommendations. This should make it easier for the development studios to convert the US dollar price to the 39 currencies supported by Valve. The Turkish lira and the Argentine peso have been hit particularly hard, but the proposed euro price hasn’t gotten off scot-free either.
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What is a game allowed to cost? And what does it have to cost?
What does it say exactly?
The price recommendations provided by Valve are intended to help studios price their game in other countries with different currencies. For example, if a developer has already determined that their game will cost $20, Steam’s suggested retail price can help estimate the amount in Norwegian kroner or Hong Kong dollars.
Will games be more expensive in 2022?
We asked 17 publishers, these are the answers
What are the new recommended prices?
As SteamDB summarizes, the percentage price increase is different depending on the US total. For the euro, the value is mainly just under 20 percent.
The previous suggested retail price for a $60 game was 50 dollars, but now with an 18 percent increase, Steam is now recommending 59 dollars.
But we got off relatively lightly when you compare it to the Turkish lira. Because she has to endured an increase of 454 percent – the original 92 liras for a $60 game has now increased to a whopping 510 liras. In Argentina, the new price recommendation was even increased by 485 percent.
The percentages are rising for all currencies, with the lira being hit particularly hard. Source: SteamDB
So the games will soon be more expensive?
It is anything but certain whether prices will soon rise in the same way. Ultimately, that is Valve recommendations onlythe studio still has the last word in the end.
The current AAA games also show that large development studios hardly follow this recommendation anyway. Let’s take Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 as a current example: The US price is 70 dollars, which according to the original Steam recommendation would be 59 dollars in Europey. With the new adjustment it would be 68 dollars, but that still does not come close to the actual price of 70 dollars.
Incidentally, the shooter costs 80 dollars for the PlayStation 5. If you want to know more about the price differences between console and PC, take a look here:
More expensive NextGen games
Why you can’t care about the price increase
For small indie projects, however, the new price recommendation can very well have an impact. They often do not have the time and resources to deal with all 39 currencies and to determine a fair price on their own. But that is also not certain, because of course they also decide for themselves how high the price should ultimately be.
