After what IOI has said today about the free upgrade for Steam users, the Standard Edition looks like a good deal since it will now offer the Base Game + Trinity Pack + Deluxe Pack. The Standard Edition costs INR 1888 in India.
The Deluxe Edition is priced at INR 2899, which will now include 7DS Collection. 7DS is separately priced at INR 1183; definitely undeserving. It would be wise to get the Standard Edition (with the current Deluxe Edition upgrade) now and wait for 7DS to go on sale. Of course, it would be wiser to wait for a sale to get everything but in that case, we will miss out on the Trinity Pack.
It seems this is also against the steam TOS to have a cheaper base price somewhere else aswell. The joys of self-publishing your game and deal with all thoses rules.
The base price on Epic is the exact same so thatās not it either.
Seems like they realized that it would look terribly bad to say they are releasing a DLC for āfreeā for Steam users and immediately make the non Steam version with the āfreeā DLC more expensive than elsewhere.
Hitman 2 Gold Edition was 75% off less than a year after launch. Subsequent discounts went to 80% and 85% off. Hitman 3 will probably get there too if youāre patient.
Just before I forget, back at the Steam āDemoāā¦
Someone on Discussions pointed out that it does not get achievements, so even if they fix the bad entitlements, you still wonāt be able to unlock and keep achievements if you decide to later buy H3. So weāll see what happens with challenges and unlocks (Again, assuming they ever actually fix it so you can play it in the first place)
Maybe the lack of a starter pack is to prevent bots from farming cards, or making the game show up as āfreeā. Possible solution is to include a starter pack in a bundle with Hitman 2, so that it gets prorated down to $0 if you already own the previous title.
That rule only covers Steam keys https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys Steam keys shouldnāt be sold in bulk. For example, you should not sell your game on sites that offer customers the option to purchase large numbers of copies of your game for a lower price. You should also not include your game in bundles on sites that allow customers to purchase multiple copies of the bundle for a lower price.
Please note that Steam keys cannot be sold on other sites unless the product is also available for purchase on Steam at no higher a price than is offered on any other service or website.
You can buy a game from GOG or Epic at a lower price than what it is on Steam as long as it does not also include a Steam key.
So no, IO decided to revert back to the full price on Epic so that they donāt pour more gas on the fire with Steam users and not because of Valveās rules
About an hour after Epicās Lunar New Year Sale began, the discount on Hitman 3 was removed without warningāit was returned to full price on Epic as well as Steam.
ā¦Valveās reported policies on price parity: Wolfire Games founder David Rosen alleged in a May 2021 blog post that Valve has an unwritten rule against offering games cheaper on other digital storefronts than they are on Steam.
I canāt imagine what the financial/business department at IOI looks like right now (or even their email inboxes)ā¦ this launch and its general pricing/sales woes have been W-I-L-D.
As I said in my previous post, as long as it involves Steam keys which yeah, Rosen made a a little bit of money by doing just that on Indie DB and other places for his games that he could afford to come up with Humble Bundle which also generated more money from selling Steam keys. Guess heās still pissed that he sold it to IGN.
Also mind that Rosen lost the court case precisely because he couldnāt provide a single piece of evidence of said āsecret policyā (that applies to games with no steam keys) ever existing (and thereās literally several thousands of examples proving otherwise at any given time ). And even when talking about steam keys, thereās only two requirements : that it has the same base price, and that sales you do on them are generally offered to steam store direct users in a reasonable timeframe.(so a game doesnāt need to have their steam key and steam store versions on sale at the same time). Which I think are perfectly reasonable policies, considering Valve takes exactly a 0% cut of any sold Steam key
That prevents IO Interactive from lowering the price of Hitman 3 in the Steam Sale, but thatās only half of the issue. The other half arises from Valveās reported policies on price parity: Wolfire Games founder David Rosen alleged in a May 2021 blog post that Valve has an unwritten rule against offering games cheaper on other digital storefronts than they are on Steam.
āWhen new videogame stores were opening that charged much lower commissions than Valve, I decided that I would provide my game Overgrowth at a lower price to take advantage of the lower commission rates,ā Rosen wrote. āBut when I asked Valve about this plan, they replied that they would remove Overgrowth from Steam if I allowed it to be sold at a lower price anywhere, even from my own website without Steam keys and without Steamās DRM.ā
Rosenās antitrust lawsuit against Valve was dismissed in November 2021, but questions about Valveās attitude toward price parity remaināespecially since a reduction in platform cuts on both the Epic and Microsoft store fronts have not resulted in lower regular prices on either. Even if itās not a policy, though, IO Interactive may simply want to avoid ruffling feathersāeither Valveās or gamersāāby offering Hitman 3 at a discount thatās not available on Steam.
Iāve reached out to IO Interactive to inquire about the pricing, and the reason for the sale reversal on the Epic Store, and will update if I receive a reply. In the meantime, you actually can pick up Hitman 3 on sale in one place: The Humble Store has Epic Game Store keys on for half-price until February 2. EDIT : Nope
