The Steam Summer Sale 2019 is likely to go down in history as one of the most chaotic in Valve’s history. However, indie developers suffered greatly as a result.
The Steam Summer Sale 2019 is over. Not only do users and their wallets have to recover from it, but also another group: indie developers. For them, the Summer Sale was a catastrophe like no other.
Instead of additional revenue, many fell short of expectations and now have a smaller potential customer base. The blame lies with the “Grand Prix,” which few have truly understood to this day.
What was the problem? In the “Grand Prix” meta-game, in which all users on Steam could participate, there was the chance to win a game from their wishlist. Since the rules were not clear, and Valve explained them far too late, it had dramatic consequences.
Users edited their wishlists and removed all games that were not full-price titles. They thought that in the event of a win, they could derive the greatest value from the action.
These were the effects for indie developers: Indie developers often produce games that are developed by smaller teams or are particularly niche. This often results in a reduced price. Instead of 60€, indie games often cost between 5€ and 30€. Exactly these games were the first to be removed from the wishlists of many players.
A large customer base was lost: The wishlist on Steam is an important marketing tool. It shows developers how many players potentially have an interest in their title and might be more inclined to buy it when the price is reduced. Developers who have only announced a game can also roughly estimate how many buyers there will be later.
But even more: Friends can view each other’s wishlists. When browsing the store, if you come across a game that says “Friend A wants this game,” you might take a closer look. After all, it’s practically a recommendation from a friend and better than any other form of advertising.
What the developers say: In a conversation with Kotaku, many indie developers speak up and explain this very situation. They call it a catastrophe and say it led to significantly fewer sales than expected. The developer of Vulpine (Clockwork Giant Games), for instance, said in an email:
The message from Steam to its users not to delete their wishlists had no significant impact on how much we were [deleted from these lists].
In the past, the developer received about 180 new wishlist entries per day. This time, it was different:
This sale resulted in us getting between 40 and 60 new wishlist entries per day, while 30-50 were deleted each day. We are just barely in the positive range, and from what I can say, we are still among the developers who were lucky. For an unreleased indie title, wishlists are the lifeblood; that’s how we are perceived on the platform. It’s sad to see how many of our colleagues among the developers were hit hard by this sale.
The Steam Summer Sale 2019 has not only excited players; the developers are visibly disappointed as well. Let’s hope Valve learns from the mistakes of this year.
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