Summary
Steamusers in Argentina and Turkey have been hit with some eye-watering price hikes that many said made Valve’s storefront too expensive for them. The unpleasant price adjustments stem fromSteam’s recent decision to regionalize game pricesin select countries, thus fundamentally changing the way some of its users pay for products.
The move itself resulted from some consistently wild—but generally downtrending—fluctuations in the exchange rates of the currencies that have now been targeted by this new policy. For example, the value of the Argentine peso plummeted from $0.00991 in November 2021 to $0.00281 two years later, a 71% decrease. Meanwhile, the Turkish lira declined from $0.0742 to $0.0347 during the same period, which amounts to a decrease of over 53%. As a result,game developers wanting to maintain their profit marginshad to constantly adjust their prices to keep up with the fluctuations.
Steam Game Prices in Argentina Rose by Up to 4,300%
Valve’s new regional pricing policy went into effect on November 20, requiring users in Argentina and Turkey to pay for titles in U.S. dollars instead of their local currency. The move effectively hiked up the prices of countlessSteam games, with the increases in Argentina ranging from about 5% forHadesto nearly 4,300% forCivilization 6. A select few titles such asFootball Manager 2024andDiablo 4have actually decreased in price as part of the change, but only because their publishers set their new regional pricing manually.
Game Devs and Publishers May Yet Mitigate the New Steam Price Hikes
The fact that many companies failed to decide on the new regional pricing madeSteamdefault their listings in Argentina and Turkey to at least half of their U.S. prices, according to some developers who took to social media to give more context to these unpleasant changes. Based on those accounts, it is possible that the current price hikes will be mitigated in the coming days, as more developers and publishers realize what is happening and adjust their regional listings to make them more affordable to Argentinian and Turkish gamers.
In the meantime, many people from the affected territories are saying that they have effectively been priced out of buying games on Steam. According to theWorld Salariesdatabase, the average salaries in Argentina and Turkey going by the November 2023 exchange rates currently sit at $126 and $277, respectively. Asking consumers to spend up to a week’s worth of earnings on a single new PC game by forcing even just half of typical U.S. prices on them is hence unsurprisingly causing many to stop spending money on Steam altogether.
Steam rival Epic Games Storehas yet to give any indication that it intends to follow suit with similar regional pricing policies. So, for the time being, theFortnitemaker’s storefront is a significantly more affordable alternative for Argentinian and Turkish PC gamers.
Steam
Steam is a digital video game storefront and program developed by Valve that allows gamers to purchase, play, and mod their titles all through one convenient program.
