ASA Ruling On Valve's Misleading Steam Ads

[HardOCP News]

The Advertising Standards Authority has issued a ruling on the allegations of misleading Steam sale pricing. While the complaint against pricing on Wolfenstein: The New Order was not upheld, GTA V wasn't so lucky.

We noted the claims for the game stated that consumers could make a saving of 25% on the previous price of £51.98, which we considered would be understood to represent a genuine saving against the usual selling price of the product at the time the ad appeared. However, we understood that was not the case and it had instead been sold by Steam at £39.99, rather than £51.98, since the date of its launch. Because a 25% saving was not available on the usual selling price of the product at the time the ad appeared, as claimed, we concluded that it was misleading.

 

[Exavior]

Reading the article, I have to say that part of this seems like BS stuff, however we are also use to this type of advertising so just don't care as much.

Basic recap of events,

Wolfenstein was priced at $34.96 and went on sale or had a price break of 50% one day, the next day went on sale for 75% off. People bitched that they should have gotten 75% off of the 50% price cut instead of the normal price.

GTA one is a tad different but even then, the banner just said GTA however it was actually one of the bundles and not the stand alone that was on sale.

Overall, they just can't show the ads again, for a sale that ended many months ago. So shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Nenu]

The ruling has no value.
It gives no punishment and will not prevent them doing the same again because there is no penalty.

They should tell Valve to pay the true 25% discount back as a refund to those who purchased at that time and add on a good faith token as well.

 

[dandirk]

Reading the article, I have to say that part of this seems like BS stuff, however we are also use to this type of advertising so just don't care as much.

Basic recap of events,

Wolfenstein was priced at $34.96 and went on sale or had a price break of 50% one day, the next day went on sale for 75% off. People bitched that they should have gotten 75% off of the 50% price cut instead of the normal price.

GTA one is a tad different but even then, the banner just said GTA however it was actually one of the bundles and not the stand alone that was on sale.

Overall, they just can't show the ads again, for a sale that ended many months ago. So shouldn't be an issue.

I agree... though I do remember being confused on the GTA listing. I remember saying to myself how can this be 25% off when the price was only $2 less than the game...

After I figured out that the deal was to basically get a free "shark card" and $2 off rather than just the % off the game price, I was a bit miffed. Not that they can't do something like that, I just saw it more as you didn't put it on sale you just threw in some dumb ass stuff (that probably wasn't selling on its own) to pad the price and THEN give a discount to the same price point. Then hoping people would see %25 ooooo click buy.

Steam admitted there was a bug and fixed the issue in 3 hours for GTA bundle listing.

Glad someone is at least watching the ads, even though in this case it wasn't that big of a deal.

Wish people would just vote with their wallets and not get suckered by .99 pricing or "sales" that are just typical price adjustments. Companies do these things because it works (sadly).

 

[CreepyUncleGoogle]

I'm sure Valve will be pretty Steamed up over the ruling.

 

[Dwango]

The ruling has no value.
It gives no punishment and will not prevent them doing the same again because there is no penalty.

They should tell Valve to pay the true 25% discount back as a refund to those who purchased at that time and add on a good faith token as well.

Why? They never claimed a 75% sale was 75% off the 50% sale price. To even think it would be that way is idiotic in the extreme. Sale prices are almost always calculated against the normal retail price of the product, not some mythical price it might have been available for at some other time. Might as well start claiming Valve owes you something because you bought a game at it's launch price months ago and now it's on sale.

And the GTA V sale was a sale, just not on GTA V by itself. Don't want it bundled with something you consider useless? Don't buy it. Don't think GTA V is worth that price alone? Don't buy it. It's not rocket science.

 

[Nenu]

It was show to be a deceptive advert.

 

[pothb]

Not with the wolfenstein one, it wasn't.

And I don't really see the GTA one to be bad either from the description, but I have not seen the actual picture.

 

[DPI]

 

[iTYPE]

Does anybody remember when you could just go buy a god dam game. Lol, if it isnt 27 differnt models of the same thing, its a price that we cant even figure out anymore. No wonder im on the back end of this hobby. I find it more trouble then its worth sometimes.

 

[Advil]

And that means that from now on a game will spend a day or two at some insane inflated MSRP so the claim can be made that it's 95% off the retail price of $500.

 

[coreyb3]

Doesn't Amazon do this all the time with their whole 95% off bologna?

 

[westrock2000]

All retailers do this.

"That's a savings of 65% of the suggested retail price!"

Did it ever actually sell at that price???