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Should steam allow you to sell your games?

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I can see valve liking it for a business feature.
Here are some examples how it helps them.

1. I bought Black Ops, HUGE mistake for that pos game. I could sell it back to valve for half price or whatever and they get CD code back. They simple reap a profit because no physical exchange happened just digital. Plus digitally its one way, since they just disable my copy and reuse the CD key.

2. Have a used game marketplace for games more than 3 years old. Sell at $5-15 increments depending on polarity. Bought Original Half Life from steam? Sell it back to valve for $4 and they sell it for $5. (just a example of prices)

The way Steam is setup, its easy for them to control the whole process. They could even make it so old games sold to them can be used to future game purchases.
 
Publishers will never agree, so it doesn't really matter.

Sure, I'd like the ability to gift games or trade them in for store credit. But most of what I buy is 75% off or more, so I don't feel badly about permanently "renting" a game for $5.
 
It would be really cool if they implemented that....

But as others said, it won't ever happen 🙁
 
Why allow people to resell the game at a lower cost thus taking away a possible sale that Valve could make from forcing a consumer to buy a new copy?
 
coloumb said:
Why allow people to resell the game at a lower cost thus taking away a possible sale that Valve could make from forcing a consumer to buy a new copy?
Click to expand...

This is why Valve will never do anything like this. It doesn't make business sense for them allow resale.
 
This wouldn't work. Unlike used goods, digital games don't physically deteriorate and would take next to no effort/cost to transfer. It would be way too easy to endlessly pass around the same copies of games. Someone would make a website www.usedsteamgames.com to facilitate this. No game would sell a single copy a month after release.
 
BD231 said:
If you're saying you can't sell your game and key that's decent grounds for a lawsuit IMO.
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for normal items yes, that would be correct.

But if you read the T&C for most software, you are purchasing a limited use right to the software (ie: pay for access). You own less than of the program than a unit in a high rise building complex owns the land.
 
darkxshade said:
Steam games are already filthy cheap and likely because they are non transferrable. Add that feature and I would imagine the price of the game to go up as well on top of a transfer fee.
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Yea, I don't mind that I can't trade in games I hate. I mean, all the great steam deals I got basically offset the fact that I can't trade in games. I mean, sure, I paid $50 D: for Homefront, but the fact that I've bought a couple 20-game packs for the same price completely offsets a few stinkers.

And even then, it doesn't make sense for steam to buy back games. Sure, it makes sense for amazon or gamestop to do, because they're dealing with tangible goods and a limited supply. Steam deals digital goods with virtually an unlimited supply. Why would they buy back a game when there would be no profit to resell it "used?"
 
No. I'm pretty sure the reason they can give so many sales and stuff is BECAUSE there is no selling the games afterwards nor are there returns so every sale is a locked in customer. I'm fine with this.

If they keep up with the sales, I do not endorse allowing the selling of games.
 
yeah, would be awesome. then when your account gets hijacked you would lose all your games to the hackers selling them off! sweet!
 
Couldn't you set up every game as a seperate Steam account, and 'sell' the whole account when you want move on. That would be compulsively excessive, but if it was a game you were suspicious of, say....?

Of course, that's still technically forbidden, and is just a jury-rigged workaround.

My buying price on Steam does factor the questionable interest in, but I have several games that I would happily rid myself of, even with the low sale prices.
 
After owning a game for <certain period of time> perhaps you should be able to sell your games onto someone else.

You get <agreed amount of money as Steam credit> from the buyer and they are charged <x amount flat rate or certain &#37; rate> to Steam for the transfer.

The game would be removed from your account, the CD Key would be frozen (with all negative Steam-related bans removed from it) and the game would appear in the buyers account in the same manner that a gift would show up. Once they paid the agreed game price and transfer charge, the game would be theirs. The process could be cancelled by the buyer at any time and incur no charge. The process, if not completed, would expire after 7 days and become the property of the seller again with no charges incurred.

I think this is the best way we could hope it to happen though I do note some caveats.

1) Steam Credit only, not real money. Steam would collect the money for the game and the transfer charge, pocket the transfer charge and give you the money what the buyer paid them in Steam credits.

I suggested that as the most appropriate method as it may get a bit complicated behind the scenes at Steam admin wise and drive the cost up to the stage where it might be inappropriate. Also most of us would buy games with the money we recouped from selling 'old' or 'used' games anyway.

2) Same CD-Key. I am not a multiplayer fiend and I've never been banned (been booted for being too good before) but it may be possible for the CD-Key to have certain sanctions imposed on it from the previous owner such as server bans or game-wide bans outside of Steam's control. This is a major issue with any multiplayer game.

3) MMO's? Maybe a ban on the re-sale of any MMO content.

This way Steam gets your initial money, it brings in a transfer cost and brings in the sale value of the product which sits in their bank account, appearing to you as Steam Credit which could sit there for weeks/months until the next big sale, which is what a lot of people do.

