Heard of Steam? You should have. Not only is the online PC and Mac gaming store a very carefully maintained and updated service run by Half-Life creator Valve, it?s also just pulled off a complete masterclass in customer care and rewards that its console counterparts seriously need to take note of.
If the very existence of Steam is news to you, this is a case of showing you what you could have won, but we?d just like to quickly point out what happened over Christmas. And what happened is this: Valve went insane.
There?s too many offers to start detailing all of them, but suffice it to say that every day throughout the Christmas break you could walk away a top tier game with discounts ranging up to 90 per cent.
Slightly older games such as Batman: Arkham Asylum were being near given away for ?2.49, while brand new titles such as Saint?s Row: The Third had 33 per cent shavings, taking them down to ?20.09.
That daily does of discounted goodness was the very flaky snow atop a much larger iceberg, though. Entire collections of games, either divided into categories or collections from individual developers, were available at ludicrous prices.
The ?Square Enix Complete Pack? comprising of 59 games, that would normally set you back ?404.54? Yours for ?59.99. The 2K complete pack with 48 games including both Bioshock titles and Borderlands? ?39.99 down from ?346.
Oh, and there was a competition. Complete a list of game goals each day and you would get either a gift (containing a full game or a voucher) or a lump of coal. Collect enough coal and you could exchange it for a gift.
Hold onto it all and you?d be entered into a mega competition with a myriad prizes doled out to well over 1000 winners.
One lucky winner would win every game on Steam. Oh, and if you started winning games you already own, you could trade them or outright gift them to Steam friends or complete strangers.
Following Reddit over Christmas revealed that people were receiving Skyrim and the like from complete randoms in their droves. It was a social gaming revolution, and a lot of people deserve some very big real life karma as a result.
But what?s the point in telling you all this now that it?s over? Simple: Valve?s temporary brain loss wowed a lot of people. It showed the gaming industry that not only can you afford to heavily discount prices every now and again, but you?ll probably benefit massively from it in the long run ? such deals are going to get reported on websites such as this and fed about from friend to friend. It?s viral marketing in disguise.
The love for Steam, both in and of itself as well as on communities such as Reddit, is huge. People love Valve because the internet loves Half-Life, but it goes further than that ? Steam is a gaming service with a much more friendly and human persona about it than?OnLive or EA?s Origin.
It doesn?t feel like a big, nasty corporation because it?s constantly giving back. Simply not seeming so profit driven goes an awfully long way for your reputation as a service, and Steam does it right.
Of course, Microsoft and Sony both have online game delivery services, and neither of them bothered to run anything anywhere near what Valve was offering.
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If you?re Microsoft or Sony, loyalty to your brand is everything. Nintendo arguably commands fan loyalty in the extreme already, but I imagine that if you?ve got a PS3 or Xbox 360 then your next console will be chosen and bought on the basis of specs, rather than through a kinship with the brand.
Neither console goes out of its way to spoil you, when they could really afford to. When you have to fork out around ?300 to get on board in today?s market, you deserve to be rewarded and thanked graciously for doing so, since you?ve made a commitment to be part of that company?s infrastructure for several years.
I don?t want to fuel the fire that already burns between rival consoles, but I have an Xbox 360 and I don?t really feel like I?m on enough of a side. They need to make you feel like, in choosing their console, you chose the right way to play games.
Imagine if either console just gave you a free movie every month, or if the powers that be randomly sent you messages to say you?ve earned a new game for nowt.
Check out Steam right now
Valve gets this, and as a result Steam has been on a constant road to win the respect of its users for some time now. Its Christmas deals were sensational, but weren?t a one-off. Let me know if you disagree, but for the amount of money you have to pump into Microsoft or Sony?s camps, they could both do far more to throw prizes, discounted games and joy in your lap.
It?s a very competitive time for gaming. You don?t just need a console or top end PC to play games any more. You can do it on your tablet or netbook via OnLive. You can avoid stores altogether with services like Steam.?You can even play games exclusively built by indie developers and save yourself some money.
In this massively fragmented industry, attracting and rewarding a customer base who?ll stay with you is key ? something that some companies still don?t get or aren?t acting on enough to keep my business.
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