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One of the cooler features on Steam is the ability to buy games as gifts for other people. This can make Christmas and birthdays for gamer friends and family members a lot easier, but it can also mean people can take advantage of regional pricing differences to make money or buy games for far cheaper than they could at home. Thanks to the collapse of the Russian Ruble at the moment, gamers would theoretically be able to buy a £35 title for just a few pounds. So with that in mind, it's not too surprising that Valve has now blocked some regions from trading games with one another.
While Valve has yet to release an official statement on the matter, Reddit has drummed up a pretty comprehensive break down of regions and respective steam messages informing of the restrictions. Steam game trading is still possible and many nations and territories can still swap and gift with one another, but the following cannot:
- Russia can now only trade with itself and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
- Malaysia can now only trade with Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
- Thailand, same as above.
- Indonesia, same as above.
- Philippines, same as above.
- Singapore, same as above.
- Commonwealth of Independent States can only trade with itself and Russia.
- Turkey can only trade games with locals.
- Brazil trading is restricted to South American nations only.
- Mexico can trade with itself and South American countries only.
These restrictions apply to all games, regardless of whether publishers or developers have any of their own stipulations on trading/sharing. No blocks have been made on trade among European nations, as well as the UK, U.S.A., Canada Japan or Norway.
Other practices that Valve is expected to be targeting with this move include money laundering through game gift buying with stolen cards, as well as accounts being hacked and drained of funds through gift purchases.
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KitGuru Says: What do you guys think of these restrictions? Is it a good thing for Steam, or is it going to hurt some innocent people in all of this?
steam dont like not being able too over charge for all their games. this is simply a response to all the lost money from G2A, really loosing faith in steam :/
Faith being lost, least I got DBZ Xenoverse for £12 before this happened… Steam is just too expensive, it is always full rrp and is often cheaper to buy a retail copy here in the UK which is ridiculous.
They want to earn more money and make people pay the game’s full price instead of letting us charge discounts by using other countries currencies. But will it help? I don’t think so. Looking at my own example, I can afford a game only when it really cheap, otherwise I can’t buy it. Russian currency was a great help for me and I used to buy multiple titles. Now? I doubt I will be able to buy any.
An example of Russian rubel – US dollar – European EURO pricing difference on current 75% sale of Crusader Kings II:
– Russia: 149р. (2.18$);
– US: 9.99$;
– Europe: 9.99€ (12.33$).
They reason why they pulled this stunt is because of the ruble going down. But the others have no actual reason. I don’t see why Americans and Western side of Europe would complain giving their income, but those that live in the Eastern side of Europe and have a salary of around 250€/month and a game is 60 friggin euros that’s where the issue rises. There’s the need of a 3rd UE region that selects countries from Eastern + some other exception like Portugal and all other that have the income too low. Do that and everyone is happy.