What do you guys think of that outline? I think it's reasonable if I'm honest though I don't think it would be implemented.
 
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Arglebargle said:
Couldn't you set up every game as a seperate Steam account, and 'sell' the whole account when you want move on. That would be compulsively excessive, but if it was a game you were suspicious of, say....?

Of course, that's still technically forbidden, and is just a jury-rigged workaround.

My buying price on Steam does factor the questionable interest in, but I have several games that I would happily rid myself of, even with the low sale prices.
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If I had 1 account per game I would have 260+ accounts - that would in impractical and stupid.

I buy 95&#37; of games during sale, so I dont see any point in second hand sales.

It doesnt matter anyway because publishers wouldnt agree to that - ever.
 
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No way. As someone said previously it just wouldn't work because a purely digital item doesn't become "used". There would be no difference between a new and "used" game. No one would ever buy new games after the initial batch.

As much as people love to hate on developers something like this would cut new game sales on steam into a fraction of what they are now. If there's no money to be made no games will be made.

Lastly, since your selling a new game, you'd be in direct competition with Steam on its own service. Not going to happen.
 
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I don't think it makes sense. Everybody would sell their used games when they're done playing, and of course a used download copy is just as good as new, so there's no downside to buying used. Steam would lose a lot of profits.
 
Better yet, you should just be able to sell them back to Steam itself for a full refund, so they can sell the copies to others. That way it costs nothing.
 
You need to stop thinking of Steam games as being owned in any sense of the word.

Everything on a Steam account is licensed to you and you get the right to use one game easily at a time from that license bundle.

You don't own the game, you can't do what you want with that game, and the license for the use is personal and tied to the account while they let you have it.
 
Create a new account for every purchase, then sell the account for the game you want to sell. Just be sure to delete any credit card/personal info first.
 
So, I imagine this will be challenged in court soon enough.

1.I buy a physical copy of a Book, BDR, DVD, etc. The publishers have no control with what I do after paid in full .

However I buy a digital copy and it is non transferable, (unlike the physical media)

Publishers should lose in a court of law ...

Now challenge it.




.
 
CrystalBay said:
So, I imagine this will be challenged in court soon enough.

1.I buy a physical copy of a Book, BDR, DVD, etc. The publishers have no control with what I do after paid in full .

However I buy a digital copy and it is non transferable, (unlike the physical media)

Publishers should lose in a court of law ...

Now challenge it.




.
Click to expand...

Uh, except you agree to the non-transferability of the digital copy when you buy it.
 
Elcs said:
After owning a game for <certain period of time> perhaps you should be able to sell your games onto someone else.

You get <agreed amount of money as Steam credit> from the buyer and they are charged <x amount flat rate or certain &#37; rate> to Steam for the transfer.

The game would be removed from your account, the CD Key would be frozen (with all negative Steam-related bans removed from it) and the game would appear in the buyers account in the same manner that a gift would show up. Once they paid the agreed game price and transfer charge, the game would be theirs. The process could be cancelled by the buyer at any time and incur no charge. The process, if not completed, would expire after 7 days and become the property of the seller again with no charges incurred.

I think this is the best way we could hope it to happen though I do note some caveats.

1) Steam Credit only, not real money. Steam would collect the money for the game and the transfer charge, pocket the transfer charge and give you the money what the buyer paid them in Steam credits.

I suggested that as the most appropriate method as it may get a bit complicated behind the scenes at Steam admin wise and drive the cost up to the stage where it might be inappropriate. Also most of us would buy games with the money we recouped from selling 'old' or 'used' games anyway.

2) Same CD-Key. I am not a multiplayer fiend and I've never been banned (been booted for being too good before) but it may be possible for the CD-Key to have certain sanctions imposed on it from the previous owner such as server bans or game-wide bans outside of Steam's control. This is a major issue with any multiplayer game.

3) MMO's? Maybe a ban on the re-sale of any MMO content.

This way Steam gets your initial money, it brings in a transfer cost and brings in the sale value of the product which sits in their bank account, appearing to you as Steam Credit which could sit there for weeks/months until the next big sale, which is what a lot of people do.

What do you guys think of that outline? I think it's reasonable if I'm honest though I don't think it would be implemented.
Click to expand...

I think this could work. You would sell your games to other users for full retail price, Steam gets something like 65% of that as a transfer fee, and then you get the rest in Steam credit. Steam wins both ways this way. They get a good chunk of money for the transfer fee, and then they get the rest of the money when you use it to purchase a new game. It's got to be setting Steam up to make a decent amount of money otherwise they wouldn't invest the time and money to do it.

Also, I think it would probably have to be for single player games only. If they were to include muliplayer games, MMOs probably wouldn't work (because your characters are tied to your key usually and it would be hard to put a value on people's characters), but regular online games could as long as they check that the CD key isn't VAC banned before they allow the user to sell it.
 
